over twenty oxen, whether you believe it or not!" Quail
said, mocking Anastasio.

XXI

The firing lessened, then slowly died out. Luis Cervantes, who had been
hiding amid a heap of ruins at the fortification on the crest of the
hill, made bold to show his face. How he had managed to hang on, he did
not know. Nor did he know when Demetrio and his men had disappeared.
Suddenly he had found himself alone; then, hurled back by an avalanche
of infantry, he fell from his saddle; a host of men trampled over him
until he rose from the ground and a man on horseback hoisted him up
behind him. After a few moments, horse and riders fell. Left without
rifle, revolver, or arms of any kind, Cervantes found himself lost in
the midst of white smoke and whistling bullets. A hole amid a debris of
crumbling stone offered a refuge of safety.

"Hello, partner!"

"Luis, how are you!"

"The horse threw me. They fell upon me. Then they took my gun away. You
see, they thought I was dead. There was nothing I could do!" Luis
Cervantes explained apologetically. Then:

"Nobody threw me down," Solis said. "I'm here because I like to play
safe."

The irony in Solis' voice brought a blush to Cervantes' cheek.

"By God, that chief of yours is a man!" Solis said. "What daring, what
assurance! He left me gasping--and a hell of a lot of other men with
more experience than me, too!"

Luis Cervantes vouchsafed no answer.

"What! Weren't you there? Oh, I see! You found a nice place for
yourself at the right time. Come here, Luis, I'll explain; let's go
behind that rock. From this meadow to the foot of the hill, there's no
road save this path below. To the right, the incline is too sharp; you
can't do anything there. And it's worse to the left; the ascent is so
dangerous that a second's hesitation means a fall down those rocks and
a broken neck at the end of it. All right! A number of men from Moya's
brigade who went down to the meadow decided to attack the enemy's
trenches the first chance they got. The bullets whizzed about us, the
battle raged on all sides. For a time they stopped firing, so we
thought they were being attacked from behind. We stormed their
trenches--look, partner, look at that meadow! It's thick with corpses!
Their machine guns did that for us. They mowed us down like wheat; only
a handful escaped. Those Goddamned officers went white as a sheet; even
though we had reinforcements they were afraid to order a new charge.
Tha