Chapter Text
For months now, police officers across the nation had been wondering: What had happened to Idaville?
Idaville looked like many other beautiful seaside towns its size. It had lovely white beaches, churches, and a synagogue. It had two delicatessens, three movie theaters, and four banks.
Idaville, however, only looked like other towns. For nine years now, nobody, grown-up or child, had gotten away with breaking the law.
Police officers from Maine to Hawaii respected the police force of Idaville. They especially respected its chief of police, Chief Brown. They thought that he must be the smartest police chief in the country, perhaps the world.
Chief Brown was a fine man. He was smart and brave. His officers were smart and brave. But Chief Brown knew that he was not the only reason for Idaville's spotless record. And the hardest cases were not solved in police headquarters—a stunning new glass-and-granite building downtown, built to honor the impeccable record of Idaville's finest—but in the Browns' red brick house on Rover Avenue.
The real brains behind Idaville's crime crackdown was his son, eighteen-year-old Encyclopedia.
Over dinner, Chief Brown would tell Encyclopedia about the latest case that was puzzling him. Encyclopedia would solve the case before dessert. He usually needed to ask only one question.
Chief Brown would have liked to honor Encyclopedia with his own glass-and-granite building. He would have liked the statue in the lobby to be one of his son, spitting water from his carved ceramic mouth. (Instead, it was a statue Chief Brown thought was supposed to be J. Edgar Hoover.)
But who would believe him?
Who would believe that his finest case-cracker couldn't even drink legally—and, Chief Brown was quite sure, never had?
So Chief Brown said nothing.
Encyclopedia, for his part, had rarely said anything about the help he gave his father. Only his best friend and junior partner, Sally Kimball, knew without him having to say. He had never wanted to seem different from the other fifth—or sixth, seventh, tenth, twelfth—graders.
But there was nothing he could do about his nickname. He was stuck with it.
Only his parents and teachers called him by his real name, Leroy. Everyone else in Idaville called him Encyclopedia.
An encyclopedia is a book or set of books filled with facts from A to Z. Encyclopedia's brain was like an encyclopedia. He had read more books than anyone else in Idaville, and he never forgot what he read. His friends said he was better than a library. He didn't shut down fifteen minutes before bedtime (although sometimes Mrs. Brown told them not to call so late).
For eight years now, Chief Brown had been taking his toughest cases home to his soup and his son.
But now Encyclopedia was eighteen years old, a young man, two months into his freshman year of college at Massachusetts Institute of Technology. His emails home were filled with paragraphs about his classes and his new friends, the clubs he had joined and the food they ordered late at night. He assured them that he was brushing his teeth, checking the balance in his bank account, and looking both ways before he crossed four lanes of traffic and the T tracks. He wrote of Maslow's hierarchy of needs, English composition, and vector calculus, not questions about his father's cases.
For his part, Chief Brown was trying not to worry his son. Encyclopedia deserved to have a good time in college. The Idaville police force had survived, and would continue to survive, without him.
They were surviving. But they were no longer excelling. Sometimes it took them weeks, even a month, to solve a single case. His officers were discouraged. For nine years, they had begun to expect and then assume that Chief Brown would have all the answers. Chief Brown and Mrs. Brown had kept their secret too well.
Sometimes, after a particularly late night, Chief Brown would stop in the hall outside his son's room and look in at the perfectly tidy desk, rug, twin bed. Encyclopedia had always kept his room neat, but it felt different now. It felt sterile, as if the room were hermetically sealed and waiting for Encyclopedia to come home.
Chief Brown felt that he was waiting too.
He decided to send his son an email that night.
*
October in Massachusetts was cold. Encyclopedia Brown supposed he should have known to expect this, but he was surprised each morning when he left his dorm room. He had had to buy another sweater and his first pair of gloves.
His roommate—a huge, hulking redhead who had grown up in Maine and towered over him by five inches—laughed at him every morning when he mentioned how cold it was. "You southerners," was one of his favorite taunts, which he alternated indiscriminately with, "You sound like a little old lady."
