Chapter 3 #2
But she wasn’t done. “It’s all going to seem very confusing. These people, they might not even seem nice to you. But none of that matters. You have to show them the very best that you are. How smart you are, how perceptive, how aware.”
He felt that final word echo through his brain. Aware. He liked the power she gave it. The intensity of her gaze, the fierce protective nature that he could almost taste.
“Will you do that for me, child?”
“Yes.” He wanted to say he would do anything to make her pleased with him. But she was already up and exiting the car.
The lettering over the entrance read, “UNC-Greenville Child Care and Development Center.” The lobby was very big and the walls were covered with photographs of happy children and paintings of rainbows and animals and trees and lakes and sunlight.
Even so, Colin felt a vague unease, as if a secret whispered in the cold air-conditioning, something dark and hidden behind a hall of closed doors.
Celeste must have noticed his unease because she took a firmer hold of his hand and said, “Remember what I told you.”
They took the elevator to the fourth floor. A man in a white doctor’s coat stood in the hallway, his arms crossed around a bulky file. He looked askance at Colin, as if he could not bring him into focus. “Really, Celeste? Really?”
The woman released Colin’s hand, but only so she could move in close to the doctor.
She kept moving forward until she would have collided with him had he not stepped back.
Whatever he saw in Celeste’s gaze brought him to a state of rigid uncertainty.
She remained there, glaring at him, as she said, “Colin, say hello to Dr. Arnold.”
“Hello.”
“Hi … Colin, right?” He cleared his throat and stepped around the big woman. “Why don’t we get started?”
But she wasn’t done. She slapped his chest with the file she had brought, a sharp sound like hands clapping. “The only reason I put up with your attitude is because you’re working part-time at the academy.”
“Celeste …”
“Yes, I know your focus is adolescents. Yes, I know he is six years old. And I’m telling you, look closely and tell me whether his age matters even one little bit.”
Celeste locked him with her gaze. When she finally turned around, she knelt in front of Colin. “You won’t see me. But I’ll be right there.”
Colin wished he could hug her. “Okay.”
She must have found what she sought in his gaze. Because she rose and turned back to the doctor. “This is as serious as serious can be.”
“Sure, Celeste. Okay.”
“If you don’t think you can handle this, if you can’t take this seriously, you just let me know. I’ll inform the director, see if we can’t—”
“Celeste, I’m telling you I’ve got this.”
“All right, then.”
He watched the big woman walk down the hall, knock on a door, and enter. Then he turned to Colin. “Come with me.”
The room was almost completely featureless.
The walls and table and chairs were all a vague off-white.
The ceiling was tiled in white blocks that were perforated with little holes.
The lighting came from long white fluorescent bulbs with metal strips forming a checkerboard pattern.
The wall to Colin’s right held a long mirror, tall and framed in wood painted the same color as the walls.
Each corner of the room held a small black bulb.
Colin thought they were probably cameras.
Dr. Arnold seated himself across the table from Colin and set the two files unopened on the surface between them. “Do you have any questions before we begin?”
He could hear a tight undercurrent to the man’s voice.
Colin had learned early and well to detect such elements.
At home, this hidden rage could be very dangerous.
It usually marked the time when he did his best to melt away.
Even if it meant missing a meal. But Colin remembered everything Celeste had said, and did his best to erase the fear.
Colin asked, “Is Arnold your first name or your last?”
The man in his white coat was younger than Celeste and had tanned skin. He looked very fit. Not strong like Colin’s father. But athletic just the same. “Arnold is my first name. My last name is Weinbrandt. Can you spell that, Colin?”
He could because he had seen it before. A deputy sheriff on his father’s force had the same name. Colin had seen the badge when the deputy drove Roger Eames back from the cop bar and helped him up the home’s front steps. Colin spelled it, making sure to put the d before the t.
As he opened one of the files, Arnold Weinbrandt watched Colin. “How old are you precisely?”
The way he emphasized that last word, precisely, seemed important. “What time is it?”
Arnold glanced at his watch. “Eleven-seventeen.”
“Six years and four weeks and seven hours and twelve minutes.”
Arnold studied Colin as he shifted pages. “Six years and four weeks and seven hours and twelve minutes. How many seconds does that make?”
Colin found it easy to look at the man while he calculated.
Arnold Weinbrandt seemed so impersonal. So disconnected.
There was no danger here. He knew Celeste was worried about something.
Something that had to do with him. But he also knew he was safe here.
“Sixty thousand nine hundred and fifteen.”
Arnold drew out his phone, tapped swiftly, glanced at Colin, then took a pen from his shirt pocket and made swift notes. Then he opened the second file and took out a sheaf of papers inside a smaller plastic sleeve. “I want to give you a test of logic. Do you know that word?”
“Yes.”
“Define it, please.”
“The computer logic or the other, I don’t know what that one is called.”
Something in the way he answered eased the hard glint in Arnold’s eyes. “It’s called the philosophical definition.”
“‘Reasoning conducted or assessed according to strict principles of validity.’”
“Where did you read that?”
“The Webster dictionary. We have one at home.”
“Do you know what those words mean?”
He nodded. He had looked them all up. “It means figuring out the solution of a problem based on evidence. Nothing else. Not how much you want it to be one way or another. Not the way you hope things will be. Just evidence. Lining it all up in the right order and then accepting the answer. The only answer.”
Arnold turned and stared at the mirror for a long moment. Then, “Tell me why that interests you.”
“It’s a way to test everything. Look away from the confusion. Find what is really there. Find the real answer.” He didn’t know if he had said what he should, but he thought he found a hint of something new in Arnold’s gaze. Almost a smile. But one that came nowhere close to his mouth.
“There are three basic kinds of logical reasoning. You understand those two words together, yes? Good. These are deductive, inductive, and abductive. Have you heard these before? No? Can you say them back to me?”
“Deductive, inductive, abductive.”
“Good. Deductive reasoning is where the conclusion is guaranteed. A general rule combined with solid evidence leads to one specific conclusion. Inductive is where the conclusion is probable, not certain. Abductive reasoning begins with an incomplete set of observations and proposes a set of likely solutions.” As he spoke, Arnold lay out a series of pages.
Each one held drawings. “We are going to apply inductive reasoning to geometric designs. I want you to study each of these. Take as long as you need. When you are ready, I want you to tell me what is the one aspect that all of these designs share.”
Colin knew the answer before Arnold finished speaking. “I’m ready.”
“Don’t speak until you’re absolutely certain—”
“They all share something that’s not there.”
This time, the doctor rocked all the way back in his seat. The chair squeaked softly as the legs shifted on the cement floor. He looked at the mirror again. “What is the missing aspect?”
“An isosceles triangle.” He took his time and said the hard word as best he could. Isosceles.
Arnold kept his gaze on the mirror and said, “You were right and I was wrong.”
Colin figured he was speaking to whoever was on the other side of the glass, so he did not reply.
Arnold turned back to him, studied Colin a long moment, and then said, “Okay. We’re going to shift gears. Ready?”
“Yes.”
“All right. From this point on, my aim is to identify your boundaries. There is nothing bad about giving me a wrong answer, or saying you don’t know something.
That is actually my goal here. I want to see how far you can take these elements of reasoning and deduction. Nothing more. Do you understand?”
“Yes.”
“You mustn’t be frightened or worried if you don’t know the answer. Just tell me, and I’ll explain things, and we’ll move on.”
“I’m not scared,” Colin replied. And he wasn’t. He was so excited it was hard to stay in his chair.
This time, the smile touched his entire face. “Then let’s begin.”