The Cruzada road was in full view. Beyond it, on gently rising ground, was spread the first-line transport of a brigade and most of its men at a range of a little over a thousand meters.
Miro jumped to the ground and waved up his detachment of Fifth Combat Group.
“Can you work the guns?”
“We can try,” answered the young captain in command.
“It’s easy. Look! Depress until you have the enemy in open sights. You may need to come up a bit. No science to it at all. We’ll see.”
With Salvador and a tank gunner, he gave a demonstration. The sixty-pound shell landed in a group unloading mortar bombs. There was a noticeable change of color in the tiny figures as the odd two thousand men in view looked around. Their gestures suggested that half of them thought the gunners had been careless, half that the dump of bombs had gone up accidentally.
Fifth Combat Group, assisted by a sprinkling of the tank gunners, worked the howitzers insanely and raggedly but with devastating effect. The armor, out on both flanks hull-down, broke up the enemy’s counterattack. In five minutes the road was empty except for burning dumps and transport, and two squadrons were over it and on the other side of the valley.
There was no effective enemy force in sight. The mass of Third Division was evidently concentrated much farther forward for the final assault on the Box. Miro launched Nicuesa down the Cruzada road and ordered him to hook right up the parallel valleys. Third Division was already cut off from its supply base without knowing it, and what would happen when the armor appeared on and behind their left flank was on the knees of the gods.
He set up his Headquarters where he was and started to talk to a wildly excited Chaves. Then the news began to trickle in. Mario Nicuesa had raced into trouble down the Cruzada road and lost four tanks before Chaves’s right wing could roll forward to meet him. The combined force then pushed northward.
A breakout by the Cruzada road had become out-of-date by nine o’clock. For five minutes Miro anxiously paced his patch of high ground trying to compel the excited and sometimes contradictory reports into a concrete picture of the chaos. Then he perceived that if one ignored a pocket of enemy troops on the south of the Box, who could do little harm and might go and breakfast in the Cruzada cafés if they liked, the Box had ceased to exist. The mass of Fifth Division under Chaves had become the powerful left wing of a general advance. Third was at his mercy, cut off from its supplies, enfiladed, without time to find any new defensive position which could not be instantly turned by the armor.
But his lack of man power was quickly apparent. The Juy force reported triumphantly that it had picked up Don Jesús-María and his staff, and half an hour later was begging for orders about what on earth to do with the prisoners. The two troops of tanks and the detachment of Fifth Combat Group had cleared out of Juy with a packed lorry of generals and colonels. The flying, disorganized units of Fourth Division, through which at first they had contemptuously shot their way, were showing signs of rallying; the sheer weight of their numbers was alarming, though they had only their rifles and automatic weapons. The armor was continually sealing off the more persistent packs of the enemy, but the speed of the column was slowed and it was unable to protect its prisoners from long-range, scattered fire. Don Jesús-María was protesting.
He would — loudly, and with all the compelling force of his ultra-military personality. In any other context the position would be comic. But it was not at all comic for the commander of Fifth Combat Group, who would be apologizing and saluting every time a stray bullet ripped through the canvas of the lorry.
Miro toyed with the idea of ordering the column to turn its prisoners loose. If there was any more fighting to do he much preferred that his opponent should be Jesús-María; and once the web of command had been utterly destroyed it didn’t much matter what happened to the individual threads of it. That, however, wouldn’t do. Professional dignity had to be considered. You could shell or bomb the enemy commander — if you didn’t mind your own headquarters being disrupted in retaliation — but you could not insult him. Jesús-María and his officers represented the Army of Guayanas, past and future, and must be carefully treated with the military protocol so dear to his heart. Miro ordered the column to form a laager of armored vehicles within which the distinguished prisoners would be quite safe from small-arms fire, and to present his sincere and personal apologies. It would have to do for the moment. He hoped it would do until he could spare troops and armor to bring the prisoners in. That depended on whether Fourth Division had any artillery which had not been abandoned and any communication with the gunners.
