We’re back on the couch together to enjoy another classic NCIS episode! This week, Ducky gets center stage as we watch an episode from season six called Broken Bird.
NCIS cast. (Photo: CBS)
Let’s get right to finding out this week’s mystery, shall we?
We see a sailor and a young flight attendant exiting a hotel, deep in each other’s personal space, teasing and flirting as she regretfully departs to make her flight. His post-flight-attendant bliss is short-lived, however, when another woman marches up to him, indignant, claiming she loves him and he stabbed her in the back.
Screenshot of Kym Lane Hoy as Cheryl Young on the NCIS season six episode Broken Bird. NCIS airs on CBS on Tuesdays.
She is also deep in his personal space, only in her case it’s to make a point. Literally. She sinks a knife into his gut, saying at least she stabbed him while looking him in the face. So … wow. No ambivalence there. Scorned Woman stalks off, leaving Stabbed Sailor to pull the knife out, then drop, bleeding, to his knees. Prognosis: poor.
Well, at least we don’t have to wait to find out who our Dead Guy of the Week is going to be!
Cue amazing theme song and awesome flashback opening credits.
Screenshot of Mark Harmon as Gibbs on the NCIS season six episode Broken Bird. NCIS airs on CBS on Tuesdays.
Our team of very special agents starts in the Bull Pen of Orangey Goodness with Tony and Ziva looking at a rather large box that has been delivered to McGee’s desk. Tony notes it came from Tim’s hometown, and ponders what might inside. Cookies, perhaps? Ziva sort of slinks around the box, saying they must be very big cookies. Mittens? She lifts the box, drops it on Tony’s hands. “Too heavy.” Heh. Tony decides he doesn’t want to play anymore, so Ziva pulls her knife out, intending to open it herself, when McGee strolls in, delighted to see the package. He takes the knife, slits open the tape and starts lifting out his life history in computers. They traveled remarkably well given there seems to be zero packing material. Tony and Ziva exchange looks of what the? as McGee waxes rhapsodic over his very first PC, and onward to his first laptop. Tony says he’ll be sure to call the Smithsonian so they can do a display on The Chronicles of a Teenage Shut-in. McGee says Tony has no respect for history. Enter Gibbs, who says he does, and so does our Stabbed Soldier. “He is history?” Ziva wants to know. “Oh, yeah,” Gibbs replies. Ouch. “Grab your mittens. It’s cold out there.” Oh, Gibbs.
We shift to the scene as the team takes photos of the body, the knife, while Gibbs talks to Flirty Flight Attendant. Seems she came back for her forgotten passport and found her lover lying dead in the street. Gibbs asks if she saw who did it, getting a tearful shake of the head in response. She tells him she didn’t need to see who did it, she knows who it was. She names Stabbed Sailor’s ex-fiancée, and it’s the same name SS called Woman Scorned. So, no mystery there, then. Tony takes FFA off for a statement and McGee and Gibbs walk away, as McGee tells him they have an eye witness who saw a woman nearby with blood on her hands. He says that woman doesn’t match the description of Woman Scorned as given by FFA. Ruh roh.
Screenshot of Brian Dietzen as Palmer on the NCIS season six episode Broken Bird. NCIS airs on CBS on Tuesdays.
Shift to Palmer complaining to Ducky about the alphabet streets in D.C. not making any progressive sense (welcome to my former life, Jimmy!). Ziva’s response to Palmer’s alphabet rant that I Street should be two blocks down from K Street is that in Hebrew, there is no J. Heh. Ducky launches into his L’Enfant speech on how the city was designed, giving Palmer a hard time for not paying attention in school. (I was born in D.C. and even I learned something new from this particular History Ramble of the Week. I didn’t know that after the alphabet letters are used up for street names, they go by syllables. One-syllable word name, followed by two-syllable word name, etc. Fascinating.) Ziva still wants to know why there is no J Street. Heh.
