Page 78 of Dead Mountain

“Good. Just forget Hawley. Even if Skip had dug up stuff on him, it would never be admitted.” He paused. “Listen: the Isleta council is being extremely generous with my time and fees, so I have a lot of resources to work with. Don’t give up hope.”

Somehow, that final sentence made Nora’s hopes—already slim—grow fainter. Taking a deep breath, she nodded again, thanked Lightfeather, then turned and walked out into the pitiless November air.

41

MASTER SERGEANT RAMSAY Brickell lived in a neat house in the Trumbull Village section of Albuquerque. Corrie had decided to interview him by herself, after Sharp had shown more than a little impatience at her continued pursuit of the Kirtland angle. Sharp hadn’t exactly forbidden her to interview him—he evidently was willing to let her make her own decisions—but he hadn’t tried to cover up his skepticism, either.

But Corrie just couldn’t shake her sense that there had been a flicker of something in Brickell’s eyes, in that moment of hesitation, when she brought up the Dead Mountain incident during the tour of the base. More to the point, as part of his investigation of Cheape’s murder, Watts had obtained certain personnel files from Kirtland, and he’d passed along a single document to Corrie. As Watts had already implied, there was a minor commendation note in Cheape’s file. The note was uninformative as to what Cheape had actually done that was commendable. It wouldn’t normally have been of interest, except for the date of the event that led to the commendation: November 1, 2008.

The day after the Dead Mountain incident.

She pulled into Brickell’s driveway, put the car in park, got out, and went to the door. It was answered immediately—Brickell was clearly waiting for her. Corrie was a little disconcerted to find him wearing his dress uniform this time, decorations and all. With a brief handshake he ushered her into the house with great formality, and they sat down in a modest living room. He exuded an air of military correctness and decorum.

“Thank you, sir, for agreeing to see me.”

He inclined his head. “A pleasure to see you again, Agent Swanson. Glad to be of help.”

“May I record?” Corrie held up her FBI phone.

He hesitated. “No, thank you. I would prefer you did not.”

“Fine.” She put the phone away. “Just for the record, this interview is voluntary. You’re obviously not a suspect. I’m here for information-gathering purposes. You can halt the interview at any time or, of course, have an attorney present if you wish.”

He nodded briskly. “I understand.”

Corrie took out her notebook in which she had jotted some questions. Sergeant Brickell was sitting with military straightness in his chair, hands clasped, looking every inch the tough, unbending sergeant he had seemed on their first meeting. She sensed he was a man of strong moral principles and fixed integrity—and she was uncertain how that would play out in the interview.

“Sergeant Brickell,” she began, “you were at Kirtland at the time of the Dead Mountain tragedy. I know we’ve spoken about this once before—I was wondering if you remember anything else specific to it.”

“Not much. It was just background noise. We were busy with more pressing business.”

Corrie presumed he meant nuclear annihilation, which did seem worse than missing hikers. “Did you know that one of the victims—the one still missing, Rodney O’Connell—had a father who worked at Kirtland? Lieutenant Colonel Harry O’Connell?”

“I knew Lieutenant Colonel O’Connell slightly, and, yes, I knew his son was one of the missing. It was generally understood on the base at that time.”

“What was Lieutenant Colonel O’Connell’s position there?”

“He was a commander in the 58th Special Operations Wing, but in what role, I do not know.”

Brickell’s voice was as gravelly as before, and he had what sounded to Corrie like a Texas accent. He spoke with deliberation, pausing to formulate each response. Was this habitual—or was he being extra careful for some reason?

“Did you ever meet him?”

“I believe I must have, but I don’t recall any specific encounter.”

“Did you know Benjamin Cheape?”

“You mean the person who was murdered in Socorro?”

“Yes.”

“I didn’t know him well, but our paths crossed. He was a civilian employee in the maintenance department.”

He seemed to radiate an increasing tension. Was he lying? He certainly didn’t look like the lying type—just the opposite.

“How did your paths cross?”

“Very glancingly and, I believe, only once. We worked on the same project—at different levels, of course. He was, as I said, a civilian maintenance worker. I am a master sergeant. There’s not much mixing between the civilian and military sides of Kirtland.”

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