Author's Notes: A few people commented on my last chapter about the plausibility of Beth's issues with both finances and the State Dept. Firstly, big thanks to those people for their feedback, which was really helpful. I've given some thought to both the finances of a professional chess player and how Beth's actions looked from outside; if you want to know why the Moscow invitational paid only moderately and the three things that happened in Moscow that changed the game for the State Department, you can read it at my journal, shiva-goddessof DOT livejournal DOT com. However, there are some spoilers vis-a-vis this chapter, so you may want to leave it to the end.
Also, I intended to fulfil my "travel" promise with some international travel, but I couldn't quite manage it this time around. Definitely coming up next though.
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Townes leans across the table. "Did you see that?"
She's laughing. "I did! His face! That wasn't nice of you."
"Ah, they don't like me here anyway. I entertain on the paper's account and then the Leader takes forever to settle the bills. They need to know when they have a celebrity to entertain."
"I'm not a celebrity."
"You're not a good one anyway. I can't believe you hung up on the White House."
Beth moans and hides her hot face in her hands. "Neither can I. And they never called back. I just wasn't ready! I couldn't go to the White House. I just could not talk to somebody from the White House while standing in my kitchen."
Townes sets the menu aside and leans on the table. "Are you ready? Wine?"
"No, thank you. Yes, I can order."
Townes picked the restaurant, and it's dark and smoky; she wouldn't have liked to be here without him. There aren't many women here, and none alone. She feels safe enough with him, though; he pulled out her chair when they got to the table, and when he was done telling the waitboy who she was, the kid was backing away faster than should have been possible, ducking and scraping.
Townes gestures at the luckless boy, who can't be more than sixteen and looks terrified of approaching the table again. "So, Miss Harmon, how has it been to return to the United States?"
Beth feels the smile fading off her face. She has a sudden impulse to be honest. "It's - I don't know. Moscow was like - it was like another world. Like the one I'd always been born for. How I felt - when those women were outside - the way they'd say my name - "
Townes is studying her face seriously.
"But then - but then - I had to come home. What was there if I stayed? I speak a child's Russian. Who would I talk to? What would I do all day? Who would I play with?" She attempts a smile; her face feels stiff with tension.
"And then you landed back here," says Townes, pushing aside the menu to cover the back of her hand with his own. With his other, he makes a quick jerking motion to redirect the waiter.
"And then I landed back here. Yes."
His brown eyes are serious and steady.
"Besides," she says, narrowing her eyes at him, "I hear the fashion there is terrible," and his eyes crease immediately.
"I read the article, you know," she says, in a rush. "I'm sorry I didn't look at it before. I forgot, you know, how good you are. They were always so bad, when they started writing about me… I stopped looking."
"There are more things in the world worth being good at than chess, Beth." He tightens his fingers around hers, for just a second.
"I know." She ducks her eyes to her own place setting.
Townes takes out a cigarette and lights it, as the terrified waitboy puts some glasses down. "So how can I help? You said you wanted my help. Advice on how to manage your press?" He exhales.
"No, not my press. I need…" She gathers her courage, and forges on. "I need to know what to do now. I beat Borgov, but he'll come back, he'll study what I did, and I'm not the champion, yet. I need to get ready for the world championship, next year. And I don't know how… I don't know how to train. The Russians, they all work together. They went over every game together. But I don't have anybody. And I don't know how…"
Townes is studying her intently again; the cigarette is burning down between his fingers, the smoke stinging her throat. "Beth," he says eventually, and God, how she hates the softness in his voice. "Why are you asking me? I'm a third-rate chess player at best. I topped out long ago. I know that. You have better people to ask than me."
Her throat is really hurting now. "No. I don't. I need you to tell me what to do." She swallows.
The silence hangs in the air for a long, heavy moment. Townes takes another drag.
"A coach," he says eventually. "The best players, they have someone to coach them, to challenge them. You need a coach."
She feels a sharp stab of disbelief. "A coach?"
Townes doesn't say anything, just keeps his eyes pinned on her.
She laughs, harshly. "Who, Townes? Who? I've beaten everyone in the US. Who can coach me?"
