The Question of the Unfamiliar Husband Read online

  I had never seen a film about the fictional Zorro, but I had seen photographs of actors in the role, so I was familiar with the look the character would have had. A wide-brimmed hat and a mask over the eyes would have obscured much of the man’s face. “Was it the man to whom you are now married?” I asked.

  Her arms flapped a little at the sides, just once. Some people with autism spectrum disorders will flap their arms in excitement or frustration, but this gesture was less severe—more like a shrug to indicate she could not answer definitively. “He says so,” she reported. “I remember having two glasses of red wine with him on the deck behind the house, and then I don’t remember anything until three days later. He says we were married the second night because we were so taken with each other that we couldn’t wait any longer. I don’t have any memory of that at all, but there is a marriage certificate and pictures his best friend Roger took at the wedding. I’m smiling. I don’t know why.”

  “Where was the wedding performed?” I asked. “You wouldn’t have been able to get a marriage license that quickly in New Jersey.”

  “Apparently we went to Darien, Connecticut,” she said. “They don’t have a waiting period up there as long as you have identification on you.”

  “I would have suspected Delaware, but if the person getting married is not from the state, there is a four-day waiting period there,” I noted. I hadn’t actually made a specific study of the delay times for marriage licenses, but I had once been asked a question about Delaware’s specifically, when a man had wanted to know if his parents’ marriage license was indeed legitimate. It was.

  “I don’t know,” Ms. McInerney said. “I don’t remember being in Darien, Connecticut. I don’t even remember leaving the party. I think I was drugged, Mr. Hoenig.”

  “I am not aware of a narcotic that would erase three days of your memory, Ms. McInerney, but I will have to do some research. What do you remember after attending the party as Harpo Marx?”

  Her face clouded over, as if she were being forced to recall a traumatic experience. I have seen people look that way after the death of a pet or the loss of a favorite sports team’s most important game.

  “I remember waking up in my apartment, like always,” Ms. McInerney said. “And when I saw Ollie—that’s his name, Ollie Lewis—in bed next to me, I almost had a heart attack.” She was clearly exaggerating at this point, since heart disease is brought on through arterial blockages or other organic internal causes, and not by a surprise. I ignored the point. “I thought I’d done the most impulsive, ill-advised thing ever, and I was right, but I had no idea how right until he woke up and started calling me his wife.”

  “You had never met Mr. Lewis before?” I asked.

  She shook her head. “Never. I’d never even heard his name mentioned.”

  I had not been taking notes, but they would not be necessary; I knew I would remember the conversation accurately. “What was his connection to your friend Ms. LeBlanc?” I said. “Why was Oliver Lewis at her party?”

  Her voice sounded wistful and betrayed regret. “He was a friend of a friend,” she answered. “I heard he came with Terry Lambroux.”

  “Terry” is a name that can be assigned to either gender. “Is Terry a man or a woman?” I asked.

  “That’s a good question,” Ms. McInerney said. “I wish I could tell you, but I’ve only heard the name. I’ve never met the person. The only other person I met at the party was Ollie’s friend Roger Siplowitz.”

  “The party and the wedding, if one actually took place, happened weeks ago,” I said, moving the conversation ahead. “What steps have you taken? Have you notified the police?”

  “And tell them what? That a man married me against my will? It doesn’t make sense, Mr. Hoenig. I’m not a wealthy woman; I work for a living. Ollie can’t be trying to claim he’s my husband to have access to my vast fortune. I don’t have one, and neither does anyone in my family.”

  “Perhaps he just wanted to have sex with you,” I suggested. Sex is often a motivating factor in the actions of people, particularly men.

  “So he married me? If Ollie slipped a date rape drug into my drink, he could have done what he wanted and then left. I hear it happens all the time.” She stood up and turned away from me. The effect was similar to that in an old noir film, except Ms. McInerney wasn’t wearing a trench coat and had no cigarette in her hand.

  However, she was correct in pointing out the illogic of my suggestion. “Have you seen the marriage license Mr. Lewis says you have?” I asked. “Do you have a copy with you?”

  The question seemed to surprise Ms. McInerney; she blinked twice and then bit her lower lip again. “No, I don’t,” she said. “But I have seen it. It looks official.”

  I ran my tongue over my upper teeth, which is something I seem to do involuntarily when thinking. Since it took me over a year in therapy to break myself of a larger gesture (wiggling my fingers), this did not seem to merit much attention. “It is not difficult to produce an authentic-looking document,” I said. “I will have to do some searches in the files of the Fairfield County clerk’s office.” I was speaking more to myself than to Ms. McInerney, whose expression was difficult to read—Irritation? Puzzlement? I couldn’t tell.

  “Then you’ll take the case?” she asked.

  “I do not take cases,” I explained again. “I answer questions.”

  “Will you answer my question, Mr. Hoenig?”

  “First, what is your favorite song by the Beatles?”

  Ms. McInerney’s eyes narrowed, as if trying to see me more clearly. I have observed this reaction to that question—one I ask to help determine a person’s state of mind—before. But she did not ask why I might be interested. Her lips bulged a moment, very slightly.

