The General's Daughter

  Cynthia and I thought about this a moment, and I suppose a few personal thoughts ran through our minds, and neither of us spoke.

  Finally, Moore said, “Here’s a more relevant example for you: An adolescent or young adult female loves and worships her father. Then one day she overhears him speaking to one of his friends or professional associates, and the father says of his daughter, ‘Jane is a very weird girl, she’s a stay-at-home, hangs around me too much, fantasizes about boys but is never going to have a date because she’s awkward and very plain. I wish she’d get out of the house once in a while, or go find her own place to live.’ ” He looked at us. “Would that devastate a young woman who idolized her father? Would that break her heart?”

  No doubt about it. It broke my heart hearing it, and I’m not even sensitive. I said, “Do you think it was something like that?”

  “Perhaps.”

  “But you don’t know what it was. Why wouldn’t she tell you?”

  “Often, the subject can’t bear to discuss it because to tell the therapist invites judgment or evaluation, which is not what the subject usually wants. The subject knows that the betrayal might not seem so total to an objective listener. Though sometimes the betrayal is enormous by any conventional standards—such as incest. It wasn’t that, but I believe it was terrible by any standards.”

  I nodded as though I were following all of this, and I suppose I was. But the question remained, and I asked it. “Can you take a guess at what it was?”

  “No, and I don’t have to know what her father did to her—I had only to know that he did it, and that it was traumatic. A complete breach of trust after which nothing was ever the same between them.”

  I tried to apply my own standards to this statement, but I couldn’t. In my job, you must know who, what, where, when, how, and why. Maybe Moore knew at least when, so I asked him, “When? When did this happen?”

  He replied, “About ten years ago.”

  “She was at West Point about ten years ago.”

  “That’s correct. It happened to her in her second year at West Point.”

  “I see.”

  Cynthia asked, “And when did she begin to seek revenge? Not immediately.”

  “No, not immediately. She went through the expected stages of shock, denial, then feelings of depression, and finally anger. It wasn’t until about six years ago that she decided she had to seek revenge rather than try to cope with it. She, in fact, became somewhat unstable, then obsessed with her theory that only revenge could make things right.”

  I asked, “And who put her on that path? You or Friedrich Nietzsche?”

  “I refuse to take any responsibility for her campaign against her father, Mr. Brenner. As a professional, I did my job by listening.”

  Cynthia observed, “She might as well have spoken to a canary, then. Didn’t you advise her that this was destructive?”

  “Yes, of course. Clinically, she was doing the wrong thing, and I told her that. But I never promoted it, as Mr. Brenner just suggested.”

  I said, “If her campaign of revenge had been directed toward you, then you’d have been a little less clinically aloof.”

  He stared at me and said, “Understand, please, that sometimes the subject does not want to begin the healing process in a therapeutic way, but wants to hold the grudge and settle the score in his or her own way, usually in a like manner—you betrayed me, I’ll betray you. You seduced my wife, I’ll seduce your wife. Usually, to try to exact a revenge that is similar to the original crime is not realistic or possible. Sometimes it is. Conventional psychology will say that this is not healthy, but the average layperson knows that revenge can be cathartic and therapeutic. The problem is that revenge takes its own mental toll, and the avenger becomes the persecutor.”

  I said to him, “I understand what you’re saying, Colonel Moore, though I’m wondering why you persist in speaking in clinical and general terms. Is that your way of distancing yourself from this tragedy? Your way of avoiding any personal responsibility?”

  He didn’t like that at all and replied, “I resent the implication that I failed to try to help her, or that I encouraged her behavior.”

  “Resent it or not,” I informed him, “it seems to be a strong suspicion in some quarters.”

  “What do you expect from—” He shrugged and said, “Neither I, nor my work here, nor this school, nor my relationship with Ann Campbell, was very much appreciated or understood on this post.”

  I said, “I can relate to that. You know, I’ve seen some of Captain Campbell’s video lectures, and I think you people are performing some vital functions. But maybe you were straying into areas that made people nervous.”

  “Everything we do here is sanctioned by higher command.”

  “I’m glad to hear that. But I think Ann Campbell took some of it out of the classroom and tried it on her own battlefield.”

  Moore didn’t respond to that.

  I asked him, “Do you know why Ann Campbell kept files of therapy sessions with criminals? Sex offenders?”

  He thought a moment, then replied, “I don’t know that she did. But if she did, it was a private pursuit. There’s hardly a psychologist here who doesn’t have an outside project or interest. Most times it has something to do with a Ph.D. program.”

  “Sounds reasonable.”

  Cynthia asked him, “How did you feel about her having sexual relations with multiple partners?”

  He didn’t reply at first, then said, “Well… I… Who told you that?”

  Cynthia said, “Everybody but you.”

  “You never asked.”

  “I’m asking now. How did you personally feel about her having sexual relations with men she didn’t care about just to get at her father?”

  He coughed into his hand, then replied, “Well… I thought it was not wise, especially for the reasons she was doing it—”

  “Were you jealous?”

  “Of course not. I—”

  Cynthia interrupted him again. “Did you feel betrayed?”

