Walt Murphy – Part Two – 8

A few hours later Ricky was asking me, as we fixed dinner, "How's the hunt for that woman's son going."

"I'm discovering looking for a kid, when I don't even know what his name is now, is a lot harder than searching for a missing adult."

"Maybe whoever adopted him kept his birth name?"

"Even if they did, his last name would be different and there's a hell of a lot of Benjamins in this country." I checked the chicken then told him, "I did find out about his father."

"So was I right? Is he a Mafia don?" Ricky asked with a grin as he finished making the salad.

"Not even close. He comes from a nice upper-middle class family. His father was chemical engineer; his mother's a housewife…"

"Women still do that?" Ricky broke in, looking surprised.

"Yeah, believe it or not, some do. It probably helps that Mr Donati senior worked for a major oil company before he retired. Anyway, Carlo majored in business. Three years ago he opened a consulting firm for start-up businesses."

"Really?"

"No I'm lying. Yes, really." I wasn't surprised that piqued Ricky's interest. He'd often thought about opening his own accounting firm, rather than working for someone else.

"Around here?"

"Relatively. About two hundred miles south of us, in Louisville."

We had dinner on the table by then and sat down to eat.

"Are you going to get in contact with him?" Ricky wanted to know.

"Yeah, first thing in the morning. I want to find out if he and Ms Engel are in touch one way or another."

"Just ask her," Ricky said.

"I already did and she says she wants nothing to do with him."

"You don't believe her."   

"Let's just say, what we talked about last night still holds true. It's a bit late for her to be going all motherly by trying to find out if Benjamin ended up in a good family. At least in my opinion. There has to be something more behind it, so I'll see what Mr Donati has to say."