Chapter 211: The Widow: My Husband's IQ is 180, Higher than Einstein's! Jane: Hahaha!
"Are you terminally ill?"
Jane was speechless for a while before asking with concern, "Or do you have some incurable disease? Is your husband the cause?"
"Neither."
The heavyset woman shook her head. "I forgot to introduce myself. My name is Linda Kloster, and my husband is Patrick Kloster."
Seeing that Chuck and Jane didn't react at all, unlike others who would either recognize the name or vaguely know the surname, she added, "He's a chess grandmaster."
Jane immediately looked at Chuck.
"Never heard of him."
Chuck understood what she meant and shook his head.
"He's a chess grandmaster, a world champion."
The heavyset woman, Linda, elaborated.
"You really haven't heard of him?"
Jane couldn't help but stare at Chuck, confirming with her eyes. They had just been talking about chess, and she knew Chuck loved playing chess.
"I told you, I've never competed against a professional chess player,"
Chuck said. "And he's American."
"So?"
Jane asked, puzzled.
"America doesn't produce true chess grandmasters,"
Chuck stated bluntly.
"Patrick is a true chess grandmaster,"
the heavyset Linda couldn't help but defend her husband. "He won an international championship." Even though her husband wanted to kill her now, her status was tied to that title and to being his wife, and she didn't like others denying it.
"Is his rating above 2800?"
Chuck asked, looking at her.
"..."
The heavyset Linda was speechless. As the wife of a world chess champion, she knew a little about chess.
The rating system, created by the Hungarian-American physicist Arpad Elo, is a method for evaluating various competitive games, used in chess, basketball, football, and other fields. It's based on statistical assessment and is considered relatively fair and objective.
The higher the rating, the more skilled the player theoretically is. International titles are also determined by ratings; a chess rating above 2500 is considered a grandmaster!
A rating of 2400-2499 qualifies one as an International Master.
A rating of 2300-2399 qualifies one as a FIDE Master.
While International Grandmaster is the highest title, it's not uncommon; it only requires meeting one of two conditions: participating in any World Championship Challenger Match, or having an International Master or FIDE Master achieve Grandmaster norms twice or more in a tournament with a total of at least 24 games, and possessing an International rating of at least 2450.
However, after reaching International Grandmaster, advancing to the next level—from a rating exceeding 2500 to exceeding 2800—is incredibly difficult.
Looking at the rating system, FIDE Master, International Master, and Grandmaster are all very close, differing by only 100 points. Yet, the historically significant 2800 rating is a full 300 points higher than the 2500-point International Grandmaster title!
This might not be as high as climbing Mount Everest, but it's not far off.
To date, only three players have achieved a chess rating above 2800: Garry Kasparov, Vladimir Kramnik, and Veselin Topalov.
Two of these are Russian, and one is Bulgarian with close ties to the Russian chess tradition; none are American. This gives an idea of the dominance Russians and former Soviet players held in the chess world during and after the Cold War.
At that time, defeating a group of Soviet and Russian players of "legendary" status was virtually impossible, akin to the intimidating shadow cast by certain dominant sports dynasties—like trying to beat the USSR hockey team in their prime, or the Dream Team in basketball.
Every American victory was a historic triumph, made into movies and celebrated, as if history had been completely changed from that moment... but it hadn't.
Even the best players have off days, losing or drawing. An occasional loss doesn't decisively affect the overall rating.
They'll still win when they're supposed to win, and lose when they're supposed to lose!
If it weren't for the prestige involved and national pride, the West, with its complete control of media narratives in later generations, would probably have found some excuse to downplay chess as a competitive sport long ago.
Hmm.
Even if the rules were changed, winning would be virtually impossible. It's a pure intellectual competition; the outcome is obvious. Trying to game the system is too difficult. Anyone with common sense wouldn't fall for it. If you can't win, just stop paying attention. As long as it's not publicized, out of sight means out of mind.
Chuck didn't pay attention to professional chess players or American chess grandmasters; the only ones he knew were these three historically supreme players.
"His IQ is 180, higher than Einstein's!"
the voluptuous Linda emphasized.
"Wait."
