Arch and Pitt and Turner ambled over to me and dropped at my feet all the letters they had plundered. “You might read ’em,” Arch said. “I won’t.” “Can’t,” said Pitt. “Won’t ’cause I can’t,” Arch admitted. “Take these with ’em,” Pitt said. He dropped a cloth satchel of mail they’d found when they first took the prisoners. “There’s not a thing of use in here, Black John says. Just home letters and relative talk.” This gift was an outlandish gesture for my comrades to make. “Why?” I asked. “Why give the letters to me?” “Oh,” Arch said, and stammered around on his feet a bit. “Oh, we just figured you might find a thing or two of use in them. That’s all. That’s what we figured.” “I don’t know what it would be,” I said. “Aw, hell!” Pitt snapped. “Read ’em or burn ’em, Dutchy! Whatever you want to do, you do it!” Turner sat beside me then, and Arch and Pitt walked away. They seemed to think I had not been gracious.
