Chapter 17

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_ CHAPTER XVII

The lay sister was right. The great powder magazine at Monteverde had been blown up, but by what hands no one has ever surely known. The destruction was sudden, complete, tremendous, for a large quantity of dynamite had been stored in the deep vaults. Today, a great hollow in the side of the hill and near the road marks the spot where the buildings stood. Many stories have been told of the catastrophe; many tales have been repeated about suspicious characters who had been seen in the neighbourhood before the fatal event, and for some of these there is fairly good authority.

All those who were in the city when the explosion took place, and I myself was in Rome at the time, will remember how every one was at first convinced that his own house had been struck by lightning or suddenly shaken to its foundations. Every one will remember, too, the long and ringing shower of broken glass that followed instantly upon the terrific report. Every window looking westward was broken at once, except some few on the lower stories of houses protected by buildings opposite.

Giovanni Severi was in the main building over the vaults a short time before the catastrophe, having just finished a special inspection which had occupied most of the afternoon. He was moving to leave the place when an unfamiliar sound caught his ears, a noise muffled yet sharp, like that of the discharge of musketry heard through a thick wall. The junior officers and the corporal who were with him heard it, too, but did not understand its meaning. Giovanni, however, instantly remembered the story told by one of the survivors from a terrible explosion of ammunition near Naples many years previously. That muffled sound of quick firing came from metallic cartridges exploding within the cases that held them; each case would burst and set fire to others beside it; like the spark that runs along a fuse, the train of boxes would blow up in quick succession till the large stores of gunpowder were fired and then a mass of dynamite beyond. There were divisions in the vaults, there were doors, there were walls, but Giovanni well knew that no such barriers would avail for more than a few minutes.

Without raising his voice, he led his companions to the open door, speaking as he went.

'The magazine will blow up in two or three minutes at the outside,' he said. 'Send the men running in all directions, and go yourselves, to warn the people in the cottages near by to get out of doors at once. It will be like an earthquake; every house within five hundred yards will be shaken down. Now run! Run for your lives and to save the lives of others! Call out the men as you pass the gates.'

The three darted away across the open space that lay between the central building and the guard-house. Giovanni ran, too, but not away from the danger. There were sentries stationed at intervals all round the outer wall, as round the walls of a prison, and they would have little chance of life if they remained at their posts. Giovanni ran like a deer, but even so he lost many seconds in giving his orders to each sentinel, to run straight for the open fields to the nearest cottages and to give warning. The astonished sentinels obeyed instantly, and Giovanni ran on. He reached the very last just too late; at that moment the thunder of the explosion rent the air. He felt the earth rock and was thrown violently to the ground; then something struck his right arm and shoulder, pinning him down; he closed his eyes and was beyond hearing or feeling.

Within three-quarters of an hour the road to Monteverde was thronged with vehicles of all sorts and with crowds of people on foot. The nature of the disaster had been understood at once by the soldiery, and the explanation had spread among the people, rousing that strange mixture of curiosity and horror that draws the common throng to the scene of every accident or crime. But amongst the very first the King was on the spot with half-a-dozen superior officers, and in the briefest possible time the search for dead and wounded began. The story of Giovanni's splendid presence of mind and heroic courage ran from mouth to mouth. The junior officers and the men whom he had sent in all directions came in and reported themselves to the officer who had taken charge of everything for the time being. Only one man was missing--only one man and Giovanni himself. A few casualties amongst the peasants were reported, but not a life had been lost and hardly a bone was broken. Yet Giovanni was missing.

With the confidence of men who understood that the magazine must have been so entirely destroyed at once as to annihilate all further danger in an instant, the searchers went up to the ruin of the outer wall and peered into the great dusty pit out of which the foundations of the magazine had been hurled hundreds of feet into the air. Something of the outline of the enclosure could still be traced, and the sentinels whom Giovanni had warned from their post had already told their story. They found, too, that the missing man himself had been one of the sentries, and the inference was clear: their commanding officer had been killed before he had reached the last post.

For a long time they searched in vain. Great masses of masonry had shot through the outer wall and had rolled on or been stopped by the inequalities of the ground. Most of the wall itself was fallen and its direction could only be traced by a heap of ruins. Twilight had turned to darkness, and the search grew more and more difficult as a fine rain began to fall. Below, the multitude was already ebbing back to Rome; it was dark, it was wet, hardly any one had been hurt, and there was nothing to see: the best thing to be done was to go home.

