Honour Among Men

by Barbara Fradkin

  “What did your son get his medal for, Mr. MacDonald?”

  MacDonald squared his shoulders and met Green’s gaze with steely pride. “Risking his life for strangers half a world away who didn’t even appreciate what our lads were sacrificing for them, from the sounds of it. The town they were protecting was under fire, and Ian rescued a lot of local villagers. His company commander put him forward for the medal.”

  Mrs. MacDonald’s eyes were brimming again. “On Danny’s recommendation, don’t forget. He was Ian’s section leader.”

  Mr. MacDonald nodded grudgingly. “They were inseparable once.”

  Green leaned forward, his tone soft. “What happened?”

  “What do you mean, what happened? I just told you!”

  “I mean when Ian came home. I understand he had some trouble readjusting to civilian life.”

  “Who told you that?”

  Green took a careful sip of tea. “He changed his plans about vet school and returned to the farm.”

  “And what’s wrong with that? The lad hadn’t been more than a hundred miles from his home his whole life. The apples and hay were just coming in, and there was a lot needed doing on the farm. I think he was grateful for the peace and quiet after Europe.”

  Mrs. MacDonald bent over her tea pot, her lips pursed, but Green thought he saw a tiny spasm of pain flicker across her face. He hated to add to it. “I know this is difficult for you, but I understand he was shot in a hunting accident. Was he alone?”

  Mr. MacDonald surged to his feet, bristling. “I don’t want you putting my wife through this! What do the damn details matter? He was duck hunting down by the creek, just like he loved to do, and the gun misfired. Danny wasn’t with him, if that’s what you’re getting at. Danny hadn’t been near the place in over a year, and if that was eating him up, it damn well should have!”

  He was hunched in the doorway. His wife looked up at him, her cheeks flaming. “Angus, the detectives are just doing their job.”

  “And it shouldn’t involve stirring up Ian’s death, which was a pointless accident. The boy runs through bullets to rescue a bunch of bloody foreigners, and he ends up getting shot with his own rifle in his own backyard!”

  Unexpectedly, Kate McGrath stood up and reached out a soothing hand. “Mr. MacDonald, I’m sorry to put you both through this again. To spare your wife, perhaps you and I can go outside, and you can show me where it happened.”

  MacDonald hesitated, scowling dubiously at Green from under a bristly black eyebrow. “I don’t see any reason for him to be staying in here—”

  “He can keep me company while you’re out,” his wife interjected, collecting her husband’s tea. The cup was untouched, and a faint tremor in her hands sloshed tea into the saucer. “Since Ian’s death, it’s been hard for me . . . to be alone.”

  MacDonald took some convincing, but finally he snatched a sheepskin jacket off its peg, shoved his feet into massive work boots and jerked his head to summon McGrath outside. In the living room, Mrs. MacDonald sank back onto the sofa as if relieved to be rid of him and reached for the teapot.

  “More tea, Inspector?”

  He rose to take the chair closer to her and held out his cup. “Thank you, it’s delicious.”

  She fussed over the cup and added a square of cake to the saucer. A frown pinched her brow, and her eyes avoided his. Green waited, sensing she was building up to something.

  “That’s a terrible thing about the Ross girl,” she said finally. “I remember her. She came to Ian’s funeral with Danny, was a big help to him. Poor lad.”

  “I gather the boys had a pretty rough time in Yugoslavia.”

  “More than many of them bargained for, that’s sure.”

  “Did Ian talk about those times? About what went on, or about the soldiers he was with?”

  “We got letters from many of them when he died. They were so proud of him.” A tremulous smile played across her lips. She thrust aside her tea and struggled to her feet. “Come on, I’ll show you.”

  He followed her through a low doorway and up a steep, narrow, wooden staircase to the upstairs hall. The ancient floorboards creaked as she led the way down a dim hall to a door at the end. When she opened it, light flooded a room barely larger than a closet. Dust motes danced in the shaft of sunlight from a gabled window overlooking the pasture. It was clearly a young man’s room, with a single bed neatly made under the window and an array of homemade shelves along the opposite wall, on which were orderly stacks of clothes, books, CDs and computer equipment. On a dresser by the bed sat a large studio portrait of a young man in a dress suit. He had his father’s blue eyes, poorly tamed brown hair, and a lean hatchet face that he had yet to grow into.

