“Well,” she began, “you’re in charge of all the money stuff at the business. And money is really just numbers, so you must be really good with them. With numbers, I mean.”
Uncle Mort looked at her expectantly, as if he were waiting for further explanation. Now she knew how Teddy felt.
“And second of all, you always use numbers when you speak. You like to talk about percentages and things that come from math. So you must think about math a lot.” She cleared her throat.
He was still looking at her.
“And third, my father always says how careful you are with numbers and how smart you are in math. We figured there’s a ninety-nine-percent chance [did Uncle Mort raise an eyebrow?] it’s your book. You probably still remember a lot of it.”
Uncle Mort took a drink of water. Then he asked Natalie a question.
“How did you calculate your percentage?”
She was confused. “Excuse me?”
“You said there was a ninety-nine-percent chance the book is mine. How did you calculate that?”
“I didn’t. It was an expression.”
“Either the book is mine or the book is not mine. Do you agree?”
“Yes.”
“Then isn’t there only a fifty-percent chance that the book is mine?”
“Well, if you look at it that way—”
Uncle Mort interrupted her. “There are six people living in this house, correct?”
“Yes.”
“If that is the case, then isn’t there a one out of six chance that the book is mine?”
“Maybe, but—”
“But what? If there is a one out of six chance that it is mine, then what would that percentage be?”
Natalie took a few moments to think through the answer. “A little more than sixteen percent, I think, but that isn’t really right.” Natalie felt her cousins stiffen. None of them has ever had this long of a conversation with Uncle Mort before.
“Why isn’t it correct?”
“Because we know the book can’t be Teddy’s or Mimi’s or Dinah’s. They’re too young. There are really only three people out of the six people living here who could be the owner of the book. Judith, you and Aunt Rose. So it’s a one out of three chance.”
“Teddy, bring me the book.”
“Okay.” Teddy got up from the table and returned with the large green volume.
Uncle Mort took it from him and turned to the back cover.
“If you had been more observant, you would have found that there is actually a one-hundred-percent chance that this book is mine.”
“Why?” Teddy asked.
“Because I wrote my name on the back cover, right here.” He held up the book and pointed to his signature. Natalie giggled. She felt the tension drain out of the room as Uncle Mort’s lips formed something close to a smile.
“We can look at this together next Thursday,” Uncle Mort said. “Unless you want to study it with me alone, Teddy.”
Teddy shook his head. “No, Natalie and I want to do it together. So I’ll wait.”
“Fine,” said Mort. “But I’m only going to do this if you both agree to work hard and pay attention. I’m not going to waste my time unless you both are fully committed.”
“We will be,” Natalie assured him. She sat back in her chair and exchanged smiles with Teddy. Dinner is finally getting interesting.
Chapter 35
MORT
Thursdays became the highlight of Mort’s week. In the beginning, he worried that looking through his old math books might bring back painful memories of having to give up school. But his fears were unwarranted.
The first time he read those books, all he wanted was to soak up the information as quickly as possible. Looking at the books with Teddy and Natalie so many years later, he understood what he should have been doing back then: enjoying the study of the subject.
It was only because of Teddy that he was able to do that now. It didn’t matter that the books his son found in the garage were much too difficult. It didn’t matter that he had never taught math to anyone before. What mattered was that Mort was sharing something he enjoyed with one of his children, perhaps for the very first time.
Mort had never been a father who sat down on the floor and played board games or drank pretend cups of tea. He didn’t kiss dolls and he didn’t sing lullabies. Mort hadn’t known how to talk to his daughters when they were little, and as they evolved into young women he found himself only more uncomfortable. When Teddy came along, Mort had hoped it would be different, but he had already fallen into bad habits. He thought baseball might bring them together, but Teddy was a tentative player, and Mort wasn’t exactly sure how to instruct him. Teddy was too young to play on his cousins’ team and too shy to ask any of the kids at school to be on theirs. Mort and Teddy listened to the professional games on the radio together, but as soon as the games ended, Mort ran out of things to say.
Every once in a while, Mort would bring Teddy to the factory so he could learn about the family business. But Teddy was still too young to be interested, and he mostly just sat at the receptionist’s desk and colored. Sometimes he watched the machinery, but it was loud and monotonous. When Mort stopped asking if he wanted to come along, Teddy never questioned it.
Then the children found the math book. Mort wondered whether Teddy would have had the courage to ask about it if Natalie hadn’t been there. He supposed it didn’t matter—she had been there, and Teddy was willing. Mort knew he would never be great at teaching his son how to hit or throw a baseball, but explaining arithmetic to him was something he knew he could do. The best thing was that Teddy seemed to enjoy it. Having Natalie close by seemed to give Teddy the confidence to ask Mort all of his questions.
“Dad, can you explain square roots again?”
“Absolutely. A square root of a number is a number which, multiplied by itself, gives you the original number. So the square root of nine is three because three times three equals nine.”
“Oh.” Teddy didn’t sound convinced.
“Let’s do it backwards. What is two times two?”
“Four.”
“Right. So that means the square root of four is two.”
“I think I understand.”
“Let’s pick a different number. Try sixteen. What do you think is the square root of sixteen?”
Teddy scrunched up his eyes to concentrate. “Four?”
“Yes! Because four times four is sixteen. Good!”
This is better than a home run, Mort thought.
Later that evening, when Teddy was in the bathroom, Natalie asked Mort another question. “Uncle Mort? There are really two square roots for every number, right?”
“What do you mean?”
“I mean four is the square root of sixteen but negative four is also. Every positive number has two square roots, right?”
Mort nodded. “Yes, that’s true. A negative number times another negative number equals a positive number.”
“Good,” Natalie said. “That’s what I thought.”
She never lets Teddy figure out she knows more than he does.
Mort was used to being treated with a mixture of reverence and apprehension by his children, but Natalie was different. She wasn’t disrespectful, but she certainly wasn’t afraid of him. In fact, she seemed genuinely fond of him and comfortable in his presence in a way that most people were not.
“Uncle Mort, what do you like better, pie or cake?” she asked him one Thursday.
“Cake.”
“Exactly!” Natalie practically shouted. “Most people do. So why do books always use pies to show fractions? Why not cake?”
“Yeah!” Teddy chimed in. “I like cake better too.”
Mort didn’t skip a beat. “It’s the layer cakes that are the problem,” he said solemnly. “Layer cakes confuse the mathematicians because they have to multiply the fraction by the number of layers. That’s why they use pies.”
The children stared at him. Then they burst out laughing. “You’re so funny, Dad,” Teddy said.