Raid against the main road and the railroad between Bejar and Plasencia."
"Very difficult," Sordo said.
"We have worked against that same railroad in much more dangerous country in Estremadura," Robert Jordan said.
"Who is we?"
"The _guerrilleros_ group of Estremadura."
"You are many?"
"About forty."
"Was the one with the bad nerves and the strange name from there?" asked Pilar.
"Yes."
"Where is he now?"
"Dead, as I told you."
"You are from there, too?"
"Yes."
"You see what I mean?" Pilar said to him.
And I have made a mistake, Robert Jordan thought to himself.
I have told Spaniards we can do something better than they can when the rule is never to speak of your own exploits or abilities.
When I should have flattered them I have told them what I think they should do and now they are furious.
Well, they will either get over it or they will not.
They are certainly much more useful in the Gredos than here.
The proof is that here they have done nothing since the train that Kashkin organized.
It was not much of a show.
It cost the fascists one engine and killed a few troops but they all talk as though it were the high point of the war.
Maybe they will shame into going to the Gredos.
Yes and maybe I will get thrown out of here too.
Well, it is not a very rosy-looking dish anyway that you look into it.
"Listen _Ingles_," Pilar said to him.
"How are your nerves?"
"All right," said Robert Jordan.
"O.K."
"Because the last dynamiter they sent to work with us, although a formidable technician, was very nervous."
"We have nervous ones," Robert Jordan said.
"I do not say that he was a coward because he comported himself very well," Pilar went on.
"But he spoke in a very rare and windy way."
She raised her voice.
"Isn't it true, Santiago, that the last dynamiter, he of the train, was a little rare?"
"_Algo raro_," the deaf man nodded and his eyes went over Robert Jordan's face in a way that reminded him of the round opening at the end of the wand of a vacuum cleaner. "_Si, algo raro, pero bueno_."
"_Murio_," Robert Jordan said into the deaf man's ear.
"He is dead."
"How was that?" the deaf man asked, dropping his eyes down from Robert Jordan's eyes to his lips.
"I shot him," Robert Jordan said.
"He was too badly wounded to travel and I shot him."
"He was always talking of such a necessity," Pilar said.
"It was his obsession."
"Yes," said Robert Jordan.
"He was always talking of such a necessity and it was his obsession."
"_Como fue?_" the deaf man asked.
"Was it a train?"
"It was returning from a train," Robert Jordan said.
"The train was successful.
Returning in the dark we encountered a fascist patrol and as we ran he was shot high in the back but without hitting any bone except the shoulder blade.