The General's Leman: A Love Story Read online

  The next letter, dated nine months later, contained more small news, family doings and the like. A gap of eighteen months separated the second and third letters, and René wondered why she’d waited so long to write him. The third letter sounded concerned. She had not heard from him, and although she assumed that no news was good news, she worried. Well, he thought, that was her job as his Contracta and a woman. She was supposed to worry, so he could focus on his work. The last letter dated to two weeks before the attack on Morada and described in detail the memorial services for his mother, and the stone and family tablet that Eleána had arranged for with his sister’s agreement. His sister hated making decisions and her husband couldn’t care one way or another, René knew, leaving Eleána to see to everything. The letter sounded both desperate and hesitant. She’d opened, “My dearest René, I do not know if you will see this, but I write anyway,” and closed with, “If you do read this, please know that I love you and honor our Contract, no matter what may come to pass.”

  As he reread the letters, René realized that there had to be more. He found nothing about his father’s passing, or his grandson’s birth, or other events he knew Eleána would have written about. And it sounded as if she’d not gotten any of his messages, even the most innocuous ones, or the two legal notices that he’d forwarded to her just before he’d gone into the field. Of course the army censors had looked over his notes to her, probably holding some for later delivery, but still, what had happened?

  He learned a little more the next day, when Capt. Mancuso presented him with a stack of mail. “I’m not sure what to do, sir,” Al began. “Some of these are yours, but several are from people who are deceased. Protocol says they should be sent to the next-of-kin.”

  “Then do … oh. Yes,” he saw the names and dates on two of the envelopes. “Set these aside for the chaplain to look at, please.” Those would require delicate handling. But the others … all eight of his letters to Eleána, two of them written before he’d gone “away,” now sat on his desk. “Ochoa again?”

  “Yes, sir. Apparently he and two mail clerks had quite a tidy business going. They blackmailed both troopers and families, demanding ‘fines’ be paid before releasing ‘illegal’ letters. And of course, if anyone had protested afterwards, well, they’d been bribing military officials, hadn’t they, and that’s a federal offense.” Mancuso looked as if he wanted to spit. “A rather sick pair of creatures, I must say, sir.” Mancuso shook his head.

  “Agreed.” René put his unsent letters aside.

  The next day he began trying to find Contracta Eleána. He got as far as discovering her temporary address, a small inn where she’d stayed following her release from the hospital in the wake of the attack on Morada. In a way the news made him feel better: he’d feared she’d been killed in the car bomb. Apparently she’d been injured, but not seriously, even though their apartment’s building had been condemned.

  One of René’s first discoveries once he returned to “the world” had been the loss of his apartment. He’d found his possessions, and most of hers, stored in boxes and waiting for him to decide what to do with them. She’d made an inventory of each box as well as a master list, and had given her address as the inn when she submitted the papers to the headquarters chaplains’ office to hold for him. But where had she gone after that? His sister and his children had no ideas, and further efforts turned up multiple dead ends. Meanwhile, René had found a house suitable for his rank and moved some of their things there, even having plans drawn up for a small suite decorated the way he recalled Eleána had dreamed about. He threw himself into his duties, but kept hoping.

  Early the next spring, just as he’d begun to think that she had been killed, dying in the bombing of the commemoration ceremony two months after the gas attack, one of those so horribly mangled that their bodies couldn’t be identified, a note came from his bank. He’d given Eleána a private account for her “fun” money, one that he never saw the statements for. “Dear General Atwiler,” the message read. “This is to inform you that Eleána Norhado, I.D. number,” and a long string of digits, “has removed the funds from account number,” and more digits, “and closed the account. The funds went to Banco de Isla de Avila in a cash transfer without receiving account. This closure does not affect your other accounts,” and so on. René stared at the name. Isla de Avila rang no bells, summoned no memories or recognition. But it meant that Eleána still lived!

