On a swinging couch in front of their house, Benharash and Elise sat whispering sweet nothings in the blackness of night. Their day had been spent with kisses, caresses, sweet thrusts and pledges. Now, tired and dreamy, this odd couple, the warlord and the pacifist victim who loved him, languidly sipped a final glass of wine before bed. The wine was sweet, heavy, and rich, and it warmed them. They talked and smiled, each drugged by the other’s scent and radiance. Their voices trembled as again they reminded each other of all that was precious between them.
The night was clear and the air was crisp. Lovelorn crickets sang and lonely dogs barked in the distance. The ocean’s salty freshness filed the air. Suddenly, Puglese’s voice broke the serenity.
Benharash rolled his head toward Elise. Softly he hissed, “I don’t want company. I told the guards to stop even him.”
Elise said blithely, “Social avoidance: classical depression.”
“Bullshit.”
“He’s our friend; we can see him for a moment. He never comes at night: Maybe it’s important.”
“He’s never important.”
“He is to me,” she said.
“And me?”
She slapped his arm hard. Benharash sighed. When the sun went down, he dimmed the lights and could bear no company other than Elise. After the grandeur of conquest, leisure had enervated his heart and soul. During the day, he spent time with his troops. He relished the camaraderie. The loose banter with his men diverted him, but any conversation of substance dried his mouth and turned his stomach. After all, these days he had nothing to talk about. Normally Puglese’s company caused him no pain, with his books, his ideas, and his subtle deference to the general. But at night, even the absurd little mapmaker saddened the ennui-imprisoned general. So Benharash swilled his wine and prepared himself for an unwanted encounter.
Elise yelled to the guards that her friend could enter. Puglese approached the house, waving his hat. Benharash’s small smile caused him tremendous effort, and as Puglese approached, he saw as much. His own mind was troubled with the news of Kout’s death, and he knew his master must be apprised of the event. The cartographer held up his trembling hand and said haltingly, “I hate to bother you at night, I know how you relish you time alone, but this news you need. You won’t like it!”
“Nonsense,” said Elise warmheartedly. “Make yourself comfortable.”
Puglese looked at her with pained eyes. He knew she was always glad to see him. But he now waved her off, as if to say: No time for comfort! What he did say was, “Kout 's been killed!”
Elise cried out and brought her hand to her stomach.
Benharash leapt to his feet. “How? When?”
Elsie put her hand on her lover’s arm, as though to restrain the explosion she feared. Then quickly she took his empty goblet and, although her knees were weak, she went to pour wine for the three of them. Oh God, she thought, make this not so!
Out of breath and covered in perspiration, Puglese stepped up onto the porch. He sat on a small, teetering chair. “The daughter’s one-armed bodyguard turned out to be an assassin. Somehow, he got Kout alone, cut his throat, and slipped away.”
Elise stood holding out a tray with three brimming goblets. She bit her lip, squinted, and asked, “He just killed him in cold blood?”
Puglese nodded. He tried to suppress the gleam in his eye that he knew appeared each time he looked into tender eyes of his boss’s mistress. He said, “Damn near severed the old man’s neck. You could see the neck bone through the throat wound.”
Elise’s face twisted. “That’s disgusting!”
“Wasn’t he guarded?” Benharash asked.
“I guess not.”
Standing large, arms akimbo, Benharash said darkly, “They hated him for betraying their accursed tunnels. More for the tunnels than for what he stole.” A short silence ensued. Then, with slow, hate-filled precision, Benharash said, “We can’t-- I can’t let their man come onto our turf, kill our asset, then skip away unscathed.”
Puglese narrowed his eyes and said cautiously, hopefully, “It’s not your war.”
“It’s my fault.”
“No!”
“No! Honey!”
“I was his patron in the camp, I should have considered Friscan revenge! I should have guarded him!”
He paced for a moment, looking out into the darkness and into his own black thoughts. Elise saw her lover’s face. The reflection of the porch lantern shone on the smooth, white skin of his scarred eye and cheek. He was pokerfaced, tight-jawed, staring straight ahead. When he blinked, the motion was slow, controlled. He had no expression, but Elise read his thoughts all the same.
She flashed a look at Puglese and saw that he, too, saw this angering news bypass Benharash’s judgment and, magnetlike, attach its ramifications to his desperate craving for action, his army, and to end the stalemate. She knew, too, that once back to duty, he would not stand on the hill with the vice mayor and Isoka, watching their men slaughter and be slaughtered. Her strong-hearted and violent lover would lead the death-inviting charge. She remembered nights during the campaign through the Central Valley: she had sewn up his knife-sliced skin, disinfected his laser wounds, and splint his broken bones. She had hoped such horrible nursing was over. Too, Elise feared that if Benharash were killed, she would be taken by one of the other officers--most likely the head of Benharash’s guards. She could not expect the tender treatment she had enjoyed in the general’s arms, should she be passed into the hands and bed of a different soldier.
Puglese also feared his treatment at the hands of the other officers, should his protector come to a sudden death. Many had observed his and Elise’s great influence over the absentee general, and they despised him for it. Also, his unwise tendency to tease Aslanian exacerbated the ill-will born of his sway over the highest-ranking military man in the Army of Los Angeles. Also, he had vested much in making Benharash a hero for the ages. Puglese wanted his subject to become the first man of Los Angeles. Besides his ambition to be the biographer of the great man, he wanted to shape policy, and Benharash’s mind was easy to influence. Only a living Benharash could reward his efforts.
Breathlessly, Elise whispered, “Abe?”
He held up his hand, keeping his grim face turned toward the star-filled night. Puglese stood and put his arm around Elise, and she welcomed his skinny warmth. They waited. Eventually their warlike patron turned to them and declared, “This warrants response! It warrants my action.”
“No!” said Puglese. “You’re thinking tactically when you need to think strategically. Remember? King of Peace, King of Los Angeles? We’ve talked forever about this and you agreed. Before we had the Aqueduct, the army was best used for gain. Now we want stability. If you jump in to avenge what you perceive to be a personal insult--”
“He was under my protection,” the general shouted with conviction. “My shield must not be cheapened!”
Elise’s gaze went inward, which always dismayed Benharash, for he saw her shyness as an infirmity. Looking at the ground she murmured, “You said we shouldn’t be in this, how can you expect Frisco not to fight back?”
“View this tragedy,” said Puglese, “as a symptom of the wrongness of the siege, not as a personal event. It was the vice mayor’s responsibility to protect the banker. He met this guy, the one-arm, and failed read his intent. Didn’t even frisk him. It’s his shame, not yours.”
Benharash wheeled round and said loudly, “It is LA’s shame, and I cannot abide that!”
“No,” Elise cried.
Puglese shouted, “It’s not the murder that perturbs the peace! The fault lies with the worthless leadership! Perhaps the army will recognize that and turn back to you.”
Benharash took the two steps to the wall of his conscripted home. A hand laser lay on an unpainted wooden shelf, an indication of readiness to act common to all householders in California. He touched the gun; he took it up and cradled it.
Elsie put her hands to her mouth.
Again, Benharash mumbled, “Los Angeles can’t ignore this.”
Elise felt her eyes begin to tear. “What about mission creep?” she pleaded in his own words. “What about the fool’s war?”
Benharash shook his head. “The Wentworths can’t just walk into our camp and . . . ” He could not find the words. He looked at Puglese, who assumed a mask of disappointment; fear filled the lackey’s lungs. Then the general looked at Elise, whose watering eyes held his gaze. Benharash smiled: They were so firm. More firm in their love of peace than most men in pursuit of war. He placed the gun back on the shelf and said softly, “I will abide.”