boasts Friedemann T., helping himself to a generous portion of caviar from the sideboard.“How could you not know,” remarks Pravdin, gesturing with his caviar and toast toward the chess players. A flamboyant Russian grand master named Zaitsev is strutting back and forth between two long tables full of very serious blue-blazered members of a British chess club. Zaitsev, who is playing twelve games simultaneously, grips a chesspiece in his fist and slams it down on the board with a roar. “He never had a chance,” he tells the crowd of onlookers. “If God played the Benoni against God, white would win!” Zaitsev reaches across the table to accept a glass of champagne, drinks off half of it in one smooth swallow, struts on to the next board. He tilts his great head and examines it for a moment, then pounces on a piece. “Check! Tell the truth—you didn’t anticipate that, did you? Never mind, you’re in good company: I crushed Petrosian in the sixty-nine interzonals with the same move.”