By midday the surrenders of whole battalions from Third Division were becoming embarrassing. Miro toured the enemy dumps and petrol points, where his own armor was now filling up, and added his authority to that of the escorts, who had no cages for their prisoners and were very thin on the ground. The officers and men of Third Division were still shocked and ashamed at the sudden reversal of their fortunes. Miro told them cheerfully that they would be home in a week. He obtained little response. The ranks of brown eyes which met his were veiled and resentful.
Sixth Division stood magnificently firm, fighting its own battle, passing the demoralized units of Third through its forward positions when that was possible, ruthlessly ignoring their existence when it was not. Its right slowly fell back along the line of the forest while its left fought off the continual attacks of the armor, imposing losses and caution on Colonel Nicuesa. If only Sixth had been in action against the Armored Brigade for the first time! Miro realized that he was now paying the price for his mistake on the second evening out from Cumana. He did not persist. One couldn’t have it both ways. In difficult country there had been meticulous control of the squadrons in action and no serious mechanical failures. He broke off the assault on Sixth’s left wing and sent the armor off on a far-ranging hook to the northwest, with orders to complete the encirclement of the enemy and to report any advance of Twelfth Cavalry from its positions at Cumana.
There was now time to clear up loose ends. The indefatigable Ferrer reported that he was at Ventas with the Field Company’s troop carriers, one armored recovery vehicle and five tanks, abandoned along the line of the Breakfast Tram, now extracted and battleworthy. This was a handy force, and Miro had little doubt that his engineer would command it with enterprise and common sense. In any case there was nobody else. He launched Ferrer with orders to contact and escort out of danger the column with Jesús-María and his staff. After that, if he and his company had still any life in them, they were to drive for the Escala de los Ingleses, laager for the night and report early next day whether they could relieve the Saracens and, if not, what force was required.
The column arrived at Miro’s Command Post in the late afternoon. He received Don Jesús-María with the proper military honors of convention, accepted his very beautiful sword and at once returned it. Jesús-María, still bewildered and astonished by a journey which had ended not at Cruzada but at the aldea which had been the former Headquarters of Third Division, seemed to have forgotten all resentment at his unceremonious capture.
“What has happened?” he asked. “What has happened?”
Miro handed over the care of the enemy staff to Salvador Irala, took his former commander into the cottage where his pennant was now flying and showed him the map.
“Third and Fourth Divisions have ceased to exist. Sixth is more or less in my old position, but its right wing is ten kilometers farther north. It has only its first-line transport and supplies, and must surrender in two days at the most.”
“But what will you do to us? This is without precedent, without sense!”
“To you and your commanders, Don Jesús-María? On parole in the Citadel if that suits you. What I am to do with the rest of my prisoners, God knows. Perhaps you will be good enough to help us with your advice.”
“Have you all Fourth Division?”
“Very few,” Miro answered frankly. “Many are disarmed, bu
t I have not the men to round them up.”
If it hadn’t been for Basilio Ferrer, whose reports were just coming in, Fourth Division might have begun to forget that they had been defeated. When last seen, Ferrer had added a troop of Third’s motorized eighteen-pounders to his force and for the first time in anyone’s memory looked — according to the commander of Fifth Combat Group — as if he were really enjoying himself. After clearing the way home for the Juy column, he had perceived that his move to the Escala would be thoroughly unsafe until the organized groups of Fourth Division were disorganized again. So he had raided the plain far and wide, disarming the units, crushing rifles and automatic weapons under the tracks of his five tanks, and herding the defenseless troops along the roads to Los Milagros and their peacetime stations.
“You have won a remarkable battle, Captain General,” said Don Jesús-María. “For the sake of Guayanas, I only hope it is decisive.”
“That is the affair of the commander in chief,” Miro answered — and then, more warmly: “Your quarters will be ready now, and I hope you will do me the honor to dine with me. Believe me, Don Jesús-María, you will be as welcome as you always were in the Citadel.”
