Eldorado Network Page 7

  “You’re under arrest, Davis,” Summers said. He spoke flatly, not trusting his voice: everything betrayed him now. “You’ll be court-martialled.”

  “Really? With tanks, and planes, and guns?” Davis taunted. “Promise?”

  “Get him out of here.” Summers turned to one of the officers. Davis grabbed the sandbag and slammed it hard against the side of Summers’ head. Summers lurched and thudded against the wall, folded at the knees and slid to the floor, bringing a little rain of dirt and pebbles down on top of him. It coated his head and shoulders and trickled down his arms.

  “Clear off!” one of the officers snapped. At once Davis vanished up the communications trench.

  Summers lay stunned; his eyes kept opening and closing; each time they opened he was looking in a different direction.

  “I guess we ought to be going too,” Townsend said, but at that moment Davis came back. Behind him tramped the huge, unhappy figure of André Marty. The trench was too narrow for both of them.

  At the sight of Summers, Marty stopped. He gave the little circle a glare of scalding contempt; then he stooped, seized Summers by the tunic and hauled him semi-upright. “Zis man,” he growled, “equals fifty of you!” He thrust Summers at the nearest officer and dusted his hands.

  Davis had backed out and escaped again. Marty went to an observation slit. He took out his pistol and blasted off the complete clip in the general direction of Mola’s camp. “Sales boches!” he spat. Summers moaned.

  The correspondents slipped out, and filed through the trenches in silence. As they emerged onto the hillside they saw Davis talking to Templeton. He waved cheerily.

  “You ought to lie low, you know,” Townsend called.

  Davis shrugged. Townsend walked on, worrying, and then turned back. “That bastard is liable to have you shot,” he said.

  “Oh well,” Davis scratched at his scabby face. “Isn’t that what bastards are for?”

  “You’re crazy.” Townsend was angry and concerned; if he hadn’t stayed to talk, Davis wouldn’t be in this mess. “listen, come back to Madrid with us. lie low for a bit. Take a break.”

  “No thanks. I didn’t come to Spain to lie low.”

  “Why the hell did you come to Spain?”

  “Can’t remember. But it seemed a good idea at the time.”

  Townsend ran to catch up with the others. “Get a good story?” Dru asked.

  “Dunno. The International Brigade got screwed at Jarama. Is that a good story?”

  “But they won,” Barker said. “I mean, they really did win. Mola got badly beaten. That’s what those officers told us.”

  “The man Davis is very funny,” Luis remarked.

  “I laughed till I cried,” Townsend said.

  *

  Three days later Dru was back at Jarama—but on the other side of the lines.

  Townsend and Barker had lost interest in the battle. Dru, however, now hoped to get a good pro-Franco story out of it. Victories usually made better news than defeats, and Dru couldn’t see the Republicans winning this one. So Luis drove all around the flank of the war zone, approached Jarama through the Franco lines, and delivered Dru to the flat roof of General Mola’s headquarters in good time to watch Mola’s men go up the hill to attack the International Brigade. This battle had gone on long enough; Dru wanted a good, clean-cut result. He rested his binoculars on the parapet and searched for signs of success in Mola’s men. “These guys look like they know what they’re doing,” he told Luis.

  They did. Six batteries of Spanish artillery had lobbed shells at the Republican positions; German gunners of the Condor Legion had been pounding away with their 88-millimeters; and a unit of the Italian Air Force had bombed the crest. Now Mola’s infantry were climbing to take the hills: professionals from the Army of Africa, lithe, agile, Moorish-looking riflemen in gray blanket-capes. They seemed to flit up the slope like a plague of moths climbing a brown curtain, pausing every few paces to find cover where even Dru, using binoculars, could see no cover. Their shots sounded like someone breaking up firewood, a busy, irregular snapping which nibbled away at the quiet of the valley. Once they had broken the Line, Mola said, he would launch his cavalry at the retreating remnants.

  A German captain of the Condor Legion came onto the roof to watch the assault. Dru nodded to him, and said: “Those eighty-eights of yours pack quite a punch.”

  “In Germany we make the best artillery in the world.”