Jane suddenly stopped Linda. "Let me get this straight. The reason you think you're doomed is because your husband is a chess grandmaster. He's incredibly intelligent and says he has a perfect plan to kill you. You believe he absolutely has that ability?"
"Yes!"
The heavyset Linda nodded. "He's a chess grandmaster and world champion. He can see through my every move. I can't even hide because he can find me in two minutes. If he says he'll kill me, he definitely can."
"Ha."
Jane leaned back in her chair, a relaxed expression on her face.
"What's so funny?"
The heavyset Linda exclaimed excitedly. "You don't know how terrifying Patrick is. Every day he tells me he's going to kill me and he has a perfect plan. Before going to sleep, he says, 'Goodnight, darling, your days are numbered.' He even bought me a ten million dollar insurance policy."
As she said this, she couldn't hold back anymore and burst into tears of fear.
"Sorry, sorry."
Jane quickly handed her a tissue, apologizing as she explained, "I wasn't laughing because it was funny, but because I was happy you're not going to die!"
"How so?"
The heavyset woman, Linda, wiped away her tears and looked at Jane, waiting for an explanation.
"Because your husband's IQ of 180, higher than Einstein's, does seem very impressive."
Jane laughed and said, "But that depends on who he's up against. I have some good news for you. Detective Chuck also loves to play chess. He regularly makes Sheldon cry, and Sheldon's IQ is 187!"
"..."
The heavyset woman, Linda, paused mid-wipe, exclaiming incredulously, "Is this true?"
She wasn't foolish enough to fixate on the "young" in Sheldon's description, because in the world of chess, there's no shortage of child prodigies. There are even teenagers who win world championships, let alone someone with an IQ of 187—seven points higher than her terrifyingly intelligent husband!
And this super genius was actually brought to tears by Detective Chuck... This was indeed good news!
"Chuck, tell her!"
Jane said with amusement.
"IQ scores have some reference value, but they don't mean everything,"
Chuck shook his head. "Otherwise, any competition would be over after a simple IQ test."
The heavyset woman, Linda, couldn't help but wipe away tears again.
"...Chuck!"
Jane's lips twitched, and she raised her voice.
What she needed was for Chuck to comfort Linda, who was facing the fear of death, not to deliver a clinical analysis!
"Don't be afraid,"
Chuck said bluntly. "Although IQ scores don't mean everything, and I've never met your husband, I know he's actually not smart at all; in fact, he's quite stupid. That's good news for you."
"He's not smart, and he's stupid?"
The heavyset woman, Linda, didn't know whether to continue crying or force a bitter smile.
"Yes,"
Chuck nodded. "A truly intelligent person wouldn't constantly reveal their plans beforehand, giving you an opportunity to break the deadlock.
First, your reluctance to call the police is clearly related to your alcohol-induced mental state. He can claim it's all your imagination, making the police disbelieve you.
But even if they don't believe you, it will still be a significant point of suspicion after your death. After all, it's a ten million dollar insurance policy; the motive for murder is too obvious. Even if the police don't investigate thoroughly, the insurance company will send investigators to conduct a complete investigation. These are all risks that could be completely avoided. A smart person wouldn't do something so foolish.
Besides, you said he talks about it every day, so you had every opportunity to secretly record it as evidence!
I know you'll say he can see right through you, so even if you wanted to secretly record it, you wouldn't succeed.
That's fine too.
Since you've come to ask for help with the determination to die, wouldn't it be wiser to record a video beforehand and explain everything you know about the situation?
A perfect plan is to make your death appear accidental. With this video, those seeking justice for you can use it to apply for all necessary measures, including a full autopsy and a thorough investigation.
Otherwise, if it just looks like an ordinary accidental death, even a full autopsy would be difficult to obtain approval, and your death would be meaningless.
Not to mention that he tells you every night before bed that you don't have much time left—that's incredibly foolish!
Perhaps in his eyes, you're a pawn he can manipulate at will, but this is the real world, not a chessboard!
Pieces on a chessboard must follow various rules and can only move according to the player's wishes, but not in the real world.
People have a survival instinct. You may seem 'extremely passive and helpless' to him, but you're not without a chance to fight back. On the contrary, given your alcoholism and desperate will to survive, you actually have a high probability of killing him first.