“Ah, Miro! Miro! Only two weeks ago!”
“Why did you do it? It was not for Avellana.”
“Affection, Miro. An old man’s affection for his Army and you and your Division. I saw that Ledesma’s revolt would make it impossible for you to move. I hoped you would feel that fuerza maior at last relieved you of all responsibility. That you would lead out your — your machine — against the whole Army and Air Force — well, it was unbelievable.”
Unbelievable? Why? That was what he was for, what the Division was for. The train of circumstance had been brutally fast for them all, but there was no point in it at which he could have done anything else but what he did. Gil Avellana — the only man of the whole lot who believed in a principle and acted on it — had seen quite clearly what the result of his illegal course must be, and accepted the challenge.
Miro could not respond to the slight quivering of the white mustache, the worn, steady eyes which would not even blink to hold back a tear. Pride and emotion — how did they mix the two so easily?
“I warned you that my duty was plain to me,” he replied.
“Your sense of duty has been expensive, Miro. The university . . . And here at Cruzada, what? Two thousand casualties, or is it three? And five hundred men killed and burned in the Quebradas Pass.”
“The Quebradas Pass?”
“Do you have to tell me it was an accident?”
“I have no news. You must admit, Don Jesús-María, that I have no telephone to Twelfth Cavalry.”
“Miro, the money and a visaed passport were found on the body of the engine driver. He lost his nerve and jumped too late. And it must have been you who gave the order to Vidal.”
“The line had to be blocked. What happened?”
“He loosed a freight train down the slope when two squadrons and a Regiment of Artillery were coming up. Both trains went over the edge and finished three hundred meters below. That was not necessary to put down revolution, Miro. That is no way to fight.”
“And Cumana, where my troops were helpless under your air attack — is that a way to fight?”
“Let’s not split hairs, son! Excuse my freedom — at my age one does not accustom oneself easily to the changed circumstances of old friends. You complain of Cumana? I might as well say that your splendid Armored Brigade murders the defenseless. No, no, Miro, we have both fought, I hope, with such chivalry as science in these days allows. But sabotage and on that scale! No one will understand.”
Miro escorted Don Jesús-María to the door in a sudden, silent embarrassment, for the guns above the hamlet had begun to crash and roll like some monstrous pack of hounds unleashed for the kill. In the last hour before darkness he had brought up the unlimited ammunition captured from the enemy and added to his own as much of their heavy artillery as he had the men to serve. The brutality of the bombardment of Sixth Division made it impossible to look in the face the commander whose inefficacy was responsible for it. But in the end, this merciless shelling would save lives. The morale of Sixth Division had to be broken before its command received the summons, flowery and courteous as he and his staff could make it, to surrender.
Salvador Irala returned from his temporary job as catering manager for distinguished prisoners.
“How are they?” Miro asked.
“Ghosts, my General. Nothing fits for them.”
“What the devil did they expect?” he asked in exasperation.
“Some hard fighting like yesterday. And then, when we saw that our position was hopeless, a truce.”
“You have heard what happened in the Quebradas Pass? Don Jesús-María considers it was not war.”
“His opinion on war is not of overwhelming interest to us, my General. One might as well consult Colonel Chaves on politics.”
“We may come to that, too, Salvador.”
“Excellent — if he does not insist that an intellectual like myself should have the Ministry of Education when I want the Washington Embassy.”
Miro turned his usual stare on the incorrigible A.D.C. What he implied so lightheartedly was a vision of a quite possible future — not necessarily Rosalindo’s, but well within the pattern of a Latin-American military dictator handing out the jobs.
“Any other news on its way to me?”
“Q has just heard that the Santa María is anchored off Viera.”
“Get me Colonel Chaves on the land line.”
Before Miro could say a word, Chaves was begging his permission to attack. If the barrage were stopped or lifted, there were two positions he could take before the last of the dusk.
“No, Rosalindo. They are not worth another life.”
