“Corporal X sank into despondency. The future he had imagined for himself seemed to die with that glimpse of his reflection. He had internalized his society’s sense of repulsion at the sight of a disfigured face and had turned it on himself. He no longer felt worthy of love due to his altered appearance. Indeed, the ban on mirrors likely reinforced in him a feeling that his was a face not worth gazing upon. Black reckoned “he must have fought out his battle in the night.” The next morning, he asked her to post a letter addressed to Molly. After she had done so, Black returned to the ward and said to the young man, “You're well enough to see her any time now. Why not let her come down?” With sorrow in his voice, Corporal X answered quietly, “She will never come now.” He then told Black that he had lied to Molly in his letter, informing her that lie had met a woman in Paris and had realized that their engagement was a mistake. “It wouldn’t be fair to let a girl like Molly be tied to a miserable wreck like me,” he said to Black. “I’m not going to let her sacrifice herself out of pity. This way she will never know.””

—Lindsey Fitzharris