The Secrets on Chicory Lane: A Novel(55)

Serious objection! The spectators broke out in spontaneous murmuring. The judge banged the gavel and called for order. The attorneys were brought to the bench for a sidebar, and the jury was sent out of the courtroom. The judge continued to speak in hushed but earnest tones. Finally, counsel was released and the jury was brought back. The judge ordered that the witness’s preceding testimony be struck from the record. But the damage had been done. The jury had heard it.

“Okay, Mr. Blair,” Shamrock resumed. “Let’s skip to June 1972. What happened with the battalion then?”

“We were deactivated and sent home.”

“And was Private Newcott with you at that time?”

“No, sir, he was AWOL.”

“AWOL?”

“Absent without leave. He had disappeared.”

Shamrock put on an act of being very concerned. “Was that unusual?”

“Yes, sir.”

“What do you know about the situation?”

“He simply vanished a few days before the unit was scheduled to depart Vietnam and return to the States.”

“What was done to locate him?”

“Military police searched Da Nang from top to bottom. We finally learned that he had a Vietnamese girlfriend.”

“What was her name?”

“Phan Mai. Mai. She lived In Country … er, out in the jungle, in a small village with her parents.”

“And was Private Newcott found there?”

“Yes, he was.”

“And was he ordered to leave Vietnam with his battalion?”

“Yes sir, but he refused. He planned to stay and live with her in Vietnam.”

“I see. What happened after that?”

“We went home. Private Newcott didn’t join us.”

“And what do you know about the defendant’s actions in Vietnam following the battalion’s deactivation?”

“MPs were sent to arrest him for AWOL, but he and the girl had disappeared. Gone. Vanished. I received reports that no one knew where he was for an entire year. Then he suddenly showed up at the base in the summer of ’73 in a state of dehydration, starvation, and delirium.”

“What did he say had happened to him?”

Blair rolled his eyes. “He told investigators that he had acquired amnesia and was lost in the jungle for months.”

“And you don’t believe him?”

Crane objected before Blair could answer, saying that since the witness wasn’t there at the time, he had no business testifying to what did or did not happen. The judge overruled, and Shamrock continued.

“I’ll repeat the question—did you believe what you had heard about Private Newcott?”

“Not at all.”

“Why not?”

“It’s too far-fetched.”

“What happened to his girlfriend?”

“We don’t know. Private Newcott claimed that she had left him. Had gone off with another man. No one ever heard from her again.”

More objections that the testimony was irrelevant. More overruling.

“So, Mr. Blair, knowing the defendant as you did, do you have an opinion on what might have happened to Private Newcott and his girlfriend?”

“Newcott was a good soldier, but he was rash and unpredictable. He had a rebellious streak. He bucked authority and thought he knew all the answers. I couldn’t say what happened during that year he was missing. There were rumors that he had been captured and was a POW. At one point, he was suspected of working for the enemy. I know that when he returned, the army put him through the wringer with interrogations. In the end, there was no real evidence for or against him. They had to take him at his word. As for the girl, who knows? Maybe he killed her.”

Objections. Pandemonium. Gavel banging. Once again, the jury was sent out of the courtroom and the lawyers were summoned to the bench. I wished I could hear what was said up there. Finally, things settled down and the jury returned. The testimony was struck from the record a second time.

When Shamrock handed over the witness for cross examination, Crane stood and asked, “Mr. Blair, you don’t really know what was going on in Eddie’s head during the several months the two of you worked together in the army, do you?”

“No, sir.”

“And isn’t it true that Vietnamese civilians disappeared all the time during the war? They were displaced and moved about?”

“That’s true.”

“Mr. Blair, you testified earlier that the defendant was ‘crazy.’”

“Yes, sir.”

“You are not a medical expert, are you?”

“No, sir.”

“But you are trained to assess the mental states of your men, is that correct?”

“Yes, sir.”

“Please tell the court why you thought the defendant was, as you say, ‘crazy.’”

“Well, sir, he had a morbid outlook. All he talked about was death and the devil and how evil the enemy was. Everyone in his unit tended to ostracize him. That’s not a good thing in the army. He was considered very weird, sir.”

“Weird, how?”

“Just some of the things he’d say. He constantly tried to tell the men that there was no God. He once got into an argument with the chaplain at the base in Da Nang. It almost escalated into a fistfight, sir. I believe Private Newcott was a very violent person.”