The torrential rain had transformed the road into a river of mud and the bus had some difficulty getting started. After five miles or so they came to the crossing of the road leading back towards the ‘Red Flag’ sovkos. The irrigation canal running alongside had overflowed and the road was under a good fifteen inches of water. With Comrade Oregov’s authorization the driver took a left turn in the direction of Tifiz and for a couple of hours the truck rolled over a narrow, winding track which was blessed with a solid bottom.
Unfortunately it began to rain again and the driver was faced with further trouble. The bus skidded from one side to the other, threatening to go off the road, and under continuous abuse the differential got out of order. The rain gave no indication of letting up and darkness was beginning to fall. Since the village of Tifiz was only two or three miles away the driver was sent ahead to bring back a tow truck or a tractor. But he came back with disappointing news. The only piece of working machinery in Tifiz was attached to the grain elevator. Since this offered no help out of the present situation and the kolkhos at Tifiz belonged to the distressing six per cent without telephones the group had no choice but to walk the rest of the way. They set out, with a bitter wind blowing into their backs and mud up to their ankles.
By the time they came to the village it was completely dark and, since it was one of the unfortunate eight per cent without electric light, its aspect was anything but welcoming. The assembly room of the rural soviet was filled with sacks of fodder, but in a voice of unprecedented volume and severity Comrade Oregov gave orders that it should be cleared without delay. A group of men armed with brooms concluded the cleaning operation, leaving the visitors covered with dust at one end of the room, which had only kerosene lamps to light it. Don Camillo found himself standing next to Comrade Tavan, the tenant farmer, and he proceeded at once to undermine his morale.
“Comrade,” he said audibly to Peppone, “do you remember what I said to you about the peasants this morning? At the sovkos which is run directly by the government everything functioned efficiently. But here, where the kolkhos people manage their own affairs, there is nothing but disaster. Trucks and tractors are not running and the assembly room is used for a storehouse. Isn’t it very much the same at home? At Le Pioppette, where many peasant houses have been rebuilt since the war, what do you find? Potatoes in the bathtub; kindling wood and chickens in the garage while trucks and tractors rust outside. Believe me, Comrade peasants haven’t the stuff in them to live as free men under a socialist régime. All they know how to do is obey orders. How ridiculous to speak of ‘giving the peasants land’! The land must belong to the State, every square inch of it. We must set up government-directed sovkos until such time as the peasants have acquired some sense of responsibility.”
“That’s not the half of it, Comrade,” chimed in Scamoggia. “It will take centuries for sense of any kind to penetrate their noodles.”
The surrounding light was dim, but Tavan’s flapping ears had turned red enough to shine even in complete darkness. Don Camillo was getting ready to shoot off some more of his ammunition, but the heel of Peppone’s right shoe came down on a corn on his left foot. If a gun barrel had been stuck into his belly, Don Camillo would have had no thought of surrender. But a corn irritated by a long walk in wet weather was strongly conducive to silence.
As the dust subsided, Comrade Oregov was seen standing with his legs wide apart in the middle of the room, issuing imperative orders. Trestles and boards were assembled to make a long table. Someone brought out a roll of burlap, and soon the table had a cloth upon it. Heat began to fan out of the stove, extra kerosene lamps provided more light and the table was set with plates, knives, forks, spoons and glasses. Comrade Oregov glanced at the corner where Peppone and his little band were awkwardly standing and guessed at the growing tension among them. In the twinkling of an eye he summoned three girls to pass around the vodka. After two good drinks the visitors’ faith in the ultimate triumph of socialism was fully restored. That is, except in Don Camillo, whom the vodka cast into a deep depression.
Because they were prey to a genuinely Communist hunger they fell like wolves upon the bowls of steaming cabbage-and-potato soup. When he saw that their appetites were satisfied, Comrade Oregov called upon Comrade Petrovna to express his deep regret for the inconveniences of the afternoon. Don Camillo was once more in a diabolical mood and he stood up to respond to the apology.
