Thing to Love (39 page)

They would. Of course they would. Felicia remembered how she, too, had once thought as they did. How could it ever be possible to explain to them that Miro had made his stand for something higher still? They did not know him as she and Fifth Division and even Pablo Morote did. They were bound to file him indignantly away in one of the existing pigeonholes of their intellectual minds. By far the most convenient was Fascist Mercenary, To Be Shot. And if they did not approve on principle of shooting a man to death (except perhaps in South America) at least they would have no objection to imprisonment for life. An hour a day to see his beloved sun was quite enough for him.

Obsessed by the imagining of that burst of fire, that cone of bullets which would leave the hard and splendid body a white sack emptying its blood, she leaped out of her chair at the double deep crash of two explosions from the sea. They were followed instantly by a thunder of guns which were unfamiliar to her.

All of them were on their feet in time to see through the great window of the Little Salon two white fountains still hanging in the air five hundred meters from the shore. From the corner of the arch, looking to the northwest, the
Frente Unido
could be seen silhouetted against the tumbled red rocks below the Avenida Gregorio Vidal. She was so close inshore that she seemed to be aground, and so confused with her own shadow on the cliffs that anyone unfamiliar with the coastline would have had to look twice to see that she was not a cave or a stratum of gray clay.

Avellana did not bother with the discreet and gentle telephones.
He strode across the Little Salon, flung open the door and shouted for Salinas.

As the captain entered, he saluted with exaggerated deference and exchanged a casual greeting with Felicia and her father. She could tell nothing from his lined face, which only showed its usual, genial indifference. In the depths of the creases something was alive, some hint of savagery and mischief. Oh, but for God's sake, was it now going to be necessary to analyze an ape?

He drew out the formalities, ignoring the President's demand for an explanation.

“What does this mean, Captain Salinas?” Avellana repeated.

“Nothing,
hombre
, nothing! I merely wished to speak with your Excellency. And I thought it more fitting that you should send for me rather than that I should have the discourtesy to insist.”

“Now that you see with whom I am engaged —”

This was intolerable. She had not yet given up hope, though even if Gil Avellana could be shaken, there was still the cold, deadly fanaticism of Pedro Valdés. But this mad Spaniard was making mercy impossible.

“Go, please go, Captain Salinas!” she cried. “Some other time, for God's sake!”

“Have you seen your husband, Doña Felicia?”

“No.”

“I am not surprised. All I wished to say, Excellency, is that Miro Kucera has deserved death ten times over. In these days there is only one fate for a Quixote. But torture, no!”

“Miro Kucera has not been tortured,” Avellana replied, his voice more puzzled than indignant. “What do you think I am?”

“Paco, your accusation is ridiculous!” Juan exclaimed. “And it is I who tell you so.”

Felicia, too, knew that it was impossible. She would have felt Miro's physical agony as clearly as she felt his depression.

“Friend Juan, you are an Avellanista. You have faith in your leader, but what do you know? The North Americans say he has been tortured, and the Navy of Guayanas wishes to know the truth.”

Avellana seemed to have completely recovered his poise. For a
moment she could almost admire him, or at any rate understand the devotion he inspired.

“I fear newspaper readers are more interested in torture than truth, Captain Salinas,” he said, smiling.

“Quite true, Excellency! But all the same I wish to see him.”

“It did not need so loud a knock on the door. You may go down and see him now if you wish.”

“I have not the face for a prison chaplain, my President. And besides, once I am in with Miro I see no reason why you should not keep me there as the next tenant of his cell.”

“Frankly, I had not thought of it.”

“I feel sure that General Valdés would recommend it to Your Excellency in my absence. Meanwhile, perhaps I had better have a word with him, for long experience of Communist mentality persuades me that when they do not understand what is happening their first instinct is to fiddle with a trigger. Don Pedro, if communication ceases for four minutes between me and the
Frente Unido
, the gunnery lieutenant will carry out his orders. I regret that he will do so with relish. He has never enjoyed San Vicente as much as I.”

