“When will you begin to look at old men, Teresina?” I shouted, so that
she might hear me--for she was already some way off.
“When I am old too,” she shouted back without even stopping, and burst
out laughing.
“But the old men won’t look at you then. You mark my words! I know
them!”
I shouted at the top of my voice, enjoying a joke which was directly
inspired by my sex.
At that moment the clouds opened at various points in the sky and let
some sunrays through, which fell straight on Teresina, who was now
about fifty yards away and more than thirty feet above me. She was dark
and small, but shining!
The sun did not shine on me! When you are old, you have to stay in the
shade, however witty you may be.
The war has reached me at last! I used to listen to stories of the war
as if it were a war in times gone by, which it was amusing to talk
about, but about which it would be foolish to excite oneself; when,
to my astonishment, I found myself right in the middle of it, and was
surprised then to think I had not realised that I must sooner or later
become involved. I had lived quite peacefully in a building of which
the ground-floor had caught fire, and it had never occurred to me that
sooner or later the whole building, with me in it, would go up in
flames.
The war took hold of me, shook me out like a rag, and robbed me at one
blow of all my family, including my steward. From one day to the next
I became a completely new man or, to be more exact, every one of my
twenty-four hours was different. Since yesterday I have felt a little
calmer, for after waiting a whole month I have at last had news of my
family. They are safe and sound at Turin, while I had already lost all
hope of ever seeing them again.
I have to spend the whole day in my office. There is nothing for me to
do there, but the Olivis, who are Italian citizens, have had to go,
and all the best of my employees have gone off to fight in one place
or another; so I must stick to my post and superintend it all. I go
home in the evening laden with the huge warehouse keys. To-day, when
I felt so much calmer, I took this manuscript with me to the office,
thinking it might help to pass the time. And it did in fact procure me
a wonderful quarter of an hour, which reminded me that there was once a
time in the world’s history when one could allow oneself the luxury of
sitting down in peace and quietness to enjoy such trifles as this.
It would be nice if someone were to invite me seriously to fall into
a state of half-consciousness in which I might live again even one
hour of my former life. I should laugh in his face. How could one give
up a present like this to pursue such frivolous trifles? It is only
now that I feel myself definitely detached from my preoccupation with
health and disease. As I walk through the streets of our unfortunate
city I am conscious of being a privileged person who does not have to
go and fight and who daily has what he needs to eat. In comparison
with all the rest I feel so happy (especially since I had news of my
family) that I should be afraid of provoking the wrath of the gods if
everything were absolutely well with me.
My first encounter with the war was a violent one, of which I can now
see the comic side.
Augusta and I had returned to Lucinico to spend Whitsun there with the
children. On May 23rd I got up early, for I had to take some Carlsbad
salts and go for a walk before my morning coffee. It was during
this cure at Lucinico that I realised that the heart carries on its
restorative work much better on an empty stomach, and spreads a sense
of well-being through the whole body. My theory was to find remarkable
confirmation that very day, when I was compelled to practise a long and
salutary fast.
Augusta raised her white head from the pillow to wish me good-morning,
and reminded me that I had promised to get my daughter some roses. Our
only rose-tree had finished flowering, so I was obliged to get them
from elsewhere. My daughter has grown into a fine girl, and is very
like Ada. I had suddenly forgotten to behave towards her as a stern
mentor, and had assumed the rôle of a cavalier who respects femininity
even in his own daughter. She at once realised her power and abused it,
to Augusta’s and my great amusement. She had expressed a wish for some
roses, so I must procure some for her.
I proposed to walk for about two hours. The sun was shining brightly,
and as I intended to walk all the time and not to stop till I got
back home, I did not even take a coat or hat with me. I fortunately
remembered that I should have to pay for the roses, so I did not leave
my pocket-book at home as well as my coat.
I went first of all into the neighbouring property, belonging to
Teresina’s father, to ask him to cut some roses, which I would call for
on my way back. I entered the great courtyard surrounded by a partially
ruined wall, but found no one there. I shouted Teresina’s name. The
youngest of the children, aged about six, came out of the house. I put
a few coppers into his hand, and he told me the whole family had gone
off early to the other side of the Isonzo for a day’s work on a field
of potatoes which needed earthing up.
