Death of the Ayn Rand Scholar: Mystery

by Gray Cavender

  He asked, “Are you injured?”

  She exhaled a blast of breath upward, as if blowing imaginary hair from her face, then found her voice, “I’m OK. I’m OK.“

  Professor Roberts screamed again, now more at Officer Cuevas. “Will you get me a doctor, for God’s sake? I think she’s broken my arm.”

  “Will do…just rest easy, dude.”

  There was more commotion and Wes and Doc came running in. Seconds later they were followed by a Tempe PD uniformed cop and Detective Georgia Robson. Suddenly, the tunnel felt very crowded.

  Professor Roberts on his stomach, his hands cuffed behind him, arched his back to try to see what was going on. He continued to demand to have a doctor, but no one paid him much attention.

  Wes asked, “Jilly?”

  “I’m OK, Wes. Just excited, that’s all…I’ll calm down in a minute.” Jillian had spit this out very quickly. She stood, took a deep breath, released it, and a said, “Really, I am.”

  Wes looked at her carefully, then said, “OK.” Then, after a pause, he asked, “Did you Mirandize him?”

  She canted her head, then smiled. “Yes. Of course.” She was slowly returning to normal—heart and respiration—and it helped that Wes was there. He had a calming influence. They were partners.

  Doc looked first at Jillian, then at Professor Roberts on his stomach. “So what happened here?”

  “When I rounded this turn, he was waiting. He jumped me, and tried to stab me with that screwdriver over there.” She pointed to it, near the far wall.

  Then, she said, “Wes, he’s a righty,” and nodded toward Roberts. She’d remembered their discussion about the direction of the head wounds back when they were first in the Professor’s office.

  Wes grinned, then pointed to the screwdriver, and told the uniformed officer, “Bag it…carefully.” Then to Jillian, he asked, “So what did you do?”

  I used judo. Well, actually, it was more of a martial arts self-defense move.”

  Wes laughed, “Of course you did.”

  Doc asked, “Why didn’t you just shoot him?” He pointed with his index finger at Professor Roberts and dropped his thumb.

  “There wasn’t time…he was on me so fast.” She was quiet, then said, “Thanks, Doc.”

  Sergeant Doc Halliday was about to say something, but stopped. Embarrassed, he just nodded.

  Wes said, “Plus, in these tunnels, a pistol report would have damaged your ears…maybe permanently.

  Georgia looked at Professor Roberts lying on his stomach, and then at Jillian. She seemed to be a little freaked, but then smiled at Jillian. Her eyes returned to Roberts and then back to Jillian. Finally, she said, “OK, guess I’m going to sign-up for judo. What night is class? I can drive.”

  Professor Roberts yelled again, “Hey. I’m down here. I need a doctor. My shoulder’s broken. Hey.”

  Officer Cuevas said, “I don’t even know if we can get a cell signal down here. I’ll go back topside and call for an ambulance.”

  Wes nodded to Officer Cuevas, then bent down and said, “OK, Professor Roberts, we’re calling for an ambulance. But let me ask, do you acknowledge that Detective Sergeant Warne apprised you of your Miranda Rights?”

  “I need a doctor.”

  “We’re calling for an ambulance, Professor. They will be here shortly. Let me ask again, did you receive your Miranda warning?”

  He nodded, “yes.”

  “I’ll need a verbal commitment of that.”

  “Yes,” he answered, annoyed.

  “Thank you, Professor. Would you like to make a statement?”

  He said, “No, I would not.” His eyes looked much too intense to Jillian. Maybe it was the pain, or maybe he really was wound too tight.

  Wes asked, “Doc, you got this?”

  “Got it.”

  Wes nodded to Doc and to Georgia, and to the uniformed officer. Then to Jillian he said, “OK, why don’t we get back above ground. I think you could use a breath of fresh air.”

  CHAPTER 17

  Wes exited the tunnel first, reached down and gave Jillian a hand, mainly for balance. She needed it. She was shakier than she’d realized.

