Harem (28 page)

‘Well, give me the money then!’ the girl said and snapped her pudgy fingers at the elderly man sitting in front of her.

‘Only if you go with Abdullah,’ Ali Müren replied sternly.

‘Oh!’ His daughter stamped her wedge-heeled foot hard against the floor.

‘I’m sick of having to pay off clothes shops you have stolen from when you’ve spent all my cash, Alev,’ her father retorted. ‘When it’s gone Abdullah can bring you home.’

‘But he’s such a freak! I can’t take Abdullah to Akmerkez or Galeria!’

‘Then go somewhere else!’ Ali Müren stood up. He wasn’t a tall man but he was considerably larger than his daughter. He looked down at her with a mixture of frustration, fury and adoration in his eyes. ‘Go to İstiklal Caddesi.’

‘That’s old and boring!’ Alev pouted.

‘Go there anyway.’ He handed her two enormous rolls of banknotes. ‘One is for yourself, take the other to Türbedar Sokak.’

‘Oh, I don’t have to see Grandma, do I?’

Ali sighed with exasperation. ‘Yes you do, we owe her,’ he said and then turned to the middle-aged man who sat silently in the corner of the room. ‘Take my daughter to Türbedar Sokak and then on to İstiklal Caddesi, Abdullah, and make sure she doesn’t steal anything.’

‘Yes, Ali Bey,’ Abdullah gummed through broken, nicotine-stained teeth.

Alev tossed her coiffured head and made her way petulantly towards the door. As she moved, the rolls of fat on her back wobbled with each heavy footstep. Abdullah rose from his chair and followed her.

When they had gone, Ali Müren opened the door out onto his considerable balcony and smiled at the tall blond man who was standing looking down into the teeming street below.

‘My daughter. My youngest,’ he said, joining the other man at the rail. ‘She’s expensive, but . . .’

‘You love her,’ the other responded in his deep heavily accented voice. ‘You’ll be able to give her everything she wants soon.’ He smiled.

‘Inşallah!’

They both watched as Alev and the tried and trusted Abdullah got into a large Japanese car and drove off just ahead of a very sorry looking Mercedes. Both cars and a horse cart made slow progress through the heavy multinational Beyazıt crowds.

‘Come on,’ Ali said as soon as he was sure that his daughter was well on her way. ‘Let’s eat lunch and talk business.’

The other man’s pale blue eyes sparkled appreciatively.

Zelfa was full of tears now. Whatever arcane psychiatric narcotic Sadrı had given her to calm her down had now worn off and she was full of remorse. How could she have been so cold towards their son, the most precious child in the whole world? How could she have attacked Mehmet with such ferocity? He had just been sleeping, alone, in their bed, after all. What on earth had possessed her?

‘Post-natal depression can be a terrible thing,’ her father said as he rocked her gently back and forth to comfort her. ‘You know that.’

‘Yes, I have patients . . .’

‘Ah, but it’s not the same as experiencing it yourself, is it?’ Babur Halman said gently.

‘No.’ She looked up into his eyes, her face pale with tension. ‘Mehmet will forgive me, won’t he, Dad?’

‘As long as you don’t slap him again, yes,’ he said with a smile.

‘I lost touch with reality, didn’t I?’

‘For a while. It happens. And you’re not going to get over this in five minutes, Zelfa. Sadrı will still have to monitor your condition for a time. But hopefully the worst has passed now. Babur moved from behind his daughter and stood up. ‘You had to have surgery, it was very traumatic, the experience temporarily heightened your insecurities.’

‘Yes, but I should have known!’

‘Because you’re a psychiatrist?’ Babur smiled. ‘Zelfa dear, do you remember that story I once read to you from the
Irish Times
about Dr McConnell?’

She looked at him blankly.

‘He bricked himself into his own office so that he could have a little peace and quiet,’ Babur said. ‘He was an eminent Belfast psychiatrist.’ He smiled again. ‘Now try and get a little more sleep. I’ll send Mehmet up later once his father has gone.’

Zelfa lay back down against her pillows and closed her eyes. ‘Thanks, Dad.’

‘You’re welcome, darling girl,’ he replied in slightly Irish-accented English.

Babur closed the door behind him and went downstairs to where Süleyman and his father were sitting silently in the living room. Strangely, Muhammed Süleyman had come to visit them without his forceful wife. Babur knew that Mehmet had told his parents nothing about Zelfa’s troubles, and had discouraged them from visiting her whenever he could, which must have seemed odd to them. Turkish grandparents, generally, have absolutely free rein with their children and their infants. Perhaps Muhammed had just dropped by to try and work out what was happening for himself – and of course for his wife.

