Heart of War

by Lucian K. Truscott

  “Yeah, I guess so.”

  “So if murder is not a public, but rather a very private affair, sir, why do you think that Captain Taylor had the door to a public hallway open?”

  “I don’t know. That’s his business, not mine.”

  “Didn’t he tell you the door was open when he walked by, and he looked in and saw Captain Love lying on the bed covered in blood?”

  “Yeah, he told me that, but I didn’t believe him.”

  “You didn’t believe him because you found him astride her.”

  “Yeah.”

  “Do you know the correct position for the administration of CPR, Mr. Reilly?”

  “No. We got a house doctor for that.”

  “Would it surprise you if I told you that the correct position for CPR is the position Captain Taylor was in when you walked into the room?”

  “I don’t know that.”

  “I know you don’t, Mr. Reilly. You have made at least that much abundantly clear. No further questions.”

  Sanders stood. “Redirect, Your Honor.”

  “Proceed.”

  “Mr. Reilly, Captain Taylor was covered with Captain Love’s blood, isn’t that right?”

  “All over him. Yeah.”

  “The knife was right next to his hand, wasn’t it?”

  “I thought he was going to reach for it when I surprised him.”

  “Thank you. No further questions.”

  Kara was on her feet. “Recross, Your Honor.”

  “Proceed.”

  “Where were the defendant’s hands when you entered the room?”

  “On her chest. Like this.” He put his own hands on his chest.

  “He didn’t reach for the knife, did he? His hands remained on her chest until you put the cuffs on him. Isn’t that correct?”

  “I had the Glock on him. He wasn’t going anywhere.”

  “The question was, he didn’t move his hands from her chest. He didn’t move toward the knife, isn’t that right?”

  “Yeah.”

  “Mr. Reilly, I’d like you to step down from the stand and assume the position the defendant was in when you walked into Captain Love’s room. On the floor, please.”

  Sanders was up. “Your Honor, please—”

  Kara addressed the judge: “Your Honor, this is a reasonable request. He has testified as to how he found the defendant. All I’m asking him to do is reenact it for the members of the panel.”

  “That is a reasonable request. Step down. Do as she said.”

  Reilly got down on his hands and knees. His rear end was in the air, and he was leaning forward in the crawling position. “Like this.”

  “Thank you. No further questions.”

  After Reilly, Sanders put on his housekeeping witnesses. The fingerprint expert who took the prints off the knife testified that the prints were Randy’s. A representative of the N.S. Meyer company verified that Captain Taylor had purchased gold U.S. insignia from his company. He examined the two U.S. insignias in evidence, and confirmed that they were both solid gold and quite likely a pair. The testimony of a gas station attendant who had filled up Randy’s car on the night Sheila was killed showed that Randy had been out of his house at ten forty-five p.m. and had the opportunity to commit the murder.

  Sanders introduced into evidence Randy’s Nikon camera, with a 70-200mm zoom lens that an expert claimed could have taken the photographs. And with a final flourish he introduced huge color blow-ups of the autopsy photos of both women, showing the similarities in the placement of the neck wounds.

  With a self-satisfied glance at Kara, he said, “Your Honor, the prosecution rests.”

  Freeman addressed Kara: “Will the defense be prepared to present its case tomorrow morning?”

  “We will, Your Honor,” she said reluctantly.

  “Very well, this court-martial will stand in recess until 0900 tomorrow.”

  When Kara got home that night, she spent most of the evening going over her notes for her presentation in court. Around midnight she washed her face and put on her pajamas. She grabbed her court files and got into bed. She started going through her notes, but after a few moments she could stand it no longer, so she picked up the bedside phone and dialed Mace’s number. An unfamiliar voice answered.

  “Is Sergeant Nukanen there? I need to talk to him, please.”

  “No, ma’am, he’s not here.”

  “Do you know where he is?”

  “No, ma’am, I don’t.”

