“Amazing thing is, the Republic’s still in there kicking,” Chaim said. Mike nodded. General Sanjurjo and his pack of reactionary bastards must have thought their foes would fall apart in nothing flat. Who could have blamed them? They had the trained troops, and they had Mussolini and Hitler-which meant Italian and German materiel and soldiers-on their side.

But it didn’t pan out that way. The brutal farce of noninterference kept the Republicans from getting munitions and reinforcements. Like the rest of the men in the Lincoln Battalion, Chaim and Mike had to sneak over the border from France, dodging patrols every step of the way. Russia sent arms and advisers, though not enough to offset what the Fascists fed Sanjurjo.

And the Republicans squabbled among themselves. Did they ever! Anarchists and Trotskyists didn’t like admitting that, since Stalin was paying the piper, he could call the tune. They also complained that Communist units got the best weapons. Chaim was a Party member, even if he’d left his card in New York City when he sailed. Most (though not all) of the foreign volunteers-men from every corner of the Earth-were. But the Spaniards themselves did the bulk of the fighting and dying.

An airplane buzzed by overhead. Chaim automatically started to duck; German and Italian aircraft ruled the skies. But this was a Republican plane: a Russian biplane fighter. Its blunt forward profile made the Spaniards call it Chato -flat-nosed. It dove to shoot up the Nationalists’ trenches, then scooted off to the east.

“‘Bout time those mothers caught it for a change,” Mike said.

“Yeah,” Chaim agreed doubtfully. “But now we’ll get it twice as hard to make up, you know?” The Spaniards on both sides thought like that and fought like that. It made for a rugged kind of combat.

Mike started to answer. Before he could, a runner came up from the rear yelling, “War! War!”

Mike and Chaim started laughing like maniacs. “The fuck ya think we’re in now?” Chaim said. “A ladies’ sewing circle?”