I said to the MP sergeant, "Will you unlock Colonel Moore, please?"
"Yes, sir." He unlocked Moore's cell and asked me, "Cuffs?"
"Yes, please, Sergeant."
The MP sergeant barked at Moore, "Wrists, front!"
Moore thrust his clenched hands to his front, and the sergeant snapped the cuffs on him.
Without a word, we walked down the long, echoing corridor, past the mostly empty cells. Moore, in his stockinged feet, made no echoes. There are few places on this earth more dismal than a cell block, and few scenes more melancholy than a prisoner in handcuffs. Moore, for all his intellectualizing, was not handling this well, which was the purpose.
We went into an interrogation room, and the sergeant left us. I said to Moore, "Sit."
He sat.
Cynthia and I sat at a table opposite him.
I said to him, "I told you that the next time we spoke, it would be here."
He didn't reply. He looked a little frightened, a little dejected, and a little angry, though he was trying to suppress that, since he realized it wouldn't do him any good. I said to him, "If you'd told us everything you knew the first time, you might not be here."
No reply.
"Do you know what makes a detective really, really angry? When the detective has to waste valuable time and energy on a witness who's being cute."
I verbally poked him around awhile, assuring him that he made me sick, that he was a disgrace to his uniform, his rank, his profession, his country, and to God, the human race, and the universe.
All the while, Moore stayed silent, though I don't think this was an expression of his Fifth Amendment right to do so as much as it was his accurate estimate that I wanted him to shut his mouth.
Cynthia, meanwhile, had taken the printouts of the diary and had gotten up and left for most of the verbal abuse. After about five minutes, she came back without the printouts, but she was carrying a plastic tray on which was a Styrofoam cup of milk and a donut.
Moore's eyes flashed to the food, and he stopped paying attention to me.
Cynthia said to him, "I brought you this." She set the tray down out of his reach and said to him, "I've asked the MP to unlock your cuffs so you can eat. He'll be here when he gets a moment."
Moore assured her, "I can eat with my cuffs on."
Cynthia informed him, "It's against regulations to make a prisoner eat with wrist manacles, chains, cuffs, and such."
"You're not making making me. I'm perfectly willing to-" me. I'm perfectly willing to-"
"Sorry. Wait for the sergeant."
Moore kept looking at the donut, which, I suspected, was the first mess hall donut he'd ever shown any interest in. I said to him, "Let's get on with this. And don't jerk us around like you did the last few times. Okay, to show you how much shit you're in, I'm going to tell you what we already know from the forensic evidence. Then you're going to fill in the details. First, you and Ann Campbell planned this for at least a week-from the time her father gave her the ultimatum. Okay, I don't know whose idea it was to re-create the West Point rape"-I stared at him and saw his reaction to this, then went on-"but it was a sick idea. Okay, you called her at Post Headquarters, coordinated the times, and drove out to rifle range five, where you pulled across the gravel lot and behind the bleachers there. You got out of your car, carrying the tent pegs, rope, a hammer, and so forth, and also a mobile phone, and maybe the tape player. You walked along the corduroy trail to the latrines at rifle range six, and perhaps called her again from there to confirm that she'd left Post Headquarters."
I spent the next ten minutes re-creating the crime for him, basing my narrative on forensic evidence, conjecture, and supposition. Colonel Moore looked duly impressed, very surprised, and increasingly unhappy.
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, might 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."