The Luzhin Defense

by Vladimir Nabokov

  As soon as he was taken to the hospital she went to the hotel for his things, and at first they would not let her into his room, and this led to long explanations and a telephone call to the hospital by a rather cheeky hotel employee, after which she had to pay Luzhin's bill for the last week, and she did not have enough money and more explanations were necessary, and it seemed to her that the mockery of Luzhin was continuing, and it was difficult to hold back her tears. And when, refusing the coarse help of the hotel chambermaid, she began to gather up Luzhin's things, the feeling of pity rose to an extreme pitch. Among his things were some that he must have been carrying around with him for ages, not noticing them and never throwing them out--unnecessary, unexpected things: a canvas belt with a metallic buckle in the shape of a letter S and with a leather pocket on the side, a miniature penknife for a watch chain, inlaid with mother of pearl, a collection of Italian postcards--all blue sky and madonnas and a lilac haze over Vesuvius; and unmistakably St. Petersburg things: a tiny abacus with red and white counters, a desk calendar with turn-back pages for a completely non-calendar year--1918. All this was kicking about in a drawer, among some clean but crumpled shirts, whose colored stripes and starched cuffs evoked a picture of long-gone years. There also she found a collapsible opera hat bought in London, and in it the visiting card of somebody named Valentinov.... The toilet articles were in such a state that she resolved to leave them behind--and to buy him a rubber sponge in place of that unbelievable loofah. A chess set, a cardboard box full of notes and diagrams, and a pile of chess magazines she wrapped up in a separate package: he did not need this now. When the valise and small trunk were full and locked, she looked once more into all the corners and retrieved from under the bed a pair of astonishingly old, torn, laceless brown shoes that served Luzhin in place of bedroom slippers. Carefully she pushed them back under the bed.

  From the hotel she went to the chess cafe, remembering that Luzhin had been without his cane and hat and thinking that perhaps he had left them there. There were lots of people in the tournament hall, and Turati, standing by the coat rack, was jauntily taking off his overcoat. She realized that she had come just as play was about to be resumed, and that nobody knew of Luzhin's illness. Never mind, she thought with a certain malicious satisfaction. Let them wait. She found the cane but there was no hat. And after glancing with hatred at the small table, where the pieces had already been set out, and at the broad-shouldered Turati, who was rubbing his hands and deeply clearing his throat like a bass singer, she swiftly left the cafe, reentered the taxi on top of which Luzhin's checked little trunk showed touchingly green, and returned to the sanatorium.

  She was not at home when yesterday's young men reappeared. They came to apologize for their tempestuous nocturnal intrusion. They were well dressed, they scraped and bowed and asked after the gentleman they had brought home the night before. They were thanked for delivering him and were told for the sake of decorum that he had slept it off wonderfully after some friendly revels, at which his colleagues had honored him on the occasion of his betrothal. After sitting for ten minutes the young men rose and went away quite satisfied. At about the same time a distracted little man having some connection with the organization of the tournament arrived at the sanatorium. He was not admitted to see Luzhin; the composed young lady who spoke to him informed him coldly that Luzhin had overtired himself and it was uncertain when he would resume his chess activities. "That's awful, that's incredible," plaintively repeated the little man several times. "An unfinished game! And such a good game! Give the Maestro ... give the Maestro my anxious wishes, my best wishes ..." He waved a hand hopelessly and plodded to the exit, shaking his head.

  And the newspapers printed an announcement that Luzhin had had a nervous breakdown before finishing the deciding game and that, according to Turati, black was bound to lose because of the weakness of the Pawn on f4. And in all the chess clubs the experts made long studies of the positions of the pieces, pursued possible continuations and noted white's weakness at d3, but nobody could find the key to indisputable victory.

  10

  One night soon after this, there took place a long brewing, long rumbling and at last breaking, futile, disgracefully loud, but unavoidable scene. She had just returned from the sanatorium and was hungrily eating hot buckwheat cereal and relating that Luzhin was better. Her parents exchanged looks and then it began.

