Pinocchio (15 page)

“Never! And you?”

“Never! Ever since this morning, though, one of my ears has been aching.”

“I've got the same pain myself.”

“You, too? And which ear is the one that hurts?”

“Both of them. And you?”

“Both of them. Could it be the same sickness?”

“I'm afraid it might be.”

“Would you do me a favor, Lampwick?”

“Gladly! With all my heart.”

“Show me your ears?”

“Why not? But first I want to see yours, my dear Pinocchio.”

“No, you have to go first.”

“No, dear: you first, then me!”

“Well then,” said the puppet, “let's make a deal, like good friends.”

“Let's hear the deal.”

“We'll both take off our hats at the same time—agreed?”

“Agreed.”

“Okay, get ready!”

And Pinocchio began to count out loud: “One! Two! Three!”

At the word
three!
the two boys grabbed their hats and threw them into the air.

The scene that followed might seem unbelievable were it not true. Pinocchio and Lampwick, when each saw that the other was stricken with the same misfortune, instead of being mortified and sorrowful, began poking fun at each other's outsize ears until, after a thousand incivilities, they wound up bursting into hearty laughter.

And they laughed and they laughed until they were doubled over with laughter. But suddenly, at the height of their hilarity, Lampwick stopped laughing and began to stagger and to change color, and he said to his friend, “Help, Pinocchio, help!”

“What's wrong?”

“Oh no! I can no longer stand up straight.”

“Neither can I,” shouted Pinocchio, crying and tottering.

And as they spoke, they both fell forward onto all fours and began to trot and run around the room on their hands and feet. And as they ran, their hands became hoofs, their faces lengthened into muzzles, and their backs grew a coat of light gray fur speckled with black.

But do you know what the worst moment was for those two wretches? The worst, most humiliating moment was when they felt their tails sprouting behind them. Overcome then by shame and by pain, they tried to weep and to lament their fate.

If only they had never tried that! Because instead of moans and laments, out came the braying of jackasses. And they brayed resoundingly, in chorus:
hee-haw, hee-haw, hee-haw.

Just then there was a knock at the door, and they heard a voice outside say, “Open up! Mini-Man here, the coachman who brought you to this country. Open up at once, or else!”

W
HEN NO
one opened the door, Mini-Man opened it wide with a violent kick. Entering the room, he addressed Pinocchio and Lampwick with his usual giggle, saying, “Well done, boys! You brayed nicely, and I recognized your voices right away. And so here I am.”

At these words, the hearts of those two little donkeys sank, their heads bowed, their ears drooped, and their tails slid between their legs.

First Mini-Man rubbed them, stroked them, patted them. Then he took out his currycomb and began thoroughly grooming them. After combing them until they gleamed like two mirrors, he put halters on them and led them to the market square, in hopes of selling them and pocketing a tidy sum.

And indeed he did not have to wait for buyers.

A farmer whose jackass had died the day before bought Lampwick, and Pinocchio was sold to the Ringmaster of a troupe of clowns and acrobats, who planned to train him to jump and dance with the other beasts in his troupe.

And now do you understand, my little readers, what a fine line of work Mini-Man was in? This nasty little monstrosity, who looked all milk and honey, went about the world from time to time in his coach, using promises and sweet talk to gather up all the lazy children who were bored with books and school. And after loading them into his coach, he drove them to Toyland and let them spend all their time playing, raising a ruckus, and having fun.

And when those poor deluded kids, as a consequence of always playing and never studying, turned into so many donkeys, well then Mini-Man, pleased as punch, would seize them and take them off to fairs and markets to be sold. And so, in just a few years, he had made scads of money and become a millionaire.

What became of Lampwick I can't say. I do know, however, that Pinocchio's new life was, from the very beginning, grueling and harsh.

When he was led to his stall, his new master filled the manger with chopped straw. But Pinocchio, after tasting a mouthful, spit it back out.

So his master, grumbling, filled the manger with hay—but Pinocchio didn't like hay, either.