"It's not about being the best." Townes stubs his cigarette out sharply in the tin ashtray on the table. "It's about having someone who can see what you can't. Who can keep you focused, make you learn from your mistakes. You aren't too good to learn, Beth. Don't make that mistake."
"But how - how - " She swallows. "How do I find someone?"
"There are a lot of retired champions, in chess." Townes forks a piece of his cooling omelette towards his mouth. "And talented people who never competed. All you have to do is do an interview, I can get you another one with Chess Review, they'll be dying to talk to you. And say that you're looking to find someone to work with you ahead of the world championship. They'll be beating down your door." He chews and swallows.
Beth looks down at her own food, untouched. "That's not all," she says suddenly.
Townes lets his fork rest, waits.
Beth lifts her water glass and swallows. The water is weightless on her tongue; no burn, no numbness. "The State Department," she says, when she sets it down. "They want to interrogate me. They keep calling…"
"The State Department?" Townes leans forward. "Why?"
"I don't know. I guess I… they had that man with me in Moscow, Booth, I was supposed to stay with him all the time, and I, I wanted to be alone and walk in the park. And then I wouldn't go with him in New York. But they won't stop calling. And they said I have to come, tomorrow. And talk to them." She draws her fork through the noodles on her plate.
"I think you just have to talk to them," he says, lifting his own wine glass. "You didn't do anything or see anything in Moscow. Tell them so. Just tell them."
"I guess." She swallows. "I hope."
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Her eyes open in the semidark, before her alarm. She glances at the clock; six a.m. Sighs.
Alice would have moved to another trailer. Changed her phone number. Just stared down any man from the State Department, in silence, until he gave up and went away. Or cuffed her.
Alma would have put on her best dress and her hat with the veil. Painted her face carefully. Cadged a cigarette from the State Department man, and lingered with it on her lip until he lit it for her. Folded her hands carefully on her knee, letting her skirt pull back a little from her ankles. Smiled with her heart in her mouth.
And what good did that do Alice? What good did it do Alma?
Beth gets up and begins to dress.
Borgov's face is in front of her eyes, as it had been in Moscow. He'd always been a… a thing to her. An obstacle. Solid and immovable. As unreadable as a wall. As unbreakable.
Then she'd seen his face soften. His mouth curl. His words, in English.
"It's your game. Take it."
It's still an hour until her cab comes. On impulse, she bolts upstairs for the card on which she wrote down the number of the Moscow hotel. It's three p.m. in Moscow right now. Her fingers shaking, she dials.
"Gostinitsa Metropol' Moskva," says a voice, flatly.
"Zdravstvuyte," she says, through dry lips. "Hello. I need to speak with Valery Borgov…"
"Kakaya?" says the voice, incredulously.
"Valery Borgov. Ya Elizabeth Harmon. Liza Harmon. I stayed with you. Borgov stayed. I need to speak to Borgov. Ponimayesh'?"
"Liza Harmon," says the voice, in another register altogether. "Liza Harmon! Amerikanski! Liza Harmon!"
Beth bites her lip and clenches her own hand around the receiver. "I need," she says steadily, in English, "to speak to Borgov. You will find his number and give it me. Da?"
"Da, Miss Kharmon. I find. I find. Odna minuta." The line buzzes. The minute hand of the clock creeps from 12 to 1 to 2.
She's almost given up, her fingertips going numb around the Bakelite, when the attendant is back on the line and excitedly gabbling a number to her. She clicks the switchhook, redials.
"Da, zdravstvuyte," says a pleasant voice. A woman's voice. Her stomach twists sharply. "Allo?"
Beth swallows. "Who is this?" she says.
"Ya ne ponimayu." The woman sounds anxious and confused.
"Kto ty? Who are you?"
"Irina Borgova." The woman sounds frightened. "What happens? Who you?"
Beth tastes bile in her mouth. She'd forgotten, again. Forgotten that Borgov is married. Has a wife. She remembers her now. Dark and still, composed, beside him, with her intricate braids and her neat outfits and her little son.
"I want to speak to Valery," she says in English. "Ya khochu pogovorit' s Valery. Do you understand?"
The woman - Borgov's wife - drops the receiver; there is an angry stream of Russian, and then Borgov comes on the line, sounding cautious and reserved. "Allo?"
