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It seems that Lila called from Harvard this morning, so the dinner conversation is all about how she is clearly the most incredibly talented, smartest person to ever go to Harvard, blah blah blah. I tune in and out, playing with my food as my mind turns over the one problem I need to solve.

“Let's say Isabel
does
escape her dad's house? What do we do then?” Caleb asked when I called before heading down to dinner, to tell him I'm pretty sure I'll have the solution to getting Isabel out by the morning.

That stopped me cold.

“I mean,” Caleb continued, “she doesn't have a bike here. And there's no way you and I can lug your mom's bike up that hill.”

“Yeah,” I agreed, “and I don't see her riding on either of our handlebars.”

For some reason, the image of that, with Isabel perched there like a scene from some corny movie, made both of us crack up. It's clearly something that would never happen.

“I can just see it. She's up there, you're going downhill, hit a bump and—”

“Don't go there,” I implored. “We need a real answer to this. I'm just glad you thought about this before we got there.”

We agreed to try and find a solution by morning.

I tune back in to discover that the dinner conversation is winding down.

I get up with my dishes, when my dad's question stops me in my tracks.

“You really didn't find any ‘treasure' in Ted's apartment, right?”

I keep my back to my dad. I try to keep my voice as even as possible. “Yeah. Like I told you. All we found were some paperbacks that Isabel took, and his lighter.”

Dad turns me around. His eyes catch mine and hold them. He's clearly not finished. Mom is watching me as well. “I mean, if you did find something valuable, you'd tell us, right?”

It's not a lie,
I tell myself.
We haven't found anything. Yet.
“Of course, Dad. There's nothing to find. We've gone through all this.”

My dad hugs me. I can feel the worry as he holds me tightly. “Teddy, we trust you. You really are a very smart kid.”

“Please be careful,” my mother adds.

“Sure, Mom,” I say. “Dad, could we let up on the hug? I'm starting to have a hard time breathing here.”

Dad laughs and relaxes his death grip. “Sorry about that. Guess I don't know my own strength, huh?”

Dad sounds relieved. I know as soon as the corny jokes come out, things are back to normal.

As I move to head upstairs, a thought occurs to me. It's risky, but it's a plan. And it just might work. I look and see that Mom has gone into the kitchen and I'm all alone with Dad. Now is my chance. I pause, wondering if I really have the—well, let's just say the nerve to do this.

I know it's the only way, and I have to make it convincing. I turn to Dad.

“I need to ask a favor,” I say, hoping my face looks appropriately desperate.

“What…kind of favor?” my dad asks, looking slightly worried.

“The thing is,” I look away, figuring this is what I would do if I were actually telling the truth, “this has to do with Isabel.”

My dad licks his lips. Clearly he's no more ready for this conversation than I am.

“We aren't doing anything…you know…anything,” I stammer, “We're just hanging out, you know?”

“Of course. That's what I thought.” Dad lets out a big breath, relieved. Even though we've entered uncharted territory (like they say on those old maps, Here Be Dragons), this is going even better than I hoped.

Then, I kid you not, he jingles the coins in his pocket. Like some corny dad from a movie. All he needs is the pipe and sweater. Movie Dad nods wisely.

“Ted, I just don't want you to get hurt. Isabel's not like the girls around here. And I know she's really pretty, so it's no wonder that—”

“That's not the reason I like being with her. The truth is, what I like about her the most is that she's so smart…kind of like Mom.”

I look at Dad at this point. I know I've taken a calculated risk with this one. For a moment I can't tell if he's going to burst out laughing or roll his eyes.

But instead, his eyes are glistening.

Oh, man. I've really hit a home run.

Dad leans in conspiratorially. “So what's the big favor?”

“Apparently Mr. Archer feels strongly that Isabel should go back to New York and her old school.”

“That's too bad—” my dad starts.

“And what's worse, she's leaving the day after tomorrow. And as you know, tomorrow's that big all-day conference for new faculty members—so I was wondering if you'd drive me over there tomorrow morning. Otherwise we won't have a chance to say goodbye.”

Dad stands up. “Can't he drop Isabel here? I really have things to do.”

“She has to finish packing,” I say quickly. “Caleb would be coming too. We'll meet her there and then you can pick us up like in an hour.”

“An hour at most,” Dad says. “I think there's a coffee place near there where I can get some reading done. But it can't be much longer. I have some students coming in to see me at noon.”

“That would be so cool. We'll just be on the corner of Treemont and Alameda. You can meet us there.”

