The notes from Lester Bowie's saxophone filled the studio, cutting her off from everything else. Gently she ran the solvent-soaked cotton wool along Roger de Arras's profile, near his nose and mouth, and once more she immersed herself in her scrutiny of those lowered eyelids, the fine lines betraying slight wrinkles near his eyes, their gaze intent on the game. She gave her imagination free rein to pursue the echo of the ill-fated knight's thoughts. The scent of love and death hung over them, the way the steps of Fate hovered over the mysterious ballet performed by the black and white pieces on the squares of the chessboard, on his own coat of arms, pierced by an arrow from a crossbow. And in the half-light a tear glinted, a tear shed by a woman apparently absorbed in reading a book of hours (or was it the Poem of the Rose and the Knight, a tear shed by a silent shadow next to the window, recollecting days of sunlight and youth, of burnished metal and tapestries, recalling the firm footsteps on the flagstones of the Burgundy court of the noble-browed warrior, with his helmet under his arm, at the height of his strength and fame, the haughty ambassador from that other man, whom she was advised, for reasons of state, to marry. And the murmur of court ladies and the grave faces of courtiers, her own face blushing when his calm eyes met hers and when she heard his voice, tempered in many battles, full of that singular assurance found only in those who know what it is to cry out the name of God, their king or their lady as they ride into battle against an enemy. And the secret that lay in her heart in the years that followed. And the Silent Friend, her Final Companion, patiently sharpening his scythe, standing near the moat by the East Gate preparing to fire his crossbow.
The colours, the painting, the studio, the sombre music of the saxophone filling the room seemed to circle her. She stopped working and sat with her eyes closed, feeling dizzy, trying to breathe deeply, steadily, to shake off the momentary panic that had run through her when, confused by the perspective in the picture, she began to feel that she was actually inside the painting. It was as if the table and the players had suddenly shifted to her left and she had been thrust forward across the room reproduced in the painting, towards the window next to which Beatrice of Burgundy sat reading; as if she had only to lean out a little over the window ledge to see what lay below, at the bottom of the wall: the moat at the East Gate, where Roger de Arras had been shot in the back by an arrow.
It took her a while to regain her composure, and she only really did so when she lit a match and held it to the cigarette she had in her mouth. She found it hard to hold the match steady, for her hand was trembling as if she'd just touched the face of Death.
"It's a chess club," César said as they went up the steps. "The Capablanca Club."
"Capablanca?" Julia looked warily through the open door. She could see tables inside with men leaning over and spectators grouped around them.
"José Raúl Capablanca," César said, by way of explanation, clasping his walking stick beneath one arm as he removed his hat and gloves. "Some people say he was the best player ever. There are clubs and tournaments named after him all over the world."
They went in. The club consisted of three large rooms, filled by a dozen tables, at almost every one of which a game was in progress. There was an odd buzz, neither noise nor silence, but a sort of gentle, contained murmur, slightly solemn, like the sound of people filling a church. A few players and spectators looked at Julia with incredulity or disapproval. The membership was exclusively male. The place smelled of cigarette smoke and old wood.
"Don't women ever play chess?" asked Julia.
César offered her his arm before they went in.
"I hadn't really thought about it, to be honest," he said. "But they obviously don't play here. Perhaps they play at home, between the darning and the cooking."
"Male chauvinist!"
"Hardly an appropriate epithet in my case, my dear. Anyway, don't be horrid."
They were welcomed in the hallway by a friendly, talkative gentleman of a certain age, with a bald, domed head and a carefully trimmed moustache. César introduced him to Julia as Señor Cifuentes, the director of the José Raul Capablanca Recreational Club.
"We have five hundred members on our books," he told them proudly, pointing out the trophies, certificates and photographs adorning the walls. "We also sponsor a nationwide tournament." He paused before a glass case containing a display of various chess sets, old rather than antique. "Nice, eh? Although here, of course, we use only the Staunton set."
