Lucia Rudini | Page 5

west. It was
setting in a bank of golden clouds over the little river that ran parallel
with the west wall of the town. Lucia stopped to look at it.
"Rain to-morrow, I suppose, by the look of those clouds," she said, a
real pucker of concern between her eyes.
"And no wonder," Maria agreed, "with all this banging of guns one
would think it would rain all the time out of pity for so much
suffering."

"Now, Maria, don't begin to cry," Lucia protested not unkindly. "It will
do you no good, and it will only make things look worse than they
really are."
"How can they?" Maria demanded, with more show of resentment than
was usual with her quiet acceptance of things. "Only this morning I
sold milk to such a sweet boy from the south. He had great sad, brown
eyes like yours, and he was very young and unhappy. His father and
brother were both killed, and now he is going."
"But perhaps he won't be killed," Lucia said practically. "Anyway, he
will get a chance to do a little killing first, and surely that is enough to
satisfy any one, or ought to be."
"Oh, Lucia you are cruel sometimes," Maria protested. "Who wants to
kill? Surely not these happy boys, and they don't want to be killed
either. It is all too terrible to think about, and you are an unnatural girl
to talk as you do. Why, I don't believe you have cried once since the
war began, even when the poor wounded were brought here, and we
saw their faces all shot away."
Maria's anger rose as she talked, and Lucia listened curiously. It was
something new for Maria to take her to task. Her mind flew back over
the past year, and she saw herself with her face buried in the grass and
her hands clenched, and remembered her furious anger and her vows of
vengeance, but she had to admit that her cousin was right; she had shed
no tears.
"We are not made the same way, I guess," she replied ruefully to
Maria's charges. "I cannot cry, I can only hate."
"But hate won't do any good," Maria protested feebly.
"It will do more than tears," Lucia replied shortly.
They continued their walk in silence, now and then nodding to an
acquaintance or bowing respectfully to the Sisters of Charity who lived
at the big Convent just outside the Porto Romano, and who came to

town to take care of the sick and cheer the broken-hearted. When they
reached the north gate Lucia stopped. Roderigo was still on duty, but
this time he did not pause in his brisk walk up and down to chat. He
never even glanced in the girls' direction.
Maria nodded towards him and whispered excitedly, "That is the boy I
was just now speaking of. Doesn't he look sad?"
"No, he looks quite cross," Lucia replied in a voice loud enough to be
overheard, and her eyes sparkled with mischief as she added, "I wonder
if he will let me through the gate to get home."
"May I pass, sir, please? I live a little beyond the wall, but I am not a
spy," she said with mock humility.
Roderigo blushed. A soldier does not like to be made fun of,
particularly when some one else is present.
"Pass," he said gruffly.
Lucia laughed provokingly.
"Good night, Maria," she said as she kissed her cousin. "Sweet dreams.
I may not be in very early in the morning, there is so much to do, you
know, but I will bring as much milk as possible," she finished. Then
without even a glance at Roderigo she walked through the gate and
down the wall.
When she had walked for a little distance she looked back. Maria and
the soldier were in earnest conversation. Maria in her timid way was
apologizing for her cousin's rudeness, and Roderigo was beginning to
have doubts of the superiority of Southern beauty over the Northern,
particularly when a gentle spirit was added to the charm of the latter.
Lucia did not know she was the subject of their talk. She shrugged her
shoulders and turned her thoughts to a more important question that
was puzzling her. It was, how to slip out of the house the next morning
without disturbing the already suspicious Beppi.

CHAPTER III
BEFORE DAYBREAK
Lucia found Beppi asleep in the grass, curled up in the same position
that he had been in earlier in the day. One of his little hands had tight
hold of the precious pink bag, and a sticky smile of blissful content
turned up the corners of his full red lips.
Lucia looked at him and shook her head. There might have been
twenty-seven instead of