by Graham Marks
“As you say, we have similarities. I collect information, like you.”
“Except I have one master, and you have many.”
“That is where yourself and I have taken our own roads, Herr Gessler.”
“Correct.” Gessler pulled up a chair and sat right in front of Baba Duan, the pistol mere inches away from his stomach. “But our roads have now met and I require you to tell me the answers to the questions I am about to ask.”
“And if I cannot find these answers?”
“If you have been doing your job as well as it appears you have, you will know enough about me to understand that I have the ways and the means,” Gessler paused and glanced at his briefcase, “to give you whatever help you might need, Herr Hendek. Would you like me to go into more detail? I always carry a few pictures with me...”
Baba Duan smiled rather too broadly, extracting an off-white handkerchief from his trousers and dabbing his upper lip. “That will not, I think, under the circumstances, be at all necessary.”
“I do hope not.” Gessler looked at his watch. “I do not have so much time.”
“What could I possibly know that you do not already?”
“Tell me about the American and his son. Tell me everything you know...”
“Would it not be quicker, if your time is of an essential nature, for you to tell me what you know, and I will do my absolute level best to fill in the spaces left over?”
Gessler’s right hand whipped out like a snake, the barrel of the gun slashing across Baba Duan’s ear. “I obviously did not make myself as clear as I had intended: I said ‘tell me everything’, Herr Hendek. Und schnell – quickly!”
A bright redness grew on the handkerchief which Baba Duan held tightly to the side of his face. He licked his lips and fumbled for another cigarette, Gessler taking a lighter from his coat pocket, leaning over and flicking it into life...
Hardly more than five minutes after arriving, Herr Reinhardt Gessler exited Baba Duan’s house. He strode quickly to his car and drove off at some speed, leaving behind a sluggish cloud of oily exhaust smoke and dust.
In his office, blood still flowing from the gash on his ear, Baba Duan Hendek remained sitting in his chair, staring at his desk. He had never considered himself an especially brave man – or a particularly bad one, either – but even he was surprised at how quickly threats of violence against his person had forced him to hand over everything he knew about the Drummond MacIntyres, Two and Three. Well, almost everything he knew.
What had incensed Baba Duan was Gessler’s promise that he would return and reduce the house – and all who lived inside – to ashes if he discovered he hadn’t been told the truth about anything. What had his family got to do with this business? Nothing! Except maybe for Evren, but he was only doing what he was told, so that didn’t count.
One of the phones rang in the other room and Baba Duan got a little unsteadily to his feet. The truth was that what he had failed to tell Gessler was not a fact – it was not something he knew, but a suspicion, a theory...a guess. And therefore, Baba Duan smiled thinly to himself, it was not something the German spy wanted to know, was it.
18 SO NEARLY THERE
As Trey followed Evren and Neyla, he found himself going through narrow alleys (where the top storeys of some of the houses almost touched), across wide, crowded boulevards and then, at a turn, into the awning-covered warren of a market. Here the intensity of colours – brilliant jewellery in one shop window, next to jewel-like fruit and vegetables displayed as if they had all just tumbled, freshly picked, out of a “horn of plenty” – collided with the tapestry of aromas from fishmongers, perfumiers, spice merchants, coffee houses and restaurants.
They were passing a bakery when Trey spotted a boy bringing a tray of sesame-covered bread sticks out into the shop; they looked so very tasty that Trey allowed himself a moment’s pause in the mission and gave Evren the money to pay for some. Handed over and wrapped in a sheet of thin paper, they were still warm, and smelled and tasted as delicious as they looked. The sesame seeds tumbling like large grains of sand to the ground, Trey chivvied his new friends to hurry up and get him to the American Consulate.
“So you have not been this place before?” Evren halted for a moment at a water fountain, its brass spigot turned a dark, mottled green by verdigris, cupped his hands and took a drink.