  “You enjoying yourself in Spain?”

  “It is good training for my men.” The German accepted a glass of beer from an orderly, and grimaced at it. “See: no guts. That’s the trouble with this country. They make bad beer. And bad bread. And bad governments.”

  “Do they make anything good?” Luis asked him.

  “They make good targets.” The German turned away and called down to a friend who was walking by and spilled some beer over the edge to make him dodge.

  Luis was about to reply when Dru nudged him. “Forget it,” he said.

  “Spain does not need these foreign mechanics to save herself,” Luis scowled, “I wish they would all go home.”

  “How about those foreign mechanics, up there?” Dru asked.

  “At least they are dying for Spain.”

  “Uh-huh. You’ve got to die for something before you’re accepted into the club. Is that it?”

  There was an answer to that but Luis could not immediately produce it. He folded his arms and stared sullenly at the hill. At length he made a statement. “It is all a matter of courage and sacrifice,” he said. “That is what matters in Spain.”

  When they went downstairs for lunch, the assault had been halted by raking machine-gun fire from the top: the Republicans’ elderly, armor-plated Maxims were clattering away as regularly and implacably as farm machinery. Mola was in good humor, however. He welcomed Dru and asked him about his impressions of the Republican forces. “I’m told those curious volunteers up there actually have no maps,” he said. “Is that right?”

  “It’s possible. I saw no maps.”

  “Their commander does not believe in using maps. It seems he associates maps with treachery.” Mola spread his arms in a gesture of mild amazement. “How can one win a war without a map?”

  Dru put his finger to his lips. The muted clatter of the Maxims came down the hot midday air, soft and steady, like someone lazily popping the stitches of an endless, metallic seam. “They don’t think they’re losing,” he said.

  “Nor does the bull when he charges the matador,” Mola replied, and there was a ripple of laughter from his aides.

  “Is that how you see this war? A kind of ritual blood-letting?” Dru asked. “An act, a dramatic performance?”

  Mola sipped his wine while he thought about his answer.

  “In Spain everything is a dramatic performance,” he said. “It’s always the same drama: life against death. Every Spaniard is half in love with death. Here we have a civil war because so many Spaniards wish to kill Spain, and only a great deal of death will satisfy them. It must be death met with courage and resolution and all the other dramatic virtues, of course, otherwise the performance will not be considered adequate. Our friends from Germany and Italy,” he smiled at those present, “are not full participants in our drama. They are, if they will forgive the expression, stage-hands rather than actors.”

  The German captain did not look as if he could forgive the expression.

  “And how do you think today’s battle will go?” Dru asked.

  “I hope the enemy will counter-attack,” Mola said. “One cannot have a drama without dialogue.”

  It took another three hours before he had his wish. The International Brigade counter-attacked at half-past four, a long, thin line of men strung out as they appeared over the skyline and ran downhill, their weapons sputtering like stale firecrackers. Dru watched through binoculars and saw the skilled marksmanship of the Moorish soldiers pick off their stumbling attackers, at first by twos a
nd threes and then, as the range shortened, by dozens. The counter-attack faltered, halted, and turned back uphill. Dru watched several men get knocked on their faces as if smashed between their retreating shoulders by an invisible battering-ram. He gave the glasses to Luis and turned away in disgust. “What the hell was that meant to accomplish?” he asked.

  “Dialogue,” said Luis brightly.

  “Lousy dialogue. Jesus Christ, any dummy can get himself killed.” He clenched his teeth and swallowed to suppress a feeling of nausea. “Get the goddam car, Luis. I’ll go say my farewells to the Big Man.”

  As they drove out of the camp, slowly so as not to startle the horses, Luis asked: “How does the general feel?”

  “He says tomorrow is another day.”

  They bounced past the batteries of the Condor Legion, and Luis waved at the blond men sunbathing, naked, by their guns.

  “I don’t understand Mola,” Dru said. “He keeps attacking straight up the face of those hills. That’s a thousand feet from the river to the top.”

  Luis waved at the sentries and put on speed.

