They moved a few steps away, the captain steadying her against the shuddering heave of the sea. “That was his name now, Piansky, though why he should have been called Rusty I never could see. They were married, as I said, after one of those lightning courtships we sailors have to make because we have no time for any others, and they went to live in a big house in Candovaria Square, which the old man had built, and some said it was a cruel waste of money for just the two of them. But I could never follow that, since she was the only daughter, so she would have come into the whole inheritance in time, and she was only getting what would be hers. “One voyage Rusty missed while they were building their nest, but after that he came back to us, happy as a rabbit, and well he might be with a fine wife, a good home and his fortune made. It was about that time my own wife died; Rusty took me home to be with him while the ship lay over for a new cargo. Dame Belella always had a great deal of wine and a house full of people, different ones always, to whom Rusty must forever be telling some tale of his adventures. She would laugh at the ridiculous parts and look proud over him. They were very gay; at least up to the time of the Tritulaccan war, which I was speaking of. “I remember going to Rusty’s house after the second or third voyage in that war, and a dangerous running passage it was, too, out with wool to the south and back with goods for the army, but our captain had judged where the Tritulaccans would be, and we never saw a sail of them. That was the passage where we slipped through the Green Islands, as I have said. We reached Rusty’s house late in the evening; the parlor was already full with people sitting drinking round the fire, and Dame Belella stumbled as she got up to embrace him, which shows how much cargo she had taken aboard already, ha, ha. She let him take her place while she sat down on his lap, saying we must be quiet because here was Ensign Glaverth of the Red Shar, who had been on a raid right through the Ragged Mountains, and was just telling about it. I did not think a thing at the time, since this Glaverth was sitting on the floor with his back to a red leather hassock, and besides he was one of those Glaverths from Ainsedel, the family they call the mountain Glaverths, to distinguish them from the ducal branch. “He was telling how he had requisitioned a bed in a Tritulaccan farmhouse where there was a daughter, and made love to her, so that she told him of an ambush that had been set for the Shar. As I said, I had no hint that Rusty would take it ill till he suddenly interrupted the tale by throwing his cup into the fire and crying that he would have no more of this southern red, which he called hog’s water and traitors’ wine, but wanted the honest fiery beverage of the north.