I tried to find the rhythm of my days again, but it was broken. The snow was too deep and the ground too frozen for me to dig graves, and there was very little else for me to do. I missed my schoolbooks. Writing in my journal almost made things worse. I had far too much time to think. Magic, my father’s opinion of me, Spink’s knowledge that I was in Gettys, Colonel Haren asking my opinion on the road dilemma: I had too much to ponder.

I tempted myself to go into town, thinking that any sort of company might be a welcome distraction, but I felt an almost irrational fear that I would encounter someone who knew me from my academy days. I isolated myself at the graveyard until a rider came out one day to fetch me. An old man had died. I hitched Clove to the wagon and went to town for the coffin and corpse. The old man had been an ex-soldier and a drunk who had died in debt to everyone who had tried to befriend him. The poor fellow had no mourners to follow me out to the grave site.

Once I had him loaded, I steeled my heart to my own callousness and completed my own necessary errands. I picked up hay and grain for Clove and some basic food supplies for myself. I forced myself to take my noon meal in the mess hall. Ebrooks was at table, shoveling his food into his mouth as if it were a competitive sport. From him I learned that Kesey was sick in bed with a toothache, but hadn’t the courage to have the molar pulled.

“That side of his face is swollen like a melon, and so tender he can’t eat a bite. Even drinking water hurts him. I told him, go have it pulled and be done with it. How could the pain be any worse? He still hopes it will go down by itself. But he almost counts himself lucky to have been sick in bed last night after what happened in the streets.”

“Why? What happened?”

He shook his head and then lowered his face to his plate to shovel in another large spoonful of beans. He spoke around them, muffled. “Ain’t sposed to talk about it. Gonna be hushed up and smoothed over, like they allus do.”

“What?”

He swallowed noisily and gulped coffee to be sure the food had gone down. He glanced around the mess and then leaned closer to me. “Murder last night. I heard something ’bout a whore, an officer, and some soldiers. What I heard was the officer fancied the bit and got mad when the soldiers had her first. He shot one of the boys. Something like that.”

“That’s ugly,” I said, leaning away from his breath.

“Life’s ugly,” he agreed, and went back to his food.

I turned my attention to my own plate, and a short time after that, Ebrooks pushed back from the table and left. My meal was four rashers of bacon and a steaming sea of brown beans with biscuits. I enjoyed it more than the food merited, until I noticed Sergeant Hoster at a nearby table with a couple of his cronies. His friends were grinning broadly as they watched me eat, but Hoster was regarding me with a stare of flat dislike. One of Hoster’s friends rolled his eyes and muttered something to Hoster. The other man snorted wildly into his cup of coffee, spattering liquid all over their table while the first one leaned back, choking with juvenile laughter. Hoster’s expression didn’t change. He rose slowly and approached my table. I kept my eyes on my plate, pretending I didn’t know he was coming. I refused to look up until he addressed me directly.

“You look tired, Burv. Keeping some late hours?”

I had to swallow before I could reply. “No, Sergeant.”

“You sure about that? You didn’t come to town last night for a bit of fun?”

“No, Sergeant. I stayed home last night.”

“Did you?” He didn’t wait for a response. “Must get lonely out there. A man lives alone all the time, he can get real hungry for the company of a woman. Isn’t that so?”

“I suppose.” I suspected he was setting me up for mockery. I was trying not to rise to the bait.

He leaned very close to me and spoke softly. “Did you hear the news, Burv? She didn’t die. In a few days, the doctors think she’ll feel well enough to talk. She’ll be able to describe who attacked her. And I’d say you’re a hard man to mistake.”

He was accusing me of being one of the rapists. Outrage vied with shock. I kept calm with difficulty. “I was at my cabin all last night, Sergeant. I’ve heard about the attack on the woman. It’s a terrible thing. But I had nothing to do with it.”

He straightened up. “Well. We’ll see, won’t we? Don’t think about running off. You wouldn’t get far.”

All around the mess hall, men had stopped eating to stare at us. They continued to stare even when Hoster sauntered away to rejoin his friends. I glanced around at the speculation on their faces and then back at my food.

All pleasure in my meal vanished. I kept my eyes on my plate as I finished eating, ignoring the sergeant and his friends even when they walked out right behind my seat. The company of others, I reflected hotly to myself, had done little to distract me from my own dark thoughts. I left the mess and walked out into what was left of the cold day,

I buried the old soldier as the last of the day’s light fled, and I’m afraid the only words I said over his body were a feeble prayer to the good god that I would not end up just like him. The day was unpleasantly cold, the kind of cold that cracks lips and numbs fingers even when a man is working hard. The hair inside my nose froze and prickled me, while the muffler over my mouth grew frosty from my breath. The soil that I threw down on the coffin was as much ice and snow as earth. I mounded it well over the grave and then trampled it down as tightly as I could. By the time I sought my fireside, afternoon was darkening into evening.

I divested myself of my chilled garments, built up my fire, and swung the pot on its hook over the awakening flames. This week’s stock was a good one, with barley and a meaty beef bone as the base for it. I had taught myself, via trial and error, to make hearth cakes using saleratus as leavening. They were not bread, but my recent efforts had been palatable. I stirred up some to go with my soup. Bending over my belly to crouch down by the hearth to watch them and then turn them was uncomfortable. Some days, I scarcely noticed the inconvenience and simply accepted my body. At times like tonight, I felt as if like I were bound up in someone else’s garments. I could recall so clearly how my body used to work. I felt I should still be able to crouch low and jump high, to chin myself or reach down and tie my shoe without holding my breath. But every time I forgot the flesh that enclosed me and attempted such a movement, I paid with a twinge or a cramp or failure.

When all my hearth cakes were browned, I stacked them on my plate and with a grunt heaved myself to my feet. I set them on my table and then ladled a generous helping of soup into my bowl. By virtue of great self-control, I still had one of Hitch’s apples left to accompany my meal. I sat down to my repast with anticipation. Food always worked. No matter how distressing the rest of my life might become, food and the sensations of eating it were always pleasant. Food had become my comforter and my companion. I refused to dwell on what Hoster had implied. As he had said, we would see. When the woman recovered enough to describe her attackers, my name would be cleared of the sergeant’s foul accusation. I was an innocent man with nothing to fear.

Just as I sat down, I heard a sound outside. I froze, listening. There were the small sounds of a man dismounting from a horse, and then the squeak-crush of boots on packed snow. I expected a knock at the door. Instead I heard a voice say firmly, “Nevare, let me in.”

I had an almost overwhelming urge to sit silently where I was. I didn’t answer. But after a moment I went to the door and lifted the latch. Spink stood on my doorstep. The cold had pinched his face white, save for his red nose and the tops of his cheeks. Steam came out of his muffled mouth as he asked, “Can I put my horse in with yours? It’s cold out here and getting colder.”