The Assassins chase Pinocchio, catch him, and hang him to the branch of a
giant oak tree
As he ran, the Marionette felt more and more certain that he would have to give
himself up into the hands of his pursuers. Suddenly he saw a little cottage
gleaming white as the snow among the trees of the forest.
"If I have enough breath left with which to reach that little house, I may be
saved," he said to himself.
Not waiting another moment, he darted swiftly through the woods, the Assassins
still after him.
After a hard race of almost an hour, tired and out of breath, Pinocchio finally
reached the door of the cottage and knocked. No one answered.
He knocked again, harder than before, for behind him he heard the steps and the
labored breathing of his persecutors. The same silence followed.
As knocking was of no use, Pinocchio, in despair, began to kick and bang
against the door, as if he wanted to break it. At the noise, a window opened and
a lovely maiden looked out. She had azure hair and a face white as wax. Her
eyes were closed and her hands crossed on her breast. With a voice so weak
that it hardly could be heard, she whispered:
"No one lives in this house. Everyone is dead."
"Won't you, at least, open the door for me?" cried Pinocchio in a beseeching
voice.
"I also am dead."
"Dead? What are you doing at the window, then?"
"I am waiting for the coffin to take me away."
After these words, the little girl disappeared and the window closed without a
sound.
"Oh, Lovely Maiden with Azure Hair," cried Pinocchio, "open, I beg of you. Take
pity on a poor boy who is being chased by two Assass--"
He did not finish, for two powerful hands grasped him by the neck and the same
two horrible voices growled threateningly: "Now we have you!"
The Marionette, seeing death dancing before him, trembled so hard that the
joints of his legs rattled and the coins tinkled under his tongue.
"Well," the Assassins asked, "will you open your mouth now or not? Ah! You do
not answer? Very well, this time you shall open it."
Taking out two long, sharp knives, they struck two heavy blows on the
Marionette's back.
Happily for him, Pinocchio was made of very hard wood and the knives broke
into a thousand pieces. The Assassins looked at each other in dismay, holding
the handles of the knives in their hands.
"I understand," said one of them to the other, "there is nothing left to do now but
to hang him."
"To hang him," repeated the other.
They tied Pinocchio's hands behind his shoulders and slipped the noose around
his neck. Throwing the rope over the high limb of a giant oak tree, they pulled till
the poor Marionette hung far up in space.
Satisfied with their work, they sat on the grass waiting for Pinocchio to give his
last gasp. But after three hours the Marionette's eyes were still open, his mouth
still shut and his legs kicked harder than ever.
Tired of waiting, the Assassins called to him mockingly: "Good-by till tomorrow.
When we return in the morning, we hope you'll be polite enough to let us find you
dead and gone and with your mouth wide open." With these words they went.
A few minutes went by and then a wild wind started to blow. As it shrieked and
moaned, the poor little sufferer was blown to and fro like the hammer of a bell.
The rocking made him seasick and the noose, becoming tighter and tighter,
choked him. Little by little a film covered his eyes.
Death was creeping nearer and nearer, and the Marionette still hoped for some
good soul to come to his rescue, but no one appeared. As he was about to die,
he thought of his poor old father, and hardly conscious of what he was saying,
murmured to himself:
"Oh, Father, dear Father! If you were only here!"
These were his last words. He closed his eyes, opened his mouth, stretched out
his legs, and hung there, as if he were dead.