As he entered the room, Babur gave Mehmet, who had been staring at the front of his father’s upheld newspaper, an encouraging look.

‘She’s fine,’ he said quietly. ‘But sleeping. See her later.’

Mehmet, whose face had become rather thinner and more strained since the birth of his son, smiled.

‘You know I’ve looked all through this paper and I cannot find any information about the kidnapping of Hikmet Sivas’s wife,’ a deep, cultured voice from behind the newspaper,
Cumhuriyet
, boomed. ‘It’s almost as if the entire event has disappeared.’

So what İkmen had told him about a press embargo was true. Mehmet Süleyman raised a wry eyebrow.

‘I expect more important stories have superseded it, Father,’ he said. ‘These things happen.’

Muhammed Süleyman let the paper drop down onto his lap. Although elderly and quite grey, he was still, like his son, a very handsome man.

‘You weren’t working on the case, were you?’ he asked.

‘No, Father. I’ve been rather busy with other things.’

Babur Halman left to go and make tea. Mehmet and his father had an odd, frosty relationship that he didn’t really understand and so leaving was probably rather a good idea at this point.

‘Mmm.’ Muhammed Süleyman fitted a cigarette into the end of his silver holder and placed it in his mouth. Mehmet, as he knew he must, walked over to light it for him. ‘I saw Hikmet Sivas, the Sultan, once. Must have been in the late fifties.’

‘Did you, Father? Where?’

‘My uncle, Selim, had been allowed home after many years in exile. Malta, I believe.’ He smiled. ‘He’d been raised in Yıldız Palace. He showed me around. Extraordinary place if you saw all of it as I did – not that you can these days. Like a template or plan of the mind of his uncle, the Sultan who designed the thing. He was a very disturbed man, the Sultan Abdul Hamid – your wife would have found it fascinating.’ He raised his newspaper again.

‘Yes, Father. And Hikmet Sivas?’

‘Oh, yes.’ He put the paper down again. ‘They were filming there, some historical epic. A Yeşilcam film. Sivas wasn’t of course famous then, but I recognised him later from a Hollywood movie. Oddly, he was dressed as a Janissary which was absurd given that Mahmud II destroyed the Janissaries before Abdul Hamid was even born. He, Sivas, was standing in front of the Sale Pavilion, the one that looks like a Swiss chalet. It was an incongruous moment which is why I suppose it has stayed with me.’

Mehmet smiled. ‘Indeed.’

‘Yes.’ And Muhammed disappeared behind his newspaper once again.

In common with so many of his aristocratic forebears, Mehmet’s father was becoming more eccentric by the year. But unlike some of his more famous and powerful ancestors, many of them sultans, Muhammed’s peccadilloes were neither lethal nor deranged. Weak, profligate and uneasy with strong emotion, he had come to Mehmet’s home not only at the behest of his nagging wife but also because he was worried about Zelfa. Unlike Nur, he liked the little Irish woman and he loved his grandson, Yusuf İzzeddin. Not that he, a man, would have asked to see the baby himself. But when Mehmet did eventually suggest that they have a quick look at the sleeping child, Muhammed Süleyman leapt from his chair with alacrity.

İkmen looked more like a wraith than a person as he pulled a terrified Hikmet Yıldız into Saka Selim Sokak opposite the Church of St Anthony of Padua.

‘What are you doing on İstiklal Caddesi?’ the older man asked, his voice low and sibilant as if he were trying not to be overheard. ‘Why aren’t you in Kandıllı?’

‘I was told to report back to the station.’

‘That doesn’t explain why you’re here.’

‘I came on the bus, sir,’ he said. ‘Commissioner Ardıç told lots of us to go – Inspector İskender, Sergeant Çöktin, the technical man. All the cars were full and so I had to come on the bus. I got off at Taksim. I’m going to walk down through Karaköy and across the Galata Bridge.’

İkmen, his face grey and drawn with exhaustion, grimaced. ‘I don’t believe this,’ he said. ‘I don’t understand. What is going on?’

Yıldız shrugged. ‘I don’t know.’

‘Oh, Allah!’ İkmen coughed. ‘Well, now that you are here, you can help me,’ he said. ‘In fact your being here now could be fortuitous.’

