Miracle Man (9 page)

“Pretty tight security for a school, don’t you think Ray?” Peter asked.

Ray didn’t answer. The tall trees soon gave way to beautiful open pastoral vistas of estate gardens on each side of the driveway.

“Damn, is all of this land part of the Institute?” Peter asked.

“Sixty manicured acres. It’s a virtual botanical wonderland. Newton used to have some other estates of this size, but they’re long gone. This is the only one left.”

Around another bend, buildings finally came into view. A mansion reminiscent of Thomas Jefferson’s Monticello, but five times as large, was fronted by a tremendous oval marble fountain with muscled Greek gods and voluptuous nymphs frolicking in its center. Quite some distance to the left were four modern looking single-story tan brick buildings. The Lincoln pulled up to the mansion edifice where Dr. Uhlman stood, together with a svelte fortyish blonde woman dressed in a Chanel suit. Chiseled into the marble overhang above the fourteen foot tall double mahogany doors was the inscription,
Institute for Advanced Intelligence Studies
.

Ray opened the passenger door, and Bobby jumped out. “Dr. Uhlman, good to see you again. Is this your weekend get-away cottage?” said Bobby. Uhlman bent down and lifted Bobby up in a smooth sweep.

“My boy, you’re gaining weight or I’m getting weaker.” He put Bobby down and faced Peter and Edith. “I welcome all of you to the Institute, a unique school with a unique mission and unique resources to accomplish it. Let me introduce you to the dean, Dr. Avalon Vanderslice.”

Vanderslice’s pale but flawless complexion accentuated her high cheek bones, strong jawline and well sculpted nose. Her long arched eyebrows, notably darker than her blonde hair, framed light gray translucent eyes. The cold authority of her facial features was only partially attenuated by her surprisingly full burgundy lips. “Dr. Uhlman and I have so much to show you, but first, why don’t we have some lunch. You must be hungry after your travels.” Vanderslice led them all in to the mansion’s opulent reception area.

“Who built this place?” Peter asked, craning his neck to take in the size of the structure. “It’s a palace.”

Uhlman replied, “John Denning, a partner of William Vanderbilt.”

Vanderslice added, “We use the first floor of the house for administration offices, and for receptions and special events. The library occupies the entire second floor. The third floor houses a natural history museum which the students find fascinating. Much of its contents is comprised of Mr. Denning’s private collection, but we have supplemented it substantially. You may have noticed the large rotunda. The fourth floor is our planetarium and I must say that it meets rigorous scientific standards.” When Bobby heard the mention of a planetarium, his face lit up. Vanderslice continued, “Our class rooms, laboratories and dormatories are housed in the four buildings that you saw when you arrived.”

“How many kids attend this school?” Peter asked.

“Attendance varies since we don’t have a set curriculum or grade levels here. But I would say three hundred students are here at any given time.”

Peter’s eyebrows arched upwards as he shook his head. “All this for three hundred kids? I guess you’re not exactly operating on a public school’s budget.”

“No we’re not,” replied Uhlman.

After lunch, Uhlman and Vanderslice led the Austins on a tour of the Institute’s facilities. “All of our teachers have Ph.Ds and could easily find positions in leading universities. They recognize that the Institute provides them with a unique opportunity,” explained Vanderslice. As they toured the physics, chemistry, biology and computer science labs, Vanderslice said, “No expense has been spared on these facilities. The natural science laboratories are comparable to those in the top colleges and our computer science lab is equal to that of any graduate school in the country, bar none.”

The students of the Institute looked like ordinary kids going about the typical activities of students. There were no shortages of smiles, laughter and animated conversation.

“Let me show you our dormitories,” Vanderslice said, as they entered another of the modern brick buildings. “For children of Robert’s age, we have found that they are most comfortable with an “apartment style” set-up. This consists of a living room that is shared by three children, each of whom has a separate bedroom. This way the children have companionship but also privacy when they want it. As the children get older, or in certain circumstances where they express a preference, they can private accommodations. We carefully pair children to maximize compatibility—and we’re sensitive to any issues. And also note that we have on staff a full-time pediatrician, nurse, and psychiatrist who also holds a qualification in neurology. So rest assured, Robert will receive the best care, and constant monitoring and sensitivity to all situations or issues.”

Edith squeezed Peter’s hand and Peter nodded.

Vanderslice ushered the Austin family and Uhlman into an oversized golf cart for a trip around the Institute’s grounds. Two large swimming pools (one of them indoors), four tennis courts, six basketball courts, a baseball diamond, soccer field, track, gymnasium building, and a two acre pond were the highlights, interspersed between impeccably-maintained gardens and museum quality statuary.

“This place is like a resort,” Peter said, shaking his head.

Uhlman asked, “What do you think Robert?”

Bobby’s face scrunched up. “It’s a bit overwhelming I guess. It’s so big. You could fit the school near my house in one of the swimming pools.”

Uhlman laughed as he patted Bobby on the shoulder. “You’ll get used to it soon enough. Now let’s get to the important stuff. Wait till you see the cafeteria!”

The golf cart whisked them away to the Copernicus Student Center. Inside, there was a video game room equipped with multiple units of all of the latest game consoles and a library of video games, an arcade, table-tennis tables, billiard tables, air-hockey tables, and beverage and snack vending machines (which Peter noticed didn’t require any payment).

“The cafeteria is open twenty four hours a day. We find that often the students get hunger pangs at irregular hours because they stay up late working on a project and don’t want to eat at the normal times,” Vanderslice said. “Our kitchen staff will also accommodate any dietary restrictions or special requirements.”

