Father's Return

MR. HOBBS' VACATION (248 pp.)--Edward Streeter--Harper ($3).

The Father of the Bride is back again.

He has a new name, is a little older and more tired, but his family status is unchanged. Mother runs the house. Daughters, sons-in-law and grandchildren enjoy it. And father pays the bills.

Father's name this time is Mr. Hobbs. Edward (Dere Mabel) Streeter, the vice president of the Bank of New York who fathered Father in his spare time, now puts that vestigial American male through his paces during a vacation. The summer house, on an island off New England, has been rented sight unseen and looks it. but Mr. Hobbs is brave in the face of basketwork furniture, a recalcitrant pump and a cesspool that backfires.

He has been dreamily anticipating palship with a four-year-old grandson and his sons-in-law. When little Peter arrives, he is asked to give grandpa a big hug. "I don't want to," Peter cries. "But Peter, darling," his unreflecting mother demands, "don't you like Bompa?" "No," cries Peter. Peter's father is politer, but conversation with him is exhausted "in 40 seconds flat with ten days to go.''

When the entire clan is gathered, Mr. Hobbs continues such chores as garbage disposal, and evenings finds it impossible to concentrate on a book against theoretical talk that outrages his practical intelligence. "Dollars are only symbols," he hears. "Wealth is the natural resources of a country. . ." Running a finger under his shirt collar, his voice trembling, Mr. Hobbs explodes: "It was dollars that bought that beef tonight that you all gobbled up so cheerfully. It was dollars that bought that bottle of gin that disappeared before dinner. Nobody ever handed me any natural resources, and I never paid a grocery bill with the potential of a labor force. I wouldn't recognize one if it walked into the room."

By summer's end, Mr. Hobbs decides that the age gap is too great for him to be a pal to his children or grandchildren, that his ties to them "can only be based on need or respect." He also decides, despite all its mishaps, that the summer was "hard to beat." But readers will find that Mr. Hobbs' Vacation has not even come close this time to beating Father of the Bride.

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