Dvorin scans a list of callback numbers. Each entry includes the caller's background: "Death of son. Disability. Possible PTSD."
He dials the number of a veteran's wife he spoke to before. The couple have had marital problems since the husband came home from the war.
"I called to find out how you're doing," Dvorin says. "I noticed you're going to try another counselor. Did you try anyone else yet?"
He offers to help them find another counselor, and says he will check in again soon.
His next callback is to a soldier who is looking for information about a local war memorial ceremony. Dvorin searches the Internet for the location.
Once, a father of a dead soldier called, upset that his son's name had been misspelled on a memorial. The mistake had plunged the father into despair again. Dvorin helped him submit paperwork to correct the error. He knew how the man felt. After Seth died, people wrote about him online, but failed to mention that he had a home in East Brunswick. Dvorin contacted every website that made the mistake, asking for a correction.
"Every time I help somebody, it's like putting another gold star on my son's shoulder," says Dvorin, who was recently hired as a paid employee.
The heater hums inside Dvorin's van on a frigid, gusty Saturday morning. Dressed in a navy blazer and red tie, he fumbles with the MapQuest directions as he heads to the funeral of Holmdel Staff Sgt. William R. Neil Jr., the obituary stapled to the map.
Neil, like Seth Dvorin, was killed by a roadside bomb. Neil was 38, and gave up a career on Wall Street for the Army, according to the article. That is as much as Dvorin knows.
Next to the passenger seat lies a local newspaper article featuring a photo of Niederer with a microphone at a war protest at Rutgers University in New Brunswick two days earlier.
Dvorin pulls up to St. Catherine's Church in Holmdel. Police cars line its front, their lights swirling. The scene reminds Dvorin of Seth's funeral. His police colleagues had sent 60 officers to handle traffic control, and the funeral procession stretched nearly two miles.
Dvorin puts on his Jewish War Veterans cap, embroidered with Seth's name and decorated with Seth's military pins. Inside the church, uniformed servicemen fill the pews and stand with hands behind their backs. Dvorin takes a seat in the last row.
