The Boat (6 page)

The trouble didn’t start until they got back to Bodrum.

It was late by the time the dolmush pulled in at the bus station. Stars were scrawled across the sky like spilt paint and a wind was blowing wildly from the sea, swirling bits of litter into the air and ballooning the men’s long shirts as they rushed to the mosques, called to prayer from the tower. The floury waft of baking bread mixed with the pungent sweetness of flowers whipped past their noses as they stepped off the bus. The town no longer felt alien to them; their arrival seven weeks earlier on the little fishing boat from Naxos felt like a lifetime ago – the yellow lights of the harbour winking out at them through the darkness from miles out long before the small white buildings and the castle became visible, the call from the mosques luring them in. Only later did it strike them that they were actually out of Europe, on a different continent, in a Muslim country. Apart from the man in the kebab shop in Hammersmith and the old bloke in the tower block who wouldn’t use the lift, neither of them had ever knowingly even met a Turk before. But now, getting off the dolmush, Bodrum felt like home.

They had decided that with a little money in their pockets for once they would treat themselves and stay in Genghis’s guest house for a few nights before finding more work in the boatyard; they’d save a few bob, pack up the tent and start heading east in the next few weeks.

Johnny flung the big red bag over his shoulder and stepped off the bus; it was half the weight it normally was as the majority of Clem’s stuff was still in the tent. It contained only their sleeping bags, some of her junk and a change of clothes. If it was down to him they would always travel like this.

Clem was in high spirits after her little purchase in the dolmush. Somewhere during the first hour on the bus the driver had stopped at the side of the road to pick up a pile of carpets. Johnny had watched through the window as the pile stood up and climbed on to the dolmush all of its own accord. It came up the steps and made its way down the aisle of the bus to the back where they sat. His heart sank; as tourists they were like beacons to salesmen. The bus had been pretty much empty, save for two old women and a pervy old bloke a few seats further down. The pile of carpets stopped and sat down right next to Johnny in the back row. He caught a glimpse of a weathered old hand and a dark creased eye somewhere in amongst the fabric.
Here we go.

‘Eenglish?’ a voice came from within as the vehicle lurched forwards along the bumpy road, the undercarriage clanking loudly. Johnny pretended not to hear him.

‘American?’ the voice said. The carpets were rubbing against Johnny’s arm; they smelt musty but not unpleasant. Johnny shook his head without looking up from his book.

‘English,’ Clem confirmed across Johnny’s lap, her hand reaching out to touch the fabric of a blue and red carpet halfway down the pile. Johnny looked at her aghast. He knew, just as the carpet man did, that he had a taker. The blinking eye went berserk and the weathered hand tugged at the carpet.

‘Beautiful, hand-made, one hundred per cent natural dye… prayer mat…’ he said, the words tumbling out.

‘No lira,’ she said to him.

‘God hears your prayers on this carpet… magic carpet… Sterling?’ he said, the eye glinting excitedly at the mention of money. ‘Sterling good,’ he said. ‘For you special price… only four hundred pounds this carpet, very special.’

Clem laughed and shook her head. ‘Four hundred pounds? You’re joking!’

‘Three hundred ninety… come quickly.’ The hand flapped beckoningly at them as if it wouldn’t be offering this crazily good price for long. But time was the one thing they did have. He sat next to them for six hours and he didn’t stop selling for one single second. They ignored him, politely at first and then plain rudely: they talked between themselves and then later Johnny rolled up bits of tissue and stuffed them into his ears and dozed off for a while, only to discover when he awoke that the man was still gabbling figures at his side.

Then somewhere into the fifth hour of the journey, after a puncture and a scrap down at the front between the two old women, Johnny began to tune in to what the man was saying. His voice was quiet, his tone deflated now, his eye rolling exhaustedly, but his stamina and the price he was now offering were quite remarkable.

‘Did you say
four
pounds?’ Johnny turned slowly and stared at the carpets. The eye appeared through the pile, refocusing, blinking itself out of a trance-like state.

‘Four pound sterling, yes please,’ he said wearily.

‘It’s a deal.’

