The General's Daughter

  I continued, “You called the general’s red phone, and when he answered, Ann played the taped message. It was then, knowing you had about twenty minutes or so, that you both began to set the stage. She undressed in or near the jeep in case someone came along unexpectedly. You put her things in a plastic bag which you left at the humvee. Correct?”

  “Yes.”

  “She kept her watch on.”

  “Yes. She wanted to keep track of the time. She could see the watch face, and she thought that would be reassuring somehow as she waited for her parents.”

  Odd, I thought, but a lot less odd than the scene that presented itself to me the first time I saw her naked and staked out, wearing a watch and nothing else. In fact, I had come a long way since that morning, when I thought I was looking at the work of a homicidal rapist. In truth, the crime had taken place in phases, in stages, and the genesis of the crime was a decade old, and what I saw was not what it seemed to all the world to be. What I saw was the end product of a bizarre night that could have ended differently.

  I said to Moore, “By the way, did you notice if she had her West Point ring on?”

  He replied without hesitation, “Yes, she did. It was a symbolic link to the original rape. It was engraved with her name on the inside, of course, and she intended to give it to her father as a token of some sort—as a way of saying that the bad memories that it symbolized were in his possession, and she did not want to be reminded of them again.”

  “I see. . .” My goodness, this was a unique, if somewhat troubled, woman. And it occurred to me that there was some sort of psychosexual thing between father and daughter that was buried deep down there, and probably Moore understood it, and maybe all the Campbells understood it, but I damned sure didn’t want to know about it.

  I exchanged glances with Cynthia, and I think she had the same thought that I did. But back to the crime in question. I said to Moore, “Then you both walked out on the range, picked a spot at the base of the closest pop-up target about fifty meters from the road, and she lay down and spread her arms and legs.” I looked at him and asked, “How does it feel to be thought of as a handy eunuch?”

  He showed a flash of anger, then controlled it and said, “I have never taken sexual advantage of a patient. No matter how bizarre you may think this therapy was, it was designed to help, to act as a catharsis for both parties. The therapy did not include me having sex with, or raping, my patient when she was tied up.”

  “You’re one hell of a guy, an absolute paragon of professional standards. But let me not get myself all pissed-off again. What I want to know from you is what happened after you tied the last knot. Talk to me.”

  “All right. . . Well, we spoke a moment, and she thanked me for risking so much to assist her in her plan—”

  “Colonel, cut the self-serving crap. Continue.”

  He took a deep breath and went on. “I walked back to the humvee, collected the plastic bag of clothes, and also my briefcase, which I had used to carry the tent stakes and rope, and which now held only the hammer, then I went to the latrine sheds behind the bleacher seats and waited.”

  “Waited for what? For whom?”

  “Well, for her parents, of course. Also, she was concerned that someone else might come by first and see her humvee, so she asked me to stay until her parents got there.”

  “And what were you supposed to do if anyone else showed up first? Hide your head in the toilet bowl?”

  I felt Cynthia kick me under the table, and she took over the interview. She asked Moore, nicely, “What were you supposed to do, Colonel?”

  He looked at her, then at the donut, then at her again and replied, “Well, I had her pistol in the plastic bag. But. . . I don’t know exactly what I was supposed to do, but if anyone else came along and saw her before her parents did, I was prepared to see that no harm came to her.”

  “I see. And it was at this point that you used the latrine?”

  Moore seemed a little surprised, then nodded. “Yes. . . I had to use the latrine.”

  I said to him, “You were so scared, you had to piss. Right? Then you washed your hands like a good soldier, then what?”

  He stared at me, then directed his reply to Cynthia. “I stood behind the latrine shed, then I saw the headlights on the road. The vehicle stopped, and when the driver’s side door opened, I could see it was the general. In any case, it was full moonlight, and I recognized Mrs. Campbell’s car, though I didn’t see her.” He added, “I was afraid that General Campbell might not take his wife along.”

  “Why?”