  “Certainly not. We had a good, platonic, intellectual, and trusting relationship.”

  I wanted to ask him if that included staking her out naked on the ground, but I had to know why he did it. Actually, I thought I knew why now. And, beyond finding the killer, I could see now, based on what Moore had said so far about betrayal, that Ann Campbell’s life and unhappiness needed to be understood.

  I took a shot in the dark and said to him, “I understand that when you and Captain Campbell were in the Gulf, you proposed a psy-ops program called Operation Bonkers.”

  He replied, “I’m not at liberty to discuss that.”

  “Captain Campbell had great faith in the power of sex as a means to achieve apparently unrelated goals. Correct?”

  “I… Yes, she did.”

  “As I said, I’ve seen her psy-ops lecture series on video, and I can see where she was coming from. Now, while I don’t deny the power of sex, I see it as a force for good, as an expression of love and caring. But somehow, Ann Campbell got it wrong. Would you agree with that?”

  He may have, but he replied, “Sex is neither good nor bad in itself. But it is true that some people—mostly women—use it as a tool, a weapon, to achieve their goals.”

  I turned to Cynthia. “Do you agree with that?”

  She seemed a little annoyed, though I don’t know whom she was annoyed at. She replied, however, “I agree that some women use sex, sometimes, as a weapon, but that is understood to be unacceptable behavior. In the case of Ann Campbell, she may have seen sex as her only weapon against some injustice, or against her feelings of powerlessness. I think, Colonel Moore, if you knew she was doing that, it was your ethical duty, not to mention your duty as her commanding officer, to try to stop it.”

  Moore sort of stared at Cynthia with those beady little eyes and said, “I was not in a position to stop anything.”

  “Why not?” she shot back. “Are you an officer or a cabin
boy? Were you her friend or not? And surely, since you weren’t seduced by her charms, you could have reasoned with her. Or did you find her sexual experiments interesting in a clinical way? Or perhaps you were titillated by the knowledge that she had sex with multiple partners?”

  Moore looked at me and said, “I refuse to answer that or to speak to this woman.”

  I informed him, “You can’t stand behind the Fifth Amendment until we read you your rights as an accused, which I have no intention of doing at this time. It’s frustrating, I know. But we’ll let the question pass for now, and I promise you that Ms. Sunhill will try to phrase her questions so that you don’t mistake them for insubordination.”

  Colonel Moore seemed to see no advantage in keeping up the moral indignation routine, so he nodded and sat back in his chair. The body language said, “You’re both beneath my contempt. Fire away.”

  Cynthia got herself under control, and, in a nonadversarial tone of voice, asked him, “When would Ann Campbell have considered the score even?”

  Moore didn’t look at Cynthia or at me, but replied in a toneless, professional voice, “Unfortunately, only she knew that. Apparently, what she was doing to him was not enough to satisfy her. Part of the problem was General Campbell himself.” Moore smiled, but it was more of a sneer, and said, “This is a general who will not admit he’s being damaged, let alone admit he’s beaten and raise the white flag. To the best of my knowledge, he never asked for a cease-fire, to continue the military metaphor, nor did he ever ask for peace talks. He apparently felt that whatever he had done to her was canceled out by what she was doing to him.”

  “In other words,” Cynthia said, “they were too stubborn to negotiate. He never apologized for his initial betrayal.”

  “Well, he did, in a manner of speaking, but you can guess what sort of apology you’d get from such a man.”

  Cynthia observed, “It’s too bad so many innocent people had to be hurt while these two fought it out.”

  Moore replied, with some surprisingly normal insight, “That’s life, that’s war. When has it been any different?”

  Indeed so, I thought. Or, as Plato said, “Only the dead have seen an end to war.”

  Cynthia asked Colonel Moore, “When you left home on the morning of the murder, did you notice that Ann Campbell’s car was not in front of her house?”

  He thought a moment, then said, “I may have. Subconsciously.”

  “Don’t you normally take note of her car?”

  “No.”

  “So you don’t ever know if your subordinate, neighbor, and friend is still home or on her way to the office.”

  “Well, I suppose on most mornings I do.”

  “Did you ever share a ride?”

  “Sometimes.”

  “Did you know that Captain Campbell had an appointment for breakfast with her parents that morning?”

  “No… well, yes, now that you mention it. She did tell me that.”

  “What was the purpose of this breakfast meeting?”

  “Purpose?”

  “Did the Campbells often get together to enjoy one another’s company?”

  “I suppose not.”

  Cynthia said, “It’s my understanding, Colonel, that General Campbell gave his daughter an ultimatum regarding her behavior, and that Ann Campbell’s reply to that ultimatum was to be given at that breakfast. Correct?”

  Colonel Moore for the first time looked a bit uneasy, probably wondering how much we knew and from whom we knew it.

  “Correct?”

  “I… She did tell me that her father wanted to resolve this problem.”

  Cynthia was getting herself worked up again and said sharply, “Colonel, either she did or didn’t tell you all about this. Either she did or didn’t use words like ultimatum, court-martial, ordered therapy, and resignation from the service. Did she or didn’t she confide completely in you, and did she or didn’t she ask your advice?”

