River of The Dead (25 page)

‘What has that no-good brother of yours been giving you, Kemal?’ İkmen said in a way that everyone else in the room knew was terrifyingly controlled.

‘Çetin, we don’t know that Bekir—’ Fatma began.

‘He was a lying, drugged-up thug at fifteen, why should he be any different now?’ İkmen said.

‘Çetin!’

İkmen threw his arms in the air, finally giving way to the fury inside. ‘I only let him stay to please you, Fatma! I would have thrown him on to the street without a thought!’ And then he leaned forward and glared up at Kemal yet again. ‘What did he give you, Kemal? What did you take from that snake of a brother of yours?’

But Kemal could only cry. Hot, fat tears sliding down his hot, red face.

‘Kemal!’

‘Dad, as I told you, there was coke loose in the bag,’ Bülent said. ‘The syringe . . .’

‘The syringe I will send off to the forensic institute for analysis,’ İkmen said. He looked up pointedly at Bülent and continued, ‘In the meantime, I want Kemal to tell me what—’

‘C-coke,’ the teenager stuttered out between sobs. ‘I – he – he let me sniff it. It was—’

‘Got you as high as a Boeing 747 no doubt!’ İkmen yelled. He stubbed the cigarette in his hand right out and instantly lit up another. ‘Did you like it? Coke?’

The youngster hung his head and whispered, ‘Yes.’

‘Did he give you anything else? Anything in a syringe?’

‘What, heroin? No,’ Kemal said. ‘No, he kept that for himself.’

The room became very quiet then. It went on for some time. The silence was finally broken by Çetin İkmen rising sharply to his feet. He looked at his watch.

‘It’s six o’clock now,’ he said. ‘When was Bekir last seen?’

‘I saw him go into his room just after two,’ Bülent replied. And then, holding on tightly to his mother, he said, ‘What are you going to do, Dad?’

There was another, this time very short silence. Çetin İkmen swallowed hard and said, ‘I’m going to report the fact that a thirty-four-year-old man was giving my child drugs. I’m going to circulate Bekir’s details and description and have him arrested.’

No one either moved or spoke again until Fatma said softly, ‘I took a photograph of Bekir the other day, Çetin. Çiçek put it on the computer for me. You can have that if you think it will do any good.’

And then she went over to her youngest son, took him in her arms and kissed him. ‘Allah forgive me,’ she said softly.

‘I don’t understand,’ Edibe Taner said to the veiled woman who stood in front of her. The light over the plains was fading now and soon Dara would be in darkness.

Underneath her veil, Elizabeth Smith smiled. ‘What don’t you understand? Why I dress like this outside the house? My marriage? Yusuf? What?’

‘Any of it,’ the policewoman said.

She had intended to go home after she left Mehmet Süleyman at St Sobo’s. But then, as she had done periodically ever since Gabriel’s disappearance, she had gone out looking for him. She had not, however, ended up in Dara purely by chance. She had an officer watching the place and she wanted to check up on him too. Elizabeth Smith was such an oddity in that setting that when she had seen her strolling in her garden, fully covered, the temptation to go and talk to her had been overwhelming.

‘I cover myself when I’m outside the house out of respect,’ the American said.

‘Women in the Tur Abdin do not generally cover their faces, just their heads,’ Taner replied.

The heavily made-up eyes above the veil closed and then opened again. ‘You know, Inspector,’ Elizabeth Smith said, ‘I may have been born and raised in Boston, but my people were Southern Baptists.’

‘What does that mean? Is it a religion?’

‘Southern Baptists are very strict and austere Christians,’ the American said. ‘They go the extra kilometre, as you would say. No drinking, no cussing, no sex outside marriage. I lost contact with all that years ago. I wanted to travel and my folks didn’t approve of that and so I left. But I still have some of the old values. The respect, at least.’

‘So now you go to the Suriani church . . .’

‘It’s a fine spectacle, yes.’

‘Miss Smith, I . . .’

‘What’s a nice American girl doing marrying a gangster, covering her face and living in a house without running water?’

‘Miss Smith, you live in a house surrounded by armed men! You are a prisoner. Willing, but . . .’

The clanking sounds of the bells that some people put round the necks of their goats drifted over from the vastness of the Ocean’s fields. The veiled woman looked up into the darkening sky.

‘When a person finds herself alone in the world, different priorities can take over,’ she said. ‘My respect for this place and its people, its purity, is paramount.’