A phone call to her cell interrupts her and she is called away. To 13th and L. Good luck with that. She heads off, ducking under the police tape, and we notice one woman in particular giving her retreating back a look. But then we’re back with Palmer and Ducky, and Palmer swearing he’ll make up that one flunked course. Ducky says no need, that Palmer can make it up to him right now. They turn to their task and we switch to Gibbs and McGee looking through an alley, as Ziva comes in from a different direction. She is the first one to notice Woman Scorned, sitting all huddled up behind some trash cans. Gun drawn, aimed at WS, she calls to the team that she has her, then orders WS to stand up and show her hands. She does, we see her bloody palms, briefly, before McGee cuffs her.
Back at the scene, Palmer is giving his report to Ducky on his findings regarding the body. He runs down information on the stabbing, says SS likely bled out in about three minutes. Ducky says the cold surface contributes to the speed of exsanguination, as the cold slows down coagulation. So Palmer changes his estimation to four minutes, clearly annoyed. Ducky asks Palmer again why there is no J Street, and Palmer repeats that he doesn’t know, rising up and heading back to the truck as Ducky calls out that he just gave him a clue. He continues his History Ramble as we see the woman I noted earlier unwrap her scarf and look at the crime scene with an expression that is decidedly menacing. Ducky is intent on doing his job, not paying attention.
Screenshot of Naz Deravian as Mosuma Daoub on the NCIS season six episode Broken Bird. NCIS airs on CBS on Tuesdays.
Meanwhile, Gibbs, McGee, Ziva and the handcuffed WS meet up with Tony, and they think they have this all wrapped up. Tony starts moving the crowd away, saying there is nothing to see, and they are congratulating themselves on a case quickly solved. The attending officers’ attention turns to the dissembling crowd, and our Mystery Woman wraps her scarf around her head, covering part of her face, then ducks under the crime scene tape. Ducky is still mid-ramble as she grabs the bloody crime scene knife and starts her own rant. She comes at Ducky as Palmer looks up from his own investigative activities. Palmer shouts a warning to Ducky as we see her charge at him, wielding the blade. She stabs at Ducky (no, not Ducky!) then takes off as he falls to the ground, with Palmer quickly coming to his aid. We’re not sure where he’s been struck, but his hands were up in front of him at the time.
The team hears the commotion, with Ziva reaching them first. Palmer sends her after Mystery Scarf Woman, but Ziva’s chase is short-lived as she finds the green scarf discarded in the street. Gibbs tells Ducky to keep still. He says he’s fine, it was just a defensive wound. Then lifts his hand, with the blade stuck clean through it. AUGH! Fade to black and white. (And I just sort of … fade.)
At the hospital, Abby enters and asks Palmer how Ducky is doing. Palmer goes into a very detailed rundown of the wound and what the prognosis might be, but all Abby wants to know is if Ducky is alive. Palmer says Ducky is fine. She reminds Palmer that when she’s told someone has been stabbed, that isn’t always a given. He apologizes and comments that she is remarkably calm. She agrees, then says that if she’s come to realize that if she has a complete freak-out every time one of them is injured, she’ll have to start having her mail forwarded. Ha! The doors open and Ducky is wheeled out of surgery.
Gibbs asks a happily morphined-up Ducky what he recalls about the incident, but he’s in his happy place, talking about how ironic it is that the solution to getting knifed is going under the knife. Heh. Ducky groggily instructs them on the M.E. he wants them to contact to step in for him while he’s recuperating. We shift to the bull pen where the team is showing a cell phone video of the attack on the Screen of All Knowing. It’s blurry and jerky, so McGee offers to see if he can clean it up. Ziva is able to detect an Afghani dialect in the woman’s shouts, and McGee gets a linguist.
Screenshot of Pauley Perrette as Abby and Cote de Pablo as Ziva on the NCIS season six episode Broken Bird. NCIS airs on CBS on Tuesdays.
Meantime, down in Ducky’s Digs, Palmer is trying Ducky’s chat-with-the-corpse bit, but it’s not a good fit. Enter replacement M.E. Jordan Hampton, who seems to take the news of Ducky’s assault a bit personally, but we don’t learn why. We shift to Abby Lab where we and Ziva learn the knife that is now part of two crime scenes is a chef’s knife from a standard 12-piece set. We learn Abby once had a summer job as a phone saleswoman for kitchen knives, and that this particular knife has a lot of fingerprints on the handle. So it will take some time to sort them all out. In the meantime, she found some hair on the scarf, or hijab. The scarf is old, handmade. Ziva says the wearer wouldn’t have lost it unintentionally. She is called upstairs by McGee, who says the linguist has arrived.