  Colonel Moore was clearly angry again at Cynthia’s tone, but he was also uneasy about this particular question, which had obviously touched on something that frightened him. He must have decided that we could not possibly know enough to hammer him on this, so he replied, “I’ve told you all I know. She never told me what he proposed, and she never asked my advice. I told you, as her therapist I listened, kept my questions to a minimum, and only gave advice when asked.”

  Cynthia replied, “I don’t believe any man is capable of that amount of self-restraint with a woman he’s known for six years.”

  “Then you don’t understand therapy, Ms. Sunhill. I certainly offered advice in terms of her career, assignments, and such, and even personal advice regarding living quarters, vacations, and so forth. But the problems with her family were only discussed in therapy sessions—these were compartmentalized discussions that never spilled over into work or leisure time. This was our firm understanding and we never deviated from it. Medical doctors, for instance, don’t appreciate friends asking them for a diagnosis on the golf course, and attorneys have similar rules about legal advice in bars. Mental health workers are no different.”

  Cynthia replied, “Thank you for that information, Colonel. I see you’ve thought about it. Am I to assume, then, that the deceased never had the opportunity to arrange a formal session with you to discuss this ultimatum and deadline?”

  “That’s correct.”

  “So, after all these years, when this heartache, misery, and anger are about to come to a head, one or both of you was too busy to talk about it.”

  “It was Ann herself who decided not to discuss it with me. We did, however, decide to meet after she’d spoken to her father. In fact, we were to meet yesterday afternoon.”

  Cynthia said, “I don’t believe you, Colonel. I think there is a connection between the general’s ultimatum and what happened to her, and you know what that connection is.”

  Colonel Moore stood. “I will not be called a liar.”

  Cynthia stood also and they glared at each other. Cynthia said, “We already know you’re a liar.”

  Which was true. We knew that Moore had been on rifle range six with Ann Campbell, and I think Moore now realized we knew this. How else could we get away with abusing a full colonel? But we were about half a step over the threshold now, and that was far enough. I stood also. “Thank you for your time, Colonel. Don’t bother to complain to Colonel Kent about us. One all-inclusive complaint is good enough for a week or so.” I added, “I’m posting an MP at your door, sir, and if you attempt to shred any papers or carry anything out of here with you, you’ll be placed under restraint and confined to post.”

  The man was shaking now, but I couldn’t tell if it was from fright or rage, and I didn’t care. He said, “I’m going to bring formal charges against both of you.”

  “I really wouldn’t do that if I were you. We are your last best hope to avoid a noose—or is it a firing squad? I have to check. They just don’t execute enough people for me to remember how they do it. But anyway, don’t piss me off. You know what I’m talking about. Good day, Colonel.”

  And we left him standing there, contemplating his options, which definitely didn’t include pissing me off.

  CHAPTER

  TWENTY-THREE

  Cynthia parked in the provost marshal’s parking field a few spaces away from my Blazer. As we started toward the provost building, we saw three news vans and a group of people outside who were obviously journalists. They saw us coming, and we must have fit someone’s description of the detectives in charge, because they moved toward us like a cloud of locusts. As I said, Hadley is an open post, so you can’t keep the taxpaying citizens out, and you normally don’t want to, but I didn’t need this.

  The first reporter to reach us, a well-dressed young man with coiffed hair, had a microphone, and the grubbier ones around him had pencils and pads. I was aware of cameras turned on us. The coiffed one asked me, “Are you Warrant Officer Brenner?” then put the microphone under my nose.


  “No, sir,” I replied, “I’m here to service the Coke machine.” We kept walking, but this great cloud engulfed us as we continued toward the front doors.

  A female reporter asked Cynthia, “Are you Warrant Officer Sunhill?”

  “No, ma’am, I’m with the Coke guy.”

  But they weren’t buying it, and the questions rained out of this cloud until we finally got to the steps of the provost building, where two huge MPs stood guard with M-16 rifles. I climbed the steps and turned to the crowd, who could go no further, and said, “Good morning.”

  The crowd of journalists became quiet, and I saw now three TV cameras and about a dozen photographers snapping away. I said, “The investigation into the death of Captain Ann Campbell is continuing. We have several leads, but no suspects. However, all the available resources of Fort Hadley, the Army Criminal Investigation Division, and the local civilian police have been mobilized, and we are working on the case in close cooperation. We will schedule a news conference in the near future.” Bullshit.

  Boom! The storm of questions broke, and I could hear a few of them: “Wasn’t she raped, too?” “Was she found tied up and naked?” “Was she strangled?” “Who do you think did it?” “Isn’t this the second rape here within a week?” And interestingly, “Have you questioned her boyfriend, the chief of police’s son?” and so on.

  I replied, “All your questions will be answered at the news conference.”

  Cynthia and I went inside the building, where we bumped into Colonel Kent, who looked unhappy and agitated. He said, “I can’t get them to leave.”

  “No, you can’t. That’s what I love about this country.”