 At length, he is befriended by the title character, Alan Mendelsohn, and is thereafter happier and more capable.When Alan starts a school-wide quarrel over his claim to Martian ancestry, both are suspended from school for one week; during which, they meet Samuel Klugarsh, the owner of an occult bookstore, who sells them a kit meant to enable telepathy and psychokinesis.Having acquired these abilities, Leonard and Alan become bored with the few uses thereof; whereupon Klugarsh lets Leonard and Alan trade their mind-control kits for a course in "Hyperstellar Archaeology"