“Strange,” I said. “Nobody about. No checkpoints on the road, no horseback patrols. Not a soul.”
“We’ve stolen a march on them,” said Ballester, whose ears had pricked up as well now. “They weren’t expecting us to disembark behind their rearguard.”
I mounted up again and rode a little farther on. Not a trace of human life. Only the thick and deathly silent forest on either side of the path. We came to a steeply rising bend. “Look!” I cried.
Startled, Ballester put his hand to the hilt of his sword. But I meant only the butterflies — hundreds of orange butterflies were swarming around in a clearing to the left of the bend in the path. Dismounting, I walked forward into that cloud of orange wings.
Thoughts of Bazoches came into my head, memories of the Ducroix brothers’ rational magic. No, I felt no desire to harm those butterflies. Quite the opposite. The world was at war, it was a time when everything was close to tumbling into the abyss, and submerging myself in those fluttering wings felt cleansing to the spirit. They understood; they came and landed on me. Dozens and dozens alighting on my outstretched arm, covering the sleeve of my uniform like a resplendent wreath.
“Thinking of eating them?” said a laughing Ballester from up on his horse.
“Don’t be barbaric! They’re resting on my hand precisely because they know I won’t do them any harm. Listen: When a person observes a scene with all his attention, he becomes a part of that scene. Plus, insects love new things.”
“Mother of God,” groaned Ballester, his hands on his saddle pommel. “We’re the expedition scouts, and here you are, wasting time trying to tame winged maggots.”
“Come on, dismount,” I said. “Come on, man, get over here. I’ll show you a trick.”
He rode on a little way to check that there was nobody beyond the bend. Then he came back and dismounted.
“Hold out your arm,” I said, showing him. He looked at me, unconvinced. “Come on! What’s the problem? Ballester the Brave, happy to take on an army of Bourbons but afraid of a few butterflies?”
“It’s me who frightens insects. My men will tell you the same. We were sleeping out one warm night, and they all woke up crucified with bites, whereas I hadn’t been touched.”
Eventually, I got him to hold out an arm, palm up. For all the butterflies swirling around me, dozens and dozens of them, as Ballester had predicted, they gave him a wide berth.
“See?” he said, somewhat triumphantly lowering his arm again.
“It isn’t just a case of holding your arm out,” I said. “You need to offer them all of yourself. The hand has to be both messenger and message.”
He let out an annoyed snort. But instead of answering, he lifted his hand again, though in the manner of someone accepting a tiresome bet. To his obvious surprise, a butterfly flew toward him. Fluttering around a little, it came to rest on his rough and calloused hand.
Ballester’s face softened. He looked childlike for a few moments, regarding the butterfly that had landed on him; an unthinkable transformation. For once, here was a creature, albeit a maggot with wings, that didn’t fear him. We glanced at each other. And began laughing. I’m not sure why, but we laughed.
The spell was broken when we heard a faint noise, measured, like brass on brass. Ballester turned and looked toward the bend in the path. Half a dozen soldiers came into sight; the sound was that of their canteens clanking against buckles and straps. Their uniforms were white. The vein on Ballester’s forehead dilated once more.
They came to a halt — though they had been advancing with rifles at the ready, this was a surprise they hadn’t been ready for: two men standing in the forest, playing with butterflies. A long moment passed, Ballester standing there with his arm still outstretched. Then his butterfly flew away.
That was his signaclass="underline" He launched himself at them with his sword drawn. The six of them had advanced two abreast, and Ballester aimed for the middle. He slashed at their necks, left and right, and all I remember is the animal cries — Ballester’s and those of the men as they fell. In the blink of an eye, six Frenchmen were down, either dead or wounded.
Gasping after that remarkable burst of energy, Ballester braced his arms against his knees. The look he gave me — was he begging forgiveness or arraigning me for frolicking with the butterflies? I was gasping, too, though in my case, it was from the shock.
Four more soldiers appeared on the path. They came at a pace and with their rifles up. They shouted something in French. They surely couldn’t believe what they were seeing: six of their colleagues dead and two men standing there.
“Drop your sword!” I said to Ballester.
He did so, but I already knew what was he was thinking: about freeing up both hands to draw his pistols. Better to be taken prisoner than die, I thought.
“Ballester!” I cried. “Don’t draw! Much as you want to, don’t do it!”
Everyone started shouting and screaming, everyone except Ballester. The French just about to pull their triggers, me saying we’d surrender. Ballester kept his arms across his torso, a hand on each of his pistol hilts. Ne tirez pas, nous nous rendons! A silly thing to point out, but one thing I remember is that all the butterflies were gone.
When I heard the shots, I threw myself to the ground and curled up in a ball, shielding my head. Three reports—crack crack crack—followed by three more, then another three.
But when I raised my head, I found that Ballester wasn’t dead, nor indeed was I; it was the four Frenchmen who had been shot down. From a bluff to our right, a dozen Miquelets were advancing, emerging from the thick woodland with the barrels of their rifles smoking.
And they were suspicious of us. “Who do you serve?” one asked.
“Emperor Charles,” I answered, on my knees and trembling. “And you?”
“Busquets. Hands up,” said the man who seemed to be their leader, pointing his rifle at me, “and keep them up. Elbows to ears.”
I did as he said, but I protested. “We’re with the army of the Generalitat!”
He only became more suspicious. A number of the others swung their rifles around in my direction. “You lie! And if you speak Catalan, that must make you a botiflero.”
As they waited to see what I’d do next, Ballester took the opportunity to finish off one of the dying Frenchmen next to him. A bullet through the nape of the neck — I remember it exiting through his mouth, as though he’d spat it.
Ballester’s relationship with death was something I could never get my head around, never. The Frenchman was certainly dying, nothing could have saved him, and I agree, the most humane thing was to end his suffering. But for Ballester, shooting a man was like tying his shoelaces. A trivial act, devoid of reflection or consequence. There I was, whey-faced, kneeling, arms to the heavens, whereas Ballester’s response was to take out his pistol.
“Take me to the man leading your unit,” he said to the Miquelet interrogating me. “He owes me twenty pesos.” Looking over at me, he said: “Busquets is terrible when it comes to dice.”
They led us to a clearing in the woods containing a group of men. There was something in the air, a tangible despondency, the leadenness that is the mark of a defeat. Those not injured and grumbling looked downcast, like scarecrows whose supports had been removed. It had begun drizzling.
Unlike Ballester’s men, hardened in a thousand battles, Busquets’s were civilians only recently incorporated to mountain life. They still had shoes on their feet, and not the rope-soled sandals; they didn’t have the usual blue hooded knee-length cloaks; and their weapons seemed cobbled together, kitchen knives and old muskets that made you think they must have grabbed whatever they could on the way out the door.