  Unable to take leave to track her down, and with no other address to try, René wrote her a brief note, addressed to the post office at Isla de Avila, asking her to respond. All his personal stationary remained in storage, so he found some old, out-of-date office envelopes and used one. The administrators in the high command had been emphasizing recycling again, now that minor matters such as winning the war no longer interfered with administrivia.

  He wrote again the next night, a longer letter. A week later he dashed off two more. He’d sent a fifth message when the first missive returned, “delivery refused,” written on it in her handwriting. René stared, taken aback. By the end of the month, as the first fruit trees began to bloom, all five letters had been returned, each one neatly inscribed to “Colonel and Mrs. Atwiler. Delivery refused by recipient.” What in the names of the gods did she mean by “Colonel and Mrs?”

  Damn it, he wasn’t going to let go until he had an answer!

  After returning the fifth letter, Eleána had hidden her tears of anger until she got back to the garden. She’d fought hard to keep herself controlled, unwilling to lose face with the mail clerk and townspeople by weeping in public. How could he? Was he still demanding release from their Contract? He certainly didn’t need it. Eleána hobbled as far as the plain, sturdy bench by the cottage door and sagged down, her back to the sun-warmed wooden wall. Bees and other little pollinators danced and hummed through the garden, giving her eyes something to follow, distracting her and helping her to calm the raging storm.

  He’d written five times, each letter coming from his office. Oh, he’d blackened out the government bits in the return address, but she knew they were there. Five increasingly thick envelopes, stuffed with legal documents, no doubt. Probably asking for his accounts and his Contract back. She’d refused every letter, just as he’d refused her. She scolded herself a little as she watched the fat blue and yellow bees working in and out of the different flowers, all but pulling the bee-balsam out of the ground. A Contracta should not stoop to such pettiness as returning a slight for a slight, she heard her long-dead instructress warning her and the other girls. Well, Eleána sniffed, she hurt.

  The spasms and contortion had grown worse over the winter. Eleána assumed that the bitter cold had caused the pain. All the older people in the village had complained about their backs, knees, and other joints during winter, and she’d joined the chorus. She’d also made extra warming salve, quietly giving some away to those unable to pay even the pennies that she asked.

  Eleána watched the shadows lengthen and pushed herself off the bench. Moping would not produce supper, her growling stomach reminded her, and she smiled a little. The cottage smelled much better now, and she propped the door open to let the soft, warm evening breeze dance through for a few minutes. The window balked at opening and she resorted to prying it up with a piece of wood. The sash popped up and the wood slipped, knocking against the corner shelf.

  A picture appeared, floating above the shelf. René and his son stood side-by-side with Marcel’s birth parents, the men’s matching curly black hair and dark hazel eyes showing their connection. The next picture featured Consuela at her wedding, she and Alfons smiling with delight at having escaped a formal marriage. Eleána turned off the projector before the pictures of her and René could begin playing. They’d summon memories and feelings she couldn’t afford to indulge.

  Eleána chopped a white root and wondered how the children fared. Because of René’s specialty, in light of the risks of chemical and radiation exposure he’d opted not
to raise children after he joined the army. Instead he’d done like so many in the military and had stored his seed, permitting his family to have line children if they needed them. Two of the birth families had encouraged the children to contact him, and he’d agreed to the half-bond. Eleána had ended up taking care of birthdays and graduations at least two-thirds of the time. She rolled her eyes at the memory as she cooked. Bless him, but René could be so forgetful! Their permanent Contract prohibited offspring, so she’d assuaged what little bit of maternal instinct she possessed with René’s children. Or she had, until he’d married. She wondered if his wife even bothered, or if one of his secretaries now reminded him of the appropriate dates and kept a list of what he’d given the children.

  Well, that mattered not a bit to her. Getting supper mattered a great deal. She also needed to start politely reminding people to return the empty jars and boxes so she could clean and reuse them. The war might be over, but prices for some things remained high, especially out here at the end of the road in Isla de Avila.

