When Lee arrived, he stood by the dead cornfield, and looked into the pasture, where the workhorses were grazing. He was quickly surrounded by little girls, who ran in circles around him, their tufts of silk held high in the air as if they were kites about to catch the wind. They were playing “nomads,” a concept that had just been explained to them. If they had no home, they reasoned that someone had to be chasing them, and it was probably Corporal Duncan.

Here was a narrow stable, and next to it another pasture (both empty), and beyond it, his destination. It was a house of whitewashed plaster, cracked and patched, with burnt-looking areas of exposed brick.

Outside, there was a pigsty. A lanky woman was throwing the evening’s bucket of feed into a trough, which she managed without backsplash. She admired her animals’ hunger for a moment, and then looked up at Lee.

“Ah! Pardonnez-moi” she said, and, wiping her hands on her apron, disappeared into the house. Lee listened to the sounds of the pigs eating, and the children playing behind him, until the woman returned. She had applied rouge and makeup. She wore a navy wool jacket that was distressingly like his mother’s. “Hello, Corporal,” she said.

“Hello,” he said.

She smiled. “Do not worry for you. It is all—okay,” she said. Her call was as precise and rhythmic as a bugler’s: “Yvette! Marie! Michelle! Irina!” And then the girls appeared on the porch.

It wasn’t until all of them were awaiting him that Lee realized how difficult this would be. War made a woman three times as beautiful. The girls looked him in the eye, and then looked down. They were still young enough to be bashful.

“And who would you like to spend some time with?”

He felt ill. He had a old-style five-dollar bill folded lengthwise between his fingers. He felt as if he were asking to throw mud on someone. “Isn’t there another girl?”

The woman smiled—all inquiries were met with a smile—and said, as if it ended the conversation, “Natalie? Ah, a popular girl, but she pays the price for that, and so, yes, you understand. Who else?”

“Natalie,” he heard himself say.

“Look how pretty—Irina. Very pretty.”

“Yes, she is. I’m sorry. But… Natalie,” he said.

“Natalie est enceinte,” she explained, the smile wavering for the first time. “Trop enceinte,” she added.

“Je pense. No, I mean Je sais. C’est pourquoi je veux, I mean, je elle— Oh, damn.” He looked at the woman with agony in his eyes. He understood that he had once looked sweet to her.

He felt the money slowly tug out of his hand. The woman was regarding him as if she had just hired a criminal to do simple chores around the house. “La bouche, et c’est tout. Comprenez-vous? Oui?”