by D. R. Bell
David and Maggie were sitting opposite John and Cathy. After they left the house, Cathy gave them a quick download on Marchuk. It was an expanded version of what Tokley said: PhD from MIT, his dissertation’s topic was in searching for patterns in large volumes of data using advanced statistical analysis. Went to work for a hedge fund in Connecticut. The fund was busted for insider trading, Schulmann involved in prosecuting. Marchuk got away with probation. Lived by himself. His house in northern New Jersey exploded the morning of September 10th, 2020 and burned to the ground. The official cause was a gas leak.
“What kind of statistical analysis did he use?” asked David.
Cathy checked her notes and blushed. “I am sorry, I scribbled clustering, Support Vector Machines, Markov chains and Bayesian networks, but did not go beyond that. Would you like for me to pull up his dissertation?”
“It’s OK, I can look at it later, thanks.”
“Do you actually understand this?” John inquired.
“As I said, I am not an expert, but I remember a bit from my college courses, and I was involved in some data analysis projects in my work. These are statistical techniques for analyzing relationships between entities across large spans of data.”
The Love Field airport was only a few minutes away. Neither David, nor Maggie had ever flown on anything resembling a Gulfstream 650. Maggie had no experience with private planes, and David’s was limited to a small two-seater, which he did not find particularly enjoyable. The pilot came out to greet them. John quickly showed them around. David asked whether the plane would take Platt all the way to Japan. “Yes, of course,” replied John. “Our pilot is conservative, so we’ll refuel in San Francisco, and from there it’s eight hours to Tokyo.”
As they glided away from the field, John said, “It’s a very short flight, so let’s plan the day. When we land in Austin, a car will take the three of us—Cathy will stay with the plane—to the Williams’s ranch. We have until about three. Then the same car will take us to San Antonio. We are supposed to meet with Chris Maidel, the late Suzy Yamamoto’s husband, at four thirty. I am afraid I’ll have to leave you soon thereafter. I have company obligations to fulfill. Cathy arranged for a car to pick you up at Maidel’s, she also made a reservation for you at San Antonio Marriott Rivercenter. You are, of course, free to change the hotel or arrange your plans however you like. Here are two files on Mitchell Williams for you to review before we get to the ranch. Cathy also made three copies of a file on Suzy Yamamoto; we can review it on the drive to San Antonio. Plus, there are two copies of files on Jim Zorn and Mike Black, in case you need to continue. I did not make any introductions there, but I’ll find a way to do so if needed. There is also a page with my contact information: two phones and a private e-mail. Now, what do you plan to do during the meetings?”
David replied, “I’d like to get access to any computer that may have been used by Williams and Yamamoto and look for traces of Schulmann’s research.”
“Which traces are you going to look for?”
“There are names of some companies that came up both in Schulmann’s early research and in Androssian’s work. These are very unique strings, so if they are present, that’s a clue that the file either is or was there.”
“But if the file’s been erased, you won’t find anything?”
“Not necessarily. Most people hit the ‘delete’ key and think they are safe, but the file is still there. Using specialized applications or even formatting the drive would help, but some data remains and can be recovered. The only way to truly erase the data is to perform a few rounds of formatting and disk-wiping using specialized applications. Most people never do that.”
“OK, that’s good.”
They came in for a landing. Cathy said good-bye; she was continuing with the plane to San Antonio. A black limo was waiting for John, Maggie, and David. It was about a thirty-minute drive to the ranch. As they were following the road amid gently rolling hills, Maggie and David studied the Williams file. Born in Houston in 1972, graduated from University of Texas in 1994 with degrees in economics and international business, worked as finance analyst from 1994 to 1996, MBA from Wharton Business School in 1998, went to work for a multinational energy company afterwards. Married Jenny Brown in 2000. Jenny Williams, nee Brown, born in Dallas in 1973, graduated from University of Texas in 1997 with an MA in history. Two sons, James and Richard, born in 2001 and 2003 respectively. Mitchell ran for Texas Senate in 2006, won. Ran for the governor in 2014, won. Ran for US presidency in 2020, assassinated.
Saturday, 4/30/2022, 1:47 p.m. CDT
The limo turned right and followed a long driveway, at the end of which was a large one-story ranch house. A small corral with four horses and a few other structures stood on the left of the house, and in the distance a large pond to the right glistened in the morning sun. Jenny Williams greeted them at the door. She was an elegant woman in her late forties with blonde medium-length hair, friendly brown eyes, and a broad smile.
Jenny hugged John Platt, and firmly shook hands with David and Maggie. “Very pleased to meet you”—in a Texas twang. Everyone got situated with a cup of coffee in a large living room. Jenny commented how empty the place was now, with both kids in college.
John was the first to get down to business. “Jenny, I am sorry, I know this is painful, but we are trying to investigate some of the circumstances around Mitchell’s death.”
Jenny nodded. “I know. Please don’t hold back. Ask anything. I would appreciate some closure. All I know for sure that my husband and many others had been killed in a large explosion in a hotel in Philadelphia. And none of the subsequent speculations or theories made much sense to me.”
