From the high vantage point of their apartment balcony the two men watched as the routines of the early morning city began to take shape. Men and women, still yawning and stretching from all too quickly curtailed sleep, slopped water across the pavements in front of their shops, cafe's and lokantas. Preparation for the thick dust that would later come both from the already choking traffic and on the shoes of passing shoppers, commuters and tourists. And as the gathering pall of cigarette smoke hanging over the ever increasing group. of shifty men assembling in Sultan Ahmet Square evidenced, tourists in particular were expected to be numerous. No self-respecting carpet or tour guide tout could or should still be in bed once the sun has risen over the Bosphorus. Some tourists like that sort of romantic nonsense, especially in the summertime when sleep is not that easy to come by. Up they get to watch the light hit the water, and then on their way back to their hotels and pansiyons satisfied, they will find it difficult not to be entranced by a truly beautiful carpet or the promise of a tour up to the legendary Forest of Belgrade. And in truth the tourists usually get what they pay for – whatever that might be. In Istanbul, it is said, a man can very easily satisfy all of his desires both earthly and divine. That the getting of those desirables might lead such a man, or woman, to discontent or even rage has little to do with either the city or its inhabitants. When you have been on the world stage for as long as Istanbul you are expected to deliver a very great deal to those who come to visit you. Çetin Ìkmen regarded the swelling ranks of touts, dodgy dealers and others who have knowledge of tourists with something between contempt and admiration.
'If only I could look upon the carpet men with new eyes, I might find their predatory nature quite interesting,' he said as he lit what was his third cigarette of the morning.
The man standing beside him was slightly taller and considerably younger. In every other respect, however, (even down to his almost ceaseless cigarette smoking habit) he was almost an identical copy. 'Still bored, then?' the young man said as he turned to face his father.
'I have this unpleasant feeling that when I don't work I actually cease to exist.'
'You're right, in the sense that you've built your entire identity around being an inspector of police,' his son replied. 'Had you involved yourself in other things years ago you'd have more extensive interests now.'
Although his son had spoken without any overt malice, Ìkmen's interpretation of his words was underpinned by his knowledge of his eldest son's opinions.
'You mean, I suppose’ he said, 'that I should have taken more account of you lot and your mother’
'Amongst other things, yes. For instance you could have watched the football with the rest of us last night, but you chose to be out here being miserable.'
Ìkmen followed, with his eyes, the progress of a small, red-haired woman he knew to be a local prostitute. As she stopped at the cigarette kiosk across the road he recalled that she usually smoked Camels. As a sort of exercise in self-flagellation he attempted to recall what brand his son smoked, could not, and so descended into still deeper gloom.
'I don't like football, it precipitates crime,' he said, breathing heavily on the already stifling early morning air. 'Oh, Sinan, what can I possibly do with all this bloody leisure time! How can I go on without even a pathetic watery little beer?'
His son, almost despite himself, smiled. 'Dr Akkale, as you well know, has said that if you rest, eat properly and refrain from alcohol, you could be back at work in a month. Thinking of sick leave as "leisure", which you hate, is only helping to make you more anxious. And that makes your condition worse.'
'You think so? I mean professionally. Not as my son but as a doctor?'
'I'm no expert on stomach ulcers, but I've witnessed my fair share of patients with a negative attitude towards their condition, whatever that may be, and I know that it really doesn't help.' For just a second he put one hand gently on his father's thin shoulder. 'If you could just relax, watch television – not football, other things – talk about nothing to Mum and the children, read… You're a very literate man. You always encouraged us to read.'
'Yes, but at my age I think I might have read most things actually worth reading.'
'Oh, what utter nonsense!' And as if to illustrate his point, Sinan reached across to the small table that routinely collected both dust and books from all those members of the Ìkmen family who liked using the balcony. He picked, at random, one volume from the pile. 'Have you read this?'
Ìkmen, whose eyesight had in the last year started to deteriorate, leaned back a little the better to see the title. 'The Black Book by Orhan Pamuk,' he read and then shrugged. 'So?'
'It's very good. Unlike most of the things you have read in the past it has been written by someone who is alive, Turkish and sober. But don't let that put you off.'
Vague mutterings about the benefits of reading the works of Thomas Hardy in the original English accompanied a very cursory perusal by Ìkmen of this, to him, very new author's work.
'Basically, it's a detective novel,' Suian explained, but it is also a work of philosophy which tackles the problem of who we are, as Turks.' 'Eh?'
