P-K4...

...Great Uncle Cuthbert is in mourning this evening having heard of, and taken badly to, the news of the death of the American chess legend and all-round basket case (to judge from his later rants against Jews - of which great race he was in part, if not in full even, one) Bobby Fischer.

GUC is not a chess maestro himself - though he can do a baffling Sicilian on occasions - and is not, I trust, regretting the silencing of the ridiculous rants per se.

He is though of the generation that sat absorbed nightly as Fischer and Spassky slugged out a world of conflict over the board. Two Cold War warrior champions in Reykjavik way back when the Cold War was pretty warm at least in 1972.

The chess was brilliant and the battle bruising. Fischer aimed to crush Spassky's spirit and did so. He lost the first game, forfeited the second and looked gone before it had begun. Then dazzling power-play games of compelling force from the American pushed Spassky to and finally over the edge.

Fischer was King for a moment - then promptly found his very own edge of darkness and took a complete header.

Very strange stuff all round.

GUC, it must be owned, did not come out of the experience untouched either. On the contrary, as it were, many others were 'touched' by him. For it seems he layed some pretty generous odds on Spassky to win after game two. The local lads, one is told, promptly weighed in with the wonga, fully expecting to take 'poor' GUC to the cleaners. Only of course to find themselves bereft of shirt and tail in the end.

But it was not memory of vast pecuniary gain that GUC has cherished down the years of the match. For he tells the fine tale of the night - one of many - when he and the lads were not merely following the game on the television, but were also having a crack themselves. Some would sit with the pieces as Fischer and Spassky had them, trying - valiantly if generally vainly - to anticipate what the next master move would be.

Others would hunker down over their very own combat in deep thought, aided - or not perhaps - by heroic ingestion of the soft drug of choice of the day. (Gold Lebanese with the Government duty stamp still on it was favourite it seems, though I know it not of course.)

This one night then, two lads were sat in the middle of the room - on the floor of course in the spirit of the times - playing away in rapt silence. As the Reykjavik game was not heading anywhere apace, concentration in the whole room began to resolve itself upon young Jan and younger Eddie.

Theirs was a complex middle-game, ripe for careful analysis and considered decision making. Clearly both sides had possibilities and both certain exposed weaknesses. But who could attack without loss of position? Who could bend the will of the other into making a mistake? There were traps to be sprung and there were pitfalls to be avoided. The game was indeed afoot!

Neither combatant moved - it seems - not a piece nor even a muscle for some two hours or more. (The kind of stoned stillness you have to experience to comprehend.) The tension in the room was rising to fever pitch. Something had to give. Someone had to dare strike for victory!

But who should that be? That, it turned out, was the moot and telling point. For finally, weary utterly spaced out Eddie said to wonderfully wired Jan "Err, Jan it is your move isn't it?" To which of course the other replied "Ahh, actually man [the self-same Eddie of course], wow actually I think it's your move. Far out."

A slow at first - minds were not of course at their sharpest at the time - rumbling then rolling, finally irresistible tide of mirth and joy swept the room as both the cause and the effect of the confusion and delay became apparent to all.

That night's notation reads something like '17: QKt to KB whatever - Game abandoned in hysterics', and this night GUC is in mourning for the remembrance and the passing of that special, silly, happy and so very youthful moment.