  “Well. . . without Mrs. Campbell, the situation had the potential to get out of hand. I never thought that the general would he able to approach his own daughter, naked. . . I was fairly certain that, if it were only those two, the sparks would fly.”

  Cynthia looked at him a long moment, then asked, “Did you stay around for the exchange between General Campbell and his daughter?”

  “No.”

  “Why not?”

  “We decided that I should not. As soon as I was sure it was the general, I threw the plastic bag with her clothing onto the latrine roof, then I hurried back along that log trail. It was about a five-minute walk back to my car, and I couldn’t be certain how long this exchange between the two was going to last. I wanted to get my car on the road and head back toward post as soon as possible, which I did.”

  Cynthia asked, “And did you see any other vehicle on the road as you were driving back to post?”

  “No, I did not.”

  Cynthia and I glanced at each other, and I looked at Moore. I said to him, “Colonel, think. Did you see any other headlights going in either direction?”

  “No. Absolutely not. That’s what I was concerned about. . .” He added, “I was certain I wasn’t seen.”

  “And you saw no one on foot?”

  “No.”

  “Did you see or hear anything when you were at rifle range five or six? How about at the latrine, the humvee, on the trail?”

  He shook his head. “No.”

  “So after you left, someone killed her.”

  “Yes. I left her alive.”

  “Who do you think killed her?”

  He looked at me, sort of surprised. “Well, the general, of course. I thought you knew that.”

  “Why do you say that?”

  “Why? You know what happened. You know that my part was only to help her re-create the rape scene for her parents to see. He got there—I saw him with my own eyes—and later that morning she was found strangled. Who else could have done it?”

  Cynthia asked him, “What did she expect her parents to do? What did she say to you about that?”

  Moore thought a moment, then replied, “Well. . . I think she expected them to. . . She didn’t know quite how they were going to deal with what they saw, but she fully expected them to get her out of there no matter how difficult it was for them.” He added, “She knew they wouldn’t leave her there, so they would be forced to confront her, confront her nakedness, her shame and humiliation, and to physically undo her bonds, and thereby psychologically free not only her but themselves.” He looked at us. “Do you understand?”

  Cynthia nodded. “Yes, I understand the theory.”

  I put in my opinion. “Sounds screwy to me.”

  Moore said to me, “If Mrs. Campbell had been there, it might have worked. Certainly, it would not have ended in tragedy.”

  “Well, the best-laid plans of shrinks usually go astray.”

  He ignored me and said to Cynthia, “Could you at least pass that cup of milk here? I’m very dry.”

  “Sure.” Cynthia put the milk near his manacled hands, and he took the cup with both hands and drained it in one long gulp. He put the cup down, and we all stayed silent for a minute or so while Moore savored the milk as if it were a glass of that cream sherry he liked.

  Cynthia said to him, “Did she ever indicate to you that she thought her father might come alone, mi
ght become enraged, and actually kill her?”

  Moore answered quickly, “No! If she had, I would never have agreed to her—to the plan.”

  I nodded to myself. I didn’t know if that was true or not, and only two people did. One of them was dead, the other, sitting here, was going to lie about it to mitigate what he’d done. The general himself knew, of course, how he’d felt in that moment when his daughter had hurled the challenge at him. But he couldn’t even tell himself what he felt, and he wasn’t going to tell me. In a way, it didn’t matter anymore.

  Cynthia asked the prisoner, “Did it occur to you or Ann Campbell that the general did not come prepared to free his daughter—I don’t mean psychologically—I’m referring to a knife or stake puller.”

  Moore replied, “Yes, she considered that. In fact, I stuck a bayonet in the ground. . . you found that, didn’t you?”

  Cynthia asked, “Where was the bayonet?”

  “Well. . . sort of between her legs. . . The men who raped her at West Point took her bayonet and jammed it in the ground, close to her. . . her vagina, then warned her about not reporting what happened, then she was cut loose.”

  Cynthia nodded. “I see. . .”

