riano Azuela

A Novel of the Mexican Revolution

Translated by E. Munguia, Jr.

Original Title: LOS DE ABAJO

PART ONE

"How beautiful the revolution!
Even in its most barbarous aspect it is beautiful,"
Solis said with deep feeling.

I

"That's no animal, I tell you! Listen to the dog barking! It must be a
human being."

The woman stared into the darkness of the sierra.

"What if they're soldiers?" said a man, who sat Indian-fashion, eating,
a coarse earthenware plate in his right hand, three folded tortillas in
the other.

The woman made no answer, all her senses directed outside the hut. The
beat of horses' hoofs rang in the quarry nearby. The dog barked again,
louder and more angrily.

"Well, Demetrio, I think you had better hide, all the same."

Stolidly, the man finished eating; next he reached for a cantaro and
gulped down the water in it; then he stood up.

"Your rifle is under the mat," she whispered.

A tallow candle illumined the small room. In one corner stood a plow, a
yoke, a goad, and other agricultural implements. Ropes hung from the
roof, securing an old adobe mold, used as a bed; on it a child slept,
covered with gray rags.

Demetrio buckled his cartridge belt about his waist and picked up his
rifle. He was tall and well built, with a sanguine face and beardless
chin; he wore shirt and trousers of white cloth, a broad Mexican hat
and leather sandals.

With slow, measured step, he left the room, vanishing into the
impenetrable darkness of the night.

The dog, excited to the point of madness, had jumped over the corral
fence.

Suddenly a shot rang out. The dog moaned, then barked no more. Some men
on horseback rode up, shouting and sweating; two of them dismounted,
while the other hung back to watch the horses.

"Hey, there, woman: we want food! Give us eggs, milk, beans, anything
you've got! We're starving!"

"Curse the sierra! It would take the Devil himself not to lose his way!"

"Guess again, Sergeant! Even the Devil would go astray if he were as
drunk as you are."

The first speaker wore chevrons on his arm, the other red stripes on
his shoulders.

"Whose place is this, old woman? Or is it an empty house? God's truth,
which is it?"

"Of course it's not empty. How about the light and that child there?
Look here, confound it, we want to eat, and damn quick tool Are you
coming out or are we going to make you?"

"You swine! Both of you! You've go