‘The people of the Ocean are not perfect,’ Edibe Taner said. ‘Your husband is a drug dealer and a murderer.’

‘Mm.’ She didn’t deny it. But it didn’t seem to bother her too much either. ‘I first came here ten years ago,’ she said. ‘On a tourist trip. The place possessed my soul!’ She looked up into the sky once again. ‘This is a place where things are brought to life – empires, faiths. Between the great rivers the Tigris and the Euphrates. This is where civilisation began. I envy you growing up here, Inspector.’

‘I wouldn’t wish to be from anywhere else,’ Taner replied. ‘But, you know, this place does have its problems.’

‘Yeah.’ The American’s face darkened somewhat. ‘New Mardin. The crap apartments down there.’

‘I was thinking more about the conflict that exists here,’ Taner said. ‘The various terrorist organisations who base themselves here, war in Iraq, the dictatorship in Syria.’

There was a moment of silence as these two very different women looked at each other. Then the American said, ‘But things can change. They do and will.’

‘I wish I had your confidence,’ Edibe Taner said.

Whatever expression Elizabeth Smith made in response to this was hidden underneath her veil.

‘Miss Smith,’ Taner said, ‘you must know that the guards the Kayas have employed to protect you are not just for show. People are killed out here.’

‘Clan rivalry. I know,’ Elizabeth Smith said. ‘I know also that your cousin Zeynep, Yusuf’s other wife, would probably rather I was dead. But I also know she won’t do anything.’

‘No.’ Zeynep had obviously accepted the situation. However, Edibe Taner did have one question. ‘But, Miss Smith, why does Yusuf, or why did he, keep your existence such a close secret? I mean, it isn’t as if he cares about the law with regard to polygamy.’

The American laughed. ‘No. No, I was a secret, Inspector, because Yusuf feared his rivals might try to kidnap me. Hence all my guys in the house. Hence, in part, the reason I cover up in public. Foreigners fetch a good price here.’

‘Yes.’ Edibe Taner knew of several such cases of foreigner kidnap and it was undoubtedly very lucrative for the clan or group perpetrating the crime. ‘But I still don’t understand why you’re here, Miss Smith,’ Taner said. ‘Whatever you may have run away from in the USA cannot, surely, have been bad enough to make you want to become a willing prisoner?’

There was silence, and then the American said, ‘I told you, I love this place. It has possibilities. If one has money and loyal protection, as I do, one can build something special here.’

‘Something special?’

‘A life amongst the ruins,’ the American said. ‘A new life on the broken stones of the past.’

And then she left to go back into her house. It was only when Edibe Taner returned to her car that she realised that Yusuf Kaya’s American bride had only spoken about him in passing. She hadn’t once expressed what she might feel for him. She had actually exhibited more affection for her guards.

Süleyman was not unaccustomed to security outside a church, although the level was rather higher than what he had experienced before. At the bottom of the narrow lane leading up to Mar Behnam there was an armoured car blocking off any vehicular access. Up to the church itself and just inside the precinct there were very many policemen and some women too. Edibe Taner greeted all of them. Looking very smart in a modest black suit, she was accompanied by Süleyman and her father Seçkin.

Constructed from the same honey-coloured stone as all the other ancient Mardin buildings, Mar Behnam was accessed via a small doorway in a tall, very blank-looking wall. Having seen the vast mansions with humble entrances in Gaziantep, Süleyman was unsurprised to find that in common with traditional Arab structures Mar Behnam was actually a church and outbuildings – the priest’s house, a school and assembly rooms – in considerable grounds. There was also a large marquee, a temporary structure where, Taner told him, the banquet the Surianis were giving after the service was to be held. He had expected the church itself to be huge, but it wasn’t. In fact the approach to the altar down between the rows of wooden benches on both sides was quite narrow. On either side of the benches were rows of arches which gave on to still more benches and small areas of devotion around paintings and cloth pictures on the walls. One of these representations was, as Brother Seraphim had told him, of the Sharmeran. Overhead there was a large and ornate chandelier from which strings of tiny fairy lights were suspended across to the ancient arches. Built originally, so Brother Seraphim had told him, in 569, Mar Behnam was definitely part of the Cobweb World. Just the memory of that term made Süleyman shudder, recalling as it did his recent conversation with the monk about Yusuf Kaya’s aunt Bulbul Kaplan. What her brother had done, putting out the eyes of her husband Gazi, must have made her hate her family. Such a thing was inhuman and if, as was obvious, she had found love and acceptance from Gazi and his family, why on earth would she even consider entertaining her nephew Yusuf? It seemed to be counter-intuitive and he wondered whether Edibe Taner might be able to shed some light upon it later.

