“What do you see?” asked Kosmas.
“Never mind,” said Fanis. “Let’s hit a few stores.”
It was raining again when they stepped out into the crowds of evening shoppers. Fanis took Kosmas’s arm so that they could speak confidentially and nearly poked Kosmas in the eyes with the spokes of his plaid umbrella. They passed the Pearl, that old, wainscoted pastry shop where people lined up for a dish of profiteroles and fought for a seat at tiny marble-topped tables, if one was free, or ate standing up if there was no sitting room, so great was their addiction to the pâtisserie’s chocolate-drenched specialty.
“The newcomers have no idea that the Pearl was Rum,” said Fanis, stopping short. “They don’t know that almost every shop on this street was Rum. After the pogrom, when the cloth from all these shops was shredded into strips and the stinking shoes of the criminals were left in the streets to fuse with dried fruits, cheeses, and smashed refrigerator parts, I passed by here and recognized the Pearl’s pastries in the mess. That was where I used to take my sweetheart.” Fanis took a deep breath, blinked away the tears that were stinging his eyes, and resumed walking. “Haven’t you ever looked for a girl in Athens?”
“I can’t get used to the people over there,” said Kosmas, looking at his watch again.
Fanis sighed. “Foreigners here in our own place, foreigners there twice over. That’s our lot.” He pointed to a black shirt worn by a mannequin in the display window of a trendy shop. “Tomorrow you must come here by yourself and get some casual shirts for afternoon tea. Black, not striped, and Armani. I couldn’t pull off Armani, but you can. And start going to a gym. Girls don’t like tummies nowadays.” Fanis quickened his pace. “Suits, however, are another matter. One must never buy a suit off the peg. Tailor-made is the only way to go, for a true gentleman, that is.”
They turned into a dim side street and entered a shop marked with an overhanging sign: “Hüsnü Mirza’s Custom-made Suits and Shirts.” Bald Hüsnü set down the monstrous scissors with which he had been cutting a bolt of poplin. His thick gold wedding band flashed as he took a pen from his shirt pocket and said in Turkish, “Hoş geldiniz, Fanis bey.” Welcome, Mr. Fanis.
Fanis shifted gears into the language of the outside world: “Well we find you.”
Hüsnü picked up the phone, ordered three teas from the local concession, and sat down with his clients on wooden stools at the center of the shop. Above the counter, next to the de rigueur image of Atatürk, were two midcentury photographs of a fair woman with a bouffant hairdo and an older man with thick glasses.
“Your parents?” asked Kosmas.
“Oh, no,” said Hüsnü, “the original owner and his daughter. Both Greek citizens. I began working here when I was twelve and took over when they were deported. Pera was beautiful back then, wasn’t it, Mr. Fanis? Now it’s filled with outsiders and peasants. You can’t even walk in Tarlabaşı without fear of being mugged.”
The tea runner stepped into the shop and distributed full glasses with red and white thumbprint saucers.
“You haven’t been in for some time, Mr. Fanis,” said Hüsnü.
“I haven’t had reason to. What’s the use of a new shirt with no one to wear it for?”
Hüsnü peered over his wire-rimmed glasses. “I’ve missed you. You’re my inspiration.”
“I beg your pardon?”
“You used to eat in that cheap Circassian restaurant across the way with some very nice-looking ladies.”
“What kind did you expect to see me with? Ugly ones? And those young ladies weren’t dates. They were just friends.”
“Of course, brother. I assumed so. Now, tell me, what can I do for you today?”
“We need a suit for the boy, but we don’t want one of those shiny gray things with the stitching showing that all the young men without taste are wearing nowadays. We want something elegant. Not exactly the kind that I would wear, but along those lines. And he’ll also need two shirts.”
“Let’s measure him,” said Hüsnü, pulling the tape from his neck.
A minute later Kosmas was standing like an awkward giant with his arms raised while Hüsnü measured his hips, waist, chest, legs, shoulders, and arms. The tailor wrote down the measurements, removed his bifocals, and said, “I assume it will be a drape cut?”
“Of course,” said Fanis. “Double-breasted.”
“I’d prefer single,” said Kosmas. “Double seems too 1980s.”
Fanis glared at him. He himself had never worn a double-breasted suit. It was for exactly that reason that he had suggested the style for Kosmas: he wanted the boy to look good, but not too good. “But you’re tall,” he said. “Double is better for a tall man.”
“With all due respect,” said Hüsnü, “I have to agree with our young friend. I’ve always considered single classier. And it works very well for tall men if it has two buttons instead of three. What do you think about the color?”
“Navy,” said Fanis. “But with some detail.”
“What about brown?” said Kosmas.
The tailor replaced his bifocals and pulled a bolt of all-brown plaid from one of the upper shelves. “I have just the thing.”
Fanis ran the edge between his fingers. “Very fine,” he said. “But I don’t know if it’s right for him.”
Hüsnü draped the ends of two fabric bolts over Kosmas’s shoulders and turned him toward the mirror. “The subtle blue plaid of this beaver brown will add width while playing down your height. The