Screenshot of Mark Harmon as Gibbs on the NCIS season six episode Broken Bird. NCIS airs on CBS on Tuesdays.
Over at the hospital, Gibbs has been watching over Ducky. Gibbs has a quick talk with Tony and Ziva, and learns what the linguist says Mystery Woman was shrieking as she attacked Ducky. Gibbs seems surprised, asks them if they are sure it’s correct. They nod that it is, then leave him alone to talk to Ducky. Ducky explains that 30 years ago, during his Royal Army Medical Corps days, he worked with an American tank regiment. He says that hand injuries were common with the armored cavalry. It was that experience that led him to want to specialize in hand injuries. Fortunately, he quips, he moved on to a less “specialized clientele” or his current injury might have ended his career. Gibbs reads the Pashtun words MW shrieked, and Ducky’s expression goes still. Ducky says it means “Bringer of death.” Ducky doesn’t want to talk about his days in the war, but Gibbs adds that MW’s next words were, “You killed my brother.” He leans in, wants to know if Ducky has any idea why she would have said that. Ducky says, rather flatly, “Perhaps it was because I killed her brother.” Fade to black and white.
Screenshot of David McCallum as Ducky on the NCIS season six episode Broken Bird. NCIS airs on CBS on Tuesdays.
We return to Gibbs entering the bull pen and Ziva telling him they’ve identified MW. Gibbs says to put her in interrogation, but Tony joins in, saying that the woman isn’t actually there. She runs a flower shop, but hasn’t returned to work since the attack. She hasn’t returned home to her husband and kids, either. Gibbs instructs Ziva and Tony to bring the husband in. They leave and Gibbs turns to McGee, wanting to know if Director Vance is still away in meetings. McGee confirms that he is. Gibbs says he needs a personnel file. McGee says he can pull that up without disturbing the director, and asks which file he’s retrieving. “Dr. Donald Mallard,” Gibbs tells him. Surprise face.
We shift to the conference room where Ziva is chatting with Mr. MW. He doesn’t know where his wife is, he’s been calling her. He didn’t want to scare the kids, but had gotten so nervous he dropped the kids off at school and forgot to give them their lunches. Which he is still clutching in his hands. Ziva shows him the evidence bag with the hijab and asks if he recognizes it. He says it’s a scarf, not a hijab, that they are not so traditional. He wants to know where they found it. Ziva tells him it was near her shop. Mr. MW wants to know what could have happened that she wouldn’t call him back. Ziva says they will find out. Tony steps out to talk to McGee, who corroborates that there were no calls coming from MW’s cell to her home number. The only calls she did make, however, were to the embassy. Tony wants to know which one. So do we!
Screenshot of Mark Harmon as Gibbs on the NCIS season six episode Broken Bird. NCIS airs on CBS on Tuesdays.
Instead we move to Gibbs as he looks into Ducky’s personnel file. We get a voiceover history of Afghanistan from Ducky, who we see at home, putting an old album on a turntable, with his one good hand, while a bespectacled Gibbs is looking through his personnel file, back in Ducky’s Digs. Ducky continues to his own days during the war, serving with the RAMC, as Medical Examiner Jordan brings in a silver tray set with tea. The plot thickens! He says he wanted to go where he’d do the most good, but that he was also entangled with a possessive German woman and it was one way to cut himself loose. Ha! Jordan neatens up Ducky’s bow tie, saying he was too much the gentleman to speak of his old flames, and he proffers a pack of matches, saying he’s more interested in starting a new one. Ha! Jordan takes the matches and goes to light a fire in the fireplace, only to have a bird fly out of the chimney flue into the room. The starling perches on the back of the couch as both the corgis and Ducky look on. Back in Ducky’s Digs, Gibbs closes the folder and looks contemplative.
Screenshot of David Dayan Fisher as Trent Kort and Mark Harmon as Gibbs on the NCIS season six episode Broken Bird. NCIS airs on CBS on Tuesdays.