“Oh, so you don't like hay, either?” shouted his master angrily. “Don't worry, my pretty little donkey, if you've gotten some silly notions into your head, I'll be sure to get them out!”

And to teach him a lesson, he smacked his whip across his legs.

The sharp pain caused Pinocchio to cry and bray, and braying he said, “Hee-haw, hee-haw, I can't digest straw!”

“So eat hay then!” replied his master, who understood asinine dialect quite well.

“Hee-haw, hee-haw, hay makes my tummy ache!”

“I suppose you expect me to feed a jackass like yourself on breast of chicken and galantine of capon?” replied his owner, becoming angrier and angrier and smacking him again with his whip.

After this second lashing, Pinocchio wisely held his tongue and said no more.

When the stable door was closed, Pinocchio was left alone. And since he hadn't eaten in many hours, he began to yawn from hunger. And when he yawned, his mouth opened as wide as an oven.

Finally, finding nothing else in the manger, he resigned himself to chewing a bit of hay. And after having chewed it really well, he closed his eyes and gulped it down.

“This hay isn't that bad,” he thought to himself, “but how much better things would be if I had kept studying! Right now, instead of hay, I could be eating a hunk of fresh bread and a nice slice of salami! Oh well!”

When he woke the next morning, he immediately looked in the manger for more hay, but he found none, having eaten it all during the night.

So he then took a bite of the chopped straw, and as he stood there chewing it he had to admit that chopped straw tasted nothing like either Milanese rice or Neapolitan macaroni.

“Oh well!” he repeated, still chewing. “But I hope at least that my misfortune can be a lesson to all those disobedient kids who don't want to study. Oh well! Oh well!”

“Oh well, my foot!” yelled his master, entering the stable at that very moment. “Do you think, my pretty little donkey, that I bought you just to offer you food and drink? I bought you so you'll work and earn me a handsome profit. Come on, now, attaboy! Come with me to the circus and I'll teach you how to jump through hoops, how to smash cardboard barrels with your head, and how to dance the waltz and the polka up on your hind legs.”

Whether he liked it or not, poor Pinocchio had to learn all these fine things. But it took three months of lessons to learn them, and nearly enough whippings to take his hide off.

At last the day came when his master could announce a truly extraordinary event. Notices of various colors, posted on street corners, said this:

 

GRAND GALA SHOW

—

This evening

WITNESS THE TROUPE'S USUAL

AMAZING LEAPS & FEATS

PERFORMED BY ALL ITS ARTISTS

& all its horses, mares and stallions alike,

p l u s

appearing for the first time

the famous

DONKEY PINOCCHIO

also known as

THE STAR OF THE DANCE

—

The theater will be as bright as day

That evening, as you might guess, the theater was already jam-packed an hour before the show was to begin.

Not a single seat was left, not in the orchestra, not in the boxes, not even if you could afford to pay its weight in gold.

Around the circus, the tiers of seats were teeming with children, children of all ages, who were in a frenzy of excitement to see the famous Donkey Pinocchio dance.

When the first portion of the show came to an end, the Ringmaster, dressed in a black tailcoat, tight white pants, and knee-high leather boots, introduced himself to the packed audience, and after a sweeping bow he solemnly intoned the following preposterous speech: “Esteemed public, lords and ladies! Yours truly, whilst traversing through your illustrious metropolitan, wished to procreate for myself the honor, not to make mention of the pleasure, of presenting to such a discerning and distinct audience this famous donkey, who has heretofore enjoyed the honor of dancing in the presence of His Majesty the Emperor of all the major Courts of Europe. And albeit full of gratitude, please assist us with your arousing presence and indulge us!”

This speech was received with much laughter and much applause. But the applause redoubled and became a sort of hurricane as Donkey Pinocchio approached the center of the ring. He was all decked out for the occasion: a new bridle of patent leather with brass buckles and studs, a white camellia blossom behind each ear, his mane divvied up into lots of locks tied with charming red silk bows, a wide gold-and-silver sash around his belly, and ribbons of blue-and-purple velvet braided into his tail. In short, he was an utterly adorable little donkey!

