A Farewell to Arms (11 page)

It turned cold that night and the next day it was raining. Coming home from the Ospedale Maggiore it rained very hard and I was wet when I came in. Up in my room the rain was coming down heavily outside on the balcony, and the wind blew it against the glass doors. I changed my clothing and drank some brandy but the brandy did not taste good. I felt sick in the night and in the morning after breakfast I was nauseated.

“There is no doubt about it,” the house surgeon said. “Look at the whites of his eyes, Miss.”

Miss Gage looked. They had me look in a glass. The whites of the eyes were yellow and it was the jaundice. I was sick for two weeks with it. For that reason we did not spend a convalescent leave together. We had planned to go to Pallanza on Lago Maggiore. It is nice there in the fall when the leaves turn. There are walks you can take and you can troll for trout in the lake. It would have been better than Stresa because there are fewer people at Pallanza. Stresa is so easy to get to from Milan that there are always people you know. There is a nice village at Pallanza and you can row out to the islands where the fishermen live and there is a restaurant on the biggest island. But we did not go.

One day while I was in bed with jaundice Miss Van Campen came in the room, opened the door into the armoire and saw the empty bottles there. I had sent a load of them down by the porter and I believe she must have seen them going out and come up to find some more. They were mostly vermouth bottles, marsala bottles, capri bottles, empty chianti flasks and a few cognac bottles. The porter had carried out the large bottles, those that had held vermouth, and the straw-covered chianti flasks, and left the brandy bottles for the last. It was the brandy bottles and a bottle shaped like a bear, which had held kümmel, that Miss Van Campen found. The bear shaped bottle enraged her particularly. She held it up, the bear was sitting up on his haunches with his paws up, there was a cork in his glass head and a few sticky crystals at the bottom. I laughed.

“It is kümmel,” I said. “The best kümmel comes in those bearshaped bottles. It comes from Russia.”

“Those are all brandy bottles, aren't they?” Miss Van Campen asked.

“I can't see them all,” I said. “But they probably are.”

“How long has this been going on?”

“I bought them and brought them in myself,” I said. “I have had Italian officers visit me frequently and I have kept brandy to offer them.”

“You haven't been drinking it yourself?” she said.

“I have also drunk it myself.”

“Brandy,” she said. “Eleven empty bottles of brandy and that bear liquid.”

“Kümmel.”

“I will send for some one to take them away. Those are all the empty bottles you have?”

“For the moment.”

“And I was pitying you having jaundice. Pity is something that is wasted on you.”

“Thank you.”

“I suppose you can't be blamed for not wanting to go back to the front. But I should think you would try something more intelligent than producing jaundice with alcoholism.”

“With what?”

“With alcoholism. You heard me say it.” I did not say anything. “Unless you find something else I'm afraid you will have to go back to the front when you are through with your jaundice. I don't believe self-inflicted jaundice entitles you to a convalescent leave.”

“You don't?”

“I do not.”

“Have you ever had jaundice, Miss Van Campen?”

“No, but I have seen a great deal of it.”

“You noticed how the patients enjoyed it?”

“I suppose it is better than the front.”

“Miss Van Campen,” I said, “did you ever know a man who tried to disable himself by kicking himself in the scrotum?”

Miss Van Campen ignored the actual question. She had to ignore it or leave the room. She was not ready to leave because she had disliked me for a long time and she was now cashing in.

“I have known many men to escape the front through self-inflicted wounds.”

“That wasn't the question. I have seen self-inflicted wounds also. I asked you if you had ever known a man who had tried to disable himself by kicking himself in the scrotum. Because that is the nearest sensation to jaundice and it is a sensation that I believe few women have ever experienced. That was why I asked you if you had ever had the jaundice, Miss Van Campen, because--” Miss Van Campen left the room. Later Miss Gage came in.

“What did you say to Van Campen? She was furious.”

“We were comparing sensations. I was going to suggest that she had never experienced childbirth--”

“You're a fool,” Gage said. “She's after your scalp.”

“She has my scalp,” I said. “She's lost me my leave and she might try and get me court-martialled. She's mean enough.”

“She never liked you,” Gage said. “What's it about?”