  It seemed noisy after being down in the tunnel, and unusually bright. There was still plenty of sun left in the sky, low and blinding, and Jillian had to turn away from it. The area also was very hectic: two Tempe PD cars; two unmarked Tempe PD cars; an ASU PD car; two ASU PD motorcycles; two SUVs—one Tempe and one ASU—and a Tempe PD forensics van. And, a lot of people milling around.

  Officer Cuevas and a Tempe PD uniformed officer were busy. They had commandeered some barricades that had marked-off the tunnel construction, and cordoned-off the area around the tunnel entrance to keep the growing crowd away. Other barriers lined-out toward the larger sidewalk that was a major artery across the campus. They also left an opening for the police and the EMS vehicle. Jillian heard the siren in the distance.

  Officer Cuevas said, “That’ll be EMS. I called it in.”

  Wes said, “Quick response, Officer Cuevas…down there and up here. Good work.”

  Officer Cuevas beamed. Then to Jillian, he smiled and said, “But the real good work is you.” He pointed at Jillian with the index fingers of both hands.

  “Thank you,” was about all she could say. For some reason, she looked into the crowd, wondering if she’d see anyone she knew. Mostly, they were a blur.

  Wes asked, “Do we need to get you checked-out, Jilly?”

  She knew to think before she answered, to take a physical sounding. So she did. Then, she took a deep breath and exhaled. “No. I’m really OK, Wes. I think mainly I’m just coming down from the adrenalin.”

  She hesitated, then added, “And I guess from being scared. I rounded a curve in the tunnel and he was on me. But he didn’t… I guess I’m just on overload.”

  “That’s understandable. Let’s get you out of here. Cup of tea, glass of wine…whatever.”

  “OK, but first, could we go to ASU PD? I want to get my IPAD. It’s in my car. I want to show you what I saw. What led me here,” she said, looking over toward the tunnel entrance.

  Wes seemed to about to say something. Instead, he just looked at Jillian for a couple of seconds, then smiled.

  “What?”

  He shook his head, then said, “Sounds good.”

  His car—one of the unmarked Tempe PD cars—was close by. As they opened their doors, both waived to Officer Cuevas, who beamed another toothy smile. He controlled the crowd so that Wes could back up, turn around, and head out.

  Wes drove slowly on the wide sidewalk between the MU and the Business Building, took a left onto the intersecting sidewalk and headed toward College Avenue. Jillian glanced again at Discovery Hall and the Business Building, and exhaled a deep breath.

  Wes cut his eyes over toward her, but mostly stayed focused on threading their way through the late afternoon batch of students and faculty. There were fewer at this time of day, but that meant that the bikers just rode faster.

  Where the sidewalk ended and College Avenue began, Wes stopped to let the Tempe Fire Department truck pass by them, and onto campus. The truck carried medic-trained personnel. Once it was past, Wes proceeded. As he approached College and Apache, the light turned green.

  Jillian said, “You can’t go straight here, Wes…you have to turn left or right.”

  He pointed to the uniformed Tempe PD officer in the intersection who was directing traffic. Wes was already rolling down his window. He reached his badge out, then pointed with it to the ASU Campus PD building. The officer checked the traffic, then used his hands and his whistle and stopped the traffic in all four directions, and waved them through.

  Wes drove straight through the intersection and then made a left turn into the parking lot. Jillian gave him the key code. He punched it in, entere
d the lot and parked a couple of cars away from her Corolla.

  She said, “I’ll get my car and follow you over to Tempe HQ.”

  “Nothing doing. In the first place, you shouldn’t be driving right now. And second, we’re going to go in there,” he pointed to the ASU PD, “and bask in your glory. You just captured a murderer…single handedly…and I intend to be there when Al comes out of his office to shake your hand…and to thank me for sending you over here.” He raised his eyebrows and jutted his head toward the building entrance.

  Jillian flinched. “Don’t you think we need to be over at HQ when they bring Professor Roberts in?”

  “Definitely, but that’ll be a while. The EMS people will take him to an ER first and get him checked-out, and Doc and Georgia are going there to cover us. So, no rush.”

