Life After Genius

by M. Ann Jacoby

  “What’re you saying, Mother, that I made it up?”

  “No, but perhaps you’re mistaken. Jewel never has had any sartorial sense. You probably mistook her frock for a nightgown.”

  “Yeah, right. And her fuzzy slippers were really high heels.”

  “All right, you two,” Mead’s dad says. “That’s enough. I agree with your mother. She seems fine. Now let’s just drop it.”

  “Why’re you taking her side, Dad? Why don’t you believe me? I don’t think she’s okay. I think she needs help.”

  “I’m not taking anyone’s side, Teddy.”

  “Yes, you are.”

  The kitchen door opens and Martin backs through it balancing four whiskey glasses in his two hands. Mead glares at his father and folds his arms over his chest, feeling betrayed by the one ally he thought he had in this house. He’s getting ready to throw down his napkin and make his all-too-common retreat to the sanctuary of his room when Jewel returns from the bathroom, a pair of swimming trunks dangling from her right hand, a red T-shirt from the left. “I found these in your bathroom,” she says, “hanging on the shower rod. How did they get here?”

  “I left them there,” Mead says and blushes as if his aunt were holding up a pair of his boxer shorts. “Sorry.”

  Jewel looks over at Martin. “These are Percy’s. They belong to our son.”

  “No,” Mead says. “I borrowed them from a friend.”

  “What friend?” his mother asks, as if shocked to learn that he might actually have one.

  “But they look just like Percy’s,” Jewel says.

  Martin takes the swimming trunks from her and dangles them accusingly in front of Mead’s face. “Where did you get these?”

  “I just told you,” he says. “A friend.”

  “What friend?” Martin says.

  “What difference does it make what friend?”

  “Just tell him, Teddy,” Mead’s dad says. And to everyone else in the room it probably sounds as if he is asking the question all cool and calm-like, but Mead can hear the undercurrent in his voice. An undercurrent of fed-uped-ness.

  “They belong to Hayley’s brother, Eric. Okay?”

  Martin tries to give the swimming trunks back to Mead but Aunt Jewel snatches them out of his hand. “Let go,” he says softly and has to peel away her fingers one at a time. “They aren’t Percy’s. Please let go.”

  Soon after this, they leave.

  As the front door clicks shut, Mead turns to his mother and says, “Yeah, right. I mistook her crappy dress for a bathrobe. Aunt Jewel is obviously fine. Perfectly fine.” He pulls back the curtain and watches his aunt and uncle amble to the car, Jewel’s face turned once more toward the night sky, her dream finally come true. She’s probably been flying around for months now. Ever since the accident. Taking in the sights as she passes over the mountain ranges of Asia, the jungles of South America, and the vast stretches of ocean in between. Flying above it all. Making her way slowly around the world like her hero, Amelia Earhart. But she isn’t flying solo; Percy is up there with her. “I’ve always wanted to go to China,” he says, “and walk along the Great Wall. I want to visit all Seven Wonders of the World. Then you can fly home, Mother, but not one minute sooner. We still have so much more to see together before you go home.”

  MEAD WAITS UNTIL AFTER HIS PARENTS have gone to bed, until all the lights in the house have been turned off, then waits a little longer. Then he crawls out of bed and down the hall and, with a flashlight pointed at the telephone, dials the number on the scrap of paper his mother gave him. He doesn’t want to talk to the professor; he just wants to confirm that the man is there. Up in Chicago and not down here in High Grove. Heat stroke. That is the only plausible explanation, the only one that makes any sense.

  The phone rings three times and then the professor’s voice comes over the line. “Hello?” he says, but Mead does not answer. Neither does he hang up. “Mead? Is that you?” Dr. Alexander says. “Are you all right?”

  “Why does everyone keep asking me that question?”

  “Because we’re worried about you. You’ve been under an immense amount of pressure. It’s a lot to ask of an eighteen-year-old boy to speak before a crowd of seasoned mathematicians. I told the dean that much but he wouldn’t listen.”

  “I trusted the wrong person.”

  “I was only looking out for your best interest, Mead.”

