When the soldier remembered her a few minutes later, and came over to shut the door, he grumbled at the loss of the lock, but he did not apparently connect her with its disappearance, nor did he bother much about looking for it.  He shut the door and walked back to join the group that still surrounded the messenger.

Lucia sat down again and watched the door of the Captain’s dugout.  She had wondered all day what the smiling Italian soldier and Beppi had done after she left.  She knew that Beppi could easily find his way back to the cottage, and in case Nana had already gone, and Lucia knew that in spite of her threats she would not go off alone, he would go into the town and some one would take care of him.

As for the soldier, he would hear the rat, tat, tat, and know what it meant, and return to his comrades for help.  She listened, but there was no sound of guns near enough to mean a fight close at hand.

The thought puzzled her, but she dismissed it as the Captain and the two soldiers came out of the dugout.  The men looked cross and sullen, but the Captain was still smiling.  He walked over to the messenger, handed him a folded paper, and the man disappeared as mysteriously as he came.

Lucia did not pay any attention to him, however, for she was interested in the two soldiers.  They were very busy buckling on their kit bags in preparation for a departure.  When they were ready, they stood at attention before the Captain.  After more orders from him, they started off down the hill just back of the shed.

Lucia guessed that they were going to the river, with a cold feeling around her heart, she realized that they could go straight to the wall of Cellino.  She did not stop to consider the many sentries who walked up and down the walls day and night, or the fact that two enemy soldiers would hardly walk up and attempt to enter a town in broad daylight.  She only knew that the river led to Cellino, and that all she loved most in the world was there.

She was sick with fear.  She looked back at the Captain; he was again consulting his watch.  The soldiers looked at him and fell to grumbling again.  After a moment of indecision he called to them.

They stood up and saluted.  He gave a very peremptory order, and in a few minutes almost all of them had their guns on their shoulders, and waited his next word.  The Captain himself buckled on his revolver, and the party started off at a brisk pace through the tunnel.

Lucia watched them go.  In a hazy way she realized that they were going out in search of the men who had left earlier in the morning.  This was correct in part, but they were also going to look for another party of men, the ones who had been responsible for the rat, tat, tat, Lucia had heard.

The diggers, led by her captor, had been sent out that morning to relieve their comrades already at work.  When none of them returned the Captain grew anxious, and was himself leading the searching party.