"Ready . . .Aim. . .Fire!"

A priest and three Roman Catholic youths sat in a cell in Mexico City, last week, solemnly munching a breakfast of eggs fried with red and green peppers, coarse bread, and steaming coffee. As the last morsels disappeared their jailer entered. He had waited until after breakfast, he said, so as not to spoil the young men's appetites. Since they had breakfasted, however, it became his duty to inform all four that they would be led out into the prison garden later that morning, and stood up one by one before a firing squad.

One of the condemned, Luis Segura Vilchis, an electrical engineer, was said by the police to have confessed that he alone conceived and prepared the recent unsuccessful bombing (TIME, Nov. 21) of General Alvaro Obregon, one-armed onetime President of Mexico, and now a candidate for re-election (TIME, Aug. 15).

The condemned priest, the Rev. Miguel Agustin Projuarez, and his younger brother Humberto were also said to have made confessions, but an impression persisted that they were sentenced to death chiefly because several bombs of the type hurled at General Obregon were allegedly found in the priest's house. Last of the four prisoners was the boy Juan Tirade, reputed to have confessed that he hurled one of the bombs which shattered the glass of General Obregon's limousine, wounding him slightly. Because many persons thought one or more of the condemned men innocent, a huge crowd gathered outside the prison walls bearing flowers to strew upon the bodies when they should be dead.

Punctual, His Excellency General Roberto Cruz, Chief of the Mexico City Police, arrived just before 11 A. M. to superintend the execution. His spurs clinked as he crossed the prison doorsill. Entering the prison garden, he swept with a cold, appraising glance the mounted police (now dismounted) who composed the firing squads. At 11 o'clock sharp General Cruz ordered that Priest Miguel Agustin Projuarez should be the first to face muskets.

"I beg you let me pray," said Father Projuarez huskily, when he was led out. As General Cruz nodded, the priest fell on his knees, clasped a crucifix to his breast, prayed briefly. Rising, he walked resolutely to the garden wall, turned his back upon it, and extended his hands in the gesture of benediction, crying: "May God have mercy on you all!" An instant later the listening crowd outside heard three crisp commands: "Ready . . . Aim . . . Fire!"

Father Projuarez crumpled down. A police sergeant, drawing his revolver, went over and pressed it against the prostrate man's temple. Pulling the trigger, he administered the official coupe de grace.

Some moments later Engineer Vilchis was shot down as he stood, silent, expressionless, against the wall. Then Humberto Projuarez was led out. As the rifles cracked, Death came for a third time and took young Projuarez, perhaps, to join his priestly brother.

Last of the condemned came the boy Juan Tirado. "Can I see my mother?" he asked, dully. Since his mother was not at hand, the request was refused. The riflemen, perhaps unnerved, did not shoot well--maimed but did not kill Juan Tirado.

The sergeant, methodical, approached the writhing boy and fired a shot which should have been the coupe de grace . , , Juan Tirado still writhed. . . . With a hand steadied by necessity, the sergeant pressed his automatic pistol to Juan's temple, squeezed the trigger.

Later, when four ambulances carried the bodies from the prison, some 20,000 Mexicans, massed in the streets, doffed their hats and scattered flowers.

On the day after the execution General Alvaro Obregon, said, in the course of a campaign speech in Mexico City: "The men who tried to assassinate me confessed that they did not know me personally and had no personal grievance against me. They explained that the crime was inspired by their fear that I, if re-elected president, will continue the [anti-Catholic] policies of President Calles. If this is my crime, I accept the responsibility for that crime. This attempt shows that we must be alert against clerical reactionaries who demonstrate their intention to continue to the utmost their activities in combating our case, even to most reprehensible methods."