“She says I've drunk myself into jaundice so as not to go back to the front.”

“Pooh,” said Gage. “I'll swear you've never taken a drink. Everybody will swear you've never taken a drink.”

“She found the bottles.”

“I've told you a hundred times to clear out those bottles. Where are they now?”

“In the armoire.”

“Have you a suitcase?”

“No. Put them in that rucksack.”

Miss Gage packed the bottles in the rucksack. “I'll give them to the porter,” she said. She started for the door.

“Just a minute,” Miss Van Campen said. “I'll take those bottles.” She had the porter with her. “Carry them, please,” she said. “I want to show them to the doctor when I make my report.”

She went down the hall. The porter carried the sack. He knew what was in it.

Nothing happened except that I lost my leave.

The night I was to return to the front I sent the porter down to hold a seat for me on the train when it came from Turin. The train was to leave at midnight. It was made up at Turin and reached Milan about half-past ten at night and lay in the station until time to leave. You had to be there when it came in, to get a seat. The porter took a friend with him, a machine-gunner on leave who worked in a tailor shop, and was sure that between them they could hold a place. I gave them money for platform tickets and had them take my baggage. There was a big rucksack and two musettes.

I said good-by at the hospital at about five o'clock and went out. The porter had my baggage in his lodge and I told him I would be at the station a little before midnight. His wife called me “Signorino” and cried. She wiped her eyes and shook hands and then cried again. I patted her on the back and she cried once more. She had done my mending and was a very short dumpy, happy-faced woman with white hair. When she cried her whole face went to pieces. I went down to the corner where there was a wine shop and waited inside looking out the window. It was dark outside and cold and misty. I paid for my coffee and grappa and I watched the people going by in the light from the window. I saw Catherine and knocked on the window. She looked, saw me and smiled, and I went out to meet her. She was wearing a dark blue cape and a soft felt hat. We walked along together, along the sidewalk past the wine shops, then across the market square and up the street and through the archway to the cathedral square. There were streetcar tracks and beyond them was the cathedral. It was white and wet in the mist. We crossed the tram tracks. On our left were the shops, their windows lighted, and the entrance to the galleria. There was a fog in the square and when we came close to the front of the cathedral it was very big and the stone was wet.

“Would you like to go in?”

“No,” Catherine said. We walked along. There was a soldier standing with his girl in the shadow of one of the stone buttresses ahead of us and we passed them. They were standing tight up against the stone and he had put his cape around her.

“They're like us,” I said.

“Nobody is like us,” Catherine said. She did not mean it happily.

“I wish they had some place to go.”

“It mightn't do them any good.”

“I don't know. Everybody ought to have some place to go.”

“They have the cathedral,” Catherine said. We were past it now. We crossed the far end of the square and looked back at the cathedral. It was fine in the mist. We were standing in front of the leather goods shop. There were riding boots, a rucksack and ski boots in the window. Each article was set apart as an exhibit; the rucksack in the centre, the riding boots on one side and the ski boots on the other. The leather was dark and oiled smooth as a used saddle. The electric light made high lights on the dull oiled leather.

“We'll ski some time.”

“In two months there will be ski-ing at Mflrren,” Catherine said.

“Let's go there.”

“All right,” she said. We went on past other windows and turned down a side street.

“I've never been this way.”

“This is the way I go to the hospital,” I said. It was a narrow street and we kept on the right-hand side. There were many people passing in the fog. There were shops and all the windows were lighted. We looked in a window at a pile of cheeses. I stopped in front of an armorer's shop.

“Come in a minute. I have to buy a gun.”

“What sort of gun?”

“A pistol.” We went in and I unbuttoned my belt and laid it with the emply holster on the counter. Two women were behind the counter. The women brought out several pistols.

“It must fit this,” I said, opening the holster. It was a gray leather holster and I had bought it second-hand to wear in the town.

“Have they good pistols?” Catherine asked.

“They're all about the same. Can I try this one?” I asked the woman.

“I have no place now to shoot,” she said. “But it is very good. You will not make a mistake with it.”

I snapped it and pulled back the action. The spring was rather strong but it worked smoothly. I sighted it and snapped it again.

