Pinocchio, urged by desperation and hunger, took hold of the bell of a house and began to ring it with all his might, saying to himself:
“That will bring somebody.”
And so it did. A little old man appeared at a window with a nightcap on his head and called to him angrily:
“What do you want at such an hour?”
“Would you be kind enough to give me a little bread?”
“Wait there, I will be back directly,” said the little old man, thinking it was one of those rascally boys who amuse themselves at night by ringing the house-bells to rouse respectable people who are sleeping quietly.
After half a minute the window was again opened and the voice of the same little old man shouted to Pinocchio:
“Come underneath and hold out your cap.”
Pinocchio pulled off his cap; but, just as he held it out, an enormous basin of water was poured down on him, soaking him from head to foot as if he had been a pot of dried-up geraniums.
He returned home like a wet chicken, quite exhausted with fatigue and hunger; and, having no longer strength to stand, he sat down and rested his damp and muddy feet on a brazier full of burning embers.
And then he fell asleep, and whilst he slept his feet, which were wooden, took fire, and little by little they burnt away and became cinders.
Pinocchio continued to sleep and to snore as if his feet belonged to someone else. At last about daybreak he awoke because someone was knocking at the door.
“Who is there?” he asked, yawning and rubbing his eyes.
“It is I!” answered a voice.
And Pinocchio recognized Geppetto’s voice.
VII
Geppetto Gives His Own Breakfast to Pinocchio
Poor Pinocchio, whose eyes were still half shut from sleep, had not as yet discovered that his feet were burnt off. The moment, therefore, that he heard his father’s voice he slipped off his stool to run and open the door; but, after stumbling two or three times, he fell his whole length on the floor.
And the noise he made in falling was as if a sack of wooden ladles had been thrown from a fifth story.
“Open the door!” shouted Geppetto from the street.
“Dear papa, I cannot,” answered the puppet, crying and rolling about on the ground.
“Why can’t you?”
“Because my feet have been eaten.”
“And who has eaten your feet?”
“The cat,” said Pinocchio, seeing the cat, who was amusing herself by making some shavings dance with her forepaws.
“Open the door, I tell you!” repeated Geppetto. “If you don’t, when I get into the house you shall have the cat from me!”
“I cannot stand up, believe me. Oh, poor me! poor me! I shall have to walk on my knees for the rest of my life!”
Geppetto, believing that all this lamentation was only another of the puppet’s tricks, thought of a means of putting an end to it, and, climbing up the wall, he got in at the window.
He was very angry and at first he did nothing but scold; but when he saw his Pinocchio lying on the ground and really without feet he was quite overcome. He took him in his arms and began to kiss and caress him, and to say a thousand endearing things to him, and as the big tears ran down his cheeks he said, sobbing:
“My little Pinocchio! how did you manage to burn your feet?”
“I don’t know, papa, but it has been such a dreadful night that I shall remember it as long as I live. It thundered and lightened, and I was very hungry, and then the Talking-Cricket said to me: ‘It serves you right; you have been wicked and you deserve it,’ and I said to him: ‘Take care, Cricket!’ and he said: ‘You are a puppet and you have a wooden head,’ and I threw the handle of a hammer at him, and he died, but the fault was his, for I didn’t wish to kill him, and the proof of it is that I put an earthenware saucer on a brazier of burning embers, but a chicken flew out and said: ‘Adieu until we meet again, and many compliments to all at home’: and I got still more hungry, for which reason that little old man in a nightcap, opening the window, said to me: ‘Come underneath and hold out your hat,’ and poured a basinful of water on my head, because asking for a little bread isn’t a disgrace, is it? and I returned home at once, and because I was always very hungry I put my feet on the brazier to dry them, and then you returned, and I found they were burnt off, and I am always hungry, but I have no longer any feet! Oh! oh! oh! oh!” And poor Pinocchio began to cry and to roar so loudly that he was heard five miles off.
Geppetto, who from all this jumbled account had only understood one thing, which was that the puppet was dying of hunger, drew from his pocket three pears and, giving them to him, said:
“These three pears were intended for my breakfast, but I will give them to you willingly. Eat them, and I hope they will do you good.”
“If you wish me to eat them, be kind enough to peel them for me.”
“Peel them?” said Geppetto, astonished. “I should never have thought, my boy, that you were so dainty and fastidious. That is bad! In this world we should accustom ourselves from childhood to like and to eat everything, for there is no saying to what we may be brought. There are so many chances!”
“You are no doubt right,” interrupted Pinocchio, “but I will never eat fruit that has not been peeled. I cannot bear rind.”
So good Geppetto peeled the three pears and put the rind on a corner of the table.
Having eaten the first pear in two mouthfuls, Pinocchio
