CHAPTER IV
_How Pinocchio Learned That War Changes Everything--Even the Meaningof Words_
The bersaglieri had passed the Isonzo and were intrenched at ----(censor). You certainly know now what the Isonzo is, because warteaches geography better than do teachers in the schools; so I don'tintend to explain it to you. Pinocchio had followed his friends, and Iassure you no one regretted his coming. When there were orders tocarry to the rear or purchases to be made, it was Pinocchio whoattended to them. Slender as a lizard and quick as a squirrel, he wasout of the trenches without being seen and slipped along the furrowsand ditches and the bushes with marvelous dexterity. He had beenabsolutely forbidden to approach the loopholes, and when they caughthim about to disobey he got such boxes on the ears that he had torub them for half an hour afterward. Mollica, and the Bersaglierinoin particular, kept their eyes on him, so that they punished himoften.
ONE DAY HE MANAGED TO CAPTURE A PIG AND TO DRAG ITALONG BEHIND HIM]
"I'd like to know why it is you two can stand with your noses againstthe hole and I mayn't."
"Because of the _mosquitoes_."
"Who cares for them? I haven't the slightest fear of mosquitoes."
But when he saw them carry off a poor soldier hit in the middle of theforehead and understood that the "mosquitoes" were Austrian bullets,he gained a little wisdom. While the soldiers were suffering from thetrench life which restrained their ardent natures, keeping them stilland watchful, the rogue of a Pinocchio amused himself with all kindsof jokes. Dirty as he could be, he was always grubbing with his nailsin the ground to deepen the trench, to make some new breastwork, tobuild up an escarp. If they sent him out to find logs of wood torepair the roofs of the dugouts he would come back laden with allsorts of things. Hens and eggs were his favorite booty. One day hemanaged to capture a pig and to drag it along behind him. But whenthey got near the trenches the cussed animal began to squeal sohorribly that the Austrians opened up a terrific fire on him. For fearof the "mosquitoes" Pinocchio had to let him go, and the pig ran totake refuge among his brothers, the enemy.
That evening it rained cats and dogs. The trench was one slimy pool.The rain dripped everywhere, penetrating, baring the parapets whichcollapsed, squirting mud and gluing the feet of the soldiers, who, wetto the bone, had to scurry through the wire to carry ammunition tosafety and to repair the damage done to the trench. Pinocchio,barelegged, ran back and forth, bemired up to his hair, to give ahelping hand to his friends.
"What fun! We seem to be turning into crabs."
"You are a beastly little puppy!"
"Poor Mollica! You really make me sorry for you."
"I make you sorry for me?"
"Certainly. I shouldn't want to be you in all this downpour."
"Why?"
"Because this rain will melt your sugary nature."
Mollica, to convince him of the contrary, started to administer one ofhis usual boxes on the ear, but he slipped and fell, face down, intothe mud.
"Are you comfortable, Private Mollica? Tell me were you ever in asofter bed than now?... You look to me like a roll dipped inchocolate.... Bersaglierino, come and see how ugly he is! All chalkyup into his hair.... I never saw any one look such an idiot!"
"I wish they would murder you, you beastly little puppy!"
After struggling about in the mud he managed to get to his feet againand had almost caught him, but in one spring Pinocchio was far away.The telephone dugout was a little deeper than the trench and thewater was rapidly filling it up. It was already up to the operator'sknees. A crowd of soldiers were working hard to stop the flood.
"What are you doing, stupids? Do you think you can bail out thispuddle with a cap? You are green. We ought to have big Bertha...."
He didn't get in another word. They took hold of him by his arms andlegs and soused him into the dirty water and held him under till hehad drunk a cupful. The telephone operator would have liked to see himdead, then and there.
"Hold him under till he is as swollen as a toad. He was calling downmisfortune on us, wishing that a shell would fall on us. As if thisrain weren't enough (che-chew, che-chew!); we are chilled to themarrow (che-chew!) and are likely to die bravely of cold ...(che-chew!)."
"Enough! Let me go! Help! Bersaglierino! Mollica-a-a!"
"What are you doing to him? Let him go. Shame on you!" yelledBersaglierino, running up.
"But don't you know that he was wishing a shell would hit us, thelittle wretch?"
"Just as if we hadn't enough troubles now."
"Of course you have enough, and one of your troubles is that you areregular beasts," cried Pinocchio as soon as he could get his breath."I said I wished for Bertha, the cook in Papa Geppetto's house, tosweep away the water in here, but now I wish I had a broom in my handto break its handle against your ribs."
