A Bell for Adano (29 page)

At the moment of the explosion, Tomasino turned toward the point where Agnello’s boat had been. Fortunately Tomasino had his net in and could move fairly quickly.

When they reached the place they found only splinters of wood, many dead fish floating, dead Agnello floating, dead Merendino, and some pieces of Sconzo.

Tomasino and his men hauled the two whole bodies aboard as the other fishing boats came up.

Tomasino shouted to the others: “Continue to fish. Move farther offshore. I will take Agnello and Merendino in.”

Someone from another boat shouted: “And Sconzo?” “Sconzo,” said Tomasino, not looking at the small pieces of Sconzo floating in the water, “is missing.” Tomasino was careful to take bearings on the headlands with his compass before he started in.

One of his men said, “It is too bad about Sconzo. He wanted very much to go to the party tomorrow night. He has talked of nothing else for three days.”

Another of Tomasino’s helpers said: “Sconzo liked parties. Except for his nose he was handsome.” Agnello and Merendino were just as dead as Sconzo, but their deaths seemed less terrible since they were not missing, as Tomasino put it. That is why the men talked about Sconzo as they went in, and not about the other two.

As soon as they tied up, Tomasino jumped ashore and walked quickly uptown to the Palazzo. He was the first to bring the news to the Major.

“Good afternoon, Tomasino,” the Major said cheerfully. “I’m looking forward to the party tomorrow night. I hear you are one of the hosts.”

Tomasino’s face was black with misery, but the Major had not thought that unusual.

“I cannot go,” Tomasino said.

“Why not, Tomasino? It wouldn’t be the same with- out you.”

Tomasino said grimly: “I came to talk about the explosion. Did you hear the explosion?”

Major Joppolo said: “I did hear an explosion. About half an hour ago, was it?”

Tomasino said: “About half an hour ago.” “What was it?”

“One of my ships. A mine, I suppose, just as you warned.”

The Major stood up. His face had gone white as soon as Tomasino started talking about the explosion. He went around his desk to Tomasino and put a hand on his arm.

“It is my fault, Tomasino, not yours,” he said.

“It was Agnello’s fault,” Tomasino said. “He was too far in. I took bearings, and I know that he was outside the fishing zone.”

“I am sorry,” the Major said.

Tomasino said: “Why are you sorry? I thought you would be angry.”

“I feel as if I had killed your men, Tomasino.” “Accidents happened here before you came, Mister Major. Men have died here before.”

And so it happened that before he left, Tomasino was consoling the Major instead of being berated by him for allowing carelessness m the  fishing fleet.

As Tomasino started to go, the Major said: “You will continue to fish?”

Tomasino said: “Of course. Four of the boats are still out.”

The Major said: “Good, Tomasino.” Then he said: I’m sorry about tomorrow night.”

Tomasino said: “I am sorry too. But it would not be decent. I am supposed to be the head of the fishermen.”

Major Joppolo hesitated. Then he said, trying to sound delicate about it: “Do you feel that your family should stay away as well?”

Tomasino looked at Major Joppolo’s face. Tomasino looked no less sad as he said: “No, I think Tina should go.

Chapter
35

AT a little before seven that evening, Major Joppolo, who was still working so as to be ahead for the next day, heard a commotion outside the door of his office. He heard a woman crying and shouting, and Zito the usher arguing with her, evidently trying to keep her out.

The Major went to the door, opened it, and told the woman to come in. She had a child in her arms.

As he went back to his desk the Major thought, without giving the thought much importance, that the child was quite a big one to be carried. The sound of the woman’s wails followed him to his desk. She held the child across her body, with its head turned toward her breast.

When the Major was seated, the woman burst into a swift hysterical flood: “He almost died of the malaria, but God saved him, oh heart of Jesus, when he had the pox Father Pensovecchio prayed over him and he was spared, oh Lord Jesus he had such beautiful little eyes the eyes of his father, oh my child, my child, I have brought him through so much and I love him so much, what shall I do?”

