"'Port arms!' He acted like he didn't know how, so the old fool went around and took hold of the rifle.
"'This way!' says he, pulling on it.
"'Oh!' says the fellow, 'that way!' And he let him have the bayonet right in the chest...."
After that Fernando Silveyra, the paymaster, recounted a few anecdotes of the curas, or priests, that sounded exactly like Touraine in the thirteenth century, or the feudal rights of landlords over their women tenants before the French Revolution. Fernando ought to have known, too, for he was brought up for the Church. There must have been about twenty of us sitting around that fire, all the way from the most miserably poor peon in the Tropa up to First Captain Longinos Güereca. There wasn't one of these men who had any religion at all, although once they had all been strict Catholics. But three years of war have taught the Mexican people many things. There will never be another Porfirio Diaz; there will never be another Orozco Revolution; and the Catholic Church in Mexico will never again be the voice of God.
Then Juan Santillanes, a twenty-two-year-old subteniente, who seriously informed me that he was descended from the great Spanish hero, Gil Blas, piped up the ancient disreputable ditty, which begins:
"I am Count Oliveros
Of the Spanish artillery...."
Juan proudly displayed four bullet wounds. He had killed a few defenseless prisoners with his own gun, he said; giving promise of growing up to be muy matador (a great killer) some day. He boasted of being the strongest and bravest man in the army. His idea of humor seemed to be breaking eggs into the pocket of my coat. Juan was very young for his years, but very likable.
But the best friend I had beside 'Gino Güereca was Subteniente Luis Martinez. They called him "Gachupine"—the contemptuous name for Spaniards—because he might have stepped out of a portrait of some noble Spanish youth by Greco. Luis was pure race—sensitive, gay and high-spirited. He was only twenty, and had never been in battle. Around the contour of his face was a faint black beard.
He fingered it, grinning. "Nicanor and I made a bet that we wouldn't shave until we took Torreon...."
Luis and I slept in different rooms. But at night, when the fire had gone out and the rest of the fellows were snoring, we sat at each other's blankets—one night in his cuartel, the one next to mine—talking about the world, our girls, and what we were going to be and to do when we really got at it. When the war was over, Luis was coming to the United States to visit me; and then we were both coming back to Durango City to visit the Martinez family. He showed me the photograph of a little baby, proudly boasting that he was an uncle already. "What will you do when the bullets begin to fly?" I asked him.