TEN

"FRED, WHAT the hell are you doing?" I asked when I caught up with him. He was unlocking the door to leave.

Fred turned around, but he didn’t look surprised that I’d followed him. "I knew it. Exactly five seconds," was his informative reply.

I folded my arms across my chest impatiently. "Fred, you know I know you’re up to something. Now, tell me what it is." He smiled innocently. "What what is?" The rest of his face belied his innocent grin. His eyes were darting back and forth, and they were dancing mischievously. I stepped closer to him and grasped his shoulder with my good hand. It didn’t have quite the effect that grabbing both his shoulders would have, but he was still taken aback. "Look, Fred, this is a very dangerous situation we’re in here. I need to know what’s going on so I can keep myself from getting killed," I told him, slowly and deliberately.

Fred gently removed my hand and held it, matching my no-bullshit expression. "Alida, don’t worry. I’m not going to do anything that would make it worse for you." He looked as if he truly meant it, which caught me off guard. I’d never experienced such protectiveness from anyone but Sallie. To my further dismay, my heart had started tap-dancing in my chest when he’d taken my hand. I tried to brush aside the sensation. This had never happened before, and there was no way in hell I’d let it happen now. What surprised me most was that I knew what I was feeling, and I hated myself for it. I wriggled my arm out of his grasp.

"Well, let me see what it is you’re doing," I protested. "I can take care of myself, you know, but if you want to help, I can’t be in the dark about it."

He was silent a moment, just gazing at me thoughtfully. At last he sighed. "Okay. It’s only fair. Come on." He put his arm around me and led me outside to the Mercedes. We set out down 72nd street quietly. The silence was not uncomfortable as the one earlier this morning had been; on the contrary, it felt safe and familiar. Thoughts of some of the boys back home began to go through my head. Had I ever felt for one of them what I was feeling now? I knew the answer almost before I’d asked myself the question. No, I’d never felt this way at all.

But then again, Fred was not a boy. And added to that, I’d never really had time to pursue any kind of relationship with someone. Hell, never had time? I’d never had a relationship with anyone but Sallie and Ellen up until now. Most certainly not with anyone of the opposite sex. Until recently, I’d always thought males to be stupid, shallow, arrogant, hypocritical, and complete assholes.

Not that John couldn’t be hypocritical and arrogant. Not to mention his spells of being an asshole. I was sure Fred harbored the same tendencies, though I’d never seen them. With good reason; I hadn’t talked much to him. At all. Yet somehow I felt I knew him - and John - as if they were longtime friends. John and Fred were also introspective, witty, philosophical, and intelligent. And, okay, kind.

"Alida? Did you hear me?" Fred was asking me, glancing at me oddly.

"Hmmwha?" I asked, startled. Obviously I hadn’t, or I wouldn’t have jumped and hit my head on the top of the car.

Fred burst out laughing. "I guess not, then."

Rubbing my throbbing head, I glared at him. The more he laughed, however, the more I softened. Finally I laughed as well. "No, I didn’t. What were you saying?"

He regained his composure. "I was saying that we’re heading to the library, and was that okay with you?"

I stared at him, not comprehending. "I guess I don’t have much choice, unless I jump out of the car...why the library?"

That set him off again. "I take it you don’t like the library much?" Fred remarked wryly.

"Haven’t you listened to anything I’ve said? I spent almost every waking moment there in Connecticut."

"What about the other ones?"

"The bookstores or my garden."

Fred pulled up in front of the library and put the car into park. Grinning, he said, "Then you won’t mind spending some time there."

My, he caught on quickly. "You’re real quick there, Fred, y’know?" I teased.

"Yeah, yeah, I know," he said good-naturedly, sliding out coming around to open the door for me before I could do it. Surprised, I got out, trying not to let him see that I was blushing. I knew I was; my face and neck felt hot, as if a fire had been lit.

Looking up at the towering building with marble pillars framing it, I remarked, "Sure this isn’t a museum?"

"I’m sure, don’t worry," Fred wryly answered me. "Come on, let’s go inside."

When we did, I was hit by the smell of old. There are people who don’t classify that as a smell, but it is. It’s that omnipresent element that always exists wherever there is something that is over thirty years old. I looked around me and discovered I was surrounded with books and papers. I immediately fell into the trancelike state I experience around numerous books. "Great," I sighed, heading for the nearest shelf.

