Baksheesh (4 page)

I thought I was going to break down in tears at the front door.

That was another surprise.

Such is life.

 

I didn't manage to see my very own future apartment, because I couldn't get anyone to open the door, but I did see an apartment on the floor below when I went back to the building ten minutes later. I blurted out some silly words in convincing tones to the man who opened the door, saying that I'd heard there was an apartment for sale around there and did he know of one in that building.

He had Mongolian-type features, probably a Tatar, and he was clearly less amused by my patter than I was.

“You're too late, madam. This one was sold a month ago,” he replied with a serious expression on his face.

“You're joking,” I said.

“Why should I joke about it, madam? It was for sale and a buyer turned up with thirty-two thousand dollars. The new owners have given us three months to get out. I don't know what they intend to do with it. Live in it, I think. This area has become much sought after recently. But you know that, of course, because you want to buy something here too.”

“OK,” I said, “but could I have a quick look inside? Just to get an idea of prices.”

The man opened the door wide, but before I was even inside he remarked that he thought he knew me from somewhere.

“Yes, we're more or less neighbours. I have the bookstore on Lokum Street,” I said.

“Which is Lokum Street?” asked the man. Turks are like that – they don't even know the name of a street two feet away. That's why streets get defined by some building on the corner – say a mosque, pharmacy, supermarket, school or hospital.

“It's the street that goes down to the Austrian High School,” I said.

“Oh,” he said. “Is there a bookstore there? I've never noticed. That's strange because I like reading. But I don't really have the time, what with work and so on. You know how it is.”

The building spread along the street like a top-quality limousine gliding round a sharp corner. All the windows at the back looked out over the Bosphorus, which, you will appreciate, was a very rare feature. The views from the first floor were magnificent. The Bosphorus was even visible from the toilet window. On the hill behind, you could see Topkapı Palace on Sarayburnu. If you leant your head to the right, you could see the golden building of Sirkeci station where the Orient Express once terminated, the minarets that had turned the Byzantine Hagia Sophia into a mosque, a car ferry waiting by the shore, a passenger ferry trying to get alongside the jetty at Karaköy, a sombre-looking tanker, and tiny fishing boats that looked like mere specks on the water. In the distance to the left was the Bosphorus Bridge with its constant stream of cars. Oh, the wonders of Istanbul!

The views from the apartment still to be sold would be even more magnificent. After all, it was higher up, on the second floor. The apartments were 220 square metres. I hadn't written that down incorrectly. Exactly 220 square metres, with six rooms plus a living room. No bathroom of course. The building was at least 150 years old. With high ceilings! Yes, it was in a state of decay, but that was the least of my worries just then.

I called Kasım Bey the moment I got back to the shop. He said he'd heard nothing about the apartment being sold, but he'd go and see the charity's lawyer to find out more and would call me back as soon as possible.

“I couldn't get anyone to open the door, so I didn't see inside the apartment you meant. Can you do something about that?” I asked.

“Be patient, miss. Don't be in such a rush. All things come to those who wait,” he said.

But I am not the waiting type. Never have been. I wanted to see my new home that day, or the next day at the very latest. I just couldn't wait to see inside the apartment and plan how I would arrange my furniture, what colour I'd paint the walls, which room I'd convert into a bathroom…

Over the previous two years, I'd had plenty of time to realize that it wasn't much good just sitting around, praying for Turks to dig into their pockets and invest their last cents in a book.

I rushed out of the shop.

 

If only I hadn't. If only I hadn't had that horrible row with Selim and become so embroiled in house-buying as a means of getting over it. If only I'd been calm and patient and waited for Kasım Bey to call.

But that wasn't what happened.

Not at all.

There was no warning of impending disaster.

It came completely out of the blue.

 

First, I walked all around the building. God, how majestic it was! It had a beauty that made you quiver inside. Then, taking care not to arouse suspicion, I paced in front of it trying to work out its measurements. It had to be over thirty-nine metres. Unbelievable.

I went inside and up the marble staircase to view my future home. The front door was still closed. Of course, there was no reason why it should be wide open if nobody lived there. However, as someone who had lived in various squats during her days as a student in Berlin, I felt I had a certain amount of experience in these matters, and you didn't need to be an astrologer to work out that there were squatters in there. Probably a family with seven or eight children. I knocked on the door again, this time more decisively.

I put my ear to the door, expecting to hear the shuffling steps of an exhausted mother of seven or eight children. After a pause, I knocked again, at the same time looking around for a bell. If only I'd asked the man downstairs to tell me who was living in this apartment. I tried again, this time hammering with both fists.

“Hold on!” shouted someone inside. “Keep your hair on.”

The door suddenly flew open.

I found myself face to face with a man. I didn't know what to say. Should I say why I'd knocked on the door? The man had no idea what to say either. First of all, he looked me up and down from top to toe. Then he leant forward, trying to see down the neckline of my green shirt. He had a bulbous nose and skin so dark it was almost aubergine colour. There was actually something rather charming about him. Either that or I was still seething from my recent quarrel with Selim.

“Hello,” I said. “I've been told there's an apartment for sale here. Is it this one?”

“No. It's not,” he said, moving to shut the door.

“Is this apartment yours?”

“Yes, it is.” But he was clearly lying.

I leant on the door with my hand to stop him from closing it.

“May I see inside?”

He waved his hand in the air as if to indicate that I was mad.

“I just told you – it's not for sale. So what's the point of looking at it?”

If I were the sort to be scared off by bullies, I'd have been sitting at home doing embroidery, or making lace edgings to put on hand towels.