  “I just had a look at Mola’s map,” Dru said. “Half a mile to the right, those hills come to an end and another river runs into the Jarama.” He fished out a piece of paper and read his notes. “The Jajuna. Nice wide, flat valley with a good road beside the river. So Mola could send his cavalry around there, outflank the Republican position, and capture the whole damn lot inside an hour.”

  Luis sniffed. “One does not kill the bull by sticking the sword in its rump.”

  “What the hell’s that supposed to mean?”

  “It means battles are for fighting.”

  “Then you’re all crazy.”

  Luis was not listening. “You do not understand Spain,” he said, and put his foot down hard.

  *

  When they got to Madrid the city was under fire. Luis swerved expertly around reeking craters, and hooted his way through the rescuers and onlookers who milled about the dusty ruins of newly shelled buildings. From time to time they heard another curt crump, as random as a thunderclap. After one unusually loud explosion had rattled the car windows, Luis grinned and said, “Boom! Boom! Good story for you.” Dru slumped in his seat and braced his feet against the dashboard.

  They found Barker and Townsend at their hotel. With them was Charles Templeton, the ex-cricketer-painter from the 2nd English Battalion. He was buoyant and breezy and slightly drunk.

  “Get anything new?” Townsend asked at once.

  Dru made a sour face. “It’s like a bad prize-fight on a wet Tuesday in Alberta. Nobody has the punch to win or the brains to lose. What the hell’s he doing here?”

  “I deserted.” Templeton looked briefly woebegone. “You are harboring an outlaw. I can’t tell you how delicious it feels.”

  Dru looked at Barker. “Is there a story in this?”

  “Unfortunately, there is,” Barker said. He went around with the brandy bottle, and gave Templeton a good four fingers. “Can you bear to relate the awful facts once more, old chap?”

  “I’ll tell you what,” Templeton said, “I’ll relate the awful facts, if you’ll order up some grub. Quails’ eggs and avocados and Beef Wellington and knickerbocker glories and lots of brown-bread-and-butter. You see …” He rinsed his teeth in brandy and swallowed pleasurably. “I’ve eaten nothing but filth and sludge for weeks.”

  “I’ll try,” Barker said. He picked up the telephone.

  “And get lots of wine. Tell them to send up a few firkins of decent claret and a couple of carboys of fine hock. You’ve no idea how abrasive Spanish homebrew can be. Even after it’s been cut with ditchwater. One’s palate remains scourged, simply scourged.”

  “So what happened to you?” Dru asked.

  “Nothing,” Templeton said. “But poor old Davis got shot stone dead, and that kind of thing is very infectious these days.”

  He told the story quickly and brightly. Templeton and Davis had shared a dug-out. In the early hours of the morning after the correspondents’ visit, two men had awoken Davis and taken him away to Brigade Headquarters.

  When Davis did not come back, Templeton had volunteered to fetch ammunition from Brigade Headquarters. He sniffed around the farmhouse and found what looked like a fresh grave. He got a shovel and opened it. Davis was three feet down. He had been badly beaten up and shot, or perhaps shot and beaten up, although the latter was less likely.

  “Any ideas?” Dru asked.

  “Oh, it was André Marty,” Templeton told him. “I met a dispatch-rider who told me he saw Marty taking Davis into a barn, before breakfast. Any luck?” he asked Barker.

  “I’ve got you some ham sandwiches and a half-bottle of Beaujolais.”

  “Wonderful.” Templeton shut his eyes and swallowed loudly, in anticipation. “Absolutely spiffing. You’re a gent.”

  “Well, we were at school together.”

  “So then I pinched a motorbike and beetled off to Madrid.” He held out his glass for more brandy.

  “Poor old Davis,” muttered Townsend.

  “Well, he knew what was coming, the silly man,” Templeton said briskly. “He didn’t have to stay.”

  “It sounds as if Marty really is mad,” Barker remarked.

  “Of course he is,” Dru said. “He goes around shooting people. He’s shot about two hundred already.”

  “I’ll tell you what, old boy,” Barker said, “why don’t you have a bath? You smell a bit fruity, you see.”

  “What a noble thought!” Templeton began taking off his clothes and throwing them out of the window.