It was late when a squad of four artillerymen heard a low moan that came from under a heap of stones close by them. In an instant they were at work with the pickaxes and spades they had borrowed from the peasants' houses, foreseeing what their work would be. From time to time they paused a moment and listened. Before long they recognised their comrade's voice.

'Easy, brothers! Don't crack my skull with your pickaxes, for Heaven's sake!'

'Is the Captain there?' asked one of the men.

'Dead,' answered the prisoner. 'He was warning me when we were knocked down together. Make haste, but for goodness' sake be careful!'

They were trained men and they did their work quickly and well. What had happened was this. The heavy and irregular mass of masonry that had pinned Giovanni to the ground by his arm had helped to make a sort of shelter, across which a piece of the outer wall had fallen without breaking, followed by a mass of rubbish. By what seemed almost a miracle to the soldiers, their companion was entirely unhurt, and no part of the officer's body had been touched except the arm that lay crushed beneath the stones.

They cleared away the rubbish and looked at him as he lay on his back pale and motionless under the light of their lanterns. They knew what he had done now; they understood that of them all he was the hero. One of the men took off his cap reverently, and immediately the others followed his example, and so they all stood for a few moments looking at him in silence and in deference to his brave deeds. Then they set to work in silence to move the heavy block of broken masonry that had felled him, and their comrade helped them too, though he was stiff and bruised and dazed from the terrific shock. As the mass yielded at last before their strength and rolled away, one of the men uttered a cry.

'He is alive!' he exclaimed. 'He moved his head!'

Before he had finished speaking the man was on his knees beside Giovanni, tearing open his tunic and his shirt to listen for the beating of his heart. It was faint but audible. Giovanni Severi was not dead yet, and a few moments later his artillerymen were carrying him down the hill towards the road, his injured arm swinging like a rag at his side.

They did not wait for orders; there were a number of carriages still in the road and the men had no idea where their superiors might be. Their first thought was to get Giovanni conveyed to a hospital as soon as possible.

'We must take him to the White Sisters,' said the eldest of them. 'That is where his brother was so long.'

The others assented readily enough; and finding an empty cab in the road, they lifted the wounded officer into it and pulled up the hood against the rain, whilst two of them crept in under it, telling the cabman where to go.

In less than a quarter of an hour the cab stopped before the hospital of the White Sisters, and when the portress opened the door, the two artillerymen explained what had happened and begged that their officer might be taken in at once; and, moreover, that the portress would kindly get some money with which to pay the cabman, as they could only raise seven sous between them.

The Mother Superior had supposed that there would be many wounded, and had directed that the orderlies should be ready at the door with stretchers, although the Convent hospital did not receive accident cases or casualties except in circumstances of extreme emergency. The hospital of the Consolazione, close to the Roman Forum, was the proper place for these, but it was very much farther, and the White Sisters were so well known in all Trastevere that they were sometimes called upon, even in the middle of the night, to take in a wounded man who could not have lived to reach the great hospital beyond the Tiber.

Under the brilliant electric light in the main hall, the Mother Superior recognised Giovanni's unconscious face; his crushed arm, hanging down like a doll's, and his torn and soiled uniform, told the rest. He was taken at once to the room his brother had occupied so long. The Mother Superior herself helped the surgeon and another Sister to do all that could be done then. Sister Giovanna knew nothing of his coming, for she was in the wards, where there was much to be done. The patients who had fever had been severely affected by the terrible explosion, and most of them were more or less delirious and had to be quieted. In the windows that look westward every pane of glass was broken, though the outer shutters had been closed at sunset, a few minutes before the catastrophe. There were heaps of broken glass to be cleared away, and the patients whose beds were now exposed to draughts were moved. Sister Giovanna, who was not the supervising nurse for the week, worked quietly and efficiently with the others, carrying out all directions as they were given; but her heart misgave her, and when one of the nuns came in and said in a low voice that an officer from Monteverde had been brought in with his arm badly crushed, she steadied herself a moment by the foot of an iron bedstead. In the shaded light of the ward no one noticed her agonised face.

