Land of the Blind

by Barbara Nadel

  Yiannis waved a thin, dark hand over the silk scarf and mumbled some words the children strained to hear, but couldn’t. There was a pause. Then he flicked the scarf away to reveal a tiny black kitten.

  ‘Aaahhh!’

  The girl with the baby brother said, ‘Can I have it?’

  Yiannis picked the kitten up. ‘No,’ he said. ‘But you can stroke him if you like.’

  The children treated the kitten gently, even the boys. The sons and daughters of shopkeepers and pansiyon owners, they were not street urchins who had little regard for animals or rich kids who found anything not on a computer screen boring. These kids were the ideal audience and Yiannis made a point of always having some new tricks for them whenever they gathered outside the gates of the Negroponte house.

  Once all the children had stroked the kitten, Yiannis said that was the end of the show for the day and went back through his gates. Hakkı was in the garden and Yiannis gave him the kitten as he passed.

  ‘He can go back to his mother now,’ he said.

  ‘As you wish.’

  Yiannis walked into the house via the French windows. Anastasia was asleep on one of the couches in front of the television, which was blaring out football scores. He turned it off but she didn’t wake. Then he looked at her. In sleep she looked almost serene. But he knew she couldn’t be. Peace of mind, under the circumstances, was impossible for any of them. He looked again at the figure Ahmet Öden had offered him for the house. He’d written it down on the back of one of his business cards. At the time, Yiannis had just shoved it in his pocket. Now he looked at it and wondered how the man had the gall to think they’d even consider such an insulting sum. But then Öden could afford gall. He had never and would never pay the going rate for the land he developed. Mostly he bought from the poor and ignorant or from people who would get some sort of kickback once he’d built his tower blocks. Öden had made it abundantly clear to Yiannis that he was doing an old Byzantine family who were a bit strapped for cash a big favour. What he didn’t know was that there was actually no price he could offer that would buy the Negroponte house.

  When Anastasia opened her eyes and looked at him he said, ‘Don’t worry, Mama, everything is going to be all right.’

  She smiled.

  The contents of Ariadne Savva’s desk at the museum arrived at İkmen’s office just before the archaeologist’s father, Demitrios. He put them away quickly.

  An elderly, frail man, Demitrios Savva spoke Turkish fluently. ‘Our family lived in this city and then later in Anatolia for centuries,’ he told İkmen when he commented on his language skills. ‘We were “exchanged” for Turks from Salonika in 1923.’

  The population exchanges between Greece and Turkey in the 1920s still left a bitter taste.

  ‘I was born in Athens,’ Savva said, ‘but my parents still spoke Turkish. I taught it to my children. You can never know enough languages, whatever they are.’

  He looked around the room as if he had a bad smell under his nose. İkmen was polite. He tried to converse about the daughter Savva had lost but the old man wouldn’t be drawn. ‘I’ve come to see my daughter’s body and take her home, Inspector,’ he said. ‘And the child. What of that? Do you have it? Do you know who its father is?’

  ‘No, we don’t have the child and neither do we know the identity of its father.’

  ‘If you don’t have the child by this time—’

  ‘We must not lose hope,’ İkmen said. ‘On the positive side we have not found the dead body of a child. The father could have it—’

  ‘Or paedophiles,’ Demitrios Savva said. ‘Or maybe the father was a paedophile.’

  İkmen took in a deep breath and then let it out slowly. ‘Sir, your daughter was an intelligent woman. Do you honestly think that she’d have a relationship with a pervert?’

  The old man shuffled in his chair. ‘I don’t know. I never wanted her to come to this country.’

  ‘She was a scholar of the Byzantine Empire. She had to come here,’ İkmen said. ‘Like it or not, Mr Savva, İstanbul is the centre of Byzantine inquiry. And by your own admission, you taught your daughter Turkish—’

  ‘Don’t be clever with me!’

  İkmen looked down. ‘I’m sorry. I thought—’

  ‘You thought nothing. I’ve lost a child. My only daughter. And I have to come to this place where my family were treated like cattle . . .’ He began to cry.

  İkmen wondered whether he should tell Mr Savva that he too had lost a child but he decided against it. What good would knowing that he had lost a son do for this man? He let him cry.