  Moore continued, “She was trying to shock him, of course, shock both of them, and they were going to have to retrieve the bayonet and cut her loose. Then she thought he would offer her his shirt or jacket. I’d left her bra there, and her panties were around her neck, as I’m sure you found them. That’s how they had left her in the woods at West Point. They’d thrown her clothes around, and she’d had to retrieve them in the dark. In this case, however, she intended for her parents to help her back to the humvee, then she intended to tell her father where her clothes were—on top of the latrine—and make him go get them. She’d left her handbag in the humvee with her keys, and it was her intention to get dressed and drive off as if nothing had happened, then return to duty at Post Headquarters. Then she was going to show up at the breakfast meeting she had with her parents, and, at that point, they would all confront the issues.”

  Again Cynthia nodded. She asked, “Did she have much hope for this breakfast meeting?”

  He considered a moment, then replied, “Yes, I think she did. Depending, of course, on how her father and mother had reacted to the rape scene. Well, as it turned out, Mrs. Campbell had not come along. But I think that Ann realized that whatever forces she unleashed that night, no matter how her father reacted, things could not get any worse. There is a high risk with shock therapy, but when you’ve nothing left to lose, when you’ve hit bottom, then you’re ready to gamble everything and hope for the best.”

  Cynthia nodded again, the way they tell you to do in the interrogation manual. Be positive, affirming. Don’t appear stone-faced, or judgmental, or skeptical when a suspect is rolling. Just keep nodding, like a shrink during a therapy session. Perhaps Moore recognized the technique, which was ironic, but in his present mental and physical state, all he wanted was a smile, a nod, and the stupid donut. Cynthia asked him, “Did she tell you why she had hope for this meeting? I mean, why this time, after all those years?”

  “Well. . . she was finally ready to forgive. She was prepared to say anything that morning, to promise anything that would make things right again. She was tired of the war, and she felt the catharsis even before she’d gone out to the rifle range. She was hopeful, almost giddy, and to tell you the truth, she was happy and close to peace for the first time since I’d known her.” He took a long breath and looked at us, then said, “I know what you think of me, and I don’t blame you, but I had only her best interests at heart. She had seduced me, too, in another way, and I went along with what I knew was. . . unorthodox. But if you could have seen how optimistic she was, how almost girlish she was acting—nervous, frightened, but filled with hope that this was the end of the long nightmare. . . In fact, however, I knew that the damage she had done to herself and others was not going to disappear just like that, just because she was going to say to her parents, ‘I love you, and I forgive you if you forgive me’. . . but she believed this, and she had me believing it too. . . But she miscalculated. . . I miscalculated her father’s rage. . . and the irony is, she thought she was so close to being happy again. . . and she kept rehearsing what she was going to say to them that night. . . and at breakfast. . .”

  Then the oddest thing happened. Two tears rolled down Moore’s cheeks, and he put his face in his hands.

  Cynthia stood and put her hand on his shoulder and motioned me to come with her. We went out into the corridor, and she said to me, “Let him go, Paul.”

  “Hell, no.”

  “You got your jailhouse interview. Let him go sleep in his office, attend the funeral tomorrow. We’ll deal with him tomorrow or the next day. He’s not going anywhere.”

  I shrugged. “All right. God, I’m getting soft.” I went to the guard office and spoke to the sergeant. I filled out a confinement release form and signed it—I hate confinement release forms—then I walked out to the corridor where Cynthia was waiting for me.

  I said, “He’s free, but restricted to post.”

  “Good. It was the right thing.”

  “We don’t know that.”

  “Paul. . . anger is not going to change anything that happened, and vindictiveness is not going to bring justice. That’s the lesson you should learn from this. Ann Campbell never did. But what happened to her should at least be a useful example of that.”

  “Thank you.”

  We walked to our office, and I sat at the desk, dividing the diary printouts between Cynthia and myself. Before we began to read, I said to her, “What happened to the bayonet?”