“By God, they are! I’ll teach ’em to make a revolution against Fifth Division.”
“I think we have made the point clear.”
“As you wish, Chief. Then what orders?”
“Do you want anything unloaded from the Santa María? She is in.”
“Not I! They go to war in luxury, our friends! I have Pedro Valdés’s cook and his mess truck. A pity you can’t smell our dinner cooking down the telephone!”
“Is the cook willing?”
“He’d better be. If you want to discharge the Santa María I’ll requisition labor from Cruzada.”
“I’ll decide later. It seems hardly worth it. We’re short of nothing but shell for the armor.”
“What about Twelfth Cavalry, Chief? Are they doing good business selling manure?”
“Mario has been halfway to Cumana. No sign of movement.”
“Suppose they advance to San Vicente and blow the Jaquiri Bridge behind them? Don Gregorio is going to wet his pants.”
“Avellana will wet his worse if there’s nothing in the Quebradas Pass between us and Siete Dolores.”
“We’ll force the Pass anyway.”
“No, it would cost half what is left of us. And my nerves won’t stand any more armor in single file. As soon as Sixth surrenders, you and I will sit at Cumana while Mario goes round by Los Milagros into Siete Dolores. Have you got the mission there?”
“Just arrived, Chief. Where did you get the white sheet from? Pinch it off a Cruzada hotel?”
“Mess tablecloth, Rosalindo. Use your loudspeaker and send them over from any of the forward positions. There’ll be dead silence in another seven minutes.”
When the silence came it was of a whole world blessedly and startingly deprived of man. The tumbled ground where Sixth Division clung to its folds and foxholes had lost all detail. It just showed as a low, straight, blue-black cloud between darkness and the last red stripe of sunset. One could imagine beyond it the trees, the sea and the last of life. Continuity as well as noise had ended.
For Miro the peace broke his determined control of utter tiredness. The speed of reasoning, the accuracy of command stop
ped dead, returning the human computer to the earth from which it had been built. Victory was unimportant, and emptier still the hearty usefulness of his conversation with Rosalindo. The singing of his ears, the slight raising of the hair at the back of his neck stopped as he wondered if Rosalindo could possibly be feeling the same. But of course he did, and perhaps more keenly. Could one allow mystic vision to the tiger? With certainty, for it was not rotten with human doubts. If it were the pure in heart who should see God, what could be purer than a tiger?
Around his Headquarters the sounds of the military evening came to life — the clink of cooking vessels, the conventionally exasperated growl of the usual adjectives, the ratlike clickings and scufflings of the Signals Office, the raised voice of a sergeant. A brief snarl of machine-gun fire, from low ground somewhere far out to the right, returned his mind instantly to its picture-making of the map, of commanders, of units connected to the enemy by bright threads of fire and to their supports by paths of darkness.
He went over to the palm-thatched, open shed which was doing duty as a mess. Insects were slapping against the paraffin lamps. His orderly, with the native eagerness to be a generous and understanding host, was doing his best to back up Salvador in entertaining Don Jesús-María and his chief of staff. They sat down to dinner, and Miro thanked heaven for the habit, ingrained in all of them, of effortless chat. One neutral subject succeeded another without awkwardness. They didn’t even show self-consciousness — though Miro was sure that they all felt it — when the conversation turned to the proper covering for children’s soft toys in a tropical country.
A dispatch rider roared up to Headquarters, the dust of his passage misting the darkness beyond the lamps of the mess. Salvador, going out unobtrusively, returned with a letter. Miro read with utter astonishment, which he did not attempt to conceal, the answer to his summons to surrender.
Pedro Valdés, elected to the Command of Sixth Division and confirmed in his appointment by President Avellana, has the honor to inform Major General Kucera that he is not empowered to enter into any discussions or to accept any conditions which will betray the future and the ideals of Guayanas and its armed forces. Where the Division stands, there it dies. Viva Avellana!
Thing to Love Page 23
