Child, Lee – The Enemy

mile later. We merged with the east-west highway spur and

came off at the cloverleaf next to Kramer’s motel. We left it

behind us and drove the thirty miles down to Fort Bird’s gate.

The guard shack MPs signed us in at 1930 hours exactly. I told

them to copy their logs starting at 0600 hours January 1st and

ending at 2000 hours January 4th. I told them to have a Xerox

record of that eighty-six-hour slice of life delivered to my office

immediately.

My office was very quiet. The morning mayhem was long gone.

The sergeant with the baby son was back on duty. She looked

tired. I realized she didn’t sleep much. She worked all night and

probably played with her kid all day. Tough life. She had coffee

going. I figured she was just as interested in it as I was. Maybe

more.

‘Delta guys are restless,’ she said. ‘They know you arrested

the Bulgarian guy.’

‘I didn’t arrest him. I just asked him some questions.’

‘That’s a distinction they don’t seem willing to make. People

have been in and out of here looking for you.’

vVere they armed?’

‘They don’t need to be armed. Not those guys. You should

256

have them confined to quarters. You could do that. You’re

acting MP CO here.’

I shook my head. ‘Anything else?’

‘You need to call Colonel Willard before midnight, or he’s

going to write you up as AWOL. He said that’s a promise.’

I nodded. It was Willard’s obvious next move. An AWOL

charge wouldn’t reflect badly on a CO. Wouldn’t make him look

like he had lost his grip. An AWOL charge was always on the

man who ran, fair and square.

‘Anything else?’ I said again.

‘Sanchez wants a ten-sixteen,’ she said. ‘Down at Fort

Jackson. And your brother called again.’

‘Any message?’ I said.

‘No message.’

‘OK,’ I said.

I went inside to my desk. Picked up my phone. Summer

stepped over to the map. Traced her fingers across the pins,

D.C. to Sperryville, Sperryville to Green Valley, Green Valley to

Fort Bird. I dialled Joe’s number. He answered, second ring.

‘I called Morn,’ he said. ‘She’s still hanging in there.’

‘She said soon, Joe. Doesn’t mean we have to mount a daily

vigil.’

‘Bound to be sooner than we think. And than we want.’

‘How was she?’

‘She sounded shaky.’

‘You OK?’

‘Not bad,’ he said. ‘You?’

‘Not a great year so far.’

‘You should call her next,’ he said.

‘I will,’ I said. ‘In a few days.’

‘Do it tomorrow,’ he said.

He hung up and I sat for a minute. Then I dabbed the cradle

to clear the line and asked my sergeant to get Sanchez for me.

Down at Jackson. I held the phone by my ear and waited.

Summer was looking right at me.

‘A daily vigil?’ she said.

‘She’s waiting for the plaster to come off,’ I said: ‘She doesn’t

like it.’

Summer looked at me a little more and then turned back to

257

the map. I put the phone on speaker and laid the handset down

on the desk. There was a click on the line and we heard

Sanchez’s voice.

‘I’ve been hassling the Columbia PD about Brubaker’s car,’

he said.

‘Didn’t they find it yet?’ I said.

‘No,’ he said. ‘And they weren’t putting any effort into finding

it. Which was inconceivable to me. So I kept on hassling them.’

‘And?’

‘They dropped the other shoe.’

‘Which is?’

‘Brubaker wasn’t killed in Columbia,’ he said. ‘He was dumped

there, is all.’

258

SEVENTEEN

S

ANCHEZ TOLD US THE COLUMBIA MEDICAL EXAMINERS HAD FOUND confused lividity patterns on Brubaker’s body that in

their opinion meant he had been dead about three hours

before being tossed in the alley. Lividity is what happens to a

person’s blood after death. The heart stops, blood pressure

collapses, liquid blood drains and sinks and settles into the

lowest parts of the body under the simple force of gravity.

It rests there and over a period of time it stains the skin

liverish purple. Somewhere between three and six hours later

the colour fixes permanently, like a developed photograph. A guy who falls down dead on his back will have a pale chest and

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