  “No, I’m not talking about you. Someone else.”

  “Who?”

  “Dr. Alexander, did you ever own a 1940 Buick sedan?”

  He laughs. “A long time ago, Mead, why do you ask?”

  “I’m going to take your advice.”

  “And what advice is that?”

  “To step back. I have to step back until I see a pattern in the chaos.”

  “When did I say that?”

  “Good night, Dr. Alexander,” Mead says and hangs up.

  8

  FLYING NONSTOP

  Chicago

  Three Months Before Graduation

  MEAD BOARDS THE CITY BUS and rides through the park, over the interstate, and into one of the outlying neighborhoods to his coffee shop. He takes a seat in a booth by the window and orders three buttermilk pancakes with two sunny-side-up eggs, two sausage links, and a glass of milk. Then he takes out a copy of American Mathematical Monthly, folds it open to an article on the Riemann Hypothesis, and begins to read.

  Mead has not had one good night’s sleep since his meeting with Dean Falconia at the beginning of the year, when the man assigned to him the task of writing his own paper on the Riemann Hypothesis as his senior thesis. The first thing Mead did upon leaving the dean’s office was go to Dr. Alexander’s office. But he wasn’t there so Mead headed over to his house. And they have spent nearly every waking hour since —collectively and separately —reading through old copies of American Mathematical Monthly and Mathematical Intelligencer that were archived in a dozen musty cardboard boxes in the professor’s basement in search of all the articles related in any way, shape, or manner to the Riemann Hypothesis.

  The waitress comes over and gives Mead a third refill on his milk. “Can I get you anything else, sweetie?”

  “Yes. A roast beef sandwich.”

  “I’m sorry, we don’t serve sandwiches before noon.”

  “That’s okay,” Mead says. “I don’t plan to eat it before noon.” He plans to take it back to the dorm for dinner since the cafeteria will be closed all week, what with everyone but Mead away on spring break.

  The waitress checks out the magazine he is reading, then looks at the napkin upon which he has calculated a couple more zeta zeros (by now he does it without thinking), then smiles and says, “I’ll see what I can do for you.”

  He is just finishing an article on the characteristic polynomials of matrices and the spacings between non-trivial zeros of the zeta function when Herman Weinstein slides into the booth across from him and slaps an airline ticket on the table. Mead is so startled that he chokes on his pancake and has to wash it down with a slug of milk. “How in the hell did you find me here?”

  Herman shrugs. “I followed you.” He pats the ticket. “Open it.”

  Mead does not have any interest in looking at Herman’s ticket. He could really care less where the guy is going during the break. Italy. Switzerland. Greece. Or with whom. Although it would hardly be a stretch of the imagination to guess that Cynthia will be joining him. What girl could possibly turn down a week spent sunbathing on the sandy beaches of south France? Not that any of that matters to Mead. Just so long as Herman is as far away from here as possible. That way Mead won’t have to worry that the guy is going to drop by for a chat in the middle of the night. That Herman will invite him out to the symphony one night only to snub him in class the next day and then act as if he doesn’t exist for an entire month only to pop up in a crosstown coffee shop and offer him an airline ticket. Mead would prefer not to waste any more of his valuable time wondering whet
her they are supposed to be friends this week or not, so he pushes the ticket back toward Herman, opens another math periodical, and says, “No, thank you.”

  The waitress comes over and asks Herman if he would like to order breakfast. He declines her offer, claiming he does not have time to eat, and orders two cups of coffee instead: one for himself and one for the limousine driver parked at the curb outside, then slips the waitress an extra couple dollars to carry it out to him. God forbid Herman Weinstein should ride a city bus. At least he won’t be staying long and Mead will soon be able to go back to doing what it was he was doing before he was so rudely interrupted.

  Herman empties two creamers into his cup of coffee and adds three spoonfuls of sugar. “Aren’t you even the slightest bit curious?” he asks.

  “I’m curious about a lot of things, Weinstein, like whether or not there is life on other planets and if we’d recognize it if we saw it. Like how a bird that migrates over a thousand miles every winter ends up nesting in the same tree every summer. Like how incredible it would be to come back a hundred years from now —a thousand years from now —and see what shape the planet is in. But where you are going over spring break? No, I’m not curious about that at all.”

