At Close Quarters by Eugenio Fuentes Read Free Book Online Page A

only need to accept a transfer. Or take early retirement.’
    ‘You know well that for some neither is a very honourable possibility. But they too will obey … they all will. I know them, they are disciplined, as I said. And discipline is best shown by obeying orders we don’t like.’
    ‘I would never question that.’
    The colonel, who had not moved from his place, once again turned his back to him and looked out of the window. The soldiers were leaving the training field three abreast and presently the place was empty. There was no one walking along the clean streets in front of the pavilions with manicured areas of grass and straight paths flanked by whitewashed stones. At one end of the pitch one could see the deserted stands and, beyond, the high brick wall complete with barbed wire surrounding the compound and enforcing a dual purpose: to keep soldiers in, and to keep people out. The barracks, usually aflutter with activity, were at that moment in the deepest calm, the officers waiting in the meeting room, anxious to learn the results of his report. There was none of the shouting or clicking of heels normally heard during instruction, and nor did one hear vehicles or everyday noises generated by cleaning or pruning trees. For Olmedo all that solitude and emptiness heralded the final closure. The colonel must have thought something along the same lines, because he asked, again without looking at him:
    ‘Do you realise? This is all going to disappear. Everything we established with a view to remaining here will be reduced to transient, useless work.’
    Olmedo didn’t reply. He just nodded briefly, even though the colonel couldn’t see him.
    ‘It had to happen, it was inevitable since they abolished compulsory military service. At the end of the day, there’s no betterreason to knock down barracks than the fact that they’re empty of soldiers. And I seem to remember you agreed with that measure too,’ he added recalling an old grievance which was more bitter that Olmedo had thought.
    The colonel had looked at him when uttering the last phrase, and now he was expecting an answer – an austere, hardened old man silhouetted against the large window, scornful of luxury and superfluity, who would retire from active service in a few months’ time with neither pomp nor circumstance, just as he had lived his life.
    ‘Yes, I did agree,’ Olmedo replied. ‘We no longer needed hundreds of thousands of men …’ – he paused before saying ‘wasting time in the barracks’ and chose a more positive expression – ‘to fight for their country.’
    ‘It wasn’t all about fighting, Olmedo, and you know it. The military service was a good way of getting to know one’s country, and for getting to love it,’ he added.
    Olmedo did not agree with that either, but he didn’t contradict the colonel. ‘I think that, all in all, we have as many men as we need. And whenever the quota has not been met, we’ve received enough applications from foreign soldiers. Such as your own orderly,’ he said, knowing the colonel held him in high esteem.
    ‘Make no mistake about them, Olmedo, make no mistake. I remember that, a few years ago, when we almost went to war with Morocco over Perejil Island, we were putting together a squadron to take part in a rescue operation. The officer of the Legion asked volunteers to step forward, and you know how many foreigners took that step?’
    ‘I don’t.’
    ‘Not one! None that were not Spanish. And by Spanish I mean those like you and me, not those who wear the uniform in order to obtain Spanish citizenship and because six hundred euros a month is a fortune in the countries they come from.’
    When he finished, the colonel turned again towards the window, as if he wanted to hide his face as he added, in a voice so low that Olmedo had difficulty understanding him:
    ‘All too often those who make greater sacrifices for their country end up being neglected by their superiors.’
    It was a