世紀文學經典:《百年孤獨》第7章Part 7

Actually, they did not dare carry out the sentence. The rebelliousness of the town made the military men think that the execution of Colonel Aureliano Buendía might have serious political consequences not only in Macondo but throughout the area of the swamp, so they consulted the authorities in the capital of the province. On Saturday night, while they were waiting for an answer Captain Roque Carnicero went with some other officers to Catarino's place. Only one woman, practically threatened, dared take him to her room. "They don't want to go to bed with a man they know is going to die," she confessed to him. "No one knows how it will come, but everybody is going around saying that the officer who shoots Colonel Aureliano Buendía and all the soldiers in the squad, one by one, will be murdered, with no escape, sooner or later, even if they hide at the ends of the earth." Captain Roque Carnicero mentioned it to the other officers and they told their superiors. On Sunday, although no one had revealed it openly,although no action on the part of the military had disturbed the tense calm of those days, the whole town knew that the officers were ready to use any manner of pretext to avoid responsibility for the execution. The official order arrived in the Monday mail: the execution was to be carried out within twenty-four hours. That night the officers put seven slips of paper into a cap, and Captain Roque Carnicero's unpeaceful fate was foreseen by his name on the prize slip. "Bad luck doesn't have any chinks in it," he said with deep bitterness. "I was born a son of a bitch and I'm going to die a son of a bitch." At five in the morning he chose the squad by lot, formed it in the courtyard, and woke up the condemned man with a premonitory phrase.
"Let's go, Buendía," he told him. "Our time has come."
"So that's what it was," the colonel replied. "I was dreaming that my sores had burst."
Rebeca Buendía got up at three in the morning when she learned that Aureliano would be shot. She stayed in the bedroom in the dark, watching the cemetery wall through the half-opened window as the bed on which she sat shook with José Arcadio's snoring. She had waited all week with the same hidden persistence with which during different times she had waited for Pietro Crespi's letters. "They won't shoot him here," José Arcadio, told her. "They'll shoot him at midnight in the barracks so that no one will know who made up the squad, and they'll bury him right there." Rebeca kept on waiting. "They're stupid enough to shoot him here," she said. She was so certain that she had foreseen the way she would open the door to wave goodbye. "They won't bring him through the streets," José Arcadio insisted, with six scared soldiers and knowing that the people are ready for anything." Indifferent to her husband's logic, Rebeca stayed by the window.
"You'll see that they're just stupid enough," she said.
On Tuesday, at five-in the. morning, José Arcadio had drunk his coffee and let the dogs out when Rebeca closed the window and held onto the head of the bed so as not to fall down. "There, they're bringing him," she sighed. "He's so handsome." José Arcadio looked out the window and saw him. tremulous in the light of dawn. He already had his back to the wall and his hands were on his hips because the burning knots in his armpits would not let him lower them. "A person fucks himself up so much," Colonel Aureliano Buendía said. "Fucks himself up so much just so that six weak fairies can kill him and he can't do anything about it." He repeated it with so much rage that it almost seemed to be fervor, and Captain Roque Carnicero was touched, because he thought he was praying. When the squad took aim, the rage had materialized into a viscous and bitter substance that put his tongue to sleep and made him close his eyes. Then the aluminum glow of dawn disappeared and he saw himself again in short pants, wearing a tie around his neck, and he saw his father leading him into the tent on a splendid afternoon, and he saw the ice. When he heard the shout he thought that it was the final command to the squad. He opened his eyes with a shudder of curiosity, expecting to meet the incandescent trajectory of the bullets, but he only saw Captain Roque Carnicero with his arms in the air and José Arcadio crossing the street with his fearsome shotgun ready to go off.
"Don't shoot," the captain said to José Arcadio. "You were sent by Divine Providence."
