The enemy was perceived to be Zeno Mayfield who'd been the one to accuse Brett from the start. The matter of the broken engagement was seen to be the motive.

Some of Brett's friends from high school came by. Guys he'd known years ago and a few girls including one who was married now, and pregnant, and had come to see him defiant of her husband's objections, as she'd made sure Brett knew.

Halifax, Stumpf, Weisbeck came by. Awkward in Brett's company since Brett lapsed into silences while they talked, guzzled beer and greedily ate potato chips Ethel set out for them in front of the TV.

Real shitty, Brett. What the fuckin cops are tryin to do.

People sayin crazy things. Assholes . . .

. . . we weren't there, you tell them that? None of us, we weren't there, whatever happened, wherever you took her, or-whatever it was . . .

After the Roebuck Inn. Wherever it was . . .

It was just you, Brett, OK? That girl climbing all over you, had to be crazy-high, asking for-whatever it was, that happened.

Overhearing, Ethel stormed into the room, screamed at them to get the hell out of her house. If they were Brett's friends God damn they had to help him. Fuck them all they wanted was to cover their fucking asses well how's about helping him, Brett was the one in need of fucking help.

Neighbors came over. Not many. Others, sighting wild-eyed Ethel by the curb, or Brett Kincaid limping to his Jeep to drive to rehab, turned quickly away without a greeting.

Interviewers ceased coming to the house. Visitors ceased.

Not what Ethel Kincaid had expected! When the phone rang it wasn't relatives, friends, neighbors wishing them well, assuring them they believed that Brett was innocent, but strangers calling to accuse Ethel of harboring a murderer. Aren't you ashamed! You're his mother-tell him to confess.

Cards came to the house addressed to Corperal Kinkaid: You disgusting killer. You are a rapest killer of that young girl, you are a coward to confess.

Jesus sees into your heart you are both Sinners & will be brougt to justice.

In the house on Potsdam Street he stayed inside most days. In his old boyhood room with yellowing postcards from his father still taped to the wall, he never saw any longer. He could not leave the house without being observed. He could not enter the rehab clinic without being observed. Seth Seager who'd been his therapist/friend until he'd broken up with Juliet and for a while afterward had quit the clinic and moved away without saying good-bye. Sessions at the clinic were arduous, painful. A shimmering coil of pain ran up and down his spine like electricity. His breathing was labored, his lungs were yet acrid with fine filaments of sand, like death; tears ran down his cheeks, he could not brush away fast enough; his new therapist, replacing Seth, was a middle-aged woman named Inge who smiled tightly at him as if she could not bear to touch him, despite their physical intimacy.

Sometimes, Inge called him "Corporal"-he gave no sign of hearing.

On bad days Ethel had to take off work to drive him to the clinic and home again which was a round-trip of about six miles. Where in mid- and late summer Ethel Kincaid had been triumphant at the fact of her son being out of police custody now in the fall, as time passed, she was becoming ever more resentful of her situation as the mother of a disabled Iraq War veteran under nonstop police surveillance. In her mood of embittered strain she was likely to swerve, skid, hastily brake and sideswipe the now-battered Jeep Wrangler against rails or even other vehicles stationary or in motion.

Out of nowhere as in a TV movie a girl Brett had known (before Juliet Mayfield) reappeared in his life to drive him to rehab and to the doctors in Watertown and anywhere else he wished but one day when Gayle Nash called him it was Ethel who answered the phone saying tersely No more. He can't see you no more. He says to tell you. Thanks for all you done but-no more.

Last thing the grieving mother wanted was another man-crazy female grabbing hold of her son. The last one that did that, stuck-up Mayfield bitch, see how that turned out.

It was rare that Brett ventured outside now. Drinking with his friends at the lakeside taverns on weekend nights had ended abruptly that night in July.

Occasionally, he went with Ethel to the mall. It was Ethel's idea: get out of the house, show your face, nothing to be ashamed of, they're the ones should be ashamed!-sonsabitches.

At the mall, Brett walked haltingly. He was still tall-but curiously asymmetrical, as if his spine were twisted and his hips out of alignment. He wore a baseball cap pulled down over his forehead, loose-fitting shirts with long sleeves, khaki pants with drooping cuffs. At first glance you thought his face was a gauze mask, or parts of a gauze mask. Dark-tinted glasses hid the upper half of his face.

He stared straight ahead. He walked with his arms close against the sides of his body. Ethel gripped his arm, to steady him. She was trembling with indignation even when no one stared at them.

What are you looking at, you?-take a good look.

Know who this is?-a wounded veteran of the Iraq War.

Sacrificed himself for you-now look at him!