'It's like a collage, but of ideas as opposed to pictures. It's clever and witty and it's about-'
Just at that moment Sinan's exposition was drowned out by an extremely loud burst of Arabesk music emanating from the open door of a taxi in the street below. An uneasy blend of traditional Turkish tunes and ornate Egyptian laments, Arabesk is for good reason sometimes dubbed the 'music of the slums'. Most of its performers, many of whom originate from the countryside, possess keen, often painful memories of poverty amongst the shanty districts and cheap tower blocks which even now house many of those peasants who come to the city in search of work. Always mournful and sometimes also critical of the plight of the poor, Arabesk has by turns been patronised by politicians and banned by same on the pretext that it undermines the nation's happiness. Not that the millions of its devotees care about such opinions. To Ìkmen and his son, however, whose faces only relaxed out of their grimaces when the music had ceased, Arabesk was anathema.
'Miserable, sentimentalised excrement!' Ìkmen said in a voice loud enough to permit those in the street below access to his opinions.
His son shrugged. 'It's as much a part of our national identity as lokum, or the harem system or this mad belief we all possess that if we copy them closely enough the Europeans might just get to like us one day.'
Ìkmen smiled. 'So are you now one of those who believe we should turn our eyes eastwards?'
'No. But as Pamuk illustrates again and again in his writings, we are some of the most contradictory of Allah's creatures. The stereotypically cruel Turk who is also the willing butt of arrogant European jokes. The melancholy, lovelorn Turk who is at the same time both faithless and subtle. Our women smoke, drink and work like men and yet they still live lives circumscribed by their fathers and husbands. I could go on and on.'
‘Yes,' his father agreed, 'you probably could.' Then moving forward to take the book from his son's hands he said, 'But far better if I read this. If this Pamuk is as good as you say I will discover it rather more eloquently from his words.' He sighed. 'And if it's a detective novel too then so much the better.'
Sinan wiped the first bead of sweat of the day from his brow and then smiled. 'You'll be able to pick holes in his method.'
'I expect I will. And I'll probably become angry in the process and might need to be left alone for a while in order to rage.'
'So if I hear you huffing and swearing as if you're actually in physical pain…'
'You will know that I am simply enjoying a good read about murder, Turkish identity and lokum.' 'And not-‘
'And not intoxicated in any way, shape or form. Just stimulated and annoyed.’ He laughed and then lit another cigarette.
'Right,' Sinan agreed, lighting one of his own.
'OK.'
'OK, Dad, fine.' -
Gently, but with some insistence, Sinan reached out and took the book from his father's hands.
Confused by this action, Ìkmen mumbled, 'Hey! What the-'
'Nice try, Dad,' the younger man said as he clutched the book tightly to his chest. 'But if you think that anyone in this family is going to leave you alone in the apartment for more than a minute, even if it is just supposedly to read a book, then you must think again.'
Uncharacteristically, Ìkmen was, for a moment, dumbstruck.
'You see, Dad,' his son continued, 'I know all about your bribing Bulent to buy you a bottle of brandy. Which, by the way, he and his friend have now probably consumed.' He held up one small hand in order to silence his blustering, red-faced father. 'I know this because when you tricked Mum into leaving the house this morning, I got up and intercepted my brother before he could see you. Bulent is now at
Sami's apartment and when he returns some time later on today he will, knowing him, have a very sore head. You will have no brandy and I might as well continue to read this book which will not now provide you with a cover for your drinking activities.'
Ìkmen, livid and desperate, raked his ringers viciously through me strands of his thick, greying hair. 'But I am so bored with this illness! I'm so sick of the pain! I am so humiliated to be so fucking useless!' Then turning to face his son, his eyes just a little wet from tears of frustration, he added, 'And I am so ashamed of what must be the most amateurish attempt at deception in all the history of dishonesty!'
Sinan smiled. 'It was quite dreadful, yes. Were you not unwell I would be afraid that you might have-'
'Lost the plot? Yes,' Ìkmen said, turning to look out into the sun-flooded street once again, 'yes, I feel very much like that myself. When I'm not feeling nauseous I'm having my guts stabbed from inside by some invisible bastard. It's hell! All I want to do is get back to how I was before – go back to work and, yes, have a few drinks just to make the day run more smoothly. Be myself with all my faults and foibles and… and, oh, just do what I do!'
'Until you get better you can't.'
'But while I'm idle like this I'm tense!' As if to illustrate the point, Ìkmen held his slightly shaking fingers up to his son's face. 'What if they decide to force me to accept retirement? They've already made Suleyman up to inspector.' 'At your request, Dad.'
