Page:The adventures of Pinocchio (Cramp 1904).djvu/145

 bound in thick cardboard. It was a treatise on arithmetic. I will leave you to imagine how heavy it must have been. One of the boys seized the arithmetic and, taking aim, threw it at Pinocchio. Instead of hitting the marionette it struck the head of one of his companions. The boy became as white as a sheet or raised bread and said only these few words, “Oh, my mother! Help me, for I am dying.”

At the sight of the little fellow apparently dying the boys were scared and ran away as fast as they could. In a few minutes there was no one left but Pinocchio.

Although he was more dead than alive through grief and fright, he ran to soak his handkerchief in the sea and began to bathe the temples of his poor schoolmate. Meanwhile he cried despairingly: “Eugene! My poor Eugene, open your eyes and look at me! Why do you not answer me? It was not I who hurt you. Believe me, it was not I. If you keep your eyes shut, you will make me die too. How shall I be able to go home now? What can I say to my good mamma? What will she say to me? Where shall I go? Where can I hide myself? Oh, how much better, a thousand times better, would it have been if I had gone to school! Why did I listen to them this morning?