We shift to the Mall, as a man in a trench coat approaches a bench. The Washington Monument soars in the background, and there is still some snow on the ground. Oh, look, it’s Agent Trent Kort. (So sorry about season 13 there, TK. Except, you know, not really.) Gibbs comments that Kort’s agency is keeping him close to home and Kort says, surprising no one, that he’s “made a few enemies overseas.” Gibbs is all, “What, with your winning personality?” And Kort is all, “When you finally open that charm school, let me know.” Heh. Gibbs wants a favor, Kort says he doesn’t like him, Gibb says the feeling is mutual, and yet, here we are. He talks about a CIA mission aiding the Mujahedeen against the Russians which happened back in the ‘80s. Kort says as much, it was before his time. Gibbs gives him a specific place and time he wants Kort to dig into, see what info he can find. Kort says it will cost him, then leaves. Gibbs just smiles, nods.
Screenshot of Cote de Pablo as Ziva, Michael Weatherly as Tony and Bernard White as Afghani Ambassador Qasim Saydia on the NCIS season six episode Broken Bird. NCIS airs on CBS on Tuesdays.
Over at the Afghanistan embassy, Tony is being his sometimes brash and insulting self with the ambassador as Ziva looks mildly uncomfortable. However, we learn that MW is actually in the building, and the ambassador seems aware of her criminal actions the day before. However, he says they’re still investigating the “allegations.” Ziva tries the more diplomatic route, but finds out that the ambassador isn’t talking about the allegations against MW, but rather her allegations against Ducky. He says that MW claims Ducky violated the Geneva Convention and is accused of committing war crimes. Ducky? Fade to black and white.
Back in the bull pen, McGee is reviewing that particular part of the convention, but Ziva stands firm in her belief that Ducky is no war criminal. McGee says they can’t do anything until formal charges are filed. Tony says then everyone would know. They figure out that MW was only 8 years old when she and Ducky were in the same camp in Afghanistan, and that it seemed highly unlikely that she simply recognized him while walking down the street and became overwrought enough to race up and stab him. Somehow she had to have known he was at least living in the area. They go to work trying to figure out how she could have known Ducky would be working a case that day, on that particular street. Tony is all over it, expecting Gibbs to walk in any second. Only … no Gibbs.
Screenshot of David Dayan Fisher as Trent Kort on the NCIS season six episode Broken Bird. NCIS airs on CBS on Tuesdays.
We shift to Gibbs in his basement, spectacles back on, as Kort enters, saying he hopes Ducky knows how good a friend he has in Gibbs. “Two-way street,” is Gibbs’ response. Kort grouses about how long it took him to find the folder, then lays it on top of the boat Gibbs is working on. Kort and Gibbs talk about owing favors, and Kort mentions how Gibbs’ director could have gotten the same info by contacting Kort’s director, and yet … He goes on to say how Gibbs obviously wanted to go the back channel route, avoid the paper trail. Then he says that in the hope of continuing their good will, he offers up another file, free of charge. That one has the name Vance printed on it. “You really should learn to polish the brass,” he says, then leaves.
Once Kort is gone, Gibbs takes the Vance file and stows it away without looking at it, then returns to Ducky’s file and slides the confidential folder out of the envelope. He holds a strip of old film up to the light. In the next frame, we see him knocking on Ducky’s door. Ducky opens it, presuming Jordan has locked herself out, only to find Gibbs entering with a case in one hand. He asks if Ducky was expecting someone else, then asks what’s in the box under his arm. He says it’s a dead starling (aww) and comments that superstition says that when a bird flies into a house, it means one of the occupants is about to die, and given his mum has moved out, he thought perhaps it would apply to him. Gibbs asks after his mother and we learn her bad days outnumber her good, and Ducky talks about Alzheimer’s and the battle waged between his scientist brain and philosopher’s soul. He comments that the bird didn’t fly away when the corgis went for it. (Yeah, more detail there is what I don’t need. Thanks, Ducks!) So, he presumes the superstition referred to the bird itself. All the while, Gibbs is setting up a projector. Gibbs asks Ducky if he’d heard about the war crimes claims and he says he had a talk with the Afghanistan ambassador, then says the Netherlands is lovely that time of year. Heh. Gibbs says Ducky isn’t going anywhere, that he has CIA footage taken at the camp where MW’s brother and Ducky were both stationed.
