The Time Regulation Institute

by Ahmet Hamdi Tanpınar

  “I just looked in on Dr. Ramiz. He’s sleeping like a baby.”

  “Is he alone?” I asked.

  “Oh no,” he replied. “He’s with his chosen one. Everything’s going well. Let’s go have a drink!”

  We went back to the bar. But no one was there. Still, we managed to find a server who opened a bottle for us. To the detriment of my daughter’s inheritance, my aunt ordered a caviar sandwich. No fortune could keep pace with such extravagance. “She’ll crawl back to us and expire in my arms,” I mumbled to myself. Turning to Halit Ayarcı, I asked:

  “Do you think those jewels are real?”

  “Of course, but those aren’t the important ones,” he said. “They are in the bank. It’s an incredible fortune really, but don’t worry. It won’t be too easy for her to go through it so quickly.”

  Then he changed the subject.

  “You managed it all quite well really.”

  I suddenly lost my head.

  “Why didn’t you warn me?” I cried. “Am I forever to be forced into situations not of my own making?”

  He looked at me, smiling.

  “My dear friend,” he said. “My poor dear friend! But really I should say poor me! For I am in fact the one to be pitied in this affair. I have just now managed to find a way to express my good intentions. You should have come to understand at least some of this by now. There’s no one here forcing you to play a role. And there are no faits accomplis. There is only a man who respects you and who believes in you. I only want you to accept my dreams as second nature. If I were to inform you in advance, I would infringe on your personal freedom. Only then would you indeed be playing a part. But when the evening began, you had no more idea of what might happen, in much the same way that you don’t know whom you might bump into when you head out into the street. So you came tonight not knowing quite what to expect, and we have lived through all this together. There’s nothing forced about it.”

  “But I might have put a foot wrong, and everything would have been ruined.”

  He let out a laugh.

  “And, so what if you had? In such circumstances there’s no such thing as a mistake. Don’t forget that! Imagine that indeed you had committed an error! We’d simply shift from there toward the truth. Mistakes only exist for those foolish enough to try to fix them. But we are different! Once we have accepted an error, we rise above it. But, no, Hayri Bey, oh no, there’s no such thing as a mistake and there never will be. It’s all a matter of solid preparation and faith in man’s potential. I am well aware of your powers, for I was the one who discovered you!”

  What did he mean by that?

  He refilled our glasses and downed his in one gulp.

  “Managing people is incredibly difficult and it takes time. The important thing is to set the stage. Humans then live what they have been given. The trick is to give humankind a chance to be creative. I don’t like the theater. I am a man who likes life to unfold naturally!”

  “Didn’t you tell anyone here what they were to do tonight?”

  “Of course I may have made a few hints to a few. You were sleeping. Then Van Humbert came, so I simply said that you were in a conference and would be coming along soon. The rest happened all on its own. Look, if there’s anything that’s difficult in all this, it’s choosing the right people. And there you’re absolutely right—I always pick a good team!”

  “No, if nothing else, you were wrong in choosing me, because I don’t believe in what we’re doing. You know this all too well. And I’m suffering for it.”

  “That’s all the better! This is precisely why every step you take, every move you make, is a success. Instead of behaving like all the others—like automatons—you live your life like a man made of flesh and blood!”

  At this point Pakize came in alone.

  “Where’s our guest, then?” I asked.

  “With Zehra. I left him in her hands. She’s teaching him how to dance the zeybek. I’ll just have a drink, and then we’ll go and watch!”

  Refreshed drinks in hand, we went off to do just that. Now, this was a spectacle beyond anyone’s wildest dreams. It was nature stripped bare. The jazz group had struck up a feverish zeybek. And in the middle of the room, where my sister-in-law had just been displaying her talents, my daughter and Van Humbert were performing the strangest and most unfathomable zeybek I had ever seen. All around them were wide-eyed with shock. And for a while we watched Van Humbert’s arms dangling awkwardly in the air as he bent down on one knee and struggled to his feet again.

  Halit Ayarcı whispered softly into my ear:

  “Now this is something else.”

  I was the chairman of the most spectacular family in the world. With this thought in mind, I nudged my wife, getting even with her for her flirtatious elbow jabs earlier.

  Then Halit Ayarcı added:

  “What do you think? Does it meet your approval? Set aside paternal pride—aren’t you astounded by the success of our women? Did you ever even dream of witnessing such a scene?”

  With one eye fixed on the obscene and dangerous contortions that my daughter had forced on Van Humbert’s large and shockingly clumsy body, I said:

  “How could I have imagined this? Not ever in my wildest dreams. And my own daughter . . .”

  “You’re right. Such rapid progress is quite unprecedented.”

  “If only they were just a little more aware of what they’re doing. If, for example, my daughter actually knew the steps to this dance, and if my sister-in-law had the faintest idea of what she was just doing, thrashing around on that dance floor, and if the older one didn’t go after musical compositions as if she were smashing a chandelier with a chair . . .”

  In the politest way possible Halit Ayarcı yawned.

