Istanbul Noir - Mustafa Ziyalan [77]
The following day, at around 2 o’clock, I met Cevat Bey in Fener. We sat in a café, we talked very little. It was from him that I learned the name of my father’s and mother’s murderer: Kenan.
My memories of that time from my childhood were permanently etched in my mind: the decrepit walls of Dimitrie Cantemir’s palace, the stone wall of the Red Church, the narrow streets, the muggy, reclusive evenings, a history drunk with glory, and so on and so forth. Yet, for me, none of that was enough to explain away that particular night, and the way the neighborhood’s reflection gleamed so ghastly upon the dark waters of the Golden Horn. Cevat Bey finally spoke the words that I didn’t dare to say: “Are you ready to face the man who changed your destiny, Vasili?” Though the question sent an unfamiliar rage coursing through my body, I was a coward, frozen with fear. The visible change in Cevat Bey, though, was something else altogether: In that moment, he became a machine designed to resist, a machine built to withstand not only physical attack, but the impact of time. He motioned for me to get up.
We left. The heat, not at all tempered by the night, was unbearable. Later, it was said to be the hottest night Istanbul had had in recent years. I hadn’t slept a wink in days. In my exhausted state, I didn’t have the willpower not to follow him. Still, I was afraid. Not because I thought everything would be in vain, but because the meeting would drag me to the inevitable, to the very last thing I should do.
We turned into a street on the right, the last one before reaching the Greek Church of Fener. We were both silent. At that moment, Cevat Bey’s face seemed devoid of any distinguishing features, except for his huge eyes shining in the darkness. I doubt I looked much different; he must have been as afraid as I was. We went up to the third floor of a bay-windowed building. An old man of medium height opened the door. He was in his pajamas. Seeing me, a stranger, at his door, he peered at me closely, inspecting my face. His expression was one of dread.
“I brought you the son of an old friend,” Cevat Bey said. His voice was calm and reassuring.
We entered. The man told us to have a seat, to make ourselves comfortable. There was a grave sadness in his old face, as there is in mine now. I let my imagination wander through the past, through our blood-soaked home, and through Fener. To my mind’s eye I summoned the hilly streets of my old neighborhood, its people of different religions, different ethnicities, the flowers on our windowsill, flowers which obscured our view, flowers my mother adored, and pictures of the crucifixion of Christ, and the Virgin Mary holding the Christ Child, her head tilted to one side. It was as if that deluge of blood, which had turned my days and my nights into one long, monotonous, unbearable chain of hours, was seeping out the window that looked upon the Golden Horn, flowing into its waters.
“So why don’t you tell me now,” the old man said. “This gentleman, whose son is he?”
He was waiting for an answer, his desperation palpable. Cevat Bey gave the old man, who was now sitting on the couch, a solemn glance; then with a bitter smile he alternated, looking at the man, then at the darkness outside, then back at the man, etc. His demeanor was cold and professional.
“The son of a friend of yours, a friend of the past, and of the future,” he said.
Without a doubt, the truth could be summarized only in this way. Clearly, we were there to kill my father’s murderer. Kenan Bey no longer seemed anxious. He seemed to sense that this summary of the truth was not meant to be ironic or mere insinuation.
“Whose?” he said, smiling.
Instinctively I looked at the man’s long, slender old fingers. He could see that I was nervous.
“You tell me, young man,” he said. “Cevat’s always been like this, he’s so fond of suspense.”
There, facing my parents’ murderer, it wasn’t only anger that I felt; I felt sorry for him too. It was a strange feeling.
“Yorgo,” I said. “I’m Yorgo’s son.”
He had heard