Buck Boorington would not have been his first choice for a roommate. Encyclopedia had realized that the instant they met over the mountain of unpacked bags in the middle of their too-small dorm room. He had already lined up his books on a windowsill and was trying to calculate the most efficient method of putting all his clothes in the closet and drawers. Buck carried up yet another load of what looked like enough Ramen noodles, beef jerky, and beer to feed an entire football division and dumped it in the middle of the room. The bottles clinked musically. "Hey," Buck had grunted, as if noticing him for the first time. "Name's Buck."
"Buck?" Encyclopedia had repeated, taking his hand. "Is that short for something?"
"Butch Boorington, Junior." Buck had thrust his chin out proudly. "Named for my dad, so they call me Buck."
"Buck," Encyclopedia repeated again. "Nice to meet you."
Buck rolled his eyes. "Yeah, whatever." He studied the neat row of books behind Encyclopedia's laptop on the windowsill. "What's your name, Mr. Brain?"
Encyclopedia was reminded powerfully of Bugs Meany (who, he was pretty sure, was going to fail out of the University of Florida this year, his third on academic probation. He had made Sally promise to keep an eye on Bugs once she got to campus. Sally had groaned and punched one fist into the other palm. "It's bad enough, Encyclopedia," she had said, "that you're going to MIT, and I'm going to the same school as Bugs Meany."
"You should go somewhere else," Encyclopedia had said. "Somewhere out of state."
Sally had sighed impatiently. "It's not the same for me, Encyclopedia. You know that. I can't go that far away. Money's tight.").
Buck looked at him expectantly. Encyclopedia had cleared his throat. "Call me Leroy."
*
And now, two months later, he was still getting used to being Leroy. It was true that his teachers had always called him by his full name, so it wasn't strange to be called Leroy in class. Nor was it strange to be called Mr. Brown, by the professors who were more formal—his father, after all, had always been Chief Brown.
But it was strange to hear his friends shouting out, "Leroy, man!" in casual situations, like on the street or in the Stratton Student Center or at a party, over a keg. It made him feel even less like Encyclopedia Brown.
He wasn't the only one, he knew. His friend Joe, the first time they met in calc, introduced himself as "Please call me Joe." He was Joseph Brochard III, and it turned out he'd been called Josie all his life, a nickname he was only too happy to drop now that Joseph (his dad) and Joe (his grandfather) were no longer around. And Rod had been called by his middle name all his life, and was sick of being one of eight Michaels in a classroom. Lots of people changed when they went to college. Lots of people tried out something different. But it was still hard to get used to.
Which was why, after a meeting of the Undergraduate Mathematics Association and an abnormally tasteless dinner at Ashdown, Leroy was glad to get back to his room and wake his laptop. He was even gladder to see that Buck wasn't around and that he had an email from his father.
From: chiefbrown@idavillepd.org
To: ldbrown@mit.edu
CC: formerenglishteacher@gmail.com
Date: Tue, Oct 5, 3:32 PM
Subject: The Case of the Burglarized Books
Mailed by: holmes.idavillepd.org
Leroy,
I hope you are well and continuing to work hard in your classes. In your last email you mentioned that you think your psychology class is giving you more insight into the reasons why criminals fail to complete well-thought-out plans yet successfully commit spur-of-the-moment crimes. Care to elaborate?
Your mother and I miss you and are looking forward to seeing you at Thanksgiving.
I was hoping you might be able to take time away from your studies and help me with a case. Last Wednesday, Officer McDonald and I responded to a call at Donny's Books. Mr. Rose, the owner, contacted us to report a robbery. When Officer McDonald and I arrived, we found the store and Mr. Rose unharmed, but several dozen books had been stolen. In addition, three very valuable first editions of classic novels, which were on loan to Mr. Rose for a special display, had been taken. Nothing else was damaged or harmed.
Leroy knew which bookstore his father meant. Donny's Books was a new bookstore downtown that had opened only a year ago. They sold both new and used books and had a much bigger selection than any other bookstore in town. At the same time, though, Mr. Rose went out of his way to make the store seem homey and welcoming. He had hung a little silver bell on the front door and had a station for free coffee and tea in the back corner. When the bakery next door had day-old goods, they donated them to Mr. Rose and he set them out with the coffee.
