Page 98 of The High Tide Club
41
They found Marie and Lizzie in the kitchen, having lunch. Louette looked up from the sandwich she was eating.
“Did C. D. tell y’all that crazy story of his? ’Bout how he’s Josephine’s son?”
“What’s that?” Marie asked, startled. “You mean C. D., the man who pilots the boat? He’s Josephine’s son?”
“That’s whathethinks.” Louette’s voice dripped scorn. She stood up and motioned for Brooke to take her chair. “Sit here. You want some lunch? I got chicken salad and crab salad.”
Gabe dragged a chair up to the table. “I’d love a crab salad sandwich.”
“I’m not really hungry,” Brooke said. “But if it’s all right, I’d like to call the ferry to book a ride back to the mainland.”
“Oh, I already took care of that,” Louette said. “You’re on the two o’clock, if that’s all right.”
Brooke gestured to Lizzie. “Will that give us enough time to get you to the airport for your flight back to California?”
Lizzie reached for a potato chip from the bowl in the center of the table. “I’m not going home. Not just yet. I canceled my flight.”
“But… I thought you were in such a rush to get back. For your deadline and everything,” Brooke said.
“I was, until last night, when Josephine started spinning that amazing story of hers, and then, after what happened this morning, it dawned on me, there’s a story right here. Like, a once-in-a-lifetime story. And I’m a part of it. So instead of packing this morning, I pounded out a query letter and emailed it to a couple of magazine editors I know in New York, and I heard back from one right away, and she loves the idea. So I’m staying.”
“Here?” Gabe asked. “At Shellhaven?”
“Why not? Louette doesn’t have a problem with that, do you, Louette?”
“Be nice to have company, especially with Josephine gone,” Louette said.
“Do you have a problem with me staying here?” Lizzie asked Gabe pointedly.
“No. I mean, as I said, I’ll petition the court to be named administrator of the estate, but in the meantime, I guess there’s no reason you couldn’t stay on.”
“Then it’s settled,” Lizzie said. “Now what’s all this about C. D.? He really claims he’s Josephine’s long-lost son?”
While Gabe polished off two crab salad sandwiches, a homemade pickle, and a couple of tea cakes, Brooke recited what the lawyers had just heard from C. D.
“This story just keeps getting better and better,” Lizzie said, rubbing her hands together gleefully. “Josephine, an unwed mother! Now it’s not just a magazine article or a book. We’re talking potential movie deal.”
“I wouldn’t go that far,” Gabe said, brushing cookie crumbs from the front of his golf shirt. “I hated to burst the guy’s bubble, but an old newspaper clipping of her holding a little orphaned tyke at Christmas probably isn’t going to hold water in court.”
“That man is crazy,” Louette said, shaking her head. “I never heard a story so crazy. Even if it were true, don’t you think Josephine would have recognized her own flesh and blood?”
“It does strain the imagination,” Marie said. “Abandoning a baby in a church? And then going to the orphanage every year at Christmas to visit him? How could anybody be that cruel? Even Josephine?”
***
Varina pushed her walker slowly into the kitchen, with Felicia following behind. “Is Josephine… gone? Did the funeral home man come?”
“Yes, but actually, the coroner is a woman. Her family owns the funeral home too. They took her body back over to the mainland, just until the funeral arrangements can be made,” Gabe said, scrambling to his feet to offer his chair to the old woman.
“But they’ll bring her back, won’t they?” Varina asked anxiously.
“Yes, I understand those were her wishes,” Gabe said.
“Auntie Vee, you need to eat some lunch before we get on the ferry so your blood sugar doesn’t get too low,” Felicia said.
“I got her a nice sandwich right here,” Louette said, sliding a plate of food in front of Varina.
