P Deutermann - Darkside

He looked around. It was close to eleven o’clock and already the first of the noontime joggers were out on Ingram. He watched for a few minutes to see if anyone appeared to be interested in what he was doing out there on the seawall. He was dressed in his usual coat and tie office outfit. Probably look like just another alumnus, he thought, recalling those thrilling days of yesteryear when he’d been a midshipman. And the program had been a whole lot tougher then, by God, sir. A whole lot tougher. He grinned and went to see if he could find a sandwich somewhere before his noon meeting.

As he was walking back up into the Yard, his cell phone chirped. It was the lady lawyer, Liz DeWinter.

“Mr. Hall,” she said. “Got a minute to talk?”

“I’m on my cell,” he warned.

“Yes, I know. Your chief gave me your number. This concerns a person of mutual interest.”

Julie Markham, he thought. “Go ahead.”

“What’s your current thinking on the railroad business, Mr. Hall?”

He found an empty park bench and sat down. A group of Japanese tourists were being herded up Stribling toward Mother B. for the noon meal formation. The drum and bungle corps was thumping something martial in the central plaza, the drums echoing madly around the wings of Bancroft, creating a cacophony of rhythms. “The railroad business is still a possibility,” he said. “Although I have no direct indications, I can tell you the management is less than pleased with the subject.”

“My subject.”

“Your subject, yes. Uncooperative is the term, I believe.”

“I’ve heard a rumor, Mr. Hall. That the subject might be held back on throw-the-hats day. Until the matter is resolved. Can they do that?”

“Absolutely, counselor. Sometimes there are matters of academic probation to resolve. Sometimes health issues-whether the candidate for commissioning is still physically qualified for commissioning, for instance. Football players end up in that situation often enough.”

“So they can if they want to?”

“Affirmative.”

“Any progress on the underlying issue?”

“Not that I can share. But I can offer some advice.”

“Shoot.”

“The subject should stop screwing around.” Then something else occurred to him. “You might also probe whether or not she’s under some kind of pressure other than from the system. Anyone, inside or outside, another mid even.”

Liz didn’t answer right away. “Noted,” she said finally. “I’ll get in touch with the subject as soon as possible.”

He looked at his watch. “Time is probably of the essence, counselor,” he said, thinking of the meeting coming up in fifteen minutes. He reminded himself to tell Branner about this call.

Jim and Branner arrived together at the commandant’s office right at noon. The noon meal formation was just getting under way out front. The secretary went to get Captain Rogers, then returned to show them into Rogers’s office, where they found the captain and Midshipman Hays standing next to the deputy’s desk.

“What do you have for us, Mr. Hays?” Branner asked.

“Nothing to report, ma’am,” Hays replied, facing straight ahead and not looking directly at either of them.

“What the hell? Over,” Jim said quietly.

“Sir, I spoke at length with Midshipman Markham. She insists she knows nothing about the Dell incident. She doesn’t know what happened to him or why it happened. She said we could ask anybody, talk to anybody, but it wouldn’t change anything.”

“And that’s it?” Branner said. “All this stuff about the big bad Brigade Honor Committee in the sky-she didn’t care?”

“I’m sure she cares, ma’am,” Hays said, his demeanor stiffly formal. “But she insists she’s telling the truth.”

“In other words: You do your damnedest; I don’t care because I’ve nothing to hide?” Jim said.

“Yes, sir, essentially that’s it.”

Captain Rogers intervened. “We said at the outset that the Honor Committee had no real leverage here unless Midshipman Markham was hiding something,” he said. “If she isn’t, there’s no case, honor or otherwise.”

“I don’t actually recall you saying that,” Branner said. She stared at Hays. “You’re telling me that you got nowhere? That even the threat of an honor investigation this close to graduation didn’t make any difference to Markham?”

Hays glanced over at Rogers. “Not sure how to answer that, ma’am,” Hays said.

Branner shook her head and looked at Jim. “I think we’re done here, Mr. Hall,” she announced. “Now we’ll do it the hard way.”

“What exactly does that mean, Agent Branner?” Rogers asked.

“It means I detect obstruction, Captain. I’m going to report to my chain of command that I smell a cover-up in progress, aided and abetted by the Academy’s administration. Mr. Hall, we’re outta here.” She headed for the door, her face flushed with anger.

“But-but-” Rogers spluttered.

“You say graduation was planned for when, Captain?” Branner said over her shoulder. “You know the old deal when there’s a homicide investigation and the cops tell the suspects, all the suspects, not to leave town?”

Rogers gaped at her as she led Jim through the door and out into the executive corridor. There they had to wait as the entire Brigade, all four thousand of them, filed through the side doors on their way down to the mess hall. Once the way was clear, they went through the big doors and down the steps toward Tecumseh Court, where the crowd of tourists was breaking up after watching the show. Branner’s heels were clacking forcefully on the brickwork. Jim decided not to speak until they were halfway across the courtyard in front of Bancroft Hall.

“And the Oscar goes to-” he said.

“Shut up and keep walking,” she said. “They’re probably watching.”

“And thinking about getting clean skivvies,” he said with a barely suppressed grin. “Did you see Rogers’s face when you threatened to hold up graduation?”

“I did, and it made me feel just a wee bit better.”

“Not that you can do anything of the sort.”

“No, I can’t. But they don’t have to know that just yet. I need to call Harry Chang.”

They turned left at the bronze bust of Chief Tamamend, the massive figurehead from the sailing ship Delaware, which adorned the entrance to Bancroft Hall’s front courtyard. By tradition, everyone called him Tecumseh, hence Tecumseh Court. “I was really hoping that honor thing would work,” she said. “But it looks like Markham’s holding her ground. We’re nowhere.”

“Maybe, maybe not,” Jim said. “I was watching Hays through all that. He wouldn’t look at either one of us directly. I think I need to get to him in private, somehow. Find out what really happened.”

She stopped and turned to face him. “I think they just went through the motions. Of course I was grandstanding in there, but that doesn’t mean I’m not pissed. Hays very clearly implied to us that someone had something on Julie Markham. Now suddenly we get stonewalled? Bullshit.”

“He may have been under orders, based on the way Captain Rogers was acting. This may be the shutdown we’ve been anticipating.”

They reached Branner’s car, which was parked illegally in one of the chapel spaces. A Yard cop car was pulling up behind it, but Jim waved him off.

“I’m going back to the office,” she said. “I may have to go up to headquarters if I keep getting voice mail every time I call up there.”

“You being shut out, too?”

She thought about that. “Maybe.”

“Remember that meeting this morning. They might be squeezing all the local players out of the loop. Oh, and I heard from Markham’s lawyer this morning.” He told her what Liz had said.