Chapter 9 The Fire
Fire filled my nostrils; I coughed. I was so afraid, and I couldn’t breathe.
There is a long whine. My heart skips a beat as I jolt awake.
“Nachum! What’s wrong?”
He is standing beside the bed with his ears down and his tail between his legs. I notice his eyes have turned with an amber color as he gazes out the window. All of a sudden, I am fully awake. I see the fire at the Stables. I pull on my work clothes and rush outside, telling Nachum to stay behind. He watches me with reluctant eyes, and because he is Nachum, he follows me. We run into Marie.
“What happened?!” I exclaim.
She can barely answer because she is coughing.
“My brother accidentally left the fire going and fell asleep while he was camping out waiting for one of the mares to give birth!”
“Are they all okay?”
She shakes her head and glances over at a bay horse lying in the grass. Beside her is a foal.
“Is the baby dead?”
There is a lump in my throat as I ask; there has already been too much death…images of Jenny, the woman, Nachum when I first found him, and the dead bodies inside the barracks all flash through my mind.
“No, he’s alive, but he’s really small. He’s from San Juan’s favorite mare and stallion. If he had died, we would be dead.”
I follow her to the mother and foal. We get down beside the mare. I can see that she is a Quarter horse/Arabian mix. Her features are delicate and defined as if drawn by a perfectionist artist. Her nostrils are flared as she gasps for air. We crouch down beside her, and I stroke her neck. It is hot and sweaty.
“They’ll make it,” Marie murmurs as she scratches the mare’s withers.
“What’s her name?”
“Rosa de Belleza,” she murmurs.
“Rose of Beauty,” I repeat.
“Muy bien!”
Suddenly San Juan storms toward us with two indentured servants, a man and a woman, and Ilona.
“What happened?! Rosa, my dear caballo! Whose fault is this?!” he exclaims. “Is that the foal?! Pick him up! Pick him up! He will die of cold!” The servants immediately lead the mare and foal away.
“Is this your fault?!” he yells at us.
Nachum turns with a snarl.
“You do not yell at them like that, San Juan!” Ilona defends us.
“It was Marcos,” a stable hand reports.
“Donde esta el muchacho?!” he turns to Marie. “Donde esta tu hermano?!”
She shrugs. He approaches her as if he is going to slap her, but Ilona stands between them.
“You pack your things now! You and your brother are done!” he snaps.
“Que?!”
“You can find a new master!” he yells, leaving.
Ilona looks at us. Marie is crying, and I am close to crying myself.
“Everything will be fine,” Ilona assures.
Nachum whines and laps Marie’s tears.
The mare is very weak over the next weeks, and Marie and I nurse her back to health while Ilona tries to convince San Juan to keep Marie and Marcos to no avail; she did keep him from killing Marcos, though.
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A Country Not Your Own
Historical FictionIn 1939, as World War 2 began, a Jew named Analiese Baldwin is rescued from an explosion by a German soldier. She has only his dog tag to remember him by. Now, four years later, she is rounded up like all the other Jews to be placed in a cruel conce...
