For Whom the Bell Tolls (19 page)

“Now the mob was pressed tight against the door so that those in front were being crushed by all the others who were pressing and from the square a big drunkard in a black smock with a red-and-black handkerchief around his neck, ran and threw himself against the press of the mob and fell forward onto the pressing men and then stood up and backed away and then ran forward again and threw himself against the backs of those men who were pushing, shouting, ‘Long live me and long live Anarchy.'

“As I watched, this man turned away from the crowd and went and sat down and drank from a bottle and then, while he was sitting down, he saw Don Anastasio, who was still lying face down on the stones, but much trampled now, and the drunkard got up and went over to Don Anastasio and leaned over and poured out of the bottle onto the head of Don Anastasio and onto his clothes, and then he took a matchbox out of his pocket and lit several matches,
trying to make a fire with Don Anastasio. But the wind was blowing hard now and it blew the matches out and after a little the big drunkard sat there by Don Anastasio, shaking his head and drinking out of the bottle and every once in a while, leaning over and patting Don Anastasio on the shoulders of his dead body.

“All this time the mob was shouting to open up and the man on the chair with me was holding tight to the bars of the window and shouting to open up until it deafened me with his voice roaring past my ear and his breath foul on me and I looked away from watching the drunkard who had been trying to set fire to Don Anastasio and into the hall of the
Ayuntamiento
again; and it was just as it had been. They were still praying as they had been, the men all kneeling, with their shirts open, some with their heads down, others with their heads up, looking toward the priest and toward the crucifix that he held, and the priest praying fast and hard and looking out over their heads, and in back of them Pablo, with his cigarette now lighted, was sitting there on the table swinging his legs, his shotgun slung over his back, and he was playing with the key.

“I saw Pablo speak to the priest again, leaning forward from the table and I could not hear what he said for the shouting. But the priest did not answer him but went on praying. Then a man stood up from among the half circle of those who were praying and I saw he wanted to go out. It was Don José Castro, whom every one called Don Pepe, a confirmed fascist, and a dealer in horses, and he stood up now small, neat-looking even unshaven and wearing a pajama top tucked into a pair of gray-striped trousers. He kissed the crucifix and the priest blessed him and he stood up and looked at Pablo and jerked his head toward the door.

“Pablo shook his head and went on smoking. I could see Don Pepe say something to Pablo but could not hear it. Pablo did not answer; he simply shook his head again and nodded toward the door.

“Then I saw Don Pepe look full at the door and realized that he had not known it was locked. Pablo showed him the key and he stood looking at it an instant and then he turned and went and knelt down again. I saw the priest look around at Pablo and Pablo grinned at him and showed him the key and the priest seemed to
realize for the first time that the door was locked and he seemed as though he started to shake his head, but he only inclined it and went back to praying.

“I do not know how they could not have understood the door was locked unless it was that they were so concentrated on their praying and their own thoughts; but now they certainly understood and they understood the shouting and they must have known now that all was changed. But they remained the same as before.

“By now the shouting was so that you could hear nothing and the drunkard who stood on the chair with me shook with his hands at the bars and yelled, ‘Open up! Open up!' until he was hoarse.

“I watched Pablo speak to the priest again and the priest did not answer. Then I saw Pablo unsling his shotgun and he reached over and tapped the priest on the shoulder with it. The priest paid no attention to him and I saw Pablo shake his head. Then he spoke over his shoulder to Cuatro Dedos and Cuatro Dedos spoke to the other guards and they all stood up and walked back to the far end of the room and stood there with their shotguns.

“I saw Pablo say something to Cuatro Dedos and he moved over two tables and some benches and the guards stood behind them with their shotguns. It made a barricade in that corner of the room. Pablo leaned over and tapped the priest on the shoulder again with the shotgun and the priest did not pay attention to him but I saw Don Pepe watching him while the others paid no attention but went on praying. Pablo shook his head and, seeing Don Pepe looking at him, he shook his head at Don Pepe and showed him the key, holding it up in his hand. Don Pepe understood and he dropped his head and commenced to pray very fast.

