Do you remember that dinner? The smell of dust and stale cigarette smoke clinging to the curtain in the room at the "Zur Goldenen Krone"—a pitiful inn in that Godforsaken town where even the floorboards groaned like a death rattle. The dim lamplight, a sickly yellow halo above our table, illuminated only tiny stains on the tablecloth – white as bones, ghostly... Outside, in the ringing silence of a dying evening, only the occasional, distant planes scrawled across the sky, their rumbling sighs a distant echo of a war that, in that moment, felt unreal, remote. On the table: a bottle of sour wine, a chunk of bread, some dried sausage, and a plate of tough, overcooked beef – a stark, unappetizing centerpiece to our meal. The meat, dark and gristly, seemed to reflect the grim realities of our surroundings. The meagerness of the meal was palpable; a testament to the scarcity and deprivation that permeated the town, a town clinging to life in the shadow of war. Even the wine, thin and tart, mirrored the hollowness in his eyes.

And him, von Steinfield, his posture rigid, as if carved from stone, his gaze both haunted and desolate. His fingers, nervously tapping the rim of his glass, barely touching it, yet seemingly pushing away something invisible, elusive... The flickering lamplight danced across his face, highlighting the sharp angles of his cheekbones and the deep lines etched around his eyes, lines that spoke of sleepless nights and burdens too heavy to bear. His uniform, though impeccably tailored, bore the subtle signs of wear – a faint tear near the cuff, a smudge of something dark near the collar, a hint of dust clinging to the brass buttons. These were not signs of negligence, but rather the silent testament to a life lived on the edge, a life consumed by war and loss.

"You remind me of her," he murmured then, his voice a low baritone that cracked at high notes, like a needle skipping across a scratched record. He spoke of Lucile, his Lucile, of how they met in Berlin before the war. The words flowed slowly, like drops of poison from a cracked vial. His memory painted a portrait of a delicate girl, bathed in light, the embodiment of what he'd lost. He described this light as if trying to capture its fragments in the gloom of our dinner. He pushed the tough beef around on his plate with his fork, seemingly oblivious to its presence, his gaze fixed on some distant point beyond the room.

He talked of his yearning to marry her, of his plans. And then, quite calmly, in measured tones, he said: "I want to marry you." His hand, holding the wineglass, trembled slightly. His gaze, though striving for assurance, was full of anxiety. There was no betraying tenderness, no intoxicating passion, only the cold intention to fill a void. His words sounded like a sentence, calm, measured, like a quiet gunshot in a silent room. The distant drone of the planes seemed to fade, to be swallowed by the powerful hum of his inner destruction. At that moment you didn't yet know that this quiet voice was the harbinger of a storm, something far more terrifying than any war. The toughness of the beef, the sourness of the wine, the grimness of the room – all seemed to foreshadow the harsh reality of the choice that lay before you.