While Rome Was Sleeping

by M. S. Forsythe

  Ed began by describing Monte’s appetite and his frequent trips to the first floor to buy candy and snacks. He’s been extremely nervous,” he added.

  The Captain listened attentively, then asked, “So his appetite’s increased and he seems nervous; is that why you’re here?”

  “It’s not just the appetite, Captain. Let’s see, today is Monday; it started about a week and a half ago,” Ed told him. “Monte hasn’t been himself. I thought at first it had something to do with the phone calls that he got starting a week ago last Thursday, to be exact.

  “He seemed really jumpy after that; come to think of it, that was about the time he started going to the newsstand for food; and then last Thursday morning he came in looking terrible. I asked him if he was sick and he said he was just tired; that he had been working long hours on a case.”

  “What case?” Captain Martin asked.

  “I don’t know.” Ed answered. “When I asked him that, he just made some excuse and said it was nothing and then he said that it was personal. Then he left to go meet somebody. I didn’t say anything but he came back awhile later and said he was going home.”

  Jim thought to himself, “He didn’t go home—he went to the Center,” but he didn’t interrupt.

  Ed continued, “He came in Friday morning, Captain. You saw him.”

  “Yes, I know that he was here on Friday.” Captain Martin agreed. “That morning he came into my office and volunteered to investigate the fatalities at the Rainier Tower. I didn’t see any reason why I shouldn’t assign him to do it. He doesn’t volunteer often. He seemed okay to me then.”

  “Not to me, he was very edgy,” Ed answered. “But he seemed glad you assigned him to be the lead investigator on the window washers’ fall.”

  “How did that go?”

  Ed cleared his throat. “Ah...not real well, he had words with the guy from Labor and Industries.”

  Captain Martin raised his eyebrows and his glasses slid down his nose. “Oh? I told him not to get crosswise with Len Phillips. How bad is it?”

  Ed squirmed, “I, I don’t know, Captain. He was here late on Friday checking out Property and writing his report. He hasn’t come in today, and his wife said he told her he was going on a stake out with me yesterday afternoon, Sunday. She doesn’t know where he is –and we don’t either.”

  Jim stepped in at this point. “I really wanted to talk with him personally before this got away from us. I had hoped there could be a logical explanation for all of it and, if so, we don’t want Internal Affairs involved; but like Ed said, Monte went down to Property ostensibly in his words “to tie up loose ends” on the Rainier Tower incident.

  “According to Carl Cramer, Monte asked to examine the personal effects of the two window washers’. Now there is a large sum of money missing that belonged to one or both of them. Carl is logically concerned. He doesn’t want to be left holding the bag for this.

  “I was curious myself about Schultz and Tanner’s personal effects and while I was examining them I spotted a switch-blade that was among Schultz’s things; I had Carl bag it and send it up to the Lab. I have reason to believe that it was used in the murder of George Kelshaw, the guy that was stabbed outside the Seamen’s Center last Tuesday.”

  Captain Martin looked at Jim in surprise. “Are you suggesting that Schultz and Tanner were involved in the Kelshaw murder?”

  “Yes, I believe they were– the investigation so far indicates that Kelshaw was attacked by two men on Tuesday, and we know Schultz and Tanner broke into the Seamen’s Center on Wednesday night. I think it is more than likely it was the two of them that murdered Kelshaw. I was about to have them picked up, but someone got to them before we could.”

  The Captain had turned his chair away from Ed and Jim momentarily and then turning back again he asked, “What else do you have for me?”

  Jim continued, “I had a call from Len Phillips this morning. He wanted another opinion regarding the accident at the Rainier Tower. As Ed said, Monte argued with him on Friday, declaring it was an accident while Len was sure that two of the cables on the scaffolding had been cut. I looked at them this morning and I agree with Len, one of the cables clearly looks as if it has been tampered with.

  L & I are having the cables x-rayed for fatigue and they will share the results with us, of course.

  “Phillips is concerned that the Department doesn’t jump at the accident theory until they have evidence one way or the other. And he wants to maintain goodwill on both sides.”