“Actually we have enjoyed the adventure,” he began, “because Comrade Oregov gave us a splendid example of how a Communist leader should behave. In my country there is a proverb which says that the master’s pride lends nobility to his horse. In our era of mechanization and social progress, which has swallowed up both horse and master, it might be more apt to say that Comrade Oregov is ennobled by the rightful pride which the Communist Party takes in his achievement.”
Comrade Oregov was delighted with this witticism and with the compliment which Don Camillo had paid him.
Peppone, as a senator, a Party official and leader of the mission, carried a brief case bulging with important secret papers. In the course of the dinner he imprudently put the brief case down on the floor, and Don Camillo, who was as usual sitting beside him, had an opportunity to open it and quickly examine the contents. Underneath the papers he found a bottle of brandy and a piece of excellent salami. Peppone became aware of his neighbour’s discovery only when he quite unexpectedly heard Comrade Oregov thanking him for his generous gifts and insisting upon dividing them among all those present. The gifts, of course, were the bottle of brandy and the salami.
“Comrade,” said Don Camillo, when he came back from making the presentation, “that was a splendid gesture. Just as splendid as the round of vodkas which you offered us with the change from your ten-thousand-lira bill.”
Peppone shot him an angry look.
“He who laughs last laughs best,” he retorted. “We have a long way to go before we get home.”
Comrade Oregov was sitting at one end of the long table. At his right were the director and political secretary of the kolkhos and at his left Comrade Nadia Petrovna. Beside Comrade Petrovna was Comrade Salvatore Capece of Naples, who had wedged himself in between her and Comrade Nanni Scamoggia.
The brandy and salami showed typical bourgeois inertia and never got away from this end of the table.
“Comrade,” said Capece, turning the full force of his melting eyes upon Comrade Petrovna, “if I had a guitar I could make a far prettier speech than that of Comrade Tarocci.”
Comrade Petrovna said something to the director of the kolkhos, and he disappeared from the table. Nobody noticed, because the heat of the room, the vodka and the cigarette smoke had reduced the whole company to a state of somnolent euphoria. But when he came back, they were aroused by a loud shriek from the throat of Comrade Capece.
“It’s a guitar!”
The kolkhos of Tifiz did not have a single working machine, but it did have a guitar, and also an accordion with a boy who knew fairly well how to play it. While Comrade Capece was tuning the guitar, the boy struck up a march on the accordion. At this moment the habitually taciturn tenant farmer, Tavan, had a sudden inspiration. He snatched the accordion from the boy’s hands and sounded a chord which reduced the whole company to silence. Then he played “The Horsefly” and “The Mazurka of Migliavacca”, and played them so well that the size of his ears became almost unnoticeable.
Comrade Salvatore Capece was ready to join in, and to the accompaniment of the accordion he burst into song. He sang “O sole mio”, and all Naples was in his voice, from the Vomero to Possillipo, from Zi’ Teresa to “Funiculi, funicula”, from Moonlight on the Bay to the Problem of the South. If he hadn’t given them an encore they would have torn him to pieces.
He sang half a dozen more songs, and Comrade Nanni Scamoggia began to foam at the mouth, because the singer never took his eyes off Comrade Nadia Petrovna and she was in a state of obvious enchantment.
Then C
omrade Tavan broke into a polka. This had a magic effect. In a second, table and tableware were swept away and anyone who wanted to go on drinking had to take refuge in the adjacent kolkhos office, which was also the repository of the vodka. Everybody began to dance and the only one actually to take refuge from the horrendous sight was Don Camillo, who found the picture of Lenin on the office wall to keep him company.
Comrade Salvatore Capece finally tossed aside the guitar and began to dance with Comrade Nadia Petrovna. He held on to her so jealously that when Peppone had something urgent to get translated she had almost literally to tear out of his arms.
“Comrade,” said Peppone when he had drawn her off into a corner, “after a days hard work a man is entitled to some good, clean fun. And if a fellow is a spoil-sport like Comrade Tarocci, and refuses to join in, then he deserves to be punished. Don’t you agree?”
“I do,” she answered promptly.