“What are those orders?” Avellana asked.

“Mutiny. No doubt he will allow us another minute, in case we are so engrossed in conversation that I forget to call. But slowly, slowly, Excellency! To tell you the truth, science bores me, but sometimes it is useful.”

He took a flat box from the inside pocket of his tunic, which had appeared to them all clumsy and ill-fitting. His return to a normal, naval smartness somehow emphasized — though so little a thing — an impression of ruthlessness.

“My wireless officer assures me this will work if I remember what to do. Do you understand transistors, Don Juan?”

“Not I! Not even when it has wires.”

“That is a pity, for these gentlemen of the open spaces are most unlikely to be of any help. Well, we can only try. With your permission, Excellency . . . for my first call is due at sixteen hours fifteen. That clock is a minute fast. It always annoyed me that Don Gregorio liked his clocks to be fast.”

He sat down before a little occasional table of mahogany and silver which had belonged to Concha, placed on it the miniature walkie-talkie and snapped up a folding aerial.

“We will see if I am able to communicate with the conning tower. . . . It is I, Paco. . . . Over.”

The box replied very audibly:
“Can I give them one, my Captain?”

“Patience, Alberto! Patience! I am testing. Give me two from the bridge pom-pom.”

Two sparks of light flashed against the
Frente Unido's
shadow, followed by the sharp cracks of the pom-pom.

“Thank you, Alberto. Targets as ordered, should I fail to call you. . . . What a marvel, Excellency! It seems incredible! . . . Now, to return to our conversation, would it be possible for me to ask a simple question of Miro Kucera? I give you my word that it has nothing to do with politics.”

Avellana picked up the telephone:

“Kucera and escort to the Little Salon immediately! . . . Captain Salinas, I am prepared to listen to you rather than blow the
Frente Unido
out of the water. But I warn you that if you attempt to reopen the civil war, I shall have no mercy on you and your officers.”

“And Your Excellency would be entirely justified, for my officers and I are all agreed. I would, however, remind you that the crew come from the poorest of your citizens, for whom I sincerely hope you will do better than Don Gregorio. They are trained to obey orders without question. And being most of them pure Indians, they delight in watching their shells explode without bothering very much what they explode on. But you understand your people as well as I do. If circumstances should compel us to forgo the honor of serving your government, let me assure you that you may have absolute trust in the seamen I have trained and the officers who have been left on shore. I would not like you to think that we have not done our duty.”

“Calm, Feli!” her father murmured. “This may be the one in ten thousand that I spoke of.”

She tried to give herself to his voice, for she was at the point of near hysteria. All her efforts to play on the emotions of Avellana
had been utterly frustrated by Paco Salinas — or by Vidal if he was behind this nautical farce. But he couldn't be. Salinas's interruption sounded like some bizarre, personal challenge which had nothing to do with Miro and could only confirm his sentence.

The
mayordomo
opened the doors. It was unnecessary for him to bow as Miro between two young officers entered the room, but long habit could pass as the excuse.

Miro was in his field uniform without any badges of rank. Felicia felt the tears pour silently down her cheeks, for in his surprise at seeing her he had begun to stretch out his arms to her and stopped the gesture before it was more than an upward start of the wrists. His dark blue eyes passed from her to the four other occupants of the room, summing up so curious a disposition, where his own people were inextricably mixed with the enemy.

“Mercy, Gil, mercy!” she cried. “You cannot forget that he was your guest, your friend.”

Avellana merely raised a deprecating hand. The physical presence of that face, which he had so long imagined and feared during the helpless months in Los Venados, had ended, she could see, all hope of reprieve.

“The escort will remain,” Valdés ordered.

“There is no need, Pedro,” Avellana replied. “We have nothing to fear. And this business — Well, out of respect to Don Juan and his distinguished family, I think it should be settled in private.”

When the door was again shut, Avellana turned to Paco Salinas.

“Here is Kucera. You can see for yourself that your accusation of torture is an insult to me. Ask him your question.”