What's the matter-can't face us? Asshole!

Once, Ethel gave a little rush in the direction of several young teenagers who were gaping at her and her tall lanky son who looked fitted-together out of mismatched parts, hissing-Get away! Go to hell! Think your turn won't come-it will!

No one asked Brett about Cressida Mayfield. No one spoke of the girl, that girl-the girl they say is missing.

Ethel did not ask him about Cressida. It was a long time before Brett realized she'd never asked him anything about that night, or about what had happened to him in Kirkuk.

He'd overheard her on the phone, speaking with a relative very likely one of her sisters.

This place Kik-kik it's called-in Ir-wack-turns out there's a big oil field there-like, really big. So the U.S. government, you can figure, there's big-business oilmen paying them off, so they go into the Arab states to take over the oil. Capit'lists laying some damn big pipeline. That's why Bush declared war! Poor Brett, he didn't know none of this, nobody did, but you wise up fast. Poor dumb kid is what you call col-late-ral damage nobody gives a shit for, once they're out of uniform like his sonuvabitch old man that disappeared into the West like who's-it-Clint Eastwood.

You bet, they owe us big-time. Once this trial is out of the way we're going to sue the U.S. government for "liability." Department of Defense. Rumsfield. Everybody says we'd be fools to take the first offer of a settlement, like only a million or two when the papers and TV gets hold of Brett's story and the shit hits the fan of America.

EACH CUT OFF A FINGER, and each an ear.

From other bodies they'd cut other bits of flesh. A small square of skin dries swiftly in the desert heat-instant "mummification."

An almost-entire face. He'd had a glimpse of a pouch made of three civilian faces, looked like male faces, carelessly sewn together. Muksie had said it was something the Sioux and the Iroquois did.

Cell phone pictures of corpses, and guys goofing off. Secret pix you wouldn't want to get into the wrong hands.

Don't show Kincaid. Not for the corporal!

Still he'd seen. Had to see. No way not to see.

Everybody in the platoon knew. Mostly it was just-Jesus that's sick. You assholes are kind of disgusting y'know?

But you wouldn't inform. Not even the chaplain. You just wouldn't, you would not.

Except, Kincaid believed in his heart he must. Could not sleep knowing I must.

Like sand sifting through your fingers. Nothing to grab onto. Nothing to give a name to. When you return home you will confide in just your special friends, possibly a brother, but no one else in the family. Guys who understand, know what you endured and why these matter-trophies.

Your mom, your girlfriend or wife, sister, cousin-you don't show these trophies which are private. No female could understand. Even a female pretending not to be one of her sex like Juliet's fierce-faced younger sister could not understand. You don't show them any trophies just "picturesque" photos, trinkets, mementos, souvenirs. Nobody knew where Iraq was or had any knowledge of the country, you could buy Middle Easternlooking jewelry or miniature African animals carved out of ivory in the Frankfurt airport, Indian shawls-who'd know the difference?

First deployment, on his return home he'd bought things like that for Juliet, for his mother and Mrs. Mayfield. Second deployment, on his way home he was shipped in an airtight Ziploc body-bag.

In Halifax's car they drove out to Route 31 to score some pot.

God-damn strong dope, does weird things to your brain.

He's wheezing like asthma. Halifax thumps his back.

Jesus Christ! Don't fucking die on me Kincaid!

THE FANCY LAWYER who'd taken on his case had a way of speaking of Corporal Kincaid in the third person even when he was present like you'd speak of a brain-dead person, or a corpse.

My client acknowledges the girl might have been in his vehicle which accounts for the prints, the blood and the hairs. But not that night. Another night.

My client is neurologically impaired. That is a medical fact. Medical records are here provided. He cannot remember clearly since he was injured in Iraq-"traumatic brain injury." No jury would ever convict him.

IN THE BARRACKS lavatory at the post north of Kirkuk. He did not think I will kill him now. This must be done. In his hands he was wielding his rifle with just enough space to raise and swing and so that the butt struck Private Muksie on the side of the head, one, two, three swift strokes as with a look of utter surprise Muksie grunted and sank to his knees, sank to the befouled cement floor spouting blood. Not thinking God has directed me. This is the first.

But somebody had seen him. One of the guys hurrying to help him-to help Brett-taking the rifle from him, wiping the butt clean.

Gone to hell. This is the first.

He was laughing. Stumbling. His friends were hauling him back to the barracks.

Later seeing Private Muksie-"Coyote"-returning from patrol.

Fully awake then rubbing his temples feeling the fat arteries inside beat, beat, beat close to bursting.

Can't guarantee your safety, Corporal. Take precautions.

