"I was saying," she told him, "that you must not worry about your work because I will not bother you nor interfere. If there is anything I can do you will tell me."
"There's nothing," he said. "It is really very simple."
"I will learn from Pilar what I should do to take care of a man well and those things I will do," Maria said. "Then, as I learn, I will discover things for myself and other things you can tell me."
"There is nothing to do."
"Que va, man, there is nothing! Thy sleeping robe, this morning, should have been shaken and aired and hung somewhere in the sun. Then, before the dew comes, it should be taken into shelter."
"Go on, rabbit."
"Thy socks should be washed and dried. I would see thee had two pair."
"What else?"
"If thou would show me I would clean and oil thy pistol."
"Kiss me," Robert Jordan said.
"Nay, this is serious. Wilt thou show me about the pistol? Pilar has rags and oil. There is a cleaning rod inside the cave that should fit it."
"Sure. I'll show you."
"Then," Maria said. "If you will teach me to shoot it either one of us could shoot the other and himself, or herself, if one were wounded and it were necessary to avoid capture."
"Very interesting," Robert Jordan said. "Do you have many ideas like that?"
"Not many," Maria said. "But it is a good one. Pilar gave me this and showed me how to use it," she opened the breast pocket of her shirt and took out a cut-down leather holder such as pocket combs are carried in and, removing a wide rubber band that closed both ends, took out a Gem type, single-edged razor blade. "I keep this always," she explained. "Pilar says you must make the cut here just below the ear and draw it toward here." She showed him with her finger. "She says there is a big artery there and that drawing the blade from there you cannot miss it. Also, she says there is no pain and you must simply press firmly below the ear and draw it downward. She says it is nothing and that they cannot stop it if it is done."
"That's right," said Robert Jordan. "That's the carotid artery."
So she goes around with that all the time, he thought, as a definitely accepted and properly organized possibility.
"But I would rather have thee shoot me," Maria said. "Promise if there is ever any need that thou wilt shoot me."
"Sure," Robert Jordan said. "I promise."
"Thank thee very much," Maria told him. "I know it is not easy to do."
"That's all right," Robert Jordan said.
You forget all this, he thought. You forget about the beauties of a civil war when you keep your mind too much on your work. You have forgotten this. Well, you are supposed to. Kashkin couldn't forget it and it spoiled his work. Or do you think the old boy had a hunch? It was very strange because he had experienced absolutely no emotion about the shooting of Kashkin. He expected that at some time he might have it. But so far there had been absolutely none.
"But there are other things I can do for thee," Maria told him, walking close beside him, now, very serious and womanly.
"Besides shoot me?"
"Yes. I can roll cigarettes for thee when thou hast no more of those with tubes. Pilar has taught me to roll them very well, tight and neat and not spilling."
"Excellent," said Robert Jordan. "Do you lick them yourself?"
"Yes," the girl said, "and when thou art wounded I will care for thee and dress thy wound and wash thee and feed thee-"
"Maybe I won't be wounded," Robert Jordan said.
"Then when you are sick I will care for thee and make thee soups and clean thee and do all for thee. And I will read to thee."
"Maybe I won't get sick."
"Then I will bring thee coffee in the morning when thou wakest-"
"Maybe I don't like coffee," Robert Jordan told her.
"Nay, but you do," the girl said happily. "This morning you took two cups."
"Suppose I get tired of coffee and there's no need to shoot me and I'm neither wounded nor sick and I give up smoking and have only one pair of socks and hang up my robe myself. What then, rabbit?" he patted her on the back. "What then?"
"Then," said Maria, "I will borrow the scissors of Pilar and cut thy hair."
"I don't like to have my hair cut."
"Neither do I," said Maria. "And I like thy hair as it is. So. If there is nothing to do for thee, I will sit by thee and watch thee and in the nights we will make love."
"Good," Robert Jordan said. "The last project is very sensible."
"To me it seems the same," Maria smiled. "Oh, Ingles," she said.
"My name is Roberto."
"Nay. But I call thee Ingles as Pilar does."
"Still it is Roberto."
"No," she told him. "Now for a whole day it is Ingles. And Ingles, can I help thee with thy work?"
"No. What I do now I do alone and very coldly in my head."
"Good," she said. "And when will it be finished?"
"Tonight, with luck."
"Good," she said.
Below them was the last woods that led to the camp.
"Who is that?" Robert Jordan asked and pointed.
"Pilar," the girl said, looking along his arm. "Surely it is Pilar."
At the lower edge of the meadow where the first trees grew the woman was sitting, her head on her arms. She looked like a dark bundle from where they stood; black against the brown of the tree trunk.
"Come on," Robert Jordan said and started to run toward her through the knee-high heather. It was heavy and hard to run in and when he had run a little way, he slowed and walked. He could see the woman's head was on her folded arms and she looked broad and black against the tree trunk. He came up to her and said, "Pilar!" sharply.
The woman raised her head and looked up at him.
"Oh," she said. "You have terminated already?"
"Art thou ill?" he asked and bent down by her.
"Que va," she said. "I was asleep."
"Pilar," Maria, who had come up, said and kneeled down by her. "How are you? Are you all right?"
"I'm magnificent," Pilar said but she did not get up. She looked at the two of them. "Well, Ingles," she said. "You have been doing manly tricks again?"
"You are all right?" Robert Jordan asked, ignoring the words.
"Why not? I slept. Did you?"
"No."
"Well," Pilar said to the girl. "It seems to agree with you."
Maria blushed and said nothing.
"Leave her alone," Robert Jordan said.
"No one spoke to thee," Pilar told him. "Maria," she said and her voice was hard. The girl did not look up.
"Maria," the woman said again. "I said it seems to agree with thee."
"Oh, leave her alone," Robert Jordan said again.
"Shut up, you," Pilar said without looking at him. "Listen, Maria, tell me one thing."
"No," Maria said and shook her head.
"Maria," Pilar said, and her voice was as hard as her face and there was nothing friendly in her face. "Tell me one thing of thy own volition."
The girl shook her head.
Robert Jordan was thinking, if I did not have to work with this woman and her drunken man and her chicken-crut outfit, I would slap her so hard across the face that-.
"Go ahead and tell me," Pilar said to the girl.
"No," Maria said. "No."
"Leave her alone," Robert Jordan said and his voice did not sound like his own voice. I'll slap her anyway and the hell with it, he thought.
Pilar did not even speak to him. It was not like a snake charming a bird, nor a cat with a bird. There was nothing predatory. Nor was there anything perverted about it. There was a spreading, though, as a cobra's hood spreads. He could feel this. He could feel the menace of the spreading. But the spreading was a domination, not of evil, but of searching. I wish I did not see this, Robert Jordan thought. But it is not a business for slapping.