Don Anselmo shrugged his shoulders.
“It is my duty to report on everything I know,” he said. “And I may as well tell you that many people don’t think it was a mistake for Don Camillo to snatch the pitchfork away from someone who was trying to stick it into his stomach.”
“Quite right,” the Bishop agreed. “It wasn’t a mistake to snatch it away; the mistake was to hit those two fellows over the head with the handle.”
“Even then, some people think that Don Camillo had right on his side,” Don Anselmo said in a respectful manner. “It is my further duty to inform you that under the circumstances I should have done the same thing myself.”
The Bishop raised his eyes to Heaven.
“Lord, forgive this old madman!” he exclaimed. “He doesn’t know what he is saying.”
Don Anselmo was not just an impulsive boy; he was well on toward eighty, and now he hung his head in embarrassment, but continued to be of the same opinion. The Bishop delivered a long and very wise sermon, and ended up by saying: “Now go on house-to-house visits, to explain to the people that Don Camillo made a mistake and must be punished for it. It’s up to you to make them see reason.”
Don Anselmo went from house to house, and everywhere he received the same answer.
“If he did make a mistake, then it’s only right that he should pay. We’re waiting for him to finish paying and come back, that’s all.”
Meanwhile the Reds were beside themselves with joy. They had got Don Camillo out of the way, and no one was going to church. One evening Peppone accosted Don Anselmo.
“It’s sad to see an old racket like the Vatican closing down,” he sighed. “If we weren’t excommunicated, we’d come to your Mass ourselves! Anyhow, if you decide to rent the premises, give me an option on them.”
Don Anselmo did not let himself be perturbed.
“I can’t even ask you to rent me your brain in return!” he retorted. “You rented that out a long time ago. I only hope you didn’t let your soul go with it.”
* * *
Then it began to rain. It rained on the mountains and in the valleys. Old oak trees were shattered by lightning, the sea foamed up in a storm, the rivers began to swell, and as the rain continued, they overflowed their banks and flooded whole towns with their muddy waters. Most dangerous of all, the mighty Po was rising, pressing harder and harder against its embankments. During the war, the embankment was bombed at a point called La Pioppa, and they had got around to mending it only within the last two years. Everyone looked fearfully at La Pioppa, feeling sure that if the pressure became too great, this was the point where the embankment would give way. The earth hadn’t had time to pack solidly, and whereas the rest of the bank would hold, just as it had always held before, La Pioppa would crumble.
Meanwhile it continued to rain, night and day, and after each momentary respite, it came down harder than before. The papers were filled with news of squalls, floods, and landslides, but the village people thought only of their own danger. Already a lot of old crones were saying:
“Ever since Don Camillo went away, taking the altar crucifix with him, there’s been trouble brewing.”
The crucifix had a long-standing association with the river. Every year the people of the village carried it in a procession to the banks where the priest gave the waters his blessing. The old crones shook their heads.
“As long as he was here, we were protected. But now he’s gone away.”
As the river rose, they spoke more and more of the crucifix, and even the wisest among them lost their heads. One morning the Bishop found a village delegation waiting upon him.
“Give us back our crucifix,” they implored. “We must form a procession right away and hold a blessing of the waters. Otherwise the village will be swept away.”
The Bishop sighed.
“Brethren, have you so little faith?” he asked them. “God seems to be not within your souls but extraneous to them, if you pin all your trust in a wooden image, and without its help fall into despair.”
Some of the men of the delegation hung their heads. And one of them, old Bonesti, stepped forward to say:
“We have faith in God, but we have lost faith in ourselves. All of us love our country, but when we go into battle, we need to see our regimental flag. The flag keeps us fighting for the country whose love is within us. That crucifix was our flag, and Don Camillo our flag-bearer. If we can have our flag back, we will face our troubles more courageously.”
Don Camillo came back during the night, when no one was expecting him. But he had no sooner walked from the rectory to the church the next morning than the whole village knew it. They crowded to hear his first Mass, and afterwards they gathered around him to say:
“We want a procession!”
“Christ has gone back to His altar, and there He stays,” said Don Camillo severely. “He’ll not move until we hold the regular procession next year. This year, the waters have been blessed already.”
“Yes, but the river is rising.”
“He knows that,” said Don Camillo. “No one needs to refresh His memory. All I can do is pray that Christ give us strength to bear our sufferings serenely.”
The people were obsessed with fear, and when they insisted on a procession, Don Camillo had to speak to them even more sternly than before.
“Have a procession, then, but rather than carry a wooden cross about the streets, carry Christ in your hearts! Let every one of you hold a private procession of this kind. Have faith in God, and not in graven images. And then God will help you.”
* * *
But the people’s fear continued to rise, along with the river. Engineers came to inspect La Pioppa and declared it would hold, but they advised the villagers to get their belongings together and be prepared for evacuation. The engineers went away at ten o’clock in the morning, and at eleven the water was still rising. Then fear turned into terror.
“There’s no time to save anything,” someone was saying. “The only thing to do is to cross the river and cut an opening in the embankment on the other side.”