He had turned to César as if expecting his approval, and the latter felt obliged to adopt an appropriately serious expression.
"Of course," he said, and Cifuentes rewarded him with a friendly smile.
"Wood, you know," he added. "No plastic."
"I should hope not."
Cifuentes turned to Julia.
"You should see it here on a Saturday afternoon." He looked around contentedly, like a mother hen inspecting her chicks. "It's a fairly average day today: keen players who leave work early, pensioners who spend the whole afternoon playing. And, as you've no doubt noticed, there's a pleasant atmosphere here. Very ..."
"Edifying," said Julia, without thinking. But Cifuentes seemed to find the adjective appropriate.
"Yes, that's it, edifying. As you can see, there are a number of younger men. That one over there, for example, is quite remarkable. He's only nineteen but he's already written a hundred-page study on the four lines of the Nimzo-Indian Defence."
"Really? Nimzo-Indian? It sounds very..."—Julia searched desperately for the right word–"definitive."
"Well, I don't know about definitive," Cifuentes replied honestly. "But it's certainly significant."
Julia looked to César for help, but he merely arched an eyebrow, as if expressing a polite interest in the conversation. He was leaning towards Cifiientes, his hands behind his back holding both stick and hat, apparently enjoying himself hugely.
"Some years ago," added Cifuentes, pointing at the top button of his waistcoat with his thumb, "I added my own little grain of sand."
"Really?" said César, and Julia gave him a worried look.
"Yes, believe it or not," Cifuentes said, with false modesty. "A subvariant of the Caro-Kann Defence, using two knights. You know the one: knight three bishop queen. The Cifuentes variant, it's called," he added, looking hopefully at César. "Perhaps you've heard of it?"
"Naturally," replied César with great aplomb.
Cifuentes smiled gratefully.
"I can assure you it would be no exaggeration to say that in this club, or recreational society, as I prefer to call it, you'll find the best players in Madrid, and possibly in all Spain." Then he seemed to remember something. "By the way, I've found the man you need." He scanned the room, and his face lit up. "Ah, there he is. Come with me, please."
They followed him through one of the rooms, towards the rear.
"It wasn't easy," said Cifuentes as they approached. "I've spent all day turning it over in my mind. But then," he half-turned towards César with an apologetic gesture, "you did ask me to recommend our best player."
They stopped a short distance from a table at which two men were playing, watched by half a dozen others. One of the players was softly drumming his fingers at the side of the board over which he was leaning with, thought Julia, the same serious expression Van Huys had given to the chess players in the painting. Opposite him, apparently untroubled by his opponent's drumming, the other player sat utterly still, leaning slightly back in his wooden chair, his hands in his trouser pockets, his chin sunk on his chest. It was impossible to tell whether his eyes, fixed on the board, were concentrating on that or were absorbed in something else entirely.
The spectators maintained a reverential silence, as if what was being decided was a matter of life and death. There were only a few pieces left on the board, so intermingled that it was impossible, at least for new arrivals, to work out who was White and who was Black. After a couple of minutes, the man drumming his fingers used the same hand to move a
white bishop, placing it between his king and a black rook. Having done that, he glanced briefly at his opponent and returned to his contemplation of the board and to his gentle drumming.
The move was accompanied by a lot of murmuring amongst the spectators. Julia went closer and saw that the other player, who hadn't changed his posture at all when his opponent made his move, was staring intently at the intervening white bishop. He stayed like that for a while, when, with a gesture so slow it was impossible to tell until the last moment which piece he was reaching for, he moved a black knight.
"Check," he said and returned to his former state of immobility, indifferent to the buzz of approval that rose about him.
