Before they reached the door Pica met them, breathing hard and muttering Sicilian imprecations on the man who had wounded his master and got away; but while the Captain was being taken upstairs the orderly lit a candle and went to the telephone in the hall.

He glanced at the address-book and then without hesitation he asked the central office to give him Princess Chiaromonte's number.

His reason for doing so was simple: she was the only person in Rome who had ever appeared in the light of a friend of the Captain's family; she would do the right thing at once, Pica thought, and would send the best surgeon in Rome out to Monteverde in a motor in the shortest possible time.

She was at home that evening, as it turned out, and at Pica's request she came to the telephone herself and heard his story.
She answered that she would try and get Doctor Pieri to go at once in her own motor, as he had the reputation of being the best surgeon in the city, but that if he could not be found she would send another doctor without delay.

Pica went upstairs and found the Captain stretched on his bed in his wet clothes, while the three soldiers who had carried him up were trying to pull his boot off instead of cutting it.