“It is used,” the woman said. “It belonged to an officer who was an excellent shot.”

“Did you sell it to him?”

“Yes.”

“How did you get it back?”

“From his orderly.”

“Maybe you have mine,” I said. “How much is this?”

“Fifty lire. It is very cheap.”

“All right. I want two extra clips and a box of cartridges.”

She brought them from under the counter.

“Have you any need for a sword?” she asked. “I have some used swords very cheap.”

“I'm going to the front,” I said.

“Oh yes, then you won't need a sword,” she said.

I paid for the cartridges and the pistol, filled the magazine and put it in place, put the pistol in my empty holster, filled the extra clips with cartridges and put them in the leather slots on the holster and then buckled on my belt. The pistol felt heavy on the belt. Still, I thought, it was better to have a regulation pistol. You could always get shells.

“Now we're fully armed,” I said. “That was the one thing I had to remember to do. Some one got my other one going to the hospital.”

“I hope it's a good pistol,” Catherine said.

“Was there anything else?” the woman asked.

“I don't believe so.”

“The pistol has a lanyard,” she said.

“So I noticed.”

The woman wanted to sell something else.

“You don't need a whistle?”

“I don't believe so.”

The woman said good-by and we went out onto the sidewalk. Catherine looked in the window. The woman looked out and bowed to us.

“What are those little mirrors set in wood for?”

“They're for attracting birds. They twirl them out in the field and larks see them and come out and the Italians shoot them.”

“They are an ingenious people,” Catherine said. “You don't shoot larks do you, darling, in America?”

“Not especially.”

We crossed the street and started to walk up the other side.

“I feel better now,” Catherine said. “I felt terrible when we started.”

“We always feel good when we're together.”

“We always will be together.”

“Yes, except that I'm going away at midnight.”

“Don't think about it, darling.”

We walked on up the street. The fog made the lights yellow.

“Aren't you tired?” Catherine asked.

“How about you?”

“I'm all right. It's fun to walk.”

“But let's not do it too long.”

“No.”

We turned down a side street where there were no lights and walked in the street. I stopped and kissed Catherine. While I kissed her I felt her hand on my shoulder. She had pulled my cape around her so it covered both of us. We were standing in the street against a high wall.

“Let's go some place,” I said.

“Good,” said Catherine. We walked on along the street until it came out onto a wider street that was beside a canal. On the other side was a brick wall and buildings. Ahead, down the street, I saw a streetcar cross a bridge.

“We can get a cab up at the bridge,” I said. We stood on the bridge in the fog waiting for a carriage. Several streetcars passed, full of people going home. Then a carriage came along but there was some one in it. The fog was turning to rain.

“We could walk or take a tram,” Catherine said.

“One will be along,” I said. “They go by here.”

“Here one comes,” she said.

The driver stopped his horse and lowered the metal sign on his meter. The top of the carriage was up and there were drops of water on the driver's coat. His varnished hat was shining in the wet. We sat back in the seat together and the top of the carriage made it dark.

“Where did you tell him to go?”

“To the station. There's a hotel across from the station where we can go.”

“We can go the way we are? Without luggage?”

“Yes,” I said.

It was a long ride to the station up side streets in the rain.

“Won't we have dinner?” Catherine asked. “I'm afraid I'll be hungry.”

“We'll have it in our room.”

“I haven't anything to wear. I haven't even a night-gown.”

“We'll get one,” I said and called to the driver.

“Go to the Via Manzoni and up that.” He nodded and turned off to the left at the next corner. On the big street Catherine watched for a shop.

“Here's a place,” she said. I stopped the driver and Catherine got out, walked across the sidewalk and went inside. I sat back in the carriage and waited for her. It was raining and I could smell the wet street and the horse steaming in the rain. She came back with a package and got in and we drove on.

“I was very extravagant, darling,” she said, “but it's a fine night-gown.”

At the hotel I asked Catherine to wait in the carriage while I went in and spoke to the manager. There were plenty of rooms. Then I went out to the carriage, paid the driver, and Catherine and I walked in together. The small boy in buttons carried the package.

The manager bowed us toward the elevator. There was much red plush and brass. The manager went up in the elevator with us.

“Monsieur and Madame wish dinner in their rooms?”