Clem was thrilled. She had spent the rest of the trip folding and unfolding the prayer mat. It wasn’t big, maybe three feet by two feet, but she had no doubt that the carpet seller was right: it was a magic carpet. Its prayers would be answered. She could feel its power. Its past and future history lay in her hands. One day she would show it to her grandchildren and tell them how she and Johnny had bought it on a bus for four quid.

Back in Bodrum she carried it rolled up tightly under her arm as they made their way through the square. She was looking forward to showing it to Genghis. He was a man who knew a thing or two about everything and would surely be impressed with her bargain.

They wandered through the throng and down to the front where the trees were all painted white from the waist down as if wearing petticoats to protect their modesty. They shook their leaves loudly as the wind swept through them. Someone had hung some lights in a tree and they bounced about in the breeze. Groups of men hung around on the street corners doing nothing in particular as the older ones sipped tea and played Okey. As usual they stopped talking and turned their heads as Johnny and Clem passed by. Just beyond the jazz café an old man with an enormous nicotine-stained grey moustache yelled something at them, waving his hand.

‘What’s his problem?’ Clem said. Johnny took her hand and walked a little faster. He hated the way the men here looked at her. Sometimes they even reached out and touched her – her crotch or her breasts, with him right by her side. He walked a little faster. Little dots of rain began to darken the pavement. They made their way down along the harbour where the dim lamplights dotted along the front of the quay shone double on the water’s speckled surface. Deserted boats tied to the heavy iron loops bounced up and down in the waves and others anchored further out in the darkness could be seen bobbing about, their rigging tinkling loudly in the wind. A yellow moon flashed sporadically through the clouds silhouetting the castle over on the far side as the sounds from the bars and restaurants filtered across the water.

The rain was falling a little harder now and they jogged the last bit to Genghis’s
pansiyon
. Up near the marina they could see some activity going on: various police cars and uniforms were wandering around in the darkness flashing their torches along the boats. Johnny knocked on Genghis’s door but there was no response. He knocked again a little louder. A shuttered window on the first floor opened and Genghis stuck his head out. He said something in Turkish which they didn’t understand before glancing nervously up and down the street. He shut the window quickly and they heard him running down the stairs. The door opened.

‘Come quickly,’ he said, pulling them in, shutting the door behind them fast. He leant against it as if keeping someone out.

‘What is it?’ Johnny asked. He’d not seen Genghis looking in such a state; he was usually a man with an easy smile on his lips.

‘You must leave, Johnny,’ he whispered. ‘You must leave Bodrum immediately.’

‘What? Why?’

‘I don’t know what has happened… but they are everywhere looking for you.’ Genghis looked truly terrified, his mouth twitched and his eyes kept darting to the door.

‘Who? Who is looking?’ Johnny said, worried now by the state of him; the wonder and thrill of last night’s events suddenly dimming into something sinister.

‘This morning they go to your tent, they pull it down, they take your things. They go to Attila restaurant, they pull up a table, he say nothing…’

‘Who, Genghis? Who does this? The police?’

‘Maybe. I don’t know. I don’t think so… Bad men. They go to boatyard, they take Australia man…’

Johnny’s heart dropped. ‘They took Aussie Dave?’

The Australian was not a man to get on the wrong side of. They had spent weeks working for him. He’d built his own boat out of ferro-cement specifically for smuggling purposes. He smuggled guns, carpets and God knew what. He would personally be after them if these other people didn’t get them first.

‘He’s in the hospital. They smash his boat up.’

‘Oh my God,’ Clem cried, the colour draining from her face.

‘They were here this morning asking me questions about a truck from the UK. They know you were in Kos. They go to Kos. They come back. They go to Marmaris. They come back. They wait. You must leave before they find you. Go, I say. Go!’

‘But it was nothing to do with us, Genghis…’Johnny said.

‘Don’t tell me anything. I must know nothing,’ he said, holding up his hands, a look of pure fear in his eyes. ‘You have made enemy. Just have to leave!’

‘What do we do?’ Clem turned to Johnny expectantly. Johnny heaved the bag back over his shoulder. What indeed? They stood out a mile. There were barely any foreigners in Bodrum – tourist season was still a long way off.

