After

Deciding that he must help Gabriek, Felix climbs out of his hiding place and goes out into the night. He is surprised to see that the strangers are leading Gabriek not toward the town but across the countryside. He realizes that the Nazis often take people into the woods and thinks, “The Nazis like to shoot people in the forest. I think it’s to save making the graveyards in the town overcrowded” (11).

He follows them across the fields and then into the woods. He has a hard time keeping up with them because his leg muscles are atrophied from hiding for two years in the hole. He makes up a story that Gabriek is actually a Jew-hunter and that Felix is tired of trying to get away from him. He hopes that Gabriek will join in with the story and convince the Polish Secret Police not to hurt him. Felix prays to his favorite author, Richmal Crompton, a British author of children’s books, whose books he reads continually. As he approaches Gabriek and the men, he hears a distant train just before he throws himself into the midst of everyone and surrenders.

When Felix breaks into the clearing and begins shouting, Gabriek grabs him and drags him up the hill and away from the railroad track. The others scamper up the hill as well and fall on the ground just before the train explodes. Those with guns, including Gabriek, fire on any Nazis who escape the train crash. Gabriek explains that the men who came to his farm are Polish partisans: fighters who live in the woods and attack Nazis. He explains that he works with them.

Felix fears that the leader of the partisans might shoot him because now Felix knows who they are. Instead, the leader simply tells Gabriek not to let this happen again. Though Gabriek is angry at Felix for breaking the simple rule of not leaving the barn, he also thanks the boy for trying to save him. He says that he has a special meal to celebrate his birthday. However, as they draw close to the farm, they discover that both the house and barn are on fire.

Realizing the farm is burning, Gabriek and Felix run across the fields toward it. Gabriek tells Felix to remain in the fields because the Nazis may have started the fire and might still be present. Felix waits briefly, then realizes that Gabriek will need his help putting out the fire and that somebody might need to save Dom.

Approaching the house, he sees a truck full of Nazis. He hides in the field until they leave, then sees Gabriek get up and run toward the house. Felix goes into the barn and puts his blanket around Dom’s head, then leads the horse out into an open corral. He goes back to get certain precious items out of his hiding place. Coming out, he sees Gabriek outside as well. Suddenly, the house collapses and the debris knocks Gabriek to the ground. Felix realizes that Gabriek is injured and knows he must take him to someone who can help. He arranges a pulley and manages to get Gabriek onto Dom’s back but does not know where to take him. Gabriek whispers a single word to Felix: “[p]artisans” (32).

Felix leads Dom toward the train that the partisans blew up. They walk for hours in the freezing cold, and Gabriek is acting “delirious” because of his head wound. Felix tries to speak to him in ways that will calm him. As they walk through the forest, partisans come out of the darkness and surround him. Felix identifies himself as a Jew and Gabriek as someone who helps the partisans. A tall partisan named Szulk points a gun at Felix and says, “Wherever you Jews are, […] Nazi wasps come buzzing” (38). Just as Felix expects Szulk to shoot him, he hears bicycle bells. The leader of the partisans, Pavel, arrives on a bicycle with a woman that Felix saw earlier. Pavel tells Szulk to put away his rifle. Recognizing Gabriek, the partisans take him to their field doctor. Pavel tells Felix to get lost, but the woman reminds Pavel that they need recruits and that age does not matter. Though he does not want to join the partisans, Felix realizes that doing so will keep him near Dom and Gabriek. The partisans tell him that in order to join, he must make a contribution; he must steal a gun and bring it to the group.

The partisans leave Felix alone in the forest with the woman, who identifies herself as Yuli. She takes him through the woods and points out a different town, telling him that he will find many guns there. She asks him whether he can fight and shows him the most effective way to kill another person. Giving him one of her shirts to help keep him warm, she tells him that she knows that he can succeed.

As Felix prepares to go down to the village, he remembers the gift that Gabriek gave him for his birthday. Opening it, he finds a compass and starts toward the town, knowing that the sooner he can find a gun, the sooner he can return and be with Gabriek and Dom.

Felix finds the town to be larger than he anticipated and is intimidated. Felix tries to blend in with the crowd at what he initially believes to be a marketplace. Instead, he finds that the Nazis have hung bodies on posts; the bodies wear signs proclaiming that they helped the enemy. Realizing how dangerous the area truly is, Felix hurries to the outskirts of town.

Felix decides to break into houses to look for a gun. When he hears people marching toward him, he hides in a ditch, and as the marchers pass, he sees Jewish people on their way to a death camp. He also witnesses a Nazi soldier execute a man who cannot keep up. Afterward, Felix hears one more marcher wearing boots that only Nazis wear. Making a weapon from a stick, he follows the marcher, who parks a bicycle outside. Felix realizes that this is a boy about his age. The boy takes off his boots and leaves them outside when he goes in. On the bicycle are two bazookas. Felix puts on the boy’s boots, gets on the bicycle, and rides back to the woods.

Felix returns to the woods, where he is confronted by partisans who take him to the camp. When they see the bazookas he has brought, they welcome him as a fellow partisan. In the camp, he discovers that Gabriek has just been taken in for emergency surgery. Going into the underground treatment room, he sees three men; two hold Gabriek down as another operates. The surgeon yells commands to Felix, the only one with his hands free. Felix figures out what the doctor wants. The doctor commands him to put his hand in Gabriek’s mouth so the farmer cannot bite his tongue.

When the surgery is over, they all end up in the partisan sleeping area. Yuli comes in, and they talk about Gabriek’s condition. Yuli tells Felix that she was captured in Russia by the Germans, who took her to a work camp and killed her parents. She escaped and changed her name to her father’s name; now she fights against the Nazis. When he watches Gabriek and Yuli talking, Felix thinks, “If Gabriek and Yuli did want to be my new parents, I’d like that” (67).