“No...” Trey, who was too thirsty to care about all the warnings his mother had given him about drinking the water “on the Continent” before she left for Los Angeles, waited for Neyla to finish, then took his turn. “My dad got some introductions when we were in London – to this English family, the Stanhope-Leighs?” Trey shrugged and sighed. “They have kids kind of my age, and a tutor, and Ahmet – the guy driving the car in your photographs? – he took me over there a couple of times when my dad had to work. We did this and that.”
“‘This and that’ not good?” asked Evren.
“It was okay, I suppose.” Trey nodded to himself, having to allow that Arthur was not quite the complete milquetoast he’d first thought. “But I’d’ve rather been with my father, this being a holiday and all.”
“The childs were not so nice?” Evren asked.
“Arthur and Christine? They were okay, like I said.” Trey saw Neyla staring at him, frowning like she couldn’t work him out. “Look, they were fine, I just didn’t want to be there, that was all! I go away with my father and all I do is get to spend time with strangers...”
“We strangers.” It was Neyla’s turn to shrug.
Coming round a bend in the road, Trey’s spirits lifted when he saw “Old Glory”, the Stars and Stripes, waving from the top of a flagpole a couple of hundred yards up the street – he was nearly home! Sort of. Trey stopped walking, aware that the adventure was almost over and that he probably wouldn’t ever see Evren and Neyla again; he looked up and saw that the two of them were a little way ahead of him. He was about to catch them up and tell them that it was different with them, that he somehow didn’t think they were strangers, but he never got the chance.
None of them saw the two-door Opel roadster coming. Seemingly from out of nowhere it just appeared from behind Trey, screeching to a halt just ahead of him, one of its front tyres up on the pavement and its mud-splattered bonnet angled to create a barrier between him and the other two. A man jumped up from the passenger seat, making Trey think that the car looked like it was some kind of giant mobile Jack-in-a-box and the man should be on springs.
But he wasn’t. And the half-smile was wiped off Trey’s face as the man leaped to the pavement and he started to lunge towards him. But the fact that this was not an accident – that it was actually all about him – was something Trey figured out too late to do anything about. Momentarily rooted to the spot, he finally turned to make a run for it as a bearded man, wearing dark glasses and a hat, dashed from the driver’s side; he said something in a language Trey could have sworn was German.
The next thing Trey knew was that some thick, coarse cloth had been tied over his eyes and someone had grabbed him from behind, picking him up as if he weighed next to nothing. Then a rope or a belt was pulled tight around him, pinning his arms down, and whoever was carrying him dropped him like a brick. Lying, dazed and in complete darkness, Trey heard a slamming noise right above his head. They’d put him in the trunk! The car rocked as the two men got in and, as the driver hit the throttle, it roared off down the street.
It had all happened so fast neither Evren nor Neyla could quite believe what they’d just witnessed – Trey was actually in the back of the car they could now see skidding sideways and disappearing from sight!
The only signs that anything had happened, apart from the fact that Trey really was no longer with them, were the skid marks on the pavement and the nose-pricking smell of overheated rubber. The street was oddly silent, almost as if the buildings, and everyone in them, were holding their breath, shocked by what had occurred.
Evren looked around, waiting
for someone who had witnessed the incident to react; there were a scattering of other people on the street, but by the way they were acting none of them appeared to have seen or heard anything. He looked at Neyla, wondering how that could possibly be, and shook his head. “That man, the one with the beard...he was foreign, but what kind?”
Neyla shrugged. “Baba Duan’s not going to be pleased we didn’t get him safely to the Consulate...”
“We shan’t tell him.”
“No?”
“No, this is our job and we must finish it!”
“What can we do?”
“We must tell the Americans.” Evren pointed up the road at the Consulate.
“They will listen to us?” Neyla looked down at her threadbare, workaday clothes, her grubby hands and scuffed shoes.
“You’re right...” Evren thought for moment, chewing on a nail. “But there are other people, people they will listen to.”
“People we know?”
“We don’t know them yet.”
“You mean the English?” Neyla frowned. “How?”