Though no one said anything, Julia knew that he was the man Cifuentes had recommended to César. She therefore watched him closely. He must have been just over forty, he was very thin and most likely of medium height. His hair was brushed straight back, with no parting, and was receding at the temples. He had large ears, a slightly aquiline nose, and his dark eyes were set deep in their sockets, as if viewing the world with distrust. He completely lacked the air of intelligence Julia now believed essential in a chess player; instead, his expression was one of indolent apathy, a kind of deep-seated weariness that left him utterly indifferent to his surroundings. Julia, disappointed, thought he had the look of a man who expects very little from himself, apart from making the correct moves on a chessboard.
Nevertheless–or perhaps precisely because of that, because of the look of infinite tedium written on his impassive features–when his opponent moved his king one square back and he then slowly stretched out his right hand towards the remaining pieces, the silence in that corner of the room became absolute. Julia, perhaps because she didn't understand what was going on, realised that the spectators did not like him, that they felt not the least warmth towards him. She read in their faces a grudging acceptance of his superiority at the chessboard, for, as enthusiasts of the game, they could not help but see the slow, precise, implacable advance of the pieces he was moving.
"Check," he said again. He'd made an apparently simple move, merely advancing a modest pawn one square. But his opponent stopped his drumming and rested his fingers instead on his temples, as if to calm a troublesome throbbing. Then he moved the white king diagonally back another square. He seemed to have three squares on which he would be safe, but, for some reason that escaped Julia, he chose that one. An admiring whisper round him seemed to suggest that the move had been an opportune one, but his opponent did not react.
"That would have been checkmate," he said, and there wasn't the slightest hint of triumph in his voice; he was merely informing his opponent of an objective fact There was no pity there either. He pronounced those words before making another move, as if he felt it unnecessary to accompany them with a practical demonstration. And then, almost reluctantly, without appearing in the least affected by the incredulous look on the face of his opponent and on the faces of a good many spectators, he made a diagonal move with his bishop right across the board, bringing it, as it were, from some far distant place, and setting it down near the enemy king, but not near enough to constitute any immediate threat. Amidst the rumble of remarks that burst out around the table, Julia looked at the board in some bewilderment. She didn't know much about chess, but enough to know that checkmate involved a direct threat to the king. And the white king appeared to be safe. Hoping for clarification, she looked first at César and then at Cifuentes. The latter was smiling good-naturedly, shaking his head in admiration.
"It would, in fact, have been mate in three," he told Julia. "Whatever he did, the white king had no escape."
"Then I don't understand," said Julia. "What happened?"
Cifuentes gave a short laugh.
"That black bishop was the piece that could have delivered the coup de grâce, although, until he moved it, none of us could see that. What happened, though, was that this gentleman, despite knowing exactly which move to make, chose to take it no further. He moved the bishop to show us what would have been the correct move, but he deliberately placed it on the wrong square, thus rendering it completely harmless."
"I still don't understand," said Julia. "Doesn't he want to win the game?"
"That's the odd thing. He's been coming here for five years now, and he's the best chess player I know, but I've never once seen him win."
At that moment, the chess player looked up, and his eyes met Julia's. All his poise, all the confidence he'd shown during the game, seemed to have vanished. It was as if, when the game was over and he once more looked at the world around him, he found himself stripped of the gifts that ensured him the envy and respect of others. Only then did Julia notice his cheap tie, the brown jacket creased at the back and baggy at the elbows, the stubbly chin that had been shaved at five or six in the morning before catching the metro or the bus to go to work. Even the light in his eyes had gone out, leaving them grey, opaque.
Cifuentes said: "May I introduce Señor Muñoz, chess player."
IV
The Third Player
"So, Watson," continued Holmes with a chuckle,
"is it not amusing how it sometimes happens
that to know the past, one must first
know the future?"
Raymond Smullyan
"IT'S A REAL GAME," said Muñoz. "A bit strange, but perfectly logical. Black was the last to move."
"Are you sure?" asked Julia.
"Yes, I'm sure."
"How do you know?"
"I just do."
They were in Julia's studio, in front of the picture, which was lit by every available light in the room. César was on the sofa, Julia was sitting at the table and Muñoz was standing before the Van Huys, perplexed.