"But don't you know that a 'Big Bertha' is a Boche gun that would haveblown us into a thousand pieces?"
"So, little devil, do you understand? And now that you have learnedyour lesson, be off with you."
There was nothing else for poor Pinocchio to do but to spit out themud still in his mouth and turn on his heel.
"Bersaglierino, I would have believed anything but that words changetheir meaning in this way. With these idiots you have to pay attentionto what you say. They made me swallow so much ditch-water that it willbe a miracle if I don't have little fish swimming around in mystomach."
It stopped raining, but as if the Austrians didn't want to give thebersaglieri time to repair the damages caused by the bad weather, theybegan a furious bombardment of the trench. The "mosquitoes" kept up aterrible singing. Huge projectiles churned up the ground all around,digging out deep holes, raising whirls of earth, throwing off shredsof stone and steel in every direction. One shell had fallen near thetelephone and had done great damage. The soldiers couldn't venture anydistance from the dugout to aim at the enemy who was firing at themwith such accuracy. Mud prevented their movements. They couldn'tchange their positions because the slippery earth offered no foothold.It was impossible to excavate deep because the earth slid down. It wasa critical moment. Several men had been killed, the wounded weremoaning bitterly, the dying were groaning.... But the Italianbersaglieri did not lose courage and stood up against the foe, showinga genuine disregard for their lives. Pinocchio longed to cry. Hewasn't thinking of the danger to himself, but of the fact that if thisdevilish fire kept up much longer all his bersaglieri would be killed.Wasn't there anybody to look out for them? What was our artillerydoing? Did they really intend to let them all be massacred?
He had scarcely thought this when he heard behind him the thunder ofItalian guns. A quarter of an hour later and the Austrians were quitequiet. But the situation hadn't improved. Orders had come from thesecond line to hold out at all costs because it wouldn't be possibleto relieve them until the next evening. An attack in force wasexpected every minute.
The captain assembled his company and said: "Men, we must stick and beready for anything. We can't have reinforcements, but to-night theywill send us _chevaux de frise_ and barbed wire. But I don't want tobe caught like a bird in a net. We have plenty of 'jelly.' If twowould volunteer to carry a couple of pounds of it under theentanglements of those gentlemen over yonder we might be able tochange our lodgings. They have a fine trench of reinforced concretewith rooms and good beds and bathroom. We'd be better off there thanin this mud. What do you say, boys? Is there any one who ..."
They didn't even let him finish. All stepped forward, and, if I am totell you the truth, Pinocchio, too, but no one noticed him. Mollicaand the Bersaglierino were chosen.
It grew dark. Some of them, completely worn out, dozed leaning upagainst the side of the trench. The Bersaglierino was writing rapidlya letter in pencil. Mollica had pulled out of his knapsack the oldnewspapers his father had sent him and seemed about to take up his oldstudies of fingerprints. There were tears in his eyes.
"Heh! Mollica,
you look as if you weren't pleased with the duty thecaptain has given you."
"Well?"
"But you ought to let me go."
"You? But how do you suppose they would let a boy like you carryjelly?"
"Do you think I would eat it all up? I won't say that I mightn't tasteit, especially if it is that golden-yellow kind that shivers like aparalytic old man, but I would carry out the order like any oneelse.... Only, I can't understand how for a little bit of jelly thosescoundrels will give up their comfortable trench. It's true that theyeat all sorts of miserable kinds of food and that Esau sold hisbirthright for a mess of pottage, but ..."
"Shut up, you chatterbox! You'll see what will happen. I'll explain toyou that 'jelly' in war-time is what we call a mixture of stuff thatwhen put in a pipe under the wire entanglements and set off by a fusewill blow you up sky-high in a thousand pieces, if you don't take toyour heels in time."
"And you ... want to go and be blown up?"
"No. I hope to come back safe and sound, and I have still to send yourletter to Franz Joey."
Pinocchio was silent and hid himself in a corner without another word.I can't tell you exactly if he had some sad presentiment or if hisdisillusion resulting from Mollica's technical explanation of "jelly"had put him in a bad humor. There was no doubt about it--war hadchanged the dictionary. He was still more certain of this when, anhour later, he saw the "Frisian horses" arrive. He was expectingbeasts with at least four legs, and instead he saw them drag in frontof the trenches a huge roll of iron wound up in an enormous skein ofbarbed wire. But there was still a greater surprise in store for him.That very night he was to find out that in war-time not only the valueof words changes, but that there are some which are canceled fromcertain persons' vocabulary.