Ducky says there was such devastation and suffering in that camp. He wants to know where Gibbs got it, and all he says is, “Pulled a few strings.” Ducky says he thought he could save lives there, but he could “sooner pluck a grain of sand from a sirocco.” Over in the bull pen, Tony says in speaking with MW’s friends and co-workers they all describe her as being a calm and steady type. McGee says he’s not going to find anything new, but Tony says they have to. Then back at Ducky’s we see the film of a man being held prisoner, but Ducky says that’s not MW’s brother. Ducky says he knows the man, knows his name, remembers his wounds. He was lacerated as if he’d been in a knife fight. Ducky stitched him up, but the man returned to fight and the wounds reopened. Gibbs asks who the man is conducting the interrogation on the film, and Ducky said his affiliation remained a mystery. He knew little about him, they’d played chess, and he had given him a physical. From that, Ducky knew the man had a congenital defect that left him unable to feel pain. So you have a guy who can’t feel pain inflicting torture during interrogations, a guy who due to his own defect (well, the congenital one anyway) couldn’t know when things were going wrong. Gibbs wanted to know if things went wrong often. A defensive Ducky says he was never in the interrogation room, but became suspicious when MW’s brother came back to him a third time. He did some digging and found out that the man was known to everyone but Ducky as Mr. Pain.
Screenshot of Mark Harmon as Gibbs, David McCallum as Ducky and Torri Higginson as Dr. Jordan Hampton on the NCIS season six episode Broken Bird. NCIS airs on CBS on Tuesdays.
Ducky sees MW’s brother on the film, saying he was tortured for days, even though he claimed to know nothing, and each time he was sent to Ducky to be sewn up. It was Ducky’s first exposure to that kind of interrogation technique, though he acknowledged it went on to become “dreadfully commonplace.” Gibbs turns off the projector and loses his patience, reminding Ducky his life is in the balance. He demands that Ducky, who is still beating around the bush, tell Gibbs exactly what he did there. “Only what was required of me,” Ducky says, prompting an outburst from Gibbs, who wants to know if Ducky is protecting MW’s brother. Ducky says he’s protecting no one, and he’d rather Gibbs stop pulling strings to unravel the story any further. Gibbs is succinct in his response to that. “No.” As he leaves, he encounters Jordan, who is just returning. Gibbs glances back at Ducky, then smiles, and tells Doc Jordan it’s good to see her. She says the same, then turns to Ducky and says, “Donnie, I think I found a place in the ground that’s not too tough.” Meaning to bury the bird, I’m assuming, but we’re all hung up on her calling him Donnie. Ducky thinks whatever she found will be fine, but when he opens the box, the bird flies out. (Yay! Starlings for the win!) Except, ruh roh … who is the superstition referring to now?
Back in the bull pen, the team hasn’t been able to find anything to support their theory that MW knew Ducky worked in the area prior to the day of her attack. Gibbs hands the film reel to McGee and asks him to identify Dr. Pain. He gets a call from Jordan saying Ducky took off and she doesn’t know where he is. “I do,” Gibbs says, then grabs his coat and takes off. We see Gibbs enter the embassy, where Ducky is seated in the foyer, and tells him they’re leaving. Ducky isn’t having any of that. The ambassador comes out, says they’re convening a tribunal unless Gibbs can provide proof Ducky didn’t torture MW’s brother, and Gibbs counters that he will arrest MW them, for her crimes. The ambassador isn’t impressed, then asks Ducky if he’s brought counsel with him. Much to Gibbs’ disgust, he says he hasn’t brought a lawyer as he’s there to confess. Fade to black and white.
We return to Gibbs and Ziva sitting in the waiting room at the embassy, as Gibbs recites the quote, “All that is necessary for the triumph of evil is that good men do nothing.” (How timely. Then again, when isn’t it?) Ziva reminds Gibbs that he can’t personally bring any leverage against the ambassador, but the fact that the man hasn’t contacted the State Department shows he doesn’t want this to happen, either. Ziva says given the state of affairs between the two countries, the ambassador can’t afford to look like the aggressor. She adds that when the sun rises in Kabul, the situation will likely move up the chain, so they have about seven hours to get Ducky to open up.