“We have to find the driver first: Ahmet, the one who took Trey to the house. He knows where these people live.”
“How many Ahmets must there be in Constantinople who drive cars, Evren? How many?”
Evren took something out of his trouser pocket and held it up. “Only one who looks like this,” he said, showing Neyla one of the photographs he’d taken of Trey’s father and his chauffeur...
Tied up and blindfolded in the boot of the car, Trey tried to somehow wedge his shoulders and legs against something in an attempt to stop himself from being thrown about like a sack of potatoes. Something, he had to admit, he was not able to do with any great success.
It felt as if the driver was succeeding in an attempt to find every single pothole in Constantinople as the car bounced like crazy – and Trey bounced with it – down hills, round bends and across what felt like rutted fields. None of this in any way helped Trey collect his thoughts and try to understand what had happened to him; he’d never seen either of the people in the car before and could only imagine they must have something to do with The Bald-headed Man. Which meant that he could be being taken off to the same place his father was being kept.
Maybe.
But what if it was someone else, someone working against The Bald-headed Man? What if he was being used as a bargaining chip? Give us the father, or we’ll kill the kid, that kind of thing? Or...Trey forced all the “what if” thoughts away and concentrated on hoping that Evren and Neyla were doing something to help him.
When the car did screech to a halt, flinging Trey backwards and forwards so fast he actually did see stars, he was sure he could hear the sort of sounds you’d kind of associate with boats: the slapping of water against wood, the creak of taughtened ropes, the discordant yell of seagulls. They hadn’t, he realized, actually driven that far, the journey had just seemed never-ending. Did that mean they were either down by the Bosphorus, or over on the northern side of the Golden Horn? It could only be one or the other, if he recalled the map in the guidebook correctly. Then the trunk was opened and all the sounds got louder and a small amount of light seeped through the coarse weave of the sacking.
“You let me go!” Trey yelled, kicking out blindly. “GET ME OUT OF HERE!”
“Sei ruhig, Junge – be quiet, boy!” said a harsh voice, as hands gripped Trey painfully tight and held him down. “It will hurt so very much more if I have to make you do as I say. Stanislaus, get the case, please.”
Trey heard footsteps walk away, now completely sure the men who had grabbed him were German (they sounded just like the Grünestadts, who owned the shoe store his mother took him to), but no nearer working out why they’d done it. As the seconds ticked by the man who’d spoken continued holding him down with an uncomfortably iron grip, and then he heard the other person returning and the sound of latches unsnapping and hinges creaking. Without warning Trey felt himself being rolled sideways out of the car’s trunk and into something else; he had no idea what it was, except that it was even smaller and more cramped than where he’d been. Then the hinges creaked, everything went dark again and the latches snapped shut.
He was in some kind of case!
He was in some kind of case that was being lifted and carried off...but where to? Were they going to throw him in the water and get rid of him? The thought that he might be moments from drowning made panic rise in him like heat from a flame and as Trey began to struggle the case was put down.
“I rarely warn people twice, junge Herr MacIntyre.” The man’s voice was muffled by the case. “I recommend you stay calm, and this part of your journey will all very soon be over.”
Stay calm! Trey could hardly believe his ears! Here he was, tied up like Houdini – locked in a box! – and he was supposed to stay calm?
“I shall take your silence as an agreement that you will make no more trouble.”
Somehow the man did not sound to Trey like he was about to dump him in the Bosphorus, so he decided to keep his mouth shut. For now. The men grunted and the case was lifted up again, and he could hear that they were much nearer the water. And then he became aware that something had changed and they weren’t on solid ground any more...the case he was in was jerkily swinging to and fro, the water sounding very near now. Where the heck were they taking him? A boat? That had to be it... but a boat that was going to take him exactly where?
Before he could take the thought any further, Trey heard a lot more grunting and he could tell, just knew, that he was being manhandled into something, rather than onto a boat. The case he’d been stuffed in was roughly dropped. For a moment there was silence, and then he heard the muffled sound of a loud, harsh coughing. He knew that sound! He knew he’d heard it very recently, but where?
