Friendly Fire by C. D. B.; Bryan Page A

to the house, sprayed the lawn for dandelions, visited his friend and neighbor Cecil Joens, then climbed up on the old plum-red Farmall tractor to clean up the lower field.
    By ten o’clock that night Michael had ripped out the last stump, the remains of a cottonwood tree. He stepped down from the tractor to unhook the chain, and as he knelt by the stump, his eye was caught by the faint flinty gleam of an arrowhead caught in the cottonwood’s bole. Michael picked at it until the point came free, then wiped the arrowhead clean on his blue-jeaned thigh. It was a beauty, side-notched, about an inch and a half long and three-quarters of an inch across, the sort used for deer and smaller game. The tip was white, but unlike the other quartzite arrowheads he had found, this one darkened to orange and black at its base. The point was still sharp, the notch and base unchipped by any plow; the cottonwood tree must have grown up around it. The arrowhead may even have been old enough to have been fired by Black Hawk himself. Michael dropped the arrowhead into his breast pocket, climbed back up on the tractor and just sat for a moment listening to the deep drumming of the Farmall’s motor in the moonlight. He rested his elbows on the steering wheel and looked out over the land; then, reluctantly, he double-clutched the tractor into gear, advanced the ignition and slowly drove back up to the farm. Michael backed the Farmall into the shed, carefully aligned its wheels with the newer Farmall and shut the motor off. The sudden silence was broken only by the crackling sounds of the engine cooling, the distant chuckle of a cock pheasant and moments later another pheasant’s answering call. Michael climbed down from the tractor and walked into the house.
    The next morning, September 4, 1969, Michael’s family watched his airplane lift off from the Waterloo Airport, saw it climb northwest over the Cedar River and Turkey Ford Forks where the last Indian council had been held, and then he was gone.

Chapter Four
    When the telephone rang in the parish office of the Sacred Heart Catholic Church off Poplar Street in La Porte City a little after nine o’clock on Saturday morning, February 21, 1970, the thin, stooped late-middle-aged country priest assumed it was just another mother whose child, sick with a midwinter cold, would be unable to attend catechism classes that day. He unhurriedly walked to his desk and, lifting the receiver, was surprised to hear an entirely unfamiliar male voice ask for him by name.
    â€œFather Otto Shimon?”
    â€œYes-s-s?”
    â€œFather Shimon, this is Master Sergeant Fitzgerald. I’m with Fifth Army Headquarters.… Do you have an O. E. Mullen in your parish?”
    â€œâ€˜O. E. Mullen’?” Father Shimon repeated, giving himself time enough to move to the chair behind his desk and ease himself down.
    â€œThat’s right,” Fitzgerald said. “I was just talking to the priest at the Carmel parish and—”
    â€œThat would be Father Rahe at St. Mary’s,” Father Shimon interrupted, then added, “Sergeant,” because he had been a captain in the Army during World War II and served now as chaplain for the local American Legion chapter in La Porte.
    â€œYes, sir, that’s the one,” Sergeant Fitzgerald said. “Well, the Father, Father Rahe, thinks he has a Ralph Mullen in his parish, but I’m trying to locate an O. E . Mullen and I thought perhaps you—”
    â€œThat would be Oscar Eugene Mullen,” the priest said. “He’s listed in the phone book, however, as Gene Mullen, hence”—Father Shimon chuckled—“your, ah, confusion.”
    â€œThen this O. E. Mullen is in your parish, sir?”
    â€œYes-s-s, Gene Mullen’s in my parish.” The priest did not like this sergeant’s tone; he was being altogether too businesslike. “As a matter of fact, Sergeant, the Mullens