Many and Many a Year Ago

by Selcuk Altun

  “If she’s gone back to İzmir and kept it from me, I couldn’t bear it,” he moaned.

  “Sir,” I pointed out, “we still have three days to find her. I would prefer to hear such a lamentation from an acknowledged translator of romantic novels when he has to board the plane empty-handed.”

  I went back to my room and out onto the balcony, realizing that I had yet to enjoy the view. The haunting darkness that rose up when rush-hour traffic died down grew on me. Between the hotel and the desolate port were the Retiro train station, which was fast approaching retirement, a bus station resembling a dumpster and, the last figure in the frame, a colonial clock tower rearing up like an agitated Trojan horse.

  I took it as an omen when the light rain let up. Starting with Leandro Alem, I walked the half-deserted streets interlocked like lines on a chess board. Converting prices on the goods in those dimly lit windows to New Turkish Lira was somehow therapeutic. I observed dignified groups of people rummaging through garbage bins and greeted weary men out walking their dogs. When I got cold while counting the buildings with only one lighted window, I ducked into a bar with lively music. My drinking companions were a retired sailor and a trade unionist who confused Turkey with Estonia. At my next bar a gay antique dealer’s invitation to San Telmo was enough to send me scampering home.

  *

  In view of the average age of the walking monuments on the morning shift in the crumbling Confitería Ideal I wondered whether it was okay to put in an order. It seemed clear that the hawk-nosed man talking to the eighty-year-old waiter was Dikran the jeweler. As an extra hint, I assumed, he wiggled his shoulder. The way he used his right hand to signal for coffee for the two of us took me back to my days at the Huzur Coffeehouse at L.

  “I felt close to this quiet man from İzmir, although they told me that a partnership between a Jew and an Armenian was unheard of even in Ottoman times. But Eli looked like Robert Taylor, and this of course was an advantage when it came to attracting female customers. So I put him downstairs at the cash register. It took only two days to realize that he had the mind of an eighteen-year-old. This lost soul couldn’t focus on life, let alone the cash register. If he wasn’t diving into youth magazines at his desk, he was doodling sports-car designs. He was well mannered and helpless, so for the sake of his innocent face I never said much. I even accepted the three hours in the middle of the day when he regularly disappeared. I was thankful that he was not a meddlesome guy who put his nose in his partner’s business.

  “One day I caught him pilfering from the cash register and he grasped my hand and begged me not to say anything about this shameful act to his wife. We took our salaries out of the company profits, and our families didn’t socialize with each other, so I didn’t find out for a long time that for an eighteen-month stretch they lived solely on his wife’s bank account. He convinced her that there were no profits and therefore no salary, so that he could use the money for installments on the sports car he had secretly bought. At that I returned his capital and fired my so-called partner of seven years. Esther, whom any man would consider a prize, was probably sent to Eli as divine retribution. For a while I thought this mismatched couple were victims of love at first sight. If only the fault-finding Stella hadn’t been so devoted to her father, Esther might have said to hell with her inheritance and kicked her foolish husband out straightaway.

  “She was a woman full of life who radiated joy wherever she went. Chic, intelligent, and well educated, of course she found it easy to make friends with men. Two years after I got rid of Eli she paid a surprise visit to the store, looking as exhausted as a firefighter. She asked what I thought of her husband going into the used-car business. ‘If he has to work, let him do what he knows and likes,’ I said, feeling somewhat regretful. The last time I saw her was at Eli’s funeral. She still carried herself like a queen though she was on the far side of fifty. I have to be honest—God knows the truth anyway—during the whole funeral I was only thinking about how I would woo her if I were a widower. The only clue I have for you is this old address, and I doubt that it’s much use. When we last met she told me they were about to move again; and from the way she sighed it was obvious that it would not be to a more delightful home …”

  Seeing me consult my watch, Dikran summoned the waiter, whom I felt like strangling for sneering at him as he asked for the check in Grand Bazaar Spanish. He extracted a yellowing card from his exhausted briefcase, put on his glasses, and flourished his antique fountain pen. He wrote down Esther Arditti’s address and blew on it twice. I knew as he handed me the note that he was going to invite me to dinner. I dealt with it by accepting, provided we met in Istanbul at the Taksim monument on Christmas Eve. I walked to the door aware of being followed by the restless gaze of everyone in the establishment.

