her understood, glanced at him
and slipped away, closing the door very softly. She knew that stage of
awakening from the influence of opium, with its alternating 'zones' of
sleep and waking.

It was half-past five now, and a spring morning, and all was astir
downstairs; lay sisters were gathering the broken glass into baskets,
the portress was clearing away the wreck of broken panes from the
outer hall, and the nun who had charge of the chapel was preparing the
altar for matins. No one was surprised to see the Mother Superior in
the cloister so early, for she was often the first to rise and almost
always the last to go to rest; the novices said that the little white
volcano never slept at all, but was only 'quiescent' during a part of
the night.

She found one of the orderlies scrubbing the outer doorstep, and
despatched him at once with Giovanni's report, which she had put into
an envelope and directed. He was to bring back an answer if there was
any; and when he was gone, as he had not finished his job, she took
the scrubbing broom in her small hands and finished it herself, with
more energy, perhaps, than had been expended upon the stones for some
time. Before she had quite done, the portress caught sight of her and
was filled with horror.

'For the love of heaven!' she cried, trying to take the broom herself.

The nun would not let it go, however, and pushed her aside gently,
with a smile.

'If any one should see your Reverence!' protested the portress.

'My dear Anna,' answered the Mother Superior, giving the finishing
strokes, 'they would see an old woman washing a doorstep, and no harm
would be done.'

But the example remained impressed on the good lay sister's mind for
ever, and to her last days she will never tire of telling the novices
how the Mother Superior washed the doorstep of the hospital herself on
the morning after the explosion at Monteverde.

The delivery of the report produced a more immediate result than
either Giovanni or the Mother had expected. The accident had happened
near sunset, and the story of Giovanni's heroic behaviour had been
repeated everywhere before midnight. The men who had found him had, of
course, reported the fact after the first confusion was over, but it
was some time before the news got up to any superior officer, though
the King's aide-de-camp had left instructions that any information
about Giovanni was to be telephoned to the Quirinal at once. When it
had been u