I looked at Featherstone. He was in his Class As, and for the first time I looked at his chest. He had a Bronze Star with a V for Valor and an oak leaf cluster adorning it, signifying a second award, along with a Purple Heart and the red, yellow, and green Viet Nam Service Medal. Colonel Featherstone hadn't always been a lawyer. I nodded in understanding to him.
"Technically you need to be in either a combat theater or serving with troops in a combat situation, but I convinced your brigade commander that Nicaragua qualified.", he commented. "By the way, what did you do to get your battalion commander so pissed off? He refused to recommend you for the award. I got the recommendation from the commander of the 505th. You don't get the V device, but so what."
I laughed at that. "I kept growing! Mighty Mouse has a problem with officers of height. You'd do even worse!" Featherstone was even taller than I was, by an inch or so. "Unfortunately for me, but fortunately for the battalion, he's disturbingly competent otherwise."
"Well, they can't all be bad, now can they?"
The nurse returned with my broth and gave Featherstone another ration of shit for smoking. He put away his smokes and conned her into getting him a sandwich while I slurped my broth and Jell-O. He made several disparaging remarks about my meal, so I gave him a Bronx salute, which he just laughed off.
After lunch, Colonel Featherstone said, "Take me through the mission, start to finish. I want to hear your side of it. You're the only one I haven't heard it from. Take it from the top."
I spent the next half hour going over the drop, from the time we were trucked over to the Gooney Birds to the time we landed back at the base in the Hueys. "I can figure why Hawkins was pissed at me. What happened? Did he have the MPs waiting for me as soon as the first bird landed?"
"Pretty much. The Provost Marshal snapped up your Lieutenant Fairfax as soon as he landed. He's the one who said you killed the four civilians."
I stopped at that point, and eyed Featherstone for a moment. "I think you meant to say allegedly killed the four civilians, counselor."
He shrugged. "Eh. Maybe so, maybe so. Tell me about them, Captain. Hypothetically, of course."
I took a second to gather my thoughts. No way was I about to confess to jack shit with this guy! "Hmmm ... hypothetically speaking of course. Well, remember, once we were all down, my mission was twofold. First, get all my men back home, no matter what. Second, not to let the Nicaraguans know that they had been invaded. No international incidents."
Featherstone nodded. "International incidents are bad. If you guys had been captured by the Nicaraguans, they could have had you in the headlines for a year. Remember the Pueblo?"
"Quite. So anyway, we captured these four narcos, not soldiers or civilians, but drug traffickers. Unfortunately for us, our resident genius, Lieutenant Fairfax, disobeyed orders and spoke to these clowns in English, so they knew we were Americans. Hypothetically speaking, of course, anything that happened to those men was ultimately his responsibility."
It was his turn to nod. "I heard that already, although not from him. I have to tell you, nobody else corroborated his allegations of murder."
"Then I guess the murders never happened.", I replied.
"Yeah? So tell me, hypothetically speaking, what happened next."
"Nothing, of course. Like all the others told you I went over to the prisoners, who were tied up next to the fuel dump, and released them, then fired four shots into the air to scare them away. It must have worked. Have we heard anything from the Nicaraguans?"
"Nothing. Of course, Lieutenant Fairfax says you simply shot the men and then burned them up in the fire."
"Well, considering that Lieutenant Fairfax and all the men were in the LZ at the time, nobody would have seen me releasing the prisoners, would they?", I asked. "Which is what happened, of course."
"So I was told." He waited a few seconds, thinking about things. My answers must have satisfied his curiosity, or whatever, and he shrugged. "It's over now. Care to make a phone call?"
"Yes, please."
He nodded and stood to go to the door. "Captain, let me just say one last thing to you. I pulled your records before I ever came down here. I've read your fitness reports. I've seen your FBI and CIC background reports. I've even seen your IRS tax records..."
"The FBI and CIC? What are you talking about?", I said, interrupting him.
Featherstone nodded and looked serious. "You were being groomed for major command, Captain. Of course there were background checks."
"Jesus!"
He continued. "I probably know more about you than anybody but your wife. You graduated from high school, for all intents and purposes, at 16. Your family threw you out then, too. I know about your psychotic brother. You burned through college and got a doctorate at 21. You made captain at 25 and were going to be a major at 28. You could have done the R&D stint and CGS blindfolded and standing on your head. Hell, you'd probably have picked up another grad degree there. After that, a nice tour as a battalion exec somewhere, followed by a tour at the Pentagon for seasoning. You'd have a brigade sometime in your thirties. Sound familiar?"
I nodded mutely. He was right. I'd have had a brigade just in time to take them into action against the Iraqis when they invaded Kuwait. Commanding a brigade in the most lopsided victory since the Franco-Prussian War would have been a guarantee of a star by the time I made twenty years. Featherstone kept going. "You've been on a high speed tear through life since you hit puberty. You're already a multimillionaire." He must have seen the surprise on my face, because he then said, "Yeah, I know. I had the IRS pull your tax returns, remember?"
I shrugged at that. "What's your point, Colonel?"
"Just this. You've been on a high speed tear to general. You'd have made it, too. But it's all over now. The thing to remember, Captain, is that this is just another job. Really, that's all it is. It's a good job, an honorable job, a dangerous and exciting job at times. It's certainly a job that needs doing. Still, at the end of the day, it's just a job. That job is now over for you. Your job is not who you are, it's what you do. It's time to go home now and be a father and a husband. That's your job now.", answered Colonel Featherstone.
I closed my eyes and took a deep breath. He was right in many ways. I was a fast burner. Like General Hawkins? Would I have been like him? Burning through people? I didn't like that thought. I had nothing left to prove here. I opened my eyes and smiled. "Point taken, Colonel. Get me that phone and I'll start on that."
"The plan is that tomorrow you'll be flown to Washington, to Walter Reed, for the work on your knee. If you'd like, I can help get your family to see you there."
"I'd appreciate that, sir."
Five minutes later the colonel returned with a telephone and a wire that he plugged into a phone jack behind the bed. Interestingly, it was still a high security area. The phone didn't have a dial, but when you picked up the handle you immediately got a switchboard and had to give the number to be called. When I gave them my home number, Colonel Featherstone nodded and left the room.
"Hello?", answered Marilyn.
"Honey, it's me, Carl."
"CARLING! Where are you!? What's happened to you!?"