Season of My Enemy, page 3
“Miss O’Brien!” Corporal Taft hollered to her.
“Stay. I’ll see what they want.” Jerry moved past her, his breath still coming in shallow pants from his run.
She let him go. The way those prisoners looked at her got under her skin, and she couldn’t deny it. This was something Jerry could probably handle. She strode toward the house with one eye peeled on Jerry and the PWs. The corporal was speaking, and Jerry nodded. Two men walked to the corporal at some command. Jerry turned around and headed back.
Fannie was almost to the porch steps when she saw the two PWs carrying water jugs toward the house. Jerry pointed past her toward the hand pump outside the barn.
She scored them with a glance as they passed by the house not thirty feet away, but one man’s gaze caught hers. He was one of the older ones, her age or more. His hair was dark, his eyes gray in the distance. He wasn’t at all the Aryan type she’d heard tell Hitler talked about as his perfect specimens of humankind, but then most of the others weren’t either. His eyes narrowed, and then his face relaxed and his mouth lifted on one side. Whether she would call it a smile or a snarl, she didn’t linger long enough to find out. She turned up the step and swung open the screen door. She’d watch the pump from the shadows on the inside.
The two Germans strode to the pump with empty pails, and Jerry waited outside a few yards away. She could hear the creak and slam of the pump handle each time one of them thrust it up and down. The farm had a water line that ran off a new electric pump into the barn, and another line went to the house, but her father had driven a shallow point for the old hand pump just for emergency use. Jerry was smart to have them use that now. No way would she want them going into the barn.
A voice called to them, “Beeil dich!” and they picked up their pace, careful not to slosh out too much of the water in the full pails they carried. Fannie leaned closer to the screen so she could see them heading back to the field. The older blond soldier waved them to hurry up. He’d been last man off the truck that morning. He’d rolled up the sleeves of his shirt over matured, hardened forearms, and even from this distance, she could see the sweat stains on his gray shirt. Fannie studied him top to bottom. What was his story? What malicious deeds had he done over there in Europe or Africa or wherever he’d been? He ran his tongue over his lips, then turned away as the men with the water drew near.
Jerry clomped up the steps, and she moved away from the screen door. He came inside.
Mom came into the kitchen. “Wipe your feet. How did it go out there?”
“Corn is tilled.”
“I got a call from Dick Pearson today,” Mom said. “He’ll be over this afternoon to check the peas.”
“They’re ready when he is,” Fannie said.
Mom raised her brow. “What about the prisoners? They look like they’re going to work out for us?”
Fannie glanced at Jerry. He went to the sink and turned on the water, then reached for a glass. “Looks like they did okay on the potatoes. I didn’t see any of the plants pulled out. Hills are nice and even.”
“When did you see that?” Fannie moved alongside him to wash her hands. “Just now?”
“Yeah.” He gulped down his water. “I told them they could fill their water jugs at the pump whenever they needed, so don’t go sending Patsy out there without checking if they’re around.”
“I’ll be sure not to.” Mom swept a look toward the living room. “Patsy is asking a lot of questions. I don’t want her curiosity causing any trouble.”
Fannie shook water droplets from her hands and reached for a hand towel. “What kind of questions?”
“Nothing serious. She has the idea they’re not quite human. ‘Course, that’s not too surprising given the talk she hears.”
“I’ll talk to her.”
“Do that. My ears are about worn out with all her jibber-jabbering.”
Fannie hung the towel on the wooden dowel in front of the sink, glad to share a smile with her mom and Jerry. Patsy could be a handful, smart as a whip and curious as a kitten. She couldn’t get enough to read. “Maybe I’ll take her with me to the library next Friday. It’s been a few weeks, and I’m sure she’ll need some more books by then.”
“I’d appreciate that. Especially if those workers are here.”
“You don’t think I’ll go off to the library if they’re here.” It wasn’t a question. Fannie had no plan whatsoever of leaving her mother and Jerry alone with a bunch of Nazi soldiers. “I’m not leaving this farm if those Germans are within a mile. One lone guard is not enough to watch them, if you ask me. What if they circled him or something? He can’t shoot them all. One guard,” she said again with a shake of her head.
