JACK LOOKED FOR JULIE IN THE BACK OF THE COURTROOM. Their eyes met. He took a deep breath.
“Mr. Prado, before the break I’d asked if it were not true that Roger Girardin was one of the men assigned to mine clearing. But more directly, let me ask you, Mr. Prado, do you know what happened to Roger Girardin?” Nick asked, his shoulders noticeably slumped.
“I once believed I’d killed him!”
Doubting what he had just heard, Nick asked for confirmation. “You? I’m sorry, Mr. Prado, please repeat that?”
The courtroom stilled. Jack planted his face in the palm of his hands. Nick asked quietly, “Mr. Prado, why did you believe you killed Roger Girardin?”
“It’s a long story,” Jack said, sounding completely spent.
“You knew Roger before the war, did you not?”
“Of course,” he answered, as if everybody knew.
“He was your sister’s boyfriend?” Nick asked, guardedly.
“Yes,” he answered sheepishly.
“Did he die? Are you sure?”
“I’m sure.”
“How did it happen? How did that poor boy die?”
“It comes back to me like a dream remembered. I’d really forgotten, put it far back in my mind, until I heard Mr. Preston. Sometime, late winter ’53, they sent a few of us to clear mines, like Mr. Preston said. A bunch of us, me and Roger. Don’t remember the other names. I was out of it most of the time. A zombie—I felt like a zombie. Guards gave us iron rods, pickaxes, you know. We had to stab the ground, looking for mines, because it was snowed over.”
“Was Trent Hamilton there?” Nick asked.
“Don’t know. Don’t see him when I try to remember. But I see the dog that followed him. Strange, I don’t see Trent, uh, Mr. Hamilton. We were in teams of two or three. Teams were two, three hundred yards apart. I see me and Roger away from the rest, poking around a mound next to some woods. All of a sudden, an explosion. Guard went down—blew his leg off at the knee. Dead, I figure. I see Roger, too. He’s about ten feet from me... on the ground. When I get to him, he’s bleedin’ from the gut. I put my hand on his coat. It’s warm, wet. He’s in shock. I figure... still able to know what was goin’ on. Asks me, how bad. I don’t know. ‘Don’t let me die like this,’ he begs. Blood soaks his coat. ‘Can’t do it,’ I tell him. ‘Do it... do it before they come, don’t let me die like this.’ I’d been in a fog. I don’t know what to do. If his gut’s opened? The worst. You die, slow. Hear men yelling, getting closer. I see the dog.”
Lindquist looked to the back of the room where Julie sobbed openly. “I am afraid I will have to ask the marshal to escort out anyone who may be interrupting these proceedings.”
Nick waited until the courtroom quieted down. “Trent’s dog?”
“Yeah, the mongrel.”
“And Trent?”
“Like I said, no. But I’m confused. I turned Roger on his side. The guard with no legs had a rifle. I ran over got it, ran toward Roger. It’s hazy. Thought I heard a shot.”
“What do you mean ‘thought you heard a shot?’” Nick asked, measuring his words.
“Well, gunfire, but somebody cold-cocked me. Maybe I imagined all of it.”
“Did you fire the weapon?”
“Don’t know.”
“Was the weapon aimed at Roger?”
“Maybe.”
“Was it your intention to kill him, as he begged?”
“Don’t know.”
“What happened then?”
“I came to in the cell in back of the dayroom.”
“Were you grilled?”
“No, left alone. About a week later, brought me out. Bunch of Chinese, maybe five, sitting at a long table. Cho was there and Trent, too—he had the brown dog. Asked me what happened. Trent translated. Told them much as I remembered. Claimed I’d shot him. So I figured I did but couldn’t remember.”
“Shot Roger?” Nick repeated what he had heard. “You figured you’d shot Roger?”
“Yes, yes, shot.”
Stubbornly, Nick wanted Jack to add an element of doubt that he had shot the boy. “But you don’t know for sure?”
“No, no, don’t know for sure.”
“You did not defend yourself?” Nick shouted.
“Told them I saw someone else. Between us, I’m not sure.”
