Nostromo: A Tale of the Seaboard
pañia Anzani, a great general store, like those co-operative things at home. Old Anzani was murdered by the National Guards in front of his safe. It was even for that specific crime that the deputy Gamacho, commanding the Nationals, a blood-thirsty and savage brute, was executed publicly by garrote upon the sentence of a court-martial ordered by Barrios. Anzani's nephews converted the business into a company. All that side of the Plaza had been burned; used to be colonnaded before. A terrible fire, by the light of which I saw the last of the fighting, the Llaneros flying, the Nationals throwing their arms down, and the miners of San Tomé, all Indians from the Sierra, rolling by like a torrent to the sound of pipes and cymbals, green flags flying, a wild mass of men in white ponchos and green hats, on foot, on mules, on donkeys. The miners, sir, had marched upon the town, Don Pépé leading on his black horse, and their very wives in the rear on ourros, screaming encouragement, sir, and beating tambourines. I remember one of these women had a green parrot seated on her shoulder, as calm as a bird of stone. Such a sight, sir, will never be seen again. They had just saved their Señor Administrador; for Barrios, though he ordered the assault at once, at night too, would have been too late. Pedrito Montero had Don Carlos led out to be shot-like his uncle many years ago and then, as Barrios said afterwards, ’Sulaco would not have been worth fighting for.’ Sulaco without the Concession was nothing; and there were tons and tons of dynamite distributed all over the mountain with detonators arranged, and an old priest, Father Romàn, standing by to annihilate the
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