  The Captain weighed Jim’s words carefully. “Back to Schultz and Tanner; am I right in surmising that you think Monte was somehow involved with them?”

  “Yes, I do, Captain,” Jim replied.

  Captain Martin heaved a deep sigh and then sat quietly, hands clasped behind his head while he listened, presently he rose out of his chair and nodded to Ed and Jim saying, “Thanks, for the information. Let’s find Monte.”

  As the two detectives rose to go, the Captain spoke “Jim, would you please wait a minute. That’s okay, Ed, I need to speak to Jim privately. I was contacted by an Evan Scott this morning who asked to meet with you and me briefly. I understand this is about the Kelshaw murder as well. Is there something else you should tell me?”

  “I think we should wait and hear what Mr. Scott has to say,” Jim demurred.

  “That’s fine, Jim. He said he would be here shortly so just have a seat. I gathered from what he said that this won’t take long.”

  ✽✽✽

  The Captain and Jim were talking casually when Evan Scott arrived. After showing his credentials, he extended his hand to Jim saying, “Good morning.”

  The Captain looked surprised as he remarked, “Please sit down, Mr. Scott. We don’t often have people from the U.S. State Department drop in on us. You said this has something to do with the Kelshaw murder so I assume this is an official visit; if so perhaps you should be meeting with our Chief. What can we do for you?”

  “Yes, it is somewhat official, Captain; but it’s not necessary to involve your Chief, at least not at this time,” Evan stated in a friendly manner. “There is some information I would like to give you. I’ve already met Detective Savalza during the preliminary investigation of George Kelshaw’s death,” he paused, “Nice to see you again, Detective,” he interjected.

  “I’ll get right to the point, Captain Martin. George Kelshaw worked for the Central Intelligence Agency; I’m here to ask that his body be released to be sent home for burial. He was a survivor of Southeast Asia; an ex POW in Laos, he had escaped and had finally made his way home after nearly ten years, when he was murdered.

  “We don’t believe that his connection to the Agency had anything to do with the unfortunate timing of his death. As a result we have allowed Detective Savalza and your Department to handle the investigation here at the local level and tried to stay out of the way.”

  Captain Martin looked over his glasses at Jim, “What do you have to say about this, Savalza? Any objections to the body being let go?”

  “No, Captain. As I reported to you earlier, I’m quite certain that we have found the murder weapon, and the guys that used it are dead so I don’t see any reason to hold the body. There was nothing suspicious on the victim; he had no personal items other than a wristwatch and the clothing on his back. I don’t see any reason not to release the body.”

  “All right, as soon as we know about the weapon, I’ll see that the body is released, Mr. Scott. I’ll also make sure that whatever personal effects there may be, are released to you as well. I appreciate your being up front with us on this matter. But humor me by answering a question if I may ask. Why is a State Department representative collecting the body of someone who worked for the CIA?”

  “George was my friend, Captain; I owe him more than I could ever repay; I’m standing in as next of kin; there is no one else available,” Evan said emphatically. “Thank you for your time,” and nodding toward Jim, “Good day, Detective.”

&
nbsp; Andrew had determined that the only thing worse than actually facing the cleanup of the destruction in his apartment was thinking about it.

  He had just started to collect items from the kitchen floor when the doorbell buzzed. “Probably Savalza” he muttered as he opened the door to a wide eyed Charlene Thayer.

  “Hi, what are you doing here at this hour?” He glanced at his watch.

  “It’s 8:30,” she smiled, “Besides; I figured I’d return the favor of an early morning visit although you do have me beat by an hour. So where do we begin?”

  “How did you find out about...?” Then he added “Oh, yeah, Savalza probably told you, huh?”

  “As matter of fact he told me how to find you, but the two plain-clothes-men who were out in front of my house last night told me about it. Why didn’t you call and tell me?” Looking around her eyes fell on the disabled telephones resting on a table. “I can see why,” she said answering her own question.

  “Who do you think could have done this, Andy?”

  Andrew shrugged. “Beats me! I do know who it wasn’t. You probably aren’t aware of it yet, but the two guys who trashed the Center were killed in a fall on Friday.

