Last Train to Istanbul (27 page)

“Oh!” Tarık said. “I had no idea. Congratulations.”

“We only found out ourselves recently. We haven’t told anyone yet. I’d rather you didn’t know either.”

“I understand, but do be careful, won’t you?” Tarık replied, patting his friend on the back. “Your responsibilities in life are just beginning. Don’t get involved in anything dangerous, my friend.”

Later that day, while traveling on the Métro, Ferit reflected on his conversation with Tarık. He wished he could have persuaded him to cooperate. As soon as they had met, he’d felt he could trust Tarık. He was an honest, hardworking, brave man who wasn’t indiscreet. He had all the virtues of someone who could be a member of the Organization. What a pity that—as was to be expected—Tarık had
chosen to stick to his country’s laws. However, he had left the door slightly open when he’d said, “I promise I’ll do what I can to help you.”

Ferit became suspicious when he saw the reflection of a scrawny man watching him in the window of the Métro. He tried to look at him from behind his newspaper. When the man began to fidget, Ferit wondered if he had given himself away. Should I get off at the next stop? he thought. Ferit stood up when the train reached the next station. The man got off, so he sat down again. He had been anxious for no reason at all. “All this worry,” he said to himself. “It’s not the Gestapo; it’s the worry that will eventually kill me.”

These worries made him feel that he might try that door Tarık had left open after all. If anything happened to him, Tarık was the only person who might be able to get Evelyn to his family in Istanbul. Neither Muhlis—his friend for the past forty years—nor anyone else would do. There and then, he promised himself if he should accomplish his mission successfully, he would go see Tarık first thing tomorrow. But what would he say? How would he appeal to this man he’d met not more than five times? What could he possibly say to him? “I’m entrusting my wife to you.” Surely not. Tarık would probably think he was mad. But then, maybe not. Hadn’t he trusted him enough to tell him of his association with the Resistance after only a few meetings? Tarık hadn’t batted an eyelid. He wasn’t surprised; he hadn’t disapproved or tried to give him advice. Yes, Tarık was his man; he could entrust his wife to him.
Inşallah
, he would get through today without any problems, and then first thing tomorrow…

After getting off the train and walking toward the exit, Ferit noticed a long line forming. The women were passing straight through, but the men had to produce identity papers. German officers were loading those who had no identification or had Jewish stamps on their papers straight onto a truck waiting at the Métro’s exit.

“This is all I need,” he said to himself, anxiously searching in his pockets. Thank goodness he had his papers with him. He gave a sigh of relief, but all the same he was still worried about having to wait in line. Thank God, it was moving quickly. The cursed men were carrying out their job quickly and efficiently. When his turn came, he produced both his birth certificate and his teaching certificate to the soldier with an SS band on his arm.

The scoundrel looked at his papers and said, “Get through.”

Ferit grabbed his papers back and stuffed them into his inside pocket. He hurried along for a few kilometers before entering an awful grocer in a back street, with dirty windows and half-empty shelves. There was a very bored looking man sitting behind the counter.

“Give me a
Paris Soir
, will you?” Ferit said.

“Do you want the supplement too?”

“Why not, if it’s free.”

Ferit put some money on the counter.

“Don’t you have change?”

“I don’t. Do you?”

“Through that door and down the stairs on the left,” the grocer said without looking up. He continued doing his accounts.

Ferit went through the door at the back of the shop, down the stairs, and opened a door. He was now in a garage. Five or six people were gathered around a small table behind some cars.

“Where were you, Turk?” one of them asked.

“Sorry, I’ve just managed—”

“Sit down, there’s something that might concern you. We received some information today.”

Ferit took one of the stools nearby and squeezed in between those already at the table.

“What information?”

“The Turks are apparently making preparations to get their Jews to Turkey. Have you heard about this?”

“No.”

“
Mon Dieu!
What on earth are you talking about with your friends from the consulate?”

“Well, I’m not about to say, ‘Apparently our organization has received some information about getting Turkish Jews out.’ ”

“You’ll ask them now, then.”

“Fine, I will. Supposing they are, what then?”

“We’ll get those who aren’t of Turkish origin to board the train too.”

“They won’t accept that.”

“We’re aware of that.”

“So what?”

“We will manage it all the same.”

“How will you do that?”

“We’ll find a way.”

“Supposing you do, how many people are you considering?”

“There are twenty-eight so far, but there may be more.”

“What! Are you crazy?”

“Tell us, Turk, do you think we’d be doing this if we weren’t crazy?”

“You couldn’t help us with the passports, so you might as well get on with this,” said a man with a hooked nose sitting at the head of the table.

“You must bring us precise details first. Find out if this business about the train is true. If so, when is it going to happen?”

“I’ll do my best,” said Ferit.

“Now, let’s get on to item two on the agenda,” said the man at the head of the table. “There’s a group we must get over the Swiss border this week…”

Suddenly, the naked bulb hanging from the ceiling flicked off. Everyone around the table got up. Two of them started cleaning the cars. Another got into a car with a screwdriver in his hand. With the
other two, Ferit ran toward the door he’d entered. The light went on again.

“OK, gentlemen, the danger’s over. Back to the table,” said the hooked-nosed man.

