George Bartram - Under the Freeze

“I daresay Marx would not.” Schneider laughed. “Are you a Marxist?”

“Not at all. Modern professional sport is the kind of commercial pig trough that makes one say Marxist things, however.”

Schneider was slender to the point of seeming ascetic. It was hard to make out subtleties of expression against the glare, but Tarp thought he looked rather satanically amused. “Are you a Christian?” Schneider said.

“Of course.” He said it with intentional glibness, as a Christian who never went to church might say it.

“Not a very good Christian, perhaps,” Schneider said.

“It is a state of mind, surely — a state of culture?”

“Not to the Church.” He said it as a pious layman or even a priest might have said it, austerely; Tarp made a mental note to check his ties with the Vatican. And Doctor Bonano in Havana , the abortionist .

“You asked only if I was a Christian, not if I was a churchgoer.” Tarp smiled as Jean-Louis Selous smiled, engagingly, just a bit cynically. “I am more a Christian than a Moslem.”

Schneider touched a button and the chair spun to his right. He rolled three feet in that direction, stopped, said, “I would prefer a whole Moslem to a part Christian. I do not like half men.” He had meant to sound final and acidulous, but his French was not quite up to it, and demi - homme was too crude for what he wanted. He stopped the chair again and laughed. “ Moi , je suis demi - homme ,” he said, and he moved again and stopped opposite an armchair. “Sit,” he said in Spanish.

Tarp sat. He could see Schneider plainly now, for behind him was an abstract painting in dark purples and blues, against which his face was clear. The skull was large and the dome loomed above the face, topped with dark hair flecked with silver like a fine pelt; the face itself seemed delicate, almost the face of an adolescent, large-eyed and almost feminine.

“To business,” Schneider said. “You have eighteen minutes left.” He sounded waspish. “You have a tape recorder, naturally?”

“Naturally.” Tarp put a small recorder on the arm of the chair. He let silence settle between them, take up residence there. Schneider grew impatient. At last Tarp said, switching the machine on, “What is the purpose of wealth?”

Schneider sneered. “Wealth is its own purpose.”

“But for you, I mean. Why a life of wealth — instead of a life of poverty, for example? Why not the life of intentional poverty, like Saint Francis?”

“Saint Francis began with wealth. He chose poverty later. It is the right direction to take. To begin with poverty and then choose poverty is to be an idiot.”

“And you began with poverty and chose wealth?” And what has this to do with plutonium ? he was wondering, but he knew only that he wanted to draw Schneider out.

“I began with the curse of curses, neither poverty nor wealth — the obscure comfort of the middle class.” He snapped the words out. “And one does not choose wealth, Monsieur Selous — unless one is as big an idiot as the poor man who chooses poverty — because wealth is a by-product: what one chooses is work . I chose to achieve! Next to achievement, the rest is second-rate. One exists under the eye of God. One must achieve. One must demonstrate one’s being.”

“Because one is watched?” Tarp was thinking, Is acquiring Russian plutonium an achievement ?

“Because it is expected!” As he grew excited, Schneider began to make gestures, as if he were tracing magical signs in the air. “When I say that we are under the eye of God, I do not mean that one is watched as in some stupid film about Big Brother. No, I mean that one is under the eye of God as, in a stadium, the athlete is under the eye of the spectators. One performs — because it is expected!”

“So, life is a form of sport.”

“It is the only sport. The only real sport. What you call sport — throwing balls, running about, jumping — is only imitation. At one time, I played football. Oh, yes, I could run and jump then. But it was frivolous. Mere imitation.” He sneered. “But wealth is like the gold medal. The prize after the achievement.”

“So you think that wealth is a proper reward.”

“Of course. God has made the athlete strong, and he accepts his medal; God has made me an achiever, and so I accept wealth.”

“And the poor?”

“What poor?”

“Even in Argentina, there are poor.”

“The poor do not much interest me.”

“They are the losers?”

Schneider did not understand at first. “Oh, I see, yes — the ones eliminated in the early rounds. Yes. The champion hardly thinks of the duffers when he is in the finals.”

“And what of the poor politically?”

Schneider smiled. “Your subject is supposed to be sport, not politics. But I will answer you. You mean, what of the poor in what is called a democracy, I suppose.”

“It is a democratic age.”

“It is an age of losers, yes.” Schneider looked both ways, as if trying to find something in the vast room. He touched a button and the chair turned right around so that he could look at the painting that had been behind him. The chair hummed and he faced Tarp again. “You disappoint me, Monsieur Selous. The question is naive.”

“I am sorry.”

“So am I. You know why I granted this interview? Because in one of your articles, you wrote, ‘It is the irony of sport that it is fascistic and has its greatest success in democratic nations.’ I liked that. Yes, sport is fascistic, and life is fascistic! And you ask me about the poor, about democracy. You bore me. It is often boring, being Juaquin Schneider — surrounded by flunkies, feared by everybody. I thought you might be different. But no, you are not very intelligent and you are not bold. I can tell, you are not an achiever. You asked, What is the role of the poor in a democratic age? but you should have asked, What is the role of government in a democratic age?”

Tarp waited. “Am I to ask the question now?”

Schneider sneered. “I believe the moment has passed.”

“Then let me ask another question. What is the role of the death squad?”

Schneider stiffened. “I take back part of what I said: you are not intelligent, but you are bold.”

“What is the role of the death squad?”

Schneider stared at him. Their eyes met like hands meeting to lock fingers and explore each other’s strength. “Or is the death squad the purpose of wealth?”

Schneider broke contact. He joined his thin hands in his lap. “Your time is almost up,” he said, although he had not looked at a clock.

“For that matter,” Tarp said, “what is the role of government in the atomic age? What is the role of the wealthy man in the atomic age? Is plutonium the purpose of wealth?” Nothing happened in Schneider’s face or his hands, and Tarp said again, “What is the purpose of government? Is it the same purpose as organized sport, I wonder — and of the Church? To entertain the mass of people, while a few men of achievement run things?” Schneider’s huge eyes came up. They were implacable. The effeminate face was set. The right hand rose slowly and the index finger pointed at Tarp.

“You could die in Argentina, Monsieur Selous.”

“Is the death squad the purpose of wealth?”

The finger closed back into the hand; the hand went to the arm of the shining chair, which hummed and made a sixty-degree turn. “I was mistaken about you on both counts,” Schneider said. “You have boldness, and you have some intelligence. You have annoyed me, and that is very intelligent of you, because it has caused me to reveal myself.” He nodded, as if he were agreeing with words spoken by somebody else. “I am giving a party tonight in my apartment. I want you to come.” He looked around. “You can watch me on my playing field.”