‘And the road ahead?’ The nod was slow, but positive, so Cal asked, ‘Sentries?’
That killed off any humour and Laporta once more looked grim.
‘Look, if your men are going to behave like soldiers, that is the best place to start.’
The answer did not come immediately; it was the same as sitting on that wall outside the Ritz Hotel. The anarchist suspected he was out of his depth and in need of advice, but he was too proud to ask, yet hanging in the air was Cal’s threat to take himself and his men away.
‘Tonight, they will be my men,’ Laporta said, finally and with confidence.
Later on, when the time came to execute such a promise, it turned out to be a lot less simple, only solved after a noisy discussion, which seemed again to involve every one of the Barcelona anarchists who had an opinion and the conviction of their right to air it. Cal stayed well out of it, but he did observe that Laporta finally began to lay down the law, in essence to begin to act like a proper commander and not the chairman of some revolutionary committee.
Not that his orders were accepted with grace; it was a sullen bunch of anarchists who went out into the gathering gloom, while their leader continued to argue with his senior underlings as to whose job it was to ensure both that the necessary changes were made and who should be responsible.
Vince summed it up in one well-worn phrase. ‘Fred Karno’s Circus, guv.’
‘It’s a new tactic, Vince, you make so much noise arguing the toss you frighten away your enemy.’
* * *
Another salient fact was the way the atmosphere was noticeably changed by the arrival of the chain-smoking Drecker and his men; they kept themselves separate in a way that did not apply to the British contingent, made up of youngsters who had a sunny disposition on life, took the ribbing they had received earlier in good humour and generally showed their Spanish compatriots a comradely attitude.
The communists were not given to smiling at anyone, not even each other, seeming like a particularly committed set of monks in their sense of purpose. They had appropriated one corner of the square and they stayed there, being subjected, after eating, to what looked like lectures that had to be about politics, given by their squad leaders, and Cal, seeing Laporta was still with Drecker, wandered over to listen, though it was more the tone than the words, given he could not understand them; he could tell by the gestures it was all about purpose.
So intent were they that no attention was paid to him, which allowed him to look over their stacked equipment. With the eye of a professional he did not have to get too close to their rifles to recognise them as Mosin-Nagants, the standard rifle of the Russians since czarist times; bolt action and magazine fed, they were a pretty useful weapon.
Idling on, he walked behind their trucks, and with the rear flaps down he could see they had ample ammunition and what he thought were boxes of grenades, all with Cyrillic script lettering to denote their Soviet provenance. It was not too surprising that communists looked to Russia for their weaponry, but it was just another indication of the state of the nation; how easy it had been over the years for such a group as the PCE to smuggle in their own armoury.
Back out in the open, Cal, in reacting to a shout, was dragged into having dinner with Drecker and Laporta – he half suspected the Spaniard could not abide that he should eat with the German alone. That was a sore trial; if the anarchist was given to an excess of pride in the company of his lieutenants, he was positively barbed by the new arrival. Not that he was alone in that. Both were eager to air their differences in a dialectical debate on competing principles, and the German bugger smoked incessantly, holding his cigarette in that affected manner.
What it came down to, as far as Cal could make out – not easy in a three-way language discussion – was the difference between the communist ideal of central control and the anarchist view, which was the precise opposite. For Juan Luis Laporta, centralism was an abomination and he made no attempt to keep hidden his repugnance of the notion, the idea that the leadership was not only always right, but that it had no need to explain itself to those who followed.
Listening to them argue, it was worrying how this would play out in action, and not only in the tripartite relaying of orders; Laporta, by dint of his numbers, was the leader, and if Cal Jardine was determined to educate him he must seek to do nothing to openly undermine his position in the process.
Less certain in that regard, and it was only an impression, was Drecker, a humourless prig who also had, as well as his beliefs, an air of arrogance recognisably German and of the most intolerant Prussian hue, which went against his rough Ruhr accent. He created the feeling that he might question every instruction given, which would be fatal in an engagement.
It was a relief to get away and meet up with Florencia, who had found an abandoned house into which she was eager to drag him, though he was obliged to keep her waiting while he checked on his charges, making sure they were ready for the morning, pleased that they seemed eager to undertake the task outlined, for, given a chance to engage in some on-the-job basic training for the Olympians, there was not even a suggestion that any of the Spaniards should undertake the reconnaissance.
Rejoining Florencia, and she linking her arm with his as they began to move, Cal was very aware of Drecker. He was smoking another of his long cigarettes and watching them from the communist section of the square with what looked, in the torchlight, like narrowed eyes; so was Florencia and her response was typical.
‘He is like,’ she said, with a slight giggle, relishing the chance to use an idiom that Cal had applied to one of the Ritz receptionists, ‘a man with a broom up his arse, that is what you English say, yes?’
‘Not in polite company.’
‘Is he polite company?’
‘No.’
Taking a puff in the strange manner in which he smoked, Cal saw that the flaring cigarette end lit up the red star on his cap.
Vince had his boys kitted up and ready to move in the hour before dawn and they were out of the built-up area before the sky turned grey, where they waited till there was enough light to move. Nor did they just march out of the town and straight down the road to be taken by the main body, to the point at which it forked south. They moved at an angle, as previously lectured, in extended order, five staggered squads deep, well apart, weapons ready, that took them towards the treeline, now bathed in low sunlight.
Aware of the power of imagination and approaching a forest that rose before them, dark-green and menacing, the notion that this might be something other than an exercise was not mentioned, but it was drummed in that coming out of a low sun and advancing on a forest edge illuminated by the same strong backlight created the best conditions for the approach. The sunlight rendered them indistinct, while any movement in the trees should be obvious.
Once in the shade, Cal explained what they must look for and where, outlining the same scenario as that with which he had regaled Laporta. ‘We will move on both sides of the roadway. There was rain the night before last, so look for disturbed ground at the edges, the same, as well as cuts, at the base of the bigger trees, wood chippings or sawdust, then wires leading to hidden explosives, but if you find any don’t touch.’
As he was talking Cal realised he was probably addressing a load of townies – there was not a country boy amongst them; the best he could hope for was the likes of Jock, from a small mining village.
‘Anybody keep pigeons?’
Two lads from Tyneside put up their hands, shipyard workers, he recalled. Even in what was close to the most depressed part of the country they still kept up their hobbies.
‘Well, Jack,’ Cal said, hoping he had the name right, ‘you know the noise a bird makes when disturbed, and that could signal an enemy moving if they fly towards you. Anything suspicious, it is hand up by the lead men and everyone else crouch down. Have your rifles at the ready but do not turn them inwards to the road. Remember who is on the other side – your own mates.’