Judge bridled at the touch. What did Jackson think? He’d trade his brother for a promotion on the IMT? “Sir, I beg you to reconsider.”
“The decision is final. A transfer is out of the question.” Jackson slammed his hand on the table like a gavel, then rose, tugging the pickets of his vest. “Give my regards to Hermann. Did you know they call him ‘Fat Stuff’? I hear it drives him crazy.”
Judge rose with him and when he spoke his voice had lost its harness of respectful reserve. “This morning we received irrefutable evidence that Erich Seyss ordered the massacre of our boys at Malmedy. It’s the kind of proof a prosecutor kills for: a report written by his own men implicating him at the scene of the crime. Of course, I’m aware of my responsibilities to the court and to my country, but Francis was my brother. My responsibilities to him come first.”
“Please, Major, let’s not make this more difficult than it has to—”
Finally, it was Judge’s turn to interrupt. “I’ve spent my entire adult life as an officer of the law,” he argued. “I’ve been trained to pursue those who break the law and taught to use my brains and my reasoning to ensure they don’t do it again. For the first time, I can use what I’ve learned to provide some measure of justice to someone close to me. If I don’t do everything within my power to bring in the man who killed my brother — the animal who murdered seventy American boys in cold blood — all my years as a cop, all my time before the bar will have been for nothing.”
“Hogwash,” continued Jackson, calling his tone and raising it a note. “With all due respect to you, Major, and your brother, you don’t have a snowball’s chance in hell of finding Erich Seyss. You’ll be wasting everyone’s time, especially yours. Now if that’s all, you’re excused.”
“No sir,” Judge retorted. “That isn’t all. If I do not receive this transfer, I plan to resign my commission, effective immediately.”
“And do what precisely? Find him yourself? Alone you won’t get out of Paris for a week. And if you did, what then? Do you have a car? Gasoline?” Jackson laughed gruffly. “Read your enlistment papers, son. You joined the United States Army in time of war. You serve at your nation’s leisure. You don’t have the power to resign.”
Judge looked to Storey for backup, but his older colleague had moved to the window, and stood looking down upon the Place Vendome, shaking his head. Suddenly, Judge knew he’d gone too far, that he’d let his desire to serve his brother’s memory overrule his common sense. This was, after all, an Associate Justice of the Supreme Court he was talking to. Still, he couldn’t give up now. “Damn it, sir, all I’m asking is to give Erich Seyss the chance to learn the full and proper measure of the law. You said you wanted me to help drive home our new morality. Fine. Let me start with him. If it was your brother who Seyss killed, wouldn’t you want to do the same?”
Jackson’s eyes widened — with anger, surprise, and maybe, Judge hoped even understanding — then he turned and stalked out of the drawing room. “I’ll be back in a minute, Major. Sit down and try not to make a nuisance of yourself. Bob, come with me.”
Judge poured himself a glass of water from the crystal carafe, then collapsed on a yellow couch, exhaling deeply. Taking a sip, he could hear Jackson and Storey’s voices behind the bedroom doors, raised in a not altogether friendly conversation. A frank exchange of views, as the papers would say. He just hoped Storey was arguing in favor of his transfer, not against a court martial. Someplace back there, he’d passed insubordination in a hurry. His only consolation was that Francis would have done the same for him.
Closing his eyes, he remembered the last time he’d seen his brother, 2 August 1943. Frankie’s departure to England. The two of them saying goodbye, alone among a crowd of ten thousand packed onto pier 4B at the Brooklyn Navy Yard. Francis was wearing a GI’s olive drab fatigues, captain’s bars pinned to one lapel, the Savior’s cross the other. He was staring at ten days of rough seas, tight quarters, and lousy chow, not to mention the Nazi wolfpack breathing down his neck, and he’d never looked happier.
“Hey, kid, don’t go being a hero,” Judge said, mimicking Spencer Tracy’s rough-and-tumble voice while patting his brother on the arm. Francis couldn’t get enough of Tracy.Boys’ Town, Woman of the Year, Captain Courageous — they were his favorite films.
“That’s God’s decision,” Francis replied, stoically. “Not mine.”
“Hey, Frankie, I was joking. Whatcha gonna do, anyway? Throw Bibles at Hitler?”
Finally, a smile. “If it would stop the war a day sooner, I surely would.” Francis was taller by four inches and outweighed him by a good seventy pounds. If the Roman Catholic Church had mandated a vow of hunger, he’d have never made it through seminary. Judge came in for a last hug. He kissed his brother’s cheek and let himself be drawn close. He knew he should be the one going. Francis was forty-three years old. He couldn’t see past the hem of his cassock without his glasses, and he cried like a baby at the pictures. This was him all over. Drawing the hardest duty and smiling about it.
“I love you,” Judge said.
Francis stared at him long and hard, confused by his brother’s sentiment. The fact was, the two had never been especially close. Too much sermonizing on Francis’s part. He’d been talking fire and brimstone since he was twenty-three and Judge thirteen. Repent all sinners, lest ye be cast into the abyss. Love was couched threefold behind expectation, responsibility, and since Judge’s divorce, indignation. Like Jackson had said, he was a “Jezzie.” One of Ignatius Loyola’s soldiers of Christ. What could you expect?
“Don’t worry about me, Dev. I’ll be just fine.” And then, as if to prove his point, or looking back, maybe his invincibility, he’d removed the leather lanyard from his neck, yanked off the crucifix and handed it to Judge. “Remember, Dev, the Lord looks after his own.”
Judge opened his eyes, calling back the photographs he’d seen that morning. Francis lying prostrate in a muddy field, a dozen bullet holes his final benediction. Seyss’s boot in a soldier’s back. No, Frankie, not anymore he doesn’t. Nowadays, you have to look after yourself.
Jackson and Storey re-entered the drawing room an hour later. If a solution had been reached, their grim demeanor gave no clue of it. Judge stood, wanting to make a final plea, but Jackson spoke before he got a chance.
“Believe it or not, I do appreciate your dilemma. You made a persuasive case for yourself. And if I don’t recognize the law behind your argument, I do recognize the sentiment. Never underestimate the value of emotion on a jury. Or passion. Sometimes a tear is all it takes to topple the soundest defense — though I’ll thank you to leave my brother out of it, if there’s ever a next time.”
Judge no longer had a problem following Storey’s advice to keep his mouth shut. Any lawyer could recognize the preamble to good news. One thing bothered him. Why the hell did Storey look so glum?
A knock came at the door and Storey rushed to open it. A messenger wearing sand-colored puttees, crash helmet under one arm, handed over a yellow envelope, asking Storey to sign a receipt. Storey scribbled his signature, then handed the envelope to Jackson, all the while avoiding Judge’s inquisitive glare.