bothered us when we were in plain sight along the railway. The killing came suddenly and unreasonably. I wondered where Bonello was.
“How do you feel, Tenente?” Piani asked. We were going along the side of a road crowded with vehicles and troops.
“Fine.”
“I’m tired of this walking.”
“Well, all we have to do is walk now. We don’t have to worry.”
“Bonello was a fool.”
“He was a fool all right.”
“What will you do about him, Tenente?”
“I don’t know.”
“Can’t you just put him down as taken prisoner?”
“I don’t know.”
“You see if the war went on they would make bad trouble for his family.”
“The war won’t go on,” a soldier said. “We’re going home. The war is over.”
“Everybody’s going home.”
“We’re all going home.”
“Come on, Tenente,” Piani said. He wanted to get past them.
“Tenente? Who’s a Tenente? A basso gli ufficiali! Down with the officers!”
Piani took me by the arm. “I better call you by your name,” he said. “They might try and make trouble. They’ve shot some officers.” We worked up past them.
“I won’t make a report that will make trouble for his family.” I went on with our conversation.
“If the war is over it makes no difference,” Piani said. ‘But I don’t believe it’s over. It’s too good that it should be over.”
