Bosphorus 14

CHAPTER 14

         When she felt him kiss her gently, she woke up at once.

         “Your school?” He asked

         “I want to stay with you.”

         “I have to go,” holding her tamely, he kissed her on the forehead. “And you have a talent to develop.”

         “When do I see you again?”

         “It might be sooner than you think.” He gave her a playful look.

          She understood that look when he smiled at her in the school cafeteria from behind a newspaper, sipping his coffee.

         “Is this seat taken?” She asked with mischief.

         “Reserved. For the most special person in the world.”

          “What if we are spotted?” She sat down trying to keep calm.

         “It would be more suspicious if we suddenly stopped saying hello. Besides, it is safe now.”

         It pained her to sit across from him and not be able to touch him.

         “Don’t you want to eat something?” She asked.

         “Not now,” he said. “Did you talk to your teacher about the apartment?”

         “Yes, I told him in the morning. He wants to see it.”

         “I’ll take him if he wants to go now.” Ali offered.

         “He must be in his office. Do you want to go up with me?"


         Luther Brandt was surprised when Sara told him about the apartment. He thanked them both repeatedly.

         “Is it too far? I have to get back for my two o’clock class.” He inquired.

         “Twenty minutes the most,” Ali said. “It is close to where I live.”

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         Sara usually arrived at the bookstore an hour before the closing time, but today the traffic was light. When she was at her desk upstairs, Sophie handed her a message.

         “A man asked for you during the day. I told him you worked here after school.”

         The note said, ‘I’ll stop by later, Ahmet.’


         At first Sara didn’t recognize Ahmet. His hair, his clothing, and even the way he walked were different. He raised his hand in a friendly manner.

         “Hi, Sara.”

         “Hi! I almost didn’t know it was you.”

         “Am I glad I have the most forgettable face! Helps a lot in the job.”

         Ahmet had some information with which he wanted her help. “An informant tipped us about something that might be a lead,” he said. “Did you hear anything from your mother about Hotel Laslo, in Ankara?”

         Sara shook her head as a negative answer.

         “Well, she and Enver own it. They also run funny services there for others in business. It is a famous place. Makes a lot of money.”

         “Mother used to go to Ankara very often when I was living with her. I don’t think she goes there very often now.”

         “See what you can do, Okay?”


         After work Sara stopped by at Lamia’s apartment. As the elevator went up, she still didn’t know how she would get around the subject. Maybe if she let her mother do the talking, Lamia would drop a cue on her own.

         “How nice of you to come!” Lamia said, wrapping her bathrobe around her.

         “Am I disturbing you at a bad time?”

         “No I just filled the tub. I’ll let it run.”

         “Don’t do that, Mother. I’ll wait for you in your room. We can talk while you’re in the tub.”

         “Thank you, Dear!” Lamia pecked her on the cheek.

Sara stayed in the bedroom and watched Lamia lower herself into the tub from the bathroom door left ajar. She pulled the door to closed position without getting the lock to click.

         “Tell me about your school,” Lamia yelled from inside the bathroom.

         Sara looked at the file cabinet. Would that be possible? Could she manage it? Lamia had to have a file for Hotel Laslo in there somewhere.

         She started telling her about Luther Brandt and the contest and how she was working with him, and why she’d be working with him in his apartment later once he would move in. She talked continuously trying to sound chatty as she walked to the cabinet and tried to open it. But the cabinet was locked. She looked into the drawer in Lamia’s nightstand and found the key. Knowing Lamia’s habits was helping her.

         “Would you bring the bath oil on the dresser? It is in the blue bottle.“ Lamia asked.

         Sara took the bottle to her, then walked back to the bedroom and asked her about the maid. She opened the lock as Lamia talked and took out an entire file under the name Laslo. It was a thick file and had the risk of its contents falling out. She stuffed most of the papers in her bag and stuck the file itself inside her drawing pad. She locked the file cabinet, but before she had time to put the key back in its place, she heard Lamia come out of the tub. She quickly slid the key in her pocket.

         “I have to leave now, Mother,” she said. “I have homework.”

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         Sara called Ali from Madam Arakian’s, but he wasn’t in. In her room, she put all the papers together into a zippered bag and started on her homework. In a few minutes, Madam Arakian walked in with a cup of tea.

         “You work too hard. I feel for you, Child,” she said.

         “I am enjoying it.” Sara turned to her in her chair. “But I am going to enjoy talking to you more now.”

         “You have something in your mind, Sara. Come on, out with it!”

         ”I have a favor to ask. Please. Madam Arakian, do not to talk about Ali being my friend to anyone, especially to my mother.”

         ”Why Child? I’d think she’d be the one you’d want to tell.”

         ”No, see Madam Arakian, if she knew that he was my friend, he’d tell Enver.”

         ”So?” Madam Arakian stared at her funny.

          So Sara recounted Enver’s visit to the bookstore and his offer.

