Chapter 13

A PERSPIRING courier brought a note to Major Joppolo’s office.

It said in English: “I got to seen you in the immediate.” And it was signed M. Cacopardo.

Not five minutes behind the courier, Cacopardo himself showed up, all dressed for traveling. He had leather gauntlets on, and goggles up on his forehead, and he carried a green parasol in his right hand.

The eighty-two-year-old man trotted the length of Major Joppolo’s office, leaned forward over his desk, looked over his shoulder at Giuseppe and Zito, then looked at the Major and said in a loud whisper: “I got to talk alone.”

Major Joppolo asked his interpreter and usher to step outside.

“I have received a secret messages from the Mafia,” the old man said, still whispering loudly. “I have the military secrets of where are the German troops. You must send your soldiers, Mister Major.”

Major Joppolo said: “I have no soldiers, I’m just the administrator of Adano.”

Cacopardo said: “I got to go to the General. I am ready. “

Major Joppolo said: “Just a minute, Mister Cacopardo, I can’t send every Tom, Dick and Harry to see General Marvin. You’ll have to give me some evidence that your information is good.”

Old Cacopardo reached into his jacket and pulled out a piece of tissue paper. He unfolded it on Major Joppolo’s desk. “See,” he said, “here is Pinnaro, here is the hills before Pinnaro, here is the Germans. Element here of Forty-Third Panzers, something here out of Hermann Goring. I have all the details.”

Major Jop olo decided at once that the chances of the old man’s information being right were good enough so that he ought to send him forward to the Division.

“I will send you to the General, Mister Cacopardo,” he said, “but I want to warn you. The General is a very impatient man. If your dope isn’t straight, he’ll be very angry. I don’t know what he’ll do to you, but it won’t be nice. Also, old man, I’ve got to ask you not to get me in trouble with him. I’m already in Dutch with General Marvin. Promise me that you will be careful, will you?”

“I will be careful,” Cacopardo said, “but the informations is important.”

Major Joppolo made out a pass for Cacopardo and sent for a jeep from the motor pool.

Cacopardo stepped back, and raised his hand in a Fascist salute. Then, as his aged memory functioned, the hand wavered over to his forehead, and the salute became military. And he said: “Cacopardo is sulphur and sulphur is Cacopardo.” He turned on his heel, as militarily as he could, and marched out.

Between the Palazzo in Adano and the headquarters of the Forty-Ninth Division, in a villa beyond Vicinamare, old Cacopardo did not say a word to the jeep driver. He sat leaning forward against the wind, his goggles down over his eyes and his parasol straining over his head. The jeep’s windshield was down on the hood, with the canvas cover over it, as all jeep windshields should be where there is possibility of enemy strafing attacks, and so the wind was very strong. After a while old Cacopardo decided that sun was preferable to wind, and he moved the parasol down and held it in front of him, to fend off the wind.

The villa in which the Forty-Ninth Division was dug in for the time being had belonged to a friend of Cacopardo’s. Cacopardo and this friend had shared an interest in Italian furniture, and the old man knew the value of the things in this villa. The friend was dead now, but Cacopardo had a hard time remembering which of his friends had died and which were still living; he therefore thought of them all as living. It was easier that way.

Because he was entering the villa of his friend, whom he considered to be living, Cacopardo approached the gate in the spirit of a cordial visit, and he expected to be received cordially. He was in for a surprise.

Anyone who has never tried to see a general could not possibly know what Cacopardo’s reception was like. A sentry stopped him at the gate.

“Good morning,” said Cacopardo, as if addressing a butler at his friend’s door, “is my friend Salatiello here?” The sentry said: “Ain’t nobody here of that name as I know of. What is he, an M.P.?”

“What is these M.P.?” Cacopardo asked his jeep driver.

“Military Police,” the driver said.

“Military Police, indeed. He is prefect of Vicinamare and a collector of wooden curiosities. He is my friend. This is his house. Is he here?”