  “I’d like to leave a message for him. Could you ask him to call Kara Guidry?”

  “I’ll tell him, ma’am. Gotta go. I’ve got a call on the other line.”

  She hung up the phone dejectedly. Around one, the phone rang, and she picked up excitedly. She could hear the hollow sound of someone on the line, then the phone went dead. Around two, she fell asleep, court-martial papers covering the bed.

  The bedside light was still on when she awoke with a start, glancing at her watch. It was just past three. She thought she heard something . . . there it was again!

  She switched off the light, plunging the room into darkness. She moved the papers from her lap and slipped out of bed.

  There it was again! Someone was trying to open a window in the back of the house!

  She dropped to her hands and knees and crept down the hall, pausing at the door to the living room. A fluorescent light was on, mounted under one of the kitchen cabinets. She was looking quickly from one window to another when she heard the sound again.

  It was coming from behind her!

  She crept to the bathroom door and flipped on the overhead light. A pebble hit the frosted window next to the sink. She opened the window and looked down. Mace was kneeling in the bushes next to the back stairs. He held a finger to his lips.

  She ran around to the back door and unlocked it. Mace glanced around at the wooded edge of the backyard and hurried up the steps. Inside, he moved quickly to the light in the kitchen and switched it off. He crouched behind the counter next to the sink.

  “Get down,” he whispered.

  “Mace, what are you—”

  He interrupted her with a sssshhh. “There’s a car with two men sitting out there, parked in the bushes about fifty yards down from your drive.”

  “Who are they?”

  “I don’t know. They’re in a Chevy Caprice. If I had to guess, I’d say they were military, judging by their haircuts.”

  “It’s Beckwith. He’s having me watched.”

  “If they’ve got physical surveillance on you, they could be tapping your phone—”

  “They wouldn’t dare! They would be listening in on privileged communications!”

  “You think they care? He’s the next chief of staff.”

  “I’m going to get Hollaway’s people in here tomorrow and have this place swept. If I find out anyone is bugging or wiretapping me, I’ll get the whole case thrown out for prosecutorial misconduct.”

  “That’s kind of like asking the fox to check out the chicken coop, isn’t it? He’s on the other side, your friend is.”

  “I trust him. He would never condone anything like wiretapping the defense attorney.”

  “You’d know better about that than me, I guess, but I wouldn’t go taking anything for granted. They’ve got you in their crosshairs, Kara.”

  “I know they do.”

  They were sitting on the kitchen floor in the dark. He reached for her hand. “I had to see you tonight. Things were so good between us . . .” He squeezed her hand tightly and pulled her toward him.

  “Mace, I—”

  He held his finger to her lips. “Ssshh.” Then he kissed her and rocked her in his arms. “I’ve been so worried about you,” he whispered. “I had to risk it.”

  “I’m glad you did,” she whispered. “I need you.” He was looking into her eyes. There was a sheen of perspiration on his forehead, and his eyes were hooded with a mixture of fear and excitement.

  “I want to help yo
u,” he whispered. “Tell me what I can do.”

  She reached for the pad of paper next to the phone and scribbled quickly. “There is a bill for the cell phone in Beckwith’s staff car.” She wrote down the month. “Sheila Worthy made two calls from her car just before she was killed. Both of them were to him. I’ve got to get that bill.”

  “Why would her call show up on his bill? Wouldn’t it be charged to her?”

  “Ordinarily, yes, it would. But she called the secure switch, and they patched it through to him in his staff car. Once she got the secure switch on the line, she was charged for that call. But when they patched it off a land-line phone, through to his car, if the call came in on his cell phone, the cellular company would read it as a call from a regular phone to a cell phone, and the bill would go to him.”

  “The call could have been patched out to his radio.”

  “That’s why I need the bill.”

  “You still think he killed her.”

  “Yes, I do.”

  “I’ll see what I can do and call you tomorrow.”