         “That man walks with the devil, eats with the devil, sleeps with the devil. And what’s worst, he thinks with the devil!” Madam Arakian shook her head from side to side with a stern expression on her face.

         “That’s why I am afraid to come home at night, now that it gets dark early. I’ll be sleeping at a friend’s house often. I didn’t want you to worry.”

         “Sure, sure, I understand. At your age I always stayed with my friends, and I wasn’t even threatened.”

         Inside her Sara felt guilty about having to lie to her, almost wishing that Madam Arakian wouldn’t make deceit so easy for her.

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         Sara had made a drawing of the inlet staring from the marina. Luther Brandt thought she could convert it well into ink. It was compositionally correct, but Sara sensed that something was missing.

         “You’ll find it,” Luther Brandt said. “Things stand clearer under ink. It will come to you. I should be able to help you, now that I am living in your neighborhood.”

         “You are? Did you take that apartment?”

         “Yes. Didn’t Ali tell you?”

         “I didn’t see him since,” Sara said.

         Ali called the bookstore in the evening, “Give me a call when you get home. Emel will come for you.”

         Sara smiled when she recalled how Ali had insisted she visit him with Emel. “On two counts,” he had said. “One, if you’re seen with her coming here, the neighborhood will keep quiet and it won’t reach the fox’s ears. Because she’s a woman, you-know-who won’t be disturbed. Two, she can make it seem as if it is a leisurely walk, while checking around to find out if you are being followed. Two sets of eyes are better than one. They shouldn’t trace you coming to this house. Let’s not make it easy for them to connect you to me.”

         Sara told Madam Arakian she was going to sleep over at a friend’s house. She took her purse, her schoolwork and packed a small bag for herself with the Hotel Laslo file stuffed inside. Then she left Madam Arakian’s and met with Emel at a side street.

         “Good idea,” Emel said when she saw the bag. “I was going to suggest that you bring some of your things here.”

         When they finally entered the house, Sara looked at Ali’s delighted face long and hard to make sure that she had not imagined him. The rest of her troubled ominous life was erased in this new wide-awake dream.

         “If you look at me like that...” he got so excited that his words drowned out.

         Sara immediately let herself into his embrace. He picked her up carrying her into the bedroom.

         “I followed you around, yesterday and today,” he joked.

         “What?”

         “I tailed your follower. He has a pattern.”

         “What do you mean?”

         “Once you get in the house, he sticks around a couple of hours, then leaves. He doesn’t track you to school, rather waits until he sees you get in, leaves and then comes back later. He has your schedule to the dot and he trusts you with it.”

         “Do you know who he is?”

         “Yes. He escaped from the jail in Sagmalcilar six months ago, but we aren’t touching him. At least not yet.”

         “Why?”

         “ If we get him now, Enver will assign a new man. He might be harder to trace. We know who this one is, where he lives, and his habits.”

         “You know his name?”

         “He’s known as Lame Rifki, but that may be an alias. He drives a yellow Opel with the licence plate MHU459."

         “What shall I do then?” Sara asked.

         “Stick to your schedule. Have him trust you. Then you can lose him any time later, if need be.”

         “Could he have seen me come here?”

         “No, he leaves once you’re in Madam Arakian’s. It’s better to be cautious still. That’s why I asked Emel to bring you here.”

         “I hope Emel doesn’t mind.”

         “Emel understands and she wants to help because she has a purpose. Her brother, nineteen, was killed by the terrorists. She wants this terrible situation to be over as much as we do.”

         His eyes were damp again. Sara hugged him. He recognized her effort at consoling him and kissed her.

         “I have something for you,” Sara said, stretching from the bed. She pulled out the Hotel Laslo file from her bag.

         “This is something else!” He seemed astounded as he glanced at the papers. “Put your clothes on. I am calling Ahmet.”

         On one sheet of paper the titles, names, and habits of the clients were listed. The file basically contained the special contracts, the names of the employees, and the services rendered. Since they thought that the names on the agreements belonged to the members of the organization, Ali and Ahmet became excited.

         Yet there was more to it. It took Sara a while to realize the nature of some of those services. ‘Funny services for others in business’ Ahmet had told her before. One of the papers showed Lamia as the trainer of employees in grooming. From the conversation between Ali and Ahmet, and as she thought further, she understood. The services were women sent to clients’ rooms. Her mother had acted as a businesswoman for sure, and a real classy one at that.

         "I’m such a dummy! I only realize now what kind of business she was in..."

          Her voice drained off as a sharp pain shot up from the hollows of her eyes into her temples. She needed Aspirin. She got up to go to the bedroom. Her legs buckled before she reached the door but she pulled herself up. She felt a burning from deep inside reach up to inside her skull. She stumbled into the bedroom and leaned against the wall.

         Ali rushed in after her. She accepted his arms around her but could not let out the emotion she felt. Then she scolded herself. How could she be so insensitive to lose control and make him feel guilty! She kissed him and she hugged him back.

