Mystery #28: Abby and the Mystery Baby
Abby arrives home from school one day to find a damn baby on her front porch! He’s cute, quiet, and he’s been carefully tucked into his car seat with a blanket and a bag full of supplies, but she has no idea where he’s come from or who’s left him. She calls Kristy, who brings Nannie over, and they call their old pal Sergeant Johnson at the Stoneybrook Police, who comes and asks a bunch of questions. When Abby’s mom gets home, it seems like she might recognize the blanket the baby’s wrapped in, but we don’t get any more info about that right away. The authorities allow the Stevensons to keep and take cary of the baby until its parent(s) are found, and Abby is determined to solve the mystery of who left their sweet boy (whom she calls Eli) behind.
The BSC is — obviously — on the case. And they have a few persons of interest:
A woman in Mallory and Jessi’s library writing group who wrote a story about giving up a baby. They even follow her around town.
Erin, little Eli’s shady-ish nanny who showed up at like 9pm to get the job. (???)
I have to say that Mrs. Stevenson herself is acting pretty sus, seemingly knowing a little too much about Eli, having secret conversations, lying about leaving work early, etc. It’s almost like… she knows who Eli really is and who left him there and is just taking care of him while things are getting worked out. Hmmm. Abby, meanwhile, is trying to track down leads by calling pharmacy phone numbers from soggy receipts she finds in the driveway. It’s tough work, but what else is a thirteen-year-old SuperSleuth to do?
Abby must also think Mrs. Stevenson is acting sus, because she sneaks into her mother’s study and finds a yellow post-it note with the name Miriam on it. Miriam happens to be Mrs. Stevenson’s estranged younger sister, to and of whom nobody in the family has spoken in years. Abby doesn’t know why and doesn’t even know what her aunt looks like. (Weird that Miriam is Mrs. Stevenson’s younger sister, because her name implies that she is at least ninety years old.) Abby and Anna look back through old family photo albums and find a childhood photo of Mrs. Stevenson and Miriam, in which Miriam is holding the same blanket that Eli came wrapped in. TA-DA! Mystery mostly solved. The lingering question is… why did Miriam just drop off a damn baby on their doorstep?
Abby finds out that Miriam is in the hospital in New York (by using the redial button on her mother’s landline, how 90s!) so she hops on a train to Grand Central. (What?!) She finds her mother and Miriam there and her mother explains that, yes, Eli (real name: Daniel) is Miriam’s son, who Miriam had two months after Daniel’s father broke up with her. Miriam is diabetic but hasn’t been taking care of herself and ended up in the hospital; on the way, she dropped the baby off with her sister, who she knew would take care of him despite their differences. Mrs. Stevenson had known all along it was Miriam’s baby because of the blanket and a somewhat incoherent note that had been tucked in the car seat, which Abby somehow hadn’t seen. All’s well that ends well, right? Miriam is released from the hospital and reunited with Eli/Daniel (and her parents, Abby’s grandparents — she’s going to take Eli/Daniel to Florida to live with them for a while) and now Abby has a cute cousin she can take to Disney World the next time the BSC wins the lottery or a radio contest or something else that seems super likely to happen to them!