  “That’s his high school prom, the first real photo we ever had taken of him. We never dreamed it would be the last.” Her eyes welled. She tugged open a dresser drawer and bent over it. Inside, he could see piles of cards bound together with elastics.

  “We didn’t want too many people at the funeral,” she said. “Some of his reservists came, but we got cards from all across the country from men in his peacekeeping battalion.”

  His interest piqued, Green came to look over her shoulder. “What did they write?”

  “Mostly about his bravery. Some about his way with the local people, and about how he would always lend a helping hand or a listening ear. Also his gentleness with the animals. Ian always had a way with animals. Those two duck tollers outside, Rob and Roy, he got them as pups when he came back from Yugoslavia, and he trained them completely on his own. Hours, he’d spend with them out in the field. They’re old now, but they still miss him.”

  She picked up one of the letters, opened it, and slid out a simple sympathy card with a long note scrawled on the inside page. “From his first section commander over there, Sergeant Sawranchuk. Ian was as steady and courageous a soldier as any commander could hope for,” she read, “and he was the glue of the section. He took on all tasks, small or large, and endured the many hardships and personal discomforts without a word of complaint. He preferred talk to fighting, but he was as good with his weapon as any man, and in a crisis he could always be relied on to be in the thick of things. He believed in our mission, and he hoped we were making a difference in the lives of the people over there. He will really be missed.”

  She slid the card back into the envelope and replaced it carefully into the drawer. “The sergeant was sent back home on medical leave before Ian got his medal, but at least he was kind enough to write. Oh, here’s a picture of them all—his friends and the men he worked with.” She drew out a photo of a group of soldiers posing around a large armoured vehicle. They were grinning and hamming it up.

  Green took the photo for a closer look. The sun was bright and the shadows sharp, making it difficult to distinguish facial features, but a lab technician could probably make them recognizable.

  “Do you know who they are?” he asked.

  “Other than Ian and Danny, no. There’s Ian . . .” She pointed to a young man in the middle with his arms slung around two others. “Always surrounded by friends. He touched so many people.”

  “May I borrow this? I’ll reproduce it and send it back, I promise.”

  “Oh . . . it’s just sitting in a drawer now. Those days changed him so much—they aren’t how I want to remember him.” She stared out the window for a moment with sadness in her eyes, before she seemed to pull herself back from the brink of memory. Delving deeper into the pile, she pulled out a small, austere card without the purple roses and embossed script that adorned most of the others.

  “Even months later we still got cards. This was from his platoon commander Richard Hamm, promoted to major by then and stationed out in Edmonton, so it took him a while to get the news, I suppose.” Her hands trembled slightly as she opened the card and held it out to Green. “He’s not much for words, but what he said about our Ian . . . it says a lot.”

  Green glanced at the card, which contain
ed two lines of terse prose in a brusque, heavy hand. Dear Mr. and Mrs. MacDonald, my condolences on your loss. Ian was a tireless and committed soldier whose bravery saved many lives.

  “Tireless, committed, that was our Ian. If he believed in something, he’d give it his heart and soul.” Her chin quivered, and she dropped her gaze. “Nice of the major, don’t you think?”

  Green studied the card with a nagging unease. He’d heard many expressions of condolence in his time. Perhaps it was his imagination, but he sensed the major’s choice of words was important not for what they said, but what they didn’t say. No mention of a pleasure to have under my command, or an example to his fellow soldiers. These words were carefully chosen to comfort the bereaved without eulogizing the dead man. There was no warmth in the sentiment expressed; on the contrary, Green sensed a chill in his words. Yet Ian was a soldier who’d received a rare medal of bravery under the man’s command.

  “Was this the man who recommended Ian for his medal?”