Some sort of ceremony was taking place when Süleyman and the others entered the church. The red-and-gold-robed priest at the altar was intoning something in a language Süleyman imagined was Aramaic. A young boy in a white robe stood next to him, just to one side of the altar, which was bare with the exception of a simple metal cross and a painted altar cloth representing the Last Supper.

‘The service has not started properly yet,’ Edibe Taner said to Süleyman as they walked through the door. ‘The priest is just preparing for the ceremony now.’ She turned to her father and said, ‘Will you show Inspector Süleyman Mar Behnam, Papa?’

Seçkin Taner nodded his assent. ‘Please follow me, Inspector.’

Süleyman followed him straight up the aisle and to the right of the altar. The priest and the young boy appeared to take no notice of them at all. Various rough niches in the stone held boxes, candlesticks and, in one instance, a very old-looking skull. The Master of Sharmeran pointed to it. ‘That is the skull of Mar Behnam,’ he said. ‘He was the son of a Syrian king, a pagan.’

‘This church is named for him?’

‘And for his sister Mort Saro,’ Seçkin Taner said. ‘The father king killed Mar Behnam and Mort Saro because he didn’t like them being Christians. Then from beyond the grave the brother and the sister began to work miracles and the wicked father repented. If you are sick, Mar Behnam can make you well, so the Suriani believe.’

Süleyman smiled. Miracles were not really his area. He felt Çetin İkmen would have been far better placed to talk to this man about them than he was. Just then, however, there was a noise behind him and he looked round. A large group of people, the women with their heads covered by small lace scarves, the men very obviously in their best suits, were pouring through the door into the church.

‘Now the service begins,’ Seçkin Taner said. ‘Come, we must sit.’

The Master of Sharmeran and Süleyman sat on the right hand side of the church with the rest of the men. Edibe Taner, seated with the woman on the left, smiled over at both of them.

‘Now that we know from Inspector Süleyman that the nurse we thought was called Faruk Öz came originally from Mardin, and that there is at least a theoretical connection between Mardin and the name Lole, we must consider carefully what we do next,’ Ayşe Farsakoğlu said to İzzet Melik. ‘We always had a suspicion that Murat Lole was part of Yusuf Kaya’s escape plot. He possibly lied to us, too. Öz’s people are not, clearly, from Ankara. Although he may have told Lole that they were from the capital for some reason.’

‘The also significantly named Yusuf Mardin is still nowhere to be seen,’ İzzet replied gloomily. ‘As for the cleaners . . .’

‘I don’t know whether we’ll ever be able to trace them,’ Ayşe said as she looked down at the bulging ashtray on her desk. She sighed. ‘It’s possible, given the number of deaths that seem to be mounting up around this escape, that they may very well have been disposed of. We mustn’t forget either that there were only two nurses at the scene when Kaya escaped from the Cerrahpaşa.’

‘I contacted the Kartal Prison as İkmen asked to try to get them to protect the prisoner Ara Berköz,’ İzzet said. ‘But if the corruption there is as widespread as it could be at the Cerrahpaşa, I wouldn’t like to make a bet on his chances.’ He looked up at his colleague and frowned. ‘You know, Ayşe, I always knew that Yusuf Kaya was a rich and powerful drug dealer, but don’t you think that all this buying of people, all this killing, is excessive even by his standards?’

Ayşe sat back in her chair and crossed her arms over her chest. She at least was not supposed to be working on this particular Sunday but she’d been unable to settle to anything not work-related at home. The hunt for Yusuf Kaya and the various twists and turns in that investigation was obsessing all of them. Crass though he could be, İzzet was a good person with whom to discuss theories and ideas.

‘He does seem to have a lot of power now,’ she said.

‘Tommi Kerensky, the Russian he killed, was at the top of the tree amongst the eastern European dealers,’ İzzet said. ‘There are quite a few Russians in the Kartal Prison that I would have at least imagined might have had a go at ending Kaya’s life inside. It’s all about revenge in their world, after all. And then there was the beggar king Hüseyin Altun, found stabbed . . .’