the breeze. At the landing, men in cloth caps drinking tea looked up at her, foreign women a rarer sight on this side. There were more headscarves, even veils, overcoats almost touching the ground, noisy motorbikes weaving around idling buses, the air heavy with diesel. A taxi took them out of the square, past the food market, and up the long hill.
“Where are we going?”
“The Cinili Camii, the Tiled Mosque. You’ll like it.”
“Can women go in?”
“Mm. Just cover your head. A woman built it. One of the great
The gate to the courtyard was open, but the mosque itself was closed, so Leon went to the teahouse next door to find the caretaker. A small mosque, with a small adjacent
“What’s he saying?”
“Your hair is the color of the red in the
Kay laughed. “That’s a compliment, right?”
“From him? They were the most beautiful tiles ever made. Nobody knows how to duplicate the colors now. Leave your shoes out here.”
The imam was fumbling with the key.
“It’s freezing.”
“There’s a carpet.”
Almost the entire floor, in fact, was covered with intricately designed carpets, but the eye scarcely took them in, drawn instead to the walls covered in turquoise and blue tiles, not one color but a series of shades, like a musical exercise in blue. In the
“It’s like being inside a jewel,” Kay said, staring, shivering a little, the room cold despite the carpets.
“It’s the size, partly. In the big mosques all you see is how big they are. Here you really see the tiles.”
Kay stepped forward. “It’s allowed?”
The imam bowed, extending his hand.
“Don’t worry. I told him I’d like to make a donation. You can go up to the gallery too, it’s okay.”
Twisting narrow stairs, then a railed balcony barely wide enough to hold a single line, but the whole room visible now, vines and flowers and abstracted patterns, repeating themselves, flowing into each other, blue into blue. She smiled at the room, then at him. Downstairs the imam stood in a corner, pleased, as if someone had praised his children.
Afterward they sat on a wall under the courtyard tree in a small patch of winter sunlight.
“It’s beautiful,” she said.
“And no one ever comes here. That’s what you wanted, wasn’t it?”
“You do, though.”
“Once in a while. When the weather’s nice. Just to sit.”
“Alone? I mean, you don’t bring-”
“Anna? Not anymore.”
She looked away, toward the fountain. “So what do you think about, when you sit here?”
“Nothing. That’s the whole idea. The patterns, on the tiles, you’re supposed to get lost in them, let your mind drift. Not think.”
“You? I thought there was always something going on in there.”
He smiled. “Not when I’m here.”
She was quiet for a while, scanning the courtyard. The imam appeared again on his way back to the teahouse, dipping his head to them as he passed.
“But it can never be yours,” she said.
He turned to her.
“I mean, you probably know more about it than he does,” she said, a nod toward the imam. “Who built it. Where everything comes from. All that. But it’s not yours.”
“What difference does that-?”
“Oh, I know. It’s wonderful.” She waved her hand to the mosque. “But what about the rest? When do I take off my shoes? Cover my head? The looks people give you. It’s not a real life here. I mean it is for them, but we’re-just visiting.” She paused. “I am, anyway.”
“Give it some time. It takes a while.”
“What?”
“To live here.”
“But now that the war’s over, you could-”
“Go home?” he said, looking around. “I can take care of her here. The clinic. I don’t know if I could do that there. So I live here. It is home.”
“Sorry, I didn’t mean-”
“I know. You just want to know more about me. See if I’m the guy in the hotel. The one your mother warned you about.”
She looked up, her eyes meeting his. “You are,” she said. “You must be. When you said that I wanted to be there.”
He felt the blood flow to his groin, as if she had touched him there.
“I should be ashamed, shouldn’t I? For thinking that.”
“Yes,” he said, pulling her to her feet.
They caught the ferry back to Eminonu and wandered through the spice market like tourists, looking at the tall cones of ground spices and piles of dates. At a nougat stall he thought he saw Surmeli, the landlord, tunic stretched tight across his back, so broad he blocked the aisle. Who gossiped to Georg, maybe to everyone. But then the man turned, eating candied pistachios, just another fat man, and Leon realized he’d been staring and looked away. They went out the side exit, past the bird market, cages noisy with song and fluttering.
“Look at the wicker ones,” Kay said. “So elaborate. I’ll bet they hate them anyway.”
“We had a parakeet when I was a kid. We’d let it out and it would come right back.”
“It didn’t-?” she started, looking at him, then cocked her head, smiling.
“What?”
“You as a boy. I’m trying to picture it.”
“It was a while ago. Do you want to go up to the Grand Bazaar? You can’t come to Istanbul and not-”
“Let’s go back.”
“To the hotel?”
She put her hand on his neck and his skin jumped, the talk irrelevant. The day no longer lazy, stretching out ahead of them, suddenly running out of time.
“We could stay in,” she said. “Get room service.”
On Frank’s bill, the Pera Palas waiters winking at each other. Over her shoulder, the fat man was coming out of the market.
“I have a better idea,” he said.
They took the tram up the hill and out to Laleli, not circling back from the stop as he usually did but heading straight for the flat, his arm around her shoulders. So fat Surmeli could see them, watching at his usual window drinking apple tea, his suspicions finally confirmed, Leon with a woman, the reason he’d taken the flat. But there was no movement as they passed his building, no curtain twitching, maybe out collecting rents.
They were luckier at the flat itself. Two men carrying books came down the hall as Leon put the key in Alexei’s door. Nods and muttered greetings, curious. A foreigner and a woman, something they’d remember. Not Alexei, quiet as a mouse.
