The Underdogs: A novel of the Mexican Revolution

Demetrio descends into a ravine. He worries that “the Federals, the federal government forces, “will hire a native tracker to follow him. When he reaches the other side of the ravine, he blows a horn three times. Three whistles respond in the distance. Twenty-five men who have been hiding in bushes come out to greet him. They are angry when he tells them about his burning house; Demetrio says, “God willing, tomorrow of this very night we will meet the Federals face to face” (8). They count their weapons and ammunition, then light a fire and cook meat.

At sunrise, Demetrio sees many soldiers on their horses in the ravine below. He orders his men to fire on the soldiers. The men are highly trained marksmen, and they are hidden by the rocks and bushes. The soldiers taunt them, trying to get them to show themselves. More soldiers arrive and climb the ravine. Demetrio knows his men will be overrun if they don’t move. Demetrio is wounded and shouts, “They’ve branded me!” (12). He then slides into a gully, back into hiding.

Two of Demetrio’s men are missing: Serapio and Antonio. After the soldiers retreat, Demetrio returns and finds the two men. The next day Demetrio’s wound is painful, and he is unable to ride. His men carry him on a makeshift stretcher. They stop each time they find a hut, to eat and to let Demetrio rest.

A stranger named Luis Cervantes approaches the hut where Demetrio and his men are staying. He announces his name, but Pancracio shoots him in the foot to make sure he can’t get away. Luis says, “I am a revolutionary too” (17). He tells them that he was drafted by the Federals but deserted during a battle. Anastasio punches him and threatens to burn him. The men take him to Demetrio, where Luis claims to be a medical student and a journalist. Luis was imprisoned for writing a pro-revolution article: “I am truly one of your coreligionists” (18), he tells Demetrio. When Demetrio asks Luis what his cause is, Luis cannot think of a quick answer. Demetrio orders that Luis be locked in the corral for a day so he can think about what to do with him.

Luis tries to sleep in the corral, but a large pig next to him keeps him awake. He remembers joining the Federals, but quickly realizing that he had made a mistake; he was not suited to fight. After his first skirmish with the rebels, he had deserted, only to be found by his colonel and assigned to kitchen duty as punishment. The assignment makes Luis popular, though. He finds that “the sufferings of the underdogs, of the disinherited masses, touched him to the core; his cause is the sublime cause of the downtrodden who clamor for justice. He becomes the confidant of the humble footsoldier” (21). Men begin making confessions to him, almost as if he were a priest. He begins to sympathize with the rebels, which is how he comes to look for Demetrio and why he is so stunned by how the rebels have reacted to him.

Demetrio wakes, and a girl brings him a cup of goat’s milk. Her name is Camilla, and Demetrio thinks she is pretty. He takes her wrist, frightening her and causing her to run away. He tells Codorniz that he has a plan to find out whether Luis was sent to kill him’: He will tell Luis that he will die, but that Codorniz, posing as a priest, will hear his confession first. If Luis confesses to plotting to kill Demetrio, they will kill him. If not, they will let him go. That night Luis tells Demetrio that it was a mistake to come find him: “I thought you would welcome a man who comes to offer his help with open arms. Small though my help may be, it’s all to your benefit” (25). Codorniz takes Luis away for confession. He returns later and says that he does not believe Luis is there to shoot Demetrio. They give Luis food.

The next day, Camilla watches Luis tend to the men’s’ wounds. She is curious about medical procedures. As he treats the men, Luis is horrified at their bedraggled state. Newspapers have glorified Pancho Villa’s rebels and claim that they live richly and are an unstoppable force. Luis no longer believes he has made a mistake in coming, because he is with the underdogs. An old woman named María Antonia sees Camilla watching Luis and tells her that she should make a potion to make him fall in love with her.

A neighbor woman named Fortunata visits Remigia, who lives in the hut where Demetrio is resting. Demetrio’s wound has not closed. Fortunata is grieving because three months earlier, “the Government soldiers had run away with her only daughter, and that had broken her heart, and left her all but crazy” (31). They administer a medicine to Demetrio, who thinks about the best way to get his men to Durango.

Anastasio Montañez, one of Demetrio’s lieutenants, asks Demetrio to let Luis—whom they call the “curro” (Tenderfoot, in some translations)—treat him. Luis has treated himself and no longer limps. Luis washes Demetrio’s wound and rebinds it. The next day Demetrio “wakes up happy” (34). Luis treats him again. Demetrio is still suspicious of Luis and tells him that after he is cured, Luis can leave if he wishes. Over the next week, however, Demetrio begins to like Luis. He begins to take an interest in Luis’ comfort and rations. One night while the men tell stories around the fire, Luis tells a man named Venancio that he will help him become a doctor when the revolution ends. The men stop calling him Curro and begin referring to him as Louie.

Camilla disappears for three days. When she returns, she asks Luis to sing a song with her so that she can memorize the words and remember the song when he is gone. He does not understand her hints that she is in love with him. Luis laughs when she tells him that Demetrio grabbed her wrist one night; he says, “If the chief likes you, what more do you want?” (37). Camilla runs away crying and embarrassed.

