The Dark Moment

by Ann Bridge

  “I have just received a telegram from my son Ahmet, explaining why he cannot be with us today,” he said. “He is very sorry; he apologises”— and he sat down.

  “Orhan, what is it? Did you see it? What did it say?” Fuad, the young cousin, asked urgently, in a low tone.

  “Yes, I saw it. It said that there was ‘activity’ down in Palestine, and that leave was cancelled,” Orhan replied, equally low.

  “That was Hassan Bey, wasn’t it?” Fuad asked.

  “Yes. As you know, since he was wounded at Anafartalar he is in the Ministry of War—and he brought out the telegram. But Fuad— don’t talk about it, Asaf Pasha doesn’t seem to have noticed it—but the telegram is dated the 23rd.”

  “No! But today is the 28th! And why did it go to the War Office, and not to the Pasha direct?”

  “Because Kemal Pasha countersigned it—he is always kind, and he is very fond of Ahmet. But as to the delay, there must be great confusion down there. We must not tell Nilüfer, but Hassan says there has been a tremendous English attack, really a break-through; our troops are retreating on Damascus—headlong!”

  “How frightful! Was he sure?”

  “Perfectly sure. And my dear Fuad, there is worse than that.” “What can be worse?”

  “The Bulgarians have signed a separate Armistice with the Entente.”

  “It’s not possible!”

  “I tell you it has happened. Hassan heard it in the Ministry. May Allah destroy them! They have been half-hearted these weeks past— but to run out now, and without a word to us!”

  “But this is shocking!—appalling!” Fuad stopped, almost speechless. “What is to prevent the Entente troops, now, from coming here?”

  “Well, we have little enough up in Thrace to hold them with,” said Orhan bitterly. “We have relied on those wretched Bulgarians so largely —we had to.”

  At this point the Pasha made a move from the table, and all the men rose. The muttered colloquy between Fuad and Orhan had not passed unnoticed, and there were whisperings from ear to ear; released from their places, several of the younger men came over to join them, and heard the evil tidings.

  “Ah, if they had only listened to html” said one young officer. “He said from the beginning that it would be fatal for us to go into this war—and when has Mustafa Kemal Pasha been mistaken?”

  Meanwhile the older men had gathered round the Pasha, and listened to the bad news with grave faces. Presently he summoned a servant with a gesture, and despatched him on some errand—a few minutes later Mdlle Marthe entered the room. (As a foreigner and a Christian, she could come and go freely between the men’s and women’s quarters.) Grey-headed, dignified, calm, she stood while the Pasha spoke to his guests. “You will excuse my absence for a few minutes—I must bring my son’s message to my daughter.” Amid courteous murmurs of acquiescence he left the room, followed by the Frenchwoman.

  But once they entered the haremlik she preceded him—into room after room she went, scattering the unveiled female guests with the words “The Pasha is coming.” He waited in an anteroom for a few moments while she cleared Féridé’s own suite, and then passed through to his daughter’s boudoir, between the chairs thrust aside in haste and the abandoned tables of delicacies, to where she stood before the great settee, awaiting him.

  “My Father, is it news of Ahmet? Oh, not bad news!” she said, clasping her long hands. Such a visit, at such a moment, was so unprecedented that she was trembling with anxiety.

  “Of Ahmet himself the news is not bad, no,” he said, and handed her the telegram—she scanned it rapidly. “Ah, my dear brother!—he sends me his love,” she exclaimed; then she read it again, and like a hawk pounced on the date. “But my Father, this was sent five days ago!”

  “Was it? Let me see,” her father said, taking it from her again.

  “Why such a delay? Something must be gravely amiss,” she said. “And activity,’ all leave cancelled’! What can it mean?” She glanced quickly at him; his face spoke of disaster. “My Father, there is more than this—I see that you know it. Please to tell me.”

  He told her the shattering news of the Bulgarian Armistice. She considered it, with thoughtful eyebrows. “Does Niné know?” she asked then.

  “No. Please convey the news to her, and also about your brother. Now I must rejoin my guests; farewell for the present, my child. This is a sad wedding-day for you—not what I could have wished.”

  How much sadder it was to become neither of them knew then—but at his words she flung her arms round her father’s neck.