No one knew who was the first person to suggest this blasphemy, but very soon everyone was repeating it. Eighty people out of a hundred were trying to figure out the best way to cross the river and make a cut that would channel the overflow to the opposite shore. Sooner or later someone might have actually done it. But all of a sudden the rain ceased, and hope returned to their hearts. The church bells called them to the square, and there Don Camillo addressed them.
“There’s only one thing to do, and that is to carry our most important belongings to safety.”
Just then the rain began to fall again.
“There’s no time!” the people shouted. “La Pioppa won’t hold.”
“Yes, it will,” said Don Camillo firmly.
“That’s what you say!” they shouted.
“That’s the word left by the engineers,” said Don Camillo.
“It’s only a word!” someone shouted.
“It’s a fact, I say!” Don Camillo retorted. “I’m so sure it will hold that I’ll go stand on the weakest point of the embankment. If I’m mistaken, then I’ll pay!”
Don Camillo raised his big umbrella and walked toward the river, with a crowd following after him. They followed him along the embankment until he came to the newly-built stretch at La Pioppa. There Don Camillo turned around.
“Let everyone go pack up his things calmly,” he called out. “I’ll wait at La Pioppa for you to finish.”
He walked on, and fifty yards farther he came to the exact point where everyone thought there would be a break. The crowd looked in bewilderment first at the priest and then at the raging water.
“I’m coming to keep you company,” a voice shouted, and out of the crowd stepped Peppone, with all eyes upon him.
“The embankment will hold,” Peppone shouted; “there’s no danger. Don’t do anything silly, but prepare to evacuate in good order, under the chief coun
cilman’s direction. To prove my confidence in the embankment, I’ll stay right here.”
When they saw the priest and the mayor at the point of what they thought was the greatest danger, the people hurried to get their livestock out of the stables and load their household goods on trucks and wagons The rain continued to come down and the river to rise, and the village population made ready. Meanwhile Don Camillo and Peppone sat on two big stones under the umbrella.
“You’d be better off if you were still exiled in the mountains, Father,” said Peppone.
“Oh, I don’t know about that,” Don Camillo answered.
Peppone was silent for a few minutes and then clapped his hand to his hip.
“If this thing were to break while people are still loading their things and we’re sitting here, that would be a pretty mess! We’d be done for and so would they.”
“It would be a great deal worse if we’d saved ourselves by cutting the embankment dealing out death and destruction on the other side. You must admit there’s a difference between misfortune and crime.”
Peppone shrugged his shoulders.
“I’ve got the better of you, in any case.”
Toward evening the rain paused and the river fell. The village had been completely evacuated, and Don Camillo and Peppone left the embankment and went home. As they crossed the church square, Don Camillo said:
“You might thank God for saving your skin. You owe that good luck to Him.”
“True enough,” said Peppone. “But He saved your skin too, and that’s enough bad luck to make us even!”
The Right Bell
THE RIVER EMBANKMENT did not give way, even where everyone said it was sure to crack, and so the next morning many people went back to the village, which lay below the water-level, in order to fetch more of their belongings. But toward nine o’clock something unexpected happened. The water had risen higher and although it did not penetrate the main embankment, it found a weak spot elsewhere.
About a mile east of the village, the road running along the embankment went over a bridge across the Fossone, a tributary which poured at this point into the Po. The Fossone had solid banks of its own, but because the Po was so high, it had reversed its course and was running away from instead of into the river. Just below the bridge, where the banks of the Fossone joined those of the river, the water tunnelled underneath and then came up in a jet, making the hole larger and larger. There was no way of holding it, and the villagers soon returned with wagons and trucks to seek safety.
Don Camillo had worked all alone until three o’clock in the morning, carrying things to the second floor and attic of the rectory. Then he was so tired that he fell into a dead sleep. At half-past nine in the morning he was awakened by the shouts of people running to take refuge on the embankment. Soon the noise died away, and he got up to look out of the window at the deserted church square. He went down to explore further and then climbed up in the bell tower. From this vantage point he could see that the water had already crept up on the lower part of the village and was slowly creeping higher. It had encircled the isolated hut of old Merola, and when it reached the ground-floor windows the whole thing crumbled. Don Camillo sighed. The old man had not wanted to leave, and it was by sheer force that they had taken him away. Now the pace of the advancing water was faster; the rain had left the earth so thoroughly soaked that it could not absorb a drop. It was up to the higher part of the village, which lay stretched out perfectly flat before it. Hearing a crash in the distance, he looked through his field-glasses and saw that a hundred and fifty feet of one bank of the Fossone had given way. Then, going over to another window, he noticed a crowd of people on the main embankment gazing in the direction of the village.
* * *
Those who had gone with their trucks and wagons for a second load of their belongings had been forced back. Now they stood with evacuees from other villages, who had brought their livestock and household goods with them looking down at the newly flooded area, half a mile away. No one spoke, and old women shed silent tears. Their village seemed to be dying there before them, and they began to think of it as already dead.
“There is no God!” said an old man gloomily.
