“Like blackmail?” I asked.
“Sure. It’s brilliant, if you think about it. We recommend against charging Sanchez’s team, then the Serbs convene another big press conference. They hand out the close-ups of the holes in the head and announce what our troops did to their people. We’d be stuck looking like we tried to cover it up. Better yet, the Serbs now know that we know. That’s probably why Milosevic was so willing to let us visit the morgue.”
“So you think that’s it? A setup?” I asked.
Delbert stood up and began pacing, a very distracting habit that seems to be common among lawyers. For some reason, many can barely utter a word unless they’re on their feet. It’s like the blood has to rush out of their brain before their lips can move.
“Who knows?” he said, gesturing with his arms as though this were a courtroom. “Maybe they were polished off by a roving band of Albanians who heard the shots and made it to the ambush site before the Serbs. The corpses were shot with M16s. The Kosovars are armed with U.S. weapons.”
“I suppose that’s another possibility,” I admitted.
“The problem is that all the possibilities are just conjecture. The most critical fact is that Sanchez and his team are the only surviving witnesses.”
“And the inconsistencies don’t bother you?” I asked.
“You mean that flare thing you keep bringing up?”
“Yeah. How about that flare thing?”
“To be perfectly honest, I don’t understand why you keep focusing on it. I don’t wish to be offensive, but I think it’s asinine. First of all, it’s completely irrelevant. Second, under similar circumstances, I doubt I could recall how many flares were set, and how many went off. I think those men were scared witless, running for their lives, physically and mentally exhausted, and in the midst of everything else, nobody was keeping a running diary of how many flares went off.”
“He’s right,” Morrow said. “Any experienced defense attorney would turn you into hamburger if you tried to bring that up in a courtroom.”
“You don’t think it impugns their integrity?”
“No, I think Delbert’s right. I think we can keep probing at little details, and we’ll find all kinds of tiny incongruencies, but it has to be something that’s tangible, something germane. On every important thing that happened out there, they’re in total agreement. And they are the only living witnesses. You can’t prosecute without witnesses.”
“So you believe they’re innocent?” I asked them.
Delbert said, “I believe we have to strongly consider that possibility. I’ve seen nothing that indicates otherwise.”
I looked at Morrow.
“Let’s just say I’m a lot less convinced they murdered those men than I was two days ago, before I heard their side. Don’t tell me you aren’t, too.”
I looked from her to Delbert. They expected me to say I thought the men were guilty as hell. So far I had not agreed with either of them on anything and, judging by their peevish expressions, they weren’t anticipating a precedent.
“What I believe is that every man I’ve talked to so far has lied to me. Some in small ways, others in large ways. Men lie for a reason. They had a week together to cook up a common defense. Hell, maybe they cooked it up while they were still out there and just improved on it in detention. Something doesn’t smell right.”
“You can’t convict a man on smell,” Delbert said.
“Well, yeah, actually you can,” I said, vaguely recalling the case of a notorious rapist who wore a mask, and although none of his victims was able to visually identify him, the fact that he had earned the nom de guerre of “Stinky” proved enough to undo him.
I stared at Delbert. “Have you ever had a near-death experience? Maybe when you were driving and someone ran a red light and nearly plowed into you?”
“Sure, everybody has.”
“Describe it.”
“It happened a few years ago. I was driving down 95 to Florida when a semi crossed lanes and came at me head-on.”
“Day or night?”
“Daytime.”
“Did you honk your horn?”
“It happened too fast. There wasn’t time.”
“What did you do?”
“I swerved hard to the right and went off the road.”
“Did you hit another car?”
“No. There was no other traffic.”
“Did you hit any trees?”
“I almost did, but I steered hard to the left and avoided them.”
“What kind of trees?”
“Scrub pine.”
“What color was the semi?”
“Red.”
“You remember all that clearly? There’s still a clear picture in your mind?”
“Yes, but I don’t agree with the point you’re trying to make.”
“That’s because you haven’t been in combat. Your senses become razor-sharp. Why do you think all those old World War Two veterans can still sit around telling fifty-year-old war stories and recall every detail vividly, like it happened only yesterday, when most of them couldn’t remember a single word their wife said at breakfast that morning?”
Delbert said, “Nobody listens to their wives at breakfast. Besides, I’d love to get nine of those veterans on a witness stand and see how well their creaking, antiquated memories really correspond.”
“You’d be surprised,” I told him. “I can recall almost every waking hour that I was in combat. The exhaustion, strain, and fear don’t dull your senses. Your brain has to work in overdrive just to function. You don’t forget things like how many flares went off or who told you the Serbs were following you, or how many Serbs were on the hillside looking down on your position. It’s like Sam Peckinpah has taken hold of your mental faculties.”
Delbert said, “I’ll take your word for it. But I also know that nine sets of eyes, collecting images from nine different perspectives, then shoving them across nine different sets of synapses and neurons, are apt to process things a bit differently. Any experienced attorney or investigator knows that.”
“What about the fact that Sanchez never reported the situation they were in, nor did he report the ambush, even after they’d extricated?”
“I don’t know,” Delbert said. “It’s an intriguing question. Maybe he was worried about the repercussions. He’s been passed over for major once. This year is his last chance. He’s got a wife, two kids, and a file that’s borderline. He’d be dead in the water if someone decided they didn’t like how he got his team out of there.”
Morrow, who had been idly watching us argue, tapped her pencil on the table a few times to get our attention. She was going to make a fine judge someday.
She stared at me. “I watched you with Sanchez. I thought you were bullying him.”
“So you thought my interrogation technique was flawed?”
“It was flawed. You browbeat him into making inaccurate statements. I haven’t listened to the tapes, but maybe you did that with the others as well.”
“Come on, Morrow, these are battle-hardened veterans.”
“And this is the Army, and you’ve got those big, shiny, gold major’s leaves pinned to your collar. Most of them are noncoms, and now you’re wondering why they lied about how many flares went off.”
“You think I badgered them?”
She gave me an exasperated look. “I think you’re predisposed. That’s the way you come off. You made them nervous. I’m not saying they’re innocent; I’m saying your approach was flawed.”
“She’s right,” Delbert said.
I could’ve defended myself, but the truth is, they were right. I was predisposed. I believed in my bones that Sanchez and his men were lying. And if you could call dubious looks, eye-rolling, verbal baiting, and finger-pointing a bullying technique, then I was guilty. I’d used the authority of my rank and the odor of my official position to coerce them into answering my questions. I could see where Delbert and Morrow thought that I’d instigated the very inconsistencies, mistruths, and fabrications I was now complaining about.