ERNEST HEMINGWAY - Premium Edition. Ernest Hemingway
said. “I don’t want to be stuck on a lance by any —— cavalry.”
“You certainly shot that sergeant, Tenente,” Piani said. We were walking fast.
“I killed him,” Bonello said. “I never killed anybody in this war, and all my life I’ve wanted to kill a sergeant.”
“You killed him on the sit all right,” Piani said. “He wasn’t flying very fast when you killed him.”
“Never mind. That’s one thing I can always remember. I killed that —— of a sergeant.”
“What will you say in confession?” Aymo asked.
“I’ll say, ‘Bless me, father, I killed a sergeant.’ ” They all laughed.
“He’s an anarchist,” Piani said. “He doesn’t go to church.”
“Piani’s an anarchist too,” Bonello said.
“Are you really anarchists?” I asked.
“No, Tenente. We’re socialists. We come from Imola.”
“Haven’t you ever been there?”
“No.”
“By Christ it’s a fine place, Tenente. You come there after the war and we’ll show you something.”
“Are you all socialists?”
“Everybody.”
“Is it a fine town?”
“Wonderful. You never saw a town like that.”
“How did you get to be socialists?”
“We’re all socialists. Everybody is a socialist. We’ve always been socialists.”
“You come, Tenente. We’ll make you a socialist too.”
Ahead the road turned off to the left and there was a little hill and, beyond a stone wall, an apple orchard. As the road went uphill they ceased talking. We walked along together all going fast against time.
CHAPTER 30
Later we were on a road that led to a river. There was a long line of abandoned trucks and carts on the road leading up to the bridge. No one was in sight. The river was high and the bridge had been blown up in the centre; the stone arch was fallen into the river and the brown water was going over it. We went on up the bank looking for a place to cross. Up ahead I knew there was a railway bridge and I thought we might be able to get across there. The path was wet and muddy. We did not see any troops; only abandoned trucks and stores. Along the river bank there was nothing and no one but the wet brush and muddy ground. We went up to the bank and finally we saw the railway bridge.
“What a beautiful bridge,” Aymo said. It was a long plain iron bridge across what was usually a dry river-bed.
“We better hurry and get across before they blow it up,” I said.
“There’s nobody to blow it up,” Piani said. “They’re all gone.”
“It’s probably mined,” Bonello said. “You cross first, Tenente.”
“Listen to the anarchist,” Aymo said. “Make him go first.”
“I’ll go,” I said. “It won’t be mined to blow up with one man.”
“You see,” Piani said. “That is brains. Why haven’t you brains, anarchist?”
“If I had brains I wouldn’t be here,” Bonello said.
“That’s pretty good, Tenente,” Aymo said.
“That’s pretty good,” I said. We were close to the bridge now. The sky had clouded over again and it was raining a little. The bridge looked long and solid. We climbed up the embankment.
“Come one at a time,” I said and started across the bridge. I watched the ties and the rails for any tripwires or signs of explosive but I saw nothing. Down below the gaps in the ties the river ran muddy and fast. Ahead across the wet countryside I could see Udine in the rain. Across the bridge I looked back. Just up the river was another bridge. As I watched, a yellow mud-colored motor car crossed it. The sides of the bridge were high and the body of the car, once on, was out of sight. But I saw the heads of the driver, the man on the seat with him, and the two men on the rear seat. They all wore German helmets. Then the car was over the bridge and out of sight behind the trees and the abandoned vehicles on the road. I waved to Aymo who was crossing and to the others to come on. I climbed down and crouched beside the railway embankment. Aymo came down with me.
“Did you see the car?” I asked.
“No. We were watching you.”
“A German staff car crossed on the upper bridge.”
“A staff car?”
“Yes.”
“Holy Mary.”
The others came and we all crouched in the mud behind the embankment, looking across the rails at the bridge, the line of trees, the ditch and the road.
“Do you think we’re cut off then, Tenente?”
“I don’t know. All I know is a German staff car went along that road.”
“You don’t feel funny, Tenente? You haven’t got strange feelings in the head?”
“Don’t be funny, Bonello.”
“What about a drink?” Piani asked. “If we’re cut off we might as well have a drink.” He unhooked his canteen and uncorked it.
“Look! Look!” Aymo said and pointed toward the road. Along the top of the stone bridge we could see German helmets moving. They were bent forward and moved smoothly, almost supernaturally, along. As they came off the bridge we saw them. They were bicycle troops. I saw the faces of the first two. They were ruddy and healthy-looking. Their helmets came low down over their foreheads and the side of their faces. Their carbines were clipped to the frame of the bicycles. Stick bombs hung handle down from their belts. Their helmets and their gray uniforms were wet and they rode easily, looking ahead and to both sides. There were two — then four in line, then two, then almost a dozen; then another dozen — then one alone. They did not talk but we could not have heard them because of the noise from the river. They were gone out of sight up the road.
“Holy Mary,” Aymo said.
“They were Germans,” Piani said. “Those weren’t Austrians.”
“Why isn’t there somebody here to stop them?” I said. “Why haven’t they blown the bridge up? Why aren’t there machine-guns along this embankment?”
“You tell us, Tenente,” Bonello said.
I was very angry.
“The whole bloody thing is crazy. Down below they blow up a little bridge. Here they leave a bridge on the main road. Where is everybody? Don’t they try and stop them at all?”
“You tell us, Tenente,” Bonello said. I shut up. It was none of my business; all I had to do was to get to Pordenone with three ambulances. I had failed at that. All I had to do now was get to Pordenone. I probably could not even get to Udine. The hell I couldn’t. The thing to do was to be calm and not get shot or captured.
“Didn’t you have a canteen open?” I asked Piani. He handed it to me. I took a long drink. “We might as well start,” I said. “There’s no hurry though. Do you want to eat something?”
“This is no place to stay,” Bonello said.
“All right. We’ll start.”
“Should