  "I hope," said her mother resonantly, "that you have renounced your crazy intention." "More please," she asked, holding out her plate. "Out of a certain feeling of delicacy," continued her mother, and here her father quickly took up the torch. "Yes," he said, "out of delicacy your mother has said nothing to you these past days--until your friend's situation cleared up. But now you must listen to us. You yourself know that our main desire, and care, and aim, and in general ... desire is for you to be all right, for you to be happy, et cetera. But for this ..." "In my time parents would simply have forbidden it," put in her mother, "that's all." "No, no, what's forbidding got to do with this? You listen to me, my pet. You're not eighteen years old, but twenty-five, and I can see nothing whatsoever enticing or poetic in all that has happened." "She just likes to annoy us," interrupted her mother again. "It's just one continuous nightmare...." "What exactly are you talking about?" asked the daughter finally and smiled from beneath lowered brows, resting her elbows softly on the table and looking from her father to her mother. "About the fact that it's time you ceased to be silly," cried her mother. "About the fact that marriage to a penniless crackpot is nonsense." "Ach," uttered the daughter, and stretching her arm out on the table she put her head upon it. "Here's what," her father began again. "We suggest you go to the Italian lakes. Go with Mamma to the Italian lakes. You can't imagine what heavenly spots there are there. I remember the first time I saw Isola Bella ..." Her shoulders began to twitch from half-suppressed laughter; then she lifted her head and continued to laugh softly, keeping her eyes closed. "What is it you want?" asked her mother and banged on the table. "First," she replied, "that you stop shouting. Second, that Luzhin gets completely well." "Isola Bella means Beautiful Island," continued her father hastily, trying with a meaningful grimace to intimate to his wife that he alone would manage it. "You can't imagine ... An azure sky, and the heat, and magnolias, and the superb hotels at Stresa--and of course tennis, dancing ... And I particularly remember--what do you call them--those insects that light up ..." "Well and what then?" asked the mother with rapacious curiosity. "What then, when your friend--if he doesn't die ..." "That depends on him," said the daughter, trying to speak calmly. "I can't abandon him. And I won't. Period." "You'll be in the madhouse with him--that's where you'll be, my girl!" "Mad or not ..." began the daughter with a trembling smile. "Doesn't Italy tempt you?" cried her father. "The girl is crazy. You won't marry this chess moron!" "Moron yourself. If I want to I'll marry him. You're a narrow-minded, and wicked woman ..." "Now, now, now, that's enough, that's enough," mumbled her father. "I won't let him set foot in here again," panted her mother; "that's final." The daughter began to cry soundlessly and left the dining room, banging into a corner of the sideboard as she passed and letting out a plaintive "damn it!" The offended sideboard went on vibrating for a long time.

  "That was a little too harsh," said the father in a whisper. "I'm not defending her, of course. But, you know, all kinds of things happen. The man overtired himself, and had a breakdown. Perhaps after this shock he'll really change for the better. Look, I think I'll go to see what she's doing."

  And the following day he had a long conversation with the famous psychiatrist in whose sanatorium Luzhin was staying. The psychiatrist had a black Assyrian beard and moist, tender eyes that shimmered marvelously as he listened to his interlocutor. He said that Luzhin was not an epileptic and was not suffering from progressive paralysis, that his condition was the consequence of prolonged strain, and that as soon as it was possible to have a sensible conversation with Luzhin, one would have to impress upon him that a blind
passion for chess was fatal for him and that for a long time he would have to renounce his profession and lead an absolutely normal mode of life. "And can such a man marry?" "Why not--if he's not impotent." The professor smiled tenderly. "Moreover, there's an advantage for him in being married. Our patient needs care, attention and diversion. This is a temporary clouding of the senses, which is now gradually passing. As far as we can judge, a complete recovery is under way."