He doesn't even consider this, yet he whispers in your ear every day that he wants to kill you—isn't that utterly foolish!"
"..."
The heavyset Linda was so stunned by Chuck's words that she forgot to cry. What seemed like the end of the world to her was now a laughable absurdity in Chuck's eyes.
"Heh."
Jane, standing to the side, glanced at Chuck and slightly raised her chin, saying to Linda, "Actually, these aren't his most foolish mistakes. His most foolish mistake is that, knowing Detective Chuck was around, he still dared to have the thought of killing his wife!"
Seeing that she had captured Linda's attention, Jane continued to explain, "Although I don't know much about chess, I've heard Leonard say that after four moves, there are over 300 billion choices and variations. After 40 moves, the possibilities to consider exceed the number of atoms in the observable universe. And now you've only made one move, yet you already have infinite possibilities because you found Detective Chuck and made the most crucial and correct move!"
"Really?"
Linda suddenly felt a strong renewed hope for life and couldn't help but look at Chuck.
"The reason your husband sees through you is because you have too few variables,"
Chuck said calmly. "He can predict your next move without even thinking. The fact that you came to me means either this variable is sudden, a butterfly effect he hadn't considered, or it was intentional. Either way, from this moment on, the game is no longer under his control."
"Intentional?"
Jane was stunned, then said incredulously, "Is it another arrogant fool wanting to challenge you?"
This triggered memories of the previous case. That guy with the ponytail, Gold, thought himself clever. He was just an ordinary artist, yet he insisted on taking risks, resulting in even the East Coast's top criminal lawyer failing to save him.
Could it be that this chess grandmaster and world champion was too bored with life? Even knowing Detective Chuck's name and guessing that his wife might see the news and seek help from Detective Chuck, who had just successfully solved a bizarre wife-murder case, he still wanted to take action, using his wife as a pawn to play a more exciting 'chess game' with Detective Chuck remotely?
The more she thought about it, the more likely it seemed!
During this time, she had been passively absorbing some strange and unsettling theories from Monica.
For example, the line between genius and madness was very thin, and that super geniuses all had some degree of mental illness, and those around them also had some degree of psychological issues, so their behavior seemed normal within that context, blah blah blah...
She used to scoff at these theories, but now she was starting to have some doubts. And with this case that had come knocking at their door, rather than believing that a super-genius chess grandmaster was a complete fool, she was more inclined to think that he was crazy and arrogant, genuinely wanting to play a real intellectual game of chess with Chuck.
"What should we do now?"
The heavyset woman, Linda, felt a headache coming on after a moment's thought and asked directly.
"That depends on your plans,"
Chuck said. "If you want me to seek justice for you afterward, just record a video explaining the whole story and then you don't need to worry about it anymore. After you die, I will seek justice for you and bring him to justice."
"..."
Both the heavyset woman Linda and Jane were speechless. Jane said irritably, "Linda didn't know her options before, but now that she does, she definitely won't choose to have justice sought after her death; she wants to live!"
"Yes,"
the heavyset woman Linda smiled bitterly. "If you can live, who would want to die?"
"If you choose to live, then it'll be a bit more complicated."
Chuck said, "First, ensure your safety and prevent any 'accidents.' You need to leave the area he knows and can control immediately. It's best to record a video and then find a safe house to stay in right away. I guarantee he can't find you in two minutes, let alone engineer an accident."
"But I can't keep hiding!"
the heavyset woman Linda asked the crucial question. "I have to come back to live my life eventually, and you can't protect me forever. With Patrick's intelligence, he could easily kill me in an 'accident.'"
"That's the next step,"
Chuck said calmly. "I will find him, play a game of chess with him, defeat him, and make him understand that in his area of expertise, he loses the moment he makes his first move. Shatter his confidence and completely dispel any thoughts he has of taking such risks."
"Just like you did with Sheldon!"
Jane exclaimed, her eyes shining. "Just by looking at him, you made Sheldon too afraid to even touch a chess piece!"
Although Chuck's confidence sometimes shocked her, most of the time, she found him incredibly attractive!
(End of Chapter)
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