The Last of the Freemen (15 page)

“Shouldn't you be out there, too?” Hilda asked Oscar.

“No.  Better to stay out of their way.”

“Do you think we have to worry about that gang?”

“Of course we do.  But like Harm said, they have a profile.  They’re careful to stay out of cities and suburbs, because that would make the authorities look too weak.  And they avoid remote places because they'd be spread out too thin, and too many people in the country are still armed.  That's why I worry more about the Justice Brigades.  They seem to strike random farms anywhere, and most people are afraid to shoot at them because the President has endorsed them.

“No, the
Asesinos
rape small towns, as the Feds apparently want them to do, places where people still go to church and fly American flags. Hartmut’s nephew lived on the outskirts of a town like that. Dieter is in a similar situation. We're ten miles from anyone except our own people, and a few English who I happen to know are well armed, in spite of the recent orders. That provides us with a little protection.”

“That seems strange,” Erin offered.  “Why wouldn’t the government like people who fly flags?”

“Because they tend to be the same people who still believe in the Bill of Rights, who believe that their church and family are at least as important as the federal or global programs.  That's why they're being eliminated, one family, one church at a time, and those responsible don't have to take the blame. These poor folks never figured it out, that their natural rights and a central government are antithetical. They spent their lives paying a class of people who want to destroy them, and they're paying them still.”

“Oscar!” Harm called from outside.

“It seems I have to go,” he said, and stood, taking his straw hat from the table.

“You're not going with them,” Hilda insisted.

“No,” he said at the door, “I'm sure it's something else.”

Erin rose to follow him.

“You're going, too?” Hilda asked.

“I can't just sit here. I have to know what's going on.  This is about our lives.”

She hurried out to see Harm and Oscar walking towards the barnyard, Harm talking as they went. They both waved as Hartmut and his sons - all packed into the cab of an old, faded blue Ford pickup - sped away, scattering chickens before them. Torsten sat behind the wheel of his shiny red Dodge Charger with the engine running; before Erin could catch them, Harm had climbed into the back seat, and they started off.

“Harm!” she called, racing to them. Torsten stopped the car and Harm rolled down his window.

“Be careful!” she said.  “And good luck!”

He looked at her perplexed, and nodded.

“Thanks,” he said with a frown, tapped Torsten’s shoulder, and disappeared from view as he reclined onto the seat.

Oscar came alongside and watched them go.

“So what are they up to?” Erin asked.

“To scout your brother-in-law’s hideout, and maybe, rescue a family.”

“Do you think they'll be all right?”

“Not my area of expertise.  But Harm seems to know what he's doing.”

“What about those other men?  Are they helping?”

“Hartmut and his sons will get the reefer truck, and bring it to a property near here.”

She shuffled her feet as a hen pecked at her shoes; Hughie giggled while he watched.  Craning her neck, she looked out to the road and saw that Frieda was already busy with customers at the farm stand.

“How do these people do it?  It seems like the world is falling apart, gas is unbelievably expensive, and still, they come out here for vegetables.”

“People still have to eat, whatever might be happening in the world.  Business goes on as usual. Most vegetables aren’t required at the depository here, at least not yet.  They don’t have enough refrigerated warehouses, and can’t afford to build them.  So the food would just rot. And we’re allowed to sell small amounts of other things, like eggs, preserves, honey. But that ‘small amount’ requirement, that’s unenforceable at this point.”

“You don’t worry about getting caught?”

“Of course we have to be careful,” he said, kneading the straw hat in his hands.  “We watch out for entrapment.  So long as we keep the amount small on the ledger, though, they have no way of knowing.  That’s why they’re trying so hard with all that cashless nonsense, so they can steal everything.  It’s funny how they never consider people’s resourcefulness.  You know, I went for decades never seeing the silver coins they took out of circulation.  Now that silver’s illegal, I see them every day, dimes, quarters, half dollars, handfuls of them.  I never would have guessed there were so many still around.”

“But you have to hide them, I would think.”

“We don’t let them accumulate,” he smiled, and placed the hat on his head as squinted into the sun.  “And we play along, to not arouse any suspicion.  We send our share off to the depository, to be divvied up by the wasters.  And we accept their handouts, so we’re not flagged as being too self-sufficient. But you could die of malnutrition on that rationed garbage.”

