“Good. Then we have no quarrel. I trust you see the relevance of what I’ve said.”
“Of course.”
“Good,” Waldo says avuncularly, “then all that remains is for you to find some 100 percent, red-blooded, patriotic, All-American chess players to write about in the best red-white-and-blue prose money can buy.”
“Money has bought,” I say getting out of the car. It is difficult standing. I ease the door shut.
Waldo leans across the wide leather expanse of the Mercedes’ front seat. He bends down, becomes framed in the thick chrome lapping the window on the passenger side. “Paul,” he says directly, “Paul, I admire what you’re doing. I want you to know that.”
“Thank you,” I answer. What is it I’m doing?
Chapter 8
Pam says, “They don’t have very American names, do they?” She holds my first full human interest column. Not a chessboard in it. Instead, eight nice paragraphs describing five younger American masters and wondering which will be the successor to Fischer.
“It would be better for Van Shuten’s group if they were named Joe or Stan or Harry. I agree Yuri and Ivan aren’t too patriotic sounding. But which one interests you?”
“Oh, I don’t know. There’re no pictures. I can’t tell without a picture.”
“My word pictures don’t bring them into focus, is that it?”
“No. No, I wouldn’t say that.” She spends a few moments rereading the column, maybe reading it for the first time. A lazy woman, I decide. Never really willing to read my column or play through the games. At length she says, “This one, the one in Washington, D.C.”
“Why him?”
“I had a wonderful time in Washington once,” Pam answers. “And he has a nice name, David M. Spendip. That’s pretty American. And he’s the youngest.”
“That important to you?”
“You’re younger than me,” she answers, smiling a kind of valium grin, studded with mood elevators.
“Is Dr. Coffee cutting you back?” I ask.
“Yes, can you tell?”
“Yes. A certain belligerence has come back,” I answer. “No more long suffering endurance of a hostile and aggressive world. Ready to strike back.”
“Yes. Yes,” she sighs, half laughing, “ready to strike back at a moment’s notice. One moment to the next, ready to strike back.”
I take the column back from her. “Well, you picked a good one, the youngest and the one with the best chance to make grandmaster. A possible Fischer all right.”
“Body by Fischer,” Pam says, slumping back on the bed.
“You know getting pictures is a great idea. Pictures can take up half the column.”
“I have a very good camera. In fact, I have two, maybe three,” Pam says pulling her legs up on the bed. “Does the crack there,” she points to the ceiling, “look like a rabbit?”
“Should it?”
“Don’t you remember that wonderful Madeline story about the little girl in the hospital and the crack on the ceiling that had the habit of looking much like a rabbit? It was one of my favorites and ever since I like to lie on these beds and watch for the rabbit. And he’s here, maybe for the first time. In two straight lines. In two straight lines.”
“What are you saying?”
“The girls in Madeline’s school, in two straight lines, always left at half past nine. They broke their bread and brushed their teeth and went to bed and the smallest one was Madeline.”
“I see.”
“You don’t, of course. But it’s not terribly important. Just a memory.”
“Do you want to come to Washington with me?”
She stops staring at the ceiling, raises to a sitting position on the bed and smiles, then says slow, “With you?”
“Yes.”
“With you to Washington D. C.?”
“That’s right.”
“With you? You want me to come along?”
“Well, that’s why I asked you.”
“You want me to come along?”
“Of course. Yes.”
“That makes me very, very happy. The happiest I’ve been. Washington?”
“The nation’s capital. The same place. To interview Spendip. To get his picture. To fill five columns with mostly pictures and short, witty captions, and none of this heavy, stupid prose.” I slap at the clipping.
“Do you think I can?”
“I suppose so. What does Coffee think?”
“He’ll want to know what I think.”
“And what do you think?” I ask.
“I think I had better go as soon as I can, don’t you?”
“I think so.”
“It’s cold in Washington, isn’t it? I had better get some heavier dresses, maybe a wool suit. Do you think that would be best, for interviewing I mean, looking professional and competent and interested? Above all interested in the subject, the other person. That’s the key, isn’t it? Letting the subject, the interviewee know that it isn’t just a job, that really you’re really interested in the subject and whatever he wants to discuss. I can do that. I’m always doing that. I’m forever doing that. It’s what I’m really good at, don’t you know?”
“Sure.”
“No. I’m serious. For as long back as I can remember I’ve been very talented at talking with people, looking them in the eye and letting them know that what they are saying matters to me, has meaning for me—”
“As now, for example.”
“Yes,” she laughs, “right now notice how pleased I am to stare you straight in the face, and hear that you want me to go to Washington with you. I’ll ask Dr. Coffee tomorrow at the end of our session.”
“Good. No sense rushing things.”
“What does that mean?”
“Nothing. Except what I said, I guess. No sense rushing into things.”
“You want me to ask him now, is that it?”
“Un huh.”
“You do. And I’ll call him right now.”
“Don’t. It’s not that important.”
“Yes. I agree,” she lies back down. “It’s not that important, probably. What, after all, is important? We used to stay at the Sheraton Carleton, but we only stayed there because we owned it. I think that’s why we stayed there.”
“You did? Well, we’re staying in the Ramada Inn on Rhode Island near 14th street.”
“I don’t like Ramada Inns.”
“Neither do I. But that’s where Spendip’s living.”
“In a Ramada Inn?”
“Yes, with his mother. In a Ramada Inn for the past 14 months, I think.”
“How strange. In a Ramada Inn. Maybe it has small apartments, could that be?” She shifts on the bed, pulling her legs up further. She presses her head into the pillow. “When I