Peter, Edith and Bobby gazed at the array of food.

Waving her arms excitedly, Edith said, “This looks like the buffet at the Luxor Hotel in Las Vegas.”

Bobby beamed as he looked in the direction of the desserts. “I’m going to get really fat here. Forget learning, I’m just going to eat.”

The cafeteria was going a long way to clinch the deal, but the closer was coming. Uhlman gave Vanderslice a conspiratorial wink.

“Dean, is there any chance we could give Robert a demonstration of the planetarium?” Bobby’s eyes gleamed. He had never been to a planetarium.

When the planetarium show was over and the lights came back on, Bobby looked as if he had been sedated. He sat motionless, staring straight ahead. Edith tapped him on his shoulder, and then shook him gently. Bobby snapped back to the present and said, “That was the most wonderful thing I have ever seen in my whole life.”

“Well, Robert. For those students who display a particular interest and aptitude for astrophysics and astral mathematics, our planetarium is programmable to interface with our computer laboratory for real-world type testing of formulas and theories. It’s a unique capability that we have here,” said Vanderslice.

Uhlman smiled. The look on Bobby’s face said everything. The Institute had a new enrollee.

10

A
s Uhlman had predicted, Bobby was in a different league from all of the other students at the Institute. Even in this rarified environment peopled by the most profoundly gifted children in the country, Bobby, the youngest student at the Institute, was like an eagle among blind bats. By his seventh birthday, he had exhausted all of the Institute’s teachers and Dean Vanderslice had shifted most of his daily schedule to graduate classes at MIT and Harvard. The time he continued to spend at the Institute was mainly under his own auspices, working in the computer lab and experimenting with the planetarium interface. Dean Vanderslice repeatedly had to admonish several of the Institute’s teachers to stop interrupting Bobby to seek his help when they were stumped on their own research projects.

As was in keeping with the OSSIS’ mandate for the Institute’s students, three-quarters of their studies focused on mathematics, physics, chemistry, biology and astronomy. Bobby’s facility in science and math was uncanny. The Institute’s teachers and his professors at MIT and Harvard had never encountered a child or, for that matter, any student, who could conceptualize as Bobby could. His agility in the realm of abstract reasoning confounded them. He was a transcendental thinker, and his intellectual powers appeared to be growing with each passing month. His mind moved at a fantastic speed, sorting through, tossing out and deleting what he considered redundant information as he coalesced the essence of a problem. He became increasingly interested in the inter-relationships between the various sciences, and by nine years of age, expressed the view that all divisions among the sciences were artificial, and that mathematics should be the common language to express all scientific phenomena. The problem he said was that the vocabulary of mathematics had not yet been developed sufficiently to become the unifying bridge between the disciplines.

But just as Bobby’s intellectual vision was intensifying, so were his demons. Within his first few weeks at the Institute, he had to be moved to private dormitory quarters because his fitful cries at night scared the children he was rooming with. Dean Vanderslice had him placed in a two-bedroom apartment, and the second bedroom was manned each night by a volunteer from a circle of grad students who were assisting at the Institute. When Bobby ran to the other bedroom sweaty and wild-eyed with fear, there was someone to calm him down. On a good night, he would get six hours of sleep, but when the nightmares were particularly bad, three would be all that he could sustain. Despite this, Bobby’s energy level was prodigious. As for the trances, they usually took place in the computer lab as Bobby was feverishly engrossed in writing programs, and designing proofs for theorems. As had been the case since he was three years old, without warning, Bobby would just drift off. He would no longer be present—sometimes for as little as ten minutes, often for closer to an hour. The same thing happened in the planetarium with regularity. When Bobby would finally surface, he seemed refreshed and would plow-back into his work reinvigorated as if nothing had happened.

Bobby had a weekly appointment with the Institute’s psychiatrist, Dr. Riaz Verjee. Verjee was under explicit instructions from Uhlman to refrain from prescribing any drugs to Bobby or engaging in hypnosis, regressive therapy, or any other form of deep analysis, so Bobby and Verjee usually spent the hour playing chess. Director Varneys had made it clear to Uhlman that he wanted nothing done that could possibly impinge on Bobby’s lucidity or dull his intellect, and he didn’t want to risk any form of analysis that could have negative ramifications. So all Verjee did was to monitor Bobby’s situation and talk to him in general terms. Verjee vehemently disagreed with this passive approach, and told Uhlman, “The boy is a time-bomb. The fuse is burning and you’re not letting me do anything.”

Uhlman was unequivocal. “Robert’s mind is a finely tuned mechanism that we don’t understand at all. We can’t risk polluting it. Meds are problematic enough on ordinary people, and I’m not going to involve him in an analytic therapy that might open a pandora’s box in his head. You’re not aware of it—and you don’t need to know the details, but this child has a dark history.”

11

T
he sun reflected off the hard packed snow on the side of the highway. Peter sipped coffee from his travel mug as he steered the old Toyota Corolla while Edith passed him a donut.

Edith was beaming. “Bobby’s going to be so surprised to see us.”

Peter smiled as he accelerated to pass a slower car, his head bobbing to the country music on the radio.

Edith’s eyes sparkled. “He’s doing so well at the Institute. I guess we made the right decision after all.”

His mouth too full of donuts and coffee to respond, Peter nodded his head enthusiastically as he navigated the car around a bend in the road.

Edith patted Peter’s knee. She loved to see him so happy and relaxed. He glanced over and smiled.