‘They’re coming back,’ Genghis said. ‘I thought you were them. You’re not safe here. You must leave. Come out of the back.’

He led them through the
pansiyon
, his slippered feet scuffling quickly across the mottled tiled floor. Johnny grabbed Clem’s hand; he could feel her trembling, or it might have been him, his heart was punching at his ribs, his head spinning. ‘Let’s just get the hell out of here, see what’s left in the tent and maybe if someone at the marina can give us a lift.’

‘No tent,’ Genghis said, opening the back door quietly. ‘No boatyard. No marina. Just leave. You don’t understand… this is not your country. This is very different. You don’t want police. Try fishermen. You have money?’ He was rifling in his pockets now.

‘Yes, we’re fine, Genghis.’

‘Not marina, OK? They wait for you.’ His round happy face was so serious and his kindness so touching that Johnny leant forward and hugged him.

‘Thank you, Genghis,’ he said.

‘Turkish people good people. I’m sorry.’

Then he opened the door a little wider, checking first that the way was clear. They dashed out of the
pansiyon
into the rain, glad of its cover, and climbed over the little wall at the back and crossed the road to get out of the light from the street lamp. They set off up the lane at the back of the
pansiyon
before realizing it passed the field where their tent was and, sure enough, a car was parked near by, blocking the lane. They turned slowly and as they rounded the corner they started to leg it back down the hill, stopping at the harbour road.

‘Maybe we should just explain ourselves to the police,’ Clem whispered, panting, the prayer mat clutched tightly underneath her arm. ‘It was nothing to do with us. We’re not to blame.’

‘No,’ he said.
Never trust policemen.
His mind was racing. The rain had started to pour hard. He watched it fall in slants in the light from the street lamp. Up at the marina he could see a car turning round, headlights flashing across the water.

‘Someone’s coming,’ Clem whispered, looking behind them back up the lane where heels clicked in the darkness. Johnny was eyeing the road, his head trying to play catch-up, not quite believing or understanding what was going on. Down the road, the men from the tea houses had all gone inside, out of the rain, all except the man with the moustache who stood under an umbrella on the next corner looking around. Johnny squeezed Clem’s hand and dragged her forward, running across the road into a small area of scrub between the quay and the front. They ducked down into the bushes. He had to think; he had to come up with something. Above the noise of the rain, he thought he heard the crackle of a walkie-talkie or a radio. The fat man from customs had a hand in all this, he was sure of that.

‘We need to get to the road,’ he said.

‘Not down there, not past that guy,’ Clem whispered.

‘No, let’s get to the other side of the harbour.’

They scuttled out of the bushes and ran across the quay, jumping down on to the shingle beach where the fishing boats had been pulled out of the water. They pressed themselves up against the wall, catching their breath.

‘Are you scared, Johnny?’ Clem said, still clutching the carpet, her soaked hair flattened against her cheeks by the rain.

‘Shitting it,’ he said.

She rather wished he hadn’t said that. She felt the last of her own bravery ebb away. He mustn’t say things like that. He mustn’t be scared – as long as he wasn’t scared they would always be all right, nothing could ever harm them. She could feel the panic welling up. He took her hand and they ran along the shingle beach in the darkness, their footsteps lost in the pounding rain. When the shingle ran out they climbed back up on to the quay, Johnny keeping the bag on his shoulder, hiding their faces. They walked quickly along the water’s edge in the semi-darkness, ducking in and out of the line of moored gulets, all empty and locked up, past the fishing boats and the abandoned wrecks. Clem’s hand was small and slippery in his. They needed to get past all the boats and up to the road.

They passed the café with the yellow awning; laughter and noise spilt out through the rain. As they rounded the quay two men holding torches appeared from directly ahead where the road they needed joined the harbourside, which made the dash for the road unviable. One of the men shouted something to the other and Johnny and Clem backed into the darkness on to the stern of a gulet, Johnny swearing under his breath.

‘Johnny,’ Clem said in a small voice, her body twisting round. ‘There are four men behind us…’ He turned quickly and, sure enough, behind them in the darkness, maybe fifty yards away, four men were walking towards them.