'I can't dispute that Nor would I change it I like him. He's a good man and a fine officer. But,' and here he shrugged, a half smile hanging loosely about his lips – hopelessness tinged with just the slightest hint of his usual sharp humour, 'but if I, ulcer or no ulcer, do not get back to my work soon I am going to turn into one of those contradictory men your Mr Pamuk speaks of.'
'Identity confusion is common to all Turks.'
'Oh, is it?' With some difficulty Ìkmen pulled himself up to his full height 'I think not Well, at least it isn't for me, or rather it wasn't until I got this bastard illness.'
'Yes, but Dad-'
'No! I know you think that all this rest nonsense is the answer to my problems, but I know myself better than anyone and I can tell you that it is not. I need to be out there,' he said, sweeping both arms out across the dramatic panorama of the old city, the Blue Mosque, the Hippodrome, Aya Sofya – his city, 'on the street with Suleyman, Cohen, Arto Sarkdssian, even bloody Ardiç’
Sinan, who found his father's fiery eyes and heroic posture just a little amusing, pulled Ìkmen's arms back down to his sides. 'Sorry, Dad,' he said, 'but the Eva Peron pose was just a little bit too much for me.'
Suddenly deflated and, if the truth be known, also very tired, Ìkmen sank down heavily onto one of the wooden chairs that ringed the small table. 'Sorry’
'That's OK. I just wish I could help you, that's all. But until you've something to do that you actually want to do, I don't see how any progress can be made.'
'I must await developments,' Ìkmen said with a shrug.
Sinan sat down beside his father and took one of his hands gently between his fingers. 'Perhaps you should look upon this time in the same light you do when you are waiting for a break in one of your cases.'
'Dead time.'
Sinan laughed. 'Is that what you call it?'
'Yes,' Ìkmen said, his thin face resolving into the ghost of a grin.
'So what do you normally do during dead time then?' Sinan asked hopefully. Perhaps his father could use some of his dead time activities now.
'Well, first I bend my mind to the problem in as concentrated a fashion as I can,' Ìkmen explained.
'And then?'
'And then I get horribly drunk, consult a few dubious soothsayers and generally come up with some sort of plan from thereon.'
'Dad!'
'Well, you asked,' Ìkmen said, his eyes twinkling evilly. 'You asked, I told you, you didn't like my answer…'
'Which leaves us precisely where?' Sinan said, letting go of his father's hands and lighting another cigarette.
Ìkmen, who joined his son in yet another smoke, put his head down into his hands and sighed. 'Awaiting developments, I suppose’ he said. And then through gritted, furious teeth, 'Patiently, fucking waiting!'
When what is now Ìstiklal Caddesi was called the Grand Rue de Pera, back in Ottoman times when heavily fezzed Sultans routinely appointed food tasters, comical midgets and other such exotica, the apartments that still line this great thoroughfare were predominantly residential. More recently, however, due to a combination of high rents, lack of modern amenities and a certain shabbiness not entirely acceptable to younger Turkish citizens, many of these dwellings are now used as offices or storerooms. Nestling between shops selling Nike, Armani or Hugo Boss, once impressive, heavily stuccoed doorways can easily be found by those with an eye for such things. Lintels bearing legends written in the Roman alphabet proudly proclaim 'Apartments Paris', 'Apartments de Grand Rue de Pera'; examples all of the late nineteenth-century Ottomans' love of and undying admiration for anything and everything Gallic. That most of these once elegant apartment buildings now house either large numbers of fake Lacoste sweatshirts or groups of young men and women working diligently at word-processors and chattering mainly in Turkish is merely, a reflection of how quickly and totally times have changed. So common is it for these once elegant, now draughty apartments to be used for commercial purposes that the few that remain as residences are almost ignored.
It was therefore into an Ìstiklal Caddesi unaccustomed to the tragedies of birth, marriage and death that the young man with the sharp Kurdish features ran when he found the body of the young woman. Out of his home in the Apartments izzet Pasa and into a street that, early in the morning as it was, remained almost as still as it had been at four and five, the dead hours of the night. Only two old men, peasants in felt caps, smoking cheap cigarettes and clacking rosaries between their fingers, saw the youngster as he passed, weeping and red-faced, like a fallen angel tearing madly away from his wrathful God. Not that the men commented, of course. The young man obviously had problems of some sort, but given his current condition, it would be both difficult and probably prurient for either of the old men to inquire what they might be.
