dinner place setting next Christmas. You are advised to remain stoic, polite, and firm, to strictly limit the conversation to “I am sorry to inform you that your (husband, wife, child) was killed on duty on (fill in the date).” Just be sure to fill in the blanks correctly. You are further advised to bring along a chaplain in the event the situation turns sticky.
As soon as we hung up, I called the casualty office in the personnel directorate, explained my intentions, and was informed a duty officer would call shortly. An anonymous major did in fact call, arranged for a courier to bring me Lisa’s personnel file, issued me a ticket number to book a flight to Boston, warned me to abide by the Army manual and customs on notification, and wished me luck.
After three troubled hours of sleep, interrupted by a cheerless courier, I boarded the 6:15 early bird at Ronald Reagan National Airport. I waved off coffee and opened Lisa’s file. The Army personnel file is a compendium of a soldier’s life, from religion, blood type, and past assignments to schooling, awards, and so forth. The way Army promotions work, officers who’ve never met you pick through your annual ratings and personnel file, and from that paper profile determine whether Uncle Sam needs your services at a higher level.
Soldiers are required to submit a fresh full-body photo once a year to certify you meet the Army’s height and weight requirements, and aren’t too moronic-looking to be promoted to the next grade. The official line is that good looks and military bearing are completely irrelevant, not even considered-and the remarkable lack of physically deformed or ugly people in the Army’s top hierarchy is obviously an odd coincidence. The photos are antiseptic, black-and-white, stiffly posed at the stance of attention.
I took a moment and studied Lisa’s photo. The Army cautions its officers not to smile for these pictures, and Lisa Morrow was a good soldier, and wasn’t smiling. Yet she was one of those people with a reservoir of inner joy the camera couldn’t repress. She was extraordinarily beautiful, of course, and the camera could not conceal that either. Also, she had incredibly sympathetic eyes, slightly turned down at the edges, eyes that drew you in and soothed your troubled soul. I missed her already. I ripped her photo out of the jacket and stuffed it inside my wallet, a reminder of things to be done.
By eight I was in a rental car, cursing Boston traffic and making my way to the Beacon Hill section. I reviewed what I knew about Lisa and her family. Her father was also an attorney, she had three sisters, and an affluent upbringing. All four daughters were close in age and friendship. I knew Lisa had attended a tony girls’ prep school in Boston, then the University of Virginia for undergrad, then Harvard Law, a school that contributes very few people to military service, as firms like Culper, Hutch, and Westin offer juicier paychecks and, apparently, nicer wardrobes.
I knew Lisa’s mother had died when she was a teenager. As the eldest, she filled the familial vacuum. She and her father were extremely close in the way that only wifeless fathers and elder daughters can grow to be. All in all, this was going to really, really suck.
The house turned out to be an impressively wide brownstone set on the downslope of a hillside cluttered with similar homes. Nice neighborhood, and judging by the Mercedeses, Jags, and Beemers lining the curbs, an exclusive preserve for professionals who aren’t looking for success-they’ve already landed there. I spent ten minutes hunting for a parking place and appeared on the Morrow doorstep at 8:45.
I drew a sharp breath and tried to compose myself. The notification officer ordinarily has no acquaintance with the deceased, and it’s no great ordeal to remain calm and stoic. But I gathered my nerves and rang the bell, and half a minute passed before the door was opened by a gentleman in a dark business suit. On the far side of his sixties, I’d guess, trim and fit, with wispy silver hair and silver eyebrows perched atop two very green eyes. The face was leathery and lined, a face that had spent a lot of time outdoors, a warm face, etched with character and intelligence, that also looked like it could get tough if the situation warranted.
We stared at each other for a few seconds, and before I could get a word out of my lips, he sagged against the doorjamb and emitted a long, terrible sigh. Those with loved ones in the military know an unhappy moment is in the making when an anonymous officer in dress greens materializes on your doorstep.
I struggled unsuccessfully to contain my emotions. “Mr. Morrow, I’m Major Sean Drummond. Lisa and I were, uh, good friends.” That “were” popped the cork prematurely, so I raced to say, “I’m sorry. Lisa died last night.”
