Tree Girl by Ben Mikaelsen Read Free Book Online Page B

his shoulder toward the trees. I, too, worried about soldiers, but I had never seen Manuel this way. He seemed to calm down when we reached the river. Here wecouldn’t be seen from either the school or the highway. Manuel spread out the net and began showing us how to throw it into the water.
    When Manuel wasn’t watching, I snuck up behind him and threw the end of the net over him. “We caught a whale! We caught a whale!” I shouted.
    Instantly everybody tackled Manuel, and soon he rolled back and forth on the shore like a beached whale, grunting and tickling the youngest children who climbed on top of him. Finally he sat up, breathing hard, and untangled himself from the net. “Does anybody want to know what’s in my pack?” he asked.
    Instantly Victoria and Lisa grabbed his big hands and led him back upstream to the shade of a single cotton-wood tree beside the river. Slowly, as if feeling lazy, Manuel opened the pack and handed a bottle of orange drink to each of us. One at a time, he opened our bottles for us. The drinks had grown warm from the hot day, but we didn’t care. Last, he pulled out a small bag of tortillas. “Let’s have lunch,” he said.
    We all grouped ourselves close to him as he lowered himself down to sit on a low rock. Manuel’s fearand concern seemed to have disappeared. His face relaxed, and his eyes danced with mischief as he pretended to take Pablo’s drink.
    We were still laughing when we noticed soldiers, ten of them with their rifles slung over their shoulders, marching directly toward us. Our laughing and joking stopped, and we waited quietly, hoping they were only passing by.
    The soldiers walked to where we sat. “Why are you here with these children?” the comandante shouted at Manuel.
    At first, Manuel pretended not to understand Spanish, but the comandante walked up to Rubén, who sat with the rest of us on the ground. He kicked Rubén hard. “Do you know Spanish?” he shouted.
    Manuel stood. “I speak Spanish,” he answered quietly. “Please don’t hurt the children. I’m their teacher.”
    “And what do you teach them?”
    “Many things,” Manuel said. “How to read and write, and how to think.”
    The comandante who asked the questions was a very ugly man. His rough skin made his face look likea pineapple, and his eyes were small and black, like those of a snake. “To think how?” he shouted. “Like communists?”
    “No. I teach the children to—”
    Without warning, the comandante spun and struck Manuel in the stomach with the butt of his rifle before he could finish speaking. The soldier’s large mouth spread into a wicked smile, then quickly tightened to a thin line. “Lies!” he shouted. “All lies!”
    I scrambled to my feet, and instantly several soldiers pointed their rifles at me. Manuel bent over, but he didn’t cry out or fight back.
    “No!” I shouted in Spanish, ignoring the risk. “He never taught us to be communists.”
    The comandante walked up to me with a curious, ugly stare. “You’re India,” he spit, saying the word as if it were dirty and vulgar. “Where did you learn Spanish so well?”
    Before I could answer, he slapped my face so sharply it felt as if my head had exploded. I fell over, and the taste of sweet blood filled my mouth.
    “Please don’t hurt the children,” Manuel beggedonce more, and again the comandante jabbed the butt of his rifle into Manuel’s stomach, knocking him to the ground. All of us scrambled to our feet. Victoria and Lisa screamed and started running away from the soldiers.
    A soldier lifted his rifle to his shoulder.
    For a moment I stood in disbelief as the man aimed his rifle.
    “No! Don’t shoot!” I screamed, chasing after the girls.
    “Bring them back or we’ll kill them!” shouted the comandante.
    I caught up to both girls and held each of them firmly by the arm. They trembled like small bushes in a strong wind. I coaxed them back toward the group, whispering, “Don’t scream or