For Whom The Bell Tolls

"'Look, Pilar,' he said. 'This was in the hand of the officer who killed himself. Never have I fired a pistol. You,' he said to one of the guards, 'show me how it works. No. Don't show me. Tell me.'

"The four civiles had stood against the wall, sweating and saying nothing while the shooting had gone on inside the barracks. They were all tall men with the faces of guardias civiles, which is the same model of face as mine is. Except that their faces were covered with the small stubble of this their last morning of not yet being shaved and they stood there against the wall and said nothing.

"'You,' said Pablo to the one who stood nearest him. 'Tell me how it works.'

"'Pull the small lever down,' the man said in a very dry voice. 'Pull the receiver back and let it snap forward.'

"'What is the receiver?' asked Pablo, and he looked at the four civiles. 'What is the receiver?'

"'The block on top of the action.'

"Pablo pulled it back, but it stuck. 'What now?' he said. 'It is jammed. You have lied to me.'

"'Pull it farther back and let it snap lightly forward,' the civil said, and I have never heard such a tone of voice. It was grayer than a morning without sunrise.

"Pablo pulled and let go as the man had told him and the block snapped forward into place and the pistol was cocked with the hammer back. It is an ugly pistol, small in the round handle, large and flat in the barrel, and unwieldy. All this time the civiles had been watching him and they had said nothing.

"'What are you going to do with us?' one asked him.

"'Shoot thee,' Pablo said.

"'When?' the man asked in the same gray voice.

"'Now,' said Pablo.

"'Where?' asked the man.

"'Here,' said Pablo. 'Here. Now. Here and now. Have you anything to say?'

"'Nada,' said the civil. 'Nothing. But it is an ugly thing.'

"'And you are an ugly thing,' Pablo said. 'You murderer of peasants. You who would shoot your own mother.'

"'I have never killed any one,' the civil said. 'And do not speak of my mother.'

"'Show us how to die. You, who have always done the killing.'

"'There is no necessity to insult us,' another civil said. 'And we know how to die.'

"'Kneel down against the wall with your heads against the wall,' Pablo told them. The civiles looked at one another.

"'Kneel, I say,' Pablo said. 'Get down and kneel.'

"'How does it seem to you, Paco?' one civil said to the tallest, who had spoken with Pablo about the pistol. He wore a corporal's stripes on his sleeves and was sweating very much although the early morning was still cool.

"'It is as well to kneel,' he answered. 'It is of no importance.'

"'It is closer to the earth,' the first one who had spoken said, trying to make a joke, but they were all too grave for a joke and no one smiled.

"'Then let us kneel,' the first civil said, and the four knelt, looking very awkward with their heads against the wall and their hands by their sides, and Pablo passed behind them and shot each in turn in the back of the head with the pistol, going from one to another and putting the barrel of the pistol against the back of their heads, each man slipping down as he fired. I can hear the pistol still, sharp and yet muffled, and see the barrel jerk and the head of the man drop forward. One held his head still when the pistol touched it. One pushed his head forward and pressed his forehead against the stone. One shivered in his whole body and his head was shaking. Only one put his hands in front of his eyes, and he was the last one, and the four bodies were slumped against the wall when Pablo turned away from them and came toward us with the pistol still in his hand.

"'Hold this for me, Pilar,' he said. 'I do not know how to put down the hammer,' and he handed me the pistol and stood there looking at the four guards as they lay against the wall of the barracks. All those who were with us stood there too, looking at them, and no one said anything.

"We had won the town and it was still early in the morning and no one had eaten nor had any one drunk coffee and we looked at each other and we were all powdered with dust from the blowing up of the barracks, as powdered as men are at a threshing, and I stood holding the pistol and it was heavy in my hand and I felt weak in the stomach when I looked at the guards dead there against the wall; they all as gray and as dusty as we were, but each one was now moistening with his blood the dry dirt by the wall where they lay. And as we stood there the sun rose over the far hills and shone now on the road where we stood and on the white wall of the barracks and the dust in the air was golden in that first sun and the peasant who was beside me looked at the wall of the barracks and what lay there and then looked at us and then at the sun and said, 'Vaya, a day that commences.'

"'Now let us go and get coffee,' I said.

"'Good, Pilar, good,' he said. And we went up into the town to the Plaza, and those were the last people who were shot in the village."