Presently she was able to ask where the officer was, and the Sister who had brought the news announced that he was in Number Two. It was Giovanni now, and not his brother, the unhappy woman was sure of that, and every instinct in her nature bade her go to him at once. But the unconscious volition of those long trained to duty is stronger than almost any impulse except that of downright fear, and Sister Giovanna stayed where she was, for there was still much to be done.

About half-an-hour later the Mother Superior entered the ward and found her and led her quietly out. When they were alone together, the elder woman told her the truth.

'Giovanni Severi has been brought here from Monteverde,' she said. 'His right arm is so badly crushed that unless it is amputated he will certainly die.'

Sister Giovanna did not start, for she had guessed that he had received some terrible injury. She answered quietly enough, by a question.

'Is he conscious?' she asked. 'I believe that, by the law, his consent must be obtained before the operation.'

'He came to himself, but the doctor thought it best to give him a hypodermic of morphia and he is asleep.'

'Did he speak, while he was conscious?'

The Mother Superior knew what was passing in her daughter's mind, and looked quietly into the expectant eyes.

'He did not pronounce your name, but he said that he would rather die outright than lose his right arm. In any case, it would not be possible to amputate it during the night. He had probably dined before the accident, and it will not be safe to put him under ether before to-morrow morning.'

Sister Giovanna did not speak for a few moments, though the Mother Superior was almost quite sure what her next words would be, and that the young nun was mentally weighing her own strength of character with the circumstances that might arise.

'May I take care of him to-night?' she asked at last rather suddenly, like a person who has decided to run a grave risk.

'Can you be sure of yourself?' asked the elder woman, trying to put the question in the authoritative tone which she would have used with any other Sister in the community.

But it was of no use; when she thought of all it meant, and of what the delicate girl was to her, all the coldness went out of her voice and the deepest motherly sympathy took its place. The answer came after a short pause in which the question was finally decided.

'Yes. I can be sure of myself now.'

'Then come with me,' answered the Mother Superior.

They followed the passage to the lift, were taken up to the third floor, and a few moments later were standing before the closed door of Number Two. The Mother Superior paused with her hand on the door knob. She looked silently at her young companion, as if repeating the question she had already asked; and Sister Giovanna understood and slowly bent her head.

'I can bear anything now,' she said.

She opened the door, and the two entered the quiet room, where one of the Sisters sat reading her breviary by the shaded light in the corner. The wounded man lay fast asleep under the influence of the morphia, and the white coverlet was drawn up to his chin. He was not very pale, Sister Giovanna thought; but she could not see well, because there was a green shade over the small electric lamp in the corner of the room.

'Sister Giovanna will take your place for to-night,' said the Mother Superior to the nun, who had risen respectfully, and who left the room at once.

The mother and daughter turned to the bedside and stood looking down at the sleeping man's face. Instinctively their hands touched and then held each other. Experience told them both that in all probability Giovanni would sleep till morning under the drug, and would wake in a dreamy state in which he might not recognise his nurse at once; but sooner or later the recognition must take place, words must be spoken, and a question must be asked. Would he or would he not consent to the operation which alone could save his life? So far as the two women knew and understood the law, everything depended on that. If he deliberately refused, it would be because he chose not to live without Angela, not because he feared to go through life a cripple. They were both sure of that, and they were sure also that if any one could persuade him to choose life where the choice lay in his own hands, it would be Sister Giovanna herself. The operation was not one which should be attended with great danger; yet so far as the law provided it was of such gravity as to require the patient's own consent.

Neither of the two nuns spoke again till the Mother Superior was at the door to go out.

'If you want me, ring for the lay sister on duty and send for me,' she said. 'I will come at once.'

She did not remember that she had ever before said as much to a nurse whose night was beginning.

'Thank you,' answered Sister Giovanna; 'I think he will sleep till morning.'