  Still, she thought later that night, the end of the road had been good to her. They’d had rain enough the past two years to prosper, and for her plants to do well. She had a place to live, and while she had no friends, she had friendly acquaintances and customers. She now owned eight chickens and the egg money paid for her irrigation water and a few clothes. She’d not thrived, exactly, but she survived, on her own, without any support from René. Eleána had even managed to save a little cash, which she’d put away with the cemetery society.

  Three months later René, Major Al Mancuso, and a bare minimum of staff and security drove along the dusty, narrow road up onto the plateau of Avila. René glanced down at the report file once more, then closed the computer. “I want Ochoa’s head,” he informed his aid.

  Mancuso nodded. “I believe you are at the top of the list, sir, or close to it.” The more the Inspectorate had dug into now-Private Ochoa’s doings, the nastier their discoveries. He’d had the nerve to approach several soldiers’ families, including even Atwiler’s, and demand money, or told them that the soldier had died, or been badly injured, just to watch the victims’ reaction. “The psychiatric people should have caught him years ago,” Mancuso grumbled.

  “They would have, if one of the doctors had not been on the take,” René reminded him.

  Now René wondered if Ochoa had visited Eleána. If he had, it certainly could explain why she’d disappeared. He’d probably told her that René had died, and if she’d been in the hospital, or recovering from the attack on the apartment, she’d likely have believed him. René drummed his fingers on his leg as he watched the brushy, yellow-dirt landscape roll past. Although, it still did not explain why she’d returned his letters, or why she’d addressed them to Col. and Mrs. Atwiler.

  Perhaps she’d heard a rumor that he’d married, or had Ochoa added that lie to the others? He’d told her that he wouldn’t, so she should know better than to even think such a thing. René clenched his fist. There was a reason why he’d stipulated in their Contract that calling him a liar would terminate their agreement. He’d never forgiven his secondary school headmaster. “You did too well,” the old man had sneered. “I’m failing you for cheating and I do not care what you have tricked the teachers into believing.”

  René had never forgotten the slight, and he’d sworn that anyone who ever accused him of lying would feel his wrath, even his Contracta. René made himself calm down: Eleána would never do such a thing, at least not if she were in her right mind, which was why a medic rode in the following vehicle.

  “We’re nearing Isla de Avila, sir,” his driver reported, interrupting René’s thoughts.

  “Good. We will visit the prefect first and get some information, then proceed from there.” She might not be in the town, but staying close by instead, and the prefect would know. René wondered what sort of staff she’d found out here in the back-side of nowhere. He’d prided himself on her never having to do her own housework or other chores unless she truly wanted to. As he recalled, she usually didn’t.

  Not long after noon, two military vehicles trundled past the garden and Eleána stared at them, then fanned away the dust of their passing and returned to work. Probably going to one of the exercises on the training grounds on the other side of the plateau and misread their map files, she thought. A few such lost strays had wandered through Isla de Avila over the last two years. She shrugged. She had much more important things to worry about. The last seizures had left her unable to stand completely straight, slowing her just as she needed to work the hardest. Well, she sighed, her mouth twisting for an instant, that was how her life seemed to go: good luck balanced by bad. She pulled the twine from her pocket and set about trying to coerce the Schneeweiss roses into a semblance of proper decorum before they shaded the candy-flowers to death. The spring rain and summer heat promised a bounty of rose hips this year, and she hated to cut any of the canes back now if she could avoid it. Once she finished wrangling the rose, she promised herself, then she’d take a little rest.

  General Atwiler stepped out of the command car and shook his head. Of all the places to find Eleána Norhado, this tiny village of Isla de Avila would have been at the bottom of any list he could have devised, based on what he could see of the hamlet. He waved for his guards to hang back and he walked down the hill in the hot afternoon sun, to where Eleána was purported to live. A waist-high fence barely managed to contain the riot of herbs and flowers surrounding what he took to be large gardening shed. An age-bent old woman in a faded blue dress and sun cap worked near the gate, fighting something thorny. René wondered if she was Eleána’s gardener or maid or some other assistant. “Your pardon, gentle lady,” he called, not wanting to scare her. “I am looking for Contracta Eleána Norhado.”

