Secret sanction sd-1

by Brian Haig

  I said, “Nothing like making a low-key, unobtrusive entrance.”

  She smiled politely and blushed a little. “I had nothing else to wear. If I don’t get to a laundry soon, I’ll be out of clean underwear, too.”

  I thought of ten cleverly lascivious retorts to that, but this was a business meeting between associates, no matter what my libido was screaming at that moment.

  “No sweat,” I assured her, patting her arm like any good senior officer who’s concerned for the welfare of his troops. “It gets to be a problem, I’ll just loan you some of mine.”

  She giggled kindly at that. “So, should we get a bottle of Chianti?”

  “Go ahead,” I said. “I’ve got two broken ribs and a body that’s screaming for some genuine medication.” I looked up and winked at the waiter. “I’d like to start with two scotches, straight up.”

  She said, “A glass of Chianti, please.”

  Then there was this long, awkward silence. She smelled absolutely stunning. It wasn’t that sweet lily of the fields crap, either, but something much more pungent. Something musky and naughty.

  It’s damned hard to think of something intelligently businesslike to say when you’re staring at a beautiful woman whose uptoppers are peeking out her shirt, your nose is getting hard from her smell, and your mind’s off in a boudoir wildly cavorting between some silk sheets.

  Finally, she said, “Who do you want to start with tomorrow?”

  I very reluctantly retreated from the boudoir and thought about that a minute. “Why not Sanchez?”

  “You don’t want to wait until we know a little more?”

  “What’s left to know?”

  “Was there a mutiny? The ambush, whose idea was it? Why did they really do it? Why did they shoot the Serbs in the head?”

  “And just who’s going to tell us about all that?”

  “There are still five others we can pick from.”

  “I just have this sense,” I told her, watching the waiter walk across the floor with our drinks. “The fastest way to all that is through Sanchez, and I think we have enough to get him to open up.”

  The glasses were deposited on the table and I tried not to appear too desperate as I grabbed the first scotch, which was actually my third scotch, and knocked down a huge slug. Before I knew it, the glass was empty. They were the big, tall kind of glasses, too, and the bartender wasn’t one of those awful cheaters who waters things down. For some reason, my ribs had started to ache like hell. Must’ve been her perfume, I thought.

  She was twirling her glass of wine with her slender fingers. “It’s a terrible story, isn’t it? It really touches your soul.”

  “Yep,” I said, feeling the effects of that third scotch right quickly. “What did you expect, though? Did you really think we’d discover nine evil men who got together and decided to commit an atrocity?”

  “No. I’ve just never handled a case like this. It’s confusing. Not very black and white.”

  “But it is. You’re wrong, because they were wrong,” I said, starting on the next glass and hoisting up two fingers at the waiter to rush over with some reinforcements. “One of the reasons the Army insists on iron discipline is situations just like this. Officers are human, too. They screw up, and when they do, their men see it. The structure, the discipline, they have to remain. Persico’s an old soldier. He knew that. Hell, they all knew that.”

  “I understand all that,” she said, still twirling her wineglass, “but Sanchez got all those men killed. I know what the rules say, but I can also see why those men didn’t want to follow him anymore. Besides, it sounds like he stopped giving orders. Almost like he went into a walking coma.”

  My glass was now empty, and the waiter was there with the two fresh ones. I smiled at him quite happily.

  Morrow said, “Are you all right?”

  “I’ll be fine,” I assured her. “Just administering a little painkiller. Look, there’s going to be plenty enough blame to go around for everyone. Smothers never should’ve given Sanchez the job,” I said, taking another huge swallow. “Sanchez should’ve gutted it out when things went south. His men should’ve supported him. Even Hollywood knows that. Did you ever see Mutiny on the Bounty, or The Caine Mutiny? Great movies, both of them. Remember that scene with Captain Queeg, this battleship commander in World War Two, sitting there on the stand rolling those ball bearings around in his hand, ranting about who stole his strawberries? It was Humphrey Bogart at his best, playing this hard-nosed son of a bitch who rode his men mercilessly, and his first officer sympathized with his men and ended up undermining him, until it resulted in mutiny. The lawyer got the first officer off, then in the final scene he told the first officer he disgusted him, because what he did really was wrong. The system has rules and everybody has to obey them.”

