Death of the Ayn Rand Scholar by Gray Cavender (red scrolls of magic TXT) 📗

them are seriously not criminal justice. Not all of them, of course. Carolyn Patek—my thesis director…and who I published my article with—she’s a sociologist, but she studies crime-related topics. And Ian Naremore is a criminologist. Although he’s also one of the faculty who Professor Gilroy described as being really strongly anti-Rand. “I know him, Wes. Like I said, I had classes with him…he was on my honors committee and master’s project. Do you think we should interview him?” She grimaced.

“Definitely, yes. You know the drill, we’re trying to identify as many people as possible who knew the Professor, friend or foe. Tomorrow, I’ll check on the student who had the appointment with her, and we’ll also ride over to SkySong and interview the woman who was her friend. We’ll also contact the other guy…what’s his name, and see if he can meet us at her office in Business.”

“Roberts, the other guy is Professor David Roberts.”

“Roberts, right. And Seay gave us their phone numbers, so we’re good there. I’ll call them to set up an interview time.”

“Sounds good. And I have that student, Andrew Paxton, coming in for an interview in the afternoon.” She studied her wine for a few seconds. “So, back to it…you think probably an emotionally-driven crime?”

“Yes…unless there’s some sort of…intrigue that we don’t yet know about. Universities, professors, the whole megillah, always seemed to me to have a lot of hidden agendas. Maybe that comes from being in their own little world.”

She shook her head and laughed. “I think grad students are professors in training…always a lot of things going-on…like trying to one-up each other, to know scholars and their books that other students don’t know, and to…to impress the faculty by critiquing the other students. For me, it was like being a character in a movie where things are happening all around you, but your character never sees it, much less understands it.”

“At least once you became a cop, that all ended, right?”

They both laughed.

They split their bill, walked back to headquarters, and Wes gave Jillian a ride home. It was not much out of his way. She lived in the Los Arboles condos, just off College Avenue near Southern Avenue, and Wes and his wife, Marilyn, lived near Marcos De Niza High School, on Stanley Place.

They discussed the case as they drove although Wes had to mind the road. He said that he intended to take Rural all the way to Southern, then turn right, but the traffic on Rural was narrowed to one lane and creeping along because of the water pipeline construction. Rush hour made a bad situation worse. He took a right at the traffic light on Broadmor, wound his way over to College, and took a left. College had some construction and rush hour traffic, too, but it was nowhere near as bad as the mess on Rural.

As they drove, he kvetched about the construction bottle-necks. Jillian smiled. Wes really had been her mentor when she left the Research Division and became a detective with Tempe PD, even though she started downstairs in the Property Crimes Division. During that time, she got to know him pretty well, and of course even better when she transferred to Homicide. She thought he was a good detective and also a fine person.

At 5 10 and 175 pounds, Wes was very fit physically. He worked-out and also played racket ball. He said that he liked being in shape, but also thought it was important as police detectives to make a good impression when they met the public. He represented the Tempe PD and wanted to look professional.

Wes wasn’t boring or a dinosaur—no way—but he was a creature of habit, and she had learned his habits while they were partners. She considered to be a part of her apprenticeship. Clothes, for instance. He was wearing one of his three summer jackets, a linen blazer in a natural color, along with dark brown slacks, a pale yellow short-sleeve shirt and tie. A second summer jacket was also a blazer, this one a beautiful green. Wes always joked that it was his Augusta blazer. The joke was that when PGA golfers won at the Master’s Golf tourney, they donned a green blazer. Number Three was a blue-checked plaid sport coat. He had a similar three-jacket winter wardrobe. Wes also had one suit, a dark blue Year’rounder in light weight wool. This was his “court testimony” suit. He joked, “Detective Sergeant Webb’s Wardrobe by Landsend.” This wasn’t really a joke because he did buy most of his clothes from the catalog. Except for his ties. Most of these were wildly colorful and many were from the Jerry Garcia Collection. Wes was a Deadhead. His shoes were not from a catalog either. Most were good quality, always bought on sale, and always lace-ups. He said detectives shouldn’t wear loafers in case they had to chase someone. He was 42 and an Arizona native…Tempe actually. Which is why he went to the University of Arizona. He laughed that he wanted to see some of the world: Tucson was a two hour drive.

He applied for and got a job with Tempe PD right out of college, mainly because he scored so well on the exams. He’d also interned for the department between his junior and senior years at the U of A. He had told Jillian that his two main interests in life were policing—he’d watched too many TV police shows as a kid—and music. He and Marilyn had even met at a David Bowie film, The Man Who Fell to Earth. Wes had gone because of Bowie, the musician, and Marilyn liked off-beat movies. The film was showing at the Valley Art Theater in downtown Tempe, back when it was what Wes called an “artsy-fartsy theater.” He had told Jillian that The Valley Art had been crowded that night, and that there was an empty seat between them. “We just got to talking...” They’d lived together for a while, then got