For Honor and Glory

  Heather Graham

  Slush Pile Productions

  Copyright © 2020 Heather Graham

  For Honor and Glory © 2020 by Slush Pile Productions

  All rights reserved. This publication may not be reproduced, in whole or in part, stored in a retrieval system, or transmitted, in any form or by any means, including electronic, mechanical, photocopying, recording, or otherwise, without the prior express written permission of the author. Unauthorized reproduction of this material, electronic or otherwise, will result in legal action.

  Please report the unauthorized distribution of this publication by contacting the author at theoriginalheathergraham.com, via email at connie@perryco.biz, or at Heather Graham 103 Estainville Ave., Lafayette, LA 70508. Please help stop internet piracy by alerting the author with the name and web address of any questionable or unauthorized distributor.

  For Honor and Glory is a work of fiction. The people and events in For Honor and Glory are entirely fictional. The story is not a reflection of historical or current fact, nor is the story an accurate representation of past or current events. Any resemblance between the characters in this novel and any or all persons living or dead is entirely coincidental.

  For Honor and Glory

  Prologue

  General Whitaker

  Grant Whitaker loved to come to the graveyard and the little chapel at the edge of the park.

  During the week in the midafternoon, it was quiet and lovely and peaceful. The grass was a dazzling green in the fields surrounding the chapel and graveyard, and beautiful old angels and monuments had been erected for over two hundred years here, making it both haunted and enchanting. It was Saturday, and there had been services that morning at the church, but the services were over; the parishioners were gone and even Father Landry had headed home for the day.

  Of course, they were on the edge of an old battlefield that had run red with blood, and because he had been a military man all his life, he also liked to contemplate all the events that played out here.

  While he liked to think he would have been a Union man himself, he didn’t know what would have been had he lived at the time of the Civil War. The largest issue, of course, was slavery, and any sane man today knew slavery was wrong. As a military man, he was well aware it still existed in parts of the world. But this was America; the country he had served all his life.

  In the 1860s, the country hadn’t even been a hundred years old. A man’s first loyalty had been to his state. The concept was one of united states, but it had been difficult, he knew, for the first of the country’s documents to be written, even down to the Declaration of Independence. Thirteen states had to agree! So . . .

  He admired many of the Confederate generals who had also fought in the Mexican war, who had been friends with their Union counterparts at West Point. While he had spent his life for America, he had as much sympathy here for the Confederate dead as he did the Union dead.

  He’d always felt a sad empathy for Robert E. Lee. It was said Lee had spent an entire night pacing when Lincoln asked him to lead Union troops. Back to states—in the end he felt he could not take up arms against Virginia. His home had been Arlington; Lee’s wife was George Washington’s step-granddaughter. And to refuse Lincoln to side with Virginia, he knew they had to leave Arlington, her inheritance.

  He couldn’t begin to imagine having that conversation with one’s wife!

  And this graveyard . . .

  Grant wasn’t a man prone to whimsy, but it always seemed ghosts of those long gone came like images in the wind.

  He particularly liked to sit on a small stone bench by one of the vaults. It belonged to the Aubrey family and Ethan Aubrey was interred here. His father had owned a nearby farm.

  Maryland, while remaining with the Union, had been split. And many a man had chosen to fight with their Southern brethren.

  Ethan had died in the area and what was extremely sad was even though he had determined he had to fight for the South, his cousin John Haverhill had fought for the North. They had grown up together, discussing the magazine they wanted to create one day. Instead, Ethan had died near his family home.

  Ethan’s body had been found by his cousin John, and John made arrangements that the body was returned to Ethan’s father, and thus he lay here.

  Sadly, John had not survived Ethan much longer. He had died from injuries received at Gettysburg, but his commanding officer had seen to it that John’s body had made it home, too. He was buried across the graveyard, in the Haverhill family vault.

