Aunty Lee's Chilled Revenge (13 page)

“I'm just kidding. That lying bitch swore she thought the puppy was going to spend the rest of its life in a cage and she was doing it a favor by putting it down. She wouldn't shift from that. It was all one huge waste of time.”

“I think Allison Fitzgerald convinced herself that's what I said.” Cherril shook her head. “It was like she had a filter around her: only certain things got through.”

Aunty Lee smiled at this. “We all see things through filters. But like air-con filters and fish tank filters, we must regularly clean out the rubbish from our filters otherwise everything gets blocked. But you are saying that it was during that long meeting that you and Mike Fitzgerald sat down in the same room for the first time?”

“I suppose—yes.”

“Then it was not a waste of time. You got so tired that your filters came off, both of you. But if your Mike is innocent, then why did he have to sneak back into Singapore without telling you? You didn't know he was already in Singapore until the police found him, right? If Mike Fitzgerald did not come to Singapore to see you, then why did he come?”

Josephine looked pointedly at Cherril. “You should ask her.”

“Cherril?” Aunty Lee said in disbelief.

Cherril took a deep breath. “Mike Fitzgerald contacted me and said he was looking for business opportunities here, because of Josie. He wanted it to be a surprise for her. It was too good a chance to pass up, because to go big scale and international we're going to need an international guy, someone with international business experience. And he was willing to come out without expat pay so that he could be in Singapore with Josie.”

“Why did you do that without even discussing with me? And that means you knew that Josephine and Mike were a couple and you never told me!” Aunty Lee saw the younger women exchange glances.

“I guessed there was something but I didn't know for sure.
The important thing is Mike Fitzgerald knows about running big businesses and he has contacts in America.”

Aunty Lee looked doubtful. She shook her head and waved her hands. “So confusing, all of your men. Got one ‘Mark,' now got one ‘Mike.'”

“It's easy to tell them apart,” Josephine said smoothly. “With Mark, what you see is what you get. There's nothing more to him. But Mike is really Michael. There's more depth to him.”

Cherril giggled. “Lucky
someone's
not here. That would make her so mad!”

“You must tell that Silly-Nah when she comes back!” Aunty Lee said.

“I want you to meet Mike,” Josephine spoke up. “Right now the police are talking to him. Cherril, you have to go and tell the police why Mike came here without telling me. And, Aunty Lee, you're friendly with the police commissioner, right? You have to tell him that Mike didn't do anything to his ex-wife.”

“I'm sure that if he didn't do it the police will find out soon enough,” Aunty Lee said. “Besides, it's a bit funny, isn't it? The way he came to Singapore so sneakily without even telling his girlfriend? What kind of man does something like that?” Aunty Lee wondered what Josephine saw in that foreign man, why she couldn't have ended up with someone like Brian Wong, for example. She sighed. Josephine DelaVega and Brian Wong were both so energetic and passionate about changing the world for the better. And they were both so tall and good-looking and rich and would have such pretty
babies that they could afford to dress up. Plus they might have asked her to cater their wedding buffet.

Instead Josephine was throwing herself away on some divorcé with two children who might or might not have killed his mad wife.

“I know you don't like Mike. But you've got to help prove that he didn't do it because he didn't. It's just something else that ex-wife of his is trying to set him up for.”

“His ex-wife is dead.”

“She may be dead but this is all still her fault.”

Aunty Lee felt sorry for Allison—even sorrier than she had on hearing of her death.

Young People These Days

“Josephine really didn't know that Mike Fitzgerald was here because he came into Singapore early to meet Cherril. No, nothing like that, Raja. You and Brian Wong are both so biased against
ang moh
men. Mike went and got in touch with all three of them after he and Allison got divorced. He said he wanted to apologize for his part in what had happened to the dog in Singapore. That led to Josephine falling in love with him and Cherril asking him to help expand the business. He came to Singapore early to discuss working with Cherril on business expansion plans.”

Aunty Lee knew from experience how difficult it was to get into Commissioner Raja's office in the police headquarters, even if you knew he would want to see you. So instead of trying to get through the various levels of administration, she had gone to the staff canteen in the basement and phoned him
from there. Since her fall, Commissioner Raja had dropped in on her often with gifts of food and genuine concern, so it seemed only right, now that she was more ambulatory, that she should drop in on him. Admittedly she came bearing chicken curry, pineapple tarts, and a request . . . but as she had expected, Raja Kumar was still glad to see her.

“How did you get here?” It was not yet lunchtime for most people, and only the coffee and dim sum stall was busy with takeaway business.

“Nina dropped me off. She's going to pick up some more chickens and she will come back and get me in an hour.”

“With a car full of live chickens?”

“With the freezer in the car boot full of dead chickens. They kill them with electric shock, very fast. And then they have a machine that can clean and remove feathers very fast.” In the old days killing chickens had been a far more laboriously messy business. Aunty Lee still felt a twinge of nostalgia for her younger self, the girl who had decided that the best thing for both chickens and herself was to learn to kill them as quickly and painlessly as possible. There were “high-class” girls who preferred to shriek and considered themselves superior to tasks only suited for servants, but Aunty Lee believed that what could not be avoided should be tackled as quickly as possible. So—

“I want to talk to you about Mike Fitzgerald. How is the curry?”