The door closed and she made two steps forward till she stood at the foot of the bed. For a few moments she gazed intently at the face she knew so well, but then her glance turned quickly toward the corner where the other nurse had sat beside the shaded lamp. That should be her place, too, but she could not bear to be so far from him. Noiselessly she brought a chair to the bedside and sat down so that she could look at his face. Since she had been in the room she had felt something new and unexpected--the deep, womanly joy of being alone to take care of the beloved one in the hour of his greatest need. She would not have thought it possible that a ray of light could penetrate her darkness, or that in her deep distress anything approaching in the most distant degree to a sensation of peace and happiness could come near her. Yet it was there and she knew it, and her heart rested. It was an illusion, no doubt, a false dawn such as men see in the tropics, only to be followed by a darker night; but while it lasted it was the dawn for all that. It was a faint, sweet breath of happiness, and every instinct of her heart told her that it was innocent. She would have, been contented to watch over him thus, in his sleep, for ever, seeing that he too was momentarily beyond suffering.

It seemed, indeed, as if it might be long before any change came; his breathing was a little heavy, but was regular as that of a sleeping animal; his colour was even and not very pale; his eyes were quite shut and the eyelids did not quiver nor twitch. The tremendous drug had brought perfect calm and rest after a shock that would have temporarily shattered the nerves of the strongest man. Then, too, there was nothing to be seen and there was nothing in the room to suggest the terrible injury that was hidden under the white coverlet--nothing but the lingering odour of iodoform, to which the nun was so well used that she never noticed it.

Hour after hour she sat motionless on the chair, her eyes scarcely ever turning from his face. He was so quiet that there was absolutely nothing to be done; to smooth his pillow or to pass a gentle hand over his forehead would have been to risk disturbing his perfect quiet, and she felt not the slightest desire to do either. For a blessed space she was able to put away the thought of the question which would be asked when he wakened, and which he only could answer. It was not a night of weary waiting nor of anxious watching; while its length lasted, he was hers to watch, hers alone to take care of, and that was so like happiness that the hours ran on too swiftly and she was startled when she heard the clock of the San Michele hospice strike three; she remembered that it had struck nine a few minutes after she had sat down beside him.

Her anxiety awoke again now, and that delicious state of peace in which she had passed the night began to seem like a past dream. In a little more than an hour the dawn would begin to steal through the outer blinds--the dawn she had watched for and longed for a thousand times in five years of nursing. It would be unwelcome now; it would mean the day, and the day could only mean for her the inevitable question.

She sat down again to watch him, for she had risen nervously in the first moment of returning distress; and she felt the cold of the early morning stealing upon her as she became gradually sure that his breathing was softer, and that from time to time a very slight quivering of the closed lids proclaimed the gradual return of consciousness. He would not wake in pain, or at least not in any acute suffering; she knew that by experience, for in such cases the nerves near the injured part generally remained paralysed for a long time. But he would wake sleepily at first, wondering where he was, glancing vaguely from one wall to another, from the foot of the bed or the window to her own face, without recognising it or understanding anything. That first stage might last a few minutes, or half-an-hour; he might even fall asleep again and not wake till much later. But sooner or later recognition would come, and with it a shock to him, a sudden tension of the mind and nerves, under which he might attempt to move suddenly in his bed, and that might be harmful, though she could not tell how. She wondered whether it would not be her duty to leave him before that moment. It was true that he would recognise the room in which he had so often spent long hours with his brother; he would know, as soon as he was conscious, that he was in the Convent hospital and under the same roof with her; then he would ask for her. Perhaps the surgeon would think it better that he should see her, but she would not be left alone with him; possibly she might be asked by the Mother Superior or by Monsignor Saracinesca, if he chanced to come that morning, to use her influence with Giovanni in order that he might submit to what alone could save him from death. It was going to be one of the hardest days in all her life--would God not stay the dawn one hour?

It was stealing through the shutters now, grey and soft, and the wounded man's sleep was unmistakably lighter. Sister Giovanna drew back noiselessly from the bedside and carried her chair to the corner where the little table stood, and sat down to wait again. It might be bad for him to wake and see some one quite near him, looking into his face.

At that moment the door opened quietly and the Mother Superior stood on the threshold, looking preternaturally white, even for her. Sister Giovanna rose at once and went to meet her. They exchanged a few words in a scarcely audible whisper. The Mother had come in person to take the nun's place for a while, judging that it would not be well if Giovanni wakened and found himself alone with her.

The Sister went to her cell, where she had not been since the explosion on the previous evening. The brick floor was strewn with broken glass and was damp with the fine rain, driven through the lattice by the southwest wind during the night. Even the rush-bottomed chair was all wet, and the edge of the white counterpane on the little bed. It was all very desolate. _

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