He slid another photograph out of the folder. Passed it across. It showed the same boy, now twice the age, grown tall, still grinning, in a new fatigues, standing in front of an Army helicopter. It was an H-23 Hiller, an old training machine.
“That’s Fort Wolters,” Hobie said. “All the way down in Texas. U.S. Army Primary Helicopter School.”
Reacher nodded. “He flew choppers in ‘Nam?”
“He passed out second in his class,” Hobie said. “That was no surprise to us. He was always an excellent student, all the way through high school. He was especially gifted in math. He understood accountancy. I imagined he’d go to college and then come into partnership with me, to do the book work. I looked forward to it. I struggled in school, Major. No reason to be coy about it now. I’m not an educated man. It was a constant delight for me to see Victor doing so well. He was a very smart boy. And a very good boy. Very smart, very kind, a good heart, a perfect son. Our only son.”
The old lady was silent. Not eating the cake, not drinking the coffee.
“His passing out was at Fort Rucker,” Hobie said. “Down in Alabama. We made the trip to see it.”
He slid across the next photograph. It was a duplicate of one of the framed prints from the mantel. Faded pastel grass and sky, a tall boy in dress uniform, cap down over his eyes, his arm around an older woman in a print dress. The woman was slim and pretty. The photograph was slightly out of focus, the horizon slightly tilted. Taken by a fumbling husband and father, breathless with pride.
“That’s Victor and Mary,” the old man said. “She hasn’t changed a bit, has she, that day to this?”
“Not a bit,” Reacher lied.
“We loved that boy,” the old woman said quietly. “He was sent overseas two weeks after that photograph was taken.”
“July of ‘68,” Hobie said. “He was twenty years old.”
“What happened?” Reacher asked.
“He served a full tour,” Hobie said. “He was commended twice. He came home with a medal. I could see right away the idea of keeping the books for a print shop was too small for him. I thought he would serve out his time and get a job flying helicopters for the oil rigs. Down in the Gulf, perhaps. They were paying big money then, for Army pilots. Or Navy, or Air Force, of course.”
“But he went over there again,” Mrs. Hobie said. “To Vietnam again.”
“He signed on for a second tour,” Mrs. Hobie said. “He didn’t have to. But he said it was his duty. He said the war was still going on, and it was his duty to be a part of it. He said that’s what patriotism meant.”
“And what happened?” Reacher asked.
There was a long moment of silence.
“He didn’t come back,” Hobie said.
The silence was like a weight in the room. Somewhere a clock was ticking. It grew louder and louder until it was filling the air like blows from a hammer.
“It destroyed me,” Hobie said quietly.
The oxygen wheezed in and out, in and out, through a constricted throat.
“It just destroyed me. I used to say: I’ll exchange the whole rest of my life, just for one more day with him.”
“The rest of my life,” his wife echoed. “For just one more day with him.”
“And I meant it,” Hobie said. “And I still would. I still would, Major. Looking at me now, that’s not much of a bargain, is it? I haven’t got much life left in me. But I said it then, and I said it every day for thirty years, and as God is my witness, I meant it every single time I said it. The whole rest of my life, for one more day with him.”
“When was he killed?” Reacher asked, gently.
“He wasn’t killed,” Hobie said. “He was captured.”
“Taken prisoner?”
The old man nodded. “At first, they told us he was missing. We assumed he was dead, but we clung on, hoping. He was posted missing, and he stayed missing. We never got official word he was killed.”
“So we waited,” Mrs. Hobie said. “We just kept on waiting, for years and years. Then we started asking. They told us Victor was missing, presumed killed. That was all they could say. His helicopter was shot down in the jungle, and they never found the wreckage.”
“We accepted that then,” Hobie said. “We knew how it was. Plenty of boys died without a known grave. Plenty of boys always have, in war.”
“Then the memorial went up,” Mrs. Hobie said. “Have you seen it?”
“The Wall?” Reacher said. “In D.C.? Yes, I’ve been there. I’ve seen it. I found it very moving.”
“They refused to put his name on it,” Hobie said.
“Why?”
“They never explained. We asked and we begged, but they never told us exactly why. They just said he’s no longer considered a casualty.”
“So we asked them what he is considered as,” Mrs. Hobie said. “They just told us missing in action.”
“But the other MIAs are on the Wall,” Hobie said.
There was silence again. The clock hammered away in another room.
“What did General Garber say about this?” Reacher asked.
“He didn’t understand it,” Hobie said. “Didn’t understand it at all. He was still checking for us when he died.”
There was silence again. The oxygen hissed and the clock hammered.
“But we know what happened,” Mrs. Hobie said.
“You do?” Reacher asked her. “What?”
“The only thing that fits,” she said. “He was taken prisoner.”
“And never released,” Hobie said.
“That’s why the Army is covering it up,” Mrs. Hobie said. “The government is embarrassed about it. The truth is some of our boys were never released. The Vietnamese held on to them, like hostages, to get foreign aid and trade recognition and credits from us, after the war. Like blackmail. The government held out for years, despite our boys still being prisoners over there. So they can’t admit it. They hide it instead, and won’t talk about it.”
“But we can prove it now,” Hobie said.
He slid another photograph from the folder. Passed it across. It was a newer print. Vivid glossy colors. It was a telephoto shot taken through tropical vegetation. There was barbed wire on bamboo fence posts. There was an Oriental figure in a brown uniform, with a bandanna around his forehead. A rifle in his hands. It was clearly a Soviet AK-47. No doubt about it. And there was another figure in the picture. A tall Caucasian, looking about fifty, emaciated, gaunt, bent, gray, wearing pale, rotted fatigues. Looking half away from the Oriental soldier, flinching.
“That’s Victor,” Mrs. Hobie said. “That’s our son. That photograph was taken last year.”
“We spent thirty years asking about him,” Hobie said. “Nobody would help us. We asked everybody. Then we found a man who told us about these secret camps. There aren’t many. Just a few, with a handful of prisoners. Most of them have died by now. They’ve grown old and died, or been starved to death. This man went to Vietnam and checked for us. He got close enough to take this picture. He even spoke to one of the other prisoners through the wire. Secretly, at night. It was very dangerous for him. He asked for the name of the prisoner he’d just photographed. It was Vic Hobie, First Cavalry helicopter pilot.”
“The man had no money for a rescue,” Mrs. Hobie said. “And we’d already paid him everything we had for the first trip. We had no more left. So when we met General Garber at the hospital, we told him our story and asked him to try and get the government to pay.”
Reacher stared at the photograph. Stared at the gaunt man with the gray face.
“Who else has seen this picture?”
“Only General Garber,” Mrs. Hobie answered. “The man who took it told us to keep it a secret. Because it’s very sensitive, politically. Very dangerous. It’s a terrible thing, buried in the nation’s history. But we had to show it to General Garber, because he was in a position to help us.”
“So what do you want me to do?” Reacher asked.