Mr. Rose said that he had been alone in the store that day. He has two assistants, but neither of them works on Wednesdays. Mr. Rose was in the front of the store, cleaning. He unlocked the glass display case where he was keeping the rare books so that he could dust it. He had his back to the door. He didn't hear anything, but he realized that someone was in the store with him. He felt someone poke him in the back with a gun.
The robber told him not to turn around. He guided Mr. Rose at gunpoint behind the front counter, blindfolded him, made him kneel down, and tied his wrists and ankles with heavy twine. Then he went back to the front of the store. Mr. Rose thinks there were at least two robbers. He heard them loading books into boxes.
Mr. Rose was not sure how long he was tied up. He said he had heard nothing but silence for a long time, but he was afraid to move in case the robbers were still in the store. Once he thought he was safe, he managed to work the twine loose. It was several hours before he got free and could call the police.
There are no security cameras on Broad Street outside the store. Mr. Rose has security cameras on the inside of the store, and he gave me the tapes. However, the feed cuts out about fifteen minutes before the robbery. Because of this, Mr. Rose thinks it might be one of his employees. We are checking out both his assistants, but have not been able to find out anything definite yet.
Dad
P.S. I took Officer McDonald on a stakeout recently. He did much better this time.
Leroy read his father's email twice, then closed it and went back to his inbox. There was also an email from his mother.
From: formerenglishteacher@gmail.com
To: ldbrown@mit.edu
CC:
Date: Tue, Oct 5, 5:14 PM
Subject: Re: The Case of the Burglarized Books
Mailed by: gmail.com
Your father hasn't eaten his soup in three days. I am getting tired of taking it out of the fridge and reheating it. Please give him a hand. I love you.
Mom
Leroy reopened his father's message, sat back in his desk chair, and closed his eyes. He always closed his eyes when he did his hardest thinking.
After a minute he opened them and hit Reply.
From: ldbrown@mit.edu
To: chiefbrown@idavillepd.org
CC: formerenglishteacher@gmail.com
Date: Tue, Oct 5, 7:46 PM
Subject: One question
Mailed by: outgoing.mit.edu
Are there any other exits to Donny's Books, besides the front door?
In the morning he checked his email before he went off to his first class.
From: chiefbrown@idavillepd.org
To: ldbrown@mit.edu
CC: formerenglishteacher@gmail.com
Date: Wed, Oct 6, 5:08 AM
Subject: Re: One question
Mailed by: holmes.idavillepd.org
Leroy,
There are two emergency exits—these are required by law, for fire safety reasons—but both sound an alarm if you open the door. Mr. Rose does not believe that the robbers left that way.
Leroy glanced at the clock on his computer. He had just enough time to write an email before he had to leave for class.
From: ldbrown@mit.edu
To: chiefbrown@idavillepd.org
CC: formerenglishteacher@gmail.com
Date: Wed, Oct 6, 7:26 AM
Subject: One question
Mailed by: outgoing.mit.edu
Don't believe anything Mr. Rose says, Dad. He knows exactly who the robber is!
Who was the robber?
(Scroll down for the solution to The Case of the Bogus Bookseller.)
Solution to The Case of the Bogus Bookseller
The robber was Mr. Rose, the owner of Donny's Books. Encyclopedia knew as soon as he read his father's notes that he was lying.
Mr. Rose said that the robbers tied and blindfolded him. To embellish his story, he said that he was so scared that he was afraid to move for several hours, until the store was completely silent. That explained why he hadn't called the police right away.
Impossible!
Mr. Rose had hung a bell on the front door of his store, remember? He would have heard the bell ring when the robbers opened the door and left. And the robbers could not have left by the emergency exits, which had alarms.
Armed with Encyclopedia's knowledge, Chief Brown checked out Mr. Rose. He found that Donny's Books was in financial trouble. Mr. Rose had stolen the books, planning to sell them to recoup some of his losses.
Mr. Rose was fined for filing a false police report. Chief Brown recovered the rare books.