My Former Commander Had To Answer Questions Without His Admirers

The civil suit cost more than our first letters.

Nora showed us a written fee agreement before we signed. Tessa and I each put in $1,500. Amina paid the same. Ruth offered money, but we told her the suit named us, and we had it covered for now.

I drove on the old tires a little longer.

Sutter's complaint said we had spread false claims to officials and ruined a respected man's business standing.

Our answer denied that. Nora attached the documents he had left out.

The judge allowed limited discovery before deciding the early motions. That gave each side a chance to seek records and question witnesses under oath.

At Sutter's deposition, no one called him Colonel.

He wore a dark suit and kept pulling his watch back beneath his cuff. A court reporter sat near the window. His lawyer had arranged his chair beside him.

Nora started with his sworn denial.

"You stated that you never ordered water sent to Ridge Eight. Correct?"

"Not as described by these people."

"Please show me that qualification in your statement."

He looked down.

"I meant stolen water."

"Your statement says water."

His lawyer objected to her tone. Nora waited, then put Amina's order in front of him.

"Are these your initials?"

"They appear to be."

"Did you make them?"

"I signed hundreds of forms."

She showed him the second order.

"And these?"

"Probably."

Amina sat beside me. She did not move.

Nora asked why both loads had changed destination.

"Command reserve."

"Where was that reserve recorded?"

"That would have been handled below my level."

"Who handled it?"

"I don't recall."

Then came the June agreement.

He said it was only a possible job after retirement. There was nothing wrong with preparing for civilian life.

Nora asked whether he had disclosed it to the people investigating our crew.

He asked for a break.

In the hallway, he approached me while his lawyer spoke on the phone.

"You always needed somebody to tell you what mattered," he said quietly.

I looked at his empty hands.

"We had patients waiting on those loads."

"You have no idea what command required."

"Then answer her questions."

I went back into the room.

My own questioning lasted two hours. His lawyer asked why I had waited, why I kept copies, and whether I had exaggerated the incoming fire.

"I waited because the finding stood and I didn't know what else existed," I said. "I kept the copies with written approval. I described the fire I heard and the work I did."

He pointed to a pressure reading on one of my logs.

"Couldn't this have been written later?"

"I wrote it during the run. The shift checker signed beside it."

"You remember one number after all this time?"

"I remember making the entry. The number is on the page."

He turned back to the first sheet.

"So you rely on paper."

"Yes. Memory wouldn't tell me the exact meter total. That's why we logged it."

Nora let him keep asking. He had brought enlarged copies of the very records his client had said no one possessed. I could read every figure from my chair.

"You didn't save nineteen lives, did you?"

"I never claimed that. Our crew brought water. Hospital staff cared for the patients. Drivers moved them out. Eleven patients were still waiting when we arrived."

"So this is about a truck delivery."

"It's about why that delivery became an emergency."

The reporter's keys kept tapping.

By fall, Sutter asked to dismiss his suit. Nora would not agree to a deal that left his accusations hanging over us.

The final settlement dismissed his claims with prejudice. He withdrew his written accusations, paid $12,000 toward our legal bills, and signed an acknowledgment that the reunion charge had been false.

It was no fortune. After the later work, it covered our actual bills and the filing costs. Nora returned the unused client money.

I bought tires.

His acknowledgment went to everyone who had received his accusation letter. The reunion committee also agreed to make room for a public correction when the records review finished.

That could have been the end of my part. It wasn't the end of the water bills.

The county suspended new payments to Crosswind while keeping emergency water available through a temporary contract. Sutter was removed from its emergency water advisory panel.

Wes put a letter in my personnel file stating that the complaints about my work had been checked and found unsupported. He gave me a copy.

"Keep this one, too," he said.

I filed it beside his written decision to keep me off the vendor inspections.

Three weeks later, Nora called while I was changing a kitchen faucet at home.

"An indictment was unsealed this morning," she said. "Sutter and Vale. The charges concern the recent grant bills. Your subpoena is coming."