“Jenny, do you know who Jonathan Schulmann was?”
“I’ve heard the name. He may have been here once. He was one of the people killed with Mitchell.”
“Yes. I knew Jonathan for a long time, actually longer than I knew Mitchell. Jonathan was working at SEC, investigating the crisis of 2019. We believe that he may have come across some important information.”
“What kind of information?”
“Probably related to who organized the crisis and profited from it. We don’t know for sure; we don’t have his data.”
“Why not? Shouldn’t SEC have it?”
“Evidently, they don’t. His research has disappeared.”
“They are SEC, why can’t they investigate further?”
“We don’t know. We’re trying to understand what Jonathan found, how much of it he shared with Mitchell, and who else knew about it.”
“Do you think this may be related to Mitchell’s death?”
“We don’t know that either. We are looking for information; we are not ready to draw conclusions yet. We do suspect there may have been a connection here, and that your husband and Jonathan Schulmann were not in the same hotel by accident. Jenny, you were the closest person to Mitchell. Whoever made the decision to assassinate a presidential candidate, such a decision was not made lightly. What did Mitchell believe that would have convinced someone to kill him?”
Jenny rubbed her temples. “Sometimes I think it’s just a bad dream. Yes, Mitchell talked to me about his beliefs. He needed someone to talk to, to discuss his private thoughts. I was a history major, and he thought I could give him some perspective. I’d like to think I was able to do that. About seven, eight years ago he started talking to me about Dwight Eisenhower.”
“The Dwight Eisenhower? The president from the fifties?”
“Yes. Mitchell was re-reading Eisenhower’s speech, his warning about the military-industrial complex. Eisenhower was concerned about unwarranted influence and attendant corruption of the country by a coalition of groups with vested interests in particular areas.”
“But his vision of the military-industrial complex did not come to pass?”
“Not really, although Mitchell did feel that the US spending almost forty percent of the global military budget was too much. But Eise
nhower’s fear was not misplaced. Mitchell told me that, in his view, something had fundamentally changed at the beginning of the century, when we evolved a financial complex that built unhealthy relationships with the government and regulatory sectors. It was a gradual transformation, not a sudden event. After that, the financial industry captured an inordinate amount of the country’s wealth while benefiting only a small portion of the society. He quoted me the numbers of how profits and compensation in finance grew much faster than the overall economy.”
“As a president, was Mitchell planning to do something about it?”
“He knew what he wanted to do. He was working on how to do it, meeting with lawyers, economists, judges, and select legislators. It was not a simple issue, not something that could be done by a speech or one presidential order. Once such a corrupting influence gets established, it becomes self-reinforcing via campaign donations, revolving doors between industry, government, and regulators, and so on. Mitchell thought it would take a combination of legislative, electoral, regulatory, and cultural measures to effect real change.”
“Did the 2019 crisis influence him?”
“It most definitely reinforced what he already believed in. Mitchell thought that this was a result of the Faustian bargain, where the financial sector for years enabled the government to live beyond its means while the government allowed the sector to profit out of proportion to its economic contribution.”
“Was he open with this view? Because I don’t recall him expressing his position this way.”
“No, he was not. Mitchell was a pragmatist, not a revolutionary. He wanted to rebuild the system from within. He recognized that there are many voters that became supporters of the system, no matter how broken, and the change would have to come gradually. Mitchell thought that 2019 was a wake-up call for many, and he wanted to be perceived as an agent of change but not a radical.”
A horse neighed, as if to remind them of the time.
Platt gathered his thoughts. “Jenny, we’d like to check if there was correspondence between Mitchell and Jonathan Schulmann. My young friend here”— he pointed at David—“is a computer expert. We would greatly appreciate it if he could take a look at any computers that Mitchell may have used.”
“Let me see. Mitchell had his laptop with him; whatever is left of it is at the FBI. The boys took their computers with them. There is my laptop, and there is a desktop in the study. I must tell you that the FBI already looked at them a year and a half ago.”
“Do you use any online storage?” asked David.
“Excuse me?”
“I mean, do you know if your computers back up somewhere on the Internet?”
“Ah, yes. I use a MacBook and it backs up automatically. We have a computer person who comes occasionally to set things up. Should I call him?”
“Not at this point. I just have to know passwords.”
“Of course, I have them written on a piece of paper above the desk. Let me show you.”
Jenny excused herself and took David to a study where an HP computer with a large screen was perched on the desk. A list of passwords was indeed hanging above. Jenny smiled guiltily. “Our computer guy keeps making me put it away when he shows up, but I just hang it back up after he leaves. We don’t get many visitors now that Mitchell is gone.” She went away for a minute and came back with a translucent MacBook Pro. “And here is mine. Is there anything I can get for you?”
David thanked her and went to work.
