The Frenchman had come walking out of the attack with great dignity and I understood him as a man. But, as a soldier, these other men who policed the battle had hunted him down, and the death he had walked away from had found him when he was just over the ridge, clear of the bullets and the shelling, and walking toward the river.
“And that,” the Extremaduran said to me, nodding toward the battle police.
“Is war,” I said. “In war, it is necessary to have discipline.”
“And to live under that sort of discipline we should die?”
“Without discipline everyone will die anyway.”
“There is one kind of discipline and another kind of discipline,” the Extremaduran said. “Listen to me. In February we were here where we are now and the fascists attacked. They drove us from the hills that you Internationals tried to take today and that you could not take. We fell back to here; to this ridge. Internationals came up and took the line ahead of us.”
“I know that,” I said.
“But you do not know this,” he went on angrily. “There was a boy from my province who became frightened during the bombardment, and he shot himself in the hand so that he could leave the line because he was afraid.”
The other soldiers were all listening now. Several nodded.
“Such people have their wounds dressed and are returned at once to the line,” the Extremaduran went on. “It is just.”
“Yes,” I said. “That is as it should be.”
“That is as it should be,” said the Extremaduran. “But this boy shot himself so badly that the bone was all smashed and there surged up an infection and his hand was amputated.”
Several soldiers nodded.
“Go on, tell him the rest,” said one.
“It might be better not to speak of it,” said the cropped-headed, bristly-faced man who said he was in command.
“It is my duty to speak,” the Extremaduran said.
The one in command shrugged his shoulders. “I did not like it either,” he said. “Go on, then. But I do not like to hear it spoken of either.”
“This boy remained in the hospital in the valley since February,” the Extremaduran said. “Some of us have seen him in the hospital. All say he was well liked in the hospital and made himself as useful as a man with one hand can be useful. Never was he under arrest. Never was there anything to prepare him.”
The man in command handed me the cup of wine again without saying anything. They were all listening; as men who cannot read or write listen to a story.
“Yesterday, at the close of day, before we knew there was to be an attack. Yesterday, before the sun set, when we thought today was to be as any other day, they brought him up the trail in the gap there from the flat. We were cooking the evening meal and they brought him up. There were only four of them. Him, the boy Paco, those two you have just seen in the leather coats and the caps, and an officer from the brigade. We saw the four of them climbing together up the gap, and we saw Pace’s hands were not tied, nor was he bound in any way.
“When we saw him we all crowded around and said, ‘Hello, Paco. How are you, Paco? How is everything, Paco, old boy, old Paco?’
“Then he said, ‘Everything’s all right. Everything is good except this’— and showed us the stump.
“Paco said, ‘That was a cowardly and foolish thing. I am sorry that I did that thing. But I try to be useful with one hand. I will do what I can with one hand for the Cause.’”
“Yes,” interrupted a soldier. “He said that. I heard him say that.”
“We spoke with him,” the Extremaduran said. “And he spoke with us. When such people with the leather coats and the pistols come it is always a bad omen in a war, as is the arrival of people with map cases and field glasses. Still we thought they had brought him for a visit, and all of us who had not been to the hospital were happy to see him, and as I say, it was the hour of the evening meal and the evening was clear and warm.”
“This wind only rose during the night,” a soldier said.
“Then,” the Extremaduran went on somberly, “one of
“‘Where is the place this Paco was wounded?’ asked the officer.”
“I answered him,” said the man in command. “I showed the place. It is a little further down than where you are.”
“Here is the place,” said a soldier. He pointed, and I could see it was the place. It showed clearly that it was the place.
“Then one of them led Paco by the arm to the place and held him there by the arm while the other spoke in Spanish. He spoke in Spanish, making many mistakes in the language. At first we wanted to laugh, and Paco started to smile. I could not understand all the speech, but it was that Paco must be punished as an example, in order that there would be no more self-inflicted wounds, and that all others would be punished in the same way.
“Then, while the one held Paco by the arm; Paco, looking very ashamed to be spoken of this way when he was already ashamed and sorry; the other took his pistol out and shot Paco in the back of the head without any word to Paco. Nor any word more.”
The soldiers all nodded.
“It was thus,” said one. “You can see the place. He fell with his mouth there. You can see it.”
I had seen the place clearly enough from where I lay.
“He had no warning and no chance to prepare himself,” the one in command said. “It was very brutal.”
“It is for this that I now hate Russians as well as all other foreigners,” said the Extremaduran. “We can give ourselves no illusions about foreigners. If you are a foreigner, I am sorry. But for myself, now, I can make no exceptions. You have eaten bread and drunk wine with us. Now I think you should go.”
“Do not speak in that way,” the man in command said to the Extremaduran. “It is necessary to be formal.”
“I think we had better go,” I said.
“You are not angry?” the man in command said. “You can stay in this shelter as long as you wish. Are you thirsty? Do you wish more wine?”
“Thank you very much,” I said. “I think we had better go.”
“You understand my hatred?” asked the Extremaduran.
“I understand your hatred,” I said.
“Good,” he said and put out his hand. “I do not refuse to shake hands. And that you, personally, have much luck.”
“Equally to you,” I said. “Personally, and as a Spaniard.”
I woke the one who took the pictures and we started down the ridge toward brigade headquarters. The tanks were all coming back now and you could hardly hear yourself talk for the noise.
“Were you talking all that time?”
“Listening.”
“Hear anything interesting?”
“Plenty.”
“What do you want to do now?”
“Get back to Madrid.”
“We should see the general.”
“Yes,” I said. “We must.”
The general was coldly furious. He had been ordered to make the attack as a surprise with one brigade only, bringing everything up before daylight. It should have been made by at least a division. He had used three battalions and held one in reserve. The French tank commander had got drunk to be brave for the attack and finally was too drunk to function. He was to be shot when he sobered up.
The tanks had not come up in time and finally had refused to advance, and two of the battalions had failed to attain their objectives. The third had taken theirs, but it formed an untenable salient. The only real result had been a few prisoners, and these had been confided to the tank men to bring back and the tank men had killed them. The
