[2] zwei | sense and sensibility

Before the fireplace lay a green rug, two chairs, and a table on which rested an old-world novel bound in crimson linen; this last was an orphan from the two massive bookshelves which dominated the western wall of the office. The open window admitted the shouts, gentled by distance, of the soldiers training in the courtyard below. A long yellow column of afternoon sunlight draped lazily upon the wooden floor and the rightmost third of Commander Erwin Smith's desk. Here there was the restful scent of paper, and a sense of order as steep and clear as if drawn from a deep well.

Erwin himself was seated at his desk, where he was drawing up a set of expense authorizations in his swift, neat handwriting. The sound of footsteps in the hall disturbed his focus not at all. The pace was intimately familiar, and he knew by speed and heaviness what to expect, and how soon to expect it. He finished the line just in time to look up, tip his pen into the inkwell, straighten his shoulders, and in all other ways convey to his visitor that his attention belonged completely to the matter at hand.

"Welcome back." It was not necessary to indicate the comfortable chair on the other side of his desk. "How did it go?"