“What do you say?” Pablo said to her and Robert Jordan saw the betrayed look on his face and the sweat on his forehead as he turned his head.
“I am for the bridge and against thee,” the wife of Pablo said. “Nothing more.”
“I am also for the bridge,” the man with the flat face and the broken nose said, crushing the end of the cigarette on the table.
“To me the bridge means nothing,” one of the brothers said. “I am for the mujer of Pablo.”
“Equally,” said the other brother.
“Equally,” the gypsy said.
Robert Jordan watched Pablo and as he watched, letting his right hand hang lower and lower, ready if it should be necessary, half hoping it would be (feeling perhaps that were the simplest and easiest yet not wishing to spoil what had gone so well, knowing how quickly all of a family, all of a clan, all of a band, can turn against a stranger in a quarrel, yet thinking what could be done with the hand were the simplest and best and surgically the most sound now that this had happened), saw also the wife of Pablo standing there and watched her blush proudly and soundly and healthily as the allegiances were given.
“I am for the Republic,” the woman of Pablo said happily. “And the Republic is the bridge. Afterwards we will have time for other projects.”
“And thou,” Pablo said bitterly. “With your head of a seed bull and your heart of a whore. Thou thinkest there will be an afterwards from this bridge? Thou hast an idea of that which will pass?”
“That which must pass,” the woman of Pablo said. “That which must pass, will pass.”
“And it means nothing to thee to be hunted then like a beast after this thing from which we derive no profit? Nor to die in it?”
“Nothing,” the woman of Pablo said. “And do not try to frighten me, coward.”
“Coward,” Pablo said bitterly. “You treat a man as coward because he has a tactical sense. Because he can see the results of an idiocy in advance. It is not cowardly to know what is foolish.”
“Neither is it foolish to know what is cowardly,” said Anselmo, unable to resist making the phrase.
“Do you want to die?” Pablo said to him seriously and Robert Jordan saw how unrhetorical was the question.
“No.”
“Then watch thy mouth. You talk too much about things you do not understand. Don’t you see that this is serious?” he said almost pitifully. “Am I the only one who sees the seriousness of this?”
I believe so, Robert Jordan thought. Old Pablo, old boy, I believe so. Except me. You can see it and I see it and the woman read it in my hand but she doesn’t see it, yet. Not yet she doesn’t see it.
“Am I a leader for nothing?” Pablo asked. “I know what I speak of. You others do not know. This old man talks nonsense. He is an old man who is nothing but a messenger and a guide for foreigners. This foreigner comes here to do a thing for the good of the foreigners. For his good we must be sacrificed. I am for the good and the safety of all.”
“Safety,” the wife of Pablo said. “There is no such thing as safety. There are so many seeking safety here now that they make a great danger. In seeking safety now you lose all.”
She stood now by the table with the big spoon in her hand.
“There is safety,” Pablo said. “Within the danger there is the safety of knowing what chances to take. It is like the bullfighter who knowing what he is doing, takes no chances and is safe.”
“Until he is gored,” the woman said bitterly. “How many times have I heard matadors talk like that before they took a goring. How often have I heard Finito say that it is all knowledge and that the bull never gored the man; rather the man gored himself on the horn of the bull. Always do they talk that way in their arrogance before a goring. Afterwards we visit them in the clinic.” Now she was mimicking a visit to a bedside, “Hello, old timer. Hello,” she boomed. Then, “Buenas, Compadre. How goes it, Pilar?” imitating the weak voice of the wounded bullfighter. “How did this happen, Finito, Chico, how did this dirty accident occur to thee?” booming it out in her own voice. Then talking weak and small, “It is nothing, woman. Pilar, it is nothing. It shouldn’t have happened. I killed him very well, you understand. Nobody could have killed him better. Then having killed him exactly as I should and him absolutely dead, swaying on his legs, and ready to fall of his own weight, I walked away from him with a certain amount of arrogance and much style and from the back he throws me this horn between the cheeks of my buttocks and it comes out of my liver.” She commenced to laugh, dropping the imitation of the almost effeminate bullfighter’s voice and booming again now. “You and your safety! Did I live nine years with three of the worst paid matadors in the world not to learn about fear and about safety? Speak to me of anything but safety. And thee. What illusions I put in thee and how they have turned out! From one year of war thou has become lazy, a drunkard and a coward.”