  When he’d finished the old man looked up. He still had fury in his eyes.

  İkmen said, ‘What I can do is take you to see your daughter.’

  ‘Where is she? Here?’

  ‘No, she is still at the pathology laboratory. As you can understand, we had to find out what had caused Ariadne’s death.’

  ‘Which was?’

  ‘Trauma to the head,’ İkmen said. ‘After she had given birth.’

  ‘I see.’ His eyes began to water and swell again. ‘Animals!’ he muttered. ‘Animals!’

  ‘Whether the trauma was accidental or deliberate is uncertain. Our pathologist, a Christian—’

  ‘You think you do me some sort of favour by having my daughter cut open by a Christian? Do you?’

  İkmen didn’t know what to say. Dealing with bereaved relatives was something he usually did well, but this time he felt entirely wrong-footed. Greeks in Turkey were one thing but Greeks from Greece were something else. A proud people, they now lived in a bankrupt country next to a neighbour, Turkey, which seemed to be living the economic dream. It had to appear, İkmen thought, as if the clock had turned back five hundred years to when Turkey had been an empire and Greece a starving backwater.

  Demitrios Savva appeared to collect himself and then he said, ‘I apologise. Of course it is thoughtful that you assign a Christian pathologist to my daughter.’

  ‘He is our most senior doctor,’ İkmen said.

  ‘I appreciate that. And again, I apologise, it’s . . .’

  ‘Your daughter is dead,’ İkmen said. ‘You are naturally distraught. I am just so sorry that I can’t give you any more positive information. I too think of the child. I think of it day and night and I . . . I can’t believe I haven’t found it.’ He shook his head. ‘But Mr Savva, if the child is out there I will find it and I will provide justice for your daughter. Now, shall we go?’

  The Greek nodded his head. His anger spent, he sat quietly while İkmen gathered what he needed for the journey to Arto Sarkissian’s laboratory and then they left.

  Süleyman didn’t usually put people he spoke to on the phone on speaker. Had he done it this time to impress him?

  Ömer Mungun didn’t know. Understanding his superior was not something he could claim to have ticked off his mental list of life skills.

  Süleyman smiled into the phone. ‘And the English Club, Professor Bekdil, how are your numbers there?’

  ‘Oh, always high, Mehmet Bey,’ an elderly voice replied. ‘Lessons are one thing, but conversational practice . . .’

  ‘I wish I’d spent more time at Club,’ Süleyman said. ‘I understand English perfectly but sometimes my spoken English does leave something to be desired.’

  ‘I do hope you’re coming to Pilav Day,’ the professor said. ‘It’s next Sunday, the second. It would be wonderful to see you in a social milieu. That is if we can have Pilav Day this year.’

  ‘Why wouldn’t you? Pilav Day has been an annual celebration of the school and its achievements since its inception.’

  There was a pause. Süleyman had telephoned his old English teacher to tell him the latest news on the skeleton that had been found in the grounds of Galatasaray Lise. Dr Sarkissian had found what he thought could be stab wounds on the dead man’s sternum and ribs. Bekdil had been liaison between the school and the police ever since the body had been found.

&nbs
p; ‘These protests,’ Bekdil said. ‘There are thousands of people on İstiklal Caddesi, all moving down towards Gezi Park. It’s all very colourful and they’re all carrying very bright banners and flags, but when Monsieur Lamartaine went out at lunchtime he said that something in the air made his eyes sting. Are the police using tear gas, do you know, Mehmet Bey?’

  Süleyman looked at Ömer, who shrugged. He didn’t know the latest from the park any more than his boss.

  ‘I don’t know,’ Süleyman said. ‘But of course if things have become violent, then it’s possible.’

  ‘The people in the streets seem very peaceful.’

  ‘I’m not there, Professor, I wouldn’t know.’

  ‘Of course not,’ he said. ‘I apologise, Mehmet Bey. Of course you are not involved in street disturbances.’

  Süleyman said nothing. Ömer felt the professor’s last statement was obsequious. But then he imagined that the staff at the Lise did have to crawl, to some extent, to their often exalted students, especially when they grew up. His teachers back in Mardin had smacked him around the ear when he talked in class or failed to attend to a sufficient degree. Money bought lack of pain in so many ways.

