The narrative opens with the funeral in 1986 of the local priest, Don Diego, who is buried with pomp and ceremony in the central part of the cemetery, the left of which has been reserved for Protestants, suicides and prisoners shot in the Spanish Civil War. The narrative then becomes retrospective.

Manuel Liñares grew up on the border of Galicia with Portugal, next to the river Miño. His father, Valeriano, was a pointsman. He and his wife, Minia, ran a railway hostel, through which passed several colourful characters, including the Protestant ‘heretic’ soldier who married the barmaid Carmiña and saved Manuel from a rabid dog (but not from a series of anti-rabies injections), the Portuguese monarchist priest Don Domingos, the Portuguese tailor Caetano and the pedlar of books (or colporteur) Severo, from whom Manuel’s father bought a Protestant Bible, which Manuel would later borrow. Memorable experiences included the stopping over of a hydroplane on its way from England to Brazil and the purchase of a new bicycle, which Manuel used to sell pepper from village to village.

Manuel was sent to study in Vigo, where he began to visit the Protestant church on Pi y Margall Street with its English pastor Thomas Berkley. His attempts to discuss matters with the Catholic priest Don Santiago had failed. Together with his friends Feliciano and Maruxa, he rejected the ideas of Scripture only being open to interpretation by priests, of clerical celibacy and confession. His studies bore little fruit, but they did enable him to propose the setting up of a Protestant church in the community he came from, which Berkley and the elders of the church in Vigo rapidly agreed to.

On the death of his paternal grandfather, Manuel returned to his parents’ hostel, having decided to relinquish his studies. He fell in love with a girl from the congregation in Vigo, Carmiña, and worked as an apprentice on the railway. Despite provocations and his mother’s opposition to his being baptized Protestant, all went well until the shadow of conflict became a reality and the Spanish Civil War broke out in 1936 before he could sit his exams to become a railwayman. The political backdrop, the short-lived Second Republic and the Catholic hierarchy’s interest in maintaining its privileges, is analysed in the narrative.

Manuel’s hometown was the last in Galicia to fall to the Nationalist forces. They attempted a resistance, dug up the roads, removed the railway line, to make it more difficult for troops from Vigo to arrive. The priest Don Santiago was arrested and jailed in the town hall. Manuel’s parents fed all the local militia, being paid in tokens by the mayor, which Manuel’s mother feared would be worthless and would ruin their business. On 22nd July, however, a few days after the uprising, the town succumbed to the Nationalists. Manuel’s friend Feliciano was arrested, Maruxa’s father was assassinated. The captain of the border guards, who had helped organize the resistance, was shot. Initially the Civil Guard allowed the Protestants in Oleiros to continue with their worship, but the Catholic priest complained about their behaviour and their church was ransacked while the pastor, Celestino Puente, was beaten up and sent to A Guarda, where he survived thanks to the charity of local fishermen. Manuel again wished he could emigrate with Carmiña to Uruguay or Argentina, where they could be missionaries. Carmiña, meanwhile, was safe. The Nationalist leader in Vigo’s tailor was an Evangelical and the Protestants there were permitted to meet in secret.

For his safety, since escape to Portugal, from where most refugees were returned, was impossible, Manuel travelled to Vigo and enlisted in Franco’s army, the opponents of the freedom of worship he longed for. He was a trained railwayman and could operate a telegraph machine, but he entered as a common soldier, destined to become cannon fodder. His ability to write, however, led to him completing the task of filling out forms and in turn rising to the rank of corporal. Although charity was regarded as the opposite of discipline, he was fortunate to have a commander who was kind and considerate, but warned him against talking about his religion. He was allowed to visit the church in Vigo, where Carmiña informed him of the death of Feliciano and of the treatment received by other Protestants. Manuel tried to help, smuggling bread out of the barracks under his military cape, even after winter had ended.

The summer of 1937 was a purgatory. Manuel’s battalion was transferred from Vigo to Tui. There he was accused by the Catholic priest in Oleiros of being a Protestant, Mason and Communist, and he was sentenced to death by firing squad. Even his uniform, the fact he belonged to Franco’s army, could not protect him. His family, however, intervened and the sentence was rescinded. The battalion was again transferred, this time to Ávila, passing through Manuel’s hometown, so that he just had time to see his family from the train and to remember the scenes of his childhood. Outside Ávila, they narrowly escaped a Republican aerial bombardment and ended up being billeted in caves to avoid detection from the skies.