This was quite welcome news to me, for I knew the field, and it would
take me about an hour to reach it. As I had decided to go for a two
hours’ walk I was glad to be provided with a definite goal. There was
no danger now of my interrupting it by a sudden attack of laziness. I
set off across the plain, which lies higher than the road so that I
could only see from it the tops of a few flowering trees which grew
along the sides. I was in a cheerful mood; I felt so light and airy
in my shirt-sleeves and without a hat. I breathed the pure air with
delight, and as I walked along did some of Niemeyer’s lung gymnastics
which I had been practising now for some time past. A German friend had
taught me the exercises, and they cannot be too highly recommended to
anyone living a sedentary life.
When I got to the field I saw Teresina working on the side nearest
the road. I went towards her, and then caught sight of her father
and little brothers at work a little farther on. I should think they
must have been between ten and fourteen years old. Though one feels
exhausted after any unusual effort when one is old, one nevertheless
feels younger than when doing nothing, because of the accompanying
sense of excitement. I went to Teresina and said gaily:
“There is still time, Teresina. Don’t be too long.”
She did not understand, and I did not think it necessary to explain.
Since she had forgotten, I could go back to my old relations with her.
I had already repeated the experiment, and the result had again been
favourable. In addressing those few words to her I had caressed her,
and not with my looks alone.
I soon came to an agreement with her father. He would let me cut as
many roses as I liked, and we should certainly not quarrel about the
price. He was going to return to his work at once, whilst I had begun
to set off homewards, when he changed his mind and ran after me. When
he caught me up, he asked in a low voice:
“Haven’t you heard anything? They say war has broken out.”
“Well yes, we all know that! It has been going on for nearly a year,” I
replied.
“I don’t mean that,” he exclaimed impatiently. “I mean the other with
...” and he made a gesture in the direction of the Italian frontier.
“Haven’t you heard anything about it?” He waited anxiously for my reply.
“You can rest assured,” I said with complete confidence, “that if I
have heard nothing about it, it means that there is nothing to hear. I
have just come from Trieste, and the very last thing I heard was that
they will have nothing to do with the war. In Rome they have turned out
the Government that wanted war, and have put in Giolitti.”
He was reassured at once.
“Then all these potatoes that we are just covering up, and which
promise so well, will be ours after all. There are so many of those
scaremongers about.” He wiped away the sweat that was pouring from his
brow with his shirt-sleeve.
Seeing that I had made him happy, I tried to make him happier still.
I do so like to see people enjoying themselves. So I said a number of
things which I hardly like to remember. I asserted that even if war had
broken out it would not be fought anywhere near there. First of all
there was the sea, which it was time they began fighting on, and then
in Europe there were battlefields enough and to spare. There was the
whole of Flanders and several departments in France. I had heard say--I
could not remember by whom--that there was such a shortage of potatoes
in the world that they even cultivated them with great care on the
field of battle. I talked a great deal, keeping my eyes fixed the while
on the slender little form of Teresina, who was crouching down to feel
the earth with her hand before she began digging.
The peasant went back to his work, with his mind set completely at
rest. But I who had given him part of my own tranquillity had so much
less left for myself. It was clear we were too near the frontier at
Lucinico. I would speak to Augusta about it. Perhaps we should do well
to return to Trieste, or anyway to move farther from the frontier,
in whichever direction. It was true that Giolitti was now in power,
but one could not tell whether, once he had arrived there, he would
continue to see things in the same light as when someone else was in
power.
My uneasiness was increased by a chance meeting with a troop of
soldiers who were marching towards Lucinico. They were none of them
young, and they were shabbily dressed and ill-equipped. They were
carrying what we used to call a “darlindana” in Trieste, a kind of
old-fashioned long bayonet which in the summer of 1915 the Austrians
had had to fetch out of their old stores.
I continued to walk behind them for some time, eager to be at home
again. But the unpleasant odour which emanated from them at last forced
me to slacken my pace. My anxiety and my haste were equally foolish.
It was ridiculous to be alarmed just because I had been talking to a
timid peasant. I could see my villa in the distance now, and there was
no sign of the soldiers on the road. I began walking faster so as to
get the sooner to my _caffelatte_.
