Silence in the Hall

The Fifth Round

第五轮

For thirty years Davit Kapanadze had been running chess tournaments, and in thirty years he had learned that you do not recognise a cheat by his moves, but by his hands. Someone with something to hide touches his face, his ear, his pocket; he gets up too often, and he comes back too quickly. Davit had fetched players out of toilets with telephones in the cisterns, he had confiscated a shoe with a vibration motor in its sole, and once, in Tbilisi, he had sent a grandfather out of the hall who was giving his grandson signals from the audience with a handkerchief. He was not proud of it. He was only thorough.

三十年来，达维特·卡帕纳泽一直在主持国际象棋锦标赛；而在这三十年里，他懂得了一个道理：看一个人是否作弊，不能看他的走法，而要看他的双手。凡是心里有鬼的人，总会摸自己的脸、耳朵或是口袋；他起身的次数过于频繁，返回的速度又过于迅捷。达维特曾把选手从洗手间里揪出来，那些抽水马桶的水箱里藏着手机；他曾没收过一只鞋子，鞋底内嵌着微型振动马达；甚至有一次，在第比利斯，他把一位祖父驱逐出了赛场——那老头在看台上用手帕给孙子打暗号。对此他并不感到自豪。他只是做事一丝不苟罢了。

The Batumi Open was to be his last tournament. He had informed the federation in the spring, in a short letter without giving a reason, because he did not know himself exactly which one he should have given. He was sixty-three, his knees no longer liked the long days, and every Sunday his daughter called from Berlin to ask whether he did not finally want to do something else. What that was supposed to be, however, she could not tell him either.

巴统公开赛本该是他职业生涯的最后一役。今年春天，他已向棋协递交了辞呈，信写得很短，未附任何理由，因为连他自己也说不清楚究竟该给出一个怎样的由头。他六十三岁了，膝盖已受不住整日整日的站立与巡视，女儿每个星期天都会从柏林打电话来，问他怎么还不退下来干点别的。然而到底该干点什么，她自己也说不出个所以然来。