  Her gaze flickered for only an instant before she shook her head. “That was Danny. It was when the company moved down to Sector South in Croatia, and conditions were much more dangerous for them. There wasn’t much peace to be kept, truth be told, and Danny had to take over command of the section. That’s normally a sergeant’s job, and Danny was only a corporal then, but I guess something happened to Sergeant Sawranchuk–” She leaned towards him, her eyes glittering. “Exhaustion was the official word, but that covers a multitude of sins, doesn’t it?”

  “I’ve certainly heard that the missions were very hard on a lot of men.” Green steered her gently back. “So it was Daniel Oliver, not an officer, who recommended him?”

  “Put his name forward, yes. Oh, don’t get me wrong. They all supported it. His battalion commander, company commander, and this Major Hamm. Captain Hamm back then and probably General by now. He was that kind of soldier.”

  “What did Ian say about him?”

  “That he was a bit of a slave driver. But then they have to be, don’t they? They had their orders too. Still, with our Ian, that wasn’t the way to handle him. Tell him why he should do something, point out the good in it, trust him to give it his all, and he will. Always been like that, which was something his dad had trouble seeing. This sergeant who went on medical leave, he was much more Ian’s type of leader. I think it was hard on all the boys when he left. But Danny stepped in and did the best he could.”

  Green nodded slowly. “They were all just boys, weren’t they? Thousands of miles from home.”

  He heard her suck in her breath and expel it in a long, sigh. “And it wasn’t like in a war, where the soldiers all come back home as heroes who’d defended their country. No one knew what our lads had been through or what they’d seen. Why they couldn’t stand the smell of a barbeque or a trip to the dump. Why they couldn’t sleep at night or take a walk through the orchard without their gun.” She gripped the card and struggled to get it back into the envelope before abandoning the effort. “That damn gun . . . I was his mother. I should have known.”

  He felt sorry for her, hovering over the abyss of her loss. He hated to tip the balance, but sensed if ever there was a time for truth, this was it. “Should have known what, Mrs. MacDonald?”

  She shook her head. “He didn’t take the dogs that day. The only time he left them behind.”

  He waited. In the silence, the distant bark of a dog penetrated the windowpane. She took a deep, shuddering breath. “His father calls it a hunting accident. He has to. To Angus, our boy is a decorated soldier and a tribute to his country. To face the truth is to dishonour his memory. Our boy was a hero. Nothing takes that away.”

  Still he waited. Barely breathing.

  “But he was also afraid, and tormented and confused. In the end, he took his damn hunting rifle, left his dogs behind because he didn’t want them to see, and he went down to the river marsh at the bottom of the farm. Where he propped his rifle against a tree and shot himself.”

  TWELVE

  The casualties of peacekeeping,” McGrath said. “After Romeo Dallaire, the army’s worst kept secret.”

  They were having a late lunch at a roadside diner outside Antigonish. Mrs. MacDonald had offered to make them lunch, but sensing that their continued presence there was like salt in her wounds, Green had declined. Now they were hunched over greasy fish and chips. Green doused his with more ketchup as he considered McGrath’s words.

  General Romeo Dallaire was the army’s highest profile example of the post-traumatic stress the country’s soldiers often endured after trying to maintain peace in some of the most violent and tribal corners of the world. Clearly, Ian himself had struggled with memories and fears upon his return, and on that fateful morning in September 1995, he had finally ceded defeat. Despite being recognized as a hero by his superiors and his government, he was just a boy who had faced more than he could bear.

  Perhaps.

  And yet . . .

  Green wrestled to make this new piece of the puzzle fit in with the subsequent murders. Daniel Oliver had been Ian’s section commander in the latter part of their rotation, and he had recommended Ian for a medal of bravery—a relative rarity in the peacekeeping ranks, where combat heroism was less valued than mediation skills. His platoon commander, Captain Hamm, had supported the recommendation, but if his tepid letter of condolence was any indication, he did not share Oliver’s enthusiasm for Ian’s accomplishment.

  “Somehow, all these things connect to Yugoslavia,” Green said eventually. “Ian’s suicide, Oliver’s murder and Patricia’s murder. I think something happened over there . . .”