  Grant sat for a minute where he loved to sit, and then he rose looking around. He hadn’t come today to contemplate war, battles, death, or people.

  He was on a mission. Tomorrow was Memorial Day. And he meant to do something before Memorial Day. While the world was still plagued by a virus, the USA was opening up again. Tomorrow, people would be honoring those who had fought for the country.

  His little great granddaughter had been scared on her last trip to church. She’d heard people whispering outside when the services were over, laughing and saying that it was the best plan ever, using a graveyard filled with the dead as a hiding place—and maybe others would join them there, but only after they’d made their money.

  He had come to search the graveyard when he knew others wouldn’t be around. He meant to test the iron gates on the vaults, check the stone lids on the above ground tombs, and search around the monuments. His great granddaughter Sara was eleven; she was a smart girl, and while others might not believe her, he did.

  He stood and for a minute, he felt the breeze, and felt as if the land itself were hallowed ground, as if something remained, perhaps a memory of history in the very earth. He imagined faces swirling in the wind, those who had died, and those left to live the rest of their lives knowing war was truly horrible, that bloodshed kept pain in the heart, no matter how noble or just a cause.

  “Sir! Please, get out of here!”

  He clearly heard the whisper but looking around he saw nothing.

  Then he did . . .

  Too late.

  Something slammed against Grant’s head and sent him crashing down on the bench in front of the Aubrey vault. He felt the shocking pain in his temple where he had been hit hard and again as he hit the stone bench as he fell. Blood . . . the blood from where he hit the stone bench.

  Thump, thump, thump . . .

  It was his heart. He clearly knew his time was coming . . . and he was ready. He had outlived so many of his fellow soldiers, enlisted men and officers, but . . .

  He thought he heard a different voice, one so gentle it was like a caress, telling him he had always fought the good fight. It was time for him to lay down his arms.

  But he needed a minute! Just a minute!

  They were going to get away with it! He had to stop them! But . . .

  Blood. He moved and he tried and he managed . . .

  A gentle hand swept him away, not into darkness, but into light.

  And in His Honor

  “Special Assistant Director Adam Harrison’s friend, Grant Whitaker, died right there. He was found lying over the small bench by the Aubrey family tomb where Confederate Lieutenant Ethan Aubrey was entombed,” Detective David Carlson explained. He shook his head. “Looked like the old fellow just had a heart attack. The chapel is Anglican and the priest found him when he came in at night to retrieve his notebook. The rectory is a little house across that field. But Father Landry found General Whitaker. He was draped over the bench. The autopsy was just this morning. The conclusion was that the heart attack caused him to pitch over, and he cracked his temple on the stone bench. There was no reason to suspect any kind of foul play. I didn’t call it foul play, and our M.E. didn’t call it foul play. Obviously, we’re trying to extend every courtesy here to you feds, but . . . Grant Whitaker was ninety years old. I do understand the man was friends with Harrison, the head of your FBI unit. I knew Whitaker myself, and he was a fine man. We all hurt when we lose a friend . . . but, come on. He was ninety years old.”

  “Or ninety years young,” Angela Hawkins murmured.

  Jackson was happy about the fact he’d come here with his very pregnant wife. He guessed there was really only pregnant and not pregnant, but Angela was due in less than eight weeks.

  She was an agent in her own right, and in truth, he had believed they would find out an elderly gentleman had died of a heart attack.

  But after arriving . . .

  Suspicion had set in with him as well, and as of now, he wasn’t sure why.

  Carlson paused for a minute. A man in denim overalls and carrying a pail and a rake was coming around the church. He had his baseball cap pulled low over his eyes, but he lifted it when he saw Carlson there.

  “Can I help you?” he asked. “It’s Sunday, yes, folks, but Father Landry’s two Sunday services are both over now. Oh! I’m sorry,” he said, noting the detective and recognizing him. “You’re uh, Carlson, with the cops, right? Everything okay here? Do you need my help?”

