Fevzi Pasha spat. “I saw the plans. Too complex. It would never have worked.”
Yashim pushed the door. “Good evening,” he said, with a bow. “I’m afraid I was detained at the palace.” He advanced into the room. “Where’s Roxelana?”
Palewski came past him, to the door. “Marta!”
149
Roxelana came in reluctantly, her eyes on the carpet. As she advanced she glanced once over her shoulder, and at the door Marta nodded with an encouraging smile.
Roxelana bowed, lowering her hand to the floor.
“Efendim,” she whispered. She did not look up.
Fevzi Pasha took a step toward her. “You-you know who I am?” He grinned awkwardly and thrust his head forward. “Your baba!”
The little girl shrank back. “I’m Roxelana,” she whispered. “I’m big now. I’m five.”
Fevzi Ahmet dropped to one knee and opened his arms.
“My-little-girl,” he said.
Yashim and Palewski both turned their heads and looked at each other; but out of the corner of his eye Yashim saw the little girl take a hesitant step forward, twisting her fingers.
“Baba?” Her whisper was scarcely audible.
Fevzi lunged and snatched her up. Then he took her off, toward the window, whispering something in her ear.
“It’s a cold night,” Palewski said. “Have a glass.”
Yashim declined. “Too many surprises in one day,” he said, and dropped into the armchair. “I’ve come from the valide.”
There was a silence. Marta spoke from the doorway.
“The little girl was just eating her dinner,” she said.
Fevzi Ahmet let her down. “Finish your dinner.”
When she had gone, Fevzi turned to the window. “Long ago,” he said, addressing his own reflection in the glass, “I lost someone very precious to me. Never again.” He glanced around. “My daughter comes to Egypt. With me.”
Yashim considered him. His enemy. His mentor.
“My men are waiting.”
They went downstairs, Yashim holding the candles. In the hall Marta came through with Roxelana, who climbed sleepily into Fevzi Ahmet’s arms, and wound her own around his neck.
Fevzi Ahmet stroked her hair. Over the top of her head he said, “We had a deal, Yashim. Or have you forgotten?”
Yashim shook his head.
“Then you are afraid?”
“Yes. I am afraid.”
Fevzi Ahmet bent and peered into Yashim’s face. “Why do you think I chose you, all those years ago? Why?”
“Because I spoke Greek and-other languages,” Yashim answered. He looked into Fevzi Ahmet’s face, watched the shadows flicker across his scars. “Because I can be invisible.”
Fevzi Ahmet gave a dry laugh. “It takes some courage, Yashim efendi. I think you have some. That’s why I chose you.”
Yashim said nothing, but for a moment the candles dipped in his hand.
Fevzi’s voice was a whisper. “Shamyl.”
Yashim stood woodenly at the door.
“Shamyl? That’s not possible.”
“The Lion of the Caucasus,” Fevzi said. “The great hero.”
Yashim blinked. Almost single-handedly, Shamyl had fought the Russians to a standstill in the mountains of Georgia. He was a figure of myth, pure and beyond reproach.
It made no sense.
“Ask Shamyl.” Fevzi laughed. “A promise is a promise.”
He wrenched at the door and flung it back. The candles guttered in the sudden draft, and Yashim heard his boots on the stone steps. He heard him cross the graveled courtyard. He heard the sound of men assembling on the road outside. He saw a lantern, and its feeble light swinging in the air; and then the light and the pasha were gone.
The candelabra was still in his raised hand.
He lowered his hand, closed the door, and made his way back, slowly, treading carefully up the dark stairs.
150
Palewski stood in front of the fire, rubbing his hands together.
“The trouble with the pasha, Yashim, is that he has no manners. I rather noticed it the first time he visited us.”
“Manners?”
“A word of thanks, I’d have thought. Well, well.” He put two glasses on the mantelpiece and poured the brandy. “The little girl goes back to her father, in Egypt. Tulin gets her just deserts, thanks to the valide. The English have begun negotiations to return the fleet to Istanbul, too. It’s only a beginning, but I rather think the Ottoman Empire has found the outside help it needed.”
Yashim nodded.
“And Mickiewicz wrote from Paris, to approve the first few pages of my translation.”
“I’m very pleased,” Yashim said.
“You don’t seem awfully pleased.” Palewski set the brandy on the sideboard. “Go on, what is it?”
Yashim sighed. “The only people who could have known about Fevzi Ahmet’s daughter were Hyacinth, who took her into the harem, and Tulin, who recognized her there. Galytsin had set up an elaborate method for receiving Tulin’s reports-but apparently she never filed one. She broke off communications with him at the very moment she discovered that Roxelana was still alive. So how did the Russians know?” Yashim glanced up at his friend. “Or more precisely, who told Galytsin’s agent about Roxelana?”
Palewski frowned. “Don’t tell me you think it was Hyacinth?”
“A quiet old man who scarcely left the harem in his life? Hyacinth was loyal.”
“Impasse, Yashim.” Palewski sighed.
But Yashim shook his head. “Unless Tulin did file her report. Not to Galytsin, but to someone else.”
“Who?”
Yashim patted his fingertips together, concentrating. He remembered Tulin playing her flute as he descended the stairs, and how the music had nagged at him. Not only because it seemed so dismissive-there had been something else, some idea at the back of his mind that had failed to emerge.
“When I asked Galytsin why Pervyal had been so cheap, he said that was a question Fevzi Ahmet should have asked.”
“What does that mean?”
“At the time, he meant to say that Pervyal was a witch. The dealers couldn’t wait to get rid of her. But there’s another explanation. We know that the Russians fixed it up so that Tulin could enter the sultan’s harem. What if it wasn’t the first time? What if her entry into Fevzi Ahmet’s household was a setup, too?”
