The Swap Ch. 01

*BUZZ BUZZ BUZZ!

It was Mr. Schelle's cell phone, which he drew out of the left pocket of his pants. I looked around as he talked.

"Thank you for calling." he said. "I appreciate it... yes... look, I'm talking with the police right now... can I call you back?... I appreciate you calling." He hung up. "That was a friend of mine, just heard about Michelle."

"News travels fast." I replied. "By the way, what are these?" I asked, pointing to the DVDs on his dead wife's desk.

"Taped speeches and practice dissertations of her students." Mr. Schelle said. "She spent considerable time watching them."

"Was she popular with her students?" I asked.

"Yes, she had several grad students working for her and they'd come here from time to time. They all seemed to like her a lot."

"No enemies that you can think of?"

"No, no one."

"How was your relationship with your wife, sir?" I asked. Cindy was watching and listening carefully as we headed back downstairs and outside.

"It was fine." Schelle said. "Like I said before, she'd been really busy with work the last several months, but we had no real problems."

"No fights, no arguments, no money problems?" I said, my eyes boring into his.

"No sir, nothing to speak of. Of course, who hasn't got money troubles in today's economy, but we were doing okay." he replied, matching my glance, a bit too studied and forced.

"Where were you tonight, Mr. Schelle? My officers tell me you didn't get here until about 10:45."

"Yes, I was at a meeting with some clients." Schelle said. "It went from about 7:30 to about 9:45. I had some problems with my tire having low air, so I put some air in the tire with the hand pump, then stopped and checked it a couple of times on the way to make sure it was okay, and pumped it up a second time." Schelle gave me the names of his clients and the people that were there.

"Thank you for your time, Mr. Schelle. I'm told by the power company that there is a small but real danger of a possible fire after such a huge electric shock. I'm sure as an electrical engineer you understand that. So I'd like you to pack a quick bag and stay at the University Hotel tonight, and we'll pick you up in the morning."

"Er, uh, yes. Er, sure." Schelle said. He seemed to be discomfited by that. But there was no way I was allowing him to stay here while this residence was still a crime scene.

Part 6 - Family Ties

"Mr. Warner's wife and sister are here." Martin Nash told me as I entered the MCD room at Headquarters at midnight. "They're in Interrogation-Alpha."

There were two sets of interrogation rooms in HQ, each with the safety system that forbade doors to both sides be opened at once. The rooms used to interrogate perps were in the booking and holding-cell area, numbered "1", "2", "3", and were painted cold jail gray. The rooms where citizens were brought in were near the front "public" section, which also contained the Media briefing room. These were lettered "A", "B", "C" and were nicely painted and wood paneled. "Alpha" was the military word to designate the letter "A".

"They came here?" I asked.

"Yes, sir. It seems they thought Hugh and I were a bit young, so they said, and they asked for a sergeant." Nash said, a hint of a bemused smile on his face.

"Not knowing that Detectives around here are already higher level than sergeants. Oh well, I can give them a full Lieutenant. Come with me." I said.

------------------

"You're a Lieutenant?! At your age?!?!" Mrs. Anthony Warner asked, openly shocked.

"Yes ma'am." I said. "And you should see the Captain of the University Police."

"You must be the youngest police department in the country!" Mrs. Warner said. I didn't acknowledge that we indeed had a young police force, with many senior positions filled by able but young officers. In the meantime I observed her and her companion.

Karla Warner was an attractive woman of 36. She had raven black hair combed back into a rather old-school style. She had rather square shoulders and a belly that was losing its previous trimness. I noted that her arms and legs looked to be toned and strong, as if she worked out quite a bit.

Katherine Warner Wilson was the deceased's sister. She was very slender, what I'd call "willowy" with thin arms and legs, but she had a nice figure and she wore her light brown hair straight. She had a pretty, open face with large ovals for her eyes and mouth. Her nose was slender and looked long on her face. She didn't look a lot like her brother, I noted, but then again I don't look a lot like my sister Elizabeth... thank goodness for Elizabeth.

"So my detectives found you at the Ladies Auxiliary gathering?" I asked.

"Yes." said Karla Warner, the wife. "We'd been there all evening, and were helping to clean up."

"And you were there particularly between 10:00 and 10:30pm? Both of you together?"

"Yes." said Karla.

"Tell me about your husband, please."

Karla Warner said that her husband was an aggressive man who had built up his company, DynaCorp, from a small floundering entity into a large, successful concern. He and Karla had been married for nearly fifteen years, and he'd formally adopted her two children, Seth and Karen, upon marrying her.

"Did Mr. Warner have any enemies that you know of? Anyone in business or his personal life that might want to kill him?" I asked.

Mrs. Warner considered for a moment before answering. "I think I should tell you this, since you'll find out anyway: my husband was a very competitive man, both in business and in his personal life. He loved playing tennis and golf, but increasingly had trouble finding others to play with because he was so competitive with them; he didn't know what a 'friendly' game was and so alienated a lot of people. I don't know that anyone would want to kill him over that, but he did get into arguments with people over small things in tennis matches and such."

"He was like that in business also?" I asked.


