The Question of the Absentee Father Read online

  “It’s smudged,” she said. “The city is pretty much unreadable to the naked eye, but I think the state is either California or Georgia. Maybe Colorado. Does the magnifier help at all?”

  “Let’s see,” I answered. Ms. Washburn handed me the envelope and I placed it under the large lens for better visibility.

  After a few moments Ms. Washburn cleared her throat. That is a sign that the person making the sound would like someone’s attention, although to me it always sounds like he or she wants a drink. I looked up at her.

  “Can you move over just a little so I can see too?” she asked.

  The thought had not occurred to me. Moving to one side might slightly diminish my view of the envelope. I decided if it was important to Ms. Washburn I would allow her an angle and take a better look at the envelope myself after she had returned to her desk. This is one way in which I have learned to consider another person’s feelings, something I have spent many hours discussing with Dr. Mancuso.

  With enlargement due to the lens, it was clear the city name included two words, but they were not intelligible. The state was more clear with this magnification.

  “California,” Ms. Washburn said.

  “Yes,” I said. It wasn’t necessary to affirm Ms. Washburn’s statement, I knew, but I have been told that people find it odd when one doesn’t respond to something they say. If there is nothing to add there doesn’t seem to be a point to an answer, but it is easier in some cases to simply comply with convention.

  California is the most populous state in America. It takes up a large percentage of the country’s West Coast, from the border with Mexico to the Pacific Northwest states of Oregon and Washington. Its coastline, I had once noted, reaches for 840 miles. Its population is slightly under 39 million. Finding one man in the state would actually be more difficult than locating the proverbial needle in a haystack. Assuming it was one needle of hay and not a steel one used for sewing, which would shine in sunlight and be simpler to find.

  Finding Reuben Hoenig without more detailed information would be a considerably difficult task.

  “Can you read the zip code?” Ms. Washburn asked.

  “This magnifier is meant for stamp collectors looking for imperfections in very small printings, but all it does to a smudged ink mark is to make it larger,” I said. I sat back. There is a certain eyestrain that results from using a magnifying glass under bright light and it does not take a long time to set in. “Unfortunately the only easily legible digits are nine and zero, which are extremely common in California.”

  Ms. Washburn moved to my left and leaned over a little more severely. “Mind if I take a look?” she asked.

  I saw no reason her eyes would be more adept at deciphering obscured ink than mine, but there was no harm in letting her try. Ms. Washburn has proven very talented in a number of areas and there was no reason to dissuade her. “Feel free,” I said.

  She stood and looked at me for a long moment. “You need to let me in, Samuel.”

  It took a moment to realize what she meant. My first thought—which was interesting upon reflection later—was that Ms. Washburn wanted to kiss me again. I did not have time to make a decision about that before I realized she was asking for access to the magnifying glass on my desk. I nodded and stood, giving her a clear path to my chair. She did not sit, but leaned over the desk and looked directly into the lens.

  Ms. Washburn did not say anything for seven seconds as she stared intently into the glass. Then without taking her gaze away she reached for a small pad of paper I keep on the right side of my desktop. She reached behind her right ear for a pen she had stored there, something I have not told her I find slightly nauseating. I am trying to accommodate Ms. Washburn. I am her employer but I want her to think of Question Answered as her home base as well.

  She wrote without looking at the pad. I watched her hand, which wrote, “9-0” and then hesitated. I moved my gaze to her face. She was intent on the lens, squinting in an attempt to see the other digits more clearly. Again without looking down she wrote, “6” and hesitated. After a moment, the pen wrote “86” on the pad and she looked at me.

  “I’m pretty sure,” she said.

  “You rarely fail to reaffirm my wisdom in hiring you, Ms. Washburn,” I said.

  She smiled with an edge of something else I did not recognize. “It’s nice how you can turn a compliment for me into something that shows off your own intelligence, Samuel.” She laughed lightly and added, “Thank you.”

  “I did not mean to—” I began.

  Ms. Washburn waved a hand. “Don’t worry about it. So where is your father?” She pointed at the note on the pad.

  “I’m afraid we still don’t know for certain,” I answered. I sat back down in my chair and looked up at Ms. Washburn, who was not yet heading back to her desk as I had expected. “The zip code you wrote down is not in California. In fact it is located in Mexico.”

  She folded her arms. “Mexico? Do they have zip codes there?”

  “Yes. It is essentially the same system as that in the United States. This one is in an area called San Isidro.”

  Ms. Washburn shook her head, but not in a negative fashion. “The day we met you told me you had memorized every phone exchange in North America and some in Western Europe. Do you memorize zip codes, too? We need to get you a hobby, Samuel.”

  “How would a hobby differ from what I do?” I asked.

  She smiled crookedly. “We’re veering off topic again. So you know zip codes and this one is in Mexico. How about …” She looked again at the note she’d written. “How about nine-one-six-oh-six? I couldn’t decide whether that was a zero or an eight.”

  “That would be in North Hollywood, California,” I told her. “And that is far more likely the area in which to look for my father.”

