Jubilee's Journey (Wyattsville #2)(33)
“Brain damage?” Gomez asked.
Doctor Brewster shook his head. “The bullet fractured his skull but didn’t penetrate, so there’s no injury to the brain.”
“Then what’s the problem?”
“My guess is shock. He’s thrown a protective wall up to keep from remembering what happened, but it’s also preventing him from remembering other things.”
“Did you get anything? His name? Where he’s from?”
The doctor shook his head again. “No, and for now I don’t think you’re going to.”
“This shock thing,” Gomez said, “how long does it last?”
“We have no way of knowing. Shock is the brain’s way of shutting down to let the body heal. Sometimes as the body starts to heal, a person’s memory returns. Other times, well…” Brewster gave another who knows shrug and turned away.
When the doctor left Hector Gomez walked to the vending machine down the hall and returned with two coffees. He handed one to Nancy. “You look like you could use this.”
“Thanks.” She slipped a marker in front of page 77 and closed her book.
For the next two hours they sipped lukewarm coffee and chatted.
Hector, who had a way of getting information through what seemed to be a casual conversation, learned that Sid Klaussner was still in a medically-induced coma. “Too bad. Sid’s a damn nice guy, doesn’t deserve this.”
“Nobody does,” Nancy commiserated.
Once he found out that Sid had been unable to speak, let alone provide details of the robbery, he moved on to asking about Paul. “So, the kid is still a John Doe?’”
“Yeah.” Nancy nodded. “A real shame. Doesn’t even know his name.”
Gomez was determined to move up in the ranks—this year detective, next year maybe lieutenant.
“The shame is, these punk kids think they can get away with it,” he said. When he saw the grimace on Nancy’s face, he softened his stance. “But you’ve still gotta feel sorry for them. You gotta wonder what drives them to something like this.”
“We never know,” Nancy said sadly. “We just never know.”
On the way out, Gomez stopped to talk with the patrolman standing guard outside John Doe’s room. “Has anybody been to see him?”
The patrolman shook his head.
Hector peered through the plate glass window in John Doe’s room. “Damn,” he grumbled. “Nobody’s reported him missing, nobody’s been here to see him. What kind of nut-ball family does this kid come from? You sure nobody’s been here?”
He got the same answer. Sooner or later, he thought. Sooner or later somebody would show up, and when they did…
Name or no name, Gomez had already decided this one was going to be a conviction. He drove home imagining the gold bar that would one day be pinned to his chest.
On Saturday morning when Loretta reported for work, the hospital gossip line was filled with chatter about how the Klaussner’s gunman had regained consciousness. Before Loretta was fully seated behind the visitor’s desk, she’d dialed Olivia’s number.
“I understand the boy is awake,” she said in a deliciously whispery voice. “The police suspect he’s an out-of-towner, but he won’t tell them his name or where he’s from!”
Although Olivia was shaken to the core at hearing such news, she said, “Well, I’m certain that’s none of my business.”
“Oh, I think it is,” Loretta replied slyly. “Ethan Allen and that little girl were here yesterday, and they were looking to get in and see the boy.”
“Yes, you told me that yesterday,” Olivia said. “But I fail to see how—”
“Those kids know something,” Loretta taunted. “I know they know something!”
“Oh, Loretta,” Olivia said, “you know how kids are. They were just looking for adventure. Ethan Allen has been watching that Dragnet show on television, and I think it’s influencing—”
“Don’t give me that malarkey, those kids know something!”
“Well, if they do, it’s news to me.” Although Olivia cringed at giving an answer so borderline close to a lie, it was, in actuality, true. If she knew who the family was and where the boy was headed, she would deliver Jubilee Jones to the mysterious Aunt Anita and be done with the whole affair.
“Harrumph,” Loretta snorted. “If that’s your answer, then so be it. I’ve got other sources for finding what I want to know!” She paused a moment, then added, “Including the name of that girl Ethan’s been running with!” She slammed down the telephone without bothering to say goodbye.
For the first time in more than a year, Olivia’s heart began fluttering again. In an effort to calm herself she took three different cookbooks from the kitchen shelf and searched them page by page, but there was not a single recipe for okra soup. Time had not dulled the memory of those days following Charlie’s death. It was Canasta’s okra soup that had restored her will to live. The soup had magical powers, it enabled a person to look inside themselves and find a cure for the heartaches of life.
Olivia searched long and hard but there simply was no recipe for the life altering soup. Left with no other resource, she retrieved the card she’d hidden in the bottom of her jewelry box months earlier and dialed the number printed in the lower right hand corner.