  On the dim street my feet started to lose their feeling and I felt a piercing ache in my forehead. I closed my eyes and tried to grip the earth with my toes. When I opened them again everything around me seemed turned into a scene from a graphic novel. I could hear nothing but the casual fluttering of the puny pigeons’ wings. I set my feet in motion along a trail of withered leaves fallen from the tall rickety trees. At precisely the moment when I pulled myself together and began to crush them under my feet I understood that my inner voice had deserted me. My real worry was that it had taken my passion for classical music with it. It occurred to me that I hadn’t even so much as hummed Pachelbel’s Canon to myself since the day I started chasing after Esther.

  I took another taxi to Ariel’s bookstore. There I met Sebastiano Valido cracking jokes in his high voice. The old book collector was wearing a cape. “I never set foot outside Argentina, but I can describe Haghia Sophia to you down to the last stone,” he said. Ariel looked at the address I was holding and bestowed on me the honor of pronouncing the word “once”, meaning eleven, correctly as “onsey.” I felt the urge to pull out the last tuft of hair remaining on his head.

  We made it to “eleven” in a taxi driven by Rita, an ex-dancer who’d become a driver after breaking her leg. They informed me that this district where middle-class Jews once lived hadn’t been able to withstand the vicious cycle of inflation and deflation, a remark that brought to mind the sorrowful back streets of Fatih. In fact, when I saw those miniature synagogues I could hardly convince myself that I wasn’t in Balat. It was equally difficult to believe that I was not in Mahmutpaşa when I saw the clumsily scattered rolls of fabric in the lifeless shop windows. We reached the soulless building at 721E Larrea after leaving several gray or beige worn-out and deserted streets behind. Ariel reached for the bell next to “Portería (Jorge S. Perez)” and I stepped back. The salmon-faced doorman seemed to diminish in size as Ariel tucked a fifty-peso bill into his shirt pocket. The Ardittis had lived first on the top and then on the ground floor. According to Perez, who had helped them move to their new place in Paso in the fall of 1980, they were a respectable couple who even during their endless quarrels avoided disturbing the neighbors.

  As the doorman muttered and scribbled the Ardittis’ new address on an old lottery ticket, I felt weary to the bone. After a ten-minute tour around the block we pulled into a street parallel to Larrea. Paso seemed wrapped in a coal-black veil, but despite this it didn’t feel threatening. The balconies of the houses on the street where we looked for number 184F were fenced off by net-like metal screens to keep children from falling off, which created the feel of a grotesque open-air exhibition. I noted a rare number plate that looked like a fighter pilot’s ID tag. The building had collapsed after a fire brought part of it down. It disturbed me to think that it was perhaps a depressed Esther who had lashed out at it. I followed my guide to the café next door. The drowsy old men sitting shoulder to shoulder in the dim interior seemed to be fighting the angel of death to a draw. We seated ourselves next to the old-time jukebox playing Engelbert Humperdinck’s “Too Beautiful to Last.”

  My book-dealer guide learned the following from the plump waitress: the
same week her husband died, Esther Arditti disappeared; the Adonis-like Eli used to escape to this very café after quarreling with his wife and he was a partner in a used-dealership called “Sí, Sí Usados Autos”; and as for the fire, that transsexual dancer who lived on the middle floor last year …

  I wouldn’t have believed the waitress—clearly an Eli fan—except that I’d seen the company’s name, “Yes, Yes Used Cars,” in the hotel’s telephone directory. My head swam with “Too Beautiful to Last” all the way back, reminding me of my childhood. The retired principal Selahattin at L. came to mind. He would raise his walking stick and yell, “Evening, once more evening, evening once more,” but we could never tell whether it was a sad song or a happy one.

  I hurried to Professor Ali’s room. His reaction to my report was disappointing—at first quizzical, then cynical. I turned down his offer of a drink and went to bed. The sound of an ezan booming from the north soon had me up again.

