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His calm acceptance of his wife’s fault should have made it easier for me to speak Instead, it only seeht with hi, and told hi to Spink To tell it now hter’s deception, as indeed I had He listened in silence as I told the tale, passing lightly over Epiny’s efforts at being acharitably on how impressed Spink had been with her My uncle lifted his brow in surprise when I told him that Spink’s mother and elder brother would surely write to him any day now to ask per that he had not already received their letter

"Perhaps I did," he said when I paused "Perhaps it is in my wife’s secretary, with our correspondence Perhaps it is what triggered this whole incident Let me be blunt with you, Nevare My wife has lofty a the soldier son of a new noble and living hundreds of miles away from Old Thares and the court is not what she has in hter She takes Epiny into situations that I think ill advised, to try to advance her socially This seance nonsense, for instance…if only the girl were not so childish Other girls her age are already young women, formally presented to the court and already spoken for But Epiny…" He sighed and shook his head In the darkness, I caught his rueful sirl in all the iood tirow up Sorance is sweetest We shall see I have forbidden Daraleen fro Epiny into wo to waste" He cleared his throat "I thought that gested that Epiny be sent off for soe Epiny objected, with one of her harangues about being trained to be an ornalanced at me and his suessed that she was already i a poor officer’s quarters instead"

I walked on with hiue felt thick with ashes Epiny deceived her father, and by my silence I contributed to it Yet as I to say? That when she was alone with Spink andwo of a coquette? I kept uilt

"So I can see how your friend’s infatuation with her and his pro of his fa to Lady Burvelle She has not even had a time to display her precious treasure at court, and so to claim her and carry her off to a life on the wild frontier!" My uncle alretful that it had happened

I took a breath and plunged in "Spink is very taken with my cousin, Uncle That is true But he has not written to her The correspondence has been one-sided It is true that he asked his mother and brother to speak for him, but surely that is what any honorable man would do; first, to attean any courtship of the girl"

I thought I had carefully led hi the truth of it: that Epiny only pretended to be childish But he would not drink of that idea Instead, he said, "Well, at least irl has had her first childish infatuation Surely I can take that as a sign of her growing up And she chose a handsoht uniform with shiny buttons I suppose I should have expected it But I had no sisters, you know Your father and I and our two younger brothers were like a den of bear cubs growing up Mywomen and how they should be treated Epiny and Purissa are delightful but mysterious tothing to watch, but how, I ask you, can that consuent I suspect your own father takes a fir"

"He does, sir, in soent Once when Elisi asked hi her back blue hair ribbons froht her, not two, but twenty, in every shade of blue the millinery had offered hihters"

We had drawn near to my dormitory We halted on the walk The tips ofwith cold, but I sensed my uncle had not said all he wished to say

"Let e the subject, Nevare Your letters were very detailed, and I assure you that your keen observation of how cadets are treated here will benefit those who follow you But bring me up to date on yourself How have you fared over the last week?"