“Well…I'll think about it,” says my dad in that voice that usually means yes.

“Awesome!” I yelp happily, and give him a huge hug. I leave before he can return the favor.

When I walk into my room, I look achingly at the bed. I could really use some sleep around now, but I'm not sure how long this game is going to take. Well, the sooner I finish it, the sooner I can get some shut-eye.

I go to my desk, feeling good. By now, I know the score. The game will pop up. I'll play it, playing will give me clues about how to get Isabel out, and then I can go to bed. My laptop boots up, and I see the familiar game logo. Here we go.

I peer at the screen.

I see a bedroom with boxes on the floor. I click around the room. There's a bookshelf partially filled with books. A desk with more books stacked on it. The spines read
Jane Austen,
F. Scott Fitzgerald
….I'm clicking everywhere, trying to get something, anything, to pop into my inventory, going about my regular gaming routine.

Then it hits me. This is Isabel's room. This isn't just a
regular
game room to escape. It's her actual bedroom on the screen.

And I'm in it.

I have the uncomfortable feeling that I'm doing something wrong, that I'm somewhere I shouldn't be.

This is wrong. I have to get out of here before she comes back.

I sit back in my chair, panic-stricken. And then realize with enormous relief that I am completely insane.

This is just a game. I'm only in Isabel's room in a game.

And then another realization: I'm not me. I'm playing as Isabel. I have to be. It's
her
escape.

This has now become twice as hard. I don't have to just figure out how to win the game; I have to get Isabel to follow the steps in order to get out of her father's house.

I sigh. That bike ride really took it out of me, and it's getting hard to concentrate. I rub my eyes to clear the cobwebs. Time to get to work.

I find a wallet on the desk. I click on it, and it opens, revealing a neat stack of cards. I click on them and a library card slides out and presents itself into my inventory. Clicking around the room, I find nothing else useful, and thankfully nothing embarrassing.

Isabel is not a slob, like me.

My next click takes me in front of Isabel's bathroom.

I grimace. Is this necessary? I know this is the last place in the world Isabel would want me to go. But at the same time, I have no choice. As I gear myself up, my eyes droop a little, and the screen is looking a little fuzzy. I clear my head by taking a few deep breaths, and dive in.

The door opens, and I enter. Again, it's all perfect, of course, with makeup and shampoo bottles lined up in rows. I click on each of them, finding nothing.

As I absent-mindedly click on the screen, I arrive at the mirror above the sink and to my shock see Isabel's face staring back at me.

I gotta tell you, I almost close the game right then, before remembering that it's “my” reflection.

It's still an incredibly weird sensation, as if I am in her body, doing what she would need to do. I click down to the sink, and with triumph click on a tube of lip gloss, which makes a welcome
plink
and now sits in my inventory, next to the library card.

I click through to the door of Isabel's room, which brings me to the stairway. This takes me down to a set of locked double doors behind which I assume is Mr. Archer's study.

I grab the library card and click on it, bringing it up on the screen. I drag the lip gloss over to it and smile as the gloss spreads over one side of the card—to make it slippery, I've already figured. I take the card and put it next to the doors. It slides into the small crack between them, stopping at the lock, where it eases itself between the latch and the plate. They open, and I am—or rather Isabel is—in.

It's only a matter of time…time….Couldn't hurt to just put my head down for a few minutes….

“Ted!
Ted!
”

I open my eyes and gape in horror at the light streaming in through my window. My dad is shaking my shoulders. I quickly check the laptop and see that it's in sleep mode.

Sleep.
Argh!
How long did I sleep?

“I'm really sorry, Ted, but we've got to get going,” my dad says. “Brush your teeth or do whatever you have to do to make yourself presentable. We're leaving in five minutes.” He turns. “And later we'll talk about this obsession with those games. Falling asleep in front of the computer is
not
acceptable.”

“Riiight,” I say thickly, wiping the drool from my face with my sleeve. Five minutes? That's crazy! I can't solve the game in five minutes! I run to the bathroom while the laptop is waking up, trying to think of anything that will clear up this mess. I figure I'll tell Isabel the few things I've learned and hope that I can figure out the rest on my own. Hey, at least I got a good night's rest!

As I frantically go over what I do know, and write it down as instructions for Isabel, my dad calls from downstairs.

“Ted, you want to say goodbye to your friend or what?”

“Be right there, Dad.”

I grab the sheet of paper and book it down to join him.

Caleb is just pulling up on his bike as we open the door to the car. He hops in and we're on our way.