“They didn’t believe you?”
“Guess not.”
“What’d they say?”
“They ordered me to be shot,” Jack gulped.
“Did they say you killed him?”
“No, don’t think they actually said that, no. Said I shot him. I remember they didn’t say I killed him. Next I knew, I was hauled off by half-dozen guards. Walked for a day, toward Manchuria. Crossed the Yalu, over one part that still had ice. Asked if I was going to die, nobody talked.”
“Where’d you end up?”
“A holding cell.”
“How long?”
“’Bout a year, don’t know, seemed like that. Finally, me and about two dozen other guys were taken back to Panmunjom, and the U.N. took us from there.”
“Did you tell the army what happened? When you were released?”
“Told them I thought I might have fired at Roger. Told them up to the point he was wounded, and the rest, yes.”
“When you came home, why didn’t you tell people around you what’d happened? Why did you keep everything to yourself? Tell anyone?”
“’Cause, when I came back, the Army knew what I’d done. It was still a crime to fire your weapon at your own—you know, to kill a soldier. No excuses. Was told by this Army lawyer. Asked a lot of questions about other guys I knew there. If I was ever in Death Valley. A lot of questions about Roger. Asked if he ever told me about any killings of civilians, infiltrators.”
“What are infiltrators?”
“You know, North Koreans dressed sometimes like civilians.” There was a moment of silence.
“Did Roger ever tell you anything about civilians being killed?”
“Yes, and he thought the Army was involved. Said he’d taken pictures.”
“Anything else about the pictures you can remember?”
“Said he thought one of the guys looked familiar.”
Harris jumped up, “Objection, hearsay, move to strike that last answer.”
“Sustained, stricken.”
“Did he tell you who he thought that guy was?”
Harris jumped up again, “Objection, hearsay.”
“Sustained.”
“Tell us what happened next.”
“They’d let me go if I didn’t talk about what happened.”
“And that’s why you didn’t even tell your sister, Julie?”
Jack remained silent.
“Mr. Prado, is that why you didn’t tell Julie, your sister?”
“Figured Julie didn’t need to know. Painful not knowing, but knowing? Was worse. Afraid how she would’ve taken it, you know —me being accused of killing Roger. I was afraid if she learned that... ”
Nick focused on Hamilton. “What about Hamilton? He knew Roger was killed?”
“Yeah, he knew, he knew.”
“Do you think he helped in your life being spared?”
“He would’ve helped if he could have. He always said, ‘Ridley guys stick together.’ He was friendly with Cho, but he wouldn’t let me die.” There was a long hushed moment.
Nick turned to Lindquist, “No further questions, your Honor.”
Harris’s two associates shook their heads in tandem, signaling that Jack hadn’t hurt them —at least, not insofar as the main objective, keeping under wraps the Task Force mission and the fact that over 400 POWs were left behind after the final repatriation. Harris, though, could not leave it where it was, “The government has a few questions of this witness, your Honor.”
Rather than walk to the lectern, he preferred to attack the witness from behind the security of his table. “Mr. Prado, sitting here testifying today, I noticed that you were swaying back and forth. You seemed to, in fact, doze off at one point. Are you well, sir?”
“Yeah, sure.”
“Well, if you are well, let me offer an explanation as to why we saw you dozing off. Sir, you are inebriated? Drunk, aren’t you?”
“No, I ain’t. I have this condition,” Jack said.
“Are you telling this court that you had nothing by way of alcohol before you came here today?”
Jack was silent, looking down at his lap.
“Sir, we need an answer.”
“I don’t think it’s... it’s none of your business.”
“Your Honor, would you please direct the witness to answer?”
“You will answer, sir.”
He looked at the crowd. “So I have a shot to calm my nerves.” He grinned, shrugged his shoulders. “So, what’s the big deal?”
“Sir, you didn’t walk a straight line when you came across the courtroom today, is that not true?
“I walked okay.”
“Did you drive here today?”
“No, I didn’t.”
“You are not sober enough to drive are you?”
“I don’t drive.”
