“What is this place?” she said inside. “Is this where you bring your women?”
“It belongs to a friend. He asked me to keep an eye on it while he’s away.” Lies now to her, but harmless.
“
“Never mind.”
“Somebody really lives here?” she said, looking around the almost empty room, not even the duffel bag to suggest a presence anymore, just the lingering smell of tobacco. Had anyone heard Alexei coughing?
“It’s more a pied-a-terre. For when he’s at the university.” The story growing. He touched her arm.
“It’s not like a hotel, is it?” she said, mischievous, surprised at herself. “Somebody else’s sheets.” She looked at the bed. “Is there a woman who comes? To change them? I mean, what would your friend think?”
“I don’t know,” he said, pulling her to him. “Let’s do it on top.”
Afterward, adding more smoke to the stale air, they watched the light turn gray at the window.
“Now what?” she said, leaning over to stub out her cigarette, then noticed his face. “I don’t mean it that way. I promised I wouldn’t say that.” She looked away. “I meant, really, now what. We can’t stay here.”
“Now we get dressed,” he said, but pulling her down to him, her face resting against his chest. “And you go back to the hotel. After all the sightseeing. And tell the clerk how much you like Istanbul. Then have dinner in the dining room. So they’ll all notice. Alone. Bring a book.”
“And after?”
“I come and spend the night.”
“And then what?”
“I don’t know,” he said quietly.
She got up and went over to the chair, picking up her blouse. “And what if I meet somebody I know in the dining room?”
“Good. More witnesses.”
“For my alibi.” She looked over at him. “Who thinks of these things? Bring a book. Do you see so many women like this?”
“No.”
“You could. You’d be good at it. The stories. This place.” She looked around. “So convenient to have a friend away.”
“He’s never come in handy before.”
“Stop asking, you mean. So maybe that’s a story too.”
He got up from the bed, holding her by the shoulders. “I’ve never brought a woman here.”
She looked away, then started stepping into her skirt. “What book? For my dinner.”
“How about a guide to Istanbul. Read about what you’ve seen.”
She nodded. “Every detail. And what will you be doing?”
“Working. So people won’t think I’m out chasing somebody’s wife.”
“You didn’t have to chase very hard,” she said, pulling at the side zipper, then smoothing out the skirt. “Anyway, it’s so important what people think?”
“It is for you.”
She looked at him, half amused. “I never thought before. How useful it would be, secret work, for this. Knowing how to hide, make stories. Someone in that work, it’d be easy for him.”
Leon picked up his pants, beginning to dress. “Why don’t you stay longer?”
“I can’t. Besides, you’re going away. On a trip you don’t talk about. So maybe it’s better this way. What we always said. Just walk away. Oh, god,” she said suddenly, sitting down on the bed, head bent. “Now what?”
He sat down next to her. “Stay.”
She said nothing for a minute, looking down, then raised her head. “No, it’s what we said.” She turned to him. “Just come and stay the night.”
In the street, he took the direct way again to the tram, one last chance to be noticed. This time Surmeli must have been waiting at his window-stepping suddenly into the street,
“Who was that?”
“Someone Georg knew at the university.” Not quite right, bending the truth again, using her for cover.
“Does he know? About the heart attack?”
“That was all the Turkish. Life being so short.”
She looked at him, not saying anything.
At Sirkeci they took separate taxis.
“See you,” she said, door open, putting a hand on his arm. “What did I like best? For the desk clerk.”
“Topkapi. The jewels.”
She nodded, then held his arm tighter. “I eat an early dinner.”
He grinned. “Don’t get picked up in the bar.”
In the taxi he went through the checklist in his head. Clothes, the papers from Manyas first thing tomorrow, then the car in Uskudar. Safer to split up. Alexei could take the Haydarpasa ferry, just a few streets away from the funicular, impossible to miss even if you didn’t know the city. Avoid Haydarpasa itself, the station full of eyes, and follow the quay on the right instead, toward Kadikoy, an easy pickup at the end, both of them on the Asian side without having crossed together, already on the road south. Even safer if they could leave tonight, in the dark, but there were the papers. And Kay. What did I like best? For the desk clerk. Get Alexei out first-keep things separate. But he realized the excitement of one had spilled over into the other, part of the same thing now, getting away with both, juggling balls faster in the air.
At the office, Turhan was getting ready to leave. The monthly figures were done. Mrs. King had called again. A farewell party, time and place. Dorothy at the consulate wanting to know if he was expected back today. Frank Bishop.
“What did he want?”
“He just said he’d try again.”
Checking in. Maybe checking up. But why would he? Someone Leon should feel awkward about and yet didn’t. He could feel her hand on his arm again, the promise of later, not the little qualms that hid away in corners. Frank unaware at his desk in Ankara. Something else to think about later. I eat an early dinner.
By the time he left it was dark, Taksim bright with neon, Istanbul’s Piccadilly. He glanced at the signs while he waited for the Istiklal tram. Persil soap. Pamuk, the Coke substitute. If he was early he could always have a drink at the bar, run into somebody from the consulate, say he was on his way home. Colgate. A cinema with running lights. The big branch of Denizbank.
On the tram, he stood near the back, seeing his reflection in the glass. Not smiling exactly, but his lips half curled up, expectant. Going somewhere. He thought of that first rainy night in Bebek, seeing himself in the mirror at home. Now feeling like this. Lighted storefronts, barely noticed. They were near the Flower Passage now, past the big sweets store with its blocks of lokum in the window, then a bookstore, an Akbank branch. He felt a nagging, as if he’d forgotten something, or seen something out of place. Akbank. A.K. Denizbank. He gripped the rail tighter, trying to remember. Maybe that was it, not a code.
He leaped off at the next stop and threaded his way down to Mesturiyet. Lights were still on at the consulate, telephone night staff, cleaning ladies slowly making their way through the building. The snappy Marine day guard had been replaced at night by a local watchman, who asked to see Leon’s ID.
“People working late?” Leon said in Turkish while the guard examined the pass.
“Always,” he said, surprised at the Turkish. “Americans, they like to work.” He shrugged.
“It’s the time difference. Their bosses are still-” Leon began, then gave it up as too complicated to explain. “I won’t be long.”
He didn’t wait for the elevator, racing up the stairs instead. A woman was emptying wastebaskets in the hall.
“Mister,” she said, bowing, surprised at someone on the stairs.
Leon nodded back, wondering if she sifted through the baskets, one of Altan’s eyes. Behind her several transoms still had lights coming through.