“Let’s not have any talk about anyone getting shot,” Mom said, just as Patsy came around the corner.
“Who’s getting shot? Did the guard have to shoot one of those prisoners? I didn’t hear anyone shoot.”
“No one is getting shot,” Mom said again.
“You’d know if someone got shot out there,” Jerry said to his little sister. Patsy shrugged like it didn’t matter one way or another. “I’m hot. I’m going swimming.”
“Not right now. You’re going to go down to the cellar after lunch and sort the wash for tomorrow.”
Patsy’s shoulders slumped. “Why do I have to sort wash today? Why can’t I do it in the morning?”
“It’s nice and cool down there, so stop your complaining. You can help me set lunch on the table first.”
“Oh, all right.” Patsy’s dramatic sigh followed Fannie as Fannie took her seat at the table. Soon they were all enjoying some leftovers from last night’s dinner.
After their meal, as Fannie helped clear the table, another car motored up outside.
“I bet that’s Mr. Pearson,” Mom said.
“I’ll go see to him, Mom.”
“Are you sure? You’ve been doing everything.”
“It’s why I’m home.” She pushed open the screen door and stepped outside. Right away she recognized the insignia of the cannery they contracted their peas to painted on the side of the car. Mr. Pearson, the cannery man, climbed out. She strode down the front steps to meet him.
“Hello, Mr. Pearson.”
“Hi, there. You’re Ellen’s daughter. …” He stretched out the word, searching for her name.
“Fannie.” She shook his hand.
“That’s right. Fannie. I should remember. You’ve been helping your dad bring the peas in since you were that tall.” He held a hand waist high. “So many youngsters, I forget everyone’s name.”
“That’s all right. You’re here to check the crop.”
“That I am. Came as soon as I could. The viner has been pretty busy already. Figured your crop must be about ready.”
“I think you’re right. I checked them day before yesterday. Why don’t you follow me out?”
He tugged the brim of his hat and strode alongside her toward the pea field. They passed by Jerry with his head under the hood of a beat-up old car that didn’t run. He straightened to say hello. “You need me, Fan?”
“No, you keep on with what you’re doing.”
Dad had let him keep the old heap, saying it probably only needed some tuning and that it was a good project for a boy. Fannie figured it needed more than a tuning, but her father knew that if anyone was up to the task of figuring out the trouble, it was Jerry. He was clever with motors and gadgets. He didn’t have a lot of time to call his own these days since Dad died, and she wouldn’t steal this little bit from him now just to go check on the peas. Besides, since their father passed, that pile of tin held more significance to her brother than before.
The O’Briens marketed peas, snap beans, and potatoes, rotating them in the fields from year to year. They planted corn and oats too, some of it for their own livestock and the rest to sell. With the number of dairy farms in the state, there was always a market for corn, oats, and baled straw. Thankfully, beyond the livestock they raised for their own family, along with an occasional extra market beef and two or three hogs, they no longer had the demands of milking a dozen or more cows every day the way her parents had when she was a little girl. Now they only milked Mattie and Gertie, their two sweet-natured brown jerseys. Her dad and his father used to fill the silo with silage for the milk herd each year, but now it stood empty, a sentinel to the past as the fields were turned to cash crops.
“The fields look good this year,” Mr. Pearson said. “We’ll be working from sunup to nightfall for the next couple of weeks or longer. Been going strong all week.”
“Glad to hear it. Even with so many men away?”
He grunted. “We’ve seen more kids and women bringing in the peas than ever before. And quite a few of those men like you’ve got out there in your front field.” He nodded, indicating the PWs a long way off. “What are they doing? Hilling potatoes?”
Fannie nodded. They’d reached the edge of the pea crop, and she plucked a young pod. “Yes, sir. I suppose they’ll be helping us bring in the peas too.”