And then it came to him: Venice.
It was the noise of a rotary-engined plane firing up. That was it! He’d been dumped, like a piece of luggage, on a seaplane that was about to take off, taking him with it – this was not how he’d imagined his first flight! So much for helping get his father back, he thought to himself as the engine roared into life and the plane began to move...
19 MAKING PLANS
It was early evening when the black Citroën B12 pulled up outside a rather grand house, lights burning in most of the windows. It had taken a lot longer than Evren had thought it would to find the right Ahmet, the only one who could help him put his plan into action.
“This is the place, where I bring the young Mr. Trey,” Ahmet said over his shoulder.
“I think it would be good...much better, I think...if you came with us.” Now they were actually at their destination, Evren could see there were almost as many holes in this “plan” as there were in his mother’s tea-strainer.
“Us?” hissed Neyla. “Me?”
“But I...”
“I will come with you.” Ahmet opened his door and got out of the car. “I had the feeling something was not right when I went to pick up Mr. Macktire this morning; they told me at the hotel that he was suddenly not there any longer. Trey had told me a man had been there with a gun. And now you tell me about what happened to him, and I think it’s true that he and his father are now both in trouble. We should tell these people.” He nodded towards the house. “The effendi must know them well to bring his son here.”
Evren shot Neyla a glance, inwardly sighing with relief as he stepped down onto the pavement. He actually didn’t blame her for being scared about going up to the house; the idea of standing there on his own when the door opened – of trying to explain, in his bad English, what had happened – made him feel the size of an ant. He knew all about how rich foreigners (rich Turkish people, for that matter) looked down at those they thought were beneath them.
Rather than be left behind on her own in the car, Neyla followed Evren, but stayed at the bottom of the steps, watching Ahmet use the polished brass bell-pull. Somewhere inside the house they could hear a muffled ringing
, and they waited. And waited. And just as Ahmet was about to ring the bell again the door finally opened.
“May I be of assistance?” The words were out of the butler’s mouth before he’d fully taken in that he was addressing what appeared to be someone’s driver, who was accompanied by one...no, two slightly untidy children. He cleared his throat. “Are you quite sure that you have the correct residence?”
“This is Stanhope-Leigh, yes?” enquired Ahmet politely.
“Quite so...” the butler began to shut the door. “But I’m sure we have no need for whatever it is that you are selling.”
“Not sell,” Ahmet’s foot shot out and blocked the door. “This about Mr. Macktire.”
“And Trey,” added Evren. “There is trouble!”
“I really am very sorry, but Mr. and Mrs. Stanhope-Leigh are out at present and as far as I know you will find Mr. MacIntyre, and his son, at the Pera Palas Hotel. Not here.” The butler forcefully moved to close the door, only to find it, equally forcefully, being pushed back. “Now look here, my good man!”
“Simpson?” asked a rather delicate voice from behind the butler. “Did I hear someone talking about Trey?”
“I think it best that you let me deal with the situation, Miss Christina.”
“If you don’t mind, Simpson, I would like to know what this is about...I heard someone say there was trouble. Now if you’ll just let me through...”
The butler hesitated for a couple of seconds, then begrudgingly moved a step or two to the side to reveal a girl with a fountain of blonde curls, backlit into a froth by the lights behind her; Evren knew that this must be the sister Trey had told him about.
“Hello, Miss...” Ahmet, smiling broadly, bowed slightly as he tipped his hat. “Myself I am Ahmet, I am work for Mr. Macktire, and this is Evren, the friend of Trey. Most kindly of you to see us...”
“You’re Trey’s driver, aren’t you – what’s happened to him? All Papa said was that he wasn’t coming here today. Did you say there’d been some trouble?” Christina glanced at Evren as she spoke, then noticed someone else down at the bottom of the steps. Neyla quickly stepped into the shadows.
