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Show 41 into his mind Kimiko's dark eyes and gentle face, he felt he was contributing to the army's hypocrisy. But he was a sergeant; he couldn't let the side down. He had been startled how strongly love had come to him, and how quickly. He was in his early thirties, and had gone out since his teens -- had even been engaged once, to a girl from Pine Bluff whose sweetness it took some while to perceive as veneer for an Andean ego. Lora's self was large and obtrusive, like a tousled rugj he never got around without tripping. He was, of course, too honorable to break off, and would have continued trying to avoid Ego; but after a year of social awkwardness and conversational stumbling she grew irritable, told him he was a hick, and left for Hot Springs. Thereafter his passions had not so much subsided as hibernated. He went out from time to time, partly driven by his own yearnings and partly by girls who, more aware of his looks than he, managed to lie in his path rather like Lora's rug. A couple |