  The psychiatrist's words produced a small sensation at home. "That means chess is kaput?" noted the mother with satisfaction. "What will be left of him then--pure madness?" "No, no," said the father. "There's no question of madness. The man will be healthy. The devil's not as black as his painters. I said 'painters'--did you hear, my pet?" But the daughter did not smile and only sighed. To tell the truth she felt very tired. She spent the larger part of the day at the sanatorium and there was something unbelievably exhausting in the exaggerated whiteness of everything surrounding her and in the noiseless white movements of the nurses. Still extremely pale, with a growth of bristle and wearing a clean shirt, Luzhin lay immobile. There were moments, it is true, when he raised one knee under the sheet or gently moved an arm, and changing shadows would flit over his face, and sometimes an almost rational light would appear in his eyes--but nonetheless all that could be said of him was that he was immobile--a distressing immobility, exhausting for the gaze that sought a hint of conscious life in it. And it was impossible to tear one's gaze away--one so wanted to penetrate behind this pale yellowish forehead wrinkling from time to time with a mysterious inner movement, to pierce the mysterious fog that stirred with difficulty, endeavoring, perhaps, to disentangle itself, to condense into separate human thoughts. Yes, there was movement, there was. The formless fog thirsted for contours, for embodiments, and once something, a mirror-like glint, appeared in the darkness, and in this dim ray Luzhin perceived a face with a black, curly beard, a familiar image, an inhabitant of childish nightmares. The face in the dim little mirror came closer, and immediately the clear space clouded over and there was foggy darkness and slowly dispersing horror. And upon the expiry of many dark centuries--a single earthly night--the light again came into being, and suddenly something burst radiantly, the darkness parted and remained only in the form of a fading shadowy frame, in the midst of which was a shining, blue window. Tiny yellow leaves gleamed in this blueness, throwing a speckled shadow on a white tree trunk, that was concealed lower down by the dark green paw of a fir tree; and immediately this vision filled with life, the leaves began to quiver, spots crept over the trunk and the green paw oscillated, and Luzhin, unable to support it, closed his eyes, but the bright oscillation remained beneath his lids. I once buried something under those trees, he thought blissfully. And he seemed on the point of recalling exactly what it was when he heard a rustle above him and two calm voices. He began to listen, trying to understand where he was and why something soft and cold was lying on his forehead. After a while he opened his eyes again. A fat woman in white was holding her palm on his forehead--and there in the window was the same happy radiance. He wondered what to say, and catching sight of a little watch pinned on her breast, he licked his lips and asked what time it was. Movement immediately began around him, women whispered, and Luzhin remarked with astonishment that he understood their language, could even speak it himself. "Wie spat ist es--what time is it?" he repeated. "Nine in the morning," said one of the women. "How do you feel?" In the window, if you lifted yourself a little, you could see a fence that was also spotted with shadow. "Evidently I got home," said Luzhin pensively and again lowered his light, empty head onto the pillow. For a while he heard whispers, the light tinkle of glass.... There was something pleasing in the absurdity of everything that was happening, and it was amazingly good to lie there without moving. Thus he imperceptibly fell asleep and when he awoke saw again the blue gleam of a Russian autumn. But something had changed, someone unfamiliar had appeared next to his bed. Luzhin turned his head: on a chair to the right sat a man in white, with a black beard, looking at him attentively with smiling eyes. Luzhin thought vaguely that he resembled the peasant from the mill, but the resemblance immediately vanished when the man spoke: "Karasho?" he inquired amiably. "Who are you?" asked Luzhin in German. "A friend," replied the gentleman, "a faithful friend. You have been sick but now you are well. Do you hear? You are quite well." Luzhin began to meditate on these words, but the man did not allow him to finish and said sympathetically: "You must lie quiet. Rest. Get lots of sleep."