  “Yeah, well, with Norrich handling that part of the investigation . . .” She paused, grimacing as she picked oily chunks of batter off her fish. “I suppose I could have a go at the West Nova Scotia Reserve Regiment myself. See if anyone knows anything.”

  “That won’t help. We need to find out who served with them in Yugoslavia and interview every last one of them.” He reached into his pocket and slid the photo Mrs. MacDonald had given him across the table towards her. “These are some of the guys in their unit. We should start by IDing them. I have a contact in army personnel in Ottawa. I’ll get one of my men in Ottawa to follow up.”

  McGrath shoved aside her half-eaten fish and picked up the photo. She angled it to catch the light and studied it closely. A faint frown played across her features.

  Green’s interest quickened. “What?”

  She shook her head and peered more closely. Her frown deepened. Then she tapped at one of the men in the photo. He was posed behind the others, leaning against the hood of an army truck. His helmet cast much of his face in shadow.

  “This man. I can’t be sure, but I think . . .” She looked up at him, her eyes widened with excitement. “Mike, I think he might have been the other man in the bar the night Oliver was killed. The man talking to the killer beforehand.”

  “You mean the guy who gave you the fake ID? And claimed he had no idea who the killer was?”

  “The very one. And if you believe that, I’ve got a schooner full of flying codfish to sell you!”

  The minute they arrived back at the Halifax Police Station, Green put in a call to Gibbs. The young detective sounded as if he were fairly bursting with news.

  “We’ve uncovered another possible military connection, sir! At least, Sue—Detective Peters has. At the Voyageur Bus Station. Th-th . . .” He took a deep breath as if to slow himself, and Green could almost see his Adam’s apple bobbing. “This morning she took the photos of Patricia Ross and her purse to the bus station to see if anyone remembered her buying a ticket there. And . . . it took two shifts, but you know Sue, she sticks to things, and on the afternoon shift she found a floor cleaner who remembered Patricia. Said she wore a hole in his floor pacing up and down, going outside every ten minutes for a smoke while she waited for the bus. And guess where she caught the bus to?”

  Green’s pulse leaped. “Petawawa.”
/>   There was abrupt silence on the phone, as if Gibbs had even stopped breathing. “How did you know?”

  “You said there was a military connection. There aren’t too many Canadian Forces bases within bussing distance to Ottawa. And Petawawa is home to a large infantry regiment that has gone on numerous peacekeeping missions.” Sensing Gibbs’s disappointment, Green reined in his racing thoughts. “What day did she go?”

  “M-monday the 17th. Almost a week after she arrived.”

  And almost a week before she died, Green thought. More and more he was convinced she’d been on the trail of someone, and had stirred up a hornet’s nest along the way. “Excellent work, Bob,” he said. “Once we know Daniel Oliver’s military associates, maybe we’ll be able to determine who she went to see. Anything else come up today?”

  “That reporter from the Sun called, sir. Frank Corelli. His witness agreed to a meet. I wanted to wait to check in with you, but I figured it was more important to get her information, so we set it up for noon today over at Confederation Park. It’s a busy enough place, especially at lunch hour, that I figured our surveillance teams wouldn’t be obvious. Staff Sergeant Larocque gave me half a dozen patrol officers to cover it, and I figured we’d have no trouble picking her up.”

  “After she talked to Frank, I hope. Otherwise, she’s likely to shut up like a clam.” Green glanced at his watch. Five thirty. Which meant it was four thirty in Ottawa, well past the rendezvous time. Something in Gibbs’s tone suggested trouble. “How did it go?”

  “She didn’t show, sir. We waited a full hour, and Corelli sat in plain view on a park bench with the Sun open in front of him.”

  “Maybe the surveillance was too obvious.”

  “Maybe, sir, but not a single woman came near him. Or even seemed to be watching him.”

  “She was probably just testing his interest. Tell Frank to be ready, because I think she may call again, demanding a higher price.”

  “Either that or she has nothing to sell,” Gibbs said. He sounded frustrated. “It may all have been just a bid for attention. She tied up a lot of resources today.”