“It's good, but not as good as Sumathi used to make.”

Commissioner Raja had already dipped a convenient teaspoon into the curry gravy. He always remembered to pay
tribute to how well his late wife cooked. Aunty Lee remembered Sumi too, and her advice to the much younger Rosie Lee on the secret of her chicken curry: “If it looks funny, dump in a tin of Amoy chicken curry to make the color right.” It had worked too, though Aunty Lee had not had to resort to tinned curry for some time now. But Aunty Lee knew that the reason Raja Kumar fondly remembered Sumathi's curry as the best in the world was a testimony to the power of love and memory rather than the Amoy brand.

“I must get some French bread. It soaks up gravy better than rice. Sorry, what did you say?”

“Mike Fitzgerald.” Aunty Lee repeated what Josephine and Cherril had told her the previous day.

“So Cherril is talking to strangers about expanding Aunty Lee's Delights without telling you first?”

“She tried to talk to me. I told her it was no use even thinking about overseas franchises for the business unless we had someone with overseas experience. I thought that was the end of the matter. Cherril thought I was telling her to go ahead and recruit somebody.”

“Young people,” Commissioner Raja snorted. “Young people these days think they know everything and try to tell their grandfathers what to do! You know what they call young people these days? The YOLO generation—the You Only Live Once generation. And because they only live once they cannot be bothered to work on things that will take longer or benefit other people. But at the same time they feel entitled to take, take, take everything that other people have worked to build up!”

Aunty Lee was familiar with Raja's rants over the quality of new recruits and young officers. And he had other reasons to be frustrated by young would-be tyrants. His son-in-law was strongly hinting that Raja Kumar think about signing a prenuptial agreement if he wanted to marry again, while tiptoeing around the question of how much Rosie Lee was worth. Or even better, dividing his assets among his offspring now, before he inconveniently descended into death or dementia. When he was in a good mood he laughed about it, but at the end of the day when his energy was low and he most missed his wife, it got him down and left him drained the next morning.

“I never thought they would grow up so mercenary.”

“They are trying to protect you, you know. They are probably afraid I'm going to take all your money and spend it at the casino and leave you with nothing to pay your medical bills in your old age.”

“So? That's still my business, not theirs. And the café is your business. Cherril should have talked to you first!”

“When Mike offered to come out and look over the factories Cherril had short-listed, she thought it would be a good idea. She says he was willing to come on board as a partner investor.”

Commissioner Raja looked skeptical. “There are people selling plots for time-share holidays on Mars if he's looking for something else to invest in.”

“I doubt he would be interested unless Josephine DelaVega is going to be living on Mars. The point is, he was going over factory costs with Cherril when the vet was killed. He
couldn't have done it. And if you are sure that the vet was killed by the same person who killed his wife, that means he did not kill his wife either.”

“Because Mike Fitzgerald was with Cherril the morning it happened.” Raja Kumar had reached for a notebook and was making notes. The investigator in him had surfaced and Aunty Lee knew he would confirm all the details.

“That's what she says. I would be very happy if he killed his wife. I mean, better him than Josephine or Cherril or Brian. But if you say whoever killed his wife also killed the vet, then he didn't do it.”

“Unless they were in it together.” But it was clear he didn't believe it. “And the girlfriend really didn't know he was already in the country?”

“It was supposed to be a big surprise for Josephine. They didn't want to get her hopes up in case they didn't manage to talk me round.”

“At least Cherril was going to ask you before signing him on!”

It was hardly necessary to comment on the failings of the younger generation again.

“Can you really believe that if Cherril knew her good friend's boyfriend was in Singapore she didn't say anything to her friend? Girls like that talk. Cherril would have told her.”

“They both swear she didn't know. Mike says he didn't want to raise false hopes in case it didn't work out. But I think it's more likely he's just secretive by nature and being married to Allison made him more so. He made each of them promise not to tell anybody that he had got in touch with them.
Remember, the three of them also went through quite a difficult time during the dog business. They didn't want to dig things up again.”

“But Josephine goes and falls in love with him.” This seemed to be the major point Commissioner Raja held against Mike Fitzgerald, even outranking the possibility that the man had killed his ex-wife. “And they really didn't tell anybody, didn't even discuss it among themselves?”

“They were not as close as they used to be.” That was another unpleasant aftermath of the puppy killer case, Aunty Lee thought. It would always be something the friends reminded each other of.

“What about Brian Wong? He was also involved in that puppy killer business.”

“He's a big-time entrepreneur now. Sitting on government boards and committees and handing out grants, he's practically a national resource.”

“That means the big bosses won't be very happy to find out they've got an infamous activist handing out their big-time grants. You know what Singapore is like about such things. He's the one that had the most to lose from Allison's suit. Even if she didn't win his entire activist past would have come out. He would be the one hiding his head and running out of the country!”