“Comrade Tarocci has many of the qualities of leadership, but in his own house his jealous, reactionary wife leads him by the nose. Even now, when he’s thousands of miles away from home he’s afraid of letting himself go. He’s simply got to join the dance.”
“Leave it to me!” said Comrade Petrovna.
Five minutes later a band of laughing girls burst into the office and pulled Don Camillo out into the main room and on to the dance floor. Peppone thoroughly enjoyed the scene and while Don Camillo was being whirled about by the prettiest of the girls he signalled to Comrade Vittorio Peratto, the photographer from Turin, who whipped out his flash-camera and snapped a sensational picture. After that every one of the girls wanted to have her picture taken dancing with Don Camillo, and when the roll was finished Peppone said to Comrade Peratto:
“You’re responsible to me for the negatives, and don’t you forget it!”
There was a short pause while the windows were thrown open to clear the room of smoke, and fresh bottles of vodka were uncorked. But the gaiety did not subside. Comrade Li Friddi, the Sicilian, produced a mouth organ; Comrade Curullu, the Sardinian, gave an imitation of a drunk trying to fit a key in a keyhole in an attempt to sneak back into his house late at night; Comrade Gibetti, the Tuscan, sang an operatic air in a shrill falsetto voice, and Comrade Bacciga, from Genoa, held the whole company spellbound with a bag of magician’s tricks.
“Organized recreational groups and television have raised the cultural level of the working class,” Don Camillo said pantingly to Peppone.
“No doubt about it,” Peppone replied. “And I have an idea that back home a display of picture postcards would be much better propaganda than any number of political manifestos.”
“What sort of pictures?” inquired Don Camillo.
“Pictures of our beloved parish priest in false clothing, kicking up his heels at a dance.”
“Don’t count your chickens before they’re hatched,” retorted Don Camillo. “As you said yourself, we have a long way to go before we get back home!”
The dancing had resumed, and a little man about forty years old accosted Don Camillo.
“Comrade,” he said in Italian, “are you the head of the group?”
“No, this stuffed clown beside me is the head. I’m only the cell leader.”
“Well, I have something to tell you both. If your Neapolitan friend over there doesn’t let go of that girl, the fellow from Rome is going to break his bones.”
Without pausing to find out how the stranger happened to speak Italian, Peppone rushed away to forestall any possible trouble. Don Camillo made some wild gesture, and the stranger laughed and showed that he understood.
“Vodka, that’s what you want, isn’t it?” he inquired.
“Da, da!” responded Don Camillo, still unable to believe that the man spoke his language. And he pointed towards the office, which was also the vodka cellar.
Once they were in the office they were able to talk freely.
“I am a Rumanian,” the stranger informed Don Camillo.
“Then how do you happen to speak Italian with a Neapolitan accent?”
“Because I come from Naples, that’s why. In 1939 I was a sailor, and I met a Rumanian girl and followed her to Rumania.”
“Did you catch up with her?” asked Don Camillo.
“I caught up with her, all right, but not in time.”
“What do you mean? Was it too late? Had she already married another man?”
“No, it was too soon, and I had to marry her myself. Fortunately the war came along and the Russians moved into Rumania. They were recruiting agricultural workers and I volunteered to go….”
While the stranger was telling his story, Peppone was waiting for a chance to get hold of Comrade Petrovna. At the end of a mazurka he took her away from Comrade Capece and whirled her into a waltz.
“Look here, Comrade,” he said; “I have something to tell you. Comrade Scamoggia is an asset to the Party, but he isn’t politically mature. He’s subject to capitalistic errors.”
“I’ve noticed them,” said Comrade Petrovna. “But I think he’ll outgrow them with time.”
“I quite agree. But tonight they have taken the upper hand, and if you don’t stop dancing with that guitar player, he may make trouble. I thought I’d tip you off, because I’m sure you wouldn’t want the party to wind up in a fight.”
They finished the waltz together and then parted company. Peppone went to the office, and Don Camillo brought him up to date on the Neapolitan’s story.