  “The area? Not the town itself ?” Now Ms. Washburn did move back toward her desk and sat down. She started typing on her computer keyboard.

  “Just because the mail went through the North Hollywood post office does not mean we can be certain the person who mailed it lives there,” I pointed out. “If it was my father who mailed it, he might have been on his way to or from his home when he mailed the letter. It is also possible he asked someone else to mail the envelope for him. We don’t know enough about the process to be definitive. We must avoid reaching a premature conclusion.”

  “Yes, but it gives us a direction, an area,” Ms. Washburn argued. “It’s not very likely that your father drove from Denver to mail a letter and then turned around and drove back.”

  “Perhaps not, but it is possible. He also could be in the Los Angeles area on a business trip.”

  “So what’s our next step?”

  I put the magnifying lens back in the desk drawer and returned the letter to the envelope in the hope that I had not damaged it in any way, certainly not noticeably. Then I slipped the envelope into my jacket pocket to return to our house and Mother’s nightstand before she could notice it missing. These manual tasks, although not emergent, were helping me to think more clearly.

  “No doubt we should begin with calling the six possible Reuben Hoenigs we have managed to identify,” I said. “If, as I expect, none of them is revealed to be my father, we need to gather more information about him to determine why he might be living under another name and where that possibility might lead us in establishing his location.”

  We spent the next twenty-seven minutes (not including my next exercise session) in that pursuit. While I was able to reach both numbers assigned to me in Europe, neither person answered the phone—it was evening where the men were located while morning in New Jersey—the messages I left after voice mail prompts in languages I did not understand were short and probably incomprehensible to the targeted recipients.

  The third man on my list, the Reuben Hoenig in Billings, Montana, did answer the phone. That ti
me zone was two hours behind mine so it was earlier in the morning but I had not expected the man to sound like I had awoken him with the call. “Yeah?” he said by way of a greeting.

  “Is this Mr. Reuben Hoenig?” I asked after a moment of contemplation. In my experience, “yeah” was a form of “yes,” which would indicate that I had asked a question whose answer could be found in the affirmative. I had said nothing at all to this man yet. I had heard the word used as a form of, “Why are you speaking to me?” and assumed this was one of those instances.

  “Who wants to know?” the voice asked. Again, it took me a moment to decipher the inquiry. Would he slip into a different identity depending on the person asking? Wasn’t he the same person all the time? It was confusing. I decided, looking at Ms. Washburn, who was on the phone to another Reuben Hoenig, that I should simply press on. It seemed he was asking for my name, so it made sense to tell him who was calling.

  “Allow me to introduce myself,” I said. “I am Samuel Hoenig, the proprietor of Questions Answered in Piscataway, New Jersey.”

  “I don’t want to buy anything,” the man said.

  “I am not selling anything,” I countered.

  “They all say that.”

  “Who?”

  “People who are selling something.”

  That seemed contradictory. “I am not selling anything, I can assure you,” I told the still-unidentified man. “I do not wish for you to give me any money. I am simply looking for Reuben Hoenig.”

  I heard a rustling sound through the telephone. Perhaps the man was getting out of bed. “Who did you say you are?”

  “I am Samuel Hoenig, proprietor of—”

  The man spoke before I could finish the reiteration he had requested. “Is this because we have the same last name?” he asked. “Are we related or something?”

  “I am not sure,” I told him. “That is one of the reasons I am calling. Are you Reuben Hoenig?”

  “I suppose so.”

  That answer wasn’t at all helpful. Did the man in Montana not know who he was? Amnesia is an extremely rare disorder, usually brought on by a severe blow to the head or some other trauma and is most often temporary. “You’re not certain?” I asked.

  “Of course I’m certain.” Now the man sounded slightly irritated, which did not seem logical. He had said he supposed he was Reuben Hoenig but apparently I was meant to understand he was stating his name with certainty. I have never been to Montana, but I did not think the English language was spoken differently there.

  “So you are Reuben Hoenig.” Perhaps if I stated, rather than asked, the answer would be clearer.

  “Yes, for god’s sake. What do you want?”

  That was clearer, but I seemed to be annoying this Reuben Hoenig more now. “I am trying to locate a man named Reuben Hoenig who lived in Piscataway, New Jersey, until twenty-seven years ago. Are you that man?”

  “No.”

  Certainly that was definitive. “My apologies for disturbing you then, sir,” I said. “Do you know anyone else with that name? I am endeavoring to locate my father.” I have been told by Mother and Dr. Mancuso that people tend to respond more favorably when one personalizes the problem at hand. It is meant to arouse a sympathetic impulse.

  “I’ve never been to New Jersey,” the man said. He disconnected the call without saying goodbye, which I found mildly surprising. I put the telephone receiver back in its cradle and looked at Ms. Washburn, who was still speaking into her phone but noticed my glance and shook her head negatively. She had not found my father, either.

  It was the result I had expected but it was still something of a disappointment. Our efforts would have to move in another direction now.

  For reasons I could not have explained I retrieved the envelope from my jacket pocket and spread the letter out on the desk again. I decided that reading it for content rather than subliminal information might be helpful. Ms. Washburn would say I had no better ideas, and she would be right.