But just at that moment the church bell rang. There was no mistaking the sound, even if the tone was somewhat different from usual. All eyes were fixed on the church tower.
* * *
After Don Camillo had seen the crowd on the embankment he went back to the ground. The water had climbed the three steps leading to the church door and was running into the nave.
“Lord, forgive me for forgetting that it is Sunday,” said Don Camillo, kneeling in front of the altar.
Before going to prepare himself in the sacristy, Don Camillo stepped into the little room at the base of the bell tower, whose floor was lower than that of the church and already covered with eight or ten inches of water. He tugged at a rope, hoping that it was the right one. It was, and when the crowd on the embankment beard it ring they said:
“Eleven o’clock Mass!”
* * *
The women joined their hands in prayer and the men took off their hats.
Don Camillo lit the candles and began to say Mass. The water was climbing the altar steps and soon it touched his vestments. It was muddy and cold, but Don Camillo paid no attention. His congregation was dry and safe on the embankment. And when it was time for the sermon, he did not mind the fact that the church was empty, but preached to his parishioners just as if they were there before him. There were three feet of water in the nave, and the pews and confessionals had overturned and were floating at random. The door was wide open, and beyond it he could see the submerged houses on the square and the lowering clouds on the horizon.
“Brethren,” he said, “the waters have boiled up from the river bed and now are sweeping everything before them. But one day they will be calmed and return to their rightful place and the sun will shine again. Even if you lose everything you have, you can still be rich in your faith in God. Only those who doubt God’s mercy and justice will be impoverished, even if their possessions are intact.”
And he went on at considerable length in the flooded church, while from the embankment people continued to stare at the tower. When the bell sounded for the elevation, the women knelt down on the damp ground and the men bowed their heads. Then the bell rang again for the final blessing. The Mass was over, and people moved about freely and talked in a low tone of voice, hoping to hear the bell again. Soon afterward it rang out gaily once more, and the men took out their watches and said:
“Noon! It’s time to go for dinner.”
They got into whatever vehicles they had with them and went to the improvised canteens and shelters. And looking back over their shoulders at the village, which seemed to be afloat in a sea of mud, they were obviously thinking:
“As long as Don Camillo’s there, everything’s all right.”
* * *
Before Don Camillo went back to the rectory he looked up at Christ above the altar.
“Forgive me, Lord, for not kneeling. If I were to kneel, I’d be in water up to the neck.”
His head was bent and he could not be sure that Christ had smiled. But he was almost sure that He had, for there was a glow in his heart that made him forget the fact that he was soaked to the waist. He was able to get to the rectory, seizing on the way a floating ladder, with which he managed to climb into a second-storey window. He changed his clothes, had something to eat and went to bed. Toward three in the afternoon there was a knock at the window.
“Come in,” said Don Camillo, and there was Peppone.
“If you’ll come down, there’s a boat rowed by some of my boys waiting for you,” Peppone mumbled.
When a man is lying in bed, or even sitting up in it, he is in no position to come out with a phrase that will go down in history. So Don Camillo leaped to his feet and shouted:
“The old guard dies, but it never surrenders!”
Alth
ough he was on his feet, he had nothing on but his drawers, and this detracted from the solemnity of the occasion. But Peppone was in no mood to notice.
“Then devil take you,” he said angrily. “You may not get another chance to escape so soon!”
The rescue squad rowed on. When the boat passed in front of the open church door, Peppone shouted to the rowers to watch out on the left. While they were looking in the other direction, he had time to take off his cap and put it back on without being observed. For the rest of the way he cudgelled his brain to know what Don Camillo had meant about the old guard that dies but never surrenders. Even if the water stood eight feet high, the flood seemed to him to have abated since he knew that Don Camillo was at his post.
Everyone at His Post
MAROLI WAS AS OLD as sin, and all skin and bones, but at times he could be as hardheaded as a young man of twenty-five. When the flood became really serious, his two sons loaded all their belongings onto wagons and prepared to take their families away, but the old man refused to budge. He said as much to his daughters-in-law when they came to carry him down from the bed to which he had been invalided for some time. And the two women told their husbands to do something about it themselves, because there was no use arguing with a madman. The sons and two grandsons went upstairs to try to persuade him, but they received the same answer.
“Here is my home, and here I stay.”
His sons explained that the whole village was being evacuated because at any moment the river might overflow its banks, but Maroli only shook his head.
“I’m a sick man and I can’t stand the exposure. I’m staying here.”
The daughters-in-law came up again to tell their husbands to hurry. And one of them said:
“Don’t be silly. No sick people are being left outside in the bad weather. They’re all sheltered and taken care of.”
Maroli sat up in bed and painted a rheumatic finger at her.
“I see now. You want me to get away from here and into an institution. For a long time you’ve been looking for a way to get rid of me. But I don’t want to go to the hospital and die there, alone, like a dog. I’ll die here, among my own things, even if I am in your way. Here, in this bed where my wife died, I intend to breathe my last. And you must bury me beside her.”
Don Camillo and his Flock Page 19