Frank Brady - Endgame

Spassky was given a standing ovation. He said to Schmid, “It’s a pity,” while someone from the audience, angry at Fischer, yelled: “Send him back to the United States!”

Fischer lodged a formal protest less than six hours after the forfeiture. It was overruled by the match committee on the grounds that he’d failed to appear at the game. The committee upheld the forfeit, but not without some trepidation and soul-searching. Everyone knew that Fischer wouldn’t accept it lightly. And he didn’t. His instant reaction was to make a reservation to fly home immediately. He was dissuaded by Lombardy, but it seemed likely that he’d refuse to continue the match unless the forfeit was removed. Schmid himself voiced his sincere concern regarding the danger to Fischer’s career if he walked out of the match: “What will happen to Bobby? What city would ever host a match for him?”

Bobby had his supporters, though. Grandmaster Svetozar Gligoric suggested that the cameras, staring constantly at him, may have signified human eyes peering at Bobby and distracted his attention. Vladimir Nabokov, the Russian-born novelist who’d written The Defense (about a genius who lives only for chess), also spoke up for Bobby, saying that he was “quite right” in objecting to the use of cameras in the match: “He can’t be subject to the clicks and flashes of those machines [on their tall tripods] above him.”

Notified of the decision and realizing its implications, Dr. Euwe, who’d returned to the Netherlands, cabled his own decision to Schmid in case Fischer refused to appear at the next game:

IN CASE OF NON-APPEARANCE OF FISCHER IN THIRD GAME, PRESIDENT OF FIDE DECLARES IF FISCHER NOT IN THE FOURTH GAME, MATCH WILL BE CONCLUDED AND SPASSKY WILL BE PROCLAIMED WORLD CHAMPION.

Fischer began receiving thousands of letters and cables urging him to continue the match, and Henry Kissinger called him once again, this time from California, to appeal to his patriotism. The New York Times even issued an open plea urging Fischer to continue his challenge. In an editorial entitled “Bobby Fischer’s Tragedy,” the paper wrote:

The possibility seems strong that his temper tantrums will turn the present world championship match into a non-event in which Spassky will retain his crown because of Fischer’s refusal to play.

The tragedy in all this is particularly great because for nearly a decade, there has been strong reason to suppose that Fischer could demonstrate his supremacy convincingly if only given the opportunity to do so.…

Is it too much to hope that even at this late state he will regain his balance and fulfill his obligation to the chess world by trying to play Spassky without histrionics? Consequential as is the two-game lead the Soviet champion now enjoys, the board is still set for a duel that could rank among the most brilliant in this ancient game’s annals.

Perhaps as a result of Kissinger’s interest in the match and his two conversations with Bobby, President Nixon also relayed an invitation to Fischer, through Life’s photographer Harry Benson, to visit the White House after the match was over, win or lose. Nixon said that he liked Bobby “because he is a fighter.”

In an effort to ease the situation and encourage Fischer to continue the match, Schmid announced that according to the rules, he had the right to move the match from the stage of the hall to a backstage room. Speaking privately to Spassky, Schmid appealed to him “as a sportsman” to agree to this new attempt to enable the match to continue. Spassky, ever a gentleman, was willing. By the time Fischer was notified of the new arrangement, he’d already made reservations on all three flights going back to New York on the day of the third game. He took a few hours to consider the offer, and ninety minutes before the start of play he said he’d be willing to give it a try if he was assured complete privacy and no cameras.

Why did Fischer continue to play? Probably a combination of genuine nationalism, faith in his ability to overcome the odds of a two-point deficit, a desire to get paid (even if he lost the match, he was to receive $91,875 in prize money, in addition to an estimated $30,000 from television and movie rights), and an overwhelming need to do what he’d always vowed to do, almost from his first official match: prove that he was the most gifted chess player on earth.

Spassky appeared on time at the backstage location; at first he sat in Fischer’s chair and, perhaps unaware that he was on camera, smiled and swiveled around several times as a child might do. Then he moved to his own chair, and waited. Fischer arrived eight minutes late, looking very pale, and the two men shook hands. Spassky, playing white, made his first move and Fischer replied. Suddenly, Fischer pointed to a camera and began shouting.

Spassky was now on his feet. “I am leaving!” he announced curtly, with the bearing of a Russian count, informing Fischer and Schmid that he was going to the stage to play the game there.

Schmid recalled later that “for a second, I didn’t know what to do. Then I stopped Spassky’s clock, breaking the rules. But somehow I had to get that incredible situation under control.”

The men continued talking, but their voices became subdued. Schmid put his arms around Spassky’s shoulders, saying: “Boris, you promised me you would play this game here. Are you breaking that promise?” Then turning to Fischer, Schmid said: “Bobby, please be kind.”

Spassky gaped for about ten seconds, thinking about what to do, and finally sat down. Fischer was told that it was just a closed-circuit, noiseless camera that was projecting the game onto a large screen on the stage. No copy would be kept. He somehow accepted it.

Fischer apologized for his hasty words, and both men finally got down to business. They played one of the best games of the match. After Fischer’s seventh move (fifteen minutes had elapsed on his clock, to Spassky’s five), he briefly left the room. As he walked past Schmid, the referee noted that he appeared intensely grave. “He looked like death,” Schmid said afterward. Yes, and also incensed, indignant, and thoroughly, almost maniacally, determined.

When the game was adjourned on the forty-first move, Fischer’s powerful position was irresistible. The game was resumed the next day and Bobby, feeling ebullient because he was in a winning position, agreed to play on the main stage. At the start of play Spassky took one fleeting glimpse at Fischer’s sealed move, which won by force, meaning that there was no ambiguity to the position: Bobby had a clear win that was demonstrable and resolute. Spassky stopped his clock, signaling his resignation.

Tardy as usual, Fischer dashed onto the stage fifteen minutes late, out of breath. Spassky was already en route to his hotel. “What happened?” he asked, and Schmid said: “Mr. Spassky has resigned.” Fischer signed his score sheet and left the stage without another word. By the time he reached the backstage exit, he could no longer resist smiling at the well-wishers waiting there.

Though it seems ludicrous to suggest that the outcome of the Fischer-Spassky match was predictable after only two games had been completed, one point going to each player, the case can be made. The fact is, Fischer’s first win over Spassky was more than a narrowing of the gap. It was the creation of the gestalt Bobby needed to prove to himself that he was capable of dominance. A drawn game would have had no significance. He’d demonstrated in the past that he could, though admittedly infrequently, draw with Spassky. By winning, Bobby not only extracted the first drop of his opponent’s blood, he ensured that the wound would not soon close up.

Even as Bobby was waging a secondary battle against cameras in Reykjavik, cameras in New York were televising his epic struggle on the board. A thirty-five-year-old sociology professor, Shelby Lyman, a master who’d been ranked high among players in the United States, conducted a five-hour program almost every day on public television, discussing the games, move by move, as information and color commentary was phoned in to him by the PBS reporter in Iceland. He showed each new move on a demonstration board and attempted to predict what Fischer’s or Spassky’s next move might be. In a primitive form of interactive programming, members of the television audience phoned the studio to offer their suggested next move. Grandmasters were often guests on the show, evaluating the audience’s suggestions and discussing the win-loss possibilities of the contestants.