  Luis had been following the discussion closely. Now he sat staring into his brandy and looking morose. He glanced up and caught Dru’s eye. “This is not war,” he muttered with sad conviction.

  “You may be right,” Dru said, “but it’ll do until something worse comes along.”

  Chapter 7

  Jarama fell. Madrid was isolated. Franco’s armies moved on, and with them went the war correspondents.

  Luis Cabrillo was still their driver but now he was also something more, a cross between a researcher, a translator, a courier and a spy. Because the correspondents found it easier and safer to report the struggle from the Nationalist side, they paid Luis to cross the war zone and bring back Republican accounts of the fighting. This was difficult work, wearying and dangerous: he drove long distances, around or between the battlefronts, guessing at unguarded areas, bluffing and lying when he guessed wrong, perfecting a display of craven horror when stopped by sentries: The war …? you mean the war is here already? … God in heaven … And with trembling hands Luis would turn the car, and accelerate away in such a panic that the rear wheels fish-tailed dramatically, and the guards laughed so much that they forgot to note his registration number. Or so he hoped.

  Eventually, inevitably, somebody remembered him. Or suspected him. Sooner or later somebody, Republican or Nationalist or both, was bound to notice the young man in the big car who always took the wrong turning and turned pale when he ran into the war. Meanwhile, Luis was bringing back rich information, the kind which nobody could invent and which only a Spaniard could discover. He knew what made a good story for each of his employers: Dru needed anti-Republican scandal, Townsend needed straightforward blood-and-guts, Barker needed pro-Republican politics. It was always the same story, but Luis learned how to serve it up three ways. Everyone was pleased and Luis got well rewarded. The extra money compensated for his loneliness, and not just on the trips through the Lines. Suddenly Luis was an orphan.

  He learned about his parents’ death several days after it happened, too late for him to do anything about attending their funeral. They had been traveling in a train, in Valencia, when it was bombed and went tumbling down an embankment at speed. The news reached Luis by a slow and roundabout route, through colleagues of his father. He never discovered which side’s aircraft had done the bombing.

  At first he was calm. What a surprise, he thought. How
very very curious. He thanked the man who had brought the news. “A terrible shock,” the man said. “We all knew your father. He was …” It was difficult, in the circumstances, to say just what Señor Cabrillo was. Or had been. Luis smiled gently, and nodded. They shook hands and parted.

  Later, when the day was dying and the dusk had the texture of old velvet, he wept. It was as if his calmness had been a paper screen of no strength, only a certain position; almost anything could make a hole in it. Luis was in his room, brushing his hair, when someone across the street picked out the first notes of a Chopin waltz on a piano. He stopped brushing. It was a piece which his mother had always played stiffly and resolutely. The unknown hand stopped, and after a moment Luis heard the soft thud of the keyboard cover. He stood with his lungs full of useless air, his fingers squeezing the hairbrush, and tears crept from his eyes like agents of betrayal. He wept not so much for what he had lost as for what he had never had. Throughout his childhood, through all the changing schools and homes and towns, and later when he went from job to job, his mother and father had always been there, too busy to bother with him perhaps, but always potentially available. One day, when everything got straightened out, Luis had planned to approach his parents again, as an equal, of course, so that they could be true friends. Now they would always be strangers. Luis wept with a passion which took him by surprise. What had he lost? Nothing. Then why this grief? He was furious at his own weakness. All his life he had asked nothing of the world, and yet here he was, still painfully vulnerable. It was unfair. Okay, so life was unfair; everybody knew that. To hell with life! He remembered the slogan of Franco’s Moroccan troops: Viva el muerte! Long live death! Luis leaned against a twilit corner of his room, hugging himself for want of anyone else to hug, and cried not like a child but like a man.

  Next day Mola opened a new offensive in the north, and Luis drove the correspondents up to Burgos. The Republicans, it seemed, were fighting a rearguard action as they fell back through the Basque country. That was supposed to be the broad theme, anyway; as usual, hard news was scarce. When they reached Burgos, Luis volunteered to go ahead and find out what exactly was happening.