What they did comment upon, however, was his identity.
'Wasn't that, you know,' the shabbier of the two asked his slightly more modish companion, 'that singer, the one who…'
'Has relations with that blonde,' the other replied in hushed, scandalised tones. 'Allah will punish such unnatural behaviour,' and then raising his arms heavenwards in a gesture of supplication, he added, 'if it please Him.’
His friend sighed heavily as he watched the rapidly retreating back of the young man and then said softly, 'I think his punishment, by the look of him, has already come to pass.'
Living with others, however kind and tolerant those others might be, is never easy. Ever since he'd separated from his wife the previous year, the newly promoted Inspector Suleyman had been renting a room from one of his more lowly colleagues, Constable Cohen. Although completely different in nearly all respects, including age, religion, class and values, Suleyman and Cohen had first become friends when the former was still in uniform. And in spite of Suleyman's rapid rise to inspector, they had remained close. Indeed when the younger man had first left his wife, Cohen had permitted him to stay rent-free to allow, as he put it, 'the bastard lawyers to screw your bank account'.
Loud, colourful and kind, Cohen and his wife Estelle included the elegant and cultured Suleyman in all their pursuits both familial and religious. As well as being expertly catered for by them with regard to his own Muslim calendar, Suleyman had been included in celebrations to mark Passover and Chanukah. He had also attended a vast and, as it turned out, ill-fated meal to mark the return of the Cohens' eldest son, Yusuf, from his tour of conscript duty in the eastern provinces. Wounded in places the eye could never see, this young man's bizarre behaviour at that dinner had been just the start of what turned out to be a very rapid descent into psychiatric instability. When Yusuf was finally admitted to an institution, Suleyman, as well as the Cohens themselves, had felt sad but relieved.
However, to say that Suleyman had experienced a quiet life since Yusuf's departure would be erroneous. As well as having to endure the sound of Estelle's frequent rages at the endless sexual faithlessness of her husband, there were the neighbours to take account of too. Cohen's apartment, though large, was not situated in the best part of Istanbul. Karaköy, which is that district that runs from the eastern end of the Galata Bridge up the hill of the same name to Ìstiklal Caddesi, is not for the faint-hearted. Though dotted with many fine old buildings, some of Genoese and Armenian origin, plus the now lovingly restored Neve Shalom Synagogue, Karaköy also possesses its share of tatty apartment buildings. The one the Cohens had moved into twenty-six years previously was the one they still lived in now. Not once in all those years had the place been so much as painted, let alone properly decorated. With the notable exceptions of one new television and an even more erratic plumbing system, nothing much had changed in all that time, at least not for the better anyway. The locals had always been dubious but in the last ten years they had become, to use a Cohenism, far more 'serious’. Despite the very best efforts of the city authorities, now run by the traditional Refah party, to flush such elements out, the old ways died hard. Indeed, in this case, they actually prospered. And, although the cheap dancing girls, petty thieves and even the legal brothels had gone away, they had been replaced mainly by full-on, streetwalking prostitutes and drug dealers. The very loud and very young girl who lived in the apartment next door and who routinely woke Suleyman in the middle of the night with her harsh laugh and passion-filled screams was quite openly a cocaine addict. That she knowingly lived next door to two police officers did not restrict her behaviour in any way. It had about as much effect upon her as it did upon her enormous pimp who liked to laugh out loud at Cohen's diminutive figure. That the criminal had access to far more sophisticated and greater numbers of weapons than the law man had much to do with this casual disdain. The effect upon Suleyman of all this was to make him angry and, despite his feelings for Cohen, very anxious to leave as soon as his finances permitted. Sleeplessness of the order he was experiencing now was neither healthy nor good for his new, far more responsible position in life.
Until almost exactly four weeks previously, Mehmet Suleyman had been a sergeant working for the city's leading homicide detective, Çetin Ìkmen. Although happy in his work, Suleyman was both ambitious and, especially since his separation from his wife Zuleika, extremely needy where money was concerned. So at the end of the previous year, 1998, he had put in for promotion. Supported by Ìkmen he had, after not too long a wait (given the gargantuan bureaucracy of the Turkish police establishment), achieved the promotion he desired and had hoped to work beside his old boss for quite some time before being let loose on his own initiative. But then Ìkmen, who had, as far as Suleyman was concerned, always complained of stomach pains, had suddenly become very ill indeed. Initially admitted to hospital, Ìkmen had been diagnosed with multiple duodenal ulcers. Although he would need surgery at some time in the future, for the moment he was prescribed medication, dietary restrictions and rest Just thinking about this regime made Suleyman's handsome features resolve into a wry smile. The 'old man' was almost as passionately attached to the notion of eating irregularly (and then only junk) as he was to his beloved brandy and cigarettes, his twin, if second-league, obsessions. His first was his work. According to the inspector's eldest son, Sinan, to whom Suleyman had spoken the previous evening, Ìkmen was not only plotting to get hold of alcohol at every possible opportunity but was also going a little mad from his enforced idleness.
