Jubilee's Journey (Wyattsville #2)(37)

Certain it could only mean trouble, Olivia shushed the kids and did not answer the door.

“Open up!” Clara yelled.

“Thank heaven it’s only you,” Olivia said and swung the door open.

“Only me?” Clara repeated. “What kind of a greeting is that?” She bristled her way past Ethan Allen who was telling Jubilee he’d raise her five and call.

“Do you know what those kids are doing?” Clara frowned.

Olivia rolled her eyes and nodded. “Playing poker.” Without any further explanation, she headed back to the kitchen.

Clara followed along and plopped down on a chair. “I suppose you heard?”

“Loretta called first thing this morning. She said the boy in the hospital has refused to talk. He won’t even give them his name.”

“Yeah, well, Loretta ain’t got all the facts,” Clara sneered. “I just came from Fred’s, and he was on the phone with his niece. She was there and knows what happened!” Before Clara could get to what she was trying to tell, the doorbell started bonging again. Not just once but several times with no pause between one gong and the next.

When the door opened Fred McGinty rushed in looking as if he were about to explode. “We’ve got problems! Last night Linda was at the hospital—pediatrics not intensive care—but after I asked her to check on the kid, she stopped by ICU and found out he’s regained consciousness.”

“But that’s not the problem,” Clara added.

Olivia’s eyebrows shot up. “What is?”

“The boy can’t remember anything,” Fred said. “Nothing. Not even his name.”

Olivia gasped. “Dear God!”

“Worse yet,” Fred continued, “Sid Klaussner is still in a coma!”

Olivia gave a second gasp, and Clara nodded knowingly.

“Detective Gomez was there last night trying to talk to the kid.” Fred lowered his voice and continued in a gravelly whisper. “Gomez said if Sid don’t make it, they’re gonna charge that kid with murder.”

“Oh dear,” Olivia replied. “What if the boy is Paul and what Jubilee says is true?”

“That’s a problem,” Fred said. “Right now he don’t even know his own name, so how’s he gonna tell what happened?”

In a terrified voice Olivia said, “Without him, how are we going to find Anita?”

“And,” Clara added, “if he isn’t Paul, then where’s Jubilee’s brother?”

Olivia’s cinnamon tea suddenly became far too inadequate for the situation. She set a pot of coffee on to brew and added a small strip of okra. Although Canasta swore there was nothing magical about okra, Olivia simply couldn’t lose the feeling of contentment that came from knowing it was there.

Olivia filled three cups, and they sat around the table trying to create a plan that would enable them to find out what they needed to know without giving away what little they knew about Jubilee and her brother. George Walther joined them a short while later. The only thing he had to report was that the scuttlebutt around the station house indicated they’d gotten a good set of fingerprints from where one of the assailants had banged open the cash register.

“But they haven’t gotten an identity yet,” George said sadly.

“If the fingerprints belong to that kid in the hospital, he’s had it,” Fred said, “whether or not he remembers what happened.”

“There seems to be no good answer,” Olivia said sadly.

Clara slapped her hand down on the table. “I ain’t for giving up! We had a bigger problem with Ethan Allen and found a way to fix it.”

“Yeah,” Fred agreed. “Ethan’s situation was a lot worse. We found a way to stop that crazy-ass murderer after him. If we could do that, we can for sure handle this.”

“In case you don’t remember,” Olivia said, “we weren’t the ones who stopped Scooter Cobb; it was Ethan Allen.”

“Oh, right,” Clara mumbled and gulped down a large swallow of okra-flavored coffee.

Fred glared at Clara with a look that indicated she should’ve kept her mouth shut. “What about that policeman friend of yours?” he asked Olivia.

“Jack Mahoney?” she replied. “I called and asked if he’d help us.”

“Well?” Clara grumped, “what did he say?”

“At first he said finding Anita was out of his jurisdiction.”

“So he’s not gonna help?” Fred asked.

“No, he’s agreed to look into it.” Olivia gave a mischievous smile. “But I had to tell a little white lie to get him to do it.”

“Little white lie?” Clara repeated.

“Yes.” Olivia nodded. “I told him I was pretty sure Anita came from over that way, because she and her sister used to go swimming in Chesapeake Bay.”

Clara doubled over laughing. “And you think he believed you?”

“Why wouldn’t he?”

“Nobody swims in that part of Chesapeake Bay. It’s good for fishing but too rocky and deep for swimming.”

“Oh.” Olivia’s face fell, and her shoulders dropped into a downward slump.

When there was nothing more to be said, Fred and George left. Clara stayed and shared the remainder of the okra coffee. Once Olivia had drained the last of it, her heart felt emptier than the pot. Thinking that another homeless child had been dropped on her doorstep, she gave a long soulful sigh and said, “Where’s hope when I need it?”