Fred caught my arm before I could go far. "What, you don’t think we came here just to look around, do ya?" he grinned knowingly. "There’s something specific we’ve got to do."

I was puzzled for a split second, but then caught on to his meaning. Glancing over at one of the reference rooms, I asked, "That?" and headed for the room. Fred managed to catch up within a few seconds.

"Right. But we’ve got to be careful. Don’t want anyone seeing what we’ve got. We’ll look here first, and then search any other records we can find."

Suddenly I realized I didn’t really know what to look for. After all, we’d never actually discussed what we were searching for. "Uh, Fred? What exactly are we trying to track down?"

He looked confused for a moment. "Uh...didn’t we talk about that?"

"No," I impatiently reminded him, "you never actually mentioned that part." What was I, a mind reader? I had an idea of what he had in mind, but I wasn’t sure.

"We’re trying to track down your dad," Fred explained. "And your mother. You know, see what they’ve done, if there’s any record of anything sinister. What did you say your dad did?"

"I never said, but he’s a stockbroker. With Carlton, Horowitz and Linnel. It started out a small Connecticut business, but it’s branched out now. That’s why we came here," I told Fred. "He transferred. Supposedly."

Fred looked thoughtful. "And your mother? What’s she do?"

I stared at him. "Other than get drunk, have parties, and do drugs? Nothing. Her family’s the one with all the money, not Henry’s. Her maiden name is Voorman, and they’re pretty prominent in Connecticut. Her father, Jurgen, was in the military for quite awhile, and he was a war hero. After that he started a department store chain." Other than that, I didn’t know much about that side of the family, except for their nomadic lifestyle.

Fred seemed intrigued. "What about Henry’s family?" he persisted. "Do you know anything about them?"

"No, I know next to nothing about the Horowitz side. Well, I know that my grandfather, Itzhak, was an alcoholic, but that’s all I know. Unless you count the assumption that they’re a line of liars and assholes," I added. How else would my father - no, Henry; I couldn’t even think of him as my father anymore - have turned out the way he had? It must have been inherited.

Fred nodded his understanding. "I see. Where are those families from?"

"Mother’s side is from Germany, Henry’s is from Israel originally. But my parents’ parents were all born and raised here in New York City, I think." This was the most information about my family I’d ever had to call up. I wasn’t used to questions like this. They made me a little uncomfortable; I could see where Fred wanted to go with all this. I wasn’t so sure I wanted to know more about my parents or their families.

He nodded again, smiling now. "Great. We’ve got all we need to know now." He led me to a shelf of the Who’s Who records and took books labeled Vo-Vy and Ho-Hy. Opening one, he began poring through it.

"I don’t think we’re gonna find anything in here," I said skeptically. "Except for my maternal grandfather’s chain of stores, that is. There surely won’t be any records of anything criminal in those books. Might be some vague reference to reasons for leaving a certain place of employment, but that’s not much to go on." Really, my skepticism wasn’t the reason for my hesitance to look through the books. I really didn’t want to know anything about either side of my family. The more I thought about it, the surer I became about that.

Fred looked up from the heavy book he was looking through. "We might. We can use what information we find in here to look elsewhere," he pointed out.

I’d known that already, but was still reluctant to look anything up, afraid of what I might find. "Yeah, but I don’t think I wanna know about my family. Either side. I know the Voormans are corrupt, but they manage to hide it fairly well. So does Henry."

His interest was piqued by this. "You know something?"

"No! Well, I know the way they treat each other and - like shit - but nothing else,’’ I answered, on my guard again. I had an inexplicable uneasy feeling about what I’d find. God knew why; I wouldn’t have expected anything less than the worst, so why should I worry? The best news I could find was that we weren’t really related after all. Actually...it might be worth it to make a discovery like that. I decided to shove my uneasiness aside and investigate. Picking up the burdensome (physically as well as mentally) Ho-Hy book, I opened it to the beginning of the book and began looking for my surname. Hockley...Holdenfield...Horowitz! Let’s see...nothing on Itzhak...aha. Henry Horowitz. He was in the newest edition of the book, as most people placed in it aren’t usually prominent for less than twenty years.

Horowitz, Henry David
b. July 9th, 1925 New York City, NY
Parents: Itzhak and Eleanor Horowitz
Spouses: Marys Lilith (Pearlman) (married 1945-57)
Magdalena Kristin (Voorman) (married 1963-)
Children: Lenora Lilith Horowitz (b. 1946), David
Itzhak Horowitz (b. 1948)

In 1945, Horowitz started Carlton, Horowitz, and Linnel,
a group of stockbrokers, in a small Connecticut town. He
successfully expanded his business nationally, becoming
one of the most sought-after stockbrokers in the United States.