          “Your tears are waterless,” he said smoothing her hair. “One day I’ll make you cry. You’ll feel better.”

         When they returned to the living room, Ahmet said, “We have a month’s work here in this folder. We could crack this thing wide open.”

         Sara sat with them as if she was in a different dimension, although each word that was uttered seared like burn. But after Ahmet left, she found her resolve defeated and gone. As much as she tried, she couldn’t clear her head. A dense fog had crouched upon her. Lamia, her mother, the operator of a prostitution ring...

         “Aren’t you coming to bed?”

         She shuddered. She became conscious of Ali holding her. She perceived his lips moving but his words were inaudible in the thunder inside her. His warmth reached her only like a distant sun.

         The sudden sting of his slap brought her back. She recognized worried look on his face. She was responsible for that. She was responsible for everything. She started shivering.

         “I am sorry,” Ali said. “I had to do that. I got worried. Are you feeling any better?”

         She nodded.

         “This thing was hard on you. You’ve had too much stress lately. Come,” he kissed her and he helped her get into her nightgown. While she was getting in bed, “I know what would help,” he said leaving the room.

         “Don’t worry, I’m fine,” she couldn’t recognize her own voice.

         “Drink this!”

         The bitterness of the caramel-colored liquid burned her throat, but its heat singed through and her shivering stopped. Under the covers, she felt his arms around her and she fell asleep.

         She woke to the sound of his voice, even though he was whispering on the phone.

         “I don’t want to involve her in this. We got to do this on our own, because she’s been through hell lately. It has been too much for her.”

         “Are you talking to Ahmet?”

         “Yes.” He turned around to her, startled.

         She reached for the phone and took it from his hand, “Never mind him, Ahmet,” she said into the mouthpiece. “I owe it to myself to continue with this.”

         She felt much better now. It had to have been more than a medicine that he had given her. Her absurd reaction of the night before had vanished.

          Later, she caught him looking at her drawings again. She laughed, “You know, I haven’t come up with a masterpiece here!”

         “Not yet. But you should hear the way your teacher talks about you.”

         “You talked behind my back?”

         “Yes, to my great pleasure! If times were the way we’d like them to be, I’d make you work day and night on this.”

         “You really mean that?”

         ”If you waste a gift like this, it is a sin. Believe me.”

         Toward the evening, Ali got a call. As he talked, his face grew solemn.

         “Bad news?” Sara asked.

         “They gunned the chief down. He was my namesake,” he covered his face with his hands.

         “I am so sorry!” She squeezed his hand. He stayed motionless for a while, leaning into her. Then he put his arms around her waist and kissed her hair.

         “So many policemen have been killed! It is even going to get worse from now on,” he said. Then he held her tighter. “Don’t worry! I am extra careful because of you.” He let her go and started getting dressed. “I have to go. I might be needed. Stay here until tomorrow. I’ll stop by the bookstore and tell Taner you can’t make it today.”

         At past midnight she woke up, feeling him slip inside the bed. He lay quietly for a few minutes, then he pulled her to him.

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         Friday, Sara told Nimet about Ali, Enver, and the man tailing her. A mutual trust was built between them after Enver’s last visit. Nimet said that Sara could stay with her some nights to throw her follower off. Then Ali could pick her up during the curfew when no one would dare to be out except the police. The idea was plausible. Sara said she would consider it.

         During the second week of November, Ali helped Luther Brandt move into his new flat. Another friendship was getting established.

         “I owe my new friend to you, “ Luther Brandt told Sara one day. ”I feel you are the common cause between us, for different reasons. His is the romantic one.”

         ”What gave you that idea?”

         “Some things are unsaid. The way you avoided each other’s eyes around me, things like that.”

         She had been afraid of this for a long time; that they would be easily read by others.

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         Luther invited them for dinner at his new place one Wednesday, as a way of thanks for finding him an apartment. “I will cook for you personally,” he said. “Do you like Schnitzel?”

         “How can we go together? We should have turned him down,” Sara told Ali. “It is risky.”

         “Leave it to me,” Ali said. “I am sick of hiding us from the whole world as it is. I’ll see what I can do.”

         Wednesday evening as she was leaving the bookstore, Ali came in. Sara turned ashen. Was he out of his mind? “Come on, Luther is waiting. Let’s not waste time,” he said. “We only have a temporary solution. Traffic police is giving Lame Rifki a difficult time at the moment.”

         Dinner was very pleasant. Luther’s apartment was on the top floor of a high rise. It had a small balcony with the view of the entire Bosphorus under its feet.

         “Isn’t this a painter’s dream?” Luther asked. “Now I know why you likened the serpentine line to it, that first day in class.”

         “You remember it!” Sara was dumfounded.

         “It was a highly original thought. But after seeing this, I know where it came from.”

         In one week’s time, Luther started teaching Sara privately two days a week during free hours in school and Sunday evenings at Luther’s place.

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Next:
"Bosphorus 15"