Jamie Brodie 02 - Hoarded to Death

notes. "What time was this?"
    "It was right before closing, so around 7:00."
    "Okay. Could you hear what the argument was about?"
    "I think it was about that paper you guys were looking for."
    "What makes you think that?"
    "They were arguing about a price. The Australian guy was saying, "This is a priceless artifact, I'm not letting it go for less than three hundred," and Quentin was saying, "It's damaged, I can't get that much for it, I can't give you more than one fifty."
    "So the argument got more heated."
    "Yeah. The Australian guy said, 'We had an agreement,' and Quentin said, 'I didn't sign a contract,' and the Australian guy said, 'I can take this somewhere else,' and then Quentin said he'd send out an email to the other dealers telling them not to buy the piece of paper, or whatever it was. That pissed the Australian guy off, and he said, 'No, you won't,' then Quentin said, 'What are you doing, you're crazy,' and then I heard the gunshots." Paulo trembled and wiped his eyes.
    "How many shots?"
    "Three. It wasn't loud, it was more like, pop, pop, pop. Then I heard the door open and the bell ring again."
    Kevin nodded. "The gun had a silencer. Then what did you do?"
    "I sneaked out into the shop to see if Quentin was alive. There was blood everywhere, his chest was all bloody, and his eyes were open looking at the ceiling, and he wasn't breathing. It was horrible. I had to go throw up, then I ran out the back door and kept running."
    "You didn't touch anything in the shop, or touch Quentin."
    "No! I know not to do that, I watch CSI."
    I bit my lip to keep from laughing. Jon rolled his eyes. Kevin said, "Okay, that's good. And you're sure the voice you heard was Australian."
    "Yeah. Like I told Dr. Brodie, he sounded just like Steve Irwin."
    "Okay. Was the voice deep, or high pitched?"
    "Pretty deep."
    "So definitely a man."
    "Oh, yeah, for sure a man."
    "Okay." Kevin turned so he was looking directly at Paulo. "Paulo, I'm going to need you to come in to make an official statement."
    " What? Why? I just told you what happened!"
    "Yeah, but we have to make it official, typed up and with your signature. Otherwise it doesn't count."
    Paulo was practically squeaking. "Now?"
    "Have you got someplace else to be? I'll buy you breakfast."
    Paulo's face relaxed a little. "Can we go to McDonald's?"
    Kevin laughed. "Sure." He stood up, and Paulo and I followed suit. Jon said to Kevin, “I’m coming with you,” then turned to me. "Are you gonna be in your office today? I need to get some details about your friend."
    "Yeah. I don't have any meetings, just my reference shift with Liz."
    He nodded. "Okay. I'll come by after three."
    Kevin put his hand on Paulo's shoulder. He was really being gentle with the kid. "C'mon. I'll show you how the police really operate."
    Kevin, Paulo, and Jon headed in one direction and I went in the other. I went back to my office and got online. There wasn't as much information about Australian Rhodes scholars as there was about American ones, but I found some pages with information about Kendall to print out for Jon. I emailed the links to Kevin as well. There was an association for Australian Rhodes scholars, but I couldn't find a website for them. I did find contact information for their officers on Oxford's site, so I printed that out too, and the contact information for OUSLA, the Oxford University Society in Los Angeles. That was the local Oxford alumni group where I'd met Kendall in the first place.
    I thought about what I really knew about Kendall, and realized it wasn't much. We'd talked a lot at alumni gatherings, and I'd been to his shop a handful of times, but I didn't really know anything about him except superficial information. Kevin and Jon would be able to find out a lot more background information than I could.
    It was hard to imagine that Kendall would have killed two people. And how would he have known Wally? I could guess what the motive was, though.
    Money.

    I was bleary-eyed the rest of the day, feeling like my brain was stuffed full of cotton. I didn't get much done. At 3:00, as promised, Jon came to the reference desk. He had a few private words with Liz while I was talking to the guys who were taking over at reference for a minute. Then Jon, Liz , and I went upstairs. We split at the door to my office. Jon said to Liz, "I'll see you in a bit," and followed me into my office.
    I closed the door behind us. "Just in case."
    "Good idea." Jon sat in one of the visitor's