  “Strange words coming out of you,” she said as I got a good firm grip and hoisted down some more scotch.

  “What? Because I act like a wiseass? Because I don’t seem to have a lot of respect for the system? Don’t kid yourself, Morrow. I was raised an Army brat,” I said, pausing only long enough to inhale a little more painkiller. “I’ve never shoved a bite of food into my mouth that wasn’t paid for by Army dollars. I saw my father go off to war three times. When the Army ships your father away to the other side of the world, and he’s being shot at, you do a lot of thinking about the Army and what it means. I actually got shot at a few times myself. That’s also been known to make one think about it, once or twice. I believe in the Army and all its silly rules. Doesn’t mean I like them, but God knows, we’ve won a lot of wars. We must be doing something right.”

  Morrow was wearing a look of surprise, and I realized that I was drinking way too much and was letting my mouth get way too carried away. My ribs still hurt like all hell, though, so I kept wading through the glass in my hand. Besides, it would be a damned shame to let a perfectly good scotch go to waste.

  She took a sip from her wine and studied the bruises and swells on my face. “You’ve had a difficult few weeks,” she said.

  “I’m not complaining,” I answered, wondering if I should stick up my finger to get the waiter to bring two more. The waiter was actually sweating from running back and forth. People from other tables were staring at me.

  “Do your ribs still hurt?”

  “I think sho,” I admitted.

  She giggled a little.

  “What?” I asked. “Wassshh so damned funny?”

  This was when I first noticed that my ribs hurt so much that they had made my tongue swell. Until that instant, I never knew my ribs were connected to my tongue.

  “We’d better order dinner quickly and get some food in your stomach,” she said, flashing those wonderfully sympathetic eyes.

  This was also about the same moment when I realized that eating had just gotten a little beyond my reach. I looked down at my silverware and there were at least ten forks. Which one would a polished gentleman choose, I wondered.

  I said, “Mmmnydnodmebok,” or something like that.

  Morrow stood up and came around the table. She took my arm, and she was really strong, because she hoisted me out of that chair like I was a fluffy pancake. She wrapped my left arm around her shoulder and led me out of the dining room. My left hand was dangling right across her left uptopper, and her naughty perfume tickled my nose. I wanted to give that comfy uptopper a gentle little squeeze, but my body was way past the point of listening to my brain.

  She leaned me against the wall in the elevator, and I stood happily humming some song as we sped up to the third floor. Once we got to my room, she actually dug around inside my pants pocket until she found my key. Then she led me over to the bed. This was the moment I was waiting for. She thought I was intoxicated. She thought I was a harmless, incapacitated, drunken eunuch, too scotched out to raise ye olde noodle. Heh-heh-heh. I lunged toward the bed, tugging her along.

  I said, “Youydod a jummbock,” and it was a real good thing she couldn�
�t understand a word I said, because what I’d just invited her to do was something nice girls don’t usually do.

  The next thing I knew, the alarm on the nightstand next to my bed was howling at me, and I could hear someone pounding on my door. I rolled out of the bed and stumbled over and opened it. That damned Morrow had changed out of that fetching skirt and was back inside her BDUs again. Now how had she done that so fast?

  She brushed past me and headed for my bathroom, while I stood there feeling stupid. I looked at the alarm clock. It read 7:40. I had set it to go off at six. I heard the shower go on, and Morrow went over to the phone and called room service. She told them to send up two American-style breakfasts and stylishly offered them a ten-dollar tip if they had it here in ten minutes.

  She put the receiver down and said, “You’ve got five minutes to shower and shave. Don’t walk out of the bathroom naked, either. Army rules dictate that higher officers shall not display their Pudleys to lower officers. It wouldn’t bother me, but you’re the one who loves Army rules.”

