Dr. Linnaeus Planck is not listed in the phone book. Famous people never are. But we had his address anyway. Prescott had found it on Dr. B’s computer.
We got a ride out there with Beamer’s cousin Ray, who was still living at their house and playing in his dad’s band. Lucky for us, they didn’t have a gig that Saturday.
After much heated discussion we had decided to show Beamer’s documentary (which is what it was, and a good one, too) to Dr. Planck. We made this decision because: (a) we were 99 percent sure he wasn’t part of the conspiracy, since none of the creepy stuff we’d found in the files dated from Planck’s active years (it all started after he retired, when Dr. Gallow took over and Dr. Bodempfedder arrived), (b) we were nervous about going to the police ourselves, since the story we had to tell was so unbelievable, especially coming from a bunch of kids, and (c) we really wanted the Allbright board of directors to see the presentation, since they had the knowledge and the power to do whatever ought to be done. They were, after all, this incredible group of hyper-famous, extremely powerful people who were unquestionably trustworthy and totally dedicated to the school. Unfortunately, there was no way we could get into that board meeting. But Dr. Planck could.
And so, there we were, crammed into Ray’s rickety car—all six of us (including Ray and Beamer). Extremely cozy.
Dr. Planck lived in Montgomery County, Maryland, near Chevy Chase. We left early Saturday afternoon, hoping to get there around five. We figured he’d be up from his afternoon nap by then (we felt sure that all old people took naps), but wouldn’t have started dinner yet. Unfortunately, despite our Google Maps directions, Ray got lost. There was a construction detour and he made a wrong turn. Then we hit some traffic. It was after six by the time we arrived.
The house was grand and beautiful, as you might expect, considering who lived there. It was a two-story, white colonial house, surrounded by big, old trees. As we pulled into the circular drive, we saw lights on downstairs.
A woman in a white uniform answered the door.
“May I help you?” she asked, clearly surprised to see us. I guess Dr. Planck didn’t get a lot of visitors. She probably thought we had the wrong house, or maybe we were selling chocolate bars for our school’s baseball team.
“Sorry to just show up like this,” I said, the very model of politeness, “without an appointment. But we’re here to speak with Dr. Planck. We’re from the Allbright Academy.” I waited to see if the name meant anything to her. She wasn’t giving any clues, however, so I added, “Dr. Planck founded the school back in the seventies.”
The nurse nodded. Apparently she knew perfectly well what the Allbright Academy was. But she still didn’t invite us in.
“We were hoping we could just have a word with him,” Prescott said. “It’s about the school.”
Before she had a chance to answer, a tall, skeletal figure came loping down the hall toward us. His white hair—so neatly combed in the pictures of him I’d seen hanging on the walls at Allbright—was wild, fanning out from his head like a halo. He was so thin that his eyes seemed to protrude from their sockets. It made me think of Egyptian mummies.
“Hide them in the bathroom!” he croaked, terror written all over his face. “Hurry! The wolves’ll get ’em!” He tried to push past the nurse and scoop us into the house. He grabbed my arm, and was surprisingly strong.
“Now, Doctor P,” said the nurse, prying him off of me, “you let go of that little girl, hear? There are no wolves. Don’t I keep telling you that? They were just on the TV.”
“No!” he cried, terribly agitated. “Hide them in the bathroom!”
“Honey, they don’t want to hide in the bathroom. They’re just fine where they are.”
He kept turning to look behind him for any sign of the approaching wolves, clinging desperately to the nurse. There were tears in his eyes.
“’Scuse us just a minute,” she said, and gently shut the door.
“Cheez,” I said. “Poor guy.”
“Yeah,” Cal agreed. “Do you think we should leave?”
“Let’s wait a minute,” Brooklyn said. “Seems kind of rude to walk away. He was trying so hard to save us from those wolves and all.”
We stood in the growing dark for a full ten minutes, thinking gloomy thoughts. Then the door opened again, and the nurse stepped out on the porch, pulling the door shut behind her. “He’s resting now,” she told us.
“Sorry,” I said, though I wasn’t exactly sure what I was sorry about. Mostly that this really great man, who had once won the Nobel Prize for physics, had turned into this frightened child in a shriveled-up body.
“You got something important you need to talk to him about? ’Cause if you do, he’ll be a lot sharper in the morning. It’s the Alzheimer’s, you know. He’s ‘sundowning’ now. Happens most every night, though not often this bad. Usually he just wants to go home—you know, to Nebraska, where he grew up. Wants to know where his mama is. But like I say, if it’s important, he’s more himself in the mornings.”
I wondered if there was any point in going all the way out there again. I mean, how much better could he be? Even at his morning best, Dr. Planck wasn’t going to be up to attending a board meeting, much less organizing an investigation or talking to the police. But, I thought, if he turned out to be a whole lot sharper in the mornings, we could show him the CD. Then maybe Beamer could film his shock and outrage, add it to the presentation. It was better than nothing.
“Is he really himself in the mornings?” I asked. “I mean, really? It’s a long drive out here.”
“Well, honey, that’s hard to say. Some things have stuck in his mind, you know, but some are gone forever. Most of the time, even when he’s at his best, he doesn’t remember that he ever had a wife—and they were married nearly sixty years. But he can recall his childhood like it was yesterday. And he talks about physics all the time—not that I understand any of it, though he seems to think I should. And he talks about that school he started. Funny that those things would be more important to him than the woman he loved.”
“The mind is a curious thing,” Brooklyn said. “But since it’s the school we wanted to talk to him about, it’s good he still remembers it. If we do come back, what would be the best time?”
“I’d say around nine. He’ll have had his bath and his breakfast by then.”
“We’ll try to make it,” Cal said. “It depends on whether we can get someone to drive us.”
“Well, I need to go back inside. You kids do what you want; come or don’t come, doesn’t matter. We’re not going anywhere.”
“That didn’t take long,” Ray said when we got back to the car.
“It wasn’t a convenient time, as it turns out,” Beamer said, loading his bag of equipment into the trunk of the car.
“What—you mean you didn’t have an appointment with this guy?” Ray was furious. “We drove all the way out here just on the off chance—”
“I know, Ray. Sorry. But we’ve got it all set up for nine o’clock tomorrow morning.”
“Tomorrow morning? You expect me to drive you out here again?”
Beamer winced. “Sorry,” he said. “But it’s really important.”
“Gaw!” said Ray, slapping the steering wheel in disgust.
“It won’t take nearly as long next time,” Brooklyn said. “It’ll be Sunday morning, so there won’t be any traffic, plus you know the way now.”
“We’ll have to get up at the crack of dawn,” Ray groused.
“How about we take you out to dinner tonight?” Prescott said, clearly hoping to put Ray in a better frame of mind. “I know this great Italian place in D.C.”
Ray seemed to think that might be all right. Eventually he calmed down. We had a delicious dinner, which Prescott paid for, and by the time we got to the cannoli, Ray had agreed to take us out to Chevy Chase the following morning.