“It's awful, I know.”

“Worse than awful.  We send them excellent cheese and honey, and our food vouchers get us some kind of orange-colored imitation cheese in return, and corn syrup with honey flavoring.  It's quite disgusting. We won't even feed it to the animals, except the worms, although it probably shortens their lives considerably. I'd be happy to not redeem the vouchers at all, but they watch that sort of thing, they'd be suspicious.  You can’t appear too comfortable, unless you’re very well-connected.”

“It all seems very counter-productive.”

“It is.”  He grinned as he noticed Hughie watching him, and waved his hat in the air to draw a smile.

“Spoils of the system,” he continued, returning the hat to his head.  “It’s a system based on leverage, nothing else.  It's how the well-connected get the things they want.” He shook his head in lamentation. “Well, I'd better go and see if she needs anything out there.”

He started for the road; she walked along beside him.

“I know we're a good distance away yet,” he said with a pause in his stride, “but you should probably keep out of view of the road, just to be safe.”

“Oh! I almost forgot!”

She hurried back towards the house.

“It's a hard thing to get used to,” she called over her shoulder.

“I can't imagine how hard,” he said, heading up the driveway.  “Can't even imagine.”

Erin watched intermittently from the bedroom window as the hours passed.  The barnyard slowly filled with cars and trucks; through the early afternoon they trickled in, and after the barnyard was filled they lined the driveway and parked on the lawn.  Men young and old, clad in varied colors of denim and duck cloth, conversed in the yard, near the barn, and in the driveway, milling about and greeting one another. Some of the teenagers took turns wrestling on the lawn, while others formed a ring of spectators around them. The few women who arrived went into the house; she could hear their voices and occasional laughter coming from the kitchen.

Gradually the older men, every one of them bearded, moved beyond her view as they headed toward the old linden tree. Most of the youths stayed near the house or close to the vehicles, talking in small groups; a few, led by Herman, carried long tables and benches from the shed and set them up near the house.  She lost interest as little else seemed to be happening and - so long as Hughie was napping - lay down to rest; soon lulled by the muffled voices, she drifted to sleep. Some time later she was awakened by someone coming up the stairs; she bolted upright when the footsteps halted at her door.

“Hello?” asked a gruff but familiar voice.

“Bern!”

She jumped up happily and went to the door, threw it open and embraced him like a long lost friend.

He laughed, taken aback, and rubbed the back of his head as she stepped away. “I'm glad to see you both made it this far.”

“Me, too. Harm got us through. He's not here, though. He went off on some kind of -”

“No, he's back.  He's here somewhere. I saw him out in the yard with his cousin Dieter. It was the three of them that went, them and Torsten.”

“Oh? Well, that's good, if they made it back okay.”

“He's not in a good mood, though. They had to kill some people. He had hoped it would go otherwise.  Torsten left for home already. He's feeling sick, he never killed anybody before. But the family was taken out of there safely, Hartmut’s nephew’s wife that is, and the four kids, they're all with her parents now. Such a horrible time they went through.”

“That's good that they're safe. Did you hear if they checked out wherever my brother-in-law is?”

“I didn't hear, but it must have been all right. He's planning to bring the two of you there tonight.”

Her face fell. “Really?  Already?”

“You don't seem happy about it.”

“I’m a little scared. I have no idea what to expect.”

“It should be fine,” he reassured. “And knowing Harm, he'll check on you from time to time, till you get settled.” He looked over at Hughie.  “Sleeping, is he?  I was going to bring you both along, to the meeting.”

“Aren't I supposed to stay hidden?  To not cause problems?”

“That plan changed.  Oscar said so, and asked me to bring you on over.  See, Hartmut has a big mouth.  Bigger than mine, even.  Not that he talks to the English, but among our own kind, he's like a town crier.  Everyone out there knows you’re here.  And now, Harm’s not avoiding the families who've shunned him, because Hartmut has a lot of sway with most of them.  And you’ve never being shunned by any of them, so why should you hide?”

“Because I'm wanted by the police?”

“That's why we like you,” he said with a grin, and started for the stairs.  “Come on down, if he wakes.”