  Damn, so that’s what a Pudley is, I thought, as I lurched toward the bathroom. The shower felt great and my ribs only ached a little. Dr. Drummond and his scotch cure had accomplished another medical miracle. I emerged from the bathroom fully dressed about seven minutes later. Morrow was at the door paying the bellhop for our breakfasts.

  I couldn’t help myself. “Where’d you learn about Pudleys?” I demanded.

  “What?”

  “Pudleys? Where’d you learn that word?”

  That made her giggle a lot. “At that private girls’ school I went to. That was the word we used for… well, you know. Only for little ones, though. Big ones we called Humongos.”

  I thought about that a moment. I took a bite of eggs and wetted it down with a little coffee. “I don’t have a Pudley,” I insisted.

  “Be that as it may,” she said, smiling, “we’re going to be late, so eat quickly.”

  “Okay,” I grumbled. “Just remember. I don’t have a Pudley. Maybe I’m not a Humongo, but damn it, I’m no Pudley.”

  “Eat,” she ordered.

  “Maybe I need to wear different pants or something,” I mumbled.

  She was still smiling when we went out and caught a sedan to the air base.

  Chapter 31

  Terry Sanchez looked thinner. And more gaunt. There were dark, hollow pockets around his eyes, so deep it actually seemed as if his eyeballs were sucking in all the skin around them. His eyeballs themselves looked like brittle crystals that could shatter at any minute. He shambled when he walked, and his arms hung limply by his sides. I had the sense of a man who was rapidly deteriorating.

  I pointed at the chair in the middle of the floor and asked him to be seated. He slumped into it and stared at me with a blank expression. I repeated the same explanation I had used the day before, taking care to update our understanding of what had happened in Kosovo.

  His eyes were wandering around the room as I spoke, and he appeared too listless to be fazed that we had learned so much about the terrible events that occurred out there.

  I paused, but before I could continue, Morrow suddenly said, “Terry.”

  He looked up at her. Her voice became very soft, mellow and soothing. Almost like a violin playing a lullaby. Or maybe more like a concerned mother talking to a hurt child.

  “Terry, we know now what happened out there. We want to hear your side, though. Do you understand what’s happening here?”

  He stopped gazing around the room and looked into her eyes. “Yes.”

  “Good,” she said, offering him a gentle smile. She was taking over the interrogation.

  “It’s important for you to know we haven’t made any judgments yet. Things like this are never black and white. You were under terrible pressures. You were trying to do what was right. We want to hear your side.”

  He was now staring into her eyes, as though they were a life raft he wanted to climb into.

  She continued. “We’re going to ask some difficult questions now. The cover-up has fallen apart. Jack Tretorne and General Murphy just want us to find the truth. The other members of your team have all been truthful. It’s your turn, Terry. Okay?”

  He nodded, but his eyes stayed glued to hers. It was almost like he was mesmerized. I knew in that instant that I could never do what Morrow was doing. She sensed that Terry Sanchez was drowning. She sensed that his insides were seething with turmoil, that he required a sympathetic listener or else he would just fall to pieces. Sympathy is not my strong suit.

  “Good, Terry. Why don’t we start with the decision that led Captain Akhan to raid the police station in Piluca?”

  He licked his lips a few times, and I thought of a man who was stuck in a desert and was staring at an oasis off in the distance. His only company the past few weeks had been the same men who obviously detested him for whatever he’d done out there. Some part of him had to be begging for the chance to explain himself to someone who wasn’t there. Morrow expertly sensed that.

  He said, “I know what you’ve been hearing from the others about that. They’re wrong, though. It’s not the way it happened.”

  Morrow said, “Then please tell us what did happen.”