  “The same old story. Rather, the same old stories! My dear friend, you are an incurable malcontent. Knowledge is secondary in such matters. Action, action, and action alone!” Then, as if talking to himself, he added:

  “Knowledge holds us back. Indeed it offers neither an end nor an aim. The main thing is to do, to create. If only they knew, if only they knew . . . But if they knew, they wouldn’t be doing it. They’d never achieve the same innovation, the same excitement at spontaneous discovery. Knowledge would stifle it all. Your daughter has made the evening. With what? With her ability to create. For creation is life. We are living individuals. We are people who choose life. You can scowl at us all you like!”

  “I’m not scowling. I’m simply speaking my mind.”

  “Keep your thoughts to yourself, and feast your eyes on this magnificent spectacle!”

  It was indeed a wonderful sight to behold. Van Humbert was now dancing without my daughter’s assistance. Executing one outrageous twirl after another, he rose up from the floor only to fall once more. The applause was thunderous.

  “Look, my dear friend, study that man’s willpower! What effort, such a life force—it’s the very joy of living! What is knowledge in the face of such power?”

  Then he leaned over and whispered into my ear:

  “Yes, my dear friend, that’s how I would like to see you.”

  For a moment I imagined myself in our guest’s position.

  “Oh, please have mercy!” I groaned. “Next you’ll send me to the insane asylum?”

  Halit Ayarcı graced me with a delicate smile.

  “What a strange idea you have of an insane asylum, sir,” he said. “You would send every one of us there, with of course yours truly at the top of the list. But, then again, there is nothing I’ve done that you haven’t participated in!”

  I’d offended him. Although I had no desire to bring a sour end to an evening that had begun so brilliantly, there was no turning back.

  “You were fully aware of the state I was in when you first met me!” I replied.

  “Yes I was. Indeed you
never concealed it from me. That’s just the way you are—everything is out in the open. The truth is this, my dear friend, no sooner had you settled into your comfortable new life than your former life comes back to haunt you. And you find it unnecessary, even extravagant, to think of letting go!”

  “No, I just miss my old self.”

  “Then go back to it! If you are longing for it, then go back!”

  Then his voice suddenly changed.

  “But you can’t. You just did the calculations. I read what was going through your mind a few minutes ago: ‘I’ve made peace with my aunt and things are working out well. Why should I walk away from it all?’ That’s what you just told yourself, am I right? But then you relinquished the idea. You’re afraid of the future!”

  He had read my mind perfectly. He placed his hand on my shoulder and led me into the inner drawing room. People watching us would have assumed we were merrily chatting away.

  “Let me tell you your version of the truth. You can’t turn back now because you aren’t willing to give anything up. Despite all your criticism and self-deprecation, you have a beautiful, forward-thinking wife and a mistress with whom you are madly in love. And I’m quite sure that you would make any sacrifice for the welfare of your daughter and son. What’s more, you enjoy notoriety, and you like being busy, even if it means being engaged in work you dismiss as absurd. At the end of the day, you’re an octopus, with your eight arms wrapped around the world! And you can’t release your hold on anything. How could you ever go back?”

  “I don’t want to go back,” I said. “I just want a more reasonable . . .”

  He laughed again.

  “Reasonable! Reasonable!” he said, shaking his head. “No, you’re not looking for reason. You’re not such a fool. If indeed you are of the belief that reason operates on its own, well, then that’s different. But, no, you’re after something else.”

  “I’m after the truth. Or rather I want it, or at least a piece of it.”

  “Truth is either whole or not there at all. My good friend, these unassailable truths you’re speaking of are there for one who is content to live with nothing but the shirt on his back and the odd piece of bread. They are not for someone like you, who wants it all and straightaway! An individual who is pure and complete seeks first of all to meet his own needs.”

  With one stroke he had thrown me out of myself.

  “But I really don’t want that much,” I said.

  “So now you’re negotiating. But such matters are nonnegotiable! At this table the man who wins one and the man who wins a thousand will always bet on the very same thing and play till nothing’s left. You might chance upon a win, but when you lose, you lose it all, and forever. Once you’ve entered the game, you have lost. Bargaining with virtue gets you nowhere. This is why our forbears accepted human nature the way it was. You know the old adage: ‘Words are clear but man’s nature is . . .’”

  Then he darted to the drinks table and filled two glasses. The bogus and outlandishly adorned Blessed One seemed to peer across the room in awe.

  “In this world no account, no attachment comes free. They all require the same sacrifice. And there is but one step between the absurd and the sublime. Are you up for the task or will you fold?”

  I thought for a moment.

  “No,” I said. “I know I won’t. But why are you speaking like this?”

  Halit Ayarcı refilled his glass. With a delighted look in his eyes, he glanced first at his glass, then the Blessed One, and then at me.

  “I don’t know,” he said. “Perhaps I’m drunk. Perhaps I am just trying to settle the score with myself. The best thing, of course, is to rise above the matter altogether.”

  “No,” I said. “You’re not settling accounts with yourself. You’re still trying to break down something inside me. And you’re even doing it brick by brick! But why?”

  “I’ll tell you: Because we’ve both traveled down the same roads. I am very fond of you, but I’m also at war with you. You remind me very much of myself. Oh no, now don’t flatter yourself too much here! I was never like you. I was never confused and downtrodden. But there’s a side to you that . . .”