  “Baba-djim, but for Ahmet’s absence, and now this terrible news, it has been a wonderful fête! I thank you for it.”

  Féridé said nothing of what she had learned, except that Ahmet was delayed, till just at the close, when the ladies were muffling themselves in their cloaks and çarşafs for departure; then she murmured the disastrous tidings in the ears of some of the younger ones. And when they had all gone, she told Nilüfer and Réfiyé Hanim. The old woman listened with a shocked face; at last she said—“Send Dil Feripé to me. I am a little tired; I think, dji-djim, that I will go to bed.” But as she moved away on the old creature’s arm, Féridé heard her murmur— “Notre pauvre pays!”

  When she had gone to bed Féridé and Nilüfer withdrew to Féridé’s rooms, and sat disconsolately eating sweets from one of the innumerable boxes that had come as presents. This was the bridal night, and there were still ceremonies to be gone through: the bridegroom should hand to the bride the yüsgürumlük, the gift made for the privilege of seeing her unveiled face; and then should see it, when he removed her veil. And he must make—kneeling on that velvet mat embroidered with gold thread—the ceremonial prayer to ask a blessing on his marriage. But so far there was no sign of any bridegroom! The two young women talked in low voices, discussing the news, huddled together on a divan— picking nervously at the bonbons, and equally nervously, now and again, breaking into giggles as they recalled this or that odd incident during the day’s events.

  The men, meanwhile, had been holding a gloomy discussion about both the reported break-through and the Bulgarian Armistice down in the selamlik, over innumerable tiny cups of coffee. Eventually most of them left; the Pasha and one or two old cronies moved to his study. Orhan and Fuad started to follow them, mechanically, but at the study door Fuad paused. “My dear Orhan—your wife. Should you not go up and see her? Mon Dieu, what a wedding for her!”

  “Yes—indeed. Of course I will. But—Seigneur Dieu, do you know that I am not sure that I know the way!”

  “No wonder—this house is like Versailles!” Fuad said, laughing. “I know it—I was here so much as a child, when Féridé Hanim’s mother was alive. But I have no business up there!”

  “Ah, nonsense. What does that matter, at a time like this? Take me up, like a good fellow. She will be so anxious, and poor Nilüfer too, I don’t doubt.”

  They made their way upstairs. In the outer room they encountered Dil Feripé, hanging about, clucking like an anxious hen; at sight of them she began to scold. It was late, the bride was tired—and she was abandoned! Where was the yüsgürumlük? Why did not Orhan Bey give it, and let her prepare the child for bed? Dil Feripé had known Fuad since he was born, and Orhan was now a son of the house, so she scolded away, freely and impartially. Affectionately, firmly, Fuad brushed her aside. “Wait, aunt! Just five minutes! We have matters to speak of.”

  “Has he the gift?” the old woman persisted.

  “Yes, yes!—he has it. There! Now, leave us in peace, my good aunt.” He pushed Orhan before him into the boudoir, and closed the door gently after him on the fussing devoted old creature.

  They found the two young women still sitting forlornly on the divan. Féridé sprang up, flashing like a sword in her silver dress, and went to them. “At last! But now, please to tell us all about it. What does it involve? Can we not fight on without them? The Germans are not yielding, are they? And how bad is it really, down in t
he South?”

  The young men, sitting down, proceeded to explain what it involved. Practically speaking, it left the land route to Istanbul through Thrace open, except for the rather scanty Turkish forces up there—so Fuad explained. Orhan took him up on the strength of these forces, and the two officers argued it between them, while the girls listened in growing dismay. Dil Feripé kept poking her head in at the door and being chivvied away by Fuad, with a—“Wait, Aunt! a little patience, in Allah’s name!”—then he would turn to renew the discussion. These interruptions introduced an element of the absurd into what was anyhow the strangest of scenes, for that place and that time. One thing struck Orhan particularly, about this bride of his of whom he knew so little at first hand—how swiftly she grasped, and how remorselessly her question pursued the crucial, the vital points: What would the Germans do? Would they hold on? What were they doing in the South? To that, neither of the young men knew the answer. The news from France, now the main theatre of war, was not good; the German stroke against Amiens in the spring had failed of its main objective, and now their forces were being slowly pressed back against the Hindenburg Line. The outlook was gloomy whichever way one turned.

