At the Café Demel, he had chosen a table in the back room. I made my heels click across the floor, swaying my hips between the white tablecloths right up to where he sat. He had all the time in the world to look me over, except that his nose was in a book. When he looked up, I was struck by his youth all over again. He was so smooth — a baby’s skin and hair that was naturally orderly — and he wore an impeccable suit. He had nothing about him of the movie actors who were oohed and aahed over backstage at the club: his shoulders were made for desk work, not for rowing crew. But he was charming. His eyes, an impossible blue, were full of gentleness. And though his kindness wasn’t simulated, it was directed not toward the person he was talking to but somewhere deep within himself.
Barely had we said our greetings than one of the Demelinerinen appeared, austerely clad, to take our order, saving us the trouble of initiating a conversation. I ordered a violet sherbet, longing all the while for the indecent pastries on the counter. Our first date was not the time to show my gluttony. Kurt fell into a deep well of thought over the pastry menu. The waitress patiently answered his barrage of questions. The minute description of so many sweets awoke my appetite. I added a cream horn to my order. To hell with manners! Why be coy? In the end Kurt opted just for tea. The young woman fled, relieved.
“What use have you made of your afternoon, Herr Gödel?”
“I went to a meeting of the Circle.”
“A club in the British style?”
He pushed his glasses up his nose, his finger stiff.
“No, a discussion group, started by professors Schlick and Hahn. Hahn will probably be my thesis adviser at the university.”
“I get the picture … You sit around after a meal in big leather armchairs and admire the wood paneling.”
“We meet in a little room on the ground floor of the mathematics department. Or in a café. There are no leather armchairs, and I haven’t noticed any wood paneling.”
“You talk about sports and cigars?”
“We talk about mathematics and philosophy. About language.”
“Women?”
“No. No women. Well, yes. Sometimes. Olga Hahn joins us.”
“Is she pretty?”
He removed his glasses to wipe away an invisible speck of dust.
“Very intelligent. Funny. I think.”
“Do you like her?”
“She’s engaged. What about you?”
“You’re asking if I’m engaged?”
“No, what did you do with your afternoon?”
“We rehearsed a new floor show. Will you come and watch me?”
“I wouldn’t think of missing it.”
I conscientiously admired the room.
“A very attractive place. Do you come here often, Herr Gödel?”
“Yes, with my mother. She likes the pastries.”
“You don’t order anything to eat?”
“Too much to choose from.”
“I’d have known what to order for you.”
The waitress set down the teapot in front of him, along with the bowl of sugar and the pitcher of milk. He rearranged the position of each. But he restrained himself from touching my tableware. He took a spoonful of sugar, leveled it carefully, and gauged the quantity before putting it back in the bowl and then starting the operation all over again. I took the opportunity to eat my ice cream. Kurt sniffed at his tea.
“Is it not to your liking, Herr Gödel?”
“They use boiling water. It’s better to let it sit a few minutes before steeping the tea leaves.”
“You’re a bit of a maniac.”
“Why do you say that?”
I buried my laugh in my cream horn.
“You have an appetite. It’s a pleasure to watch you eat, Adele.”
“I burn it all off. I’m always on the go.”
“I envy you. My own health is very fragile.”
He smiled gluttonously. I felt like a strudel in a pastry case. I patted my lips with my napkin before embarking on my drawing-closer-to-you tango.
“What are you studying exactly?”
“I am working toward a doctorate in formal logic.”
“You can’t be serious! The university awards degrees in logic? But isn’t logic a faculty you either have at birth or don’t?”
“No, formal logic is not by any means a faculty.”
“Then what kind of animal is it?”
“Do you really want to talk about this?”
I laid it on, eyelashes flaring. “I love to hear you talk about your work. It’s so … fascinating.”
Lieesa would have rolled her eyes. I stuck to my own way of thinking. The broader you play it, the better it works. A man’s vanity may make him deaf, but it also makes him talkative. First step: let him explain his life to you.
He put down his cup, lining up the handle with the floral design of the saucer, then changing his mind and setting it in its normal position, but only after giving it a full revolution. I waited, careful not to show my thoughts: Come on, schoolboy! You can’t resist it, you’re a man like any other!
“Formal logic is an abstract system that doesn’t use normal language, the language we speak, you and I, when we’re discussing something. It’s a universal method for manipulating mathematical objects. Though I don’t speak Chinese, I could follow a logical demonstration by a Chinese person.”1
“What’s the point, other than allowing you to understand a Chinese speaker?”
“The point?”
“Yes. What’s the purpose of logic?”
“To prove! We’re looking for protocols that will let us establish definitive mathematical truths.”
“Like a recipe?”
In this new light, I had a better grasp of his seduction technique. He wasn’t all that shy. I was an unfamiliar specimen, he didn’t know how to act with me. I was harder to approach than the coeds at school because I was unimpressed by his academic success. He had to proceed step-by-step, justifying every stage. A chance meeting, a walk, two walks, then tea. What could he talk about? Let her do the talking. His usual technique, as he confessed to me later, was far different. He would arrange a meeting with a young woman in a room at the university where another young woman — the real object of his desire — was studying. Jealousy, competition, scoring off a bank shot: applied mathematics.
“Not everything can be proved with your logic, can it? For instance, can you prove love?”
“In the first place, a proof requires rigorous definitions, and the problem needs to be parceled into small pieces that are hard and immutable. Second, not everything can be transposed into this realm; that would be wrong. Love isn’t governed by a formal system.”
“A formal system?”
“An entirely objective language adapted to mathematics. Based on a set of axioms. Love is subjective by its very definition. It has no foundational axioms.”
“What’s an axiom?”
“A self-evident truth, on which you build more complex ideas like theorems.”
“A kind of brick?”
The teacup revolved three more times.
“If you like.”
“I’m going to teach you Adele’s first theorem. When it comes to love, one plus one equals everything, and two minus one equals nothing.”2
“That’s not a theorem. As long as it hasn’t been proved, it’s a conjecture.”
“What do you do with those that fail the test? Do you send them to the graveyard for conjectures?”
He never cracked a smile. I moved on from subtleties to phase two: applying heat. Provocation gets you closer to the subject.
“And I don’t agree with you. Love is so predictable in its repetitions. All of us live through a logical progression: desire, pleasure, suffering, disenchantment, disgust, etc. It only appears to be confused or personal.” I purposely stressed the words “pleasure” and “suffering.”