It was night ... and there was nothing to be seen and you couldn'teven hear the traditional fly. From the Austrian trench there came adull regular noise. It seemed as if a lot of pigs were squealing.Instead, it was the Croats who were snoring. No one slept in theItalian trenches. There was a strange coming and going, a fantasticflittering of shadows. There was low talking, commands were passedfrom mouth to mouth and whispered in the ear--every one was makingpreparations. Mollica and the Bersaglierino had put steel helmets ontheir heads and had shields of the same metal on their arms.
"But what are you going to do? You look like the statue of Perseus inthe costume of a soldier."
"I would almost rather be in his place and with no more clothes thanhe has on instead of in this get-up ... but what's there to be doneabout it? I promised you to take the letter to Franz Joey."
A little later Mollica and Bersaglierino left the trench and wriggledalong the ground like serpents, carrying with them big metal boxes.The bersaglieri took their places behind the loopholes, their musketsin position, and stood there motionless, anxious, and restless.Pinocchio, too, wanted to see what was happening, and, takingadvantage of his guardians' carelessness, slipped out of the trenchand squatted down in a big hole which an enemy projectile had hollowedout twenty yards away.
The poor youngster was very sad. The black night, the silenceeverywhere, the preparations he had watched and could not understand,were the causes of his melancholy.
"But how under the sun did it ever enter Bersaglierino's head to offerhimself for this expedition?" he thought. "He might have let some oneelse go. Not so bad for Mollica. He'll eat up the Austrians likewaffles. If any one dares to play a trick on him he'll land him a fewgood blows and put him where he belongs, but Bersaglierino ... solittle and so frail.... If any misfortune happens to him ..."
Some time went by, I can't say how long, but it was quite a littlewhile, because Pinocchio had almost fallen asleep, when the air wasshaken by two tremendous explosions. He woke with a start, saw two redflashes shining for an instant on a shower of fragments thrown up to agreat height ... then blackness and the fiendish rattling of themachine-guns and crackle of musket fire. Suddenly a long white shaftof light broke the darkness, coming from no one knew where, waving tothe right and to the left, and fixing itself on the ground between thetwo trenches, which were immediately showered by shells.
"And Bersaglierino? And Mollica?" Pinocchio asked himself, anxiously,feeling his throat tighten up.
Suddenly a black shadow was outlined in the gleam of a searchlightthat was operated from a distance. It crawled along the ground, movingby starts. They had seen it, too, from the trenches and there wereconfused cries of, "Come on!" ... "Bravo!" ... "A few more steps!" ..."Stick to it!"
And the figure seemed to gain new strength and to bound like a wildbeast. But who was it? Surely the Bersaglierino. The form was small,slender, and very quick. Mollica was large and slow. What had becomeof him? Between the roar of the explosions and the whistle of theshells there came a shrill cry of anguish. The little shadow slidalong, then a leap in the silvery ray, and it was lost in theblackness of the earth torn by the rain of steel.
"Oh, beasts that they are! They have murdered him!" Pinocchioscreamed. "Enough! Enough! Wretches! Don't you see that he has ceasedto move? Stop shooting.... Give him time to recover.... Perhaps he iswounded."
It seemed that the Austrian fire grew even more murderous.
Pinocchio, beside himself with fury, rushed out of his hiding-placeand in a couple of bounds was back in the trench.
"They have wounded Bersaglierino.... He is there ... out there in theNo Man's Land.... Help him ... don't let him die so."
They sprang over the top to rescue their wounded comrades, but hadscarcely gone a step before they were lost to him.
Pinocchio lost his head. He sprang out of the dugout and ran as fastas he could into the spot still illuminated by the ray of silver. Hestumbled, fell, got up again, fell once more, but kept on crawling onhis hands and knees.... He heard a groan, felt a body, lifted it inhis arms, and, gathering all his strength together, began to drag ittoward the trench. All at once he felt his legs give way and he letout a yell of terror. He was answered by another from a hundredvaliant throats; he saw a strange flash, felt a hurricane strike him,a wave roll over him ... but before losing his senses there came tohim the cry of victory. The Italian bersaglieri had bayoneted thosewho had wounded Bersaglierino and had won from the enemy one moreportion of their country.
A little later the stretcher-bearers were able to gather up thewounded from the field of honor.