The Boiling Season by Christopher Hebert

they should have been speaking with me themselves. I could have taken pleasure in their attention, savoring the pride it gave me to have worked my way into a position where I might be mistaken for someone important—but instead every eye reminded me how easily the story of my being here might find its way to Senator Marcus’s ear.
    â€œMr. Guinee tells me you’re familiar with my new estate,” Mme Freeman said.
    â€œOh, yes,” M. Guinee cut in. “Almost as much as me,” and grateful though I was to have him speaking on my behalf, I could not help worrying about other things he might have told her, and how many of them were similarly lies. Sensing perhaps my temptation to confess the truth, M. Guinee quickly added, “And he knows precisely what needs to be done.”
    â€œI’m so glad to hear it,” Mme Freeman said, and I nodded miserably, accepting the part I was playing in this deception. “When can you begin?” she said.
    I felt what little English I at the time possessed trickle away, leaving me with only, “Yes.”
    With a nod she showed that this, the only word I had managed to utter over the course of the conversation, was the very one she had been waiting to hear.
    I had not known, until the moment I gave it, what my answer to Mme Freeman would be. During the week leading up to our meeting I had thought about little else, but my thinking was seldom the same from one moment to the next. Down at the base of the hills of Lyonville where I had grown up, a man my age was lucky if he found any work at all. If he did, the best he could hope for was a job paying him just enough to feed his family. And yet somehow, without ever having worked toward this end, I found myself in the position of choosing between two jobs, each of which was infinitely better than any job held by anyone I had ever known. Assisting an influential politician or managing the estate of a rich foreign businesswoman? Contrary to everything my father had tried to teach me to feel about people of wealth, I liked and respected them both. Senator Marcus and his wife had shown me great generosity, far greater than I deserved, and that was part of what made the decision so difficult, for it seemed to me that by going to work for Mme Freeman I would be repaying their kindness with ingratitude. But how could I refuse an opportunity like this? It was a job even Paul would have given up his toothpaste and bathroom tissue to take. And what greater honor could I pay to the memory of my mother than to dedicate myself to saving a piece of the island she had believed to be extinct? As for my father, I could think of no better way to satisfy his wishes than to take leave of the hill people and say good-bye forever to the world of politics.
    L eaving Senator Marcus was not easy, but it would have been far harder had he not been so distracted. Even now that the state of siege had ended, President Mailodet seemed reluctant to restore the legislature or give up his emergency powers. Nor was there any sign that the legions of recently arrested political prisoners—students, unionists, journalists—might soon be released. If anything, all indications were that their cells would soon be filled to bursting, now that owning a radio had been added to the list of crimes against the state. The president’s newly created security forces were busily confiscating every transistor they could find.
    Despite all this, Senator Marcus appeared suddenly rejuvenated. It was as if this crisis had given him a new sense of purpose. Men were arriving at our door early each morning, even before Mme Marcus had risen, and they were staying until long after she had gone to bed at night. I had no way of knowing what was being said behind Senator Marcus’s study door, and that was as I wished.
    It was on one of the few nights when Senator Marcus did not have guests that I delivered the news of my resignation. We were in his