nce in the town she could hardly believe her eyes. Soldiers seemed to
be everywhere, shouting and calling from one to the other. She saw the
little guns that were making all the sharp, clicking noises, and she
knew that just below, and on the other side of the river, the Austrians
were fighting desperately.

They passed many wounded as they hurried along, and to each one the big
man would call out cheerily. Lucia wished she could understand what he
said, or even what language he spoke. It was not German, of course,
and she did not think it was French.

"Perhaps he was a tourist?" she asked him shyly, but he shook his head.

"I don't get you, I'm sorry. I'm an American, you see."

"Oh, Americano!" Lucia clapped her hands delightedly. "I am glad, I
thought so, American is the name of the tourists, just as I guessed,"
she replied. "I have heard of Americans and I have seen some in the
summer, but they were not like you."

She looked up in his face and smiled.

The American did not understand a word of her Italian, but he saw the
smile, and answered it with a good-natured grin.

"You're a funny kid," he said. "I wish I could find out what you are
talking about, and where you got ahold of that queer rig and the goat."

They had reached the other gate by now, and they hurried through it and
to the convent.

Several of the sisters had returned, and there were doctors and nurses
all busy in the long room where, the night before, Lucia had left
Roderigo and Sister Francesca.

The American laid the soldier down on one of the beds, and hurried to
one of the doctors.

"Saw this youngster dragging this man on a sort of stretcher hitched to
a goat," he said. "He's pretty bad. Better look at him."

The doctor nodded. Lucia stood beside her soldier and waited. She was
almost afraid of what the doctor would say. He leaned over him and
began taking off his muddy uniform, while the American helped. When he
had examined the wound, he hurried over to a table and came back with a
queer looking instrument. To Lucia it looked like a small bottle
attached to a very long needle.

"Don't, don't, you are cruel!" she protested, as he pushed it slowly
into the soldier. She put out her hand angrily, but the American
pulled her back.

"It's all right," he said soothingly. "It's to make him well."

Lucia shook her head, and the doctor turned to her. He spoke excellent
Italian.

"It is to save his life, child, and