My Island Homicide by Catherine Titasey

canyons down her face, turning her lips downwards. ‘I did go to the Railway to take Moses home before he spent the last of the family allowance but the barmaid told me to piss off and to leave him alone. I got wild.’ I saw hopelessness and helplessness in every fold, crease and pore of her face.
    â€˜What exactly did you say to Melissa?’
    â€˜I just told her I would . . . kill her. I wanted to scare her, make her feel nathakind , bad, like the way Mikey did when Melissa been drill em .’ She went back to scratching at the cigarette burns. ‘I got nothing. Melissa, em got everything: clever husband, nice house, plenty money.’ She looked up. ‘ Em act the good wife but em not. You know?’
    â€˜Know what?’
    â€˜She’s been getting it on with the principal of the primary school, Mr Dave, visiting him when his wife’s away. Em got island wife, Leilani Isi. If Melissa been go , em probably been go into hiding. Leilani, em one for maydh. Yu ilan woman , yu mas sabe ?’
    I nodded, not letting on that I had no idea about maydh . I thanked Mrs Bintu for her time.
    Just as we drove off, Lency rang to say Georgia Finucane had phoned the station wanting to talk to me. I jotted her number in my notebook and called her back.
    â€˜I remembered something. I am not sure if it’s important,’ she said in a slow drawl.
    â€˜Is it about Melissa and the principal of the primary school?’
    There was a pause. ‘No.’
    â€˜Is it a matter of urgency?’
    â€˜No, it’s not urgent at all.’
    â€˜We’ll be over tomorrow morning, 9.30am.’
    â€˜Okay,’ she said in a faraway voice.
    I slipped the phone into my shirt pocket. ‘Georgia can have the night to think about anything else she has forgotten or failed to mention.’
    â€˜Cool. I love a mystery. Work can be a bit boring.’ Shay broke into song, something about a fun house and evil crowns. Perhaps she meant queens. ‘Do you like Pink?’
    â€˜No, I prefer earthy tones.’ I chuckled and pointed at my shirt. ‘I don’t mind lime-green, either.’
    â€˜What are you talking about?’ She was staring at me with sheer incomprehension.
    â€˜Watch the road,’ I shrieked as she veered towards the edge.
    â€˜Chillax,’ she said.
    By the time I worked out what ‘chillax’ meant, her eyes were back on the road. ‘You asked me if I liked pink. I don’t and never have, even as a little girl.’ Shay started tapping the steering wheel, impatiently. She could just wait till I finished answering her question. ‘I prefer browns and ochres. Red is quite nice, which is close to pink, you could say.’
    â€˜No,’ she said, with a good-natured roll of her eyes. ‘I meant Pink, the singer.’
    Oh. I didn’t know how to wriggle out of that one without sounding middle-aged and out of touch. ‘You know, once I started working 60 hours a week, I stopped listening to music so that’s been the better part of ten years. Your Pink, whoever she or he is, was probably in primary school then.’
    â€˜Oh, right.’ Her tone suggested I was a lost cause. ‘Hey, I might download you some music so you can relax. You obviously put too much time into your work and not enough into yourself.’ I’d pegged Shay for a space cadet, but that statement cut like a razor. ‘There’s a great hairdresser here who does massage and beauty therapy. It’s not a crime, you know, to treat yourself to something nice.’
    Shay, despite her youth and naïveté, had worked me out.
    â€˜Well, come on,’ she said, jumping out of the car. ‘I’ve got an appointment with the beautician.’ She winked. ‘Isaac’s coming over tonight.’
    â€˜Isaac?’
    â€˜The guy I’m dating.’
    Before I could deliver that lecture about dangerous men making heart-fluttering promises,