Jonathan Hoag
| Author | Robert A. Heinlein |
|---|---|
| Country | United States |
| Language | English |
| Genre | Science fiction novella |
|
Publication date
|
October 1942 |
| Media type | Print (Periodical & Paperback) |
| First published in Unknown Worlds, October, 1942 | |
The Unpleasant Profession of Jonathan Hoag is a novella by Robert A. Heinlein. It was originally published in the October 1942 edition of Unknown Worlds magazine under the pseudonym of "John Riverside". It also lends its title to a collection of Heinlein's short stories published in 1959.
A man comes to an investigator with an odd request: he wants to have himself followed, because he has no idea what his own profession is. The story evolves into a discussion of the reality of both life and art.
Jonathan Hoag, a lover of art and fine dining living in Chicago, realizes that he has no memory of his daytime activities when asked, at an evening dinner, what he does for a living. Furthermore, when he washes his hands in the evening, he discovers a red-brown substance, possibly dried blood, under his fingernails.
He contacts a detective agency, Randall & Craig, and asks them to follow him during the day. The partners, actually the husband and wife team of Ted and Cynthia Randall, agree to this. The mystery begins immediately: they try to collect fingerprints from their client, but find that Hoag left none, even when not wearing gloves. The few memories Hoag has turn out to be false, except for his home address, and a doctor, Potiphar T. Potbury, whom Hoag consulted about the substance under his fingernails. The doctor had thrown him out of his office and told him not to return.
The first time the pair tail Hoag, Cynthia sees him turn and talk to her husband. Then Cynthia is menaced by Hoag after she tails him in an office building. When she is reunited with Ted, he tells her that he had a completely different experience: after uneventfully tailing Hoag into the building and up to Hoag's office on the thirteenth floor of the Acme building, Ted discovers that Hoag is a jeweler working for a company called Detheridge & Co., and that the red substance is jeweler's rouge. Both realize that something is terribly wrong, especially once they discover that the building has no thirteenth floor.
Ted has a series of "dreams" in which he is taken through a mirror into the offices of Detheridge & Co., where he is told to leave Hoag alone by an assembly of conservative businessmen. He ignores the dreams, until in one final dream Cynthia is taken through as well. The businessmen reveal themselves as "Sons of the Bird", disciples of an old pagan religion; Hoag is a nemesis of theirs. They cause something to be sucked out of Cynthia into a bottle, and return her and Ted to their apartment.
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