Saturday, 4/30/2022, 2:29 p.m. CDT
The desktop had not been touched in a while. The last login was six weeks ago. David guessed it was also the last time the computer guy was here. David looked around the computer. Mitchell’s e-mail was still active. At a quick glance, pretty much all of the recent e-mails were junk. There was music, there were photos, a few documents. None seemed like work stuff. David guessed that the incinerated laptop was Mitchell’s primary computer. He plugged in the USB drive with Mohun’s program and ran a simple query for “Schulmann.” There were three hits, two were e-mails, and one was calendar entry for a phone call on June 8th, 2020. David went through the e-mails, one about arranging the call, the other talked about Schulmann coming to visit the ranch in late July. Just in case, he copied them to the USB drive. Then he started Mohun’s program and ran queries for Changzoo Tongren, Novaya Energya, etc. Every search came up empty. David repeated the process for the MacBook Pro using the Mac version of the program, without success. David got up. There was nothing else to do here.
Saturday, 4/30/2022, 2:30 p.m. CDT
Jenny returned to the living room. “I think David has what he needs. Can I offer you anything?”
“No, thank you,” Platt replied. “But I would like to hear more about Mitchell. Anything else you can tell us about his plan as a presidential candidate?”
“Being a Texan, obviously energy was going to play an important role in his budget. The US was on its way to becoming a major oil and gas exporter, and he was planning to accelerate this by reducing regulations and encouraging investment via tax policies. This was necessary to create the current account surplus and stabilize the value of the dollar. The other important part was cutting the federal spending. That, of course, was always politically difficult but necessary. Reducing the size of the government, reducing the government pensions, even reducing the military. He received a lot of criticism for this even from his own party, but the point was that we had to live within our means. In fairness, purely economic issues were only a part of his thinking. He believed that we must affect a cultural change in the country, which was going to take a lot of time and effort. He’d been working on a new plan of educational and professional incentives.”
“But presidents have been talking about educational plans forever?”
“True, but in a piecemeal manner and usually within constraints imposed by powerful unions. We were by far number one in per-child spending but only seventeenth in global education rankings. He thought that was just not good enough. Fewer and fewer people could keep up with new technologies, while other occupations were being replaced by automation or cheap foreign labor, leaving low-wage service jobs. And even when we succeeded in educating our children, we often pushed them into fields that from the nation’s perspective could only be described as less productive.”
Jenny stopped and took a sip of her now cold coffee. “I’m sorry. I know I am bitter. I have to pinch myself sometimes. This is all dear to me. Mitchell and I had been discussing this every night. Pillow talk of a politician’s wife. And now the house is empty. He asked me if he should run, and I said yes because I did not want to blame myself later. I wish I’d said no … I’m sorry, where was I?”
“Education,” Platt said quietly.
“Yes, of course. The subject dear to Mitchell’s heart. He thought that the best, the only way to truly grow a country’s wealth is to increase the productivity of its economy. He wanted our smartest kids to become entrepreneurs, scientists, researchers, engineers, educators, farmers, cinematographers—people that build products and companies, grow things, educate and entertain. We don’t need any more litigators and speculators. Instead, we have more per-capita lawyers than any other country in the world, more than doctors or soldiers or firefighters or police. With all due respect to you John, do we really need that many lawyers?”
Platt responded with a smile. “My Georgetown law degree came in handy in running our company.”
“No doubt, but that’s not what most lawyers do. Don’t misunderstand me, the law is an honorable and necessary profession. But many lawyers are ‘rent seekers’ that impede rather than promote economic growth. And it’s not just them. For years, Wall Street has been hiring the best and the brightest for their ‘financial engineering’ schemes. There is no such thing as ‘financial engineering,’ it is speculation and arbitrage designed to skim money off others. Mitchell was incensed that we even invented fancy new terms to hide the true meaning of legitimized thievery. Wha
t possible benefit to the society were the ‘high frequency trading’ systems, where firms would try to place their computers closer to exchanges and front-run orders of real customers? Mitchell was looking to steer young people into different careers, and his plans included both legal and financial reforms, curbing speculation, returning capital markets to what they were supposed to be.”
“Did he anticipate that the country could break up?”
“He was afraid of it. After the 2019 crisis, the separatist movement quickly gained ground. I think he was the only candidate that could have stopped it, and it was his number one priority. As I said, he wanted to keep the country together. He believed in the strength that comes from the unity of over 330 million people. It’s tragic that his death instead became a rallying cry for the separatists.” Jenny stopped, pulled a handkerchief out of her pocket, and dabbed at her eyes.
“Who do you think may have wanted to kill Mitchell?”
“That would be a long list. There could have been political motivations, there could have been financial ones. His reform plans made him quite a few enemies. Immediately after the attack, the fingers were pointed at both extreme left and extreme right. Also, Muslim terrorists have been mentioned, as Mitchell was sharply critical of some of the Middle East countries, including both Iran and Saudi Arabia. Some thought it was about oil. The investigation has been inconclusive, and I am not good at speculating.”
David came back to the living room. Everyone looked at him expectantly. He admitted that he did not find anything of significance, except that it was clear that Mitchell and Jonathan had at least one phone call. He commented that Jonathan might have been here at the end of July.
Jenny said, “Yes, you might be correct. We had a meeting here on the ranch. I cannot remember the exact date, but this sounds right.”