“Resign ourselves and wait until the Dogfish has digested us both.”
“But I do not want to be digested!” howled Pinocchio, beginning to cry again.
“Neither do I want to be digested,” added the Tunny; “but I am enough of a philosopher to console myself by thinking that when one is born a Tunny it is more dignified to die in the water than in oil.”
“That is all nonsense!” cried Pinocchio.
“It is my opinion,” replied the Tunny, “and opinions, so say the political Tunnies, ought to be respected.”
“To sum it all up, I want to get away from here. I want to escape.”
“Escape, if you are able!”
“Is this Dogfish who has swallowed us very big?” asked the puppet.
“Big! Why, only imagine, his body is two miles long without counting his tail.”
Whilst they were holding this conversation in the dark, Pinocchio thought that he saw a light a long way off.
“What is that little light I see in the distance?” he asked.
“It is most likely some companion in misfortune who is waiting, like us, to be digested.”
“I will go and find him. Do you not think that it may by chance be some old fish who perhaps could show us how to escape?”
“I hope it may be so, with all my heart, dear puppet.”
“Goodbye, Tunny.”
“Goodbye, puppet, and good fortune attend you.”
“Where shall we meet again?”
“Who can say? It is better not even to think of it!”
XXXV
A Happy Surprise for Pinocchio
Pinocchio, having taken leave of his friend the Tunny, began to grope his way in the dark through the body of the Dogfish, taking a step at a time in the direction of the light that he saw shining dimly at a great distance.
The farther he advanced the brighter became the light; and he walked and walked until at last he reached it; and when he reached it—what did he find? I will give you a thousand guesses. He found a little table spread out and on it a lighted candle stuck into a green glass bottle, and, seated at the table, was a little old man. He was eating some live fish, and they were so very much alive that whilst he was eating them they sometimes even jumped out of his mouth.
At this sight Pinocchio was filled with such great and unexpected joy that he became almost delirious. He wanted to laugh, he wanted to cry, he wanted to say a thousand things, and instead he could only stammer out a few confused and broken words. At last he succeeded in uttering a cry of joy, and, opening his arms, he threw them around the little old man’s neck, and began to shout:
“Oh, my dear papa! I have found you at last! I will never leave you more, never more, never more!”
“Then my eyes tell me true?” said the little old man, rubbing his eyes; “then you are really my dear Pinocchio?”
“Yes, yes, I am Pinocchio, really Pinocchio! And you have quite forgiven me, have you not? Oh, my dear papa, how good you are! And to think that I, on the contrary—Oh! but if you only knew what misfortunes have been poured on my head, and all that has befallen me! Only imagine, the day that you, poor, dear papa, sold your coat to buy me a spelling-book, that I might go to school, I escaped to see the puppet show, and the showman wanted to put me on the fire, that I might roast his mutton, and he was the same that afterwards gave me five gold pieces to take them to you, but I met the Fox and the Cat, who took me to the inn of The Red Crawfish, where they ate like wolves, and I left by myself in the middle of the night, and I encountered assassins who ran after me, and I ran away, and they followed, and I ran, and they always followed me, and I ran, until they hung me to a branch of a Big Oak, and the beautiful Child with blue hair sent a little carriage to fetch me, and the doctors when they saw me said immediately, ‘If he is not dead, it is a proof that he is still alive’—and then by chance I told a lie, and my nose began to grow until I could no longer get through the door of the room, for which reason I went with the Fox and the Cat to bury the four gold pieces, for one I had spent at the inn, and the Parrot began to laugh, and instead of two thousand gold pieces I found none left, for which reason the judge when he heard that I had been robbed had me immediately put in prison to content the robbers, and then when I was coming away I saw a beautiful bunch of grapes in a field, and I was caught in a trap, and the peasant, who was quite right, put a dog-collar round my neck that I might guard the poultry-yard, and acknowledging my innocence let me go, and the Serpent with the smoking tail began to laugh and broke a blood-vessel in his chest, and so I returned to the house of the beautiful Child, who was dead, and the Pigeon, seeing that I was crying, said to me, ‘I have seen your father who was building a little boat to go in search of you,’ and I said to him, ‘Oh! if I also had wings,’ and he said to me, ‘Do you want to go to your father?’ and I said, ‘Without doubt! but who will take me to him?’ and he said to me, ‘I will take you,’ and I said to him, ‘How?’ and he said to me, ‘Get on my back,’ and so we flew all night, and then in the morning all the fishermen who were looking out to sea said to me, ‘There is