The woman gently laid the child down on the Major’s broad desk, and the Major saw that the child was dead. She babbled on with her hysterical, lonely talk. Major Joppolo called Zito and asked him to get Gargano. While he was waiting for Gargano, the Major tried to get the woman to tell him what had happened, but all he could get out of her, besides sobs, was more of her heartbroken babbling. Once or twice she did mention the word “truck.”

When Gargano came in, the Major asked him what had happened. Gargano did not know and went out to find out. He came back soon holding another child by the hand.

From Gargano and the boy he brought in, Major Joppolo learned that the child had been struck and killed by an American military truck, which had driven on without stopping.

The boy had been shouting for caramels along with all the other children. He and two or three others had noticed that the ones who always got the candies, when the American soldiers threw them, were the ones who were out in front. The ones who noticed this were a little bigger than the others, so they banded together into a team: one scrambled for the candies while the others joined hands and held the other children back. The others saw they were being cheated by the superior wits and strength of the team, so they in turn banded together to break through the cordon. The very first time they tried to break through, with a squealing rush, they succeeded. Their momentum threw two children against this boy, who was out front picking up the candies, and the blow threw him in front of the next truck. The bumper of the truck hit him in the forehead.

Major Joppolo did what he could to comfort the mother. He told her that she would be paid some money and that the town would try to look out for her. He sent for Signora Carmelina Spinnato, the big health officer, and asked her to take care of the woman, and to see that the child got a decent burial.

Then he turned to the woman and said: “I hope you will not hate the Americans because of this thing. Please try to remember in your grief that the reason the children were out there, running into danger, was that the Americans have been generous with them, too generous. If the Americans did not throw candies to them, they would not keep on running beside the trucks and begging. Sometimes generosity is a fault with Americans, sometimes it does harm. It has brought high prices here, and it has brought you misery. But it is the best thing we Americans can bring with us to Europe. So please do not hate the Americans.”

The woman just sobbed. Signora Carmelina Spinnato took her out.

“Gargano,” the Major said, “I’ve been afraid this would happen. It will make the children unhappy, but we are going to have to stop them from running after the candies.”

“What can we do?” Gargano said, raising his hands, palms up.

The Major said: “Tomorrow evening I want you to go out with Rotondo and two or three others with your truck, and I want you to round up all the children who are on the street shouting for caramels. Take them to the police station and keep them there till it is dark. Then call their mothers in and let them take them home. It’s the only thing we can do - teach them a lesson.”

Gargano’s face fell. “But-Mister-Major,”-he said, plat= ing his hands together in the attitude of prayer, “tomorrow night is the party. I would be bitter if I had to miss the The Major said: “Gargano, the children of Adano are much more important than any party.”

Gargano raised his hands in resignation. “Yes, Mister Major,” he said.

Chapter
36

THE DAY of the party came, and many things happened. At about 9:30 in the morning, a U.S. Navy truck pulled up in front of the Palazzo. A Chief Petty Officer and five men unloaded a crate from it onto the sidewalk, and the Chief went inside and delivered a note for Major Victor Joppolo.

Major Joppolo was busy at his desk, and had not noticed the truck. He opened the note and read:

“Dear Major:

“The U.S. Navy is delighted to be able to do the U.S. Army a favor. Here is your bell...”

The Major jumped up and shouted: “Where is it?” Zito the usher said: “Where is what, Mister Major?” The Major said: “The bell! The bell! They have brought us our bell.” And he ran out on the balcony just in time to see the Navy truck pull away. He saw the crate sitting there on the sidewalk.

Major Joppolo shouted down to an M.P. in front of the Palazzo. “Hey, stand guard over that box, don’t let anybody walk off with that.”

The M.P. grumbled out loud, but not loud enough for Major Joppolo to hear: “From t1iC way them sailors was Joppolo gruntin’ and groanin’, don’t strike me that nobody’s goin’ to strut off with that thing.”

The Major hurried back inside, and he said to Zito: “How long did you say it took them to take the old bell down, Zito?”

Zito said: “They had to use six sets of block and tackle. It took them two days to get it down. Then one day to crate it.”

