Bottle nudged Toles, the soldier on his right. 'What are they fighting over?'
Toles looked down on Bottle, his thin, pallid face twitching. 'It's very simple. Two squads, marching in step, one behind the other, then the other in front of the one that had been in front beforehand, proving the mythical camaraderie to be no more than some epic instigator of bad poetry and bawdy songs designed to appease lowbrows, in short, a lie. Culminating at the last in this disreputable display of animal instincts-'
'Saltlick bit Shortnose's ear off,' cut in Corporal Reem, standing on Bottle's left.
'Oh. Is that what he's chewing?'
'Yeah. Taking his time with it, too.'
'Do Tugg and Sobelone know about the captain's meeting?'
'Yeah.'
'So, Shortnose who got his nose tip cut off now has only one ear, too.'
'Yeah. He'll do anything to spite his face.'
'Is he the one who got married last week?'
'Yeah, to Hanno there. She's the one betting against him. Anyway, from what I hear, it ain't his face that she adores, if you know what I mean.'
Bottle caught sight of a low hill on the north side of the road on which stood a score of twisted, hunched guldindha trees. 'Is that the old cemetery?'
'Looks like it, why?'
Without answering, Bottle pushed his way back through the crowd and set off for the burial ground. He found Sergeant Balm in a looter's pit, face streaked with ash, making a strange monotonous nasal groaning sound as he danced in tight circles.
'Sergeant, captain wants a meeting-'
'Shut up, I'm busy.'
'Dusk, in the sheep pen-'
'Interrupt a Dal Honese death dirge and you'll know a thousand thousand lifetimes of curses, your bloodlines for ever. Hairy old women will steal your children and your children's children and chop them up and cook them with vegetables and tubers and a few precious threads of saffron-'
'I'm done, Sergeant. Orders delivered. Goodbye.'
'-and Dal Honese warlocks wearing snake girdles will lie with your woman and she'll birth venomous worms all covered in curly black hair-'
'Keep it up, Sergeant, and I'll make a doll of you-'