Beth swallows. "Borgov," she says. "This is Beth Harmon."
Borgov exhales into the mouthpiece. "Miss Kharmon."
"Beth."
"Beth," he agrees. There is a long, long silence.
"You speak English," she says, feeling the silence stretch beyond endurance.
"I speak little English," says the voice in her ear. She imagines his face, pressing the receiver to his ear, creased with concentration, while Irina bangs dishes and glares in the background. "I learn from traveling. And reading. You speak Russian."
"I speak little Russian," she says, feeling an absurd compulsion to imitate his speech pattern. "I take a class. I want to understand."
There is another silence.
"Miss Kharmon," he says, carefully, over the sound of an angry voice, "why you call me?"
"I wanted…" Beth hesitates, trying to form her impulse into words. "I wanted to speak to you as a person. Not over a board."
Borgov takes a hesitant breath, pauses in the middle; she can hear him struggling, the rustle of his sigh in her ear. "I don't understand."
"I wanted…" she stumbles. "I wanted to speak to you. You are a great player. I've learned so much…"
"You are greatest player, Beth," says Borgov, and his voice has softened. "I want to speak to you also. Not just chess."
There is a pause.
"I must tell my wife why you call," says Borgov, apologetically. "She will not understand."
Beth sympathises; she is having a hard time understanding why she did this herself. "Tell her… tell her I wanted to ask you about a chess move. I wanted to ask you for advice on my endgame."
"Kto ne riskuyet, tot ne p'yet shampanskogo." Borgov laughs. "I tell her."
"Thank you."
"We will speak again, Miss Kharmon. Beth. Yes?"
Beth breathes in right to the bottom of her chest, feeling it free. "Yes," she says. "I must go. Thank you, Borgov."
"Goodbye."
"Goodbye."
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"Cigarette?"
The man from the State Department leans across the hardwood table, proffering the open packet. She shakes her head faintly. The man - he introduced himself as Brodsky - sticks the cigarette between his full lips, strikes a match, and exhales heavily. He's perhaps mid-thirties, cleanshaven, dark and sallow, in his shirtsleeves and a plain dark tie. No accent. He bowed a little over her hand, as though he might kiss it, before he shook smoke lies still and heavy in the air of the small, cushioned room.
"Well, Miss Harmon," says Brodsky, affably, "you must be wondering why we came all this way to speak to you. I must congratulate you on your victory in Moscow, by the way. I understand that it was of huge significance."
"Thank you," she says from between stiff lips.
"As you know, our relations with Moscow are difficult and complex. But we want to maintain a peaceful world, Miss Harmon. And you gained a great deal of attention in Moscow. So we think you can help with that." Brodsky smiles at her, and tilts his head, waiting for her acceptance. She grants it with a short nod.
"We'd like to record this conversation." He produces a small tape recorder from the briefcase beside him, places it on the table. "Unless you have any objections?"
Beth clenches her hands a little tighter around each other in her lap. Tell the truth. "No objections."
Brodsky depresses the Record button. "Thank you, Miss Harmon. Interview with Miss Elizabeth Harmon, third of December, 1968, in room B143 of the Kentucky State Capitol. It's nine-seventeen a.m. Miss Harmon, why don't you tell me about your recent trip to Moscow."
Beth clears her throat. "I was invited to Moscow to compete in a chess invitational with their greatest players," she says uncomfortably. "Because I'm U.S. Champion. They always invite the U.S. Champion to play in their invitational."
"How did you fund your trip?" says Brodsky, twinkling his eyes at her. "It's expensive to travel to the Soviet Union, isn't it?"
Beth feels a stab of savage hatred. "Normally the Chess Federation helps to fund the trip," she says pointedly. "For the prestige. Because the Soviet Union is the best in chess. But, well, they didn't for me. So I used my own money. And I borrowed some."
"Who was the money borrowed from?"
"Jolene. Jolene Harris. A friend. She lent me her savings."
"How do you fund your travel normally?"
"From prizes I win. I've won every big tournament in the U.S. now. And some outside. Some of them paid well. And, well, before she died, Alma - I mean, my adopted mother, Mrs. Alma Wheatley, she had alimony from her ex-husband, so we both had money from that, and I supported us with chess." Beth is beginning to feel her breathing come a little easier; her contempt for Brodsky helps.