In Abby Lab, she is running facial rec on Dr. Pain while discussing McGee’s geeky computer-filled childhood. She claims she was shocked by his package from home. He explains he’s worked hard to get past his awkward geeky parts. She says she likes his geeky parts. He says he’s not trying to be something he’s not, that he just wants to be more than a “search engine.” She gets that. He asks what shocked her then, and she says, “That you were a Mac guy.” Heh. The facial rec gets a hit. Dr. Pain has a name. Marcin Jerek. Born in Poland, fled to Britain, until health got the better of him, forcing him to retire. He lectured about interrogation techniques at Langley, apparently he was quite the master at breaking a subject. Tony notes that all of McGee’s childhood computers are once again boxed up. McGee shows a flash drive, says he got everything he needed. Tony tilts McGee’s head, says it really is shaped like an egg. McGee is all, “Don’t do that.” Heh. Boys.
Over at the embassy, Ziva nods respectfully as the ambassador comes in to see her and Gibbs. Gibbs asks him for some time alone with Ducky. The ambassador says Ducky has made it clear he doesn’t wish to speak with them. Gibbs says it’s not with him, but with someone else. We move to the room where Ducky is seated, and in comes Tony … with Dr. Pain. The now aged Dr. Pain says how he was taken from his home by federal agents, brought to the Afghan government, accused of war crimes, and after all that, “It’s just Ducky.” Wow. Nice. Tony and Ziva watch as the two talk about chess, with Tony telling Ziva that the Tower of London had nothing on Dr. Pain’s place. The door opens and Gibbs brings in MW and the ambassador to watch the two men talk through the two-way window. “Then decide both their fates,” Gibbs says.
Screenshot of William Morgan Shepard as Marcin Jerek, aka Dr. Pain, on the NCIS season six episode Broken Bird. NCIS airs on CBS on Tuesdays.
We hear Dr. Pain say that he’s sure it’s Kort that’s to blame, which perks Tony right up. DP goes on to say that he can’t believe the embassy expects them to talk, all in fear of the hangman’s noose. Ducky replies that he’s already confessed. He goes on to say that the fact that the man can’t feel pain doesn’t excuse his lack of remorse. DP says there were traitors amongst the innocent, so he was brought in to figure out who was who, only Ducky flew into the whole mess, “like a moth to a flame.” Ducky says he was there to save lives, and DP was there to destroy them. DP counters it was one life to save thousands. We see MW’s face as she listens, her expression dark, eyes wet. DP asks how many Ducky saved, and how many he “took.” MW says how Ducky didn’t refute that he killed her brother, while DP explains that it was Ducky’s job to keep them alive, because he couldn’t torture information out of a dead man. Ah. And now we see. DP thinks that thousands are alive because of his work, calling Ducky a coward. Ducky counters that he is shrouding his depravity in principle, that he enjoyed what he did. DP counters that joy and pain must be earned, that it was his genetic deficiency that drove his life’s pursuit. “The pursuit of suffering!” Ducky shoots back. DP replies that it was the pursuit of human understanding, of learning the limits of a man’s conviction, of discovering that moment when a man would abandon his beliefs. Just … no words. DP wants to know which one of Ducky’s “morphine victims” brought them there that day. He says it was MW’s brother, who was an innocent.
Screenshot of Naz Deravian as Mosuma Daoub on the NCIS season six episode Broken Bird. NCIS airs on CBS on Tuesdays.
We shift to MW, who agrees with Ducky, that her brother knew nothing, that he was innocent, that there was no reason for the torture. Gibbs says, yes, there was. Meanwhile, Ducky avows her brother’s innocence to DP, saying he only wanted safety. DP counters that he ignored the infection, delivered the fatal morphine overdose. Ducky claims he agonized over the decision, but if that he’d kept him alive, it would only have been so DP could continue to torture him, dying slowly, in excruciating pain, at DP’s hands, in the quest for information he didn’t have. You tell him, Ducky! DP says that he can’t believe Ducky still doesn’t understand, prompting Ducky to demand to know what DP wanted from her brother. DP admits he wanted nothing from him. Nothing. He was just the tool DP used to break a different man. He was doing it to torture Ducky, to change him, to stop him from wanting to be the angel of mercy, to help DP with his methods. Only Ducky took too long to break. Ducky, trembling, says he could have saved him. MW, tears streaking her cheeks, says she has heard enough and turns to leave the room. DP has his final words, but Ducky is done.