The Ringmaster continued his introduction of Pinocchio with these remarks: “Honorable auditors! I shall not stand here deceiving you with regard to the great difficulties surmounted by myself in captivating and subjugating the aforementioned mammal, whilst he grazed freely from mountaintop to mountaintop in the torrid zone. Observe, if you please, the wildness oozing forth from his eyes, notwithstanding our futile attempts to tame him to the life of a civilized quadruped, which oftentimes forced myself to resort to the genial parlance of the whip. But each kindness of mine, instead of endearing myself to him, made him even furthermore ill-disposed towards myself. Howsoever, following the Gallic system, I located within his cranium a small bony part, which that famous medicinal school in Paree has recognized as the bulb that regenerates hair and the Pyrrhic dance. And I absolved thenceforth to train him to dance, not to mention jump through hoops and paper-lined barrels. Marvel at him! And then judge him! But before I bid you much ado, allow me, ladies and gentlemen, to invite you back to the matinee show tomorrow evening. In the event that rainy weather threatens precipitation, the show will be postponed from tomorrow evening to eleven
AM
tomorrow afternoon.”

And here the Ringmaster made another very deep bow. Then, turning to Pinocchio, he said, “Attaboy, Pinocchio! Before commencing your exploits, please greet our distinguished audience, lords, ladies, and children!”

Pinocchio obeyed at once, kneeling down on his two front knees and waiting until the Ringmaster, cracking his whip, shouted, “Walk!”

At that, the little donkey rose up on four legs and began to circle the ring, at a walking pace.

After a little while the Ringmaster said, “Trot!”

And Pinocchio, as instructed, quickened his pace into a trot.

“Canter!”

And Pinocchio began running.

“Gallop!”

And Pinocchio began racing as fast as he could. As he sped along like a Barbary steed, the Ringmaster raised his arm into the air and fired his pistol.

At the shot, the donkey, pretending to be hit, collapsed onto the ground and acted as if he were truly dying.

He got back to his feet amid an explosion of applause and cheers that seemed to him to rise up to the sky, and so, naturally, he lifted his head to look up. And looking up, he saw in one of the boxes a beautiful lady with a thick gold chain around her neck, from which hung a medallion. On the medallion was painted the portrait of a puppet.

“That's a portrait of me! That lady is the Fairy!” Pinocchio said to himself, for he recognized her at once. Overcome by happiness, he began to shout, “Oh dear Fairy! Oh dear Fairy!”

But instead of words, there emerged from his throat a bray so sonorous and sustained that it made every spectator in the theater laugh, especially the children.

But the Ringmaster, to teach him the lesson that it wasn't good behavior to start braying at the audience, gave him a whack on the nose with the handle of his whip.

Sticking his tongue way out, the poor donkey licked his nose for a good five minutes, thinking that perhaps that would ease the pain.

But imagine his despair when, turning back toward the audience, he saw that the Fairy's box was empty—she was gone!

He felt like dying; his eyes filled with tears and he began to sob. Nobody noticed, however, least of all the Ringmaster, who in fact cracked his whip and shouted, “Attaboy, Pinocchio! Now show these ladies and gentlemen how gracefully you can jump through hoops.”

Pinocchio tried two or three times, but each time he approached the hoop, instead of jumping through it, he found it easier to go under it.

Finally he leapt into the air and through. Unfortunately, however, his back legs got caught on the hoop, causing him to crash to the ground in a heap on the other side.

When he got to his feet, he was limping, and he could barely walk back to the stable.

“Bring out Pinocchio! We want the Donkey! Bring out the Donkey!” shouted all the children from the orchestra seats, moved to pity by the wretched turn of events.

But the Donkey was not to be seen again that evening.

The next morning, after examining him, the veterinarian (that's a fancy word for animal doctor) declared that Pinocchio would be lame for the rest of his life.

At that the Ringmaster said to his stableboy, “What am I supposed to do with a lame donkey? He'd be nothing but a troublesome freeloader. Take him to the market and sell him.”