  The element that seemed most imperative was my father’s suggestion that this might be the last communication Mother would ever receive from him. That was expressed more than once but never explained. There were a number of possible motivations behind such a tactic, but I thought perhaps a consultation with Dr. Mancuso would best help me identify those I might not consider on my own.

  Ms. Washburn hung up the phone and her shoulders slumped a bit. “Nobody on the list is panning out,” she said. “I guessed that you didn’t find your father from those, either, did you?”

  I shook my head. “I did not expect to, so it is not a serious disappointment. Ms. Washburn, can you imagine why my father, in writing this letter, would twice announce that this might be the last time my mother will ever hear from him?”

  Her eyes narrowed, which with Ms. Washburn indicates she has questions about my meaning. “I imagine he thinks he won’t be able to write again,” she said. Her tone indicated there was more to my question that she did not yet comprehend.

  “I understand the meaning of the words,” I explained, “but it’s the motivation behind writing them that puzzles me. Why does a man write to his estranged wife, whom he apparently has never divorced, after an interval of years to tell her she won’t hear from him again? Particularly since he never actually explains why future communication will not be possible. That seems a strange message to send. It did seem to have a profound effect on my mother. I am trying to grasp what drives a person to send that message without further details.”

  “So you want to know about your father’s possible motive,” Ms. Washburn said. I believed I had said that already, but was aware this was Ms. Washburn’s way to clarify the issue.

  “That’s right. If it is going to be the last time he writes to Mother, doesn’t it make sense to say why that is happening? And if he is desperate to communicate with her one last time, why wait in this day of instantaneous communication to send a letter via postal service. From California, that delivery probably took about a week, although the date on the postmark is illegible. Why make that the point of the letter?”

  Ms. Washburn frowned. “I didn’t actually read the letter and I don’t want to; that’s private between your parents. But was that really the main message he was sending? You said he talked a lot about the job your mother did raising you and how sorry he was that he hadn’t been there for that.”

  “Yes, but he could have written to her with that sentiment anytime in the past decade and had roughly the same effect. Besides, he doesn’t know what kind of man I have become; his only source of information is my mother, and as you well know she is hardly objective on the subject.”

  “I think anyone observing would say your mother should be proud of the way you turned out, Samuel,” Ms. Washburn said. I thought that might be intended as a compliment, but it was aimed at Mother, not at me, so I did not accept it for my own.

  “Perhaps,” I answered. “But it does not answer the question at hand. Why would he write and say such a thing, then announce this might be the last communication for their lifetimes?”

  Ms. Washburn stood up and consulted the digital clock I have hung on the post between our desks. “Well, it’s just about time to see the only person we know who has actually met your father, Samuel. Let’s go talk to you mother.”

  Of course. It was lunchtime.

  four

  Ms. Washburn has a standing invitation to accompany me to lunch at my mother’s house. Since on most days she is the one to drive me home in the afternoon, she is often present anyway, and besides she and Mother have formed a bond I don’t entirely understand but which appears to be quite amiable.

  Today, however, I think Ms. Washburn saw the afternoon meal as an opportunity to ask the questions of Mother that I—either because it would not occur to me or because it is difficult with one’s parent—would not easily ask.

  If that sen
timent had been voiced I would have disagreed, although it was possible there were some areas I would not have considered independently. Sometimes I do not consider emotional aspects of an issue that another person would believe to be obvious.

  We had told Mother of our slow progress in locating my father, and I had returned the letter to her, confessing my borrowing it without asking first. Mother had said simply that she assumed I would need the letter to aid in answering the question and had not concerned herself with it being missing.

  Now Ms. Washburn, eating a tuna sandwich at our kitchen table, wiped her mouth with a napkin and looked at Mother. “I think I need a better sense of your husband, Vivian. Samuel and I have been trying to figure out what his state of mind might be. I don’t know if that will help narrow down his location, but it might give us some sign of what we can do that will.”

  “Samuel should know about his father anyway,” my mother said without looking in my direction. It is not often she speaks about me without acknowledging my presence in the room. I wondered if she was actually somewhat irritated with me for entering her bedroom to borrow the letter from my father.

  Ms. Washburn nodded. “There shouldn’t be that kind of gap in his background; you’re right. What can you tell us?”

  Mother sat back; she had taken only two bites from her own tuna sandwich. Ms. Washburn would tell me later she thought Mother might be worried about my father and therefore eating less heartily than usual. “I met Reuben at a dance my friend Joanne talked me into going to at a synagogue. I don’t know what it was about him, but he just had this swagger about him that I thought was interesting. But he was very quiet and shy when we started to talk. He loved old movies and so did I, so we bonded on that.”

  This thread of conversation did not seem to be leading to any information that would give me some idea of how to find my father in or near North Hollywood, California. But through many previous questions I had discovered that the key information sometimes reveals itself in unexpected areas, so I ate some of the turkey sandwich Mother had made for me and listened to Ms. Washburn carefully direct my mother through her recollection.