The Summer House

Chapter 20

Staff Sergeant Caleb Jefferson stares at his late-night visitor and says, “How the hell did you get in here?”

Major Frank Moore, executive officer for the Fourth Battalion, says, “I spun a tale. What else? I told the jail attendant I really, really needed to see you, and she wouldn’t let me in, and then I pulled the weary war vet who needs help bullshit story.”

Jefferson says, “And that got you here?”

Moore shakes his head. “Nah. I had to promise to give her a helicopter ride next week.”

“Sir, you need to leave, right now,” Jefferson says. “This isn’t helping.”

“But you need to know a couple of things, and I sure as hell don’t trust the phones here or at the post,” Moore says.

The major is a good guy and has run interference for him several times with the battalion commander, Lieutenant Colonel Marcello, but Moore’s exposing himself, being an hour away from post and at this town jail.

“All right, sir, but please, make it quick.”

The major is still in his fatigues, and he lowers his voice. “The battalion commander was interviewed earlier today by two CID investigators.”

“I’m sure Marcello told the investigators what fine, upstanding troopers we are.”

Moore smiles. “I had my ear to the door. He threw all of you under the bus, you know, the heavy-duty one with spiked tires.”

“You drove out here to tell me this?” Jefferson asks.

“Staff Sergeant, I’m an officer, but I try not to be stupid,” he says. “The crew that’s here, looking into things... it’s not a typical CID investigation. They’re here from Quantico, and they’re going to poke into anything and everything.”

“I know that,” Jefferson says. “My guys and I were interviewed a few hours ago by a shrink, trying to find out what makes us tick.”

“What did you tell him?”

Jefferson says, “I told the nosy little shit I wet the bed a lot when I was a kid and had mommy issues. What do you think?”

“This isn’t a joking matter, Sergeant.”

“Again, you drove out here to tell me that, sir?” he asks. “Major Moore, did they talk to you as well?”

“That they did,” Moore says. “I told them I hardly knew you and your squad.”

“Good job, sir,” he says, pleased that this officer, at least, is on the beam. “Is there anything else?”

“Your aunt Sophie called me,” he says.

Oh, shit, Jefferson thinks. “No.”

“Yes,” Major Moore says.

“Is everything all right with Carol?”

Moore says, “Oh, yes, Carol is doing fine under the circumstances. What we talked about earlier is all set. But Aunt Sophie knows you and yours are in trouble, and she wants to—”

“No,” Jefferson says.

“Sergeant, all she wants—”

“Sir, no,” Jefferson says. “It’s all under control. Everything is under control, thanks to you. But if my aunt starts making a fuss, it’ll be all done. Game over. You call my aunt on your way home, tell her to keep quiet. Please. Keep quiet.”

“Sergeant, are you sure?”

“A hundred percent,” he says, scraping his chair back. “Call my aunt when you can. Tell her I’m fine, tell her thanks for taking care of my girl. And that I’ll come over for a visit when I can. But be careful. Call my aunt from a pay phone on your way back.”

“Might be hard to find one.”

“Sir, no offense, you better find one,” he says.

Ninety minutes later, Major Frank Moore pulls up to his townhouse in Georgetown, his late-night dinner — fried chicken from a Publix store nearby — sitting on the car’s passenger seat.

Besides a quick meal, this Publix also offered a rare public pay phone outside, which he used to call Staff Sergeant Jefferson’s aunt, Sophie Johnson. The strong-willed and strong-voiced woman seemed to reluctantly agree to her nephew’s request to keep quiet and not stir up a fuss about what was happening to the staff sergeant.

Moore gets out of his Honda CR-V, goes up the brick pathway to the front door. It’s a nice, quiet development, and his wife, Patricia — four months along with their first child — is spending the week visiting her mom in DC. He gets to the door, puts the plastic bag on the steps, and, as he takes the key out to unlock the door, hears rustling in the shrubbery over by the living room windows.

Damn white-tailed deer, he thinks, are getting more and more brazen, coming out and chewing up everyone’s yard, and as he steps back to take a closer look, a man emerges from the shrubbery and says, “Hey, Major Moore.”

Before Moore can reply, the man pulls a pistol with a sound suppressor from his waistband and shoots the Army major in the forehead.