‘Oh. Right. So you want me to do that thing we talked about last night. Ask no questions and—’

‘There is a ladies’ clothes shop less than a hundred metres down İstiklal on the right,’ İkmen said. ‘It’s called the XOOX Boutique.’

Yıldız, who came from an almost exclusively male household, didn’t like the sound of this. He frowned.

‘I want you to go in there,’ İkmen continued. ‘Pick a small item off one of the shelves, drift around looking for a while and then arrest the very fat girl dressed in pink and black as she leaves the premises.’

Yıldız, shocked, said, ‘What for? Why would I arrest her?’

‘For theft, Yıldız! Theft of the small item you will drop into one of the many carrier bags she’s walking around with!’

‘You want me to set up a young girl?’

‘Yes.’

‘But—’

‘I know you have experience of the Müren family, Hikmet,’ İkmen said, rummaging for cigarettes he knew he did not have.

Yıldız looked up at the clear blue sky and narrowed his eyes in thought. ‘Drugs, prostitution, some protection . . .’

‘Yes, plus a relationship of sorts with the late Hassan Şeker.’ İkmen put one arm round Yıldız’s shoulders and moved him forward onto the main thoroughfare. He pointed at a trendily monochrome shop to the right. ‘Well, Alev Müren, old man Ali’s dearest daughter, is the said fat girl in that shop.’

‘Oh.’

‘Right. So you go and buy something for your sister.’

‘I don’t have a—’

‘Then pretend!’ İkmen said through gritted teeth. ‘And when you bring her out I will be waiting. I’ve been following that spoilt child around for more time than I care to think about. I know what she’s been up to,’ he added cryptically. ‘And I know what that could mean for her brothers.’

İkmen flicked his head in the direction of the nearest interview room.

‘Put him in there,’ he said to the thickset officer who was holding Ekrem Müren’s arm halfway up his back.

‘If any harm comes to my sister . . .’ Müren spluttered, his face red with fury.

‘Yes, yes,’ İkmen said in a bored tone as he followed the struggling officer and his prisoner into the room. ‘You’ll pull my arms and legs off and feed them to the wolves.’ He sat down and lit a cigarette.

While the other officer, Roditi, struggled to seat Ekrem Müren, Hikmet Yıldız entered the room and sat down at the table beside İkmen.

‘You’ve no reason at all to hold Alev.’

‘Ah, but we have,’ İkmen said with a smile. ‘It was a scarf Miss Müren attempted to liberate from the XOOX, wasn’t it, Constable Yıldız?’

‘Yes, sir, blue.’

‘How very attractive,’ and then with a lightning change of mood and tone, İkmen hissed, ‘Sit down and shut up, Müren!’

‘If any of those animals down there touch my sister,’ Ekrem said, referring to the small contingent of very large officers İkmen had introduced him to when they visited Alev in the cells. ‘If they—’

‘So it’s very important that we get her out of there soon then, isn’t it?’ İkmen said, ‘and your sitting still so that Constable Roditi here can have a little rest is a first step.’

Still struggling, Ekrem sneered, ‘Bastard.’

‘Is that really the best you can do?’ İkmen said. He sighed with weariness. ‘Look, Ekrem, I want to do a deal so just stop struggling and let’s all get down to business.’

Ekrem Müren eyed İkmen suspiciously. He’d felt Süleyman and İskender’s hands upon his neck before – he’d had other more pleasant dealings with lesser policemen – but he’d never had personal experience of İkmen. As he slowly allowed his body to relax as much as it could, he thought about this man’s reputation as a person of total incorruptibility and how oddly that sat beside the notion of a deal. But then not all of those around İkmen were straight, as Ekrem knew from personal experience, and so perhaps the stories about honest İkmen were just, well, lies.

He looked behind to where Roditi was still standing, though not touching him any more, then swung his head round to stare at İkmen.

‘How much do you want?’ he said. ‘I can have any amount here in an hour.’

‘Oh, that’s good,’ İkmen said and then, turning to Yıldız, he added, ‘That’s very quick, don’t you think?’

‘Yes, sir.’

‘So how much do you want then? While we talk my sister’s down there with them!’ Anger made him rise to his feet, and immediately the hard hand of Constable Roditi made him sit down again. Hot and stuffy, Interview Room 2 only served to heighten the heat that had filled his mind as soon as he’d heard about Alev.

İkmen pretended to study his fingernails for a few moments until Ekrem appeared to be settled. Then he looked up and smiled. ‘I don’t want your money,’ he said simply. ‘It’s of no use to me.’