“Yes. Will you have the menu brought up?” I said.

“You wish something special for dinner. Some game or a soufflé?”

The elevator passed three floors with a click each time, then clicked and stopped.

“What have you as game?”

“I could get a pheasant, or a woodcock.”

“A woodcock,” I said. We walked down the corridor. The carpet was worn. There were many doors. The manager stopped and unlocked a door and opened it.

“Here you are. A lovely room.”

The small boy in buttons put the package on the table in the centre of the room. The manager opened the curtains.

“It is foggy outside,” he said. The room was furnished in red plush. There were many mirrors, two chairs and a large bed with a satin coverlet. A door led to the bathroom.

“I will send up the menu,” the manager said. He bowed and went out.

I went to the window and looked out, then pulled a cord that shut the thick plush curtains. Catherine was sitting on the bed, looking at the cut glass chandelier. She had taken her hat off and her hair shone under the light. She saw herself in one of the mirrors and put her hands to her hair. I saw her in three other mirrors. She did not look happy. She let her cape fall on the bed.

“What's the matter, darling?”

“I never felt like a whore before,” she said. I went over to the window and pulled the curtain aside and looked out. I had not thought it would be like this.

“You're not a whore.”

“I know it, darling. But it isn't nice to feel like one.” Her voice was dry and flat.

“This was the best hotel we could get in,” I said. I looked out the window. Across the square were the lights of the station. There were carriages going by on the street and I saw the trees in the park. The lights from the hotel shone on the wet pavement. Oh, hell, I thought, do we have to argue now?

“Come over here please,” Catherine said. The flatness was all gone out of her voice. “Come over, please. I'm a good girl again.” I looked over at the bed. She was smiling.

I went over and sat on the bed beside her and kissed her.

“You're my good girl.”

“I'm certainly yours,” she said.

After we had eaten we felt fine, and then after, we felt very happy and in a little time the room felt like our own home. My room at the hospital had been our own home and this room was our home too in the same way.

Catherine wore my tunic over her shoulders while we ate. We were very hungry and the meal was good and we drank a bottle of Capri and a bottle of St. Estephe. I drank most of it but Catherine drank some and it made her feel splendid. For dinner we had a woodcock with soufflé potatoes and purée de marron, a salad, and zabaione for dessert.

“It's a fine room,” Catherine said. “It's a lovely room. We should have stayed here all the time we've been in Milan.”

“It's a funny room. But it's nice.”

“Vice is a wonderful thing,” Catherine said. “The people who go in for it seem to have good taste about it. The red plush is really fine. It's just the thing. And the mirrors are very attractive.”

“You're a lovely girl.”

“I don't know how a room like this would be for waking up in the morning. But it's really a splendid room.” I poured another glass of St. Estephe.

“I wish we could do something really sinful,” Catherine said. “Everything we do seems so innocent and simple. I can't believe we do anything wrong.”

“You're a grand girl.”

“I only feel hungry. I get terribly hungry.”

“You're a fine simple girl,” I said.

“I am a simple girl. No one ever understood it except you.”

“Once when I first met you I spent an afternoon thinking how we would go to the Hotel Cavour together and how it would be.”

“That was awfully cheeky of you. This isn't the Cavour is it?”

“No. They wouldn't have taken us in there.”

“They'll take us in some time. But that's how we differ, darling. I never thought about anything.”

“Didn't you ever at all?”

“A little,” she said.

“Oh you're a lovely girl.”

I poured another glass of wine.

“I'm a very simple girl,” Catherine said.

“I didn't think so at first. I thought you were a crazy girl.”

“I was a little crazy. But I wasn't crazy in any complicated manner. I didn't confuse you did I, darling?”

“Wine is a grand thing,” I said. “It makes you forget all the bad.”

“It's lovely,” said Catherine. “But it's given my father gout very badly.”

“Have you a father?”

“Yes,” said Catherine. “He has gout. You won't ever have to meet him. Haven't you a father?”

“No,” I said. “A step-father.”

“Will I like him?”

“You won't have to meet him.”

“We have such a fine time,” Catherine said. “I don't take any interest in anything else any more. I'm so very happy married to you.”