  “‘Yesterday,’” she said.

  Conventional. Possibly regretful.

  “That is all I needed to know,” I said.

  “So you will answer my question.”

  “Yes, and the one about your purported husband, as well.”

  She thanked me. We agreed upon a fee, and she paid half of it, as I require whenever a new client employs me. She filled out my client intake form, which took nine minutes, and then left, saying she was pleased I was going to help her. I wanted to tell her that I had not agreed to help—if she was indeed married to a man she barely knew, I couldn’t extricate her from the situation as a divorce attorney could—but decided reiterating that I would answer the question was enough.

  But once Ms. McInerney had left, I noticed a feeling of anxiety in my stomach. Usually the questions I am asked can be answered with some simple research. In fact, I often turn down easy questions, or answer the client on the spot and charge a small fraction of my usual fee. People could easily discover the information they believe to be elusive. Usually, coming to Questions Answered is more a symptom of laziness than difficulty.

  With this sort of situation, however, I was entering into a situation that did not play to my strengths. Facts are often easy to obtain, particularly when they pertain to history or science. Determining whether the Battle of Gettysburg was influenced by one general’s facial hair (as I had once been asked to do) was a simple matter of research and meteorology. A supposedly legendary trade of the Boston Red Sox slugger Ted Williams for the New York Yankees star Joe DiMaggio, which purportedly had been agreed upon and then abandoned, took less than three hours to confirm.

  But Ms. McInerney’s question ventured into considerably more unfamiliar territory. It would be easy enough to find out whether or not a legal marriage had been filed and recorded in Darien, Connecticut, on the date she has mentioned. But her question was more complex than simply knowing if she were indeed now a wife.

  Ms. McInerney’s question was more complex than that: “Who is the man in my bed who calls himself my husband?” In order to answer that, I would have to venture into the int
eractions between men and women, matters of emotion and expression that are not at all my area of expertise. It was possible I had agreed to answer a question that I was especially unqualified to address.

  I started to do some power walking, raising my arms for extra aerobic effect, around the perimeter of the office. Since I had been advised by my doctor not to stay in an office chair for more than twenty minutes at a time, I had been very careful about raising my heart rate three times an hour. I would like to say the practice helps me to think more deeply, but the sad truth is I think at exactly the same level, but with heavier breathing and a higher perspiration rate.

  Mother appeared at the door when I was on my eleventh lap around the office. She was accustomed to my exercise regimen but looked at her watch, no doubt wondering why I was doing so seven minutes later than usual.

  My breath was slightly forced, but not enough that I could not tell her, “I was meeting with a new client.” Mother knows I will adjust my routine when an unfamiliar person (particularly one who might become a paying customer) is in the room. For some reason, seeing me walk rapidly around the room while raising and lowering my arms makes some people uncomfortable, although it is a reasonable thing to do in terms of health. Mother nodded her understanding.

  Once I had completed my rounds, I walked to the vending machine and bought a bottle of spring water. A man named Les comes once a week to restock the machine, and he gives me what he calls my “cut” of the money I have used to pay for the drinks I have bought that week. It doesn’t seem a rational system, but it seems to satisfy Les and I pay only half for water all week.

  “What’s troubling you?” Mother is able to read expressions, particularly those on my face. It is a talent I am working very hard to cultivate, but it does not come naturally to me. Before I’d had a chance to say a word, she was already aware that I was perplexed, and possibly a little concerned. “Does it have something to do with the new client?”

  I nodded and explained my dilemma. “I find myself wondering if I will be able to answer this question,” I said after explaining the circumstances. “It might require an understanding of areas in which I am less than proficient.” At that moment, a thought struck me which must have affected my facial expression again, because Mother asked, “What?”

  It seemed the most logical thing in the world, so I was amazed I hadn’t thought of it before. “There is only one way to attack this question,” I told her. “I must get in touch immediately with Janet Washburn.”

  Mother smiled, but her tone did not communicate any joy that I could detect. “Oh boy,” she said.

  Three

  “We’ve been through this before, Samuel.”

  Janet Washburn sat in the living room of her modest suburban house in Cranford, New Jersey, and looked at me with an expression I read as stern. Mother, who had driven me to Ms. Washburn’s home only after some discussion, was drinking the lemonade Ms. Washburn had offered, and which I had declined. Lemonade is simply water with lemon and sugar in it, and not a very healthful drink.

  “That is precisely why I am asking you to come back to Questions Answered,” I responded. “You understand how I work, and you complement me very well.”

  Ms. Washburn had been my associate for only two questions, both of which revolved around the same matter. The arrangement had absorbed only parts of two consecutive days, but I had been impressed with her ability to keep me focused and to interpret for me aspects of the question that I would have had trouble noticing or understanding on my own. I had asked her to stay on with Questions Answered on a permanent basis, but Ms. Washburn’s husband had been in opposition to the idea, she had told me, suggesting the work would be too dangerous.

  “I’m not reminding you that we’ve been through the situation before,” Ms. Washburn said now. “I’m saying that we’ve had this conversation, where you ask me to come back and I say no, at least four times before today.”