  Wes parked and Jillian retrieved her IPAD from her car. When she and Wes entered the building through the employees’ entrance, her colleagues were waiting in rough a semi-circle. They immediately broke into applause. Al, standing a step or two out front of everyone, led the applause.

  Jillian looked surprised. Al said, “Officer Cuevas called it in…everything…the take-down…even that you and Wes were headed here first. He overhead you talking. I know you and Wes are on the move, but great work, Jillian.

  ”Thanks Al…Chief.”

  “I’ll expect the full story tomorrow. But first, are you OK?” As he asked, he looked her over carefully.

  “Yes. It was scary, but he never really touched me.”

  “She OK, Wes?”

  “She’s OK, Al. Maybe a little shell shock, but that’s to be expected given what she’s gone through.”

  “OK, tomorrow then,“ Al said.

  When she and Wes reached the exit, Al called, ”Jillian...”

  She turned, and said, “We’re proud of you, Detective Sergeant.”

  More applause.

  Wes stuck to his guns about Jillian not driving yet, and drove them to Tempe HQ. He promised to drive her back for her car later. There was another round of applause in the Homicide Division at Tempe PD when they entered. Everyone talked at once, so it was bedlam.

  Lt. Flett, acting like an official greeter, high fived Jillian at the entrance to the Homicide Division, and Stu Kostelac, the head of homicide, was standing directly behind him. He gave an exaggerated thumbs-up and kept nodding his head up and down, as if he and Jillian were agreeing about something. Someone called the Chief and soon she came by, along with Linda Timms and Ersula Tenney, and they all congratulated Jillian. About the time they left, Angel and the forensics team came-up from the basement. Angel snapped pictures and Becca gave her a hug. Charnell Tate wandered in, stood behind Becca and said, “Next.” When it was her turn, she shook her head and said, “Um um um. What are we gonna do with you?” Then smiled and said, “Bring it on in,” and hugged Jillian, too.

  It was a while before things settled down and Jillian and Wes could make it to her office. She opened her IPAD, but even before she could log-in, Wes said, “First things first…call your mom. This is going to be all over the news, I mean, BREAKING NEWS,” he said in a falsely loud TV voice, “and I don’t want Alice hearing the story and calling me with a million and one questions about you. So, mom first, then law enforcement.”

  “Yes sir,” Jillian said and saluted.

  Wes was right, of course, and Jillian was glad that she called. Either the news didn’t have the story yet or her mom hadn’t heard it. In any case, she was able to tell her calmly what happened…at least the highlights. Mainly, Jillian assured her mom that she was OK, physically and mentally. She promised to call later, but said that things were going to get busy, soon so it would be a while.

  “And please tell Dad that everything is OK. Really, it is.”

  “Will do.“ She paused, then said, “Jillian, you got him. Told you. Hi to Wes.”

  Jillian said, “Love you, Mom.” And tried not to cry.

  Wes handed her a bottled water…she’d left her hydro flask in her car. She turned on her IPAD, and scooted two chairs so that they were facing the desk, side-by-side, and oriented screen so that they both could see.

  “I’m going to show you a slide show that I made…from photos I took in Professor Siemens’ two offices, and at her condo. But before I begin, let me say something.”

  Wes had been focused on the screen. He leaned back, faced Jillian and said, “OK.” He was a detective, a professional, waiting for his partner’s prologue.

  “So, I went through everything…I don’t know how many times. At some point, I just had the feeling that I was missing something. It was in plain sight, but I was missing it.”

  “Know the feeling.”

  “You once told me that being intense was a good thing, but that sometimes you can get too close to a case. Remember?”

  Wes nodded.

  “So, I just pressed ‘pause’ for a while. Went to a movie. Worked on the sexual assault policy with Ersula. I was going for that fresh look, you know?”

  “Deed I do.”

  “And it worked.” Jillian hit ‘play’ and her slide show materialized. Wes stared intently as the images slowly appeared, one by one.

  Whey they ended, he asked, “OK, so what am I looking for?”

  “Her books.”

  “OK…”

  “Remember that first day when we met Professor Roberts in Professor Siemens’ office in Business? He told us that the reason he could see that everything was OK in her office was that she was orderly…a place for everything and everything in its place.”

