“I can’t afford a servant,” Starbuck said. “White or black.”

“I was rather hoping to make Joe Sparrow my servant,” Bird said wistfully, “though unless he blacks his face now, I can’t.”

“Why Sparrow?” Adam asked. “So you could whistle at each other?”

“Very amusing,” Bird was entirely unamused. “I promised Blanche I would keep him safe, that is why, but the Lord only knows how I’m supposed to do that.”

“Poor Runt,” Adam said. Joe Sparrow, a thin and scholarly sixteen-year-old, was universally known as Runt. He had won a scholarship to the University of Virginia where he was supposed to begin his studies in the fall, but he had broken his mother’s heart by joining the Legion. He had been one of the recruits shamed into volunteering by receiving a petticoat. His mother, Blanche, had pleaded with Washington Faulconer to excuse her boy, but Faulconer had been adamant that every young man had a duty to serve. Joe, like many of the men, was a three-month volunteer, and the Colonel had assured Blanche Sparrow that her son would have served his stint by the time his first semester began.

“The Colonel really should have excused him,” Bird said. “This war shouldn’t be fought by bookish boys, but by men like Truslow.”

“Because he’s expendable?” one of the sergeants asked.

“Because he understands violence,” Bird said, “which we all have to learn to understand if we are to be good soldiers.”

Priscilla peered at her stitches in the fading light. “I wonder what happened to Truslow’s daughter?”

“Did she ever talk with you, Starbuck?” Bird asked.

“With me?” Starbuck sounded surprised.

“It was just that she asked for you,” Bird explained. “On the night that she came here.”

“I thought you didn’t know her?” Adam said idly.

“I don’t. I met her at Truslow’s cabin, but not to notice.” Starbuck was glad that the dusk hid his blush. “No, she didn’t speak to me.”

“She asked for you and for Ridley, but of course neither of you was here.” Bird checked suddenly, as though aware that he had been indiscreet. “Not that it matters. Did you bring your flute, Sergeant Howes? I was thinking we might attempt the Mozart?”

Starbuck listened to the music, but he could find no joy in it. In these last weeks he felt he had come to an understanding of himself, or at least he had found an equilibrium as his moods had ceased to oscillate between black despair and dizzy hope. Instead he had taken pleasure in the long days of work and exercise, yet now the reminder of Sally Truslow had utterly destroyed his peace. And she had asked for him! And that revelation, so casually made, added new and bone-dry fuel to Starbuck’s dreams. She wanted his help, and he had not been here, so had she gone to Ridley? To that goddamned son of a supercilious bitch Ridley?