That was all on Henry in that book, but something about it kept bothering me. Well, a few things, actually. I’d known that he’d been married before, but I never heard a word about two other children. Lenora and David were my half-sister and half-brother, and I’d never met them? Of course, they were substantially older than I, but what difference did that make? My mother was one of ten children, and the eldest was twenty-three years older than the youngest. Another thing that bothered me was that the year of my parents’ marriage was listed as 1963. I knew that couldn’t have been right; I’d been born in 1963, and they’d known each other since 1957, when my mother was seventeen. That was the reason my father’s first marriage had broken up. I’d never heard the exact date of their marriage - they’d never celebrated their anniversary - but Sallie had always told me it was in the early sixties. Then again, 1963 was considered the early sixties, but I doubted it was correct.

The third and final puzzle was the fact that I was not listed anywhere in the entry. Looking back on it now, I can’t believe I was so naive as to not make the connection immediately, but at the time I didn’t want to make the connection. Despite the fact that I’d always wished I’d been adopted, I’d never thought it was a possibility and didn’t really want to. The knowledge that I had a family was too important to me, and if I’d found out I wasn’t my parents’ child, my fragile security would have been shattered. Now it was slowly falling to pieces in front of me.

"Alida?" Fred’s voice said, cutting into my thoughts. I looked up, saw him looking at me with concern. I must have had a horrible look on my face. When I blinked and felt moisture on my eyelashes, I realized to my dismay that I was crying.

"I’m not even in here," I told him, my voice wavering. "Not one mention of me anywhere."

Fred looked confused, but immediately tried to rationalize it. "Maybe you hadn’t been born yet. Maybe -"

I shook my head. "No, the book’s copyright date is 1977. I’m older than two, you know. The book says something else I didn’t know; that he has two other children. And it also says that he married my mother in 1963, the year I was born!" My depression gave way to confusion. There had to be a reason for my not being in there. One theory was already solid; he really didn’t give a shit about me, didn’t even consider me his daughter. That was just fucking fine with me. I didn’t consider the bastard my father, had never wanted him to be my father.

Fred didn’t quite know what to do with this bit of information. He just stood and studied me, trying to think of a way to explain it away. Luckily for him his keen writer’s mind served him well. "It’s not unusual for children of first marriages to be kept secret in second families. It’s also not unusual for children of second marriages to be considered unworthy of mention in a book like that. Especially if the person wants the child kept out of the press’s way. And as for the date...it’s probably just a misprint."

I was now determined to find out what was going on. No one can keep a secret from me for very long; I’m too damn curious to give up searching. This was my life, after all. My family history. I had every right to find out why I wasn’t in that book. I may have hated Henry, but that didn’t mean I’d ever thought I wasn’t his child, that I was illegitimate. "I’m gonna find out whether or not it was."

Fred gently took my hand, as if to stop me doing anything rash. "First, look at the entry on your mother. She’s listed right under your father." I scanned the page, quickly finding my mother.

Horowitz, Magdalena Kristin (Voorman)
b. July 7th, 1940 , Hartford, Connecticut
Parents: Jurgen and Kristin Voorman
Spouses: Henry David Horowitz (married 1963-)
Children: Alida Julia (b. 1963)

Magdalena Voorman Horowitz was and is the most
beautiful socialite the United States has to offer.
She is renowned for her extravagant decorating and
dinner parties, as well as her distinctive style. She
has attracted men such as Mick Jagger of the Rolling
Stones and actor Paul Newman. In 1963 she married
Henry Horowitz, one of America’s most prominent
stockbrokers.

I wanted to scream. Why the hell was I listed under my mother’s entry, but not Henry’s, when I was obviously adopted? I was becoming more and more certain that Henry was not, in fact, my father, something which was both devastating and wonderful...but Magdalena had to be my mother! It didn’t make sense for her not to be. I wouldn’t be listed under her entry and not Henry’s if they’d adopted me together. Unless, of course, Henry had manipulated it that way, which was entirely possible. Then I realized he couldn’t have; why would he leave David and Lenora in and not me, when he never spoke of them? Rather than scream, I mumbled, "Dammit. I can’t understand this. If Henry’s not my father, who is?"

