Autumn Endgame

Episode 3

 the final five moves:

11.fNd2 Rd4 12.Na5 Bb4 13.Nxc6 Rxe4+ 14.Kf1 Bc4+ 15.Nxc4 Re1 mate. Or if 15.Kg1 Re1+ 16.Nf1 Rxf1 mate.

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Moscow. Studio encounter.

J=John Osprey

E=Elena Serikova

- - - - - - - - - - - - - - - -

J:"This is very good of you."

E:"Not at all. Showing visitors round the tv studio is part of my job here."

J:"What should I call you?"

E:"Yelena will do nicely, John."

J:"Elena, it was very good of your brother to get me this invitation to Moscow."

E:"For the Red Square Tournament, you mean? Yes. He had to pull a few strings. With my help, if you must know. He's longing to get his own back on you."

J:"Our game's due to start in a couple of hours. What else is there for me to see here?"

E:"Well, there's a recording of a studio audience show that's due to begin in five minutes. But you don't understand a word of Russian."

J:"Come on, you're an interpreter."

E:"Only a guide, really."

J:"To me you're an interpreter. Look, I'll have to be off in an hour or two. What's the programme about?"

E:"Let's see if we can watch it from the control room. It's not strictly allowed, but they'll be too busy to notice. Come on. Pretend you're a VIP. I often have to show them round."

. . . . . .

J:"Who's the celebrity?"

E:"Whisper, for God's sake. His name's Arago. Stage name, anyway. Claims spiritual powers and practically everyone believes him. Thousands write in to come on his programme."

J:"What's his gimmick?"

E:"What's a 'gimmick'? He cures people. Of deafness. Cerebral palsy in children. He holds 'tsigun' sessions. That's when he exorcises evil spirits. He talks with fellow gurus in India, without using e-mail or the phone. Believes in the mystical healing properties of purple Karelian spar. Uses his hands. He's a healer. The medical profession hates him, but that doesn't harm his popularity. Headaches, hypertension, too much blood sugar, he's cured dozens, even hundreds. Parkinson's disease, tinnitus, Down's syndrome."

J:"Where did you pick up all these medical terms?"

E:"Well, they're all in Arago's publicity. We're learning all about Western advertising and public relations and using the media, you know. After all, I do work in television."

J:"And using it to push Eastern superstitious garbage."

E:"What do you know about it?"

J:"All right, all right. Not much. And I'm no great respecter of orthodox medicine myself. Look at him, though. He's dressed very soberly. Not like a showman."

E:"Arago wants to be taken seriously. There's money in it for him. They say the Kremlin consults him, but I don't really know anything about that."

J:"Where did you learn such wonderful English?"

E:"What makes you so curious about me?"

J:"Do I have to answer that?"

E:"What did Dmitri tell you about me?"

J:"Not a lot. He said you'd help - and you are helping."

E:"Helping?"

J:"I want to get to know the "real"&hibar; Russia, and I think you're just the person."

E:"You mean, "I"&hibar;'m the real Russia?"

J:"I hope so. ... ..."

E:"We're missing the show. A lady's just asked Arago a question about the future. And he's answering her."

J:"Do you know Arago?"

E:"I see him about the studio, and I think he knows me. In fact we have spoken a few times. But he's not all that friendly. Another thing they say about him is that he's got links to the violent Mafia. And to the Kremlin."

J:"You said. Has he indeed? How could I get to talk to him?"

E:"By learning to speak Russian for a start. What would you want to meet Arago for?"

J:"I'd need you to help."

E:"So that's your game. All right, but you'll have to wait..."

J:"... can't wait that long ... you know, my game with Dmitri. So I'd better have your work phone number."

E:"And that's another of what you call a gambit, I suppose?"

J:"How did you guess?"

E:"All right. Here it is - you can have my kartochka, my business card. But I'll make you pay for this."

J:"Sounds fine by me. But this Arago character and his hocus-pocus, that's surely not the real Russia? I would like to talk with him, sure, but superstition isn't what I'm really after. Historical is more like it, archive stuff."

E:"Not so fast. You take me out to dinner first."

J:"Challenge accepted. Sounds as if you've got something in mind."

E:"For the dinner, or the history lesson?"

J:"For both, I hope. I've no idea where we can eat decently in Moscow, and as to history, that's your home ground too, not mine. Look, I've got to be off if I'm not to lose on time to Dmitri."

E:"'Lose on time?' What a funny phrase. First he comes on strong, then he leaves me. I've had enough of the English. Do you know what I'm going to do?"

J:" No. What?"

E:"I'm going to phone my colleague on the radio network that's reporting the Red Square chess live. He owes me a favour. I'm going to tell him to report your game with Dmitri as it happens. The whole world will hear how he gets his revenge."

J:"You swine. But I've got the white pieces in this game."

E:"You think that'll help? He's not going to make the same mistake twice. he's been studying your games, you know."

Next episode next Sunday.

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