SHE'D WANTED HIM to tell her these things-Secrets you can't tell anyone else. I know-you have them.

In her lowered voice assuring him I am the only one who understands you, Brett. No one else can know what we know, they are beloved of God and we are-misfits.

In the Jeep he was driving. Gripping the wheel tight in both hands because he'd been drinking and a nasty buzz permeated his skull like a hive of hornets.

Crucial to him-to get the girl home: Juliet's sister.

Saying desperate things to him, even drunk he knew to be embarrassed-Juliet didn't deserve you. Juliet is one of those who "lives in light"-hasn't a clue what we know. I am the one who can love you, Brett-please believe me.

He was shocked. Juliet's sister!

Didn't know what to say to her. Though feeling a stirring of-remotely-as if at a distance-what might've been, in another lifetime, sexual yearning.

. . . the one who can love you. Brett please.

His first thought was-too young.

And Juliet's sister who would've been, if they'd gotten married, like a sister of his.

Desperately he wanted to be rid of her.

Safely rid of her-take her home.

If Juliet knew . . . Juliet would be shocked.

He'd never felt at ease with the younger sister. Possibly he'd never once spoken her name: Cres-sida.

He'd gotten along with her OK at the start. He'd known her, encountered her, when she'd had a bicycle accident a few years before-seemed like she'd been another person then.

Younger, then.

Later, she'd changed. Held herself apart from others, observing, judging; never quite smiling or laughing when Brett spent time with them. Thought herself superior.

Frequently in Brett's presence she seemed to be looking at him-in a way he hadn't wanted to decode.

For Cressida's will was a force in the Mayfield household-Brett had gathered.

From remarks Juliet had made, Brett had gathered that this was so.

Even bossy Zeno deferred to her. Arlette rarely contradicted Cressida and often in her company grew quiet as if hoping to avoid a sharp or sarcastic remark from the "precocious" younger daughter.

Cressida rarely helped in the kitchen. If she was inveigled into helping clean up after a meal she slung dishes and cutlery into the dishwasher without troubling to rinse them, with a kind of spiteful glee.

Once, in the wake of a meal, when even Zeno was helping in the kitchen, Cressida drew Brett away upstairs to her room, insisting upon showing him her "Esch-er drawings" on display on a wall, and in a portfolio on a shelf. He hadn't known what to expect and he'd been surprised and impressed by these highly detailed, obviously very skillful works of art like nothing he'd ever seen executed by anyone in Carthage.

In her room which he would remember as crammed with books and weird drawings, nothing at all like Juliet's feminine room, Cressida told him that her drawings were a way of exploring the "interior" of her own brain.

When you pick up a pen, dip it into ink, there's a kind of thrill like an electric current that runs up your arm. You go into a kind of trance. Like dreaming with your eyes open. Pausing then to add, with a shrug of her small shoulders Oh but-it's lonely there.

She told him what she hadn't told her family: when she'd been away in Canton, she was surprised how she'd missed them. And him.

I missed you all. I guess I was homesick! It sounds so banal, corny. You were in Georgia-yet I felt close to you. Closer than to my ridiculous suite mates. Juliet forwarded your emails and cell phone pictures, or most of them . . .

Brett thought it was odd, Cressida had been surprised by being homesick. He'd been wracked with what must've been homesickness-and missing Juliet-for most of boot camp at Fort Benning.

Cressida had emailed Brett, too. Terse and coy and he hadn't taken much time to puzzle over her riddle-like letters. Probably he hadn't answered most of them. Boot camp had been exhausting and intense and when he had time to think it was Juliet of whom he thought-Juliet whom he missed.

He hadn't wanted to think that Cressida had been jealous of Juliet and him. Jealous of her beautiful older sister whom everyone adored. It was in mockery she spoke of those beloved of God-which certainly included Juliet.

Yet he couldn't believe she was serious now, claiming to love him!

Seeing her at the Roebuck Inn, in that crowd-what a surprise it had been to him! Then realizing she'd come to see him.

He hadn't encouraged her. He hadn't responded to her. Yet he'd felt responsible for her.

She'd insisted upon sitting with him in one of the booths, alone.

He'd told her that he wanted to drive her home and she said Oh thank you Brett but not immediately-oh please. Shyly, daringly, she'd laid a hand-a small, tremulous hand-on his arm.

Which he should have eased off, or shaken off-but didn't.

He was used to girls and women coming on to him-or had been, until recently. But this was different.

It was hard to look at her, he was so-shocked.

Disapproving, embarrassed.

Yet he'd complied with her wish. Her will.

He'd decided to leave the lakeside tavern and not return. Take the girl home, as he told his friends.