ut quickly falls asleep again. The next morning, he travels to the Bainsizza area, the whole village is destroyed, there he can clearly see the damage caused by the war: Henry meets a man named Gino, he was a nice boy and everyone seemed to like him. They discuss the fighting. Gino says the summer's losses were not in vain, and Henry falls silent--he says words like those embarrass him. He says that the names of villages and the numbers of streets have more meaning than words like “sacred” and “glorious”. That night, the rain comes down hard, and early in the morning (3o’clock) the Croatians begin a bombardment. In the morning, the Italians learn that the attacking forces include Germans; “the word German was something to be frightened of” they didn’t want to have any thing to do with Germans and prefer to fight against the Austrians. But still the line should be kept at any cost. The next night, the Italian line has been broken, and the Italian forces begin a broad retreat. Henri returns to the villa but finds it empty. Rinaldi has gone with the hospital, the major with the hospital personnel. Henry finds the drivers under his command, including Piani, Bonello, and Aymo. Instead of going now, Henry gets a good night's sleep.Chapter 28 “Beginning of a sluggish retreat”They moved out slowly through the town, in an endless line of soldiers and vehicles. Henry takes a turn sleeping, and shortly after he wakes, the column halts again at the fall of night. He finds that Bonello has given two engineer sergeants that were left to bomb a bridge, a ride. Aymo has two Italian girls completely petrified of terror in his car. Exhausted, Henry falls asleep again, and dreams of Catherine (&talks loudly while sleeping). In the night, many peasants join the retreating army. In the early morning Henry and his men stop briefly at a farmhouse and enjoyed a copious breakfast. Soon, they continue ...