Suleyman put his tired head in his hands and yawned. Although there were other experienced detectives in the homicide division with whom he could, theoretically, discuss the more troubling aspects of his new position in life, he knew that they saw him as a dangerous rival – people like old Yalcin who openly mocked Suleyman's aristocratic background while at the same time telling others to 'watch out' for the younger man's keen intelligence. You didn't get this sort of thing from Ìkmen who, better than the lot of them put together, would have gladly backed his protege in any argument with old guard types – and enjoyed it
It was in these silent, between-shift moments that Suleyman missed Ìkmen the most The old man had always come in early and had always been there when Suleyman arrived, alert and ready for at least a short discussion of any lingering woes the younger man may have carried with him from the previous day. But, sick or well, the relationship between Ìkmen and himself was due to alter, at least in the working environment. Now Suleyman was responsible not only for his own security and actions but for that of his new sergeant too. Ìsak ‘Çöktin, at twenty-five, resembled in some ways the youthful enthusiast that Suleyman himself had once been. Although some had seen his assignment to Suleyman's command as a subtle snub to the stylish aristocrat, Suleyman himself did not view it in that light Whether or not ‘Çöktin was a 'mountain Turk', that bland euphemism for those of Kurdish descent, as some of the older and more conservative elements whispered he was, did not concern Suleyman. ‘Çöktin had been born and brought up in Istanbul, in admittedly one of the more downmarket districts. And though his tousled red hair did point towards blood that was not entirely Turkish, his record as an officer was impeccable. That Ìkmen personally liked him a lot was also a plus, Ìkmen, who by his own admission was the son of an Albanian soothsayer, possessed an almost unfailing sixth sense when it came to judging people's characters. And 'Mickey', as he had dubbed ‘Çöktin because of his almost uncanny resemblance to the scruffy American film star Mickey Rourke, was 'all right'. Just how 'all right' ‘Çöktin was, Suleyman wasn't to learn until he picked up the telephone which now buzzed harshly at his tired ears.
'Suleyman,' he drawled by way of introduction.
'Inspector, it's ‘Çöktin,' a voice barely capable of containing its excitement replied.
Suleyman sat up just a little bit straighter. 'Where are you? What's going on?'
'I'm at the Ìzzet Pasa Apartments on Ìstiklal Caddesi.' Then pausing briefly to take a large, nerve-calming breath, he added, 'I'm with Erol Urfa, or at least I was until-'
'From your tone’ Suleyman interrupted, 'I take it we are talking about the Erol Urfa?'
'The Arabesk star, yes, sir.' With even greater excitement he added, 'Actually in the next room from where I'm standing now, actually, sir.'
'Really? Why?'
Silence greeted Suleyman's inquiry and so he couched his question in rather more overt terms. 'Why are you there with Mr Urfa is what I'm trying to get at, Çöktin.'
'Oh, well, because he says his wife has been murdered, sir.'
Suleyman, as if shocked by a current of electricity, stood up. 'What!'
'Yes, here in his apartment. The body's in the kitchen.'
'Are you sure?'
'Well, without jeopardising the integrity of the site more than I had to, I did check and anyway it was quite obvious-'
'No! No!' Suleyman put his hand up to his head and held what was now a lightly perspiring brow. 'What I mean is, are you sure that the woman is his wife?'
'So he says.'
Suleyman sighed, speaking again on the outgoing breath. 'OK,' he said, 'I'll be with you as soon as I can. Keep Mr Urfa away from the site so that the doctor and forensic don't have to deal with too much conflicting information.'
'OK.'
Then just before Suleyman replaced the receiver, a thought occurred to him which rather graphically made him suddenly aware of just how inexperienced he was. 'Oh, and ‘Çöktin, er…'
'Yes, sir?'
'What leads you, apart from Mr Urfa's opinion, to deduce that this lady has been murdered?'
'The smell of bitter almonds,' ‘Çöktin said with the simple clarity of one who knows he need elaborate no further.