  The woman froze, almost dropping her tools. With great care she backed away from the bush and turned to face him. He repeated, “I do not wish to interrupt, gentle lady, but do you know Contracta Eleána?”

  The hunched woman turned her head up and removed the sun cap, revealing the face he’d longed to see, golden brown hair pulled back in a widow’s braid. “I was once Contracta Eleána.”

  He gasped, horrified at what she’d become. Or so Eleána assumed. René, still trim and neat in his dark blue uniform, stood gape-mouthed, staring at her. A younger man came up behind him and gawped as well. What did you expect, she snarled inside her mind. And why bother coming here just to stare? René closed his mouth and swallowed, his tan face turning pale, as if he were ill.

  It served him right, she thought, peering up at him as best she could, the muscle spasms twisting her neck until her ear almost touched her shoulder. “Go back to your wife, Colonel. As you see, I am no longer a suitable companion for a gentle sir such as yourself.” Only the memory of what they’d once shared kept her from spitting the words, or spitting after she finished her words. She turned, resting one cramping and clawed hand on the fence to help keep her balance as she began shuffling back to the cottage and the pot of herbs steeping on the little stove. She always had an attack after working this hard, and she’d planned accordingly. She heard the gate open and the sound of steps on dirt.

  “What wife, Contracta Eleána?” She ignored the question, concentrating on trying to walk as far as the bench before the next wave of spasms immobilized her. “I ask again, what wife?” His voice seemed to come from beside her. Again she ignored it, all attention on the bench by the door.

  Her guts and leg muscles twisted when only three steps from safety. Eleána bit her lip against the pain. She’d be damned if she’d show him anything more. Her legs gave way and she began to collapse, trying to reach out to at least control her fall. Instead a hand caught her under the arm and another under her elbow, steadying her, taking some weight. “No,” she hissed. “I can make it.” She tried to shake off his grip.

  Instead he half-carried her to the bench and left her there, but only for a moment. He spoke to the man with him, a
nd the aid nodded and hurried off, back up the hill to the colonel’s vehicle, she assumed. Atwiler returned, careful to stay out of her sun. If he gave her time perhaps she could soak up the heat enough to regain some motion. She heard him take a deep breath. “You say I should go back to my wife, Contracta. Of what wife do you speak?” His formality hid his anger, and she glanced up, seeing how his fists shook at his sides. Why should he be angry? Unless her refusal to end their Contract had caused him problems with the army. The thought pleased her.

  “I speak of the wife you married three years ago, as I recovered from the gas attack, gentle sir. The one Captain Ochoa informed me of when he came with your message demanding the return of my Contract. No,” she corrected through gritted teeth. “Your pardon, not demanding, ‘strongly requesting’ the return of your liberty.”

  He clenched his fists even tighter. “I never sent Captain Ochoa to you.”

  “You,” and she stopped herself just before finishing the fatal accusation. Breaking the Contract that way would permit him to reclaim everything he’d ever given her or paid for. “I shall rephrase. I was informed by Captain Ochoa, while I was at the field hospital, that you requested the return of your liberty on the grounds of my incapacitation and of your recent marriage.”

  “And for that you refuse my letters.”

  The spasm eased a little, enough that she could look up at his face. She read anger and pride and felt her own spine stiffening in response. “Because you had already refused mine. Four returned unopened and the last came with a warning from your aid, Ochoa, ordering me to stop all attempts at communication or be charged with harassment, Contract or no, one week before the gas attack.”

  His anger faded and he unclenched his fists. “How many letters did you write? Just the eight? I ask because when we prepared for Ochoa’s court martial, Captain Renesslar of the Inspectorate found at least two-dozen letters in with Ochoa’s personal possessions. All unread, and addressed to me and to several others.” He hesitated before adding, “There is now a treatment for the effects of warp gas.”