  Thus Luzhin came back from a long journey, having lost en route the greater part of his luggage, and it was too much bother to restore what was lost. These first days of recovery were quiet and smooth: women in white gave him tasty food to eat; the bewitching bearded man came and said nice things to him and looked at him with his agate gaze, which bathed one's body in warmth. Shortly Luzhin began to notice that there was someone else in the room--a palpitating, elusive presence. Once when he woke up someone noiselessly and hastily went away, and once when he half dozed, someone's extremely light and apparently familiar whisper started beside him and immediately stopped. And hints began to flicker in the bearded man's conversation about something mysterious and happy; it was in the air around him and in the autumn beauty of the window, and it trembled somewhere behind the tree--an enigmatic, evasive happiness. And Luzhin gradually began to realize that the heavenly void in which his transparent thoughts floated was being filled in from all sides.

  Warned of the imminence of a wonderful event, he looked through the railed head of his bed at the white door and waited for it to open and the prediction to come true. But the door did not open. Suddenly, to one side, beyond his field of vision, something stirred. Under the cover of a large screen someone was standing and laughing. "I'm coming, I'm coming, just a moment," muttered Luzhin, freeing his legs from the sheet and looking with bulging eyes under the chair beside the bed for something to put on his feet. "You're not going anywhere," said a voice and a pink dress instantaneously filled the void.

  The fact that his life was illumined first of all from this side eased his return. For a short while longer those harsh eminences, the gods of his being, remained in shadow. A tender optical illusion took place: he returned to life from a direction other than the one he had left it in, and the work of redistributing his recollections was assumed by the wondrous happiness that welcomed him first. And when, finally, this area of his life had been fully restored and suddenly, with the roar of a crumbling wall, Turati appeared, together with the tournament and all the preceding tournaments--this happiness was able to remove Turati's protesting image and replace the twitching chessmen in their box. As soon as they came to life, the lid was re-slammed upon them--and the struggle did not continue for long. The doctor assisted, the precious stones of his eyes coruscating and melting; he spoke of the fact that all around them was a bright, free world, that chess was a cold amusement that dries up and corrupts the brain, and that the passionate chess player is just as ridiculous as the madman inventing a perpetuum mobile or counting pebbles on a deserted ocean shore. "I shall stop loving you," said his fiancee, "if you start thinking about chess--and I can see every thought, so behave yourself." "Horror, suffering, despair," said the doctor quietly, "those are what this exhausting game gives rise to." And he proved to Luzhin that Luzhin himself was well aware of this, that Luzhin was unable to think of chess without a feeling of revulsion, and in some mysterious fashion Luzhin, melting and coruscating, and blissfully relaxing, agreed with his reasoning. And in the vast, fragrant garden of the sanatorium Luzhin went strolling in new bedroom slippers made of soft leather and registered his approval of the dahlias, while beside him walked his fiancee and thought for some reason of a book she had read in childhood in which all the difficulties in the life of a schoolboy, who had run away from home together with a dog he had saved, were resolved by a convenient (for the author) fever--not typhus, not scarlet fever, but just "a fever"--and the young stepmother whom he h
ad not loved hitherto so cared for him that he suddenly began to appreciate her and would call her Mamma, and a warm tearlet would roll down her face and everything was fine. "Luzhin is well," she said with a smile, looking at his ponderous profile (the profile of a flabbier Napoleon) as it bent apprehensively over a flower, which maybe might bite. "Luzhin is well. Luzhin is out for a walk. Luzhin is very sweet." "It doesn't smell," said Luzhin in a thick, small voice. "Nor should it smell," she replied taking him by the arm. "Dahlias aren't supposed to. But see that white flower over there--that's Mister Tabacum--and he has a strong smell at night. When I was little I always used to suck the sap out of the corolla. Now I don't like it any more." "In our garden in Russia ..." began Luzhin and became thoughtful, squinting at the flower beds. "We had these flowers over here," he said. "Our garden was quite a presentable one." "Asters," she explained. "I don't like them. They're coarse. Now in our garden ..."