The Major said: “I can’t wait that long.”

He went to the phone and called up the Engineers. “Major Harvey, please... Major? This is Joppolo. Say, I wonder if you could arrange to do this town a big favor. We’ve got a delicate job to do, and I’m afraid the workmen we could round up to do it would take ages and maybe hack it. The job is raising a new bell on the clock tower of the Town Hall here. I guess it would take about eight men, and if you’ve got a good strong block and tackle, and maybe a tow truck to haul out the tackle and raise the bell... You can? That’s swell. Can they start right in? What time you think they could get here? Okay, I’ll be on hand at eleven thirty to tell them what to do. Don’t know how to thank you, Major.”

Major Joppolo was excited. He called up Lieutenant Livingston and thanked him for his part in getting the bell. “Why hell,” he said, “it ought to be up this afternoon. Maybe we can ring it for the party tonight. You’re coming, aren’t you?”

“Wouldn’t miss it, Major.”

“Well, see you there, Captain. Thanks a hell of a lot “Don’t mention it. Say, there’s just one thing, Major.” “What’s that?”

“I’m a Lieutenant. It takes a long time to get to be a Captain in the Navy.”

“Is that a fact?” the Major said. “Well, you ought to be a Captain soon,” and he hung up.

He picked up the note and finished it:

“Thought you might be interested to know a little more about Corelli and the background o f the bell. Toot Dowling, who, by the way, was very generous to give up his bell - I don’t think it would hurt to write him a letter about it (U.S.S. Corelli, care Postmaster, New York) -Toot told me a little about Corelli. He said his full name was Vincent Corelli and he had a destroyer in the last war. I had it a bit wrong the other day. What happened was that Corelli was on escort duty in the North Atlantic, and this Italian freighter got in a hell of a storm and broke down. Corelli left his station with a convoy and he went and took off all the Italians with :breeches buoy although I don’t know how much you know about navigation, it was very dangerous to close with the freighter in that kind o f a storm. That was on November 12, 1917, Toot says. O f course Toot is an old classmate of mine and a lousy football player and I never know what to believe when he says it. But I think this dope is correct and hope you enjoy the noise it makes.

“If you ever get in any trouble, just come around to the Navy, and I’m sure they’ll be able to fix you up. “Yours for collaboration between the services, “Rock Robertson (Lt. Comdr., USN).”

Zito moved near to the desk while the Major read, and when he was finished, the usher said: “We have a new bell, Mister Major?”

“We have a new bell, Zito.”

“Is the tone good enough?”

“I hope so, Zito. I think so.”

“Is there some history to it?”

“Yes, Zito, I’ll tell you about it when the bell is up. Do you think I ought to make a little speech explaining the bell to the people here?”

“Oh yes, you should, Mister Major. The people of Adano will be curious about the bell.”

“Zito, do you think they will understand all that the bell means? I mean that it stands for the things that I believe in? Do you think I could explain, that to them?”

“I think so, Mister Major. I understand what you mean, and Zito is not very clever.”

A few minutes before eleven o’clock the funeral procession of the three fishermen who had been killed in the explosion went through the Piazza. Major Joppolo went out onto the balcony to watch it. At the head of the procession there were three carts. The first two carried the bodies of Agnello and Merendino. Their coffins were small dinghies such as the fishermen used to get out to their boats, with the tops planked over. The third cart, which was for Sconzo, carried a dinghy which was not planked over, but was filled with flowers.

Long before eleven thirty, Major Joppolo was out on the sidewalk beside the crated bell, waiting for the Engineers to come. He poked and shoved at the crate affectionately, as if there were something delicious to eat inside it.

The gang from the Engineer battalion was surprisingly on time. The Major explained the job, pointing to the top of the clock tower.

“How long do you think it will take?” he asked the old buck sergeant in charge.

“Well,” the sergeant said, “some days the boys gets cramps in their stomachs and they claim they shouldn’t ought to hurry when they has the cramps. Other days they don’t get no cramps. It all depends.”