“By then her maid returned with her water. Carsina sent her immediately for paper and pen, and this was in my hands before I left the room. I suggested to her in the maid’s hearing that it was all a mistake, that I had talked with you and you had said that you had only asked her name, for she resembled someone you had once known. She very faintly agreed with me. I am sure I left her with a dilemma, for she had been denouncing you so rabidly that it will be difficult for her to retract what she has said. But her fear of her own letters may keep her from taking her wicked lie any further than it has gone. I can’t tell you that your good name has been restored, but I don’t think Carsina will dare to blacken it further.”

I looked up from the letter in my hands. While he had been speaking, I’d read it through again. I was sure that her references to her future husband were put in to needle me. I was surprised by how little it bothered me. “Truth to tell, I do have her old letters. They’re shut in my soldier son journal, with all the rest of my papers.” I heaved a huge sigh of relief. “Spink, I don’t know how to thank you. You’ve boxed her in quite neatly. If I presented those letters, I’m sure it would be the end of her engagement to Captain Thayer. I doubt that she’ll do or say anything that would damage her own reputation in such a way.”

He glanced away. “I felt rather a bully at first, to tell you the truth. But once I had threatened her with exposure, I could not believe how her sweet little mouth stopped trembling; I swear she longed to spit at me. I know you once loved the girl, Nevare, but I think she did you a favor when she ended your engagement. I cannot imagine you harnessed to such a woman for the rest of your life.”

“Nor I,” I muttered. The last remnants of my old fondness for Carsina were long gone. I wondered if she had ever been the sweet and simple girl I had imagined her to be. Was it possible that both Yaril and I had been so mistaken about someone? Or had the harshness of fate changed all of us?

“Well, we have what we needed. You must write to Yaril at once, and I’ll put it in the military post for you. Tell her that she is more than welcome to come and stay with Epiny and me; Epiny would be delighted.”

Nothing would do for Spink but that I undertook that task immediately. He stood over me as I took my pen and ink from my soldier son journal. “You’ve filled pages and pages of that!” he exclaimed when he saw it. “I’ve scarcely touched mine. I’ve been waiting for something significant to occur in my career.”

“My father taught me that I should write at least a few lines every night, for insight comes from detail, and often a man can look back and see that a problem or a solution had its roots in earlier actions.” I glanced at the dwindling supply of blank paper. “I suppose that soon I shall have to stop keeping it. It wasn’t really intended for an ordinary soldier anyway, and if my father ever read all that I’ve put into it, I think he would be horrified. But I suppose I shall keep it until I run out of paper.”

“You won’t send it home to him when it’s finished, so he can replace it with a fresh one?”

I looked at Spink to see if he was making a bad joke. He was sincere.

“No, Spink,” I said quietly. “I am dead to that man. He disowned me. He wouldn’t want to see it.”

“Then entrust it to me, when you are finished, for I am sure you have written many valuable pages. I’ll take care of it. Or give it to Yaril, to pass on to her own soldier son.”

“Perhaps. If she has one. Now I need to think before I write.”

Silence reigned for a time. I’d dipped my pen, but that ink had dried before I thought of what to say and how to phrase it. I did not write a long letter; too fat an envelope might invite my father’s scrutiny. I told Yaril only the bare facts, that I was alive and at Gettys, enlisted as a common trooper, but that Spink and Epiny were living in a situation better befitting Yaril’s station and had offered to make her welcome. With every word I penned, I was painfully aware that my father might read my words and judge me on them. I hesitated long over mentioning Spink’s invitation, for fear it would prompt my father to some radical maneuver to keep Yaril at home. At last I decided that I’d have to chance it. The sooner that Yaril knew she had a bolt-hole, the more opportunities she could find to use it.

“How can she reply to this? She may need money to make the journey, or she may need to let us know when she might arrive.”

Spink grinned. “I’ve already arranged it. Tell her to write back to Carsina, but to enclose a second, sealed envelope addressed to me. That should work. Be sure to let her know that Epiny is most eager for her to join us.”

I added the requested instructions. As I sanded and then sealed the letter, I asked him, “Just how large a household are you planning to support on a junior lieutenant’s pay?”

His smile faded slightly as he took the envelope from my hand. “Well, I’m sure it will all work out some way,” he replied. And then, more sternly he added, “And I don’t expect to shoulder it alone, Nevare. You realize that once Yaril writes back to us, you will have to talk with Epiny. This deception you practice will end. You will have to step up to your responsibilities. Yaril will be coming here. You know that. Her only other recourse would be to stay under your father’s roof and marry Caulder Stiet, and I can’t imagine a woman of even rudimentary intelligence taking that path. Your sister will be here. Both she and Epiny will expect to see you living and working as a proper soldier son, even if you are not an officer. So I suggest you begin now.

“You need a proper uniform, and you need to maintain yourself as befits a soldier. That means shaving and keeping your hair cut and asking the colonel to position you in the regiment in the regular chain of command instead of reporting directly to him. Devote yourself to your duties, and you can earn some rank. The dice rolled against you and you aren’t starting your career as a lieutenant, but that doesn’t mean you have to surrender your ambitions. Many a man with less intelligence and fewer connections, I might add, has managed to work his way up through the ranks. For everyone’s sake, you had best start conducting yourself as a soldier son. You’re a part of this regiment, and it can only be as good as the worst soldier in it.”

His voice had grown sterner and more officious as he spoke. I raised an eyebrow, and he flicked a sideways glance toward the window. I instantly divined that either Ebrooks or Kesey was within listening distance. I came to my feet as quietly as I could and quietly acceded, “Yes, sir. I’ll do better, sir.”

“Yes. You will. Because this is the last warning you’ll be receiving from anyone. Whenever I choose to drop by here, I expect to find you at your duties, soldier, and looking like a proper trooper. Good day.”

“Yes, sir.”

Spink left immediately afterward. Outside, a light summer rain had begun to fall. I knew that Spink had admonished me for show, but as he rode off, I took his words to heart. I’d been teetering on the brink, but now I’d stepped back to safety in my life as a soldier son. I would do more than simply drudge along. I thought of Gord and how natty he had kept his academy uniform despite his girth. I could do that. It would take effort, but a soldier’s lot was effort. And there was no real reason that I could not set my sights on making rank. I’d begun well with my cemetery duties. Colonel Haren had said so. I could earn my stripes and perhaps more.

I spotted Ebrooks slinking away behind Clove’s stall. I hailed him as Spink rode off into the sprinkling rain. “Well, that wasn’t quite as bad as I thought it would be,” I told him, trying to sound like a man who had just been soundly rebuked by his superior. “In fact, he said pretty much the same things that Kesey did. Shape up for the good of the regiment and all that.”