"Who did you travel with, on your trip?" Brodsky is leaning back, at ease; he has a buff-colored cardboard file in front of him, but he hasn't opened it.
"You know very well who," Beth says coldly. "With your man, Booth, who was assigned to travel with me. I'm sure you have his report right there."
"I have indeed reviewed Mr. Booth's report." Brodsky has let his easy smile fall away a little. "Do you expect to return to the Soviet Union?"
Beth crosses her left leg over her right and clasps her hands around her knee. She tries on Alma's smile. "Yes, I would expect so. They are the best country in the world in chess, and that's where I need to compete now. And the world championship is there next year. So I have to go."
"Whom did you meet, when you were there?" He stubs his cigarette out in the table's cut-glass ashtray, and picks up the pen lying beside the buff-colored file. All easy business.
Beth relaxes. They surely don't suspect Townes of any inappropriate behavior. "Townes," she says. "An old friend of mine, we used to play together. D.L. Townes. He came to Moscow as a journalist, to cover my matches, and we had dinner and talked, then flew back together."
"And when you left Mr. Booth." Brodsky is no longer smiling. "Whom did you go to meet, Miss Harmon?"
Beth feels her mouth fall open.
"Did someone approach you? Did you receive a message of any kind? Who were you meeting?"
Beth fumbles her tongue back into life. She'd never thought that they would - Booth, he was so paranoid about someone approaching her, slipping her messages, but she hadn't thought that he would think -
"I didn't meet anyone," she says, almost desperately. "I just, I wanted to be free. I wanted to walk in the park, and there were people playing chess there… I didn't."
"You jumped out of a moving cab." Brodsky's voice has developed a hard edge. "You were gone for hours. You missed your flight. Why would you do all of that, unless you were meeting someone?"
Beth feels like a fish dragged out of her element by claws. "I - "
He leans back in his chair and regards her impassively.
"I didn't meet anyone. Truly. Nobody contacted me, not Borgov, not anyone. I shouldn't have done it, I guess, but I, well - I didn't like Booth being with me all the time. I'm used to being alone. I thought he was exaggerating. He seemed so paranoid to me." Beth knows her eyes are wide, and widens them just a little more on purpose. Both her mothers fought with what they had to hand.
"Miss Harmon, we were on the brink of nuclear war with the USSR not so long ago. They send agents to our shores every year. We don't make a habit, here, of exaggerating."
"I understand. I'm sorry." Beth bites her lip.
"Have you spoken with anyone in the Soviet Union since your return?" Brodsky flips the file open, and clicks his pen.
Beth feels her blood freeze again. They can't know. There's no way they can know. "No. I haven't."
He jots something on the densely written first page, flips it closed, smiles, genial again. Beth thinks, sourly, that she knows why he was the one sent to speak to her. "I'm sorry if we've alarmed you, miss. I think you may not have realised what an object of interest you are to the Kremlin now. To have beaten their champion - well, no one has broken their domination of chess for decades, and the way the Moscow public responded to you, as I understand… it wouldn't be surprising if someone there tried to reach out to you."
"I understand," Beth says, again. There is a stone forming in her chest.
"It's also a tremendous opportunity for you." Brodsky flips the file open, again, businesslike, and makes some notes on typed pages further in. "You're a very intelligent woman. You and your observations during your trips may be of great assistance to us. Though I think that someone from the department should continue to accompany you on your future trips. For your safety."
Beth pictures an endless line of Booths, and feels an upwelling of claustrophobia. "If you say so," she says flatly.
"And it could form the basis for a career with us." He's closed the file, and is watching her again, from closer quarters across the table. "After chess."
Beth feels as though the ground under her feet has suddenly lurched five feet to the right. "After… chess?" she manages, dumbfounded.
"Indeed." Brodsky displays his white teeth again. "You'll want to marry and have a family, I'm sure, but before that, there may be opportunities for you here. When you decide to step away from chess."
Beth can't summon a single thing to say.
"But for the moment, let's focus on consolidating any insight from your trip. Anything that you may have noticed in the hotel, or in conversation between the Russians. I understand you speak some Russian." He opens the file to a blank page, and looks at her expectantly. "Let's start at the beginning."