"Oh yes, very much so." she replied. "He wanted to buy out Mr. Olivet's business after Mr. Olivet died, but he pushed Mrs. Olivet so hard on it that she went in another direction. He was pretty upset about that."

"Do either of you work in his company?" Martin Nash asked.

"I did some sales work with my husband from time to time," Karla Warner replied, "but I mostly spent my time raising the children."

"And you, Mrs. Wilson?" Nash said, pressing the up-to-now silent, reticent Katherine.

"I'm on the DynaCorp board." she replied. "I've been with the company since Anthony bought it. I've been the Marketing Coordinator for several years."

"Were there any problems between either of you and Mr. Warner?" Nash asked. Both women said that there were not.

"No arguments, no money problems, no affairs?" Nash pressed.

"No." Karla Warner said. "No money problems, and I haven't dated another man since Anthony asked me out the first time. He was very kind to me, as well as to my two children."

In response to our glance at her, Katherine Wilson said "No. No problems with him."

"He never complained about anyone you were dating or anything?" Nash asked Katherine.

"No, I don't date very many men since my divorce some years ago; I've been too busy with the job. Anthony was very demanding at work. He was fair, but he asked a lot of his people."

"Anyone at work that might resent that? Or business associate, or competitor? Anyone with any reason to take action against him?" Martin Nash asked. I liked the way he was probing Katherine Wilson to get some truth out of her.

"No, not that I can think of." Mrs. Wilson replied.

"What about the two of you... are you friends with each other?" I asked. Karla Warner's face showed no change, but Katherine Wilson's lit up.

"Yes, Katherine and I have been best friends since we met, through Anthony of course." Karla replied. "We do many things together, especially with my children having grown up and her divorce setting her free.

I then threw this incisive question, very hard: "Mrs. Wilson, it is our understanding that your brother was conducting a meeting of the DynaCorp Board tonight. Were you not at this meeting?"

Katherine Wilson's mouth fell open in total shock. "What?... I... I had no idea there was a board meeting tonight." She looked at Karla, her eyes flashing, then regained her composure. Karla had not lost her composure the way her sister-in-law had; her eyes did not show the same level of shock. Either she is good at keeping her emotions, I thought, or she knows something.

"So you didn't know that there was a meeting, nor what it might have been about?"

"No. This... this is the first I'm hearing of anything like that." Mrs. Wilson replied. There was anger as well as bewilderment in her eyes.

Just then the door on the public side to the room opened, and the desk sergeant looked in.

"Sorry sir, but there's a young lady out here who is nearly hysterical, and claims to be Mrs. Warner's daughter--" At that moment, Karen Warner burst past the desk sergeant.

"Mom! Is it true? Is Dad dead?" she squealed, her tear-stained face a mask of shock and horror.

"Yes, dear, I'm afraid so." Mrs. Warner replied, getting up and taking her daughter into her arms and hugging her.

As they cried and shared this most painful of moments, I said to the desk sergeant "Show them out when they're ready, Sergeant. Ladies, we're finished here if you'd like to go home. I'll contact you tomorrow with any new information we obtain."

"Thank you, Lieutenant." Katherine Wilson said. Nash and I had to exit out the public side since the door to the rest of headquarters wouldn't open, and we went around through the lobby.

"So Nash," I said as we headed to the MCD room. "What did you think of those ladies?"

"I was surprised you didn't push harder about Mrs. Wilson not being at the board meeting." Nash said.

"Ah, good observation." I said. "Teachable moment: I intend to find out through other means what the board meeting was about, and then I'll come back to her later when I know something." Nash nodded, understanding my reasoning. "What else did you notice?" I asked.

"Mrs. Warner was definitely the stronger of the two. She was in control. Mrs. Wilson constantly was looking to her for support, if not actual answers."

"Excellent!" I said. "Anything further you can extrapolate from that?"

"No... did I miss anything?" Nash asked, concerned.

"No, but think more about it tonight. They're an interesting... couple." I replied, giving Nash about as strong a clue as I could without outright saying anything. "I think we should really look into them and their relationships with Mr. Warner."

"Yes, sir, but they seem to have an alibi for the time Mr. Warner was murdered."


"True, but you know what I think of alibis. We'll confirm their stories tomorrow, but they could always have hired someone."


"I guess my job tomorrow will be those confirmations?" Nash said.

"Yes, but I want to go with you when we talk with Myrtle L. James, head of the Ladies Auxiliary. She's a powerful woman in this town, a member of the University Board of Regents. She's someone you should get to know, and I'll introduce you to her."

"Thank you, sir." Martin said.

"Stop calling me 'sir'." I said. "And go home and get some sleep. You too, Ross." I said to Cindy as she tried to sneak up behind me.

"Practice what you preach, brother." she replied. "Go home and get some sleep... or watch an old movie or something."

"An old movie..." I said, then became lost in thought.

"Uh oh, look at it, Martin: I've seen that look before." Cindy said. "Penny for your thoughts, Don?"

I broke out of the reverie. "Just that I like your idea about watching an old movie... I think I will indeed go do that. Good night, Cindy. Night, Martin. Great job today." I said as I walked out the door.

To be continued.