“I must smoke a cigarette,” said Chertoff. He drew one from a pack and lit it, then sighed smoke. “What a proof.”
Nachman said, “Were you pleased?”
“Lindquist did good work. What did you think?”
“Same as you.”
Nachman had hoped that they might share a moment of mathematical brotherhood. Instead, like everyone else, Chertoff assented to the demonstration. Nachman felt himself closing within, shrinking from connection with Chertoff. It had always been like this. Nachman worked alone, lived alone, thought alone. He didn’t need solidarity with Chertoff, such a peculiar fellow.
“I see it in your eyes,” said Chertoff. “You think I let you down.”
“Nonsense.”
“Not nonsense. To me the proof is good. I’m not you, Nachman. How many numbers have chosen you as a friend? Fifty? Seventy-five? I have maybe five, and I’m not always too sure of their friendship. How many, Nachman? Ninety. Sure, you have ninety. Negatives, fractions, rational, complex — they come when you call. For you mathematics is a big party. But I am like most people — only five. Less is revealed to us, so we think the proof is good. You want to know something — it might as well be good. For six months, a year — good or no good — we’ll think it’s good. This is the common fate. But you, Nachman, you don’t think it’s good. You’re alone. Worse yet, you’re frightened.”
“Excuse me. I must give my congratulations to Lindquist.”
“You must run away. See?”
“I see that you’re impertinent, Chertoff.”
“Go, run to him, give him a kiss. When you’re in Moscow, ring me. We’ll talk about real things.”
Chertoff’s feral eyes surrendered their interest in Nachman as he glanced toward the corners of the room. He half-smiled, then winked slyly at Nachman. “There are more women here than I expected.”
Nachman joined the group that had formed around Lindquist, and immediately forgot Chertoff while trying to think how to make a pleasant remark, with perhaps the slightest hint, giving Lindquist pause. Someone whispered to Lindquist, and he looked toward Nachman, spotting him at the edge of the group. Lindquist extended his hand, urging Nachman forward. “Thank you for coming to hear my talk, Nachman. I feel honored.”
Shaking Lindquist’s long, cool surgeon’s hand, Nachman decided not to give any hints. Lindquist was disarming in his friendliness, which made it harder, not easier, to suggest his failure. Besides, Lindquist was extremely quick. He might see everything instantly, regardless of how subtle the hint, and he’d be furious because Nachman hadn’t been forthright. Others would sympathize with Lindquist. Even when they saw that Nachman was right — no, especially when they saw he was right. Better to keep his mouth shut. Nachman knew what he knew. A difficult knowledge. Why bring himself into bad odor? People need to believe, which requires an irrationality, a suspension of critical faculties, an abnegation of will, a spreading of the thighs. Nachman’s colleagues, like Saint Teresa, had been ravished, penetrated with belief. Between a mistake and madness, there was a nourishing relationship. If they knew what Nachman thought, they’d despise and revile him. Chertoff was right. Nachman was frightened.
The Swede looked with blue incisiveness into Nachman’s brown eyes. “What do you say, Nachman? It was all right?”
As if speaking from a trance, Nachman said, “Wonderful.”
“Wonderful? Did I play the cello? I only did mathematics. I saw you in the audience and watched your face. It didn’t look full of wonder.”
Nachman shouldn’t have said “Wonderful.” A bleat of mindless enthusiasm. Helpless to undo the word, Nachman repeated it, “Wonderful.”
Lindquist nodded gravely. “All right, then, wonderful. Such praise coming from you is …” He made a noise, not an intelligible word. His tone was grim, as if he detected in the word “wonderful” a form of contempt. “Do you have time to talk, Nachman? If you want to say something, I want to listen.”
“Now?” Nachman had intended to say he had nothing to say. With the question—“Now?”—he surprised himself. Where did the word come from? It made him feel like a liar.
“Lunch tomorrow. Could you call my room in the morning?”
“You’re staying at this hotel?”
Another question. Of course Lindquist was staying at this hotel. The whole conference was here. Lindquist looked puzzled and mock-injured, pouting as if Nachman’s question were an oblique insult. “Are you being evasive, Nachman? Would you prefer not to meet for lunch?”
“I will,” said Nachman. “I’ll call.” His voice was eager, compensating for the imagined insult. The talk had been stressful, making Lindquist hypersensitive, but there had been no insult. Unless he’d been struck by a critical thought-ray from Nachman’s subconscious, a flow of searing deadly brainlight. Nachman remembered Chertoff’s question, “If he’s a mathematician, what are you?” He’d meant that Lindquist’s existence, merely that, threatened Nachman’s, and vice versa. Confused and embarrassed, Nachman backed away, repeating, “I’ll call,” and turned, hurrying out of the lecture hall, then to a men’s room, where he shoved into an empty stall, dropped his briefcase, and — no time to spare — threw up. Weak and dizzy, he washed his face. He did it to clean himself and also not to let himself think. It came to him that he, too, was a believer. He believed there is good and bad. He’d been bad not to speak up when Lindquist asked for his reaction. Nachman saw again the solemn handsome face and heard the simple appeaclass="underline" “It was all right?”
Bad not to answer. Bad not to tell the truth. But how could it matter if Nachman’s mere existence was potentially lethal. Nachman dried his face, and then, staring into the mirror above the sink, said to himself, “Let him have the solution. I’ll settle for the slave girl.”
Nachman left the men’s room and wandered into the hotel lobby, dazed and disoriented. He looked about for people he knew. Where was Chertoff? To see the hideous blue suit, the ferocious eyes and teeth, would be a blessing. Nachman badly needed someone to talk to. Moving through the crowd, he sensed people turning in his direction. He knew he was being recognized, but he recognized nobody. The crowd seemed too young. The conversations on every side — in Italian, French, German, Russian, Japanese — were estranging. Mathematicians had flown in from everywhere. Nachman had surely met many of them, but he’d never been a sociable fellow, never made sure to remember names. Groups of two and three clustered about the lobby, talking with frenzied energy, as if desperate for communion. Nachman wandered among the groups, feeling awkward and self-conscious, scrutinizing name tags, which he considered rude. Some faces were familiar, but no names. He couldn’t bring himself to approach a familiar face without knowing the name that went with it. With exasperation, he asked himself why he was in this hotel lobby. Nobody was talking to him. Nachman supposed he looked forbidding, unapproachable. He had no reason to stay.
Planes left for Los Angeles every half hour. Nachman could be in Santa Monica, in his own house, well before midnight. Tomorrow he’d phone the hotel and leave a message at the desk for Lindquist, apologizing. Not for missing their lunch, but for what Nachman couldn’t tell him, though he’d say it was for missing lunch. Nachman remembered saying, “I will.”