Free A Barcelona Heiress by Sergio Vila-Sanjuán Page B

López Ballesteros emanated a profound sense of self-confidence and a remarkable energy.
    Hailing from Galicia and trained at the Academia de Infantería de Toledo, he had swiftly risen through the ranks to captain, at which point he volunteered to fight in the Philippines. His performance in a series of particularly brutal assaults earned him a promotion and multiple decorations. As a lieutenant colonel he served in the war in Morocco, where he fought in the Battle of Hidum Hills, the occupation of Nador, and the conflict at the Zoco del Jermís de Beni-bu-Ifrur, scoring a series of victories, always heading up Catalonia’s Rifle Batallion. He returned a full colonel, and so much was made of his feats that the king of Spain named him his assistant. In this capacity he was notable for not mincing any words and letting the monarch know just what he thought, which perhaps contributed to the abbreviated duration of his service in the position. He was later the director of the Academia de la Infantería, and soon rose to brigade general until His Majesty’s government named him Civil Governor of Barcelona, endowing him with what were, rumor had it, broad and sweeping powers.
    On his desk lay a huge stack of papers, telegrams, books, phone messages, dismantled bombs, and pencils in a range of colors that must have included the red, censor’s pencil, which at that time was wielded liberally against the city’s newspapers, whose columns were often gutted by the authorities’ interference.
    “You asked for me, General.”
    “Look, Vilar, we’re going to make some history here. In 1917 the General Union was established, comprising all the disaffected classes of workers, and ever since then the incidents in Barcelona have only multiplied. First it was strikebreakers being pelted with stones, and then personal assaults. The General Union, in addition, targets for violent attacks those workers notbelonging to the organization and refusing to support its efforts. They are blacklisted from ever getting work and condemned to going hungry. You will recall how in 1917 and 1919 the city and all of Catalonia suffered general strikes, which made daily life insufferable and could have had the most catastrophic consequences. The General Union even issued a call to its members, encouraging them to create a red army and organize for an uprising.
    “I remember that story. They sought to create a kind of Catalonian soviet. And they may still be at it.”
    “If I have taken over the Civil Government and assumed authorities which I normally would not possess, it is because Barcelona’s employers and its respectable classes, not to mention its ordinary citizens, had repeatedly pressured the captain general, the government ministry, and even the president of the Council of Ministers on multiple occasions, complaining that the situation had grown unbearable. If I accepted this responsibility at the president’s behest, and even that of the monarch himself, even though I am versed in neither civil affairs nor politics, it is because Barcelona’s business community contended that terror and crime reigned in the city, and that the authorities sat idly by, contemplating the situation with an inconceivable indifference.”
    “And so it proved. We have been through terrible times. Even the most upright and decent had to carry guns on the street. And it is not at all clear that this is over.”
    “Indeed. Therefore, upon taking over the reins of the Civil Government, what could I do, declare martial law? I could not, for Barcelona had endured that for several months, and it constitutes an emergency situation which complicates things and entrusts the army with a series of responsibilities that normally fall outside its purview. As a lawyer I suppose that you yourself had to participate in numerous trials held under the military authority in power at that time. Notonly do we not have enough people, but neither is it our responsibility to assume those