NOW in the fall the trees were all bare and the roads were muddy. I rode to Gorizia from Udine on a camion. We passed other camions on the road and I looked at the country. The mulberry trees were bare and the fields were brown. There were wet dead leaves on the road from the rows of bare trees and men were working on the road, tamping stone in the ruts from piles of crushed stone along the side of the road between the trees. We saw the town with a mist over it that cut off the mountains. We crossed the river and I saw that it was running high. It had been raining in the mountains. We came into the town past the factories and then the houses and villas and I saw that many more houses had been hit. On a narrow street we passed a British Red Cross ambulance. The driver wore a cap and his face was thin and very tanned. I did not know him. I got down from the camion in the big square in front of the Town Major’s house, the driver handed down my rucksack and I put it on and swung on the two musettes and walked to our villa. It did not feel like a homecoming.
I walked down the damp gravel driveway looking at the villa through the trees. The windows were all shut but the door was open. I went in and found the major sitting at a table in the bare room with maps and typed sheets of paper on the wall.
“Hello,” he said. “How are you?” He looked older and drier.
“I’m good,” I said. “How is everything?”
“It’s all over,” he said. “Take off your kit and sit down.” I put my pack and the two musettes on the floor and my cap on the pack. I brought the other chair over from the wall and sat down by the desk.
“It’s been a bad summer,” the major said. “Are you strong now?”
“Yes.”
“Did you ever get the decorations?”
“Yes. I got them fine. Thank you very much.”
“Let’s see them.”
I opened my cape so he could see the two ribbons.
“Did you get the boxes with the medals?”
“No. Just the papers.”
“The boxes will come later. That takes more time.”
“What do you want me to do?”
“The cars are all away. There are six up north at Caporetto. You know Caporetto?”
“Yes,” I said. I remembered it as a little white town with a campanile in a valley. It was a clean little town and there was a fine fountain in the square.
“They are working from there. There are many sick now. The fighting is over.”
“Where are the others?”
“There are two up in the mountains and four still on the Bainsizza. The other two ambulance sections are in the Carso with the third army.”
“What do you wish me to do?”
“You can go and take over the four cars on the Bainsizza if you like. Gino has been up there a long time. You haven’t seen it up there, have you?”
“No.”
“It was very bad. We lost three cars.”
“I heard about it.”
“Yes, Rinaldi wrote you.”
“Where is Rinaldi?”
“He is here at the hospital. He has had a summer and fall of it.”
“I believe it.”
“It has been bad,” the major said. “You couldn’t believe how bad it’s been. I’ve often thought you were lucky to be hit when you were.”
“I know I was.”
“Next year will be worse,” the major said. “Perhaps they will attack now. They say they are to attack but I can’t believe it. It is too late. You saw the river?”
“Yes. It’s high already.”
“I don’t believe they will attack now that the rains have started. We will have the snow soon. What about your countrymen? Will there be other Americans besides yourself?”