| |
THE AUTHORITIES CAUGHT up to Crystal Roach in Henderson, Nevada.
Crystal confessed she set the cockroach costume on fire on Donnie’s front porch. She felt hurt, she lashed out, and she was terribly sorry, she said. She claimed she hadn’t noticed the propane tanks and never would have dreamed a little fire could have done so much damage.
The cruise ship’s records indicated Alison Boyd, the resident yoga instructor, disembarked at the Aloha Tower Cruise Ship Terminal and disappeared. In fact, it wasn’t Alison who walked off the ship. It was Crystal. Poor Alison had walked off the cruise ship one stop earlier, in Mahina, and visited the new Laughing Lotus yoga studio. All Crystal had to do was take Alison for a walk in the woods, push her down a ravine, hike down after her, swap IDs, and fasten her distinctive necklace onto the victim.
Crystal swore Randy Randolph’s death had been accidental. True, Randolph had been holding back on his payments, claiming he wasn’t getting the results he wanted from her training, and he’d threatened to post negative reviews of her work online. To make matters worse, he had been inexcusably rude to poor Davison, who was practically still a child. But she insisted that she did not orchestrate Randy Randolph’s tragic misadventure.
She did not wait until he was holding aloft his heaviest weight, and then pick up additional plates and slide them onto the bar, one after another, until Randolph’s arms trembled and gave way. And she most certainly did not stand back and watch him die as he gasped for help, the bar slowly crushing his larynx. She claimed he must have tried to lift the heavy weight after their session had ended. She would not have allowed him to attempt it had she been there. She would never, she insisted, jeopardize a client’s safety.
Crystal outright denied having anything to do with Primo Nordmann’s dismemberment. Even though according to testimony from Laughing Lotus employees, Primo knew Crystal was stealing from the money box, and he’d threatened to tell Sharon and Sharla. And several members of Students for a Better World recalled Crystal and Primo going out together on a midnight “action” at Art Lam’s papaya farm the night of the murder. The leather string holding the crystal pendant—the necklace that Crystal had worn continuously until she’d placed it on Alison Boyd’s body—had traces of Primo’s blood. Thus, second-degree murder charges (for chopping up Primo) were added to arson (Donnie’s house), negligent homicide (Randy Randolph), and first-degree murder (Alison Boyd).
In case you’re wondering how I know all this, I got the details from Pat Flanagan. He’s no longer working for Mahina State’s Associate Vice President in Charge of Student Outreach and Community Relations. Island Confidential is back in business.
Pat announced this transition to Emma and me during one of our regular Sunday brunches at the Pair-O-Dice Bar and Grill. He claimed that he was tired of shilling for The Man and wanted nothing more than to return to honest and thoughtful journalism.
“You saying you didn’t get fired cause of your PEP thing?” Emma looked skeptical.
“You were fired, Pat?”
“It was a mutual decision. I’m gonna get more coffee.”
Pat got up to refill his Styrofoam cup with the Pair-O-Dice’s watery brew.
“What happened?” I asked Emma.
“He did this social media blitz promoting the university’s new Prison Education Project, you know, PEP. So this one post went viral.”
“That’s good, right?”
“Had a photo of the prison weight room with some of the guys, yeah? And the caption was, ‘Hands off the cage meat, ladies’. Some people in the sociology department said it was disrespectful and complained to the chancellor.”
Pat returned to our table.
“What are we talking about?”
“Nothing,” Emma said.
“You told me you had some good news for me?” I asked.
“Oh yeah. My friend, Jeffrey couldn’t believe your cartoon was really Mary Pfaff’s handiwork.”
“But it was signed. By Mary Pfaff.”
“Well, he dug into it. Mary Pfaff’s illustrations had become so popular, her editor at The Brockton Bugle started putting her signature on the work of other artists. Including that piece. Her editor was the main reason she quit and moved west. He was kind of a jerk.”
“So someone way out in Minnesota went to the trouble to draw a cartoon about the overthrow of the Hawaiian Kingdom?”
“Sure. The overthrow was front page news in the U.S.”
“Does this mean I can wear my Alice Mongoose t-shirt again?”
“With a clear conscience.”
“That is good news. Thank you, Pat.”
“Focusing on the important questions,” Emma sighed. “Hey Molly, I drove by Donnie’s place the other day. Doesn’t look like there’s any rebuilding going on. Insurance company stalling or what?”
“Oh. Donnie has decided not to rebuild his house.”
“How come?” Emma pressed.
“My place is a much better location for him. Just a few blocks from Donnie’s Drive-Inn. So he decided to use the insurance payout to build us another bathroom.”
“That actually seems like a good idea,” Pat said. Emma nodded agreement.
Three months after that conversation, my house is unrecognizable. Gone is the little telephone nook and nearly every non-load-bearing wall. Instead, the living room, dining room, and kitchen are one vast entertaining space, with a lofty vaulted ceiling overhead. Donnie bought us a full set of proper tableware and moved my boxes and the contents of my “skinny” closet into a storage unit, ensuring we have both a guest room and a spare room available for visitors.
I’m thrilled, of course. How could I not be? This is a new adventure, this living together in close quarters, with no privacy or space of my own, sharing decisions instead of having things exactly the way I like them. I know I’ll adjust brilliantly. Just like Alice Mongoose did.
As Emma has pointed out, invasive species are very adaptable.