大象传媒

The night was surprisingly cold when she closed the door behind her. The 3 children rushed to meet her, they had been waiting anxiously for her and wanted to hear the news. Her face was drawn and paler than usual. She stood at the door, leaning against it, while she held her coat wrapped tightly round her slender figure. The children were caught with surprise as usually she flung her arms around them and smiled every time she returned from visiting her husband in the local prison. This time she was pinned against the door as if she wanted it not to open any more on that world so hostile and indifferent, so cruel and cold.
"Mother" the children shouted, "How is Daddy? When will he be home?"
"Sh!" she whispered and led them into the kitchen, which is in the quietest part of the house. She made shure the window and the door were shut, drew the curtains and gathered the children round the table.
"Daddy is alright", she said, "he sends you his love and lots of kisses. Let's have supper now and then, quickly to bed."

The children looked at one and other; it was dark outside and the day had been bitterly cold, nevertheless, 9 o'clock was still too early to be going to bed.

During the harsh winter nights, their mother had allowed them to sleep with her in the large 4 poster bed. Their father had been taken away by the police and had been accused of plotting with the partisans against the decrepit regime. The children knew very little about the whole business, they missed their father and wanted him back but they loved the large, cosy bed, the warm large blankets and, above all, the nearness of their mother and the feeling of security they experienced close to her, like young birds in a nest.

Loud shouts and banging on the front door woke them all up in the middle of the night.

"Open the door, that's an order", a harsh voice was heard repeating more and more loudly. Their mother told them to be quiet. Int the dark, under the blanket, she whispered, "If they ask you anything, say you don't know. If they take me away stay together as far as you can and, if you get the chance to run, go to Auntie Mary's. My darlings, never talk of anything you might have heard or seen. And remember, pray to the good Lord to look after us."

The children knew what their mother meant, they had grown up used to keeping secrets and talking little to strangers asking probing questions.

The banging on the door became more and more insistant. Slowly their mother got up and left them in bed.

The shouts were now inside the hall; a sharp, authoritarian voice said, "Madam, your husband has escaped, you are under arrest!" A scream, then silence. The children rushed to the top of the stairs: their mother was motiuonless, stretched on the floor. Armed men, in police uniform, were moving around her and talking. The elder girl ran down the stairs calling "Mother! Mother!" Her brother and sister followed her, crying frantically. They knelt close to the inert body, sobbing and shielding it from the uniformed brutes.

The woman didn't regain consciousness till after she had been put to bed. Then she started muttering incoherent words. "Prison, husband, my children. No! No! Leave us alone, shut the door it's so cold!"

The children could hear but could not see her. An armed military guard stood motionless at the door of their mother's bedroom. A doctor came out and said, "She can't be moved. Her physical condition is not good enough."

The bedroom door was guarded for a week while outside the house 2 policemen marched up and down the street. The children weren't allowed to see their mother for all that time. Neighbours came in and looked after them until one day their mother was allowed out of the room. The armed guards went: a month had gone by since that terrible night. Their mother had gradually become herself again, she was smiling now. She even looked happy sometimes when the 4 of them were alone and close in the comfortable 4 poster bed, the fromt door closed between the angry world outside and their safe nest.

They never asked her about that day; she never explained.

Also see 'The Escape' for the next part of this story.

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