He stepped between rows of thick vines. “Well, I guess it would be a lot worse to lose the crops because they couldn’t get brought in. I don’t like admitting that we need the workers any more than anyone else around here, but it’s a fact, now, isn’t it?”
Fannie swallowed the gall she tasted. “I suppose it is, Mr. Pearson.”
He stooped and raised a swath of drooping pea plants to have a look at the thickness of the long pods draping the ground beneath. He culled one here and there and cracked them open to have a look. He ran his thumb along the tender green insides, popping the young peas free until he had a handful. He rolled them over his palm, then poured them into his mouth. “I’d say they’re about ready. Just another couple of days to fill out. Your family have plans for the Fourth?”
President Roosevelt had reminded the nation of the hardships their soldiers faced this holiday and that war employees would need to continue their work. As far as the O’Briens were concerned, he needn’t have bothered. With their thoughts bent toward Calvin and Dale, as well as still mourning their father and husband, they would remain prayerful at home. “Not this year.” There was no need to elaborate.
“Then I’ll put you down for Tuesday and Wednesday. Can you manage it?” He looked her square in the eye. It was more than a casual question.
She reached for another pea pod. “We’ll manage all right.”
He gave her a smile, one that seemed to want to inspire confidence.
“I’ll see you then. Just come right away. We’ll be ready first thing.”
“We’ll see you bright and early, Mr. Pearson.”
They strolled at a thoughtful pace back toward his car. “You and your mother doing okay out here, Fannie? I felt real bad when I heard about your father and those brothers of yours.”
“We’re doing all right. My mom is a rock. Her faith, well …” Fannie shook her head. “I sometimes think she really could move mountains.”
“Hearing that makes me glad. She isn’t in this alone. Too many others facing loss with this war.”
Fannie didn’t like the idea that misery loved company. It was the same as wishing bad on somebody just so you didn’t have to feel all the badness yourself. Yet she couldn’t deny that knowing they weren’t the only ones who understood how she and her family suffered was comforting. Convoluted comfort, but comfort all the same. “Yes. You’re right. Awful as it is. We’re praying that the army will be able to send Calvin home soon as they locate him.”
Rather than turn toward his automobile, Mr. Pearson paused and glanced toward the potato field. Fannie had avoided looking in the PWs’ direction, but now Mr. Pearson’s gaze drew hers along with his. The men looked to be nearly three-quarters finished with their task.
“How about I go over there with you to talk to that soldier about those peas?”
“You don’t have to do that. I can manage it all right.”
“You sure? I don’t mind helping.”
She took a breath and let it out, and her burdens lifted just a little. “I can handle it. I’ve got Jerry here, and Mom’s just inside.”
“I’ll leave you to it then.” He looked at her one last time, as if he was a little reluctant to leave her with such a task. Mr. Pearson was a nice man. He had a wife and a couple of kids her age or thereabouts. She didn’t know them personally, as they’d grown up in a different town south of here, but she’d seen them working with their dad at the vinery off and on over the years.
Mr. Pearson got in his car and waved goodbye as he drove away. Fannie strode toward the field. She put a little more purpose into her step like she had that morning when she first marched down the steps to meet them. Like it or not, these prisoners were going to be sticking around, and if all went well, they were going to be responsible for getting the O’Briens’ pea crop to market.
Corporal Taft was standing forty or fifty yards down the field’s edge, right near that shady cottonwood he’d mentioned earlier. He pushed away from the tree trunk and walked toward her.
“Corporal Taft, how are things going?”
“Nearly done. The men did a good job, if I must say so myself. The truck will be back to pick them up by four.”
The rows of potatoes that stretched out before her did look good. Healthy and green and nicely hilled with hardly a weed between them. “I appreciate the fact that they don’t do shoddy work.” She wasn’t about to belabor the thanks. “That was the cannery man, Dick Pearson, who you just saw drive away. He’s come by to check on the peas. Will you be able to bring the men back first thing Monday? It’ll take us a day and a half to cut all the vines. Mr. Pearson will expect the first couple of loads Tuesday morning. We’ll rotate cutting and hauling the rest of the day Tuesday and all day Wednesday.”