“Say, Buck!” the sentry shouted to a man lounging inside the gate. “Ever hear of a fellow round here named - what was that name again, Bud?”

“Signor Salatiello, he is my friend.” “Saladullo?”

“Hell, no,” Buck shouted back. “No one round here with a name like of that.”

“No one here that name,” the sentry repeated. Cacopardo said: “Then where is General Marvin?” M.P.’s are trained to be mysterious with strangers.

“Jeez, I can’t tell you that, Bud,” the sentry said.

“I have a paper to see General Marvin,” Cacopardo said, pulling out his pass.

“Oh, hell,” said the sentry, “why didn’t you say you had a pass? Sure, the General’s here.” And he shouted: “The Old Man’s in, ain’t he, Buck?”

“Yeah, I think His Nibs came in about half an hour »

ago.

“Yeah, he’s in,” the sentry said. “What you want to see him about?”

Cacopardo pulled out the tissue paper. “I can tell you where are the Germans,” he said.

“Right up there,” the sentry said, pointing up the driveway to the main door of the villa. “Right in that there door.”

The jeep drove up to the main door. There was another sentry there. When Cacopardo tried to go in, the sentry put his bayoneted rifle across the path. Cacopardo jumped back, alarmed. “I am no enemies,” he said. “I have the paper to see General Marvin,” and he stretched out the pass. Cacopardo learned quickly, for a man his age.

The sentry took the pass. “Brother, I doubt if you can see the General right now,” he said. “He don’t like to see no one in the mornings. You stand here a minute.” The sentry called the corporal of the guard.

The corporal of the guard came right back. “This way, brother,” he said.

He led Cacopardo to a man at a desk. “Name,” the man said gloomily. “Cacopardo. “

“Is that a first name, for godsake, or a last name?” the sour man said.

“That is the name of my family,” Cacopardo said. “How you spell that?”

Cacopardo spelled it out. The man wrote laboriously: Cacaporato.

“First name,” the unhappy man said. “Matteo. “

“Goddamit, you got to spell those Dago names.” Cacopardo spelled it and the man misspelled it. “Who you want to see?”

“General Marvin.”

“You haven’t got a chance of seeing him,” the man said. “Hell, there’s a war going on, Dago. What you want to see the General about?”

Cacopardo reached in his pocket for the tissue paper. “I can show you where are the Germans,” he said. “You’ll have to talk with G-two about that,” the man said, and he pointed with his pencil. “First door on the right, where it says Colonel Henderson.”

Cacopardo went to the door marked Colonel Henderson, and he knocked.

“Walk in, damn it,” a voice shouted. “General Marvin?” Cacopardo asked.

“Upstairs, upstairs,” the impatient voice, which belonged to a full colonel, said. Cacopardo started out. “Say, wait a minute.”

Cacopardo turned around. The Colonel said: “Who are you, anyway?”

“Cacopardo Matteo, I was sent to see General Marvin.”

“General Marvin doesn’t like Italians,” the Colonel said. “What do you want to see him about? You better not ask him for any favors, he’ll kick you out, personally, himself.”

Cacopardo reached in his pocket for the tissue paper. “I can show you where are the Germans,” he said. “You’ve got no business taking that kind of thing to General Marvin. What do you think we have a G-two section for around here? You can just show that to me.” “I was sent to see General Marvin. That is the one I am going to see.”

After an argument with Colonel Henderson, Cacopardo was sent upstairs under guard, was stopped and questioned by a sentry at the head of the stairs, was sent downstairs because he did not have a proper Division pass, was given a pass, was taken upstairs again, was questioned as to age, religion, political beliefs and sex by a sergeant, was interviewed by a staff officer who doubted whether the General would be free to see him, was referred to Colonel Middleton, the General’s Chief of Staff, was questioned by Colonel Middleton’s secretary, who thought the Colonel was busy, was finally admitted to Colonel Middleton, who, after an argument, agreed to see whether the General would see Cacopardo, which he doubted.