“Pablo swung his legs down from the table and walked around it to the big chair of the Mayor on the raised platform behind the long council table. He sat down in it and rolled himself a cigarette, all the time watching the fascists who were praying with the priest. You could not see any expression on his face at all. The key was on the table in front of him. It was a big key of iron, over a foot long. Then Pablo called to the guards something I could not hear and one guard went down to the door. I could see them all praying faster than ever and I knew that they all knew now.

“Pablo said something to the priest but the priest did not answer. Then Pablo leaned forward, picked up the key and tossed it underhand to the guard at the door. The guard caught it and Pablo smiled at him. Then the guard put the key in the door, turned it, and pulled the door toward him, ducking behind it as the mob rushed in.

“I saw them come in and just then the drunkard on the chair with me commenced to shout ‘Ayee! Ayee! Ayee!' and pushed his head forward so I could not see and then he shouted ‘Kill them! Kill them! Club them! Kill them!' and he pushed me aside with his two arms and I could see nothing.

“I hit my elbow into his belly and I said, ‘Drunkard, whose chair is this? Let me see.'

“But he just kept shaking his hands and arms against the bars and shouting, ‘Kill them! Club them! Club them! that's it. Club them! Kill them! C
abrones! Cabrones! Cabrones!
'

“I hit him hard with my elbow and said, ‘
Cabron!
Drunkard! Let me see.'

“Then he put both his hands on my head to push me down and so he might see better and leaned all his weight on my head and went on shouting, ‘Club them! that's it. Club them!'

“ ‘Club yourself,' I said and I hit him hard where it would hurt him and it hurt him and he dropped his hands from my head and grabbed himself and said. ‘
No hay derecho, mujer
. This, woman, you have no right to do.' And in that moment, looking through the bars, I saw the hall full of men flailing away with clubs and striking with flails, and poking and striking and pushing and heaving against people with the white wooden pitchforks that now were red and with their tines broken, and this was going on all over the room while Pablo sat in the big chair with his shotgun on his knees, watching, and they were shouting and clubbing and stabbing and men were screaming as horses scream in a fire. And I saw the priest with his skirts tucked up scrambling over a bench and those after him were chopping at him with the sickles and the reaping hooks and then some one had hold of his robe and there was another scream and another scream and I saw two men chopping into his back with sickles while a third man held the skirt of his robe and the priest's arms were up and he was clinging to the back of a chair and
then the chair I was standing on broke and the drunkard and I were on the pavement that smelled of spilled wine and vomit and the drunkard was shaking his finger at me and saying, ‘
No hay derecho, mujer, no hay derecho
. You could have done me an injury,' and the people were trampling over us to get into the hall of the
Ayuntamiento
and all I could see was legs of people going in the doorway and the drunkard sitting there facing me and holding himself where I had hit him.

“That was the end of the killing of the fascists in our town and I was glad I did not see more of it and, but for that drunkard, I would have seen it all. So he served some good because in the
Ayuntamiento
it was a thing one is sorry to have seen.

“But the other drunkard was something rarer still. As we got up after the breaking of the chair, and the people were still crowding into the
Ayuntamiento,
I saw this drunkard of the square with his red-and-black scarf, again pouring something over Don Anastasio. He was shaking his head from side to side and it was very hard for him to sit up, but he was pouring and lighting matches and then pouring and lighting matches and I walked over to him and said, ‘What are you doing, shameless?'

“‘
Nada, mujer, nada
,' he said. ‘Let me alone.'

“And perhaps because I was standing there so that my legs made a shelter from the wind, the match caught and a blue flame began to run up the shoulder of the coat of Don Anastasio and onto the back of his neck and the drunkard put his head up and shouted in a huge voice, ‘They're burning the dead! They're burning the dead!'

“ ‘Who?' somebody said.

“ ‘Where?' shouted some one else.