  ‘Does Dr Sarkissian have any idea about the age of the skeleton?’ The professor had changed the subject, which was what, Ömer had observed, elite people did when they had made some sort of social gaffe.

  ‘Not yet,’ Süleyman said. ‘He’s working with a forensic archaeologist so the assumption is that the body is old. I will let you know when we have an approximate date.’

  ‘Do. As you may recall, Mehmet Bey, every so often at the Lise, kitchen and cleaning staff have just left without giving notice over the years. It’s a common thing amongst domestic workers. And back in the 1970s there was Dr Deliveli.’

  ‘Was he the mathematics teacher?’

  ‘Yes. Just before your time, I think. He disappeared on Pilav Day, I seem to remember, in 1972. At the time there were rumours of homosexuality. It was said that he fell in love with a young male prostitute in Karaköy. But I don’t know.’

  Süleyman frowned. ‘Was there a police investigation?’

  ‘I think so, but not like these days,’ the professor said. ‘I remember a detective coming and interviewing all the teaching staff but I can recall no resolution.’

  People had gone missing back in the 1970s. It had been a time of political strife with socialist supporters pitched against conservative groups. In the middle, a succession of governments had tried to exercise control. Finally the military had staged a coup in 1980.

  ‘It is a name to bear in mind, Mehmet Bey,’ the professor said.

  ‘Indeed. I will.’

  They talked for a few minutes more and then Süleyman ended the conversation. Ömer watched him lean back in his chair. ‘Like all institutions, the Lise has its own life, its legends and its rumours,’ he said. ‘Schools have much in common with hospitals and prisons.’

  ‘Total institutions.’

  ‘Yes. And my status as an ex-student at the Lise could prove useful. As an “old boy” people like Professor Bekdil will speak freely to me. He may also seek to co-opt me into some sort of alliance with the school, should what we have found prove embarrassing for the Lise. Therefore I will include you, in your capacity as disinterested observer, in my conversations with the school.’

  ‘You want me to listen in again?’

  ‘If possible whenever I have any contact with the Lise,’ Süleyman said. ‘I’m not saying they will or even may seek to influence me in any way, but my old school is a special place and I wouldn’t like to do anything that may harm its reputation. But I will do if I have to, and I want you, Ömer, to remind me of that from time to time.’

  ‘Yes, sir.’ But if he were truthful Ömer’s mind wasn’t really on the Galatasaray Lise. The body they’d found there had been dead a long time and so it was unlikely the murderer was still stalking any street, in İstanbul or anywhere else. He was thinking about the thousands of people who had gathered in İstiklal and about tear gas.

  ‘Sir, do you know what’s happening in İstiklal and in Gezi Park today?’ he asked.

  ‘Not really.’ Süleyman paused. ‘Ömer, we have a job to do. What others are assigned to isn’t our business. This is a huge city. You need to realise that we can’t be everywhere or know everything. In fact, sometimes it’s best if we don’t know anything. Do you understand?’

  He was saying that they shouldn’t get involved. Which, on one level, suited Ömer, but on another it really didn’t. Some of the new legislation the government wanted to pass restricting the sale of alcohol offended him, and he believed that suspending the extension of lesbian and gay rights was a step backwards. He felt conflicted. Just then a text came to his phone from Peri: ‘Gezi Park is erupting. A hell of tear gas and water cannon. Tell your colleagues to stop it, Ömer.’

  Chapter 6

  Fatma had told him that she could hear the crowd in Gezi Park from their apartment in Sultanahmet.

  ‘Roaring and screaming like mad people,’ she’d said. ‘Thanks be to God that Kemal is in tonight. Good sense must have prevailed.’

  Fatma disapproved of protesting, especially against government policies that she found sensible. ‘What’s wrong with restricting the sale of alcohol?’ she’d said. ‘Mr Prime Minister doesn’t want people to become alcoholics.’

  He’d tried to explain about choice but she’d thrown Sharia law at him and so İkmen had put the phone down on her. Now, alone with Ariadne Savva’s personal effects from her office, he turned again to a small notebook which had been found in her drawer. It was the only document that was not in Turkish. He could make out a few words of the Greek handwriting but he’d have to send it for translation.