At the moment, General Marvin was playing mumblete-peg with Lieutenant Byrd, his aide. They had found that a certain magohany table took the knife beautifully. The General had just reached the double flip off the forehead.

Colonel Middleton walked in just as the General let the knife go off his forehead. The surprise of Colonel Middleton’s entrance was just enough to throw the General off his aim, and the knife clattered on the table and did not stick in. This annoyed the General. “Goddamit, haven’t I told you to knock, Middleton?” “Yes, sir. There’s an old Italian here wants to see you.” “Middleton, what’s the matter with you? Didn’t I tell you I didn’t want to see any more Italians?”

“Yes, sir. But this one seems to be above the average. He was sent to you by one of our people. He says he has some information you would want.”

“Well, dammit, show him in. What are you standing there for? Show him in.”

And so Cacopardo was finally brought into the pres-ence of the General. By this time he was just as angry as the General, and being some twenty years the General’s senior, he considered it his privilege to vent his anger first.

He found perfect expression for his anger in what he saw on the surface of the mahogany table.

“You are a barbarian,” he said.

This was not a very good way for old Cacopardo to begin with General Marvin, especially since he had two strikes against him to begin with: he had caught the General in a bad mood, and he was Italian.

“A what?” the General bellowed in his famous voice. “I said, you are a barbarian. How dare you chop and pick at the surface of my friend Salatiello’s table?”

For the sake of argument, it would have made no difference whatsoever if General Marvin had known that Salatiello had been thirteen years dead. The General could not possibly have been more outraged. “Jesus Christ,” he bellowed at the walls, “who is this wop, anyhow?”

“That table was made circa 1775, when your country had not even begun to existed, barbarian. It was carved by Vincenzio Bianchi of Parma. I cannot calculate the values of that table. You are a pig to chop and pick at it.” The General shouted: “Take this crazy wop out of here.”

Colonel Middleton and Lieutenant Byrd rushed into the room. They grabbed old Cacopardo, and started to push him out.

“Wait!” the General roared. “Who sent that idiot here, Middleton?”

“I don’t know, sir, it was some Major.”

“You don’t know? Goddamit, it’s your business to know.”

Colonel Middleton asked Cacopardo: “Who was it who sent you here?”

“My friend Major Joppolo, who is not a barbarian.” Colonel Middleton said: “What unit is this Major from?”

“Adano, from Adano,” old Cacopardo said. “From my home, Adano.”

“Adano,” the General shouted. “There’s something about that place. What is it about Adano, Middleton? Goddamit, what is it?”

“The cart, General,” Colonel Middleton said. Colonel Middleton would never forget Adano as long as he lived. “The cart? What cart? Goddamit, don’t talk in riddles, Middleton. What cart?”

“The cart that we threw off the road, sir. The mule we shot, sir.”

General Marvin remembered, and the memory turned his face a shade darker. “So that’s the Major who sent you,” he roared. “What was that name again? I want to remember that name.”

“Joppolo,” Middleton said.

General Marvin shouted: “Joppolo. Write that down, Middleton, remember that name. That goddam Major’s a wop, too. I remember now, he’s a goddam wop himself, isn’t he, Middleton?”

In the interests of justice, Colonel Middleton said: “I don’t remember, sir.”

General Marvin shouted: “Well, I do. Now throw this crazy Italian sonofabitch out of here, and if you let any more Italians in here, Middleton, I’ll break you back to a goddam second lieutenant.”

“Yes, sir,” Colonel Middleton said.

As they started to run him out, Cacopardo said: “But I have informations. I can tell you where are the Germans. It is important. The Germans, the Germans.”

But the General was much too far gone in rage. Cacopardo was taken out and sent home. He couldn’t get anyone, not even the sentry at the front gate, to listen to a description of the German positions before Pinnaro.