Another war began right there. Captain Roque Carnicero and his six men left with Colonel Aureliano Buendía to free the revolutionary general Victorio Medina, who had been condemned to death in Riohacha. They thought they could save time by crossing the mountains along the trail that José Arcadio Buendía had followed to found Macondo, but before a week was out they were convinced that it was an impossible undertaking. So they had to follow the dangerous route over the outcroppings; with no other munitions but what the firing squad had. They would camp near the towns and one of them, with a small gold fish in his hand, would go in disguise in broad daylight to contact the dormant Liberals, who would go out hunting on the following morning and never return. When they saw Riohacha from a ridge in the mountains, General Victorio Medina had been shot. Colonel Aureliano Buendía's men proclaimed him chief of the revolutionary forces of the Caribbean coast with the rank of general. He assumed the position but refused the promotion and took the stand that he would never accept it as long as the Conservative regime was in power. At the end of three months they had succeeded in arming more than a thousand men, but they were wiped out. The survivors reached the eastern frontier. The next thing that was heard of them was that they had landed on Cabo de la Vela, coming from the smaller islands of the Antilles, and a message from the government was sent all over by telegraph and included in jubilant proclamations throughout the country announcing the death of Colonel Aureliano Buendía. But two days later a multiple telegram which almost overtook the previous one announced another uprising on the southern plains. That was how the legend of the ubiquitous Colonel Aureliano Buendía, began. Simultaneous and contradictory information declared him victorious in Villanueva. defeated in Guacamayal, devoured by Motilón Indians, dead in a village in the swamp, and up in arms again in Urumita. The Liberal leaders, who at that moment were negotiating for participation in the congress, branded him in adventurer who did not represent the party. The national government placed him in the category of a bandit and put a price of five thousand pesos on his head. After sixteen defeats, Colonel Aureliano Buendía left Guajira with two thousand well-armed Indians and the garrison, which was taken by surprise as it slept, abandoned Riohacha. He established his headquarters there and proclaimed total war against the regime. The first message he received from the government was a threat to shoot Colonel Gerineldo Márquez within forty-eight hours if he did not withdraw with his forces to the eastern frontier. Colonel Roque Carnicero, who was his chief of staff then, gave him the telegram with a look of consternation, but he read it with unforeseen joy.