  But when they began to discuss Hassan’s rumour about the Palestine front, Nilüfer’s nerves gave way. Tired, anxious, overwrought, she burst into tears. At once the others were all concern: Fuad, glancing at his watch, saw the incredible lateness of the hour, and fled; Féridé led Nilüfer off to her own rooms, comforting her as best she could, and handed her over to her maid, who was waiting for her. Then she returned to her new suite—and now, at last, Dil Feripé, still waiting, came into her own. She hurried in, all tender bustle; brushed Orhan aside, and led her darling into the bedroom, where she undressed her, brushed her thick hair, and robed her for the night, putting a rich dressing-gown of Broussa silk over her nightdress. Then she summoned poor Orhan, who had gone off to his dressing-room—a little embarrassed, still wondering chiefly what was really going on in the South. He came in slowly; Dil Feripé went out. The two young people stood for a few moments in silence, looking at one another. And then there came a light tap on the door. This was unbelievable—Orhan and Féridé stared at each other in silent astonishment. “It must be Dil Feripé again!—what can be the matter?” said Féridé, and went to the door. To her immense astonishment, Fuad stood there, with Dil Feripé beside him.

  “Féridé—Féridé Hanim, I beseech you to pardon me!—but I must speak with Orhan.” He had a piece of paper in his hand.

  “With Orhan? Now? But about what?”

  Orhan, hearing his name, came out, also in his dressing-gown—they all stood together in the boudoir.

  “A military messenger has just brought that,” said Fuad, handing Orhan the paper. “I stayed a little talking with Mahmud Agha at the gate, and the messenger came while I was there. The paper was only folded, and I took the great liberty of reading it, hoping that it could wait till tomorrow—but it will not wait.”

  Orhan unfolded the paper, whose colour and texture were all too familiar—then checked himself. “Will you permit me?” he asked Féridé.

  “Of course! Read it quickly! What is it?” With a brother in the army for more than three years, Féridé also was familiar with the appearance of such missives.

  “‘Urgent. Rejoin your unit immediately.’” Orhan read out slowly.

  “But you were given leave for a week …” Féridé began; then checked herself. “Yes—I see. It is this new development.” She turned away, twisting her narrow hands together.

  “But can this mean now?—tonight?” Orhan asked Fuad, in bewilderment.

  “The messenger says that everyone on leave is going back tonight—there is a special train.” Fuad looked distressed and embarrassed.

  “Then I must go. I shall have to see your Father, and take leave of him, and explain,” he said, turning to Féridé. “Will he be awake? And—mon Dieu—how shall I find him?”

  “I will go and tell him,” said Fuad. “I know the way. I will come back here for you.”

  “Very well—thank you, mon ami.” As Fuad left he turned again to Féridé. “Oh, my bride, my darling!”

  “It has to be!” she said—she had recovered herself now.

  “There is one thing still,” the young man said. He went back into the bedroom, Féridé following, and kneeling down on the gold and velvet mat, he made his ceremonial prayer, asking for a blessing on their marriage. Féridé, standing by the empty bed, prayed too, silently. When he rose, he took her in his arms. “Sometime, oh light of my eyes!” he said, and went away to dress. He did not come back; she heard his swift abrupt movements in the next room—packing, and snapping his valise to—and then the sharp closing of his door, and his footsteps crossing the boudoir. She sank down then on the edge of the bed, and sat very still; she felt cold.

  What was that? The door from the boudoir was opening. What now? she thought, springing up.

  The door opened further, and Dil Feripé sidled in. “Oh my lamb, my jewel!—and he has had to go to the war!” The old woman wrapped her beloved child in her arms, rocking her to and fro—then she took off the gorgeous dressing-gown, thrust her into bed, and tucked her up, as she had done so many many times. “Allah be merciful!” murmured the dadi as she turned out the lights, and tiptoed away.

  It was only next morning that they found the yüsgürumlük, the gift for the sight of the bride’s face, lying, ungiven and forgotten, on a chair in the boudoir.

