We Are What We Pretend to Be Read Online Free PDF Page A

nodded in agreement. “Good,” she said.
    “Know where the bulletin board is?” the General asked Haley.
    “I think I saw it there in the sunroom. Is that it, sir?”
    “That’s it, allrighty. You just watch the bulletin board. Annie keeps it up for me, and it’ll help you stay out of mischief. Your name appeared on it for the first time today.”
    “What did it say about me?” asked Haley, with a trace of anxiety.
    “You get up at 5 sharp, take a cold shower, brush your teeth for two minutes, pick up your pajamas and hang them on the hook inside the closet door; eat breakfast, go help with the haying; eat lunch, go out and hay some more; eat supper, listen to the radio for an hour, brush your teeth for two minutes, take a
cold shower, hang up your clothes, and go to bed. Every minute’s accounted for,” said the General proudly. He looked again at the kitchen clock. “H-hour,” he announced, and D-squad marched out into the vermilion sunrise.
    By 11 a.m., the wagon was stacked high with the day’s sixth load of hay. The hay, the General had explained to Haley, had been pounded and bound into bales by a machine that had passed over the field the day before. The dense bundles were as high as Haley’s chest, weighed about half of what he imagined Hope to weigh, and were as wide and thick as the General’s middle. There was room for three more bales on top. Haley hung his baling hook on a wheel spoke, swept away the sweat that streamed into his eyes, and begged for a rest.
    “You just had a rest period, Haley,” said the General. “You’ll find you won’t get tired as quickly if you keep at it steadily. Breaking up your rhythm with rest periods all the time, no wonder you’re pooped. You’ll never get your second wind that way.” He was atop the load, reins in hand, with Hope seated beside him, her legs dangling over the side.
    Haley shook his head wearily and sat down on the ground, panting, wishing to Heaven that the nightmare of heat, creeping time, and lamed muscles would end. “I’ll be all right in a minute, I guess—soon as I get my breath,” he said. Mr. Banghart, who had been working on the opposite side of the wagon, walked over to him and told him to climb onto the wagon, that he would finish the load.
    “Let him learn to pull his own weight, Mr. Banghart,” warned the General. “He can do it. Come on, boy, three to go.”

    Limply, painfully, Haley sank his hook into a nearby bale. He worried it along the ground to the wagon. Hope waited, hook poised, for him to swing it upward to where she could catch it and drag it into place.
    “Put your back into it, boy,” shouted the General, and Haley swung the bale. Hope made a grab for it, but missed, for it was a full yard beyond her hook. Haley staggered backward under the weight, his eyes and lungs filled with the dust and splinters that showered down from the bale. His feet tangled, and he fell hard on the sharp stubble, the bale on top of him.
    He was yanked to his feet at once by Mr. Banghart, who, with his mouth close to Haley’s ear, whispered, “Don’t you worry—we’ll take care of that old devil when the right time comes. Wait and see.”
    Haley rubbed his smarting eyes and brought into focus the face of Hope, who was rocking from side to side with laughter. He felt utterly humiliated standing before her, comical in his weakness, and in his clothing—cast-off work clothes of the General, too short, too wide, high on his ankles and wrists, bunched at his waist. Exhaustion and sudden loneliness billowed in his narrow breast. He sank to the ground again.
    The General eased himself down from his perch and stood over him, kicking gently at the soles of his shoes and chiding, “Come on, boy, get up. All right, get up.” Haley stood. The General seemed more embarrassed than angry. “That’s enough of that,” he said. “Mooning and malingering will get you nowhere around here, do you understand? I’m ashamed of