  “They were window washers when they weren’t following their first career, breaking and entering. It seems that a cable on the scaffolding gave out and they fell thirty stories.”

  Her hand covered her mouth in shock as she gasped, “Oh!”

  “Yes, and it’s too bad that the police didn’t get them before it happened—we might have learned some very interesting things.”

  Charlene looked around and said firmly, “Well I came here to help and so point me in some direction, professor. Where shall I start?”

  He grinned appreciatively. “Let’s find the kitchen, and at least I’ll be able to offer you a cup of coffee.”

  “Oh, that reminds me,” she laughed as she removed a tall container from a tote bag. “Here you are, coffee and a Danish. After all, you need to keep up your strength.”

  “You are a woman of many surprises,” he said as he gratefully took the items from her hand. “What else do you have in that wonder bag? Does there happen to be a magic vacuum cleaner that will suck up all this mess?”

  “No, but I offer these two hands and I’ll bet it won’t take that long, soooo... drink your coffee and then let’s get started.”

  “Aye, aye, Commander,” Andrew hungrily bit into the Danish, swallowing coffee with it. He watched her gather up loose papers that had been thrown off his desk. She casually laid them on a clear spot on the desk top.

  She picked up a framed picture showing Andrew and a pretty blonde leaning against him. “Hmmn,” she mused, “Someone special?” she asked candidly.

  “Yeah, actually it’s my sister.”

  “Sister? She’s pretty. And affectionate, too.”

  “Mm hmn, I guess so,” he remarked, savoring the last of the pastry and coffee. “Thanks very much.” Touching her arm he said, “That was great!”

  “You’re welcome, very much.”

  ✽✽✽

  A call from Hal Baker was waiting for Ed Peterson when he returned from his meeting with the Captain and Jim Savalza.

  Ed picked up the phone answering with a brusque “Peterson.”

  “Hello, Ed, this is Hal Baker, I’m looking for Monte Maxwell,”

  “So is everybody else,” Ed replied dryly. “Is there something I can do to help?”

  “Well, Monte was asking me about Jake Schultz a week or ten days ago. I told him that Jake was staying out of trouble and reporting in as he was supposed to. When I asked why the interest, he said he had busted Jake and he was just curious. I told him where Jake was living and working and that seemed to satisfy him. But Jake was supposed to check in with me on Friday and he didn’t. When I called Atlas, they said there had been an accident. They told me Monte was handling the investigation, so I want to talk with him.”

  “Monte hasn’t come in yet today, Hal, but you can speak with Jim Savalza. He knows a little about the accident. He might be more helpful than I.”

  “Fine—I’ll do that, Ed. Thanks and when Monte gets in, have him give me a call.”

  “Sure will.” Ed hung up, located Jim and told him about Baker’s call. “He told me Monte had contacted him over a week ago checking on Jake Schultz.”

  “He did, huh? That’s very interesting...did he say why Monte wanted to know about Schultz?”

  Ed shook his head, “No, I don’t think he knows for sure. But I told him to talk with you about Schultz and Tanner’s accident. He’ll probably be calling you.”

  “Thanks, Ed, I’ll call Baker now; any word from Monte yet?”

  “Nope, not a word. I have a hunch Dora will be calling again, soon; what do we do about her?”

  “Play it by ear..., we can’t tell her what we don’t know.”

  The search for Monte had begun in earnest; by mid afternoon the crime lab had confirmed that the knife belonging to Jake Schultz was the weapon used in the stabbing of George Kelshaw. The lab also reported the results of dusting Andrew Kincaid’s apartment for useful fingerprints. They complained that the only clear prints, other than Kincaid’s, were two good impressions of Detective Maxwell’s on the desk and in the bathroom, commenting that it was sloppy of Maxwell to handle an investigation without gloves.

  Jim grabbed Ed and headed for the Captain’s office. “There’s a new development, you should know about Captain.”

  “Oh, what’s that?”

  “They found Maxwell’s prints in Kincaid’s apartment; the lab assumed that Monte was just sloppy during the investigation. I didn’t tell them Monte didn’t handle the investigation of the break in—I did.”

