Page:De Amicis - Heart, translation Hapgood, 1922.djvu/67

 “Mine?” replied the boy. “I can spy a sparrow a mile away.”

“Are you good for a climb to the top of this tree?”

“To the top of this tree? I'll be up there in half a minute.”

“And will you be able to tell me what you see up there—if there are Austrian soldiers in that direction, clouds of dust, gleaming guns, horses?”

“Certainly I shall.”

“What do you ask for this service?”

“What do I ask?” said the lad, smiling. “Nothing. A fine thing, indeed! Now—if it were for the Germans,—I wouldn't do it on any terms; but for our men! I am a Lombard!”

“Good! Then up with you.”

“Wait a moment, until I take off my shoes.”

He pulled off his shoes, tightened the girth of his trousers, flung his cap on the grass, and clasped the trunk of the ash.

“Take care, now!” exclaimed the officer, making a movement to hold him back, as though seized with a sudden terror.

The boy turned to look at him, with his handsome blue eyes, as though to question him.

“No matter,” said the officer; “up with you!”

Up went the lad like a cat.

“Keep watch ahead!” shouted the officer to the soldiers.

In a few moments the boy was at the top of the tree, twined around the trunk, with his legs among the leaves, but his body displayed to view, and the sun