It was at this point that my adventure began. At a bend of the road I
was suddenly stopped by a sentinel, who shouted:
“_Zurück_,” at the same time pointing his gun at me. I was going to
talk German to him because he had given his command in German, but that
was the only word he knew and he repeated it threateningly several
times.
There was nothing for it but to go _zurück_ and I did so rather
hurriedly, looking behind me constantly to make sure that he was not
going to enforce his words by firing; and even when he was lost to view
I did not slacken my pace.
But I had not yet given up the idea of reaching my villa as quickly as
possible. I thought that by climbing the hill on my right I should come
out a good way behind the threatening sentinel.
It was not a difficult climb, especially as the tall grass had been
trodden down by many footsteps. It seemed as if a whole crowd had come
that way before me, driven to do so, no doubt, by the impossibility of
going along the road. As I walked I recovered my assurance, and decided
that directly I reached Lucinico I would protest to the mayor against
the treatment I had received. If he allowed people who had country
houses to be treated like that, very soon everyone would give up coming
to Lucinico.
But when I reached the top of the hill I was unpleasantly surprised to
find it already occupied by the regiment of soldiers who smelt like
venison. A number of soldiers were lying in the shade of a cottage
belonging to some peasants I had known for a long time; at that hour
there would be no one in it. Three of them seemed to be sentinels,
but they were not facing the direction I had come from; others were
standing in a semicircle in front of an officer who was giving them
orders, which he illustrated by pointing to a map he was holding in his
hand.
I had not even a hat which I could take off in greeting him. I bowed
several times, and putting on my best smile advanced towards the
officer who, when he saw me, stopped talking to the soldiers and
stared at me. The five Czeckish soldiers who were gathered round him
also gave me their best attention. Under the fire of all those eyes,
and on the uneven ground, I found it a very difficult matter to move at
all.
The officer shouted:
“_Was will der dumme Kerl hier?_” (What does the fool want here?)
Amazed at being insulted like this without the slightest provocation, I
should have liked to make a dignified and manly protest, but thinking
discretion to be the better part of valour I left the path and was
going towards the hill beyond which lay Lucinico. The officer began
shouting at me that if I took another step he would order his men to
fire. I at once became very polite, and from that day to this I have
always been most polite. It was monstrous that I should be obliged
to treat with an uncivil lout like that, but there was at least this
advantage, that he talked German fluently. It was such an advantage,
that the more I thought of it the easier it became for me to talk
gently to him. Supposing the horrible creature had not even understood
German! I should have been lost.
It was a pity I could not talk the language very fluently myself;
otherwise I should have had no difficulty in making his Highness laugh.
I told him my _caffelatte_ was waiting for me at Lucinico, and that I
was only parted from it by his division.
He did laugh, on my honour he laughed. He laughed and swore at the
same time, and had not the patience to hear me out. He said that other
people would drink up my coffee for me at Lucinico, and when he heard
my wife was waiting for me there, as well as the _caffelatte_, he
shouted:
“_Auch Ihre Frau wird von anderen gegessen werden._” (And other people
will eat up your wife as well.)
By this time he was in a better temper than I was. I think he was sorry
to have said something which the loud laughter of his five soldiers
might have made to seem offensive; he became serious, and explained to
me that I must not hope to see Lucinico again for some days, and he
advised me as a friend not to ask any questions, because this in itself
would be enough to compromise me!
“_Haben Sie verstanden?_” (Do you understand?)
I did understand, but could not so easily resign myself to giving up my
_caffelatte_ which was less than half a mile away. So I hesitated to
turn back; for it was clear that if I went down the hill again I should
certainly never reach my villa that day at all. To gain time I said
politely to the officer:
“But to whom must I apply for permission to return to Lucinico and
fetch at least my hat and coat?”
I ought to have realised that the officer was in a hurry to be left
alone with his map and his men, but I never expected to arouse his fury
to the extent I did.
In a voice which seemed as if it would burst the drum of my ear he
shouted that he had already told me not to ask any more questions.