  Herman leans across the table. “Do I detect a note of jealousy, Fegley?”

  “Don’t flatter yourself, Weinstein. It’s not very becoming.”

  He picks up the ticket. “Okay then, I’ll open it.” And he makes a grand show of removing the ticket from its sleeve, studying the contents. “Well, looky here, will you? It’s a round-trip ticket to Newark, New Jersey.”

  “New Jersey? Sounds like you got gypped, Weinstein.”

  “Yeah, you’re right. Here, why don’t you go in my place.” And again he offers the ticket to Mead. “Besides, your name’s already on it.”

  Mead puts down his fork and looks out the window. The limousine driver has gotten out of his vehicle to smoke a cigarette and drink the cup of coffee Herman bought him. “Are you kidnapping me, Weinstein?”

  “Ever heard of Bell Labs, Fegley? They’ve got this supercomputer there: the Cray X-MP. Fastest number cruncher made to date. Their researchers are being encouraged to run projects on it, to familiarize themselves with the algorithms appropriate to its architecture. And I thought, you know, it might be just the thing for someone studying the statistical properties of the zeta zeros, for someone who needs to compute huge quantities of numbers in a short period of time. You know, someone like you.” And he sits back with this smug expression on his face.

  He’s good. So good that it makes Mead nervous. Hair is standing up on the back of his neck. Warning him. A sense of danger in the air as palpable as humidity on a hot summer’s day. And yet he is tempted. More than tempted. He’s excited. Thrilled beyond belief that such an opportunity has fallen into his lap. This could be exactly what Mead has been looking for. The new findings he needs to write his paper for the dean. There’s nothing particularly original about the idea of gathering statistical information on the zeta zeros —several mathematicians have done so already —but none have generated the sheer quantity of zeros that a supercomputer could. Hundreds of thousands. Millions. Even hundreds of millions! A quantity far in excess of any computation made to date. Mead will not be able to definitively prove the Riemann Hypothesis this way but there is always the possibility that he will discover a single zeta zero that does not sit on the critical line, therefore definitively disproving the hypothesis. And even if that does not happen, the sheer quantity of zeros generated will alone offer up a substantial preponderance of evidence in favor of the hypothesis being true. Mead has done all the groundwork. He’s got the Riemann-Siegel formula imbedded in the back of his skull; all he needs to do is teach it to a supercomputer. So really, he has no choice. He has to go. If he were to let an opportunity such as this pass him by, why, it would be equivalent to admitting defeat. Mathematical suicide.

  He takes the ticket and checks the departure time. “This flight leaves,” Mead glances at his watch, “in two hours and forty minutes.”

  “So I guess you better hurry up and finish those pancakes.”

  Mead hands the ticket back to Herman. “I can’t do it. I can’t go. There’s no time to tell Dr. Alexander. I’d want him to come with me. And besides, I haven’t packed. My clothes are all back at the dorm. It’s just not possible. Forget it.”

  “I already thought of that.” Herman taps on the plate glass window. The limousine driver opens up the trunk and lifts out Mead’s green-and-blue plaid suitcase.

  IT IS AS IF MEAD HAS FALLEN into one of his mother’s dreams as he steps out of the limousine that picked him and Herman up at the airport, onto the doorstep of a castle. Well, it’s not actually a castle, it was just built to resemble one. All stone and turrets and arching doorways. It does not strike Mead as a place where a family lives. It’s too big. Too formidable. A feeling that only strengthens when Mead passes through the front door into the vestibule. His Uncle Martin would love this place. He could embalm bodies in the study and roll them into the living room to await burial. It’s that cold.

  A butler offers to take Mead’s jacket as if this were nineteenth-century England and not twentieth-century Princeton. Mead waves him away and says, “That’s all right, I won’t be staying long.”