  And his laugh was like crystal.

  “Have you ever in your life laughed like that?” he asked. “Your soul has never been as pure as mine because I have always remained above and beyond all these matters.”

  Then suddenly he embraced me.

  “But you have taught me to love life!” he cried. “The state you were in when you whiled away your time in that coffeehouse in Sehzadebası: that ridiculous despair, your hopeless grief, those burdens you could never shake off . . . Your astonishment at the restaurant at Büyükdere, your timidity, your flights of happiness . . . That world in which you lived, small as an olive pit, all of this taught me to love life again. Had I done no more than pass a discreet five-lira note into the palm of your hand that night—how happy you would have been! Yes, you made me love life again. You are a most wonderful foil!”

  My face went bright red with shame.

  “I wish you’d done just that!” I said, wrenching myself free of his embrace.

  “Now, what a ridiculous thing to say,” he said.

  He smiled again and raised his glass.

  “Be as you like, then,” he said. “In any event I never wanted to change you altogether! If that were the case, then we would no longer need each other. It’s just that you needed mild alterations here and there. At least that way you won’t disturb those around you, who are simply living out their lives!”

  I paused for a moment. I was lost in doubt.

  “You don’t believe in anything do you?” I asked.

  He took a sip from his glass and then wiped his forehead with the handkerchief he’d taken out of his vest pocket:

  “Enough already,” he said. “Look, our friends are coming this way. Long live the Time Regulation Institute! Long live the TRI!”

  And with this toast, he saluted my entire family, including my aunt, who had taken Van Humbert by the arm.

  Van Humbert’s delight knew no bounds. You’d think he’d just won a great victory. He congratulated me on my wife and my daughter and invited both of them to Holland. He said he would teach them how to ride a bicycle.

  “Here we all ride the carousel together,” I said.

  Halit Ayarcı looked at me reproachfully. It was clear something had changed between us.

  Van Humbert stayed in Istanbul for one month. It would take far too much time for me to explain all the adventures we shared together, but allow me say just this: he left us quite pleased. Years later he described his visit to Istanbul in a series of articles. He never forgot his zeybek with my daughter, or Halit Ayarcı’s kind attention, or the yogurt kebab we feasted upon in Çamlıca on the day we visited the tomb of Ahmet the Timely.

  I’d thought this man to be thoroughly pleased with me, and so it was a shock to see him turn against me. I can only think of the old saying, “A fallen man has no friends,” which was first uttered many years before my encounter with Van Humbert. And so I harbor no anger against him, nor dreams of vengeance. I just think it would have been so much better if he’d never come at all. But let’s not forget: Van Humbert suffered dearly for his involvement with us. In particular there was his book on ancient Turkic folklore; he’d based it on information gathered from my wife and my older sister-in-law, and it was savaged by the critics. Yet in his subsequent articles he continued to speak fondly of me. He concluded one with this sentence: “Hayri Irdal and his family know all too well how to reach a man’s inner essence. No matter what may happen between us, I’ll never forget the time I spent with them during my visit to Istanbul. As happy as they might be with the carousel, if they ever come to Holland, I shall keep my promise and teach them all how to ride a bicycle.”

  PART IV

  EVERY SEASON
HAS AN END

  I

  Halit Ayarcı’s prediction came true. Within just a few months of my aunt’s cocktail party, we had received telegraphs from several agencies informing us that independent chapters of the Clock Lover’s Society had been established in six South American cities. It was not long before those groups were in direct communication with our own Clock Lover’s Society, requesting information on our charter, official rules, and regulations. Similar requests came in from all parts of the Middle and Far East, as well as from several countries in Europe. In the space of just two and a half years, three institutes and more than thirty Clock Lover’s Societies were established abroad. It was strange to see how, in countries ill disposed to such institutes, the authorities felt compelled to supply the public with clear and concise reasons for their opposition. In almost all cases the announcement was in fact the same: “Our industries are developed to a degree as to preclude the need for such an institute.”

  And so it was that—whether or not they had an institute—all countries were united in viewing it as a necessity. Following each official telegraph to this effect, Halit Ayarcı organized a press conference at which he again emphasized our institute’s importance. When he was occupied elsewhere, the task fell to me. My aunt, meanwhile, became a storm of industry. She did not miss a single one of the International Clock Lover’s Society’s frequent congresses. For a time, she kept her packed suitcase ready in her bedroom, only to decide that it would be easiest to simply leave it ready in the entrance hall. On most of these trips abroad she was accompanied by my daughter and also (on occasion) her husband. When passing through customs in Istanbul, she was among those who could count on being recognized. She renewed her passport every year without fail. In addition to the ornamental treasures and jewels left to her by the street sweeper’s trade guild, she was awarded medals by seven or eight foreign powers. Meanwhile we were just as busy. With the capital raised from our twofold penalty system, we constructed our new building on Freedom Hill, and, in partnership with the cooperative established with support from Timely Banks, which received generous aid from the International Time Trust, we brought into being a unique residential development for our personnel, which came to be known as the Clock Houses.