Demetrio’s wound is healed. While Luis is playing cards with two of the men, they notice a dust cloud in the distance. Excited at the thought that the cloud might be caused by Federals, the men ride out to fight, only to find that the dust is coming from two mule drivers. The drivers report that the federal troops are fortifying Zacatecas, preparing to make their last stand. As the men plan for their trip to Zacatecas, Demetrio is surprised to learn that Luis wants to go. Demetrio says that he must tell Luis the story of how he became a revolutionary.

While drinking in a saloon, Demetrio had spit in the beard of Don Mónico, who then “sent the whole goddamned Federal Government against me” (43). Demetrio escaped to Zacatecas, but Don Mónico sent a posse after him. While in hiding, Pancracio, Anastasio, Codorniz, and other friends who were in trouble found him and joined the revolutionary cause. He and Luis discuss their options for the upcoming fight. Luis says, “You must not forget that the thing a man holds most sacred on earth is his family and his homeland” (44). Luis believes that they should join with a group of other men who fight for a man named Natera. The others agree, and they make preparations for the trip.

Demetrio decides to have a dance for the men before they leave. He and Luis discuss Camilla. Luis tells Demetrio that Camilla is scared of him. Then Luis meets Camilla by a creek. He tells her about the dance and again says that she should be excited that Demetrio is interested in her. Camilla says, “If you only knew how bad I feel when you talk like that. It’s you I like, just you” (48). She begins to cry, and Luis leaves.

The men leave the morning after the dance. María Antonia tells Camilla to stop crying. A woman named Agapita beats Camilla with a leather strap and accuses her of being possessed by evil spirits. Demetrio is proud as he rides, remembering his modest childhood and picturing the glory that he believes will come to him from the revolution. The men ride all day, then meet an old man on the road that evening. The old man tells them that there are few Federals in the area, and Demetrio warns him not to tell anyone in the surrounding towns that he has seen the rebels.

The men rest and then resume their trip at midnight. They plan a predawn attack on the town. Luis recommends that they send someone ahead to make sure the old man didn’t lie to them about the number of Federals. They question a man in a hut on the outskirts of the town. He tells them that there are many Federals nearby. Demetrio leads his men into the town square, where they are attacked with a huge volley of gunfire. They manage to hide in an alley. The captain of the Federals in the town is a young, arrogant man. Once he knows where Demetrio’s rebels are hiding, he sends his men to take them prisoners or to kill them if necessary. As he waits for his men to return, he drafts an imaginary report to President Huerta and envisions the rewards he will get for this victory.

Demetrio’s men escape the alley and manage to flank the Federals, who do not know where the rebels are. They fire on the Federals and throw grenades, ambushing them. During the fighting, Luis sees the old man from the day before and realizes that he was a spy. Demetrio kills the old man with a knife. The men are now out of bullets, but they kill the remaining, surviving Federals with knives.

Demetrio arrives in Fresnillo with 100 men and meets with General Natera, who congratulates Demetrio on the rebels’ victory. Luis makes an idealistic speech about the revolution.

During dinner, one of Natera’s officers, a man named Solís, recognizes Luis. Solís does not understand how Luis, a former “correspondent for a Government newspaper during Madero’s time, who wrote furious articles in El Regional, who denounced us as bandits, is now fighting on our side” (63). Solís has become disappointed in the revolution because “there are facts and there are men that are pure poison. And that poison drips into your soul and turns everything bitter. Enthusiasm, hopes, ideals, joys … all come to naught” (64). He stays with the revolution because “it is like a hurricane, and the man who joins it isn’t a man anymore…he’s a miserable dead leaf caught up in the windstorm” (64).

In the morning, a prostitute is found shot dead, and two of Demetrio’s new recruits are dead, their skulls cracks. Demetrio “shrug[s] his shoulders” (65) and orders that the men be buried.

Demetrio and Pancracio talk about Camilla. Demetrio misses her, but Pancracio says that he should forget her: “To hell with women, they’re the devil, that’s what they are!” (68). Demetrio cannot stop thinking about Camilla, though.

The men hear that Pancho Villa, whom Luis calls “Our Mexican Napoleon” (69), is coming to visit. Luis thinks of all the grand stories he has heard about Villa and hopes that he will have a chance to meet him. The men tell each other tales about Villa’s victories, embellishing details to make the stories better. Someone describes the wonderful uniforms that Villa’s men wear, and some of Demetrio’s men are ashamed of their own shabby clothes. Montañez says, “One man’s the same as the next. No man’s got more guts than any other, if you ask me. For fighting, all you need is a little pride. I may be dressed like hell, but let me tell you, I don’t have to be here” (71).

During an attack, Luis is knocked off of his horse. The Federals think he is dead, but he survives by crawling to a pile of stone and hiding inside of it with Solís. Solís is impressed with Demetrio” saying to Luis, “By God, that chief of yours is a real man! What daring! What assurance!” (73). Solís describes how the Federals ambushed the rebels. The Federals were dug into trenches and firing on them with machine guns. Demetrio led his men to the trenches, and they fought the Federals with knives. They then threw lassoes around the large machine guns and dragged them away.

Luis sees scores of corpses on the slopes of the hill: “How beautiful the Revolution is, even in its very barbarity,” (74) says Solís. He worries aloud that if the rebels are victorious, they might become “monsters of exactly the same sort” (74) as the Federals. Then the sacrifice would be for nothing.

Luis feels “a little blow in the stomach” and then “eternal darkness and silence” (75).