  “Don’t be ridiculous,” Herman says, and takes off Mead’s jacket for him. “It’s late afternoon already. We won’t be going to the lab until tomorrow. Come, I’ll introduce you to my lovely mother.” And he hands the jacket to the butler, then grasps Mead by the shoulder and guides him into the adjoining room.

  But his mother isn’t lovely, not in any literal sense of the word. Herman must have gotten his good looks from his father. Mrs. Weinstein is more what you would call a handsome woman, her appearance more that of a portrait than a person. It’s the way she is dressed, all draped in cloth and bejeweled. And the way she is holding her body, all upright and shoulders back. And the way she is made up, all powder and hairspray. You’d have thought she was expecting the King of England and not just some friend of Herman’s from school. But the thing is she does kind of look like a female version of Herman. She has the same cocky set of her jaw and the same eyes that seem to look through you more than at you. Mead distrusts her on sight.

  “How very nice it is to meet you,” she says and extends her hand to Mead, who is not sure whether he is supposed to kiss it or shake it. He opts for the latter. Then she does the same thing to Herman —extends her hand —and he kisses it. Which just strikes Mead as wrong on so many levels.

  “Hermie’s told us so much about you,” Mrs. Weinstein says. “Please, have a seat. Would you like something to drink? Tea or coffee?”

  “Coke,” Mead says. “A Coke would be fine, thanks.” And he sits in the chair nearest the front door. He feels better knowing there is an exit nearby.

  As the butler strolls off to the kitchen to fill Mead’s order, Mrs. Weinstein settles onto a red velvet couch under an oil painting of herself seated in front of two men in tuxedos, one flanking each side of her. It must have been commissioned a couple of decades ago because the Mrs. Weinstein on the wall is much younger than the one on the couch. With only one chin and all of her own hair. But the same rope of pearls hangs around each neck; the same sausage legs are stuffed into identical sequined pumps. Even as a young woman, Mrs. Weinstein would have been prettier as a boy than a girl.

  “Hermie tells us that your father is a successful businessman,” Mrs. Weinstein says. “That he owns a chain of furniture stores across Illinois.”

  Mead looks over at “Hermie.” Since he has never spoken about his father with “Hermie,” he is wondering what exactly the guy knows and how he found out. Herman either didn’t get the whole story —from whomever he got it —or he has altered the facts by choice. “Not exactly,” Mead says. “The other two stores are owned and run by my father’s cousins. And they’re all within the same county. And, really, there isn’t that much money to be made
in furniture; the big bucks come from the funeral side of the business.”

  “Your father’s an undertaker?” Mrs. Weinstein says and raises her eyebrows.

  What is taking that butler so long? They probably don’t have any Coke in the house. Too provincial. The poor butler, or someone on the kitchen staff, probably had to run out and buy some. Shit. Mead should have just asked for a glass of milk.

  “Well, there’s no shame in that,” Mrs. Weinstein says, making it sound as if, indeed, there is. “No shame at all.”

  MEAD IS GIVEN A ROOM that overlooks a garden complete with gazebo and koi pond. The windows open inward, like doors, and reach all the way from the floor to the ten-foot ceiling. He is standing by the open window, thinking about how one might fashion a ladder out of brocade curtains to escape, when Herman comes in and flops down on the four-poster bed draped in damask cloth. Enough to qualify this room as a boudoir.

  “I was trying to make you look good, Fegley,” he says. “My mother didn’t need to hear all the gory details.”

  “And what exactly does your father do, Weinstein, to make enough money to support this place?” Mead says. “Where does it all come from?”

  “Glass bottles.”

  “Excuse me?”

  “My mother’s father made a killing in glass bottles. He sold them to every juice and baby food maker this side of the Mississippi. My father had nothing to do with it.”

  “So that’s what you’ll do after college? Sell glass bottles?”

  “Oh, the Weinsteins don’t make bottles anymore, Mead, we just sit on the board of directors and make money. You know, so we can spend our time pursuing more lofty enterprises. Like my father. He’s a Friend of the Institute for Advanced Study here in Princeton. He gives them a shitload of money and in return he gets to attend fireside chats and dine with intellectuals. It brings prestige to our family, so we can feel smart by association.”