It was half-time and a certain player limped out of
the field and sat down on the grass. I was beside him before his friends
had time to come up. A superb specimen, all dewy with perspiration.
"Any damage?"
Nothing much, he gasped. A man on the other side had just caught him
with the full swing of his fist under the ribs. It hurt confoundedly.
"Hardly fair play," I commented.
"It was cleverly done."
"Ah, well," I said, warming to my English character, "you may get harder
knocks in the trenches. I suppose you are nearly due?"
Not for a year or so, he replied. And even then ... of course, he was
quite eligible as to physique ... it was really rather awkward ... but
as to serving in the army ... there were other jobs going. ... Was
anything more precious than life?... Could anything replace his life to
him?... To die at his age....
"It would certainly be a pity from an artistic point of view. But if
everybody thought like that, where would the Isonzo line be?"
If everybody thought as he did, there would be no Isonzo line at all.
German influence in Italy - why not? They had been there before; it was
no dark page in Italian history. Was his own government so admirable
that one should regret its disappearance?