A man's voice called out from inside, “Osman! I can't wait any longer.”

“I'm coming,” replied Osman in a polite tone of voice. Or as polite as a thug's voice can be. He pushed the door towards my face.

I don't do bodybuilding and I'd never claim to be capable of cracking a dozen slabs of marble with one hand. In other words, there was no way I could prevent him from closing the door. My only option was to put one foot inside and squeeze my body into the space between the door and the door frame, which is what I did.

“What are you doing?” he said, without a trace of the politeness I'd just heard in his voice. “What do you want?”

He was getting annoyed. I was too. In any case, I'd been looking for someone, anyone, I could have a fight with that would put them behind bars.

“Hold on, don't I know you?”

I said nothing. I was busy thinking about what to do next. I was, of course, well aware that I was behaving like a lunatic.

“I want to see this apartment,” I said, my voice as edgy as my nerves.

“Why are you being such a bloody nuisance, woman?”

He got hold of my arm and tried to push me out of the way.

The man inside had still not even bothered to look out to see what was going on.

“I just want to see inside this apartment,” I repeated.

“And I told you it's not for sale,” he said, tapping his ear with his forefinger. “Are you deaf?”

“No, I'm not,” I said. “How would an idiot like you know if it's for sale or not?”

“What did you say?”

“I said idiot! Bloody idiot.”

The idiot went for my throat and started squeezing it. It wasn't really that bad. I mean, he wasn't squeezing hard enough to kill me. Still, the moment he let go, I started to yell. I was still in the gap between the door and the door frame and I was screaming blue murder.

“Police! Police! Help!!”

We must have looked quite ridiculous. The man now had his hands over his ears and was shouting, “Shut up! For God's sake, shut up!”

Despite all the noise and hullabaloo, the man inside had still not looked out which, even as I was screaming my head off, I found strange.

It seemed even stranger when I thought about it afterwards.

 

The Tatar from the floor below came to my help. Some Romanian labourers working on the top floor also came rushing down, but it was the Tatar who saved me. He invited me in and sent out for some tea.

I was halfway through a cigarette by the time he asked, “What happened, madam?”

“I wanted to see inside the apartment. But the man turned nasty for no reason.”

“Why? You looked at this one a short while ago. The others have exactly the same layout. So why? Why did you…”

“The apartment upstairs is about to come on the market. Apparently there's no owner. It used to belong to one of the Jewish families who lived in Kuledibi. Property that has no owner is turned over to the Treasury and gets sold off after a certain period of time.”

“Oh, my dear lady,” he said, laughing. “Do you think those men are going to let you have it? Do you have any idea who they are? They're not like us. Trust you to pick that one!”

“What do you mean by ‘they're not like us'?”

He took hold of his trouser legs and pulled them up carefully before sitting down on the chair opposite me.

“Everyone knows that. You know the car park next to the grocer's, don't you? How many years have you been in Kuledibi?”

“A little over four years.”

“Ah well, in that case, you wouldn't know about the building that was demolished on that plot. Must be six years ago. Would you like more tea? I'll send out for it right away. You've just been through an ordeal and it'll do you good. Excuse me a moment, I'll order the tea and be right back.”

So, it seemed that I'd encountered a true Istanbul Tatar gentleman in this odd place.

When he returned, he again carefully pulled up his trouser legs to maintain their crease before sitting down.

“Well now, what was I saying?”

“The car park,” I said.

“Ah yes.” He pursed his lips and shook his head slightly.

“Until six years ago, there was a historic building where that car park is now. I don't know if it had an owner, but, even if it did, it would have made no difference. Those men weren't the
sort to worry about a mere landlord. You should be grateful that you got off so lightly. You must have heard what happened in Ortaköy? They burned down a huge school. It wasn't the same lot of course, but these men are in the same business. They burn down buildings to make car parks. You must have heard how they burned down a school because the headmaster wouldn't let them use the playground for a car park.”

“I didn't know,” I said. “I don't read the newspapers.”

He nodded knowingly and made no further comment. He ran his forefinger over the table next to him and looked long and hard at it, checking to see if there was any dust, then rubbed his finger and thumb together.

“Excuse me, but may I ask you a question?” he asked, looking a little embarrassed, with his head on one side.

Oh no, I thought, what is he going to ask that makes him feel so uncomfortable?

“Of course.”

“You have a slight accent and it aroused my curiosity. Are you an immigrant?”

I relaxed.

“Yes.”

“From the Balkans, perhaps? I hope you don't mind my asking.”

“From Germany.”

“Oh, are you a daughter of one of those worker families? If you are, you don't count as an immigrant.” Was he disappointed?

“My parents are German, not Turkish.”

“But my dear lady, what are you saying?” He opened up his hands effusively. For a moment, I thought he was going to embrace me, but he didn't venture that far. “You mean your mother tongue is German? And yet you speak such excellent Turkish. You even speak it better than some Turks. And when you… Of course, there's something a bit foreign about your looks. But, as you know, there are so many different types of Turk.”

Very appropriate for this man in particular to be making this comment, I thought.

“You're right,” I said, just wanting to put a stop to all this. “I must get back to my shop. Do drop in if you ever have the time.”

“You can't go yet. I've just ordered tea. It'll be here any moment. Sit down, I can't let you go like this. You're still in shock from what you've been through.”

I don't like to think how many teas I might have been forced to drink if Pelin hadn't called me on my mobile.

Even before I woke up, I knew it was going to be a bad day. In that semi-conscious state between sleeping and waking, I found the idea of having no man in my life again unbearable. I started to cry in my sleep. But it wasn't a dream. It was real.