Then he bade me go where the devil took me (“_wo der Teufel Sie
tragen will_”). The idea of being taken anywhere was not displeasing
to me, for I was extremely tired; but I still hesitated. The officer
meanwhile, by dint of shouting at me, had become more and more enraged,
and in threatening tones called to his side one of the men who were
gathered round him, and calling him _Signor Caporale_ ordered him to
take me down the hill and not to lose sight of me till I was well on
the road leading to Gorizia. If I hesitated to obey him for a moment he
was to fire.
On hearing these instructions I was almost glad to be on my way down
again.
“_Danke schön_,” I said, without the least touch of irony. The corporal
was a Slav who spoke Italian fairly well. He thought it best to seem
brutal in the officer’s presence, and shouted: “_Marsch!_” to me, to
indicate that I was to go ahead. But when we had gone a short distance
he became quite gentle and friendly. He asked if I had any fresh news
of the war and if it was really true that Italy was coming in. He
awaited my reply anxiously.
So not even they knew whether they were at war or not! I wanted to
cheer him as much as possible, so I gave him the same news which I had
already imparted to Teresina’s father. This weighed on my conscience
afterwards. In the awful storm which burst soon after, all the people
I tried to reassure probably perished. What a horrified expression
of surprise death must have graven on their faces. My optimism was
invincible. Surely I must have felt that the officer’s words meant
war, still more the tone in which he spoke them!
The corporal was much relieved, and showed his gratitude by advising me
to make no further attempt to reach Lucinico. After hearing my news he
felt sure that the order forbidding me to go home would be withdrawn on
the following day. In the meantime he advised me to go to Trieste to
the _Platz Kommando_ who would perhaps grant me a special permit.
“To Trieste?” I exclaimed, horrified. To Trieste without a coat or hat,
and without my _caffelatte?_
According to the corporal a close cordon of infantry was being drawn
across the road into Italy at this very moment, forming a new and
insuperable frontier. He said with a condescending smile that in his
opinion the shortest way to Lucinico was via Trieste.
I had now heard this so often that I was getting resigned to it, and
set off for Gorizia, intending to catch the midday train to Trieste.
I was excited, but I must say that I felt very well. I was more
light-hearted than I had been for a long time. I was not at all sorry
to be obliged to go on walking. My legs were rather tired, but I
thought I could hold out as far as Gorizia, my breathing was so free
and deep. Once my legs had warmed up to walking at a good rate, I got
along without any difficulty at all. I went at an unusually quick pace,
beating time as I walked, and with my physical well-being my optimism
returned. They were threatening here and threatening there, but they
wouldn’t really fight. And that is why when I reached Gorizia I
hesitated as to whether I had not better reserve a room in the hotel to
spend the night, and go back to Lucinico next day to make my complaint
to the mayor.
I hurried to the post-office to telephone to Augusta. But they could
get no answer from my villa.
The only thing I remember about the clerk at the post-office is that
he was a little man with a scanty beard whose small stature and stiff
movements gave him a rather absurd and pompous air. When he heard me
swearing furiously at the dumb telephone he came up to me and said:
“This is the fourth time to-day that we have had no reply from
Lucinico.”
When I turned towards him his eyes shone with a malicious joy (I
was mistaken in saying I remembered nothing else!) and he gave me a
piercing look as if to see whether I was really as surprised and angry
as I seemed. It was a good ten minutes before I really understood. Then
I had no further doubts. Lucinico was already in the line of fire, or
would be in a few minutes’ time. It was not till I was on my way to the
café to drink the cup of coffee I had been waiting for since the early
morning, that I realised the full significance of that eloquent glance.
I at once changed my direction and went to the station instead. I
wanted to be nearer to my family and, in accordance with the direction
of my friend the corporal, I took a ticket for Trieste.
It was during my brief train journey that war broke out.
Thinking that I should soon be at Trieste, I did not even drink the
cup of coffee I had been panting for so long, though I should have had
plenty of time for it. When I was alone in my compartment my thoughts
turned at once to my family from whom I had been separated in so
strange a manner. Nothing unusual happened to the train till beyond
Monfalcone.