Screenshot of Mark Harmon as Gibbs and David McCallum as Ducky on the NCIS season six episode Broken Bird. NCIS airs on CBS on Tuesdays.
He exits just as MW is also exiting. They stand, 10 or so yards apart, and merely look at each other, both sorrowful, neither saying anything. MW’s husband puts his arm around his wife and escorts her from the room. The ambassador approaches Ducky and says he is free to go, that the charges against him will not be pursued. He leaves Ducky along with Gibbs, who tells him he’s been forgiven. “For the crime, Jethro,” he says. “For the act, there is no forgiveness.”
Back in Ducky’s Digs, Palmer is moving around, trying to put the room to rights, anticipating Ducky’s return. Doc Jordan tells him not to go overboard, that Ducky isn’t the kind of man who wants a big show of affection. This stops Palmer, who asks her what kind of man Ducky is, then. Before she can respond, the doors open, and in comes Ducky. Jordan welcomes him back with a temperate nod and smile. Palmer’s is much bigger. Then he begins to relate to Ducky the history behind why there is no J Street, about how he studied the penmanship of the times. (There is your clue!) Ducky cuts him off, tells him and Jordan to take the rest of the day off, to go outside, smell a rose or two. Palmer replies that it’s kind of cold for that (Oh, Jimmy) but then catches on to Ducky’s contemplative mood and excuses himself. Jordan remains behind. Palmer stops, however, at the door, and says how the theory is that J Street was left out as a slight against Chief Justice John Jay, but that wasn’t it. It was that given the penmanship at the time, the capital J and the capital I too closely resembled each other, so they couldn’t have both. They were just trying to keep people from getting lost. Ducky is seated, his thoughts inward, his expression conflicted, sad. After all, wasn’t Ducky trying to do the same thing? He says nothing, as Jordan looks on. Palmer smiles at her, she nods, and he finally exits. She crosses the room behind him, puts her hands on his shoulders, as they begin to shake, and he breaks down and sobs.
Screenshot of David McCallum as Ducky on the NCIS season six episode Broken Bird. NCIS airs on CBS on Tuesdays.
Fade to black and white.
Aww, Ducky. Group hug, everyone! A little heavier than I’ve chosen thus far for my classic summer recaps, but a thought-provoking episode nonetheless. Share your thoughts with me at donna@donnakauffman.com. And while you’re at it, you can enter this week’s giveaway! Up for grabs is a signed copy of my brand new release, Starfish Moon. The perfect beach/poolside/patio summer read. How do you get in on it? Just put “I need a good summer read! Send me Starfish Moon!” in the subject line, and that’s it! Winner announced in my next recap.
The winner of last week’s giveaway and the brand new owner of a signed copy of the Blueberry Cove book that started it all, Pelican Point, AND an awesome Blueberry Cove tote bag is? Sally Schmidt! Sally, drop me an e-mail to donna@donnakauffman.com with your address and your prize will go right out to you.
I hope you’ll join me on the couch again in two weeks, on July 13 when we take another walk through season six. This time we’re going back home with Gibbs, in the episode titled Heartland. You can catch it Wednesday, July 6, at noon ET on USA Network. And don’t miss the special classic NCIS marathon happening on USA Network all day on July Fourth!
In the meantime, come on over and visit me on FB, where I post updates on all things NCIS season 14 (did you see the news on the latest round of contract negotiations?) along with my weekly Mark Harmon Moment AND more chances to win free stuff! It’s the happening place to hang out this summer. Don’t miss out!
Donna Kauffman is the USA TODAY bestselling author of over 50 titles. Born in Washington, D.C., she now lives in the Blue Ridge Mountains in southern Virginia surrounded by wildlife that thankfully no longer has anything to do with what’s going on in our nation’s capital. Fortunately, the bountiful birds flocking to her feeder stations are all happy and healthy! You can check all that out for yourself and more at www.donnakauffman.com. Also? She loves to hear from her readers (and NCIS viewers!). Yes, even you.