"Smells are surer than sounds or sights to make your heartstrings crack.
they start those awful voices o' nights that whisper, Old man, come back." -- Kipling, Lichtenberg
.
.
Already the delicate spices drift up to our rooms from the warmth of the kitchen below, and I wonder which it shall be tonight, the soldier or the invalid, who partakes of supper with me. He has been only somewhat tired of late, which makes the odds uncertain. On better days his back straightens, his eyes brighten, and I am regaled with anecdotes of the other side of the world; on worse I find myself filling the air with trivialities, discoursing on details of medieval manuscripts or fishmongers' trousers -- anything to keep the dull sheen of remembered pain at bay.