sitting-room while the doctor went in to see what could be
done. If the Captain would see her, she would speak to him when Pieri
had finished his work.

Nearly three-quarters of an hour passed before he joined her.

'It is a bad fracture,' he said, 'and it will require an operation if
he is not to be lamed for life. I should much prefer to perform it in
a proper place. There is none better than the private hospital of the
White Sisters and it is by far the nearest. Do you happen to know the
place?'

The Princess said that she did and that she was a patroness of the
Convent. The surgeon observed that it was now past eleven, and that
the patient could not be moved before morning. If she agreed with him
and would lend her motor for the purpose, he would communicate with
the hospital and take the Captain there himself between eight and nine
o'clock. For the present he needed no special nursing, and the orderly
seemed to be an unusually intelligent young fellow, who could be
trusted and was sincerely attached to his master. The Princess agreed
to everything, and asked whether the Captain wished to see her.

He did, and when she stood beside him he pressed her hand gratefully
and thanked her with real feeling for her great kindness. She
answered, before Pica, that she would always do anything in her power
for any one of his name, and she explained that she would be at the
hospital on the following morning to see that he had a good private
room and received special care. He thanked her again and bade her
good-night. Two or three minutes later he heard the motor puffing and
wheezing, and Pica came back after shutting the door. Ugo now sent him
over to the guard-room with a message to the lieutenant on duty,
requesting him to write a brief official account of the occurrence and
to send it by hand to headquarters the next morning. It was necessary
that another officer should take Ugo's place in command of the fort
while he was in hospital.

Pica came back again in a few moments. Then Ugo insisted on having
writing-materials, and sat up, propped with cushions, while he wrote a
short note to the Minister of War, explaining what had happened, and
that he would not leave his home on the morrow till his brother had
arrived, but that some further arrangement must be made if Giovanni
was to lodge in the house, which would probably be wanted for the
officer who was to take his own place. Pica was to be at the
Minister's own reside