Four people are fleeing from the Czar’s secret police and one of them, Adamsky, is, for some reason, wandering around a camp by himself (Maybe because the others are sleeping?). He has lately had to forsake his livelihood (a tavern) and throw in his fortunes with Fanny, Zizev, and a drunken cantor. This intensifies his tendency towards introspection.
He stumbles across a pod of army officers and nondescript women gathered around a bonfire. They invite him to join them, and he accepts.
One of the women gets up and sits next to Adamsky. “You’re really old,” she giggles, but for some reason he is not offended. “You have wrinkles in the corners of your eyes.”
The Slaughterman’s Daughter, p. 332
Later, Adamsky will fall madly in love with this woman — in fact will crush “seven noses (leaving one man completely snoutless) and tear off twenty-one earlobes” simply to get back to her.
Stay tuned, dear blog readers. Stay tuned.