Then I saw a low open car of the sort they call gondolas coming, covered with canvas.
I stood until it had almost passed, then jumped and caught the rear hand-rods and pulled up.
I crawled down between the gondola and the shelter of the high freight-car behind.
I did not think any one had seen me.
I was holding to the hand-rods and crouching low, my feet on the coupling.
We were almost opposite the bridge.
I remembered the guard.
As we passed him he looked at me.
He was a boy and his helmet was too big for him.
I stared at him contemptuously and he looked away.
He thought I had something to do with the train.
We were past.
I saw him still looking uncomfortable, watching the other cars pass and I stooped to see how the canvas was fastened.
It had grummets and was laced down at the edge with cord.
I took out my knife, cut the cord and put my arm under.
There were hard bulges under the canvas that tightened in the rain.
I looked up and ahead.
There was a guard on the freight-car ahead but he was looking forward.
I let go of the hand-rails and ducked under the canvas.
My forehead hit something that gave me a violent bump and I felt blood on my face but I crawled on in and lay flat.
Then I turned around and fastened down the canvas.
I was in under the canvas with guns.
They smelled cleanly of oil and grease.
I lay and listened to the rain on the canvas and the clicking of the car over the rails.
There was a little light came through and I lay and looked at the guns.
They had their canvas jackets on.
I thought they must have been sent ahead from the third army.
The bump on my forehead was swollen and I stopped the bleeding by lying still and letting it coagulate, then picked away the dried blood except over the cut.
It was nothing.
I had no handkerchief, but feeling with my fingers I washed away where the dried blood had been, with rainwater that dripped from the canvas, and wiped it clean with the sleeve of my coat.
I did not want to look conspicuous.
I knew I would have to get out before they got to Mestre because they would be taking care of these guns.
They had no guns to lose or forget about.
I was terrifically hungry.
32
Lying on the floor of the flat-car with the guns beside me under the canvas I was wet, cold and very hungry.
Finally I rolled over and lay flat on my stomach with my head on my arms.
My knee was stiff, but it had been very satisfactory.
Valentini had done a fine job.
I had done half the retreat on foot and swum part of the Tagliamento with his knee.
It was his knee all right.
The other knee was mine.
Doctors did things to you and then it was not your body any more.
The head was mine, and the inside of the belly.
It was very hungry in there.
I could feel it turn over on itself.
The head was mine, but not to use, not to think with, only to remember and not too much remember.
I could remember Catherine but I knew I would get crazy if I thought about her when I was not sure yet I would see her, so I would not think about her, only about her a little, only about her with the car going slowly and clickingly, and some light through the canvas and my lying with Catherine on the floor of the car.
Hard as the floor of the car to lie not thinking only feeling, having been away too long, the clothes wet and the floor moving only a little each time and lonesome inside and alone with wet clothing and hard floor for a wife.
You did not love the floor of a flat-car nor guns with canvas jackets and the smell of vaselined metal or a canvas that rain leaked through, although it is very fine under a canvas and pleasant with guns; but you loved some one else whom now you knew was not even to be pretended there; you seeing now very clearly and coldly--not so coldly as clearly and emptily.