The trip is a whole lot faster this way, let me tell you.

Dad stops at the corner of Treemont. He turns and looks at me.

“Noon. Right?”

“Actually, we said eleven,” I remind him. “You're meeting students at noon, remember?” Mom may not be right about everything, but boy, is she right about the not-listening part.

Caleb and I jump out.

“Maybe I'll go to the office instead,” my dad mutters, and drives off.

As we approach the house, Caleb stops.

“Now, I know you've got this all figured out and everything, but I still don't know how you're going to get the instructions to Isabel. If anything breaks that beam, going in or out, it sets off the alarm, right?”

“You're forgetting one place,” I say with a smile as we walk up the stone steps leading to the front door.

I point.

“Of course,” marvels Caleb. “The mail slot. The mail has to be able to get in.”

I lift the slot and peer inside. No sign of Isabel. The house looks still and cold.

“Isabel!” I call. No response.

“Maybe she's in her room,” Caleb suggests.

We move around to the side of the house.

Up in the window, there is no sign of movement. But I can just imagine her on her bed, lying there, looking up at the ceiling. How odd to know a room so well and never have been inside.

“Isabel!” Caleb yells.

A familiar face appears in the window and breaks into a smile. I wave and gesture for her to come downstairs. Once again we station ourselves by the mail slot.

Soon we hear a rustle, and then it's clear that Isabel is on the other side of the door.

I lift the slot again.

“I don't believe you guys! It's so great to see you!” Isabel sounds genuinely happy.

“You too,” I say, proving once again my gift for smooth-talking the ladies.

“I wish I could get out of here,” Isabel sighs. “But it's nice that you came.”

“ ‘O ye of little faith,' ” says Caleb, and points in my direction.

“You don't mean—” Isabel begins, staring wide-eyed at me.

“That's from the Bible, by the way. I looked it up,” Caleb adds proudly.

“I know it's from the Bible. Matthew chapter eight, verse twenty-six,” Isabel says impatiently.

I remove the sheet of instructions from my pocket. I go into the speech I've so carefully worked out to convince Isabel to follow the walkthrough.

“Here's the thing. I sat and thought through your problem as if it were an escape game. I put together what I observed about your house and my best guesses as to what to do to get you out of there
and
get back the book. I've got an idea for the first few steps. But, ummm…I may need your help on the other stuff.”

“I figured out that the perimeter alarm was only for the windows and the doors, not the mail slot. Pretty slick, huh?” Caleb adds.

Isabel isn't listening. She looks at me expectantly. “So what do I do first?”

“Get your library card.”

Isabel looks at me like I'm demented. “My library card?”

Before I can stop myself, I blurt out, “Your library card! The one in your wallet on your desk! Then get some lip gloss from your bathroom and come downstairs.”

There is a
long
pause as Isabel takes this in.

“Look, do you want to get out or not?” I ask firmly.

Her eyes are locked on mine through the slot. I'm getting a little creeped out.

Finally: “Yes. I do. So I'll get my library card and some lip gloss.”

We hear her footsteps echo on the stone floor of the entry and then up the wooden stairs to her room.

A few moments pass, and we can see her with her library card in one hand, lip gloss in the other.

“Just put some lip gloss on one side, slide it down the door until you reach the lock, and pull,” I coach her through the slot.

“I figured,” Isabel calls back. “We used to do this all the time at school to get into the library when it was closed. It wouldn't have occurred to me to do it to my dad's office.”

There's a click, and Isabel cries, “I'm in!”

She comes back to the mail slot and stares at me. “I checked my dad's desk. I'm pretty sure that's where he's put the book, because the drawer is locked, and it normally isn't, and the book isn't on any of the shelves in there. So now what?”

I forget that Isabel is getting pretty good at this too. Great. I need all the help I can get. The fact that her dad put the book under lock and key has to mean something. I'm guessing the book has something to do with the numbers on the house alarm system's keypad.

“Okay, so first we need to find the key to that drawer….”

I begin to mull it over. It's a lot harder than the game, because on-screen I can just click until I have pieces to use. I remind myself that Graham Archer is a person, not a computer game designer. “He must have hidden it in there somewhere. Would he have left a reminder to himself about where it is?”

“I don't want to be the one to say it,” says Caleb, “but seriously, Ted. You play too many of those games. Wouldn't he just take it with him?”

I glare at Caleb. I hate him for being right. Is all this just a waste of time? Is the key with Mr. Archer?

