Just an instant Bianca appeared troubled and then her expression cleared.
"Perhaps I should not have spoken of the Countess Charlotta, not even to you, Carlo, only of course I know I can trust you. She was a young girl who was ill in our temporary hospital in Luxemburg. I thought of course she would write me, as she promised to write when we said goodby. But I have never had a line from her and neither has Sonya although Sonya and I have both written her since our arrival in Coblenz. I am afraid something must have occurred to prevent her writing and so I have been uneasy."
Bianca's speech was not especially clear, nevertheless Carlo listened sympathetically and asked no embarrassing questions.
A little time after they entered the famous Coblenzhof where Bianca had been invited to have tea.
It was crowded with people and looked like Sherry's on a Saturday afternoon.
Both Carlo and Bianca gazed around them in amazement.
The people were all comfortably, some of them almost handsomely dressed, even if with little taste, but this was usual in Germany. They were drinking coffee and eating little oatmeal cakes and appeared contented and serene, even without their famous "Deutsche kuchen."
"I sometimes wonder, Carlo," Bianca whispered, when they were seated at a small table in a corner, "if some of these people are not glad after all that the Kaiser has been defeated and that they are to have a new form of government and more personal freedom? They certainly seem to be glad the fighting is over. I suppose they had grown deadly tired of it and of being deceived by their leaders."
Carlo shook his head warningly.
"Be careful, Bianca. In spite of what you think there are still thousands of people in Coblenz faithful both to the Kaiser and his principles. Some of them may seem friendly to us, but the greater number are sullen and suspicious, regardless of the order that they are to appear as friendly as possible to our American troops. Yet somehow one can't help feeling as if there were plots against us of which we know nothing, just as there was in every allied country before the beginning of the war."