CAPTAIN LOPEZ AND THE FASCISTS

Captain Lopez had taken two of his good men to carry out a scouting mission. One was called Gonzalez and he could shoot well. Before the war he had worked as a hunter. He could aim and shoot better and more quickly than the captain. The other was called Ivan Maturell and came from a village near to the front with the fascist army. Generally he acted in an introverted and quiet way, but sometimes he had outbreaks of garrulous energy. He also had a violent temper but had begun to learn some discipline. He still always seemed a little dangerous, partly because of his enormousness. On the other hand he took orders well and spoke politely. Captain Lopez marched in front of Gonzalez with Ivan Maturell at the back.

The ground where the soldiers were walking was very soft and progress slow. It had rained the night before and so the soil had become mud, dark and completely saturated with water. But this day the sun shone powerfully down on the soldiers. The men had to march in muddy, sweat soaked uniforms so Captain Lopez and Gonzalez were both in bad moods. Strangely, Ivan Maturell seemed very merry and was telling them how he had decided to join the Communist army.

He said - as the others knew already - that his town, in fact a village, was in serious danger. He said that he hated all the fascists because they had committed brutal atrocities in the villages around his. He said that he had gone to those villages after the fascists had come and had seen a lot of bodies either mutilated or completely destroyed, just lying in the streets. The people that had escaped the sacked villages were too afraid to return so no-one had buried the bodies. They just left them, out in the sun, burning and rotting. The captain said nothing. He had seen worse atrocities than that, and had also committed them himself.

Sometimes the soldiers saw white stones lying on top of the mud. They looked porous, but worn smooth. The soldiers also saw a few bushes, dry and spiny. Hardly any trees appeared; those that did sprawled down over the ground in bare, twisted extra trunks and old branches. There were some pieces of steel that remained from a battle a month ago. However, the soldiers saw no bodies. The Communist Army, thought Ivan Maturell proudly, always allowed the people to bury the bodies.

After some time marching, the capitain threw himself to the ground. His two scouts did the same.

"Look!" said Capitain Lopez, "Can you see the three horses over there? They’re black, and look very small from here. There’s a cabin to the right of them."

"Of course," said Gonzalez.

Ivan Maturell said nothing but when the others looked at him he nodded. He was a little short-sighted and a little ashamed of it.

They crawled silently and slowly for fifty metres until they reached a rock. From behind it they could see the horses very clearly. Then three men came out of the cabin to the right of the horses. The Communist soldiers could tell that the men were fascists and pointed their silenced sniping rifles. They fired and suddenly two fascists were dead. They fired again and the other one fell too.

"Let’s go," said Captain Gonzalez and the soldiers ran to the dead bodies.

Two faces had no expression but the third one certainly did.

"Maturell, go to the cabin and look for papers!" ordered the captain. "Gonzalez, keep watch over there! I’m going to loot the bodies."

Captain Gonzalez pointed to the cabin with one hand and Gonzalez’s position with the other. The two soldiers ran to their places. The first two soldiers had only a few pesetas and cigarette cases. In the third soldier’s pocket found a small mirror with a beautifully carved silver frame. How lucky, he thought, and stroked the silver with his fingers. He turned the mirror round to look at the back and read the name ‘Maria Maturell’. Maturell, he thought, is a pretty rare name. Very carefully Captain Gonzalez replaced the mirror in the dead fascist’s pocket. When he called the other soldiers over, he gave each one a cigarette case. "They will bring you luck," he said.