Fred had been looking over my shoulder at the book I held. He, too, looked puzzled. Neither of was quite sure what was happening, but we both knew that what I’d thought was the truth was turning out to be all lies. The one thing I’d thought I could count on to be true, however unpleasant, wasn’t. I had thought my father was a corrupt, heartless bastard, but at least I thought I knew who he was. The urge to scream became an urge to burst into tears. When Fred saw how upset I’d become, he put his arm around my shoulder. I flinched and pulled away, but he didn’t seem to care. His eyes were full of sympathy. I didn’t want sympathy; it would make me fall apart. I needed cold, ruthless focus. John would understand how I felt, and he’d probably deliver beautifully. He knew all about staying tough and focused, not accepting sympathy.

"Don’t worry, Alida. We’ll find out," was all Fred said. He knew I knew what he meant.

I nodded in agreement. "We’d better. If not, I think I’ll go nuts."

"You’re already nuts," he grinned, trying to lighten the mood. It worked; I couldn’t help but laugh. "Ready to get some food?" he asked, his tone softening again.

"Sure." We returned the books to their shelves and headed out to the Mercedes.

When we returned to the Dakota, John was waiting impatiently in the kitchen. Judging by the expression on his face, he wasn’t eager for the food. "Christ!" he exclaimed as we walked in the door, relief flooding his features. "I didn’t know if you’d be back." He stood slowly, looking apprehensive.

The two of us stared at him. I immediately knew something horrible had happened. Right away my stomach knotted and my throat went dry. "John?" I asked hoarsely.

John’s expression changed, and I saw sympathy in his eyes. I began to grow angry; not even John understood that sympathy didn’t do one bit of good! Before I could say anything, though, he said softly, "Alida...Sallie rang. Your mother...your mother’s dead."

The world around me ceased to exist. My heart literally skipped two beats. John had to be playing some kind of practical joke on me. I knew his sense of humor could be as sick as mine. But I thought he was too spontaneous to plan a prank... When I looked at him again, eyes full of fear and sympathy, I knew he couldn’t be trying to pull my leg.

"How?" I asked, turning to stone.

"She doesn’t know. She got back from going shopping and found her lying on the floor dead. She said there was no blood on or around her. She thinks she committed suicide." He swallowed hard, his expression mournful. I was too numb with shock to wonder why this was so difficult for him.

I couldn’t absorb what he was telling me. Nothing was making sense, yet I understood his every word. She couldn’t be dead. She was my one link to the past, to finding out what the hell was going on, to understanding why Henry was going on a rampage.

"Helen talked to her...I don’t think Sallie knows who I am...say something, dammit." He was beginning to look frightened at my lack of emotion. I couldn’t blame him.

Swallowing hard myself, I answered, "Why? There’s nothing to say."

"Yes there is. You could say you can’t believe it, how could it be possible, how the hell could she do that to herself..." John trailed off, his face a mask of pain. It took me a moment to realize that he had probably said similar things when his own mother had died. This was bringing back painful memories for him.

I shrugged. "It won’t bring her back, will it?" I felt absolutely nothing. It was like having anesthesia, yet I was alert. As if I couldn’t feel anything, couldn’t muster up any emotion. Something I thought would happen if Henry had died, but never my mother. For all that I’d despised her, at least she hadn’t beaten me up or tried to kill me. My inability to feel anything about her death confused me. Well, it was a start, even if it was confusion, my least favorite emotion.

John and Fred both looked at me as if I’d gone insane. They couldn’t possibly have understood. Both of them had had relationships with their mothers, and though John’s had been an unconventional one, he’d adored her. In reality, I’d hardly known my mother at all.

Slowly, though, I was realizing one thing: she hadn’t committed suicide. I couldn’t believe Sallie had thought that. Mother’s life had consisted of drinking, drugs, and giving endless parties, but she’d thought it was a worthwhile life. I could see her committing suicide while Henry was around to terrorize her, but he hadn’t been for awhile. She certainly wouldn’t have done it because I wasn’t around; she probably hadn’t noticed, or if she had, didn’t think about it much. Accidental death wasn’t feasible either; she knew what to mix and what not to, even when drunk, and she had a high tolerance for nearly every substance known to man. No one could have given it to her, since she never went out and as far as I knew had no connections in New York. No, it wasn’t suicide, nor was it an accident. I knew without a doubt that someone had murdered her.

And I had a pretty good idea who.

C.J. © 2003

Eleven

Jigger