«If there had been no snow—» Pilar said. And then, not suddenly, as a physical release could have been (if the woman would have put her arm around him, say) but slowly and from his head he began to accept it and let the hate go out. Sure, the snow. That had done it. The snow. Done itto others.
Once you saw it again as it was to others, once you got rid of your own self, the always ridding of self that you had to do in war. Where there could be no self. Where yourself is only to be lost. Then, from his losing of it, he heard Pilar say, «Sordo—»
«What?» he said.
«Sordo—»
«Yes,» Robert Jordan said. He grinned at her, a cracked, stiff, too-tightened-facial-tendoned grin. «Forget it. I was wrong. I am sorry, woman. Let us do this well and all together. And the bridge ‘is’ blown, as thou sayest.»
«Yes. Thou must think of things in their place.»
«Then I go now to Agustín. Put thy gypsy much farther down so that he can see well up the road. Give those guns to Primitivo and take this ‘máquina’. Let me show thee.»
«Keep the ‘máquina’,» Pilar said. «We will not be here any time. Pablo should come now and we will be going.»
«Rafael,» Robert Jordan said, «come down here with me. Here. Good. See those coming out of the culvert. There, above the truck? Coming toward the truck? Hit me one of those. Sit. Take it easy.»
The gypsy aimed carefully and fired and as he jerked the bolt back and ejected the shell Robert Jordan said, «Over. You threw against the rock above. See the rock dust? Lower, by two feet. Now, careful. They’re running. Good. ‘Sigue tirando’.»
«I got one,» the gypsy said. The man was down in the road halfway between the culvert and the truck. The other two did not stop to drag him. They ran for the culvert and ducked in.
«Don’t shoot at him,» Robert Jordan said. «Shoot for the top part of a front tire on the truck.
So if you miss you’ll hit the engine. Good.» He watched with the glasses. «A little lower. Good. You shoot like hell. ‘Mucho! Mucho!’ Shoot me the top of the radiator. Anywhere on the radiator. Thou art a champion. Look. Don’t let anything come past that point there. See?»
«Watch me break the windshield in the truck,» the gypsy said happily.
«Nay. The truck is already sick,» Robert Jordan said. «Hold thy fire until anything comes down the road. Start firing when it is opposite the culvert. Try to hit the driver. That you all should fire, then,» he spoke to Pilar who had come farther down the slope with Primitivo. «You are wonderfully placed here. See how that steepness guards thy flank?»
«That you should get about thy business with Agustín,» Pilar said. «Desist from thy lecture. I have seen terrain in my time.»
«Put Primitivo farther up there,» Robert Jordan said. «There. See, man? This side of where the bank steepens.»
«Leave me,» said Pilar. «Get along, ‘Inglés’. Thou and thy perfection. Here there is no problem.»
Just then they heard the planes.
Maria had been with the horses for a long time, but they were no comfort to her. Nor was she any to them. From where she was in the forest she could not see the road nor could she see the bridge and when the firing started she put her arm around the neck of the big white-faced bay stallion that she had gentled and brought gifts to many times when the horses had been in the corral in the trees below the camp.
But her nervousness made the big stallion nervous, too, and he jerked his head, his nostrils widening at the firing and the noise of the bombs. Maria could not keep still and she walked around patting and gentling the horses and making them all more nervous and agitated.
She tried to think of the firing not as just a terrible thing that was happening, but to realize that it was Pablo below with the new men, and Pilar with the others above, and that she must not worry nor get into a panic but must have confidence in Roberto. But she could not do this and all the firing above and below the bridge and the distant sound of the battle that rolled down from the pass like the noise of a far-off storm with a dried, rolling rattle in it and the irregular beat of the bombs was simply a horrible thing that almost kept her from breathing.
Then later she heard Pilar’s big voice from away below on the hillside shouting up some obscenity to her that she could not understand and she thought, Oh, God no, no. Don’t talk like that with him in peril. Don’t offend any one and make useless risks. Don’t give any provocation.
Then she commenced to pray for Roberto quickly and automatically as she had done at school, saying the prayers as fast as she could and counting them on the fingers of her left hand, praying by tens of each of the two prayers she was repeating. Then the bridge blew and one horse snapped his halter when he rose and jerked his head at the cracking roar and he went off through the trees. Maria caught him finally and brought him back, shivering, trembling, his chest dark with sweat, the saddle down, and coming back through the trees she heard shooting below and she thought I cannot stand this longer. I cannot live not knowing any longer.
I cannot breathe and my mouth is so dry. And I am afraid and I am no good and I frighten the horses and only caught this horse by hazard because he knocked the saddle down against a tree and caught himself kicking into the stirrups and now as I get the saddle up, Oh, God, I do not know. I cannot bear it. Oh please have him be all right for all my heart and all of me is at the bridge. The Republic is one thing and we must win is another thing.
But, Oh, Sweet Blessed Virgin, bring him back to me from the bridge and I will do anything thou sayest ever. Because I am not here. There isn’t any me. I am only with him. Take care of him for me and that will be me and then I will do the things for thee and he will not mind. Nor will it be against the Republic. Oh, please forgive me for I am very confused. I am too confused now. But if thou takest care of him I will do whatever is right. I will do what he says and what you say. With the two of me I will do it. But this now not knowing I cannot endure.
Then, the horse tied again, she with the saddle up now, the blanket smoothed, hauling tight on the cinch she heard the big, deep voice from the timber below, «Maria! Maria! Thy ‘Inglés’ is all right. Hear me? All right. ‘Sin Novedad!'»
Maria held the saddle with both hands and pressed her cropped head hard against it and cried. She heard the deep voice shouting again and she turned from the saddle and shouted, choking, «Yes! Thank you!» Then, choking again, «Thank you! Thank you very much!»
When they heard the planes they all looked up and the planes were coming from Segovia very high in the sky, silvery in the high sky, their drumming rising over all the other sounds.
«Those!» Pilar said. «There has only lacked those!»
Robert Jordan put his arm on her shoulders as he watched them. «Nay, woman,» he said. «Those do not come for us. Those have no time for us. Calm thyself.»
«I hate them.»
«Me too. But now I must go to Agustín.»
He circled the hillside through the pines and all the time there was the throbbing, drumming of the planes and across the shattered bridge on the road below, around the bend of the road there was the intermittent hammering fire of a heavy machine gun.
Robert Jordan dropped down to where Agustín lay in the clump of scrub pines behind the automatic rifle and more planes were coming all the time.
«What passes below?» Agustín said. «What is Pablo doing? Doesn’t he know the bridge is gone?»
«Maybe he can’t leave.»
«Then let us leave. The hell with him.»
«He will come now if he is able,» Robert Jordan said. «We should see him now.»
«I have not heard him,» Agustín said. «Not for five minutes. No. There! Listen! There he is. That’s him.»
There was a burst of the spot-spot-spotting fire of the cavalry submachine gun, then another, then another.
«That’s the bastard,» Robert Jordan said.
He watched still more planes coming over in the high cloudless blue sky and he watched Agustín’s face as he looked up at them. Then he looked down at the shattered bridge and across to the stretch of road which still was clear. He coughed and spat and listened to the heavy machine gun hammer again below the bend. It sounded to be in the same place that it was before.
«And what’s that?» Agustín asked. «What the unnameable is that?»
«It has been going since before I blew the bridge,» Robert Jordan said. He looked down at the bridge now and he could see the stream through the