  “Mace, I don’t want you to do anything that’s going to get you in trouble.”

  He grinned, his eyes glistening brightly in the dark. “Major, you’ve been trouble since the day I met you.”

  Chapter Forty

  The members of the panel filed into the courtroom and took their seats. Colonel Freeman hit his gavel. “This court-martial is in session. Major Guidry, you may make your opening statement.”

  Kara walked to the podium without notes. “Gentlemen, this is going to be brief. The case against my client is such an outrageous frame, the person responsible for it must have had training in an earlier life under Goya.” She was relieved to see that there were a few smiles on the panel. She had broken through to them, and so she drove on. “Captain Randy Taylor is a graduate of West Point and has had an outstanding career as an officer in the United States Army. Until a short while ago he had the coveted position of aide to General William Beckwith, here at Fort Benning. His father is a West Pointer, and so is his uncle, and so was his grandfather. The case we will present will ask and answer this question: Why would a young man from a family like the Taylors throw his heritage, and his family name, and his career, down the drain by committing two brutal murders of women we will show he knew and admired? The answer is, he wouldn’t have, and he didn’t. He did not kill either Sheila Worthy or Lannie Fulton Love. He is innocent of these charges. We will show that the prosecution’s case is so full of holes, it looks like the cooling shroud on a fifty-caliber machine gun"—more smiles on the panel—"and we will raise the reasonable doubt you need to set this fine Army officer free and return him to his family and his distinguished heritage, where he belongs. Thank you.”

  Colonel Freeman cleared his throat. “Major, are you ready to call your first witness?”

  “We are, Your Honor.”

  “Do so.”

  “Sir, the defense calls Major Frank Hollaway.”

  Sanders jumped to his feet. “Objection. The defense has had its chance with Major Hollaway during cross-examination.”

  Freeman peered at her over his half glasses. “Major Guidry, I believe the prosecutor is correct.”

  “It’s true, sir, that I had the opportunity to cross-examine him—”

  Sanders interrupted: “Perhaps the defense should have finished with its questions then, Your Honor.”

  Kara shot a look at Sanders. “Your Honor, if I may be permitted to finish . . .”

  Freeman looked over at Sanders. “There will be no further outbursts from you, Major Sanders. Understood?”

  “Yes, Your Honor.”

  “Proceed, Major Guidry.”

  “Sir, under the rules of evidence, I was permitted to question Major Hollaway only about those subjects which the prosecution brought up during its case. I have new questions for Major Hollaway concerning matters which the prosecution did not touch.”

  “I see. This is quite out of the ordinary, but I’ll allow it. Proceed.”

  Hollaway was reminded he was still under oath and took the stand.

  “Major, you recall Lieutenant Barry Parks, don’t you?”

  “Yes, I do.”

  “Lieutenant Parks is now deceased, is he not?”

  “Yes, he is.”

  “Parks was on your list of officers who owned solid gold insignia from the N.S. Meyer company, wasn’t he?”

  “Yes.”

  “He was also something more than an acquaintance of Sheila Worthy’s, correct?”

  “Yes.”

  “In fact, they were lovers during college, isn’t that right?”

  “Yes, they were.”

  “You and I questioned Lieutenant Parks, and he told us these things, didn’t he?”

  “Yes, he did.”

  “You considered Lieutenant Parks your chief suspect in the murder of Sheila Worthy, did you not?”

  “For a time, yes.”

  “Why was that?”

  “He fit a profile I have seen in other cases. He had had a relationship with the deceased, and most murders are committed by persons who are acquainted with their victims. And his name appeared on the N.S. Meyer list.”

  “You winnowed your list of suspects down to two, did you not? Who were they?”

  “Lieutenant Parks and Captain Taylor.”

  “And of the two, you liked Parks as the killer, right?”

  “Yes.”

  “His relationship with Lieutenant Worthy had broken up after college, and he had tried to restart the relationship, and he had failed at this, correct?”

