One Hundred Years of Solitude

but the fact that the soldiers
had not returned the weapons.
A group of women spoke
with Aureliano so that he
could obtain the return of
their kitchen knives from his
father-in-law. Don Apolinar
Moscote explained to him, in
strictest confidence, that the
soldiers had taken the
weapons off as proof that the
Liberals were preparing for
war. The cynicism of the
remark alarmed him. He said