  “Yes, everything is okay, and thank you, we don’t need any help. These are just friends of General Whitaker, come here out of respect. And you’re Morrison—groundskeeper?” Carlson asked.

  “Morris. Fred Morris,” the man said. He was probably in his late thirties, Jackson thought, bronzed from his work in the sun, with shaggy brown hair and wiry build. “Groundskeeper. That’s fine—I just keep my eye out for the kids. Picking up trash around here, and well . . . jus

t leaving.” He paused. “Sorry about your friend.”

  “Thank you,” Jackson said.

  The man nodded and headed on out to a truck parked down the road.

  Jackson and Angela waved along with Detective Carlson.

  “It doesn’t matter how old someone is, if their time on this earth is compromised by someone else,” Jackson said, supporting Angela and their determined position to find out exactly what had happened here. “Trust me, if Adam Harrison didn’t have a reason, he wouldn’t have sent us out here.”

  They were near the site of the Antietam National Battlefield, run by the park service. But the land where they stood was just off the site, a graveyard by a small Civil War era chapel that still held services. The land around them was beautiful. It was a sunny day in spring, allowing for a blue sky with little puffs of clouds, a gentle breeze, and the soft calls of birds. It was perfect for a picnic, but sadly, Jackson and Angela had come out unofficially because Adam had asked them to do so.

  “Grant Whitaker was a retired general. He served in Korea, in Viet Nam, in Desert Storm. He didn’t give a damn about politics, he just loved his country,” Adam had told Jackson when he’d called him in, asking him to please investigate the situation. “He texted me, just before he headed out to the chapel and the graveyard. I’ll tell you his exact words, ‘Something is going on. Sara is a kid, yes, a smart one, and if she heard about something . . . well, I’m not a lawman, just an old soldier. But If I find something, I’ll be calling on you!’”

  If Adam was concerned, Jackson was concerned.

  “Maybe one of the ghosts gave him a heart attack,” Carlson said with a sigh. He gave them a lopsided grin. “I’m sorry. I’m not making light of this. The national park goes so far—the killing went on a lot farther, and in this area, it was really sad. Fathers and sons and brothers and friends all met here, on opposite sides of the fray. Antietam is considered to have had the bloodiest day of the Civil War, so you get all kinds out here—not to mention teenagers who like to come out of the town areas with beer, and God knows what goes on sometimes even in a graveyard. But that’s acting up—and pranks—not murder. We patrol it all to the best of our ability, and I’ll do what I can for you, but when even the M.E. says that you have a natural death on your hands . . .”

  “Photos. Crime scene photos. You couldn’t have assumed it was a natural death when the body was first discovered, right?”

  “Yes, of course, we have photos, though again, we’re not considering it a crime scene. I’ll have them emailed to you. But I can tell you right now he was slumped over the bench, in front of the monument. He was almost lain out with his head on the ground . . .”

  He stopped speaking. Angela was kneeling, examining the bench.

  “And I’m assuming you saw this, right?” she asked the detective.

  “Saw what, Special Agent Hawkins?” Carlson asked.

  “Angela,” Jackson murmured, crouching down beside her. She was over seven months along with her pregnancy. Crawling down on her hands and knees didn’t seem right.

  She didn’t hear him, or she was ignoring him. She looked up, pointing to the side of the bench. “Someone tried to write on the stone—and it looks like they were writing with blood.”

  “I told you—the old gentleman cracked his temple. Of course, there’s blood. And I would really appreciate it if you wouldn’t behave as if we’re small town and inept out here!” Carlson said.

  Jackson’s head was down by his wife’s then. And she was right. Someone had tried to write on the stone—and it appeared to be the writing was in dried blood.

  Angela looked up and gave Detective Carlson one of her great smiles. “Detective, I am sorry, and I don’t mean to be implying anything at all. You’ve done your job, and please! No one is suggesting anything less. But as you know, Adam is . . . well, he’s a caring man and an important one in watching out for strange crimes, too. And Adam has great instincts. General Whitaker texted him before he came out here. He wrote he was going to ferret out what was going on so he could bring in law enforcement.”