When I said “died” he nearly collapsed, and I reached out to steady him. Neither of us spoke. His eyes closed and tears began spilling down his cheeks. I tightened my grip.
A woman’s voice inside said, “Daddy, who is it?”
A choking sound erupted in his throat. A young woman appeared, saw me, saw her father crumpled with grief, and yelled, “Oh God… not Lisa?”
Mr. Morrow pulled away from me and he and the younger woman collapsed into each other’s arms. This lasted a minute or so, them moaning, me standing miserably, clueless about what to do, or say, or not do, or not say next.
I finally managed to say, “I am terribly sorry. Lisa and I worked together. We became close friends. She was a gifted lawyer and she was a, well, a great person.”
Appropriate words. But to the ears of a father who had burped her, changed her diapers, shared in a lifetime of great triumphs and few failures, they inevitably sounded wooden, empty, and condensed.
He apparently sensed my discomfort and said, “Come in, won’t you?”
He took his daughter’s arm, and I followed them down a hall-way to a study at the rear of the house. The house itself-spacious, high-ceilinged, furnished tastefully with heavy wooden pieces, leather chairs, and oriental carpets-was a masculine home muddied by occasional frilly touches, evidence of four daughters. Pictures were everywhere of four young girls, from infancy through adulthood-graduation shots, a wedding picture, four girls on a boat with Mr. Morrow, hair blown back, all laughing. Above the mantel in the study hung a portrait of a woman beautiful enough to make you gasp; Lisa’s mother, I guessed, blond-haired, green-eyed, looking curiously at the painter through two large orbs that exuded sympathy, a resemblance eerie enough to give me a shock.
The father and daughter fell onto the couch, arms wrapped around each other. I fell into the worn leather chair across from them. I said nothing-the questions would come.
“How?” Mr. Morrow eventually asked.
I replied, “Sir, I am instructed to state that the results and circumstances have yet to be finalized. You’ll be notified as soon as we’re sure.”
He tapped a finger on a knee. “How?”
“She was murdered. Her neck was broken. It was quick, and as painless as these things can be.”
I watched their faces crumple with shock. Death is death, regardless of the cause. Yet car accidents, plane crashes, strokes, and lightning strikes offer enough haphazardness to at least afford a sense that God or the fates simply plucked somebody you loved. Murder is different. So is its aftertaste. No random, supernatural force dealt the hand; some rotten mortal bastard robbed you of something infinitely precious.
“Have they caught the killer?”
“No. Not yet.” His eyes were boring into me, so I added, “Lisa had left the Pentagon and was getting into her car. Her purse was missing, so it may have been a robbery. But I don’t believe the police have yet discovered any evidence leading to a culprit.”
A stunned silence followed as he and his daughter tried to absorb the full ramifications. Mr. Morrow eventually informed his daughter, “I’m going to call Carol and Janet and ask them to come right over.”
He left me with a daughter who was perhaps twenty-three, dark-haired, thin, almost waifish, pretty, and, at the moment, severely distraught. I recalled that we hadn’t been introduced and said, “I’m Sean Drummond. I was a friend of Lisa’s. She spoke about all of you quite often.”
She suppressed a sniffle. “I’m sorry. I don’t want to speak right now.” She fled.
I went over to stare at book titles, the final resort in every unwieldy, distressing situation. Mr. Morrow was a fan of the classics, I noted, and the books on the shelves had their spines heavily creased. Every family has a room and this study had that feel.
The front door opened about twenty minutes later, then murmured voices, a wail of anguish, then crying. The door opened again five minutes later, and the ritual was repeated.
After a while, I heard footsteps, then they all filed through the door into the study. Mr. Morrow’s eyes moved distractedly around the room, and I suspected he was reliving what only an hour before would’ve been a happy memory and was now a painful one, perhaps of Lisa doing homework at his desk or thumbing through Dickens by the fireplace.
He said to me, “Major, I’m… I forgot your first name.”