“I’ll have them here right on time.”
“It’ll be a long day. Once the viner is ready, we don’t stop until we’re done.”
“I’ll tell my sergeant so we can make arrangements.”
Beyond him, one of the prisoners approached—the one she thought to be the oldest. The same man who’d waved the other two over with the water jugs. Fannie raised her chin to call attention to him, and the corporal turned around. “What do you need?”
The man spoke in German, and Corporal Taft answered, though the corporal’s German didn’t sound nearly as smooth. The man jerked his head with a nod, but his gaze wandered to Fannie as he said something else. Her shoulders tightened, but his expression was unreadable. Perhaps she only imagined that his remark had something to do with her. The planes of his face were smooth except for a day’s white-gold beard stubble. Slight crow’s feet appeared at the corners of his eyes when he squinted against the sun. Her body remained taut as barbed wire as she considered how near this Nazi stood to her.
The corporal nodded and sent him on his way. The prisoner’s glance flicked to her once more before he turned. She controlled her urge to say something not very clever.
“Captain Kloninger says they’re about done,” Corporal Taft said. “He wondered if there’s anything else you want me to have them do until the transport truck arrives.”
She hadn’t had a chance to think ahead. “Just—just keep them picking potato bugs. They couldn’t have gotten all those.”
He chuckled. “No, I’m sure they haven’t. I’ll give them a water break and get them to it.”
Her glance swept the workers and landed on the back of the PW the corporal had called Captain Kloninger. A captain. He’d no doubt killed his share of her countrymen. A man didn’t become a captain in the German army unless he had certain skills and capabilities. And hadn’t these men been captured under Rommel, a cunning and ruthless German fighter? A bitter taste rose in her mouth.
“They are impressed with the way you drive a tractor,” Corporal Taft said, surprising her. “Most of these men are from some city over there. Not more than one or two natural-born farmers among them.” A grin split his friendly, sun-browned face. “You drive better than my sister, that’s for sure.”
She gave him her attention. “Where are you from, Corporal?”
“I grew up in Iowa. My folks own a hog farm down there.”
“Then you are a natural-born farmer.”
“Yes, ma’am. I plan to be one again someday. This is pretty country you have around here.”
“Yes, it sure is. My dad thought so. He was born and raised here too.”
“Your family lost him a while back, so I hear.”
Her heart clenched a little like it always did still when she allowed the reality to settle in. “Just this spring.”
“I’m sorry for your loss. And that kid is your only brother still at home.”
She nodded. Her gaze turned toward the prisoners who were making their way to the edge of the field, gathering the hoes. Her thoughts turned melancholy. “I wonder if my brother Dale is picking potato bugs in some German field.”
Corporal Taft hitched his shoulders. “I doubt it. From what I hear, the German people don’t have much left. Everything has gone to feed their army.”
She didn’t bother asking, “Then what do they feed their prisoners?” Surely those detained in prison camps weren’t high on their priority list for issuing meat and potatoes.
Corporal Taft gave a command in German as the men approached. He turned to her with a smirk. “Those two years of German in high school paid off, I guess,” he said. He spoke a few more words as they approached, all of them looking hot and tired.
The dark-haired man who’d come for the water earlier was carrying the hoes. He looked straight at her with those gray eyes of his. “Es ist die Tochter des Bauern.” His grin broadened, and she immediately felt incensed.
The corporal replied briefly in German. Fannie wasn’t sure what he said, but his voice was firm.
The man dipped his head at her in a show of respect, and the next words he said were gentle. He lifted the hoes and nodded toward the toolshed attached to the barn.
The corporal gave him leave to return them. He turned to Fannie. “I’ll have him set them outside the door.” He nodded at the man. “Go ahead.” The man seemed to understand the English command. He smiled at Fannie as he passed her. Though she wanted to see something menacing in it, she didn’t. It was just a smile.