  Wes said, “Yeah…vaguely,” and made a wavy motion with his hand.

  Jillian returned to the individual photos and enlarged them for Wes, like she’d done for herself.

  “These are her bookshelves in English…three sets of shelves…side-by-side. They’re what I’d call English professor books: titles on literary theory, the history of the novel, narrative analysis…stuff like that.”

  As she spoke, she zoomed-in and slowly scrolled through photos of the bookshelves. “All of the books in her English Department office are English professor books.”

  “Makes sense,” Wes said.

  “Right. Now these next photos are from her office in Business. Look at these titles, Wes. Books on economic policy, the history of capitalism…Here’s one that I like: ‘Debunking the Myth of FDR and the Great Depression.” As she spoke, she again zoomed and scrolled across the photos of the two bookcases.

  Wes said, “Business professor books…got it.”

  “Even the posters behind her desk are ‘office appropriate.’ OK, Ayn Rand is in both, but George Orwell is in English and Milton Friedman is in Business. And look at this, Wes, this is the bookcase in her condo. See, the top shelf holds novels plus the books she’s written on Ayn Rand, and the bottom shelf has books on business. They’re pop…they’re best sellers, but they’re still business books.”

  “OK, so the professor was compartmentalized…and that’s important, why?”

  “Because, Detective Sergeant Wes Webb, Professor Siemens was supposedly beaten to death in her English Department office with a paperweight commemorating Milton Friedman, her business guru. And the paperweight in her business office was an Ayn Rand commemorative plaque.” She zoomed-in on the Rand paperweight.

  Jillian smiled. Slowly, Wes returned the smile. It widened. “The paperweights are in the wrong offices,” he said, and leaned away from the screen.

  Jillian nodded. “Everything else is in the right place. Except…the paperweights.” She leaned away from the screen, too, and looked at Wes. “She was murdered in her Business office with a business-related paperweight, and Professor Roberts moved her body and the murder weapon to English. To make it look like she was murdered there.”

  “To throw us off.” Wes shook his head.

  “Exactly.”


  “So the Rand paperweight wrongly in the Business office…?”

  “I supposed Professor Roberts moved it there, just like he moved the Milton Friedman paperweight to her English office.’

  “Books,” he laughed. You figured all this out because of her books?”

  “Eventually…yes.”

  “I can’t wait to tell Doc. Another college student detective one-upping thingy.”

  Jillian shook her hand and said, “Please, no…don’t do that. I mean, he came through with back-up when I needed it.”

  Wes chuckled and said, “OK.”

  “Thank you,” Jillian said, relieved. She looked back to the screen.

  “Now, check-out these photos, Wes. They’re from forensics.” She enlarged two photos.

  “This is obviously from her English office…see, the coat tree is knocked over. And, Professor Siemens’ jacket is still hanging on a hook, even though the coat tree is on the floor. Her jacket is NOT on that empty coat hanger, or even near it.” She pointed to the screen with the tip of her pen.

  Wes shifted in his chair to get a closer look at the screen. “OK.”

  “Now compare that one with a photo from her Business office.” She scrolled to that photo. “Here, the coat tree is upright, of course, and her garment is hanging from a coat hanger on that tree. It’s just her windbreaker, but it’s still on a hanger.” She pointed with her pen again.

  She looked away from the screen and said, “I don’t remember but I’ll bet that Professor Roberts hangs his jacket on a coat tree hook.”

  “He didn’t notice that the jacket he’d relocated over to English had been on a hanger. He just stuck it on a hook…must be a guy thing,” Wes laughed.

  He paused, then said, “And the tunnel…how you’d fall to that, Jilly?”

  “Luck,” she said and shook her head. “It never occurred to me. I mean, I knew that ASU’s been doing the asbestos abatement project in them…you even talked about the tunnels in your story about being down there when Obama was here…remember…when we were riding over to her BAC office.”

  Wes nodded.

  “And, I’ve been reading about this for weeks…gates open…sensors off. It’s all been in office memos, but it did not sink in until I saw two construction workers over on College near my place. One guy was in that water main trench up to his chest.”