  He said, “Akhan begged me to let him hit that station. A lot of his men lived near Piluca, and they were begging him. I guess he wasn’t strong enough to say no. He wasn’t really a soldier, you know. There was a Serb captain named Pajocovic. He’d terrorized that town for a year. A number of Akhan’s men had lived there. Some of them had family members who were tortured or killed by him. You see why they wanted to hit that station?”

  “Of course,” Morrow said. “It makes perfectly good sense. But it wasn’t on the approved target list, was it?”

  “I told Akhan that. I swear I did, but he said the target list didn’t apply to him and his men. He said that list only applied to my team. He was right about that, you know.”

  “Yes, Terry, according to the rules, he was right. Did you want him to raid that station at Piluca?”

  “Sure. I understood what his men were feeling.”

  “Then-”

  “No, wait,” Sanchez said, almost coming out of his chair. “You have to understand. Nobody understands. My mother and father, they’re from Cuba. They came over in ’61, with the first big wave. My father, he was recruited by the CIA to go back. He was on the first wave to hit the beach. His friends were dying all around him, but he fought for three days. He fought until the American ships that brought him there pulled out and abandoned them. Then the American planes left and there was no hope. The Bay of Pigs, you remember it? My father spent three years in a Cuban prison. We finally traded some tractors to get him and the others freed.”

  Morrow was following along with more gentle nods. She bent forward and rested her chin on her hands, as though everything he was saying made perfectly good sense. Frankly, he was rambling. I thought his mind was becoming incoherent.

  “You understand?” he continued. “He didn’t blame them though. It was his country. That happened to my family. I knew how these Kosovars felt. The others, the rest of the team… they didn’t, you see? These men weren’t fighting for America. They were fighting to free their own homeland. We can’t tell them what to hit and what not.”

  It suddenly struck me that Terry Sanchez was stretching desperately. The Bay of Pigs and what was happening in Kosovo could not be more different. Faced with overpowering guilt, his mind was trying to construct a rationalization, any rationalization that would absolve or soften what he had done. Not an atonement, but an escape.

  Morrow said, “Was Akhan’s operation properly planned?”

  “Sure. I went over it with him for two days. I told him we couldn’t lift a finger to help him, because it wasn’t an approved target for us, but I told him everything to do. I even had Akhan send three men down to town the day before. They checked all over. All they saw was a bunch of drunk Serb police lounging around. It should’ve been
easy.”

  “Then what happened, Terry?”

  “I don’t know for sure. Nobody knows for sure. What I think happened was one of Akhan’s men was a mole. It’s happened with other teams, you know? The Serbs send spies into the camps to be recruited in the KLA. I think that’s what happened here. I think one of his men tipped off the Serbs. That’s not my fault, you see? They were waiting for him. I told him before he went down there that if he got in trouble, we couldn’t lift a finger to help him. He understood that. It wasn’t my fault, you see? I told him.”

  Morrow was in her full sympathetic mode, nodding and pursing her lips, but Sanchez wasn’t through. He was speaking louder now, almost frantic.

  “That’s what the men in my team couldn’t get through their heads. You see that, right? I didn’t get Akhan killed. I didn’t make him go down there. I didn’t order him to do it. Whoever told the Serbs he was coming, he was the one who got Akhan killed. I just let Akhan do what he and his men wanted to do. You understand that, right?”

  “I understand,” Morrow said. “What happened when Perrite and Machusco and Moore returned from Piluca?”

  “What happened?” he said. “What happened was they all turned against me. None of them liked me much anyway. They never did, not from the day I took over the team. Persico, Perrite, Machusco, Caldwell, and Butler, they’d all been together over ten years. The Moores had been there six years. It was like trying to join a family, only I didn’t have the right blood.”

  “Was there a mutiny? Did they approach you? What exactly happened, Terry?”

  He finally broke eye contact with Morrow. He looked over at Imelda and her girls as though he were seeing them for the first time. Then he started rubbing his legs with his hands. Not a massaging motion, but a slow, methodical stroke with his fingers stiffened and his palms wide open. It seemed unconscious and mechanical.