P Deutermann - Darkside

Jim stirred his own coffee. GIGO was one of the not-so-secret code words around the office. Garbage in, garbage out. Given all that the Academy had accomplished over the years, it wasn’t fair that the 1 percent that was garbage could absolutely demolish the reputation of the 99 percent who were gold. It reminded Jim of his time in the Corps-he had spent 90 percent of his personnel admin time on 5 percent of his Marines.

He went to his own cube to find out the commandant’s schedule for the day. Saturdays were more flexible than regular workdays, and he wanted to back-brief him on what he’d learned about the NCIS investigation. Then he wanted to call the hospital and check on Bagger. He still felt bad about the Guinness. He should have been paying more attention.

He wondered if Branner would really call him to go out. That might be more of a thrill than he could stand at his advancing age.

Ev had spent Saturday morning in the Nimitz Library, doing some research on the Uniform Code of Military Justice and its bible, the Manual for Courts-Martial. The academic offices in Sampson were only about half-occupied for Saturday classes, especially as the academic year drew to a close. Ev taught mostly seniors, and they were definitely slacking off at this stage of the game.

The rainsqualls had quit just after sunrise and the morning dawned cool and clear, with eye-dazzling sunlight. Looking out the office windows, Ev could see the first clumps of weekend tourists filtering down from the Maryland Avenue gate. Now back in his office, he put a call into Liz at home, got voice mail. He tried her office number.

“Morning, counselor,” he said. “I talked to Julie last night. I think we have a problem.”

“Now what?”

“Julie wants to unlawyer. My fault, probably. I got clumsy, made one probe too many.” He filled her in.

“And it was the question about her getting up for early swim practice that set her off?” she asked.

“Yes.”

“Did she actually answer it?”

He thought back for a moment. “No. So I’ve put a call in to the varsity swim coach to see if they’re still doing the prereveille sessions, and if so, whether Julie has been involved. But this business about her talking to the NCIS people without you being present…”

“You told her that she’d be going against my advice?”

“Hell, I told her you’d fire her as a client.”

“I won’t do that, not yet anyway. But now you’re definitely going to have to get into this, Ev. She obviously doesn’t want to talk to me just now, and she won’t until they scare her.”

“I understand,” he said. “Let me start with the coach. I think we need to establish whether or not Julie could have been out of her room that night-or early morning, I guess.”

“Exactly,” she said. “Oh, I ran into one of the marshals at the sub shop a little while ago. He’s heard a rumor that one of the agents from the Academy NCIS office apparently got into some kind of trouble out in town last night. The nice black guy. The word is, he’s in the hospital. It gets kinda fuzzy as to what happened, which means the local cops are probably sitting on something.”

“Well, maybe that will distract NCIS, vis-a-vis Julie,” he said hopefully.

“One can always hope,” she said. “But call me when you hear from that coach. I won’t do anything until I hear from you.”

“Thanks, Liz. For not jumping ship, I mean. She needs you. She just doesn’t know it.”

“Not to burst your bubble, Ev, but if she won’t do what I tell her to, I can’t represent her. But let her swim with the sharks for a while, see how she likes it.”

“Now there’s a comforting image for a father to hear.”

“Ev, Julie’s well out of the nest. All those kids over there are. Call me at home when you have something.”

Ev put down the phone and stared at the wall in front of his desk. It was now past noon, and the Academy weekend had officially begun. He’d changed into his running clothes, then sat back down at his desk to finish reading his notes on suspects’ rights. The leather of his chair was starting to stick to the backs of his thighs. Goddamn, Julie. This is the wrong time to get pigheaded. He decided to jog over to MacDonough Hall to see if he could chase down Coach Downing in his office or at the Nat. It being Saturday, he was probably going to fail, but he needed to do something.

He stepped outside, did his warm-up, and then broke into a gentle jog across Radford Terrace and down onto Ingram Field, where there was only the Saturday complement of midshipmen and officers out for their daily running exercise. Physical fitness was an integral part of Naval Academy life, for everyone-faculty, staff, and midshipmen. Even on a liberty day, people were still exercising. Being fat or even out of shape at the Naval Academy was a cultural offense, from the admiral on down to the lowliest plebe.

He made ten circuits of the track to kill some time through the lunch hour and then cooled down by walking over to MacDonough. He went upstairs to the coaches’ office complex, which was, as he suspected, already empty for the weekend. He asked a passing mid if he’d seen Coach Downing in the building. The coach was down at the training pool with some Class IV swimmers. Ev went back down to the Natatorium, where he found Downing in the water, finishing up a lesson on the basics of the survival breaststroke. The Class Fours, as they were called, were midshipmen who couldn’t swim either because they just couldn’t get it or because they were basically terrified to be in the water. The Nat was not designed with a shallow end, so there were several frightened young faces bobbing along the side of the pool. They had also missed the noon meal.

Downing, a sixty-year-old former national diving champion, launched the last two plebes from the side, one with each hand. They thrashed their way to the other side with all the style of a light-loaded ship’s propeller that is half out of the water. Then he blew his whistle and sent everyone to the locker room. The clinging plebes came out of the water like so many salmon trying to get up a dam’s spillway. Downing climbed out of the water in one graceful spring to the side, and Ev walked over. Because of Julie, the coach recognized Ev immediately.

“Hey, Professor: Come to do a tower jump for old times’ sake?”

“Not exactly, Coach. Had a question for you. It concerns the swim team. And Julie.”

To Ev’s surprise, he thought he saw a flicker of apprehension in Downing’s eyes. “Shoot,” Downing said, reaching for a towel.

“Is the swim team still doing the zero-dark-thirty practice sessions?”

“Prereveille? Negative. We’ve just finished up the regular competition season. We’re in the maintenance mode these days. And the firsties like your daughter, they’re just swimming for exercise, if they’re swimming at all. You know, graduation looms. They’re almost through.”

Ev thanked him, said, “See you,” and started to walk away.

“Ev?” Downing said. “This isn’t about that Dell mess, is it?”

Ev stopped and almost unconsciously glanced around to see if anyone was listening in, but the pool area was empty. Downing came over.

“I’ve heard some disturbing rumors,” he said quietly. “One involves Julie.”

“The underwear thing?”

“So you’ve heard about that? Well, of course she would have told you.”

“It’s true. Although Julie thinks it’s probably a laundry mistake.”

“That he was wearing them?”

“No, no, that he had them in his possession. Surely there was nothing going on between Dell, a plebe, and my daughter, right?”

“Not that I ever saw. We have some swim team romances every year; Julie and Tommy Hays, for instance. But no, Dell was a diver. Nice form, but not quite good enough for varsity stuff. I let him stay on as a manager on the plebe bench. Plebes know to keep their distance from firsties.”