“I have a massacre for thee for tomorrow morning,” Robert Jordan said. “It is necessary to exterminate the post at the sawmill.”
“I am ready,” Agustín said, “Estoy listo.”
“Also the post at the roadmender’s hut below the bridge.”
“For the one or for the other,” Agustín said. “Or for both.”
“Not for both. They will be done at the same time,” Robert Jordan said.
“Then for either one,” Agustín said. “Now for a long time have I wished for action in this war. Pablo has rotted us here with inaction.”
Anselmo came up with the ax.
“Do you wish more branches?” he asked. “To me it seems well hidden.”
“Not branches,” Robert Jordan said. “Two small trees that we can plant here and there to make it look more natural. There are not enough trees here for it to be truly natural.”
“I will bring them.”
“Cut them well back, so the stumps cannot be seen.”
Robert Jordan heard the ax sounding in the woods behind him. He looked up at Primitivo above in the rocks and he looked down at the pines across the clearing. The one crow was still there. Then he heard the first high, throbbing murmur of a plane coming. He looked up and saw it high and tiny and silver in the sun, seeming hardly to move in the high sky.
“They cannot see us,” he said to Agustín. “But it is well to keep down. That is the second observation plane today.”
“And those of yesterday?” Agustín asked.
“They are like a bad dream now,” Robert Jordan said.
“They must be at Segovia. The bad dream waits there to become a reality.”
The plane was out of sight now over the mountains but the sound of its motors still persisted.
As Robert Jordan looked, he saw the crow fly up. He flew straight away through the trees without cawing.
23
“Get thee down,” Robert Jordan whispered to Agustín, and he turned his head and flicked his hand Down, Down, to Anselmo who was coming through the gap with a pine tree, carrying it over his shoulder like a Christmas tree. He saw the old man drop his pine tree behind a rock and then he was out of sight in the rocks and Robert Jordan was looking ahead across the open space toward the timber. He saw nothing and heard nothing but he could feel his heart pounding and then he heard the clack of stone on stone and the leaping, dropping clicks of a small rock falling. He turned his head to the right and looking up saw Primitivo’s rifle raised and lowered four times horizontally. Then there was nothing more to see but the white stretch in front of him with the circle of horse tracks and the timber beyond.
“Cavalry,” he said softly to Agustín.
Agustín looked at him and his dark, sunken cheeks widened at their base as he grinned. Robert Jordan noticed he was sweating. He reached over and put his hand on his shoulder. His hand was still there as they saw the four horsemen ride out of the timber and he felt the muscles in Agustín’s back twitch under his hand.
One horseman was ahead and three rode behind. The one ahead was following the horse tracks. He looked down as he rode. The other three came behind him, fanned out through the timber. They were all watching carefully. Robert Jordan felt his heart beating against the snowy ground as he lay, his elbows spread wide and watched them over the sights of the automatic rifle.
The man who was leading rode along the trail to where Pablo had circled and stopped. The others rode up to him and they all stopped.
Robert Jordan saw them clearly over the blued steel barrel of the automatic rifle. He saw the faces of the men, the sabers hanging, the sweat-darkened flanks of the horses, and the cone-like slope of the khaki capes, and the Navarrese slant of the khaki berets. The leader turned his horse directly toward the opening in the rocks where the gun was placed and Robert Jordan saw his young, sunand wind-darkened face, his close-set eyes, hawk nose and the overlong wedge-shaped chin.