  Carlson let out a long breath, shaking his head. Angela was much better than he was, Jackson thought, at making a situation smoother. Despite TV shows, they usually did just fine with local law enforcement. But when there was a snag, she was the one who could handle it best.

  “The truth is that no matter how you try or how sacred some find a battlefield where thousands upon thousands died, you have that teen element wanting to get frisky. I’m not saying the general didn’t see something; he probably did. Kids acting up. But we already do our best. We get complaints from the church now and then. Seriously—we consider all this hallowed ground, just like Gettysburg. Again, I’m here. I’ll help any way I can. But forgive me, I’m skeptical.” He sighed. “Look, sorry, I grew up in the city and I’m not a believer in the . . . well, this ground is hallowed, not haunted.”

  Jackson stood and helped Angela to her feet. He gave her a fierce “you’re pregnant” frown, but she ignored him. And of course, she’d read a dozen books and they’d all said that exercise was good; and she insisted most women worked until just before their children were born—even up to the time they had to go to the hospital. She was perfectly healthy, took all her vitamins, and was careful to rest. He was just . . .

  A top-notch agent—and a paranoid dad!

  “I believe that’s blood on the vault, yes, but with more to it, and, of course, hard to see unless you’re looking for something. And I believe General Whitaker was trying to write something—in his own blood—when he died.”

  Carlson didn’t seem like a bad guy; he was just convinced an old man had a walk in a churchyard, had a heart attack, and died.

  Jackson had even questioned it when Adam had first called him. General Whitaker had been ninety. A young ninety, but still . . .

  Carlson’s phone rang and he answered it, frowning as he listened.

  “I’m afraid I need to leave you. If you do find anything, please—”

  “Detective, this is your jurisdiction. We will get to you immediately with anything—even if it’s to tell you that we haven’t found a thing and we’re leaving.”

  Carlson nodded. “Thanks. I’ll come back by.”

  He left them. Angela stared at Jackson.

  “You just—let him leave. Jackson,” she said. “Whitaker was trying to write something! Look, I swear that he started with ‘D.’ and that the next letter . . . well, it’s just a line.”

  “I think you’re right. But even if we prove he was writing, if we don’t have something else, most people will believe it was going to be a goodbye to his family. And I’m not ignoring it; I’m going to get a sample and get it to our lab along with our own pictures.”

  “Jackson, I know that—” Angela began, but she was gently interrupted.

  “It’s not safe. Ma’am, your expecting a wee one. You must not be here!”

  They both heard the distressed voice. They almost slammed into one another as they turned to see who was speaking.

  Detective Carlson was not all the way to his car, but clear as day, Jackson could see the ghost of a Confederate soldier.

  “Aubrey, sir, Lieutenant Ethan Aubrey, Army of Northern Virginia. I tried to reach General Whitaker, but . . . you do see me, sir—ma’am?”

  Carlson waved to them. They smiled and waved back. Then Carlson turned again and got into his car. Jackson and Angela both managed to ignore the ghost for a minute so they could wave to him as he drove off.

  “Ah, yes, of course,” the ghost murmured. “Carlson doesn’t see—and you must not look like crazy people. He has gone, so!”

  “Lieutenant, I’m Jackson Crow and this is my wife, Angela Hawkins,” Jackson said.

  “How do you do, sir,” Angela said, and asked anxiously, “And yes. We see you clearly.”

  “Both of you. Remarkable.”

  “There are more,” Angela said softly.

  “Yes, of course, so in the world—I’ve seen one other, I believe. Oh, people sense us. Especially here. Those who don’t sense us even . . . sense us. They see the lines of blue and gray, the cavalry and the canon. So sad, the business of war.”

 

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