“Actually, I don't think so,” Isabel says excitedly. “My father hates having too many keys in his pocket. He says it ruins the line of his pants. He usually just has the car key when he leaves, and comes in the house through the garage.”

“Well, that's something!”

Isabel thinks for a minute. “Shouldn't we start in the obvious places? Hold on.” She rushes away, and we hear her rummaging in different parts of the house, before she goes back to the study and searches in there. When she comes back, she looks defeated.

“No desk key anywhere that I can think of, at least nowhere it'd make sense. It's got to be hidden somewhere pretty obscure.”

“So where do we start?” Caleb jumps in. “He doesn't have a calendar, does he? Like Great-Uncle Ted?”

“No…,” says Isabel, “but he does have a datebook. He says he doesn't trust computers with his appointments and things. Should I look in there?”

“Couldn't hurt,” I answer.

Isabel comes back with a small leather-bound notebook. She flips through the pages, then stops and holds the book up to the slot. We see a date circled in red ink. September 21.

“Father's written something below it,” Isabel says. “ ‘Deliver paper to Shakespeare Conference, LASS.' LASS?”

“Los Angeles…,” I begin.

“—Shakespeare Society!” Isabel cuts in. “Father said he was delivering a paper there in the fall. I think I saw a draft of it on his desk.” Before I can say anything, she's run back into the study and returns with a packet of papers that has a Post-it on it, marked “
⁹
/
21
.”

The title of the lecture is
What Fools These Mortals Be—The Great Clowns of Shakespeare.

Isabel flips quickly through the paper. “Nothing in here mentions a key. Now what?”

“That's okay. Dead ends happen all the time. We'll just try something else.” I try to picture the game in my head. I remember noticing something on the desk just before I conked out.

“Does your father have a laptop on his desk?”

“Yes,” Isabel says.

“Can you get onto his computer? That's a good place to start,” I suggest.

Off Isabel goes. A shout reaches us. “It's asking for a password! He's never had a password before!”

If he's never had a password before, then whatever it is will reference something recent. I think of her father's paper.
What Fools These Mortals Be.
Maybe it wasn't a dead end after all? “Try
‘WFTMB'
!” I shout back.

“Of course!” Isabel answers. Then she comes back to the door, looking dejected.

“It didn't work. Any other ideas?”

Normally at this point, if I were playing the game, I'd go to Wikipedia. But I realize I have something else just as good right in front of me.

Isapedia.

The Great Clowns of Shakespeare.
“So who would you say is the most famous Shakespearean clown?” I ask.

“Will Kempe, of course,” Isabel says immediately. “I mean, he was the original clown who Shakespeare wrote all his comic roles for.”

“Try adding
‘Kempe'
to the
‘WFTMB'
for the password,” I suggest.

Off she goes.

And back she comes, looking irritated. “Still nothing. We're missing something.” Then her face brightens. “Wait! After Kempe quit Shakespeare's company, he was replaced by Robert Armin, who created some of the most famous fools! Should I try him?”

“Sure,” I say. “ 
‘WFTMBArmin.'
If that doesn't work, try
‘WFTMBKempeArmin.'
Or
‘GreatClownsKempeArmin.'
You have to try every combination—”

“That one worked! I'm in!” says Isabel. I hear a note of triumph in her voice.

“Now you know how Ted feels when he's solved one of his games!” Caleb calls.

“We haven't solved it yet,” I remind him.

An excited squeal comes from the study. “I found a folder on the computer desktop marked ‘September 21.' ”

Then silence. Caleb and I run around to the side of the house where the study is. We push through the rosebushes to get a better view of the room.

We see Isabel through the study window as she heads toward the back wall of the room, where there is a series of three framed pictures.

The one on the left is a photograph of a beautiful woman on a beach, in a thick woolen sweater. I know at once this has to be Isabel's mom.

On the right is a family portrait of three skiers. Graham is on one side, his wife is on the other, and Isabel is in the middle, about ten years old. The two adults are laughing, and Isabel is looking up at them.

Between these two photos is an odd picture.

It's a painting of a man with a donkey's head, stretching his arms as if waking from a long sleep. Looking at him with adoration is a beautiful woman, her hands stroking the fur on his muzzle.

Isabel marches over to the middle picture and reaches behind it, feeling around. When she pulls her hand out, she waves a key victoriously.

We watch as she goes to the desk. The key opens the drawer, and she holds the copy of
The Maltese Falcon
up to show us with a big thumbs-up.

She leaves the room and we meet her back at the door. She's laughing.