“He’s never been mixed up in politics,” he explained. “He just wants us to help him get out of hot water.”
Peppone shrugged his shoulders.
“He went looking for trouble, didn’t he? Why didn’t he stay in Rumania?”
“Because of my wife,” the stranger explained. “I had to get away from her. And it’s easier for a Neapolitan to be a Rumanian in Russia than it is in Rumania! I could be perfectly happy here, because I’m a barber and hairdresser, the only one for miles around. I go from one kolkhos to another, giving shaves and haircuts. But my real specialty is permanent waves….”
“Permanent waves?”
“Women are women the world over, Chief, and if they have a chance to pretty themselves up they’ll starve themselves to death to pay for it. As soon as one girl got a permanent, all the rest of them wanted one, too. My reputation spread like wildfire….”
“I see,” said Peppone. “But that doesn’t explain why you’re in hot water.”
“Chief, can’t you imagine what it is to be a young man in the middle of this enormous Russia? It’s not true what they say about free love. When I came here from Rumania, I had that idea in mind. But if you start flirting with a Russian’s wife or his girl, he’ll beat you up just as promptly as the next one. At the first kolkhos I went to I was caught red-handed and kicked out in no time flat. At the second I had the same bad luck, and so on, right down the line.”
“Well, why worry?” laughed Peppone. “Aren’t there eighty thousand kolkhos to choose from?”
“Yes, but I’m only one man!” the barber retorted.
Peppone couldn’t stop laughing, and Don Camillo decided to take advantage of his good humour.
“The poor fellow’s joking,” he put in. “The truth is he’s crazy to get back to Naples. Can’t we give him a hand?”
“What do you mean? We can’t take him back in a suitcase, can we?”
“No. But Comrade Rondella was sent home, and you have travelling papers for a group of eleven.”
“You’re crazy! Under Comrade Oregov’s eagle eye?”
“He can’t keep tabs on us for ever.”
“Don’t be a fool,” said Peppone. “The fellow can stay here and pursue his barber’s trade and let the married women alone.”
“I don’t call that Communism!” said the barber.
“It’s a funny story,” admitted Peppone, “but I refuse to get mixed up in it.” And he went out of the room.
“Don’t desert me,” the barber implored
Don Camillo. “I’m not asking you to get yourself in trouble. Just tell me where you’re going and when. I can get myself kicked from one place to another. Only God Almighty can stop a Neapolitan from going home, and Khrushchev isn’t God.”
Don Camillo copied out the tour schedule.
“That’s all I can do for you,” he said. “And forget that we ever met. I’ve forgotten it already.”
The main room was more tumultuous than ever and Peppone was searching desperately for Comrade Petrovna. He was desperate because Comrade Capece and Comrade Scamoggia had disappeared also. Finally he caught sight of the girl and grabbed her by the arm.
“What’s happened?” he asked her.
“I got there too late,” she admitted. “They went out together and by the time I overtook them it was all over.”
“Where is Capece?”
“In the haystack of Barn No. 7.”
“And Scamoggia?”
“He’s holding a cold compress to Capece’s black eye.”
“Nobody else knows about it?”
“Only Comrade Capece, who has the black eye for a souvenir, and Comrade Nadia Petrovna, who got slapped in the face!” She clenched her fists angrily. “He had the nerve to hit me!” she added.
This was no laughing matter. Comrade Petrovna was not an ordinary woman; she was high up in the Party and a Government employee.
“I quite understand,” said Peppone gravely. “Shall I beat him up or shall I report him to Comrade Oregov?”
“There are times when personal feelings have to be sacrificed for the good of the Party,” replied Comrade Petrovna. “Just let the whole thing go. Comrade Scamoggia is still under the influence of vodka. When he comes to himself he’ll see the stupidity of his behaviour.”
Peppone shook his head.
“Comrade, Lenin has instructed us to tell the truth, no matter how disagreeable it may be. I happen to know that Scamoggia didn’t have a single drop of either vodka or brandy. He wasn’t drunk; he knew perfectly well what he was doing.”
Comrade Don Camillo Page 9