Summary
His hunger gone, Pinocchio now grumbles about wanting new feet. As punishment for his misbehavior, Geppetto leaves Pinocchio to cry for half the day. He asks if Pinocchio will use new feet to run away again. Pinocchio promises to go to school and get good grades; he says he will learn a trade and take care of Geppetto in old age. Geppetto’s eyes fill with tears at the pitiable sight of Pinocchio pleading. He then fashions new legs out of fine wood scraps and glues them seamlessly to the puppet.
Pinocchio is overjoyed and says he wants to start school immediately. However, he needs clothes. Geppetto, having no money, makes clothes out of paper and bark. Pinocchio is pleased to look like a gentleman. He then points out that he needs a spelling book, which they have to buy from a bookseller. Geppetto leaves, returning having sold his coat to buy a spelling book. Geppetto claims he sold it because the coat was too hot. Pinocchio throws his arms around Geppetto and kisses him again and again.
Pinocchio walks to school when it stops snowing. He imagines how he will learn enough to get a good job and earn the money to buy his papa an even better coat. Distracted by the sound of fife music by the shore, Pinocchio puts off school until tomorrow and spends the day at the puppet theater from which the fife music comes. However, it costs a dime to enter the theater. Pinocchio tries to sell the doorkeeper his jacket, shoes, and hat, but the boy turns down each one. He offers his spelling book finally. A nearby seller of old clothes who is listening to the conversation offers Pinocchio a dime for the book.
Inside, the puppets are arguing with each other on stage. Immediately, they recognize Pinocchio and call him out by name, referring to him as their brother. He leaps onto the stage and is met with affection. However, the audience grumbles over the stoppage of the play they have paid for. The fearsome showman comes out brandishing a whip made of twisted snakes and fox tails. He demands that the puppet stars Harlequin and Punch bring Pinocchio to the kitchen to use him as firewood to keep a spit-roasted sheep cooking. The puppets hesitate, but obey their master and carry Pinocchio off. He cries out for his papa to save him.
The showman, who is named Fire Eater, is evil-looking with his black beard that covers his torso like an apron. However, he is moved at the sight of Pinocchio struggling for his life, and he sneezes. Harlequin understands this means that Fire Eater is overcome with compassion. Taking pity on Pinocchio and his poor father, the showman decides he will burn Harlequin instead. Pinocchio cries, throwing himself at the showman’s feet and pleading for him not to burn Harlequin. The showman insists his mutton must be well roasted. Pinocchio offers that he be burned in place of Harlequin, his dear friend. The other puppets all cry. The showman, moved by Pinocchio’s sacrifice, asks the puppet to give him a kiss. Pinocchio kisses his nose. The showman resigns himself to half-raw mutton, saying that—for now—he will burn no puppets. The puppets dance merrily until morning.
The next day, Pinocchio explains to the showman that his father is a penniless beggar. The showman takes pity and sends Pinocchio with five gold pieces to take to Geppetto. Overjoyed, Pinocchio says his goodbyes. On the road he meets a cat and a fox who depend on each other to get around. Fox has an injured leg and so leans on Cat; Cat is blind, and so is guided by Fox. Fox greets Pinocchio politely and says he knows his papa.
Pinocchio shows off the gold, saying he is now a gentleman. He will buy his father a coat and himself a spelling book. The fox and cat both claim that their disabilities are consequences of their passion for studying. Pinocchio tries to leave, but Fox and Cat convince him to follow them to the land of the Owls, where Pinocchio can plant his gold in the Field of Miracles and make his fortune grow to 2,500 pieces. They tell him they expect nothing in return, and only wish to enrich others.
They walk all evening until they arrive at an inn, The Red Craw-Fish. Although Fox and Cat claim not to be hungry, they both order lavish meals. Pinocchio doesn’t eat his walnuts and bread crust because his thoughts are fixed on the Field of Miracles. They ask the innkeeper for good rooms. That night, Pinocchio is woken from his dreams by the innkeeper banging on the door. He explains that the Fox and Cat left with instructions for Pinocchio to meet in the morning at the Field of Miracles. Pinocchio learns they didn’t pay for their meals, so he pays a gold piece for them, leaving him with four. Pinocchio sets out in the dark, running into the ghost of the Talking Cricket. He warns Pinocchio not to trust anyone who promises to make him rich in a day. Pinocchio ignores the cricket and continues along the dark road. The cricket wishes him safety from assassins.
While walking, Pinocchio talks to himself about how he doesn’t believe in assassins. He thinks they are the invention of parents who don’t want their children out at night. However, two assassins tiptoe behind him. Pinocchio hides his gold under his tongue. They apprehend him and demand he give them his money or his life. They say they will also kill his father. Pinocchio cries out, the coins clinking in his mouth. But Pinocchio refuses to give them up.
When one of them tries to pry open Pinocchio’s mouth with a knife, Pinocchio quickly bites off the assassin’s hand, which, to his surprise, turns out to be a paw. Pinocchio runs off, chased by the assassins. He climbs a pine tree, but the assassins set fire to it. Pinocchio leaps off and dashes across fields, running until daybreak. He believes he is safe when they misjudge a jump and land in a coffee-colored ditch of water, but the assassins keep pursuing him, dripping wet.
Analysis
Despite Geppetto’s sacrificial gesture of giving his only food to the starving Pinocchio, Geppetto makes Pinocchio suffer for half a day without feet. Once again, Collodi depicts Pinocchio living with the consequences of his behavior—in this case, him carelessly burning off his feet on the brazier. To show his appreciation once Geppetto does make him new feet, Pinocchio promises he will be a good boy and start school, which he had told the cricket he would never want to do.
Collodi builds on the theme of sacrifice with another selfless gesture to satisfy Pinocchio’s needs, selling his coat so that Pinocchio can have the spelling book he needs for school. While Pinocchio briefly entertains a fantasy of redeeming himself by going to school, earning money, and buying his papa a better coat, his inherent laziness means he is easily distracted by a puppet theater set up by the shore. Pinocchio is so unappreciative of the clothes and book Geppetto got him that he shamelessly offers to sell them just so he can enter the theater.
In another instance of Pinocchio being punished for his bad behavior, he finds himself the target of the Fire Eater’s ire. However, the theme of sacrifice arises again as the other puppets advocate for their friend Pinocchio. Pinocchio then offers to sacrifice himself when he learns that Harlequin is going to be burned in his place. Luckily for all of them, the puppets’ selfless actions move the Fire Eater enough that he agrees to burn none of them. Additionally, the sympathetic Fire Eater gifts Pinocchio five gold coins to bring to his father. In this way, Collodi shows how Pinocchio benefits from the welcome consequences of positive actions.
The themes of greed and dishonesty enter the story when Pinocchio meets the Fox and the Cat, who are posing as disabled but are actually con artists. The greedy, lying scammers appeal to Pinocchio’s own greed when they convince him he can multiply his windfall to 2,500 gold coins if he goes along with them. Not aware he is being bamboozled, Pinocchio doesn’t even clue in when the con artists gorge themselves at the inn and expect him to pay for them.
Pinocchio must live with the consequences of his laziness and greed by suffering the Fox and the Cat’s brutal attempts to rob and kill him for his gold. He is also foolish enough not to recognize that they have dressed as assassins, even when he bites off one of their paws, Pinocchio must run for his life as the Fox and Cat chase him across the countryside to take his remaining gold coins. Had he simply gone home as the Fire Eater believed he would, Pinocchio would have been rejoicing with Geppetto instead of running for his life.