  Chapter Five

  Fuad called a couple of days later to see Féridé. He had been badly wounded some months before, and on his recovery was considered unfit for active service and given a job at Haidar Pasha—but now he had been re-called, he told her, to the Southern front. Since she was now a married woman, at least in status, and he a first cousin and an intime of the family, this visit was quite in order; but Féridé felt a little strange nevertheless, receiving him in her own salon, and alone, instead of in Réfiyé Hanim’s presiding presence.

  But Fuad had not merely come to say goodbye. He wished, he said, to tell her about Orhan’s farewell interview with her father, and proceeded to do so.

  “Asaf Pasha was in his dressing-room in his robe-de-chambre,” Fuad began, “smoking a narghilé—you know how he does, sometimes, when he has been busy, or agitated. I told him what had happened. ‘But naturally he must go,’ he said; and then—oh ma chère cousine, I wish you had seen his face—he got up, rather stiffly, as he does now, and went and stood looking at some of those verses in calligraphy on the wall—you know he has them even in his dressing-room—and began to mutter to himself. He spoke low, but I heard what he said. ‘My poor child!’ first; and then he stood up suddenly very straight, in his long robe, and looked—oh, like a prophet!—and said very clearly and firmly: It appears that Turkish women must be heroes now, as well as Turkish men.’ I never heard him say such a thing, and in such a manner, before!”

  “My dear Father! Well, and then?” Féridé asked.

  “Then I went to fetch Orhan. I met him here, with his valise in his hand,” said Fuad. “He had been very quick. We went down together. The Pasha had gone to his study—imagine, he must have lighted the candles himself!—but he was still in his dressing-gown. He said to Orhan—1 hear you have your orders.’ ‘Yes, Excellency,’ Orhan said, and drew the paper from his pocket, and held it out. Asaf Pasha took it, and read it, and handed it back, and said—Well, for a soldier, immediately means immediately. Farewell, my son,’ And that was all.”

  The next weeks were very strange to Féridé. They would have been strange enough if Orhan had been opposite her when she sat down to meals in her new dining-room; to sit alone was almost incredible. All her life she had been lapped round with companionship and love; escorted by Mdlle Marthe or an “aunt” for every excursion outside the house, and even in the garden usually accompanied by some elder, except when Nilüfer or Fanny was with her. Fanny had brought an unwonted breath of freedom and independenc
e into her life, as no one else had done; and now, in her new solitude, her thoughts turned often to her Canary, her little yellow-haired friend, whom she had not seen or heard of for four long years. But she would not break her isolation, and return to her grandmother’s table; some curious instinct forbade that. Réfiyé Hanim had fitted her out with a staff of servants, and soberly she ordered her meals and ate them in that astonished solitude, after the chatter of Mdlle Marthe and the old women rattling in her ears all her life till now; she dealt with her little household, she must learn, it was all practice; and one day Orhan would come back, and she would be ready for him.

  But she did often slip through the endless rooms of the great house to sit with Niné and roll bandages, and hear the latest news that the Pasha had brought back from his Club, the Cercle de l’Orient; or she would seek out Nilüfer, who always drooped and flagged, like a broken lily, in Ahmet’s absence, and rouse her up to come and walk in the garden or the koru, to get some air. The weather was growing chilly, as it does on the Bosphorus in October; cold winds blew down from the Black Sea, tearing the small pink and yellow leaves off the bushes on the cliff and up in the koru, and whirling them high in the air, and heaping up the tough rounded leaves of the Judas-trees under the marble seats in the garden, or sending them out in scuds over the water, to join the leaf-like flights of the “Lost Souls.”

  “Oh, it is so sad, autumn,” Nilüfer would say, leaning on the balustrade and watching the doomed leaves flying out over the rushing strait after the haunted birds.

  It was of course high time that they should have moved back to Péra, into the konak, the great town house. But with the general situation so uncertain, the Pasha had decided to keep his household at the vali for the moment. In 1918 Istanbul was even more largely built of wood than it is today, and the effect of a possible bombardment on that wooden city, with streets so narrow that fire-engines could hardly get along them, was too ghastly to contemplate. The great Fire Tower, its crenellated top rising high above the steep slope of buildings, whence watch is kept for outbreaks, is to this day a constant reminder of that peril, even in peace-time—and no one who has watched a fire, after dark, over the Galata quarter, the flames leaping as high as the dome of Hagia Sofia is ever likely to forget the horror of the sight.