She called information, asked for the Missing Persons department, and the call connected. “Hello, I’m calling about the abduction of Trish Gambone. I may have information as to their whereabouts. With whom should I speak?”
“Hold, please,” a man answered, and the call went click, then came back on. “Sorry, is this a tip about the Amber Alert? We’re fielding calls in that case.”
“No, this is a woman, an adult. She was on the TV news last night.”
“Oh, is this the case that they had in Homicide?”
“Yes.”
“We have it logged in here. Who did you say you are?”
Mary told him, spelling her name and giving her cell number, against the background noise of ringing phones.
“Give me your information. I have to get these other calls. The Amber Alerts are just a monster.”
Mary sighed. The car moved an inch. She told him everything she knew and hung up, feeling assured of nothing. The BlackBerry rang again before she could even set it down, and she checked the display before she answered. It was Amrita, returning her call.
Yay! Mary could give her the good news about Dhiren’s upcoming appointment. She pressed the green button. “Amrita?” she said, excited until she found out what had happened to Dhiren.
Then, the good news didn’t matter anymore.
CHAPTER TWENTY
M ary fought traffic for two hours to reach Children’s Hospital of Philadelphia. She parked on the street and hurried down the hospital corridor, its tile floors gleaming. A male nurse walked past in blue scrubs, a plastic daisy attached to the stethoscope that lay doubled around his neck. At the end of the corridor, she could see two older women standing outside the door to the room, and when she got closer, she recognized Elvira Rotunno, Anthony’s mother, in her old-school housedress and black plastic slip-ons, with another older woman.
“How is he?” Mary asked, walking up, and they both turned.
“Good as he can be.” Elvira managed a shaky smile. “It’s nice you came, Mare. Rita’s calm now, but she was a mess.”
“I can imagine.” Mary turned and introduced herself to the other woman, whose hooded eyes and lined expression were disapproving behind her oversized plastic eyeglasses.
“Sue Ciorletti,” the woman said, barely getting the words out before her mouth snapped back to its previous tightness, like a rubber band returning to shape. She seemed too cranky to wear a pink sweatsuit that read COOL GRANDMA.
Elvira continued, “Sue and me were talkin’ to Rita when the school called, and Sue gave her a ride here ’cause we didn’t want her drivin’ so upset. Amrita’s in there with the doctors now.” Elvira gestured at the closed door behind them, with a gnarled hand. “She’s been in there for a long time. Fifteen minutes, maybe twenty, right, Sue?”
Mrs. Ciorletti didn’t answer, maintaining her silence, and Mary assumed it was another neighbor who hated her.
“You okay, Mrs. Ciorletti?”
Elvira answered, “Sue don’t like hospitals because you could get an infection. Even if you’re just vistin’. She heard a report on the TV news.”
“I see,” Mary said. “Mrs. Ciorletti, you don’t have to stay if you don’t want to. I have a car and I’ll take Elvira home.”
“I’ll stay,” Mrs. Ciorletti answered. The door opened as if on cue, and the women watched as two young male doctors came out, led by an attractive woman doctor with an authoritative air, Dr. Sharon Satterfield, according to the red script embroidered on her white jacket. Three young male interns followed her, with weary faces and professional smiles.
Amrita came out behind them, her eyebrows a crestfallen slope, her large eyes somber, and her mouth a line. She shook the woman doctor’s hand. “Thanks, Dr. Satterfield. I appreciate all you’re doing for Dhiren.”
“We’ll get back to you when we have the results.” The doctor left, trailing interns.
Amrita sighed, then collected herself. “Mary, how kind of you to come.”
Mary gave her a big hug. “Sorry it took so long. How is he?”
“He’s fine, and they think he’ll be fully recovered in a month.”
“A month?” Mary groaned, but Amrita shook her head.
“No, that’s good. When they first called me, I was terrified.” She didn’t elaborate, and her dark eyes betrayed little emotion. But Elvira misted up with enough emotion for both of them, in addition to much of the eastern seaboard.
“We all thought Dhiren was gonna die,” Elvira blurted out, and Mary slid an arm around her.
“It’s okay now.”
Mrs. Ciorletti’s lips stretched tight, under control. “Be strong, El. We’re here for Rita, remember?”
“Yeah, I know, I’m sorry.” Elvira bit her lip not to cry.
Mary asked, “Amrita, can I see him?”
“Sure, come in. He’s asleep, still under sedation.” Amrita went back inside the hospital room, then stood aside to let Mary enter. She tried not to gasp at the sight.
The little boy looked so small, and his skin was dark against the sheets and thin white blankets. His head was bandaged, his black hair rumpled, and his left cheek was purplish and swollen. His left arm was propped up and away from his body in a cast, and the large lump under the sheets suggested that there was a cast on the leg as well.
“Thank God, he’s alive.” Amrita went over to Dhiren’s bed and touched the playground-dirty fingers that curved out of the sleeve of his cast. She stroked his hand, though he didn’t move. He was completely asleep, his head to the side. His bed sat on the left side of the room, on the same side as a sink, a small white counter, and a cork bulletin board with a crayoned drawing left behind. The other bed was empty, and the divider curtain, covered with happy giraffes and laughing cartoon tigers, drawn halfway back. A TV was mounted high in the corner, its screen black, and a largish monitor protruded from metal brackets on the wall, above an array of high-tech gauges and greenish tubes that led to Dhiren.
“So he’s gonna be okay,” Mary said, confirming it for herself. “When will he wake up?”
“The doctor said it would take a couple of hours for him to come around completely.” Amrita checked an institutional clock on the wall. “Barton should be here any minute.”
“Amrita, how did it happen, exactly?”
“At recess, they told me. You know how the morning went. I sent him anyway. The boys were restless in class. But I left, right before recess.” Amrita shook her head. “Right before it happened. I feel so terrible.”
“It’s not your fault.”
“No?” Amrita looked up sharply, her lips tight. “If I had been there, it wouldn’t have happened.”
“You can’t be there all the time. No parent can. And two can play that game. If I had gotten him some help sooner, I could have prevented this.”
“Not at all. You did what you could. The school did not. The school let him down.”
Mary didn’t agree. It was her job to make the school do right by Dhiren, and she hadn’t fought hard enough. She had only lucked out in getting him the appointment, and even that was too little, too late. But right now, it was about Dhiren. “You were telling me how it happened.”
“His teacher told me it started in the schoolyard. They were mocking him, and he ran away, so they gave chase. Usually he goes to the teacher, that’s what I tell him to do, but this time he ran into the street.” Amrita paused, but remained in control. “He wasn’t looking, and then the car came around the corner and hit him.”
Mary shuddered. “How awful.”
“The impact was on his left side.” Amrita gestured at her own body. “Luckily, his head wasn’t injured too badly, just some cuts and a concussion. That was their main concern, as it was mine. His leg and arm are broken, and a few ribs. But those bones can mend.”