Hail to the Chief

'Yes, that's the porch.'

'Is there a back porch, Mr. Sack?'

'No, just that front porch there.'

'But you said the toilet is at the back of the house.'

'Well, yes. Yes, that's where it is.'

'Then what's the light on the front porch got to do with what you saw or didn't see from the back?'

Sack blinked, and then suddenly began crying. 'I'm an old man,' he said, and fumbled for a handkerchief in the pocket of his coveralls. 'I can't hear worth a shit, and I'm living on my disability pension and what I get from the welfare. I got maybe five, six years left of living, if that much. I don't want trouble. Please leave me alone. Please.' He blew his nose and dabbed at his eyes, and then put the handkerchief away, even though tears were still running down his cheeks. 'Please,' he said.

'Want to tell us what happened last night, Mr. Sack?' Carella said gently.

'Nothing,' Sack said. 'I already told you…' He could not go on. A sob strangled the sentence, and he began coughing, and again reached for his handkerchief.

'Did you see headlights down there in the woods, Mr. Sack?'

Sack did not answer.

'Yes or no?'

'I saw headlights,' he said, and sighed heavily. 'I'm an old man, Please, I don't want trouble.'

'What time was this, Mr. Sack? The headlights.'

'Must've been about two in the morning.'

'You saw them from the bathroom window?'

'Yes.'

'What'd you do?'

'I should've gone back to bed, but I thought… I thought somebody maybe got off the road by accident… and was stuck in the mud down there by the bottom, so I… I put on a pair of pants and a shirt, and my sweater and my lumberjack, and I went down there to see if… if I could offer some assistance. Phone a garage or… I'm an old man, and I'm deaf, but I ain't worthless, I have some value, you see. I thought I could phone, if the people down there needed help.'

'Go on,' Kling said. He said the two words quite softly, and was not at all sure that Sack heard them.

'I wasn't carrying no light, I looked for the damn flashlight, but I couldn't find it. I keep losing things around here, I don't know what it is. But there was a pretty good moon, and I know those woods like the back of my hand, I was born and raised in this house, I know every inch of them woods. And I made my way down to where the lights were, and… and then I saw what was going on.'

'What was that, Mr. Sack?'

'I said I saw what was going on.'

'Yes, and what did you see?'

There was a girl laying on the ground in front of the truck. There was blood all over her dress. There was two young boys standing in the headlights near her. They were having an argument.'

'What about?'

'One of them wanted to bury her. He said they'd brought along the shovels so they could bury her. The other one said he wanted to get out of there fast, it was good enough what they'd already done, covered her with leaves.'

'What'd they look like?'

'They were just kids, couldn't've been older than sixteen or seventeen.'

'White or black?'

'White.'

'Did they use names in addressing each other? Did you hear any names?'

'I'm hard of hearing,' Sack said again, 'but I think I heard one of them calling the other one "Pig." '

'Pig? P-I-G?'

'That's right. Pig.'

'Are you sure that's what he said?'

'I'm not sure, no. But that's what it sounded like to me.'

'All right, what happened?'

'The one named Pig said he was in charge, and he didn't want to spend no more time there in the woods. So they got in the truck and drove off.'

'What kind of truck?'

'Old Chevy pickup.'

'Notice the license plate?'

'It was an Isola plate, but I couldn't make out the numbers on it.'

'When you say old… what year do you mean?'

'Sixty-four, sixty-five, something like that.'

'What color?'

'Green, it looked like. Or blue. A bluish-green.'

'An open pickup?'

'Yes.'

'Anything in the back of the truck?'

'Nothing I could see. I guess there were shovels in it, because that's what they were talking about. But I couldn't see them from where I was.'

'Anything else you remember about the truck? Any dents, any peculiar markings, anything painted on its sides?'

'There was a funny flag painted on the door closest to me.'

'Which door was that?'

'The door on the driver's side.'

'What kind of flag?'

'I couldn't make it out, I think it was a flag, it looked like a flag, anyway.'

'What color was it?'

'Red, white, and blue.'

'But it wasn't an American flag?'

'No, no, I know what the American flag looks like, don't I? This had a big blue cross on it. Stars, too, now that you mention it. But it wasn't the Stars and Stripes, that's for sure. I fought for that flag, I sure as hell ought to know what it looks like. World War I. That's how come I'm deaf.'

'What'd these boys look like, can you tell us that?'

'Both had dark hair, and both were wearing blue jackets with… Hey, that's right. That's right, come to think of it'

'What's right, Mr. Sack?'

'That same flag was on the back of their jackets. That's right Same damn flag.'

'Uh-huh. How tall were they?'

'Average height.'

'Notice anything else about them? Scars or…?'

'Yeah, one of them was wearing a scarf.'

Carella did not mention that he had said 'Scars.' Instead, he picked up on the old man's recollection, and said, 'What color was the scarf?'

'Red.'

'Which one was wearing it? Pig or the other one?'

'I don't recall.'

'Any other identifying marks?' Carella said, and then amended his earlier question so that Sack wouldn't realize he had misheard it. 'Any disfigurations? Old healed wounds? Anything like that?'

'Scars, do you mean?' Sack said.

Carella smiled. 'Yes, Mr. Sack,' he said. 'Scars.'

'No. No scars. Oh, is that what you meant before? Oh, I see. No. No scars.' Sack, for some strange reason, was smiling too.

'Thank you, Mr. Sack,' Carella said. 'I wouldn't worry about those two coming back here. They've no reason to believe they were seen by anyone. They didn't see you, did they?'

'No, but… I figured if I told you about it, they might guess where the information came from and… that girl's dead, you know. It don't take a mastermind to dope out it was them two who did it.'

'If it'll make you feel more secure, I'm sure Detective Grundy can arrange to have his men tighten the patrol around your place. Mr. Grundy?'

'Oh, sure,' Grundy said, taken by surprise and not at all sure he could ask his men to provide such a service.

'You've been very helpful, Mr. Sack,' Carella said. 'We're sorry to have interrupted your breakfast.'

'We're grateful,' Kling said.

'Don't care for it,' Sack said. 'Too bitter.'

In the squadroom of the One-Oh-One, they went through Broughan's file again. They learned that there was a gang called, in seeming contradiction, the Yankee Rebels. Their colors were red, white, and blue, and their identifying insignia was the same one the Confederacy had used during the War Between the States - the distinctive blue cross with its thirteen white stars and white edges against a field of red. The names and nicknames (called 'aliases' in Broughan's file) of the gang members were included in the dossier, together with pertinent facts about them - family make-up, school and/or employment histories, records of arrests and convictions, probation and/or parole dispositions, and the like. One of the members of the Yankee Rebels was called Little Anthony, apparently in an attempt to distinguish him from Big Anthony, who was listed as the gang's treasurer. The detectives assumed that what Rodney Sack had heard on the night of Midge's murder was not the name 'Pig,' but rather the name 'Big,' short for Big Anthony Sutherland. The legal name of the gang's 'enforcement officer' was Charles Ingersol; his nickname was Chingo. The gang's negotiator was a boy named Edward Marshall, but he was called Doc because he had once dug a bullet (with apparent success) from the shoulder of a fellow member who'd been wounded in a street fight. The gang's war counselor was named Edward Mason, and his nickname was Mace.