Never would such an opportunity as the two hares present itself again.
Not in the life of one man."
"_Anda!_" Robert Jordan said.
"And hurry back."
The gypsy picked up the two hares and slipped back through the rocks and Robert Jordan looked out across the flat opening and the slopes of the hill below.
Two crows circled overhead and then lit in a pine tree below.
Another crow joined them and Robert Jordan, watching them, thought: those are my sentinels.
As long as those are quiet there is no one coming through the trees.
The gypsy, he thought.
He is truly worthless.
He has no political development, nor any discipline, and you could not rely on him for anything.
But I need him for tomorrow.
I have a use for him tomorrow.
It's odd to see a gypsy in a war.
They should be exempted like conscientious objectors. Or as the physically and mentally unfit.
They are worthless.
But conscientious objectors weren't exempted in this war.
No one was exempted.
It came to one and all alike.
Well, it had come here now to this lazy outfit.
They had it now.
Agustin and Primitivo came up with the brush and Robert Jordan built a good blind for the automatic rifle, a blind that would conceal the gun from the air and that would look natural from the forest.
He showed them where to place a man high in the rocks to the right where he could see all the country below and to the right, and another where he could command the only stretch where the left wall might be climbed.
"Do not fire if you see any one from there," Robert Jordan said.
"Roll a rock down as a warning, a small rock, and signal to us with thy rifle, thus," he lifted the rifle and held it over his head as though guarding it.
"Thus for numbers," he lifted the rifle up and down.
"If they are dismounted point thy rifle muzzle at the ground.
Thus.
Do not fire from there until thou hearest the _maquina_ fire.
Shoot at a man's knees when you shoot from that height.
If you hear me whistle twice on this whistle get down, keeping behind cover, and come to these rocks where the _maquina_ is."
Primitivo raised the rifle.
"I understand," he said.
"It is very simple."
"Send first the small rock as a warning and indicate the direction and the number.
See that you are not seen."
"Yes," Primitivo said.
"If I can throw a grenade?"
"Not until the _maquina_ has spoken.
It may be that cavalry will come searching for their comrade and still not try to enter.
They may follow the tracks of Pablo.
We do not want combat if it can be avoided.
Above all that we should avoid it.
Now get up there."
"_Me voy_," Primitivo said, and climbed up into the high rocks with his carbine.
"Thou, Agustin," Robert Jordan said.
"What do you know of the gun?"
Agustin squatted there, tall, black, stubbly joweled, with his sunken eyes and thin mouth and his big work-worn hands.
"_Pues_, to load it.
To aim it.