“Are you currently facing charges in Superior Court of resisting arrest, assaulting an officer and criminal trespass for walking along the railroad tracks?”
Nick turned to Art. “Oh, shit!” He said and stood up. “Your Honor, allegations such as this are not relevant.”
“I agree, Counselor, move it along,” Lindquist responded.
Harris defended his line of questioning by trying to tie Jack’s arrest to his admission of having a drink before he came to court that day. “You were drunk that night, weren’t you?”
“Objection.”
“Sustained.”
“I noticed you muttering to yourself Mr. Prado. Isn’t it true that you’ve been diagnosed as a paranoid schizophrenic and on occasion exhibit delusional tendencies?”
“No, that’s not... ”
“Aren’t you under the care of a psychiatrist?”
“Yes, I see someone from the VA.”
“Are you capable of separating your dreams from reality?”
“Objection, irrelevant.”
“Sustained.”
“Your Honor, records obtained from the army and the VA tell us that this witness has a long history of delusional tendencies, and we suggest that his testimony here today about seeing Roger is simply another manifestation of that illness.”
Lindquist turned to Nick. “Counsel, would you like to comment?”
“No, sir, I think that the Court can well determine Mr. Prado’s ability to testify accurately and truthfully today.”
“Very well, the witness will answer the last question. Clerk, please read it back.”
“Are you capable of separating your dreams from reality?”
Jack hesitated before answering in a weak voice, “Yes, I’m on medication and don’t have those problems.”
“But you were not on medication in Camp 13, were you?”
“No, sir.”
“So it’s possible that all you now remember may have, in fact, been yet another delusion?”
“No, that’s not... ”
“No further questions of this witness.”
***
Nick turned to Art and shook his head. With mouth turned down, Art raised his arm as a sign of success. Nick smiled faintly at Mitch and Kathy. He turned to the crowd, then Lindquist. “Plaintiff rests, your Honor.”
“Mr. Harris, are you calling any witnesses?”
“The Army does not plan on calling anyone, your Honor.”
“Then you rest?”
Lindquist, face wan and drawn, looked at the lawyers and spoke in a quiet voice. “Gentlemen, this concludes the trial portion of this case. I will expect your findings of fact and conclusions of law on my desk no later than two weeks from today.” He sat up, grabbed the temples of his glasses and moved them to the bridge of his nose, before looking at the crowd and saying loudly, “Thank you both for a well conducted trial.”
When the gavel came down and court adjourned, Julie looked for Jack, but he had disappeared. Julie’s mind raced, stunned by what she had heard Jack tell the court. She boarded the bus to Willa Street and Barnum Avenue, its diesel engine warbling and emitting a cloud of black smoke before the driver’s brake forced the strap-hangers to pitch forward. Two sets of accordion-like doors opened with a shisss from its underbelly—the end of the line for Julie and the bodies spent in the south end factories. She walked to the old house, where she found the sink empty, fresh linens on the beds. The house had been vacuumed. Out back, garbage cans were filled, a box brimming over with spent bottles of beer, hard liquor. A bundled pile of newspapers had a note: “For recycling.”
She sat in her grandmother’s chair, thinking about Jack’s small talk and slowly cooled down. She thought about how Jack was not completely to blame. After all, she ignored the signs, the ones Father Ryan talked about. She wanted Roger to materialize in a world that she knew did not produce miracles. Neither Jack nor she ever mentioned what ailed them, what lay buried in their hearts—as much her fault as his. Maybe because they had no name for it. Rather than talk about it, they carried the weight of it—each year stooping lower than the year before, each year further narrowing their gaze into the unsounded future. For Jack, the weight became heavier and heavier until unbearable: a pending divorce, out of work, alcohol, delusions, dark impenetrable things he carried. Anna and she would talk about what bugged him, but they had no choice but to leave it where it was, each year letting it compress his space a little more, each year making him smaller and smaller in a world that did not notice. She could not hold Jack responsible for wanting to keep the pain of Roger’s death from reaching her. In the truest sense, it was an act of devotion.