  She replied, “I don’t know. If General Campbell never approached his daughter, then he never saw it, and never knew that he could have cut her loose. He told us two versions of that story—one was that he tried to get her free by pulling at the stakes, the other that he couldn’t bring himself to get that close.” She added, “He actually never got that close.”

  “Right. So the next person on the scene—let’s say it was Kent—saw the bayonet, and Kent had the same choice—if it was Kent. Then came the Fowlers, who had their own knife. . . but she was already dead. Then came Sergeant St. John, then MP Casey. . . I don’t know, but it’s interesting that whoever pulled the bayonet out of the ground kept it. . .” I noodled this awhile, then said, “If we accept the general’s second version, that he never went near her, then it wasn’t him. The killer had no reason to take the bayonet. Neither did St. John or MP Casey.”

  “Are you saying the Fowlers took it?”

  “I’m saying that when the Fowlers found her dead, and saw that the means of freeing her was right there between her legs, if you will, they realized that the general had lied to them, that the general had not tried to free her, as I’m sure he told them he did. That, in fact, as General Campbell told us truthfully in the second version, he had kept his distance from her, and they had shouted to each other. So when the Fowlers saw the bayonet, they realized that the general could have freed her, but did not, and as a result, she was dead. Not wanting to tell him this, or have him find out through the official report, they took the bayonet and discarded it. This was another favor they were doing for him, but they weren’t doing us any favors.”

  Cynthia thought a moment, then said, “Yes, that’s probably what happened.” She looked at me. “And her West Point ring?”

  “Beats the hell out of me.”

  “The Fowlers again?”

  “Possible. Another favor, though I don’t get it. Maybe the killer took it as a sentimental remembrance. I don’t think MP Casey or St. John would do something so ghoulish, but you just never know what people are going to do in the presence of a dead body. Then again, maybe the general got a little closer to his daughter than he said. He took the bayonet, considered cutting her loose, then changed his mind, took her ring off, and told her she was dishonoring her uniform, or lack of same, and left—then had a chan
ge of heart and drove to the Fowlers. Who knows? Who cares at this point?”

  “I do. I have to know how people act, what goes on in their hearts. It’s important, Paul, because it’s what makes this job more than what’s in the manual. Do you want to become like Karl Hellmann?”

  I forced a smile. “Sometimes, yes.”

  “Then you’ll never again be able to determine a motive or understand who is good and who is evil.”

  “Sounds okay to me.”

  “Don’t be contrary.”

  “Speaking of motives, of good and evil, of passion, jealousy, and hate, let’s give this stuff a quick read.”

  We read for a while and discovered what William Kent’s sexual preferences were, but more important, I discovered that Ann Campbell considered him a growing problem. I said to Cynthia, “Here’s an entry from last month.” I read aloud, “ ‘Bill is becoming possessive again. I thought we solved that problem. He showed up here tonight when Ted Bowes was here. Ted and I hadn’t gone downstairs yet, and Bill and he had a drink in the living room, and Bill was nasty to him and pulled rank on him. Finally, Ted left, and Bill and I had words. He says he’s prepared to leave his wife and resign his commission if I promise to live with him or marry him or something. He knows why I do what I do with him and the other men, but he’s starting to think there’s more to it with us. He’s pressing me, and I tell him to stop. Tonight, he doesn’t even want sex. He just wants to talk. I let him talk, but I don’t like what he’s saying. Why do some men think they have to be knights in shining armor? I don’t need a knight. I am my own knight, I am my own dragon, and I live in my own castle. Everyone else are props and bit players. Bill is not very cognitive. He doesn’t understand, so I don’t try to explain. I did tell him I’d consider his offer, but in the meantime, would he only come here with an appointment? This put him into a rage, and he actually slapped me, then ripped off my clothes and raped me on the living room floor. When he was done, he seemed to feel better, then left in a sulk. I realize he could be dangerous, but I don’t care, and, in fact, of all of them, he’s the only one except for Wes who has actually threatened me or hit me, and it’s the only thing that makes Bill Kent interesting.’ ”