  It was true. There had been, in fact, five times in the past three months when I had reiterated my offer of full-time employment to Ms. Washburn, whom I had considered invaluable in answering the question of the missing head. Each time I had done so, she had declined, although Mother often said she believed Ms. Washburn’s refusals to be reluctant, based on facial expressions and body language I had not noticed or interpreted accurately.

  “This time is different,” I argued. “I am asking for your help with only one question, one that I believe might be outside my own abilities. I need you because you understand both the interaction between people and my own thought process.”

  Ms. Washburn nodded but did not meet my gaze, which I was making a point to aim at her face. “I’m aware that your Asperger’s makes some things more difficult for you, Samuel, but you know perfectly well that with the proper amount of concentration and determination, you can handle yourself just fine without me.”

  Mother, who had taken up knitting a scarf in the armchair, did not look up. “I’ve been telling him the same thing, Janet dear,” she said. “You know how he is when he gets an idea in his head.”

  To be fair, Mother has a somewhat different view of the relationship between Ms. Washburn and myself than my own. She believes I harbor some romantic feelings for Ms. Washburn and is disturbed by the thought, since Ms. Washburn is indeed a married woman. I have denied having such feelings, often and emphatically, but Mother is not to be dissuaded when she thinks she has noticed something in me.

  “The idea in my head is that you can be of the utmost assistance on a question that might pose a special challenge to me on my own,” I told Ms. Washburn, not directly acknowledging Mother’s comment. “You can earn some money, which I imagine you would welcome, and I will maintain my reputation as well as an unblemished record of answering all questions posed. What is the disadvantage to doing that?”

  Ms. Washburn drew in breath slowly and let it out at the same pace. This appears to be a way for people to either gather their thoughts before responding, or to quell emotions they would prefer not to express, such as irritation. I asked Mother later which this was, and she indicated it was the former.

  “The disadvantage is that my husband is still opposed to my working with you,” Ms. Washburn said after the pause. “He still believes that your work is too dangerous, and after what happened—almost happened—last time, I can’t say I disagree. I’m sorry, Samuel, but the answer is still no.”

  Mother put her knitting in her bag, drained the rest of the lemonade with a satisfied gulp, and stood. “I’m sorry we bothered you, Janet,” she said. “Thank you so much for the lemonade.”

  It was odd for Mother to give up her seat and make such remarks when the conversation was clearly not yet concluded, but her thinking is not always immediately clear to me.

  “There is no danger in this question,” I told Ms. Washburn. “We are simply trying to determine the identity of the man claiming to be Ms. McInerney’s husband and his motivations for doing so.”

  Ms. Washburn looked at me, then at Mother, then back at me, but she was squinting, as if I were very far away and difficult to see. “You don’t recognize the potential for danger there?” she asked.

  I confessed that I did not.

  “Suppose this guy Lewis really is some sort of con artist and we ruin his plans by exposing him,” Ms. Washburn went on. “Suppose he gets mad at us for doing that. Do you think a man who imposes himself on a woman, gets her drunk and marries her or pretends to marry her, that kind of a man would simply stand up, pat his hands and say, ‘well done, you got me’? You think there is no element of danger at all? Come on, Samuel. You’re a very intelligent guy. Is that scenario, as you’d put it, at all likely?”

  If her concern really was that of physical danger, I could accommodate that provision. “I will see to it that Mr. Lewis never knows you are involved in answering the question,” I said. “When anyone asks, you will be known as Ms. Baroni, a
graduate student in neuropsychology who is”—and here I probably winced at the word—“studying me for her capstone project. Your real name will never be mentioned.”

  Mother, apparently taken by surprise, stopped and put her hand to her mouth. She seemed to consider the possibility.

  But Ms. Washburn was having no such thoughts. “No, Samuel,” she said. “I’m simply not going to tell Simon that I’m going against his wishes on this. I’m sure you can find someone else who can help you at least as well as I can.” She looked at Mother. “Vivian?”

  That seemed to startle my mother. “Oh no, Janet. I couldn’t. My knees wouldn’t allow it. And besides, it doesn’t look good for a man to have his mother following him around in his business.” She held her hands up as if trying to stop any words Ms. Washburn might say from getting too close. “I’m not a candidate for the job.”

  “Neither am I,” Ms. Washburn insisted. “I’m flattered, Samuel, honestly. But I’m not that special and I’m not the only person on the planet who can take notes and run interference for you. Why not place an ad on Craigslist or something?”

  “My needs are very specific,” I answered, having considered the question before. “It’s not the kind of thing a person finds on an Internet site. That seems to be the place to get rid of unwanted furniture and used pool tables.”

  This was proving to be a difficult problem to solve. I needed Ms. Washburn’s help, but I was unable to convince her that the situation made her participation necessary. I decided, without a great deal of consideration, to try another tactic.

  “Have you been working as a photographer?” I asked. Ms. Washburn had been a newspaper photographer whose job had been downsized not long before we met. I had originally agreed to answer her question—which was a fairly simple one, as it turned out—in exchange for some photographic work.