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PINOCCHIO 159 “Do not mention it!” groaned Pinocchio, who was still trembling with fright. " Do not mention it! If you had arrived a second later I should by this time have been fried, eaten, and digested. Brrr!... it makes me shudder only to think of 1t! . . ." Alidoro, laughing, extended his right paw to the puppet, who shook it heartily in token of great friendship, and they then separated. The dog took the road home; and Pinocchio, left alone, went to a cottage not far off, and said to a little old man who was warming himself in the sun: “Tell me, good man, do you know anything of a poor boy called Kugene who was wounded in the head? . . ." " The boy was proniht some fishermen to this cottage, and now. “ And now he is dead! . .. Interrupted Pinocchio with great sorrow. “No, he is alive, and has returned to his home.” ‘Not really? not really? " cried the puppet, dancing with delight. " Then the wound was not serious? ...” " It might have been very serious and even fatal,” answered the old man, “ for they threw a thick book bound in cardboard at his head." c And who threw it at him?”
