Little remained of the abbey but a single room.  Inside, an old man sat on a chair playing a squeeze box.  His audience was a baby in a wicker basket.

Smiling at us, he spoke a few words.  I knew just enough Italian to understand him.  

But not Sarge.  “What he say?”

 “Americans come.  Another miracle.”

Sarge spat tobacco into a corner.  “Another?  What’s the first?”

I asked, and the old man pointed.  “He calls the baby Miracola.”

After much faltering, I learned their story.  The Nazis and Fascists, knowing they’d lost the war, raced through northern Italy to Germany, leaving massive destruction in their wake.  The old man, all alone, sought shelter in the abbey.  Three days after the baby was left, the abbey was bombed and he lost his sight.

“He’s blind?” Sarge bellowed. ”How can he change her, feed her?”

“Like he said, she is his miracle.”