“A moment, Excellency. We are always in danger of forgetting the four minutes.”

He nodded cordially to Miro as if they had just been passing on the terrace of the Ateneo, and made the routine call to the
Frente Unido
. He ignored the fascinated eyes with the pretended detachment of a cat washing itself.

“Well, friend Miro,” he said. “Do you wish to die?”

“Not particularly, Paco.”

“I asked only because with a man like you one is never sure.
Then at last I have the honor to inform Don Gil and Don Pedro that the Navy of Guayanas declares for the legal government of President Vidal.”

“While under the guns of the Citadel?” Avellana asked.

“Too close under the guns of the Citadel, Don Gil. But I admit it is a point which would not occur to a civilian.”

Miro walked to the window. His professional interest was so obvious that neither Avellana nor Valdés challenged his right to move about at ease.

“A mortar perhaps,” he murmured. “Nothing else.”

“She'll have to move from there at low water, Gil,” Pedro Valdés said.

“Hombre!
They should make you an admiral!” Captain Salinas exclaimed. “She will indeed! But it will then be dusk, and in a few minutes she will be covered by the skyline of the city. It is a risk I would not take against Miro's radar-controlled turrets, but without disrespect to your cavalry gunners, Don Pedro, I think they would be more likely to drop a salvo on the port buildings or the moon.”

“Captain Salinas, we are all being carried away,” said Avellana with a forced but still admirably charming smile. “I hope never again to see citizens of Guayanas firing on each other. So do you. What motive can you possibly have for opposing me — you, an old republican of the left wing? It is true that until now we have been only casual acquaintances, but what I stand for you know, and you are not a man to be taken in by propaganda.”

“I have nothing against you at all, Don Gil. Put it that I am ready to fight for my religion, though God has omitted to tell me what it is. If I thought that Miro was any use to Him dead, I would not interfere. As it is, I can only judge by what I feel. What has it to do with me if Vidal provides the Barracas with a public lavatory in marble when they have nothing to eat and nothing to put in it? What has it to do with me if Avellana prefers them to borrow a horse and perform their needs like gentlemen in open country? Here I am, Don Gil — without country, without politics, without a faith. Only a man such as I can see truth. I would not fire a gun for Vidal or you, for Russia or the United States. You
are all the same. You mean well, but you have nothing to do with anything of value to me. I am not a speaker. If Don Juan understands my principles, he can loose them off in the Chamber and get an ovation for you and himself. What I tell you is that if the world were full of lunatics like Miro Kucera there would be no more need of soldiers, priests and politicians. You ask me what my motives are. They are simple:
Viva el General Kucera!
For that I fight!”

“In that case, Captain Salinas, you will be shot with him tomorrow morning without trial.”

“A pity, Don Gil. You will have lost two excellent servants of the State, and the Palace too.”

“The Palace?”

“Those are the orders you asked about. As soon as I cease to communicate with the
Frente Unido
, the two eight-inch turrets — your seamen serve them with such enthusiasm, Don Gil, that they call them Mary and Joseph — will begin on the seafront and on the Little Salon where we are. We shall then destroy the patio, and work our way through the building until we reach the President's study, the gallery and the portico. With the six-inch guns to help, I think there will be little of the Palace left by sunset. The range to the flower beds on the glacis is precisely 3870 meters. I do not wish to exaggerate. I do not say that Joseph could knock the telephone off that table without touching Don Pedro. But very nearly — very nearly.”

Avellana stared at him.

“I cannot believe —” he began. “No, there is not a man alive who would do such a thing! You cannot mean it!”

“No, Paco!” Miro exclaimed. “I forbid it absolutely.”

“And what right have you, friend, to give orders to the Navy? You should know by now that we don't obey them.”

“Look, Captain Salinas,” said Pedro Valdés reasonably. “The Presidents, the guard, the nonsense — I understand that you think it is worthless. But you, you an old revolutionary, you cannot take that beauty from the people. It is theirs.”