light. But one thing surprised him. The
window was in the west wall of the room in which he had slept, and yet
the sun was pouring into it! It didn't seem possible, yet it was true.
It was late afternoon, almost evening, and he had slept practically all
day! In his surprise he called out sharply to Steve, who had slept in
the same room, but in a separate bed. But Steve was not there. His bed
was crumpled, but he himself had vanished!

Dick went to the window and looked out. Everything seemed to be
peaceful. There were not many people about, but he knew that in this
part of Belgrade few people were to be seen at this time of day in any
case. At first he scarcely noticed a sound that came to his ears
regularly, almost as regularly and monotonously as the ticking of a
watch. Then he realized what it was; the sound of cannon. The
bombardment, then, was still going on. He wondered about its success.

He looked out toward the business quarter of Belgrade. In a good many
places black smoke was rising, shot through with yellow fumes. There was
no wind, fortunately; he guessed that these pillars of smoke were from
fires started by the Austrian shells. Had there been a gale to fan them
they might have done serious damage. He was still looking out when the
door burst open and Stepan Dushan came in.

"Hello! You're awake at last, are you?" he cried. "Well, you had sleep
enough when you once started! You looked so comfortable that I didn't
have the heart to wake you when the time came for me to get up."

"I'm glad you didn't," said Dick, honestly. "I'm feeling fine now, and
if you'll give me some breakfast I'll tackle my weight in wildcats! But
if I'd had five minutes less sleep it wouldn't have been enough! I don't
believe I was ever tired enough to sleep through a bombardment before."

"This isn't much of a bombardment," said Stepan, contemptuously. "I
don't believe there'll be much damage done. Come on out--though I'll see
that you get some breakfast first. I think I'll have something
interesting to tell you before long."

"All right. But why don't you tell me now?" asked Dick.

"Bad luck to talk about things until they're done," said Steve, with a
grin. "Don't you know that in America?"

"All right," said Dick. "But just when are you going to know?"

"Pretty soon--but that's no sign that you'll know it as soon as I do,
you know. How would you like to go back to Semlin?"

"I'm game, if you'll tell me why."

"That's ju