“Okay, thanks, I will.”

She closed the door and went back to the window.  Bern was soon headed across the yard but stopped by one of the tables - now set with linens, plates, and food - to talk to the young men there; Harm and Oscar came from the other side of the garden, speaking to each other as they approached the house.  Impulsively she lifted Hughie into her arms, though he was still sleeping, hurried out of the room and raced down the stairs.

Several women stared as she passed through the kitchen; some were at the table and others at the counters, and they all looked her way with surprise and curiosity.

“Hello, everyone,” she said with a quick wave of her hand, but didn't stop to talk; once out the back door she found Harm and Oscar speaking to Herman, though they fell silent as she drew near.

“So we're leaving tonight?” she asked.

Harm nodded stoically.

“You could have come and told me.”

“We sent Bern to get you,” Oscar said, “but that was quite some time ago.”

“So what is the place like?  The place where I'm going?”

Harm looked at the ground and frowned.

“It's hard to say.”

“That doesn't sound promising.”

“They're trying to blend in, it's an average looking house. Someone lives upstairs, someone who's not wanted by the authorities, the rest of them stay... in the basement.”

“In the basement?”

“It might not be so bad.  We’ll see.”

“We should get back to the meeting,” Oscar said. “Erin, would you mind if I were to introduce you?”

“No, I guess not.”

“Well, then, let's go. They're almost finished.”

He started off, looking back to make certain she followed, and the three walked together to the old linden tree.

Nearly a hundred men were gathered under massive branches; some of the more horizontal boughs, unable to support their own weight, were held up by stout wooden posts.  Most men were standing in a loose circle; a few of the elderly were sitting in chairs.  They spoke in turn, with no apparent moderator, but as Oscar passed through the gate a silence fell, and they all turned to look at him.  Erin stepped closer to the gate but was stopped by Harm, who held a hand out in front of her.

“We stay here,” he whispered.

She looked at him in confusion; he ignored her, and her attention was immediate drawn back to Oscar as he raised his voice to the crowd.

“Hier ist Erin Gordon,”
he announced with a gesture in her direction.  ”
Ich habe ihr geschützt.”

No one spoke, but many eyes fell upon the oldest man there; nearly bald, frail, with a yellowed beard and blue flannel shirt, he sat in a chair close to the gate, and was flanked by two of his sons, who looked to be in their seventies.  With a squint he leaned forward on his cane and focused on Oscar.

“Trefflich!”
he strained to shout.

”Fürwahr!”
rippled the affirmative response through the assembly.

“Vielen Dank,”
Oscar said, and waded into the circle.

Erin stood watching, rocking Hughie who had awakened, crying, from the sudden tumult; transfixed by the proceedings, she was interrupted by a gentle tug at her elbow.

“We're done,” Harm whispered.  “We can go now.”

“That's all?”

“That's all.”

As they walked away there was quiet chatter behind them, until Oscar again raised his voice - joined immediately by all the others - in what become a rhythmic incantation that sent chills down her spine.

“Acht auf die Ahnen / und das Anrecht unser Sprosse,”

”Unser Ortsinn und das Erbe / und die Ursprung unser Stamm.”

She turned pale and looked over her shoulder; once finished, the men began filing out from the enclosure.

“What was that?”

“Just some old verses.”

“What do they mean?”

“They -” he paused and frowned in concentration, “they were naming some of the things that we keep in mind. Respect for our ancestors, the claim of our descendants, our heritage, our sense of direction.”

“Sense of direction?”

“Yeah. Like what I was trying to explain to you last night, it’s our place finding, getting our bearings. You have to know where you are to know where you're going.”

“Oh.  Okay.  That's interesting.  There must be a lot of history there.”

“Yeah.”

She watched him, hoping for a more detailed explanation.  “So, now everyone sits down to eat?”

“Yeah. Everyone but us.  We have to go.”

“Right now?”

“The sooner the better.  Before somebody talks, or an English sees you here.  Or sees me somewhere.  We need to wrap this up before they widen their search.”

When they reached the back door of the house he held it open for her.

“I'll get the baby formula,” he said.  “If you could pack, and get back down here as soon as you can, we’ll be on our way.”