Larrabee rode across to the porch, walking the horse, and stopped below the rail and touched his hat to Sallie Gaskell.
"Mrs. Gaskell."
"Mr. Larrabee." She had a low, tired voice, a Kentucky voice with the edges worn off it by twenty years of army posts. "You'll be cold tonight."
"Colder than you, ma'am, I hope. How is Effie?"
"About the same," Sallie Gaskell said. "Thank you for asking. She ate a little supper." She looked at her husband. Gaskell did not look at her.
"You're off, then," Gaskell said.
"We're off." Larrabee looked up at him. In the dusk the older man's face was hard to read, a long pale shape above the cape with the mustache dark across it. "Philo, the line's down to Keogh. Kessel says it went just after the order came through."
"I know it."
"I'd like the repeat sent after me. When it comes up."