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There's a tournament in Ohio, the week after. The Somebody Memorial tournament, some rich businessman who loved chess, and decided to fund a prize to elevate the cause of state chess. She played it two years ago. Benny skipped it then.
She needs a car, she thinks, when she steps out of the cab at the community hall. She needs to learn to drive. Alma would never have dreamed of getting behind the wheel, and they'd rubbed along with cabs and trains. But if she's going to move, to be free…
Then she'd better get on with winning this prize. She squares her shoulders.
She doesn't have to introduce herself at the registration desk; no surprise. The high-school kids manning it can't do enough for her. She has enough points now that she gets ranked straightaway against the highest-ranked players in the tournament. No one she knows is here.
The first two matches are deadly dull. A twenty-five-year-old, bucking for national master status, who seems to take her every move as a personal insult. She cleans his clock in eighteen moves. A high school kid who pours out a torrent of questions about Russia and Borgov from the moment they approach each other to the moment the clock starts, and resumes with hardly a breath after they shake hands.
Her third opponent doesn't look any more than thirteen; he has dark, deepset eyes and his shirt collar is worn. He nods to her timidly over the scored wooden desk, and then opens with the Danish Gambit, pushing his pawns hard, his eyes hawk-trained on the board and alight with fervour. Beth feels like she's been slapped awake; joy surges up, and once again there's nothing but her, and the pieces, and their graceful dance in her mind. The kid misjudges his attack, can't get his bishops out, and by the middlegame she has him squarely on the back foot, but he won't give up, he won't stop pushing. By the twentieth move, they have a few observers, and when she takes his queen there's a small round of applause.
Beth laughs out loud with delight. "Congratulations," she says to the kid. "That was the most fun I've had in weeks. You have so much potential… What was your name?"
The kid is blushing furiously. "Alec," he says in a small voice. "Um, thank you, Miss Harmon. Alec Brskovska."
Beth holds out her hand. "Alec. We'll meet again. Well done."
Her fourth and fifth opponents are much as usual. Workmanlike, solid chess. Like playing a much duller, less talented Borgov. She's tired when the fifth opponent resigns. But she's several hundred dollars the better, when she takes a cab back to the station. And she's remembered something. That there are other Beth Harmons in the world, of a sort. Perhaps even someone who will one day do to her what she intends to do to Borgov.
Not today, though. She opens the cab window and breathes in the clear, bitter air.
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There's a letter on the mat when she opens the door in Lexington, elaborately handwritten, with international stamps. An invitation. To an exhibition match against the Italian champion. In Milan. Milan!
Finally. Something to do while she prepares for the world championship. Something to take her away from the dull Kentucky winter. To keep her from remembering how short a walk it is to the liquor store. Europe. People. Fashion. The world.
Her head is almost quiet when she lays it on the pillow. The pieces glide across the ceiling as she replays her match against Alec, taking his side, showing him how he could have won, if he'd misled her, used his knight at the right time. Then a police car slides down the street, with a few lonely whoops; the red and blue lights flash against the edge of her imaginary board, marring the shapes.
She remembers those red and blue revolving lights. The way the state troopers stared at her, impassive but prurient at the same time, as she stood there, intact, in her embroidered dress. Making her a thing. A story. She'd imagined then how they'd go home and tell their wives about it, how they saved a little girl that day, a little girl that was an orphan now, as their wives put the dinner plate in front of them.
"Poor little thing," she imagined their wives would say, cosily, as they fetched a drink and patted their children's heads. "I'd adopt her myself if I could."
Next time: Tu Vuo' Fa' l'Americano! And the return of some old friends.
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Russian glossary
Ponimayesh'?- You understand?
Ya ne ponimayu - I don't understand
Kto ne riskuyet, tot ne p'yet shampanskogo - He who does not take risks, does not drink champagne; a Russian proverb meaning that you must take risks to achieve.
Most of the rest of the Russian is fairly obvious from context; please comment if you need a fuller glossary, and I'll post one.
As referenced at the start, you can read my discussion of Beth's finances and the State Department's POV at my journal, shiva-goddessof DOT livejournal DOT com.