  I went down to the Retiro train station. When I’d had enough of that lethargy-inducing place I strolled along a few streets with melodious names—Arroyo, Junkal, Arenales—and felt more relaxed. A whistling cab driver drove me in his rattle-trap vehicle to San Telmo. Suddenly I was surrounded by a tourist trap of orange, pink, and cerulean blue buildings. I walked until Brasil cut across my path at Defensa. The city was handing me a slice of time that was a fusion of afternoon-evening and fall-winter. I followed the crowd and turned left. A brick-colored bar in the same row of buildings as the Russian Orthodox church caught my attention. It stood on the corner with its arms seductively wide open. I went inside. The spacious saloon seemed to be savoring the lull before the storm. I took a table far from the door. The old man at the table next to mine who tried to help me order a bottle of Malbec from the fussy waiter just made things worse. In his neat but old suit he might have been part of the furniture. As my bottle of wine arrived he asked sternly in English, “Are you a Turk?” Forty years earlier he had been a diplomat in Ankara. I thought he wanted to have a chat about the old times, but I was wrong. He was content to hear me answer “No” to his next and last question, “Have you ever seen Genoa?”

  “Then,” he said, stretching, “you’ve probably declared Buenos Aires and Istanbul cousins.”

  I was on the point of warming to the topic when an old woman in a fake fur with a disapproving eye stepped in and made him get up. (She must have been his long-suffering wife.)

  If I took my eyes off the label of the bottle in front of me, it would break the spell. Humming Humperdinck songs, I drank until I could see the bottom of the bottle. As my head cleared itself of thought, a fine maroon veil of tulle tried to interpose itself between me and the world. I could have had a second bottle if the bar hadn’t begun filling up. I called Ariel on the cell phone he’d borrowed from his cousin. I knew that for $20 an hour he would be at my side in thirty minutes. When he saw that I couldn’t even whistle in my condition he took my arm and helped me to his car. I remember vaguely that we followed an ambulance to Corrientes Boulevard and a huge building with a neon sign that blinked “Empuje” on and off.

  In the unpretentious restaurant on the first floor where people spoke in whispers, I was cautioned not to ask for salt, pepper, or ketchup when ordering a steak, as it was considered improper. The man eating alone at the next table was an oncology professor and bibliophile who had precisely 1,000 books in his collection; whenever he wished to add a new one, he ritually burned an old one. Ariel was happy to see that he had surprised me with this revelation. We went down to the music salon as he rattled off the eccentrics who collect books with exactly 200 or 300 pages, or whose protagonists’ names all start with “A,” or whose narrators turn out to be the murderers in the end. I felt sorry for the authors of those books.

  We shared a table with a honeymooning Austin dentist and his new wife who was his daughter’s age. The waiter collected $100 from each person, checking the bills with the aid of a torch. He then put two bottles of wine on the table and disappeared. An old clown came on first, prancing airily on stage to the tune from a sharp whistle. I loved this artist, who cried on one side of his face and laughed on the other. “My name is Alberto Bernardo Cesare Diego Ernesto Fabio Guillermo … but you can call me Evita,” he said in accented English and began his show …

  My guide gave me fair warning about the next performer as the microphone was being lowered to a height of three feet. Juanito, nicknamed Señor Ruiseñor (Mr. Nightingale), was a twenty-year-old dwarf with a hunchback. Anyone who heard his voice cascading like a waterfall was grateful that the good Lord had compensated him for his physical deficiencies. The club manager, a retired pimp, had discovered him busking on the street. He went onstage only at Empuje and refused to make recordings because he considered them akin to “frozen meat.” With the first notes from of his mouth a sacred hush fell over the room. Ariel removed his glasses and closed his eyes. The crystal voice of Juanito, who looked like a mischievous schoolboy, enthralled us body and soul. I felt somewhat ambivalent about the fact that not even Bach or Vivaldi had moved me as Señor Ruiseñor had.

  The Lunapar Trio consisted of an Inca woman on contrabass and two thin men with bandoneons who inflated themselves along with their instruments. They deserved to be paid extra for the difficult task of following Juanito. (Listening to Mr. Nightingale had shattered my old standards for music; after that the cello was merely a noisemaker.) The trio would give a short recital and then accompany the Sevilla-Silvyo tango twins. Seeing my eyelids droop, Ariel leaned over and informed me that Sevilla, the blind one, was a world-class beauty.

