The numbers I had used to help me in my grim mental exercises had been only a substitute for those carved chessmen, a symbol of them; my surprise when I saw that the movement of the chessmen on the board was the same as the imaginary moves I had made in my mind was, perhaps, like the surprise of an astronomer who has used complicated methods to calculate the existence of a new planet on paper, and then actually sees it as a white, bright, heavenly body in the sky. As if magnetically drawn to the board, I stared at it and saw my patterns – knight, rook, king, queen and pawns – as real figures carved from wood. To get an idea of the state of the game I first had to change them automatically back from my abstract world of figures into moving chessmen. Gradually I was overcome by curiosity to see a real game between two players. Then came the embarrassing moment when, forgetting common courtesy, I intervened in your game. But your friend’s wrong move was like a pang going through my heart. It was purely instinctive when I restrained him, something done impulsively, just as you’d catch hold of a child leaning over the banisters without thinking about it. Only later did I realize how very improperly my impulse had made me behave.’

I made haste to assure Dr B. that we were all extremely glad to owe the pleasure of his acquaintance to this incident, and said that after all he had told me I would now be doubly interested to see him playing in tomorrow’s improvised match. Dr B. made an uneasy movement.

‘No, you really mustn’t expect too much. It will be only a kind of test for me … a test to see if … if I’m even capable of playing a normal game of chess, a game on a real chessboard with actual chessmen and a living partner … for I doubt more and more whether those hundreds, perhaps thousands of games I played were genuine games of chess and not just a kind of dream chess, delirious chess, a game played in a fever, missing out certain stages as you do in a dream. I hope you don’t really expect me to get anywhere against a chess champion – in fact the world champion. What interests and intrigues me is just a retrospective curiosity to find out whether I was really playing chess in my cell or whether it was mere delusion, if I was on the edge of the dangerous precipice at the time or already over it – that’s all, nothing more.’

At that moment the gong summoning us to dinner was struck at the far end of the ship. We must have talked for almost two hours – Dr B. had told his story to me at much greater length than I have set it down here. I thanked him with all my heart and took my leave. But I had not walked all the way along the deck before he followed me to add, obviously nervous, even stammering slightly, ‘And one more thing! In case I should appear uncivil later, would you tell the gentlemen in advance that I will play only one game … it’s to be the final line drawn under an old account, a last goodbye, not a new beginning. I wouldn’t want to fall into that frantic passion of chess-playing a second time. I think of it now only with horror, and moreover … moreover, the doctor warned me too, expressly warned me. A man who has once fallen victim to a mania is always at risk, and in a case of chess poisoning, even if you’re cured, it’s better not to go near a chessboard. So you’ll understand … just this one game, as a test for myself, no more.’

We assembled in the smoking-room next day punctually at the appointed hour, three o’clock. Our party had been increased by two enthusiasts for the royal game, ship’s officers who specially asked for time off their duties so that they could watch the match. Czentovic did not keep us waiting as on the previous day either, and after the usual draw for colours the remarkable match between this unknown man and the famous world champion began. I am sorry that it was played only for us amateur spectators, and any record of it is lost to the annals of the art of chess, just as Beethoven’s piano improvisations are lost to music. On the following afternoons we did try to reconstruct the match from memory, but in vain; during the game itself we had probably all been paying too much rapt attention to the players rather than the course of play. For the intellectual contrast between their bearing became more and more obvious as the game went on. Czentovic, the experienced player, remained motionless as a block throughout, his eyes lowered to the chessboard with a stern, fixed gaze. In him, thought seemed to be an actual physical effort requiring the utmost concentration of all his organs. Dr B., on the other hand, was relaxed and natural in his movements.