Apparently the war had not yet got as far as this. I recovered my
peace of mind by reflecting that at Lucinico things would by now have
reverted to what they were on this side of the frontier. Augusta and
my children would probably already be in the train on their way into
Italy. The peace of mind which this thought gave me combined with the
vast and astounding calm produced by hunger to send me into a sound
sleep.
It was probably hunger also which woke me. My train had come to a
standstill in the middle of the great stony plain, known as the
Sassonia di Trieste. The sea was not visible, though we must have
been very near to it, for a light mist prevented me from seeing far.
The Carso has a great charm in May, only to be appreciated by one who
has not been spoilt by the brilliant colours and exuberance of spring
in other places. The stone which everywhere emerges from the soil is
encircled by a tender green which soon becomes the predominant note of
the landscape.
At another time I should have been in a terribly bad temper at not
being able to eat when I was so hungry. But the tremendous nature
of the historic event I had witnessed this day impressed me so much
that I resigned myself to the inevitable. The guard to whom I gave a
good cigarette could not even procure me a bit of bread. I told no one
about my experiences that morning. I thought I would wait till I got
to Trieste and found a friend. No sound of fighting reached my ears
from the frontier towards which I was going. We had stopped there in
order to let eight or nine trains go winding down the long serpentine
curves towards Italy. The open wound, as they soon began to call the
Italian front, in Austria, had broken out again and needed more matter
to feed it. And the poor men advanced towards it shouting and singing.
From every train which I passed issued the same sounds of joy and
intoxication.
When I reached Trieste night had already descended on the city.
The darkness was lit by the glow of many incendiary fires, and a friend
who saw me going towards my house in my shirt-sleeves called out to me:
“Have you been taking part in the sack too?”
At last I was able to get something to eat, and I went to bed at once,
overcome by an immense fatigue, which was caused, no doubt, by the
hopes and fears that chased each other perpetually through my mind. I
was still feeling very well, and during the short time before I fell
asleep, when I had become accustomed by psycho-analysis to retain the
images which came to me, I remember I had one last childish idea with
which to end my day: No one had been killed yet at the frontier, so it
was still possible for peace to be patched up again.
Now that I know my family to be safe and sound I don’t dislike the
life I lead. There is not much for me to do, but I cannot say I am
altogether idle. One is not allowed to buy or sell. Trade will begin
again when peace has come. Olivi sends me good advice from Switzerland.
If only he knew how inappropriate it is to these surroundings, where
everything is entirely changed! At the moment I am doing nothing.
_March 24, 1916._
I have not touched this notebook since May of last year. And now
suddenly Dr. S. has written from Switzerland asking me to send him as
much as I had written up to now. It is an odd request, but I have no
objection to sending him these notes as well; they will show him pretty
clearly what I think of him and his treatment. He already has all my
confessions; let him keep these few pages too, as well as a few more
which I shall willingly add for his edification. I have very little
time, as business takes up my whole day. But I shall let Dr. S. have
it, and not spare him. I have thought about it so much that my ideas on
the subject are quite clear.
He is no doubt expecting to receive more confessions of weakness and
ill-health, and will receive instead an account of my perfect health;
as perfect, that is, as my rather advanced age permits. I am cured! I
not only have no desire to practise psycho-analysis, but no need to do
so. And my good health is not merely the result of feeling myself to be
a privileged person among so many martyrs. It is not only by comparison
with others that I feel myself to be well: I really am well, absolutely
well. For some time past I have realised that being well is a matter
of conviction, and that it is a mere day-dreamer’s phantasy to try and
get cured otherwise than by self-persuasion. Of course I have pains
from time to time, but what do they matter when my health is perfect?
I may have to put on a poultice now and then for some local ailment,
but otherwise I force my limbs to keep in healthy motion and never
allow them to sink into inertia. Pain and love--the whole of life,
in short--cannot be looked on as a disease just because they make us
suffer.
I admit that my fate had to change, and my body to be warmed up by
fighting and above all by victory, before I arrived at the conviction
that I was well. It was my business which cured me, and I should like
Dr. S. to know it.
