So occupied was she with her thoughts that she reached the gate to the hospital before she realized it.  She lifted the heavy knocker; an old man opened the door.

“This is not visiting day, little one,” he said, as he looked down at Lucia.

“Oh, I am not visiting,” she replied, “I brought these few flowers for the sick soldiers; will you take them?”

“Indeed I will.”  The old man held out his hand.  “Do you want the basket back again?”

“Oh, no, there’s no hurry for that, I will get it the next time I come,” Lucia replied.  “I mean to bring flowers every day or two for the soldiers.”

“That is very kind of you,” the old man smiled, “I’ll take these right up.”

Lucia nodded and turned to go back along the road.  The sun was setting over the water, and below the bay beckoned invitingly.  She looked and decided to go home that way.

She took a path that led to the water’s edge.  It was steep, for that part of the coast rose high above the water.  She was tired when she reached the bottom and sat down to rest on the low stone wall.

The soft lapping of the water made her drowsy, and she slipped to the sand, leaned her head against the wall and closed her eyes.

There was not a sound but the soothing voice of nature, the ripple of the water, the sighing of the wind and the occasional cry of a sea bird.

All the sounds together seemed to rock Lucia in a sort of lullaby, and it was not many minutes before she was asleep.

When she awoke it was quite dark and she was conscious of a difference in the voice of the water.  A heavy regular splash, splash, grew nearer and nearer as she listened.  If she had been accustomed to living near the water she would have recognized it as the rhythmic stroke of oars, but she did not, and it was not until a shape loomed up in the dusk a little farther down the beach that she realized it was a boat.

She got up and walked towards it.  If it was a fisherman’s boat she wanted to see it, even if it meant being late to supper.

But it was not a fisherman’s boat, it was a light, high-sided row boat and the man in it stood up and pushed forward on his stout oars.

He made a landing on the sand before Lucia reached him, and he jumped out hurriedly.

Whatever his business was it occupied all his thoughts, for he did not look to right or left but ran straight to the wall.  Another figure came out of the shadows to meet him.  They spoke in whispers, but Lucia was near enough to hear what they said.

She listened out of curiosity for it struck her as being rather strange that a man dressed in beautiful dark clothes, with a hat such as she had seen the men in Rome wear, should be out on the beach whispering in the shadow of the wall to a boatman.

When she had listened she was even more surprised.

“It’s all right, I’ve fixed it, you can get aboard her at midnight.”  The boatman’s voice was husky and very mysterious.