  “Okay, Jim, let’s have Monte picked up. I’ll call Internal Affairs.”

  “Captain, could you let Ed and me look into it before you call IA?”

  “I’ll try Jim, but I can’t keep this under wraps too long.”

  “I know Captain, and thanks. Well, Ed that takes care of what we tell Dora; let’s go see her, maybe she can tell us something.”

  “Maybe we should get a search warrant,” Ed suggested.

  “Yeah, good idea,” Jim agreed. While you work on that I’ll drop by Kincaid’s place and fill him in on what we’ve found.

  ✽✽✽

  They worked comfortably together putting things back in place. By mid afternoon, except for the things that had been broken, the apartment was nearly put back in order. Andrew was working at his desk, sorting papers and replacing items thrown out of the drawers while Charlene had given a final touch-up on table and counter tops.

  Looking at his watch, Andrew said, “Hey, lady, do you realize we’ve been at this for nearly five and a half hours, aren’t you hungry?”

  She had curled up in the corner of the sofa, shoes off, eyes closed. “Mmm hmn,” she sighed. “I hadn’t really thought about food; what do you have in mind?” She yawned and stretched.

  “Well, we could order in a pizza, or, if that’s a little heavy, we could go out and see what there is that might appeal to us. How about the Pike Street Market? And there’s a deli just about a block away. What’s your pleasure?”

  “I think I’ll pass on the pizza and the Market, but the deli sounds good.” She began to uncurl, slipping her feet into her shoes.

  “I feel like a slave driver—” He smiled as he sat down next to her. “After all this work and I haven’t even fed you.” His arm went around her. Turning her toward him, he whispered, “I’m really sorry, but not for this,” as he kissed her.

  At first she kissed him back eagerly, hungrily and then pulled away. Taking a deep breath she said shakily, “Andrew, Andy...this isn’t...we shouldn’t.”

  “Why? Don’t pull away; I wanted to do that yesterday. You must have known, didn’t you? On top of all this mess and in spite of what’s happened, all I could think about was wanting you—wondering how you’d feel in my arms.”

  Her fingers were on his lips stopp
ing the words. “Shh, please don’t say anymore, I can’t—we mustn’t... ”

  “Stop talking,” He pulled her close and kissed her again, this time there was no resistance as she responded fully to his lips.

  The door buzzed, Andrew whispered hoarsely, “We won’t answer it.”

  “Andy, you’ve got to answer it.” Charlene was trying to regain her composure, her face was flushed and her hair was slightly mussed. She casually picked up a magazine and began thumbing through it while Andrew stood up and got a glass of water on his way to the door. Before opening it he turned back to her, “This isn’t over.”

  “Hi, I just thought I’d stop by and see how you were do-ing.” Jim Savalza’s eyes fell on Charlene seated on the sofa. “It looks like everything is almost back to normal. Good to see you, Ms. Thayer, Charlene. Hope I didn’t come at a bad time,” he said awkwardly.

  Andrew just shook his head and rolled his eyes as he guided Jim to a chair, not saying anything.

  Jim went on. “I have some news that you might find interesting. I didn’t really expect to find any prints other than yours that we could identify when we dusted this place, but we got lucky. We got a good set from your desk and from the bathroom.

  “Here’s the situation, the prints happened to belong to our friend Detective Monte Maxwell. I believe he broke in here and tossed your apartment. Now all we have to do is find out why, but he’s disappeared. We think he has skipped, so there’s an APB to pick him up.”

  “Why, would Maxwell be even slightly interested in my place?” Andrew asked incredulously. “Unless..., but that’s crazy...” he didn’t finish the thought, unless he was looking for the packet.

  “I asked myself all the same questions, Andy, and I have some partial answers; for example, I found out that Monte was somehow connected to Schultz and Tanner. It turns out the knife used to do Kelshaw belonged to none other than Jake Schultz. It turned up with their personal effects in the Property Room. I had a call from Property regarding some missing items, specifically a large amount of money that was on one of them in a money belt. It went missing about the same time as Monte.