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the Revolution, it was my job to know him. We spent many hours in conversation, it was a most pleasant assignment really. There was nothing we did not speak of, women, politics, religion. All those matters that men like to speculate about when they are at ease. From this man I learned a particular thing. Fair play , he called it. Not such a simple notion, perhaps, when you probe to find its heart. A kind of code, which each gentleman must honor individually in order for all to benefit. In time I came to understand that it was a good system for those who had more than they needed, for those who could afford to give something away. But I also realized that I had never known anybody like that. Nobody I ever knew could say, ‘Here, you take it, I do not deserve it. I do not need it so badly that I will cheat and lie to get it.’ Perhaps some day we may indulge ourselves in that fashion, we may have so much that we can afford to give some of it away, but not now. Can you understand this?”
    Khristo looked hesitant. Ozunov laughed at his discomfort. “Yes, boy, I cheated you. I moved a piece while you were daydreaming out the window, enchanted by our Russian snow. I acknowledge it!”
    “But why, comrade Major? You could have won without that.”
    “Yes, I could have. You do some things well, comrade student, but you play chess like a barbarian. I wanted merely to teach you something, that is my job now.”
    “Teach me what, comrade Major?”
    Ozunov sighed. “I am told Lenin once called it the BolshevikVariation, simply another strategy, like the Sicilian Defense. It has two parts to it. The first is this: win at all cost. Do anything you have to do, anything , but win. There are no rules.”
    Khristo hesitated. He had a response to this, but it was very bold and he was not sure of himself. At last, he took the leap.
    “I have learned what you wanted to teach me, comrade Major,” he said, opening his hand to show Ozunov the white pawn he had stolen when the telephone rang.
    “You’re a good student,” Ozunov said. “Now learn the second part of the Variation: make the opponent play your game. And the more he despises your methods, the more you must make him use them. The more he arms himself with virtue, the more you must make him fight in the dirt. Then you have him.”
    He gestured with his pipe toward the white pawn lying on Khristo’s palm. “Keep that,” he said. “A student prize from Ozunov. You have won the copy of Vladimir Ilyich’s speeches, now you will have something to remind you, in times to come, how to turn them into prophecies.”
    “Wake now , please.”
    The hand jerked his shoulder. His body rose upright, by itself it seemed, and he suddenly found himself sitting. He struggled to get his eyes open. What time was it? His heart was beating like a drum at being torn from deep sleep.
    “You are up? No falling back down in a heap?”
    It was Irina Akhimova, one of the night guardians, an immense woman with tiny eyes and a voice like a ripsaw.
    “Dress yourself, Khristo Nicolaievich. Quickly, quickly.”
    At last his eyes opened. The dormitory was dark, the windows revealed snow drifted over the sill, black night above. Goldman stirred in the next bed. Somebody coughed, a toilet flushed. Ozunov’s chess game had kept him awake a long time the night before, his mind tossed on the sea.
    “What is it?” His voice was thick.
    “Angels dancing on the roof!” Her harsh voice cut through theroom. “How should I know?” She grabbed him by the hair, not so playfully. “And wear your warmest things, little rooster, lest your manhood become an icicle.”
    She let him go with a flourish. He swung out of bed; she didn’t take her eyes off him while he dressed. When he visited the toilet, she waited just outside. He wound a scarf around his throat, put on a sweater and his wool jacket.
    “Very well,” he said.
    She looked at him critically. Reached to a nail above his bed, whipped his peaked cap