Tomorrow, thought Ferit, tomorrow I must speak to Tarık without fail.

PARIS

It hadn’t been easy for Tarık to get Selva’s message. Had it not been for her insistence and panic on the telephone, the night security guard wouldn’t have bothered to send word to Tarık at home, and he wouldn’t have known about the developments. News of the eighty people loaded onto a cattle train bound for Paris would have waited until the following day.

The security guard had slammed the telephone down on her twice. Was it possible this woman didn’t understand what he had said?

“Listen, the consul isn’t here. There’s no one here. Neither the second nor the third secretaries are here. Everybody went home. Please call again tomorrow,” he had said. But she wouldn’t listen. Then he’d gotten a bit scared when she called for the third time. He wondered if she could be someone important, who might have connections with the powers that be. It was then that he decided to call the grocery beneath Tarık Arıca’s apartment, as he had been instructed to do in an emergency. He had asked the grocer to let the gentlemen living in apartment five know they should call the consulate urgently. About half an hour passed before the grocer got around to sending his errand boy up with the message.

Tarık had run to the consulate as soon as he received the message. He found out from the security guard that a crazy woman had been persistently phoning from Marseilles. He guessed who it was and phoned Selva straight away. All he learned from her was that a number of Jews had been crammed onto a train leaving the Saint Charles Station for Paris, and Nazım Kender had also been on that train. Selva pleaded with Tarık to meet the train in Paris and save her husband. Tarık immediately called the Turkish embassy in Berlin. Because Paris was under German occupation, the consulate in Paris had to contact the embassy in Berlin for instructions. He had also informed Behiç Erkin, the ambassador in Vichy, of the situation, because he knew he was very sympathetic toward saving the Jews.

Behiç, who had been a close friend of Atatürk, was not a diplomat who had started his profession from the bottom; he had vast experience of state affairs. He was an intelligent and conscientious man with a lot of common sense. It was these qualities that had earned him his post. Maybe that had been a godsend.

“Gentlemen, even though we must be careful not to step on the Gestapo’s toes, the necessities of war shouldn’t make us forget our humanity,” he’d said to his young colleagues. “Even the Urartu who lived in eastern Anatolia in the seventh century BC showed respect to the people whose lands they conquered, giving them freedom of faith. I can’t understand what’s happening to the Germans, behaving this way in the middle of the twentieth century! Don’t get drawn into any confrontations, but of course try to do what you consider is right.”

Tarık often wondered if he would have had the courage to visit the camps and police stations had it not been for the support of such a superior.

Within a week of Behiç Erkin renting a suitable building for an embassy, the Germans had settled in the building next door
and were using it as their headquarters. The German officers were continuously watching those who came and left the embassy, making them feel uneasy. Eventually, to put a stop to this, Ambassador Erkin employed a huge Frenchman who used to work in the fish market. He gave him a uniform and made him stand in front of the gate as a security guard. His job was to escort the visitors leaving the embassy to the end of the road, thus dissuading the German soldiers from harassing them. Behiç had also given instructions to his staff to issue passports immediately to everyone who had ties with Turkey, no matter how tenuous the connection. If through the years they had forgotten Turkish, or never learned it because they were born in France, it was enough for them to prove their connection simply by learning sentences like “I am Turkish” or “I have relatives in Turkey.” The ambassador was convinced that as long as they could compose a couple of sentences, they should be offered the chance to save themselves from the fury of the Germans or the pro-German French.

After notifying his superiors, Tarık had called Selva back.

“Rest assured that our ambassadors have set the wheels in motion. Please go to bed now and try to get some sleep.” Not being able to calm her down, he decided, for the sake of Sabiha’s sister, that he would spend the night at the consulate. He felt it would reassure her to know that he was at the end of a phone. This way, he would also be able to telephone her as soon as there was any news of Rafael.

Tarık spent two hours making calls all over the place, trying desperately to find some news, when the security guard came in and stood before him.

“There’s someone at the door who wants to see you. Says he’s a friend of yours.”

“What’s his name?”

“Ferit…Ferit Say—”

“Saylan?”

“That’s it, Saylan.”

“Let him in. He’s my friend.”

Tarık felt anxious when he saw Ferit looking so pale.

“What’s up, my friend? What happened?” he asked.

“Actually, I was worried about you,” said Ferit. “I popped in to see you at home and Muhlis told me you had rushed over to the consulate in a state. What’s the matter, what is it? Is there anything I can do?”

“Thanks, but I don’t think so. The Gestapo have rounded up a number of Jews, including the husband of a friend of mine. Apparently they are transporting them to Paris. I’ve informed our embassies in Berlin and Vichy, so now I am sitting and waiting, as you can see. They will let me know if there are any developments.”

“Would you like me to keep you company?”

“Thanks for the offer, Ferit, but there’s no point in you sitting here getting miserable too. Besides, Evelyn must be waiting for you at home.”

“Evelyn isn’t at home. She went to visit a friend who’s just had a baby. She’s spending the night there.”

“Fine, stay, then. What can I offer you? Would you like some tea?”

“At this time of the night?”

“I could ask the guard to get us a bottle of wine, but you never know, it might leave a smell in the room and that wouldn’t be appropriate in the consulate.”