Up to the end of August in last year I watched the convulsions of
the world in a state of horrified inaction. Then I suddenly began to
_buy_. I underline this word because it has a greater significance than
it had before the war. At that time, when a business man used it, he
meant that he was ready to purchase a particular article. But when I
used it I meant that I was ready to become a buyer of any goods which
offered themselves. Like all strong characters I had only one idea in
my head, and on this I lived, and made my fortune by it. Olivi was
not at Trieste; if he had been he would never have allowed me to take
such a risk; he would rather have left the profits to others. But for
me there was no risk at all. I was absolutely convinced of the success
of my venture. First of all, in accordance with a time-honoured custom
in time of war, I proceeded to convert my whole fortune into gold; but
there was a certain difficulty about buying and selling gold. Ready
money, as being more easy to handle, was my merchandise, and I laid in
a large stock. I sold from time to time, but my sales were far smaller
than my purchases. Because I had begun at the right moment, I was
so lucky in my buying and selling that I soon acquired the means of
realising more ambitious schemes.
I remember with pride that my first purchase was apparently sheer
lunacy, and I only made it in order to put my new idea into practice
as soon as possible. It consisted of a stock of incense. The seller
boasted of the possibility of using incense as a substitute for resin
which was already beginning to run short. As a chemist, I knew for an
absolute certainty that incense could never take the place of resin,
from which it differs _toto genere_, but I thought the world would
soon reach such a pitch of misery that it would be _obliged_ to accept
incense as a substitute for resin. So I bought! A few days ago I sold
quite a small portion of it, and received as much for it as I had
originally paid for the whole amount. When I pocketed the money my
breast swelled at the thought of my strength and abounding health.
When the doctor gets the last part of my manuscript, he will have to
give me back the whole. I should be able to write it all over again
with absolute certainty now; how was it possible for me to understand
my life when I did not know what this last part was going to be?
Perhaps I only lived all those years in order to prepare for it!
I am not so naïve as to blame the doctor for regarding life itself as
a manifestation of disease. Life is a little like disease, with its
crises and periods of quiescence, its daily improvements and setbacks.
But unlike other diseases life is always mortal. It admits of no cure.
It would be like trying to stop up the holes in our body, thinking
them to be wounds. We should die of suffocation almost before we were
cured.
Our life to-day is poisoned to the root. Man has ousted the beasts and
trees, has poisoned the air and filled up the open spaces. Worse things
may happen. That melancholy and industrious animal--man--may discover
new forces and harness them to his chariot. Some such danger is in
the air. The result will be a great abundance--of human beings! Every
square yard will be occupied by a man. Who will be able then to cure us
of the lack of air and space? The mere thought of it suffocates me.
But it is not only that, not only that. Every effort to procure health
is in vain. Health can only belong to the beasts, whose sole idea of
progress lies in their own bodies. When the swallow realised that
emigration was the only possible life for her, she enlarged the muscles
which worked her wings, and which became by degrees the most important
part of her body. The mole went underground, and its whole body adapted
itself to the task. The horse grew bigger and changed the shape of his
foot. We know nothing about the development of certain animals, but it
must have existed, and can never have injured their health.
But spectacled man invents implements outside his body, and if there
was any health or nobility in the inventor there is none in the user.
Implements are bought or sold or stolen, and man goes on getting weaker
and more cunning. It is natural that his cunning should increase in
proportion to his weakness. The earliest implements only added to the
length of his arm, and could not be employed except by the exercise
of his own strength. But a machine bears no relation to the body. The
machine creates disease because it denies what has been the law of
creation throughout the ages. The law of the strongest disappeared,
and we have abandoned natural selection. We need something more than
psycho-analysis to help us.
Under the law of the greatest number of machines, disease will prosper
and the diseased will grow ever more numerous.
Perhaps some incredible disaster produced by machines will lead us back
to health.
When all the poison gases are exhausted, a man, made like all other
men of flesh and blood, will in the quiet of his room invent an
explosive of such potency that all the explosives in existence will
seem like harmless toys beside it. And another man, made in his image
and in the image of all the rest, but a little weaker than them, will
steal that explosive and crawl to the centre of the earth with it, and
place it just where he calculates it would have the maximum effect.
There will be a tremendous explosion, but no one will hear it and the
earth will return to its nebulous state and go wandering through the
sky, free at last from parasites and disease.
[End]