“No,” said Duncan. “Let’s mind. Why don’t we just decide to give a shit for a few minutes here?” The general leaned toward him and took a deep breath, his eyes going wide and hard. “I remember this guy.”

“What?”

“I remember him.” Now Duncan reached inside the manila envelope and began pulling out several papers.

“So you’re the reason we didn’t have the file when I was at CILHI this morning.”

“I had them bring it to me first,” said the general. “Your scientist buddy has the whole file now, but I wanted to burn some copies.”

“Isn’t this a little below your pay grade, Skipper? Don’t you have a Marine Corps to run?”

“This is personal,” said Duncan. He measured Condley as he held the papers in his hand. “When I saw the first piece of message traffic it bothered me but I couldn’t understand why. I mean, I kept thinking about it, and every time I thought about it I was pissed off. And then I was getting pissed off at myself for being pissed off. I was waking myself up in the middle of the night and then making myself go back to sleep by saying just what you were saying. That it was a long time ago, and besides, he’s dead. But after a few days a little light turned on in my brain. Sometimes that happens, you know. We’ve got so much data stored up there once we reach our age that it takes longer for the computer between our ears to sift through it. I mean, how many gigabytes of garbage does it have to process before it reaches 1969 and then the Que Son Mountains? But finally I started remembering. It was the name. Deville. You don’t forget a name like that, not after what he did. Because if you pronounce it a little differently it comes out as ‘devil.’”

“I’m not tracking with you,” said Condley, mystified by the general’s tirade. “I’ve got no idea what you’re talking about.”

“He personally killed two of our Marines. I saw him.”

The general took an eight-by-ten photograph from the papers and dropped it onto the coffee table. The picture was a standard boot-camp photo from Deville’s service record book that had been enlarged and computer-enhanced. A very young Theodore Deville stared stoically back at them. His eyes were fearless, dark and brooding, daring the camera to hit him with its best shot. This was not someone who had come to the Army from the nurturing bosom of Chevy Chase or Beverly Hills.

“June 24, 1969,” continued Duncan. “I remember because it was my mother’s birthday.”

“Salt and Pepper,” said Condley quietly, mesmerized by the memory and by the photo itself.

“In this case,” said the general, “why don’t we just stick with Salt.”