  I beat a speedy retreat from the room after the refrain-loving trio’s third piece—the wine that I’d consumed beyond the pleasure-giving stage was about to take effect. Outside the club entrance I held my face to the soft wind and dropped to my knees under the buzzing neon sign. Just as I was about to fade away, Ariel picked me up and hustled me into the restroom reeking of vinegar, where he doused my face with cold water. We hurried back to our seats just as the Sevilla-Silvyo twins were making their appearance. I studied the charming face of Sevilla, who was injecting ballet and gymnastics instead of passion into her dancing. I focused on her wide brow to avoid her eyes. Then I remembered who it was that the arrogant young woman who sat beside me on the São Paolo-Buenos Aires flight reminded me of. It was Haluk Erçelik’s blind granddaughter Sim, whom I’d seen in one of his paintings! This simple trick of memory relaxed me as thoroughly as though I’d found Esther. I was ready to go back to the hotel. There I closed my eyes, still suffused with the pleasurable lightness I’d felt on the way back. A vision of Miss Buenos Aires, wearing a gray cape and an anxious face, appeared before me. It looked as though she was trying to warn me.

  *

  I caught Professor Ali in front of the TV watching a porn movie. He said that he would get breakfast with Dr. Armenak, who was going to drop by to change his bandage. “We’ve got forty-eight hours left before heading back to Istanbul and I miss even the mold in Balat,” he said. “My one consolation is that at least you haven’t been bored to death on this wild goose chase.” Aggravated somewhat, I replied, “Well, sir, maybe I won’t come back empty-handed tonight.”

  “Avenida Cordoba, 3684H!” The four-digit number of Eli Arditti’s last address aroused the anticipatory joy of following yet another trail down yet another infinite boulevard. Cordoba Avenue was as dignified as a river marking the border between two hostile countries. It was as if I were not seeing for the first time the calm landscape flashing by the Citroen’s cracked windshield. I was telling myself that this might actually be a talent when we came to “Sí, Sí Usados Autos.” The place doubled as a parking lot and used-car dealership and looked like the junkyards you see in American movies. We approached an emaciated lad washing a clunky old Jeep with a patched hose at a faucet in front of the office. Without raising his head, the half-naked Inca pointed to a giant of a man who appeared to be some sort of guard, in answer to Ariel’s question. He was d
eeply absorbed by a lottery bulletin on the radio. He glanced up only briefly when Ariel spoke, but the fifty-peso note tucked into his shirt pocket soon loosened his tongue. We learned that the business had been taken over from Fernando Ruibial, Eli’s surviving partner, and that Ruibial resided in San Antonio de Areco, 113 kilometers north of Buenos Aires.

  Once more we hit the road; Fernando Ruibial was our last hope. We were still on the nearly deserted six-lane highway when a white Cadillac passed us and cut back, almost scraping the side of our car. Ariel reacted with wild hand gestures. The driver, who was wearing a uniform, stopped us in front of an abandoned warehouse. This was funny: the guy had cut us off and he was insulted! When he pulled Ariel out of the car and started shaking him, I saw red. I jumped out and head-butted him, then clipped him with two karate punches just above the belt. He staggered and I brought my right knee up between his legs. He moaned as he hit the ground. He had a handsome face and I supposed but for lack of talent he would have been a tango performer. My assumption that he would get up and leave was wrong. As Ariel climbed back into the car, the man attacked me from behind. This spurred me to renew my kicking and punching. Motorists passing by speeded up when they saw us—except for taxi drivers, who honked encouragingly to see me beating up a man in uniform.

  “Hey, countryman, hold up,” I suddenly heard in Turkish. A dark-haired man in his sixties with prayer beads in hand and a smile on his face was approaching. “Even if I hadn’t heard your curses I would have known you were Turkish from your fighting style,” he said. I told him I came from Balat and he asked me about the Agora Tavern; he wasn’t happy to hear that it had closed down long ago. Mardig had left Feriköy thirty years previously and was now running a milonga bar on the boulevard. I politely declined his invitation to come back for a drink, pleading lack of time. He said, “Okay, disappear, and I’ll see this sack of guts to the hospital.”