  One word he did recognise, however. When Ariadne’s body had been found there had been a small piece of porphyry stone in her left hand. Almost purple in colour, porphyry had been the building material favoured by Byzantine emperors. There was loads of it in Aya Sofya. But none in the sphendone of the Hippodrome. Now here it was in Ariadne’s notebook.

  Mr Savva had broken down again when he’d seen his daughter’s body. That happened a lot. Loved ones could often hold themselves together until they actually saw the reality of a dead body in front of them. Mehmet Süleyman’s ex-wife, Zelfa, a psychiatrist, used to say that until a father or a partner actually saw the corpse of their relative they didn’t quite believe that they had died. It was self-delusion but he could understand it. Not that it always worked that way. When Sergeant Ayşe Farsakoğlu had died in the garden of Professor Cem Atay, she’d passed as soon as she’d been shot. İkmen had run to her, cradled her in his arms, but she’d already died. In spite of the prohibition on smoking indoors, İkmen lit a cigarette. It was late and that memory always upset him. That Atay was now in prison for the rest of his life didn’t make İkmen feel any better. When he’d held Ayşe’s body to his chest, she’d still been warm, and he’d clung on to that fact as proof of some sort of life for as long as he could. It had only been when Arto Sarkissian had taken her away from him that the spell her body had exerted over him had been broken. After that he could see that she was dead. He would never forget it. However successful Kerim Gürsel’s appointment as his sergeant turned out to be, he could never be Ayşe.

  ‘What do they think they’re doing?’

  Ahmet Öden had a good view of Gezi Park from his brother’s apartment on Cumhuriyet Caddesi.

  Semih brought him a cup of coffee. ‘They’re protesting,’ he said. ‘Against laws on alcohol, restrictions on perverts, all sorts of things they feel do not conform to their middle-class liberal agenda. They’re spoilt, secular rich kids.’

  ‘They also demonstrate against us,’ Ahmet said. ‘Because they’re middle-class and privileged. They want these grim old parts of the city to be preserved because they’re “historic”. But they don’t have to live in them. Developers are doing people like the folk in Gizlitepe and Tarlabaşı a favour.
Look at what’s been achieved in Sulukule. Once a slum full of criminals, now a place where families can live in peace and security.’

  Ahmet was fifteen years older than his brother and he could remember Sulukule when it had been the place to go to watch gypsy dancers and have your fortune told. As a teenager, he’d often sloped off for some guilty pleasures in Sulukule, away from the prying eyes of his covered mother. Down in the park, Turkish flags waved side by side with rainbow flags which, someone had told him, denoted gay pride. Ahmet turned back into the vast, gilt-encrusted living room. He’d ensured that Semih had done well and it made him happy. Property development had made them both rich. They’d cleaned up slums in the process, which had had the effect of limiting the instances of immoral behaviour in those areas. That was a good thing.

  Ahmet sat down. So, if slum clearance was a good thing, then why did so many people, middle-class or otherwise, oppose it? He’d heard that the gypsies of Sulukule had first been sent to live in tower blocks outside the city, which they hadn’t liked. Then thousands of them had moved back, mainly into other slums like Tarlabaşı. Now that was being demolished a lot of them lived and begged on the streets. Often the police picked them up for vagrancy and threw them in the cells. And yet there were nice houses, houses the developer could be proud of, in Sulukule. Quiet, pious families had bought them and the whole area had completely changed character. Undoubtedly this had been for the better. Nonetheless, at the back of his mind, usually when he slept, Ahmet wasn’t so sure. Gypsies particularly were loud and irreligious, and most of the men drank, but did that mean that they didn’t deserve to live somewhere decent?

  ‘All this will blow over,’ Semih said. ‘Those people down there are in a minority; they always have been, really. Now we’re officially in charge there’s nothing they can do.’

  ‘No.’ But he wasn’t sure. The government was furious about Gezi and the police were all over the area, but those in the ‘minority’ still came, and silently Ahmet found them frightening. Mobs like that could do things. His father had told him. And those things were not always to the benefit of people like them. He felt a sense of urgency he hadn’t experienced before.