  “Yes.”

  “And that enhanced his status as a suspect in your eyes.”

  “Yes, it did.”

  “Even after Lieutenant Parks was killed, he remained your chief suspect, isn’t that right?”

  “Yes.”

  “You were going to call for a hearing and present evidence that he killed Sheila Worthy, and close the case, weren’t you?”

  “Yes.”

  “When did you decide not to do that?”

  “When the District of Columbia Police Department called and said they had arrested Captain Taylor for the murder of Lannie Love.”

  “Until that very moment you were convinced that Lieutenant Parks had killed Sheila Worthy, weren’t you?”

  “Yes.”

  Kara walked over to the defense table and picked up a document.

  “I’d like to ask you a few questions about Lieutenant Parks’ death. He was killed by an artillery round during a field exercise here at Fort Benning, correct?”

  “He crossed over into a live-fire zone, right.”

  “You’ve read the incident report on his death.”

  “Yes, I have.”

  “This is a copy of that report.” She held up the document.

  “Objection! That report is not in evidence.”

  “I supplied the prosecution with a copy of the report, Your Honor.”

  Freeman looked over at Kara. “Are you asking that the report be introduced as evidence?”

  “No, Your Honor. I merely want to refer to it when I question Major Hollaway.”

  “All right. You can use the report for the purpose of questioning the witness, but that is all.”

  “Understood, sir.” She turned to Hollaway. “Major, the report says that Lieutenant Parks failed to heed a warning to stay clear of the live-fire zone, correct?”

  “Yes, that’s correct.”

  “You thought Parks committed suicide, didn’t you?”

  “Yes.”

  “You thought he committed suicide because he was guilty of killing Sheila Worthy, isn’t that right?”

  “Yes.”

  “Do you still believe that?”

  “No.”

  “But you changed your mind only when Captain Taylor was dropped into your lap, when he was arrested for the killing of Captain Love, correct?”

  “Correct.”

  “So these two murders are i
nextricably linked, aren’t they? If Captain Love hadn’t been killed, you would have closed out the Sheila Worthy case and pinned it on Parks, wouldn’t you?”

  “Objection! Calls for speculation!”

  “Your Honor, I’m trying to show that there was in fact no case against the defendant regarding the murder of Sheila Worthy until his arrest for the murder of Captain Love.”

  “Approach the bench.”

  Sanders and Kara stood before the judge as he whispered: “I know what you’re trying to show, Counselor. If you can explain to me why this line of questioning is germane, I’ll allow it.”

  “Your Honor, it is the prosecution’s theory that Captain Taylor obsessively pursued these two women, and that because he was unsuccessful in his pursuit of them, he became enraged and killed them. It is entirely germane to show the members of the panel that there was another suspect in the murder of Sheila Worthy, Lieutenant Parks, who fit the prosecution theory, and that Parks was dropped as a suspect only when my client was arrested for the murder of Captain Love.”

  Freeman turned to Sanders. “Well?”

  “Sir, she’s on a fishing expedition here, wildly casting about, trying to find something that will save her case.”

  “Your Honor, I’m trying to cast doubt on the prosecution theory, which is my job.”

  “I’ll allow an answer to the question at issue, but that is all, Major Guidry. You will return to evidence in the case, is that clear?”

  “Yes, Your Honor.”

  They took their places, and the stenographer reread the question.

  Hollaway glanced nervously at Sanders. “I’m not sure.”

  “Isn’t it true that you were in the process of scheduling a postmortem hearing that would have closed the case on the Sheila Worthy murder?”

  “Yes.”

  “No further questions.”

  Sanders got up to cross-examine his own witness. “Major Hollaway, in the matter of the murder of Sheila Worthy, which suspect did you find more evidence on? Lieutenant Parks or Captain Taylor?”

  “Captain Taylor.”

  “You found enough evidence that he had murdered Sheila Worthy that you brought the charge against him, correct?”