Their carbines were clipped to the frame of the bicycles.
Stick bombs hung handle down from their belts.
Their helmets and their gray uniforms were wet and they rode easily, looking ahead and to both sides.
There were two--then four in line, then two, then almost a dozen; then another dozen-- then one alone.
They did not talk but we could not have heard them because of the noise from the river.
They were gone out of sight up the road.
"Holy Mary," Aymo said.
"They were Germans," Piani said. "Those weren't Austrians."
"Why isn't there somebody here to stop them?" I said. "Why haven't they blown the bridge up?
Why aren't there machine-guns along this embankment?"
"You tell us, Tenente," Bonello said.
I was very angry.
"The whole bloody thing is crazy.
Down below they blow up a little bridge.
Here they leave a bridge on the main road.
Where is everybody?
Don't they try and stop them at all?"
"You tell us, Tenente," Bonello said.
I shut up.
It was none of my business; all I had to do was to get to Pordenone with three ambulances.
I had failed at that.
All I had to do now was get to Pordenone.
I probably could not even get to Udine.
The hell I couldn't.
The thing to do was to be calm and not get shot or captured.
"Didn't you have a canteen open?" I asked Piani.
He handed it to me.
I took a long drink. "We might as well start," I said. "There's no hurry though.
Do you want to eat something?"
"This is no place to stay," Bonello said.
"All right.
We'll start."
"Should we keep on this side--out of sight?"
"We'd be better off on top.
They may come along this bridge too.
We don't want them on top of us before we see them."
We walked along the railroad track.
On both sides of us stretched the wet plain.
Ahead across the plain was the hill of Udine.
The roofs fell away from the castle on the hill.
We could see the campanile and the clock-tower.
There were many mulberry trees in the fields.
Ahead I saw a place where the rails were torn up.
The ties had been dug out too and thrown down the embankment.
"Down! down!" Aymo said.
We dropped down beside the embankment.
There was another group of bicyclists passing along the road.
I looked over the edge and saw them go on.
"They saw us but they went on," Aymo said.
"We'll get killed up there, Tenente," Bonello said.