"Would you like a drink?"
"No."
"A cigarette?"
"No. I don't smoke."
A certain embarrassment floated in the air. Muñoz seemed ill at ease. He was wearing a crumpled raincoat and had kept it firmly buttoned up, as if reserving the right to leave at any moment, with no explanation. He remained shy, mistrustful. It hadn't been easy to get him there. When César and Julia first put their proposition to him, the expression on Muñoz's face had required no commentary; he took them for a couple of lunatics. Then he became suspicious, defensive. They must forgive him if he seemed rude, but this whole story about medieval murders and a game of chess painted in a picture was just too bizarre. And even if what they told him were true, he didn't really understand what it could possibly have to do with him. After all, he kept saying, as if that way he could establish the necessary social distinctions, he was just an accounts clerk, an office worker.
"But you play chess," César had said with his most seductive smile. They had gone across the street to a bar and were sitting next to a fruit machine that deafened them at intervals with its monotonous jingle designed to ensnare the unwary.
"So?" There was no defiance in the reply, only indifference. "So do a lot of other people. And I don't see why I..."
"They say you're the best."
Muñoz gave César an indefinable look. Julia interpreted it as meaning: Perhaps I am, but that has nothing to do with it. Being the best has no meaning. You could be the best, just as you could be blond or have flat feet, without feeling obliged to prove it to everyone.
"If that were true," he replied after a moment, "I'd go in for tournaments and such. But I don't."
"Why not?"
Muñoz glanced at his empty coffee cup and then shrugged his shoulders.
"Because I don't. You have to want to do that kind of thing. I mean, you have to want to win ..." He looked at them as if he wasn't sure whether or not they would understand what he said. "And I don't care whether I win or not."
"So, you're a theoretician," remarked César, with a gravity in which Julia detected a hidden irony.
Muñoz held his gaze thoughtfully, as if struggling to find a suitable reply.
"Perhaps," he said at last. "
That's why I don't think I would be much use to you."
He started to get up, but was prevented by Julia's reaching out her hand and placing it on his arm. It was only the briefest of contacts, but it was invested with anxious urgency. Later, when they were alone, César, arching one eyebrow, described it as "supremely feminine, darling; the damsel asking for help, though without overstating her case, and ensuring that the bird doesn't fly the coop." He himself could not have done it better; except that he would have uttered a little cry of alarm not at all appropriate in the circumstances. As it was, Muñoz had looked down fleetingly at the hand Julia was already withdrawing and let his eyes slide over the table and come to rest on his own hands, with their rather grubby nails, which lay quite still on either side of his cup.
"We need your help," Julia said in a low voice. "It really is important, I can assure you, important to me and to my work."
Muñoz put his head on one side and looked at her, or, rather, at her chin, as if he feared that looking directly into her eyes would establish between them a commitment he was not prepared to make.
"I really don't think it would interest me," he said at last.
Julia leaned over the table.
"Think of it as a game that would be different from any game you've played before. A game which, this time, would be worth winning."
César was growing impatient.
"I must admit, my friend," he said, his irritation evident in the way he kept twisting the topaz ring on his right hand, "that I find your peculiar apathy incomprehensible. Why do you bother to play chess?"
Muñoz thought for a while. Then he looked straight into César's eyes.
"Perhaps," he said calmly, "for the same reason that you are homosexual."
It was as if an icy blast had blown over them. Julia hurriedly lit a cigarette, terrified by the tactless remark, which Muñoz had uttered unemphatically and without a hint of aggression. On the contrary, he was looking at César with a kind of polite attention, as if, in the course of a perfectly normal dialogue, he was awaiting the response of a worthy conversational partner. There was a complete lack of malice in that look, Julia thought, even a certain innocence, like that of a tourist who, with the ineptness of the foreigner, unwittingly offends against local custom.
The Flanders Panel Page 8