"How wonderful!" he exclaimed. "We have a telegraph office in Macondo now."

問題在於，軍事當局不敢執行判決。全鎮的憤怒情緒使他們想到，處決奧雷連諾上校，不僅在馬孔多，而且在整個沼澤地帶，都會引起嚴重的政治後果。因此，他們就向省城請示。星期六晚上，還沒接到回答的時候，羅克·卡尼瑟洛上尉和其他幾名軍官一起前往卡塔林諾遊藝場。在所有的娘兒們中，只有一個被他嚇怕了的同意把他領進她的房間。“她們都不願意跟就要死的人睡覺，”她解釋說。“誰也不知道這是怎麼回事，可是周圍的人都說，槍決奧雷連諾上校的軍官和行刑隊所有的士兵，或早或遲準會接二連三地遭到暗殺，即使他們躲到天涯海角。”羅克·卡尼瑟洛上尉向其他的軍官提到了這一點，他們又報告了上級。星期日，軍事當局一點沒有破壞馬孔多緊張的寧靜空氣，雖然誰也沒有向誰公開談到什麼，但是全鎮的人已經知道，軍官們不想承擔責任，準備利用一切藉口避免參加行刑。星期一，郵局送來了書面命令：判決必須在二十四小時之內執行。晚上，軍官們把七張寫上自己名字的紙片扔在一頂軍帽裏抽彩，羅克。 卡尼瑟洛倒黴的運氣使他中了彩。“命運是無法逃避的，”上尉深感苦惱說。“我生爲婊子的兒子，死也爲婊子的兒子。”早晨五時，也用抓鬮兒的辦法，他挑選了一隊士兵，讓他們排列在院子裏，用例行的話叫醒了判處死刑的人。
“走吧，奧雷連諾，”他說。“時刻到啦。”
“哦！原來如此，”上校回答。“我夢見我的膿瘡潰爛啦。”
自從知道奧雷連諾要遭槍決，雷貝卡每天都是清晨三點起牀。臥室裏一片漆黑，霍·阿卡蒂奧的鼾聲把牀鋪震得直顫，她卻坐在牀上，透過微開的窗子觀察墓地的牆壁。她堅持不懈地暗暗等了一個星期，就象過去等待皮埃特羅·克列斯比的信函一樣。“他們不會在這兒槍斃他的，”霍·阿卡蒂奧向她說。爲了不讓別人知道誰開的槍，他們會利用深夜在兵營裏處決他，並且埋在那兒。“雷貝卡繼續等待。“那幫無恥的壞蛋準會在這兒槍斃他，”她回答。她很相信這一點，甚至想把房門稍微打開一些，以便向死刑犯揮手告別。“他們不會只讓六名膽怯的士兵押着他走過街道的，”霍·阿卡蒂奧堅持說道。“因爲他們知道老百姓什麼都幹得出來。”雷貝卡對丈夫所說的道理聽而不聞，繼續守在窗口。
“你會看見這幫壞蛋多麼可恥，”她說。
星期二早晨五點鐘，霍·阿卡蒂奧喝完咖啡，放出狗去的時候，雷貝卡突然關上窗子，抓住牀頭，免得跌倒。“他們帶他來啦，”她嘆息一聲。“他多神氣啊。”霍·阿卡蒂奧看了看窗外，突然戰慄一下；在慘白的晨光中，他瞧見了弟弟，弟弟穿着他霍。 阿卡蒂奧年輕時穿過的褲子。奧雷連諾已經雙手叉腰站在牆邊，腋下火燒火燎的膿瘡妨礙他把手放下。“捱苦受累，受盡折磨，”奧雷連諾上校自言自語地說，“都是爲了讓這六個雜種把你打死，而你毫無辦法。”他一再重複這句話，而羅克·卡尼瑟洛上尉卻把他的憤怒當成宗教熱情，以爲他在祈禱，因而深受感動。士兵們舉槍瞄準的時候，奧雷連諾上校的怒火止息了，嘴裏出現了一種粘滯、苦澀的東西，使得他的舌頭麻木了，兩眼也閉上了。鋁色的晨光忽然消失，他又看見自己是個穿着褲衩、扎着領結的孩子，看見父親在一個晴朗的下午帶他去吉卜賽人的帳篷，於是他瞧見了冰塊。當他聽到一聲喊叫時，他以爲這是上尉給行刑隊的最後命令。他驚奇地睜開眼來，料想他的視線會遇見下降的彈道，但他只發現羅克·卡尼瑟洛上尉與霍·阿卡蒂奧，前者舉着雙手呆立不動，後者拿着準備射擊的可怕的獵槍跑過街道。
“別開槍，”上尉向霍·阿卡蒂奧說，“你是上帝派來的嘛。”
從這時起，又開始了一場戰爭。羅克·卡尼瑟洛上尉和六名士兵，跟奧雷連諾上校一起前去營救在列奧阿察判處死刑的革命將軍維克多里奧·麥丁納。爲了贏得時間，他們決定沿着霍·阿·布恩蒂亞建立馬孔多村之前經過的道路，翻過山嶺。可是沒過一個星期，他們就已明白這是作不到的事。最後，他們不得不從山上危險的地方悄悄地過去，雖然他們的子彈寥寥無幾，——只有士兵們領來行刑的那一些。他們將在城鎮附近紮營，派一個人喬裝打扮，手裏拿着一條小金魚，天一亮就到路上去溜達，跟潛伏的自由黨人建立聯繫：這些自由黨人清晨出來“打獵”，是從來都不回去的。可是，當他從山樑上終於望見列奧阿察的時候，維克多里奧·麥丁納將軍已被槍決了。奧雷連諾上校的追隨者宣佈他爲加勒比海沿岸革命軍總司令，頭銜是將軍。他同意接受這個職位，可是拒絕了將軍頭銜，並且說定在推翻保守黨政府之前不接受這個頭銜。在三個月當中，他武裝了一千多人，可是幾乎都犧牲了。倖存的人越過了東部邊境。隨後知道，他們離開了安的列斯羣島（注：在西印度羣島），在維拉角登陸，重新回到國內；在這之後不久，政府的報喜電報就發到全國各地，宣佈奧雷連諾上校死亡。又過了兩天，一份挺長的電報幾乎趕上了前一份電報，報告了南部平原上新的起義。因此產生了奧雷連諾上校無處不在的傳說。同一時間傳來了互相矛盾的消息：上校在比利亞努埃瓦取得了勝利；在古阿卡馬耶爾遭到了失敗；被摩蒂龍部落的印第安人吃掉；死於沼澤地帶的一個村莊；重新在烏魯米特發動了起義。這時，自由黨領袖正在跟政府舉行關於容許自由黨人進入國會的談判，宣佈他爲冒險分子，不能代表他們的黨。政府把他算做強盜，懸賞五千比索取他的首級。在十六次失敗以後，奧雷連諾上校率領兩千裝備很好的印第安人，離開瓜希拉，進攻列奧阿察，驚惶失措的警備隊逃出了這個城市。奧雷連諾把司令部設在列奧阿察，宣佈了反對保守黨人的全民戰爭。政府給他的第一個正式回電向他威脅說，如果起義部隊不撤到東部邊境，四十八小時之後就要槍決格林列爾多·馬克斯上校。羅克·卡尼瑟洛上校這時已經成了參謀長，他把這份電報交給總司令的時候，神色十分沮喪，可是奧雷連諾看了電報卻意外地高興。
“好極了！”他驚叫一聲。“咱們馬孔多有了電報局啦！”