“ ‘Here,' bellowed the drunkard. ‘Exactly here!'

“Then some one hit the drunkard a great blow alongside the head with a flail and he fell back, and lying on the ground, he looked up at the man who had hit him and then shut his eyes and crossed his hands on his chest, and lay there beside Don Anastasio as though he were asleep. The man did not hit him again and he lay there and he was still there when they picked up Don Anastasio and put him with the others in the cart that hauled them all over to the cliff where they were thrown over that evening with the others after there had been
a cleaning up in the
Ayuntamiento
. It would have been better for the town if they had thrown over twenty or thirty of the drunkards, especially those of the red-and-black scarves, and if we ever have another revolution I believe they should be destroyed at the start. But then we did not know this. But in the next days we were to learn.

“But that night we did not know what was to come. After the slaying in the
Ayuntamiento
there was no more killing but we could not have a meeting that night because there were too many drunkards. It was impossible to obtain order and so the meeting was postponed until the next day.

“That night I slept with Pablo. I should not say this to you,
guapa
, but on the other hand, it is good for you to know everything and at least what I tell you is true. Listen to this,
Inglés
. It is very curious.

“As I say, that night we ate and it was very curious. It was as after a storm or a flood or a battle and every one was tired and no one spoke much. I, myself, felt hollow and not well and I was full of shame and a sense of wrongdoing and I had a great feeling of oppression and of bad to come, as this morning after the planes. And certainly, bad came within three days.

“Pablo, when we ate, spoke little.

“ ‘Did you like it, Pilar?' he asked finally with his mouth full of roast young goat. We were eating at the inn from where the buses leave and the room was crowded and people were singing and there was difficulty serving.

“ ‘No,' I said. ‘Except for Don Faustino, I did not like it.'

“ ‘I liked it,' he said.

“ ‘All of it?' I asked him.

“ ‘All of it,' he said and cut himself a big piece of bread with his knife and commenced to mop up gravy with it. ‘All of it, except the priest.'

“ ‘You didn't like it about the priest?' because I knew he hated priests even worse than he hated fascists.

“ ‘He was a disillusionment to me,' Pablo said sadly.

“So many people were singing that we had to almost shout to hear one another.

“ ‘Why?'

“ ‘He died very badly,' Pablo said. ‘He had very little dignity.'

“ ‘How did you want him to have dignity when he was being chased by the mob?' I said. ‘I thought he had much dignity all the time before. All the dignity that one could have.'

“ ‘Yes,' Pablo said. ‘But in the last minute he was frightened.'

“ ‘Who wouldn't be?' I said. ‘Did you see what they were chasing him with?'

“ ‘Why would I not see?' Pablo said. ‘But I find he died badly.'

“ ‘In such circumstances any one dies badly,' I told him. ‘What do you want for your money? Everything that happened in the
Ayuntamiento
was scabrous.'

“ ‘Yes,' said Pablo. ‘There was little organization. But a priest. He has an example to set.'

“ ‘I thought you hated priests.'

“ ‘Yes,' said Pablo and cut some more bread. ‘But a
Spanish
priest. A
Spanish
priest should die very well.'

“ ‘I think he died well enough,' I said. ‘Being deprived of all formality.'

“ ‘No,' Pablo said. ‘To me he was a great disillusionment. All day I had waited for the death of the priest. I had thought he would be the last to enter the lines. I awaited it with great anticipation. I expected something of a culmination. I had never seen a priest die.'

“ ‘There is time,' I said to him sarcastically. ‘Only today did the movement start.'

“ ‘No,' he said. ‘I am disillusioned.'

“ ‘Now,' I said. ‘I suppose you will lose your faith.'

“ ‘You do not understand, Pilar,' he said. ‘He was a
Spanish
priest.'

“ ‘What people the Spaniards are,' I said to him. And what a people they are for pride, eh,
Inglés
? What a people.”

“We must get on,” Robert Jordan said. He looked at the sun. “It's nearly noon.”