Checkmate

Before I was as I am now, a 2D image pretending to be 3D, I was a half-finished shape, complete only in imagination. Before that, I was a single stroke of a brush, and before even that I was only an idea, full of potential. I was most beautiful as an idea, for the human mind is not bound in images.

The chess-board in front of me seems to gloat, and for a moment I feel that its owner gloats as well, but a glance tells me he is the same lifeless figure that he has always been.

No-one has ever told me how it worked, how I came to be chained to this game with a mere form in the picture that we share. Unmoving, unconscious, yet he plays as well as the highest grandmaster.

I, as I now know myself, am only the spirit of myself. Before ‘I’ was who I am, I was a real person. A living, breathing, human. Now I am merely ‘my’ soul, trapped in this painting, unable to move on because my image still exists in this world.

My guardian angel never moves. They watch, and wait. They are always watching and waiting, and as much as I tell myself that they are there for me, to see that my partner does not cheat, I cannot help feeling that they are hiding something from me.

Lisa smiles at me from across the gallery. When my life first became dull and colourless, Lisa kept me together. To her, there is nothing a little imagination can’t fix, despite her misleading appearance. Hands clasped on her lap, she is perpetually placid, calm. Her calmness masks a vivid imagination and cheerful disposition that only shows when she smiles. The public no longer sees her smile.

“Well?” She says expectantly, gliding over to me, leaving her painting empty behind her.

“Perhaps you know how to play chess?” I ask. I cannot understand why I have not asked her before.

She studies the chess-board closely, picking up each piece. I fidget, worried that she will place them down wrong. Once the pieces have been moved, my turn is over.

Finally she speaks. “Not with these pieces. I often played chess with my mistress, but her pieces were far more... Ladylike.”

I stare at her. Her mistress? I had taken her to be a lady herself.

“You look surprised. I had thought that I had told you.” She raises an eyebrow. “My mistress was adverse to having her likeness drawn, so I was told to sit for her instead. The artist was not to know that a substitute had been made.

I was tutored on how to hold myself like a lady, how to act like a lady, how to speak like one. My master had not known that my portrait would be of any importance to anyone but the artist himself.”

“But - your mistress’ name?”

“My lady’s name was Lisa del Giocondo.” Her eyes widen slightly. “Surely it is of no great importance to you whether I am a lady or not? I had not believed that you were influenced by class distinctions.”

I gather myself. If only the world could know of this - although perhaps it is better that they do not.

“No, no. I would not give your friendship for the friendship of a queen,” I say in an attempt at gallantry. She only laughs.

I return to my chess-board, hoping in the light of this new discovery to see a change in the pieces, some way to escape the war that my partner has waged. I am being pushed back, my forces rapidly depleting as his only seem to receive reinforcements.

“Are you happy now?” Lisa interrupts my thoughts to ask. She asks the same question every day after the gallery has closed.

“No - wait,” I add as she turns to glide back to her own painting. She spins back. “Lisa was your mistress’ name. What is your own?”

“It is better that you continue to call me Lisa.” She glides away, and I return to my game.

From across the gallery, I hear Charles I of England declaring his love for Aphrodite of Milo once again - Venus de Milo to the living ones, but she had announced to each new picture as they came that she preferred the name Aphrodite, and none disobey her.

I catch myself as my hand reaches for a pawn. Why do I play this? What will happen if I win, or if I lose?

“You ask at last. I have been waiting.” I look up, expecting to see Lisa beside me, though I know the voice that had spoken was not hers. My guardian angel has awoken.

“You need only ask again. I will tell you,” they say. “You wish to know. That is enough.” I wait for them to continue.

“If you win the game, your soul will be released from this painting.

If you lose, you will be trapped. You will be compelled to play again the same game that you lost, the same moves, until the game ends. The pieces will reset and you will start again, replaying once more. You will never be let out,” they say evenly.

I turn back to my pieces, examining them with fresh eyes and a mind fueled by desperation. The fire leaves me as I realise that my opponent has me in check.

I settle into my picture position before I realise that I have done so, and a shiver runs through me. I have never done it volunteerily before; the position is uncomfortable, but it is necessary for the public to see my picture the same as it was when painted.

Around the corner, Nike delivers the shout of victory - the signal to tell us that the gallery is opening.

The humans flood in, drifting around slowly, examining each painting as they pass. They cannot know that every few pictures they look at, a trapped soul looks back at them.

Camilla weeps silently in the Oath Of The Horatii. That is one of the few things that I enjoy about public times; when the gallery is closed, she roams free, sharing her grief with those unfortunate enough to show concern for her.

A peculiar man stands in front of me. I stare at him, willing him to move on so that I can focus on my game, but he seems to be studying me closely.

He calls a guide to him and asks about my picture. “Moritz Retzsch’ Checkmate,” the guide tells him.

The man says, “The picture is supposed to depict the devil winning a game of chess against this man, isn’t it?”

“Supposed?”

“It looks like the devil is winning, but he hasn’t won yet. That man has a few moves left. He can still win.”

I turn to my chess-board and peer at it, anxious to see what the visitor has said. And suddenly I see it, wondering why I haven’t before.

*****

Visitors to the Louvre the next day were disappointed to find the famous painting ‘Checkmate’ temporarily removed from public viewing.

A rumour spread that the one of the cleaners had discovered the painting apparently stolen and replaced with a fake. Most who heard it laughed at the painter of the ‘replacement’. Many voices were heard that day exclaiming -

“How could anyone forget to paint in a whole figure?”