“Of course Brian Wong didn't kill Allison,” Aunty Lee said firmly. “I know Brian Wong. Brian can't even kill cockroaches. Oh, I wish you could just prove Mike Fitzgerald was the murderer.”

“Because he's a white man or because he's a divorcé and unemployed?”

“Because he is not from here and I don't know his parents,” Aunty Lee said honestly. “And because he's got such good motives here—if that vet had not put down that dog for his wife, if his wife had not made such a fuss about everything, he would still have his cushy lifestyle and expat benefits, and Josephine would be in love with Brian Wong by now. But he didn't kill them.”

“So what do you want me to do about it? Go and spring him out of prison? If I do that they'll fire me and take away my pension!”

“He hasn't been arrested,” Aunty Lee pointed out. “He's just ‘assisting inquiries.' Let me assist him to assist you.”

“Here's Nina. That means there's a car full of dead chickens in the car park . . .”

Aunty Lee chatted triumphantly as Nina made sure her boss was safely settled with her stick by her feet and her seat belt locked in.

“I could see what Raja was thinking, but I know Cherril would never go after somebody else's boyfriend.”

“Madame, I thought you said Madame Cherril didn't know that man is Miss Josephine's boyfriend?” Nina started the engine and looked over her shoulder, preparatory to reversing. It would not do to run over someone in the basement of the police headquarters.

“Anyway, Cherril is happily married, so that's not an issue.”

“It's hard enough to be happily married when you come from the same background. But when your backgrounds are so different, there will be so many more problems.”

Aunty Lee's happy flow of murderous thoughts ran into a sudden stop. Was she imagining things? Nina's voice did not sound any different, but it was unlike Nina to express such decided opinions. Aunty Lee stole a look at Nina, but her helper's eyes were fixed on the electronic payment reader, as though daring it to overcharge their car. Josephine was not the only woman involved with a man from a very different background, Aunty Lee remembered. There was also Cherril, whose upbringing had been so different from Mycroft's though in the same country, and Nina herself, come from a country and culture completely alien to the young police officer who . . .

“It can be good that two people are from different backgrounds.” Aunty Lee put on her sunglasses as the car emerged from the dim car park into the brilliant Singapore sun. “Because then you know you must make adjustments. You remember that you are two different people. Otherwise you assume the other person is exactly like you, the smallest difference also very easy to get angry.”

Nina shrugged and signaled a lane change. “Too different is not good. Different religion, different food, different families, different countries—all not good.”

“All people are different, Nina. It's just that most people don't realize it. As long as they agree on the important things you can work out everything else.”

It seemed Aunty Lee had been successfully distracted
from her fall-induced listlessness. Unfortunately Nina liked this new direction even less.

“Madame, I must concentrate on driving. Cannot talk.” Domestic helpers were not supposed to drive in Singapore, and it was only Aunty Lee's pleas of helplessness and the late ML's influence that had gotten permission for Nina's special license. Aunty Lee ought to understand she could not afford to jeopardize it.

Later, with Nina safely in the kitchen tending to the fresh chicken meat, Aunty Lee put in a quick call to Constance DelaVega, Josephine's mother. Aunty Lee was old-fashioned enough to prefer talking to people face-to-face, especially friends whom she had not seen for some time and about subjects as potentially sensitive as their daughters being involved with potential murderers. But fortunately Connie had heard about Aunty Lee's fall and was understanding. Even more fortunately, she was not offended when Aunty Lee brought up the subject, saying that she was only calling because Josephine had just spoken to her about Mike and she wanted to know how her friend Connie was taking it.

“Then she's said more to you than to me,” Connie said. But at least she sounded resigned and hurt rather than angry and raging, Aunty Lee thought. And at least she had not put down the phone immediately. If anything, Connie sounded eager to talk. Aunty Lee suspected the family had been avoiding the subject of Josephine's
ang moh
boyfriend and she was longing to discuss it. Plus the relative anonymity of a telephone call might have made it easier—almost like the
anonymity of Catholic confession boxes, where you trusted the unseen person but where you could discuss things you might prefer to avoid face-to-face. Aunty Lee told herself to remember some people were less rather than more comfortable face-to-face, whatever she herself might prefer.

“Josie's young,” Aunty Lee said vaguely. “She's in love and she thinks you don't approve of the man she's in love with—how can she talk to you?”

“Of course I don't approve of that man. I don't even know him, how to approve or disapprove of him?”

“She thinks you won't approve of him.”

“Maybe that is her own guilty conscience speaking, then!” Connie's voice rose slightly.

“Because he is a white foreigner?”

“No. Not really.”

“Because he's divorced? Because he's much older than Josie? That is not necessarily a bad thing, you know. ML was much older than me. He said it gave him patience and I think that was a good thing for me!”

Although Aunty Lee did not mention it, she knew Joseph “Jojo” DelaVega was her friend's second husband. Connie had married at eighteen, to a handsome boy her own age. They had separated after less than two years and somehow their families had managed to get an annulment, back in the days when divorce was seldom spoken of in Singapore.