Part 7 (2/2)
”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 of his usual boxes on the ear, but he slipped and fell, face down, into the mud.
[Ill.u.s.tration]
”Are you comfortable, Private Mollica? Tell me were you ever in a softer bed than now?... You look to me like a roll dipped in chocolate.... Bersaglierino, come and see how ugly he is! All chalky up into his hair.... I never saw any one look such an idiot!”
[Ill.u.s.tration]
”I wish they would murder you, you beastly little puppy!”
After struggling about in the mud he managed to get to his feet again and had almost caught him, but in one spring Pinocchio was far away.
The telephone dugout was a little deeper than the trench and the water was rapidly filling it up. It was already up to the operator's knees. A crowd of soldiers were working hard to stop the flood.
”What are you doing, stupids? Do you think you can bail out this puddle 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 and legs and soused him into the dirty water and held him under till he had drunk a cupful. The telephone operator would have liked to see him dead, then and there.
”Hold him under till he is as swollen as a toad. He was calling down misfortune on us, wis.h.i.+ng that a sh.e.l.l would fall on us. As if this rain weren't enough (che-chew, che-chew!); we are chilled to the marrow (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!” yelled Bersaglierino, running up.
”But don't you know that he was wis.h.i.+ng a sh.e.l.l would hit us, the little wretch?”
”Just as if we hadn't enough troubles now.”
”Of course you have enough, and one of your troubles is that you are regular beasts,” cried Pinocchio as soon as he could get his breath.
”I said I wished for Bertha, the cook in Papa Geppetto's house, to sweep away the water in here, but now I wish I had a broom in my hand to break its handle against your ribs.”
”But don't you know that a 'Big Bertha' is a Boche gun that would have blown us into a thousand pieces?”
”So, little devil, do you understand? And now that you have learned your lesson, be off with you.”
There was nothing else for poor Pinocchio to do but to spit out the mud still in his mouth and turn on his heel.
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