“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.