Last Train to Istanbul (45 page)

“French?” she asked. The man nodded to say no. “English?”

“
Nein, nein.
”

One of the men held Evelyn’s arms and helped her get up. The other retrieved her bag. Evelyn tidied herself up and looked at the train pulling away.

“My God, what have I done!” she said. “What have I done?”

The workers were as shocked as she was. Evelyn started walking back along the line. There was a carriage waiting in the dark, far away in the distance. That must be the carriage Ferit was in. She knew Ferit was in that carriage because she remembered him saying to her, “Unfortunately, my darling, no one’s getting off on the way because all the passengers are going to Istanbul.” On the other hand, if that wasn’t Ferit’s carriage in the distance, it could be the end of everything. When it was eventually connected to another train and entered the station, her husband would go to see her, but he wouldn’t be able to find her. She started to cry. She was walking and crying at the same time. If she couldn’t find Ferit in that distant carriage, she would walk back to the station. Surely her husband wouldn’t leave without her. She was certain that he would hear of the crazy woman who had jumped off the train and realize that it must be her. Or would he simply think some woman had attempted to commit suicide? She remembered that man in the corridor who had told her that life was worth living. Silly man, she thought. He must have thought I wanted to kill myself. Suddenly she heard someone running after her. Evelyn started running too. Some men started shouting and blowing whistles. When she heard
dogs barking, she got scared and stopped. Uniformed men were approaching her. One of them was a policeman. The others were obviously stationmasters.

They started yelling and saying something in German. Evelyn pointed to the carriage in the distance, trying to explain that she wanted to reach it. The men held her by the arms, trying to take her back, and she tried to resist, but when they started dragging her, she shouted at the top of her voice, “Feriiiiit, Feriiiiit!” She yelled and yelled, but her voice was drowned out by the sound of train whistles.

“Let go of me,” she screamed, but eventually she realized they would drag her back anyway, so she gave up struggling and decided to walk with them obediently.

Some footsteps were heard behind them. A man was running fast and out of breath. “Stop!” he shouted in German.

The men stopped and turned around. When she saw her husband, looking all disheveled and obviously in distress, she collapsed.

“What are you doing with my wife?” asked Ferit. “Where are you taking her?”

“Frankly, we ought to be taking her to a lunatic asylum, but we are only taking her to the stationmaster’s office. She jumped off the train.”

“What?”

“Look here, who are you? What the hell are you doing out here in the dark? You’d better come with us too; we’ll need a statement!”

Ferit knelt down beside his wife. “What did you do? Did you really jump off the train?”

“It hadn’t accelerated yet.”

“You’re not hurt, are you?”

“I’m fine,” Evelyn said as she got up with Ferit’s help. “You weren’t going to leave me behind on my own in Berlin, were you?”

“I only realized that we had been disconnected from the train a few minutes ago. I was running to the station to find you. I panicked
thinking about what I would do if the train had already left…” He couldn’t finish his sentence.

Ferit put his arms around his wife, feeling very guilty. The two of them walked back to the station buildings with the Germans.

After listening to Ferit’s explanation, the stationmaster asked, “So why were you and your wife traveling in different carriages?”

“My wife is expecting. I wanted her to travel first class.”

“There are first-class compartments on every carriage.”

“But I just explained to you. Our carriage is special. It’s carrying Turks who want to return to Turkey from France. It’s very crowded.”

“I don’t know why all these Turks are so keen to go home in these crowded conditions, especially when they’ve been living in Paris,” he said sarcastically.

“They’re running away from the war.”

“But there’s no fighting in France.”

“Don’t you think we’re going through war?”

“Of course, but France is not at war.”

“This is wartime,
Mein Herr
. It can spread anywhere at any moment.”

“It can also spread to your country.”

“We’re neutral, and we’re doing our utmost to keep it that way, despite the Allies’ insistence that we change our attitude.”

“You don’t say.”

“Yes. For instance, we’re selling chrome to Germany, even though Britain is not at all happy about it.”

“Don’t try to change the subject. You said you wanted your wife to travel first class, yet her compartment was just as crowded.”

“How could I have known in advance that that would be the case?”

“So who exactly are these passengers traveling in this special carriage of yours? Are they Jews?”

“Most of them are Muslim Turks. There are some who are Jewish or Christian. But they’re Turkish citizens, born and bred in Turkey.”

“Is that so?” the German said with a provocative smile.

“Surely,
Mein Herr
, you don’t think for a moment that at a time when Turkey is struggling so hard to remain neutral she would provide a carriage for the transportation of Jews? There’s a saying we use in Turkish: ‘Even the crows would laugh.’ ”

The German burst into laughter. He seemed to appreciate the joke. Because Evelyn couldn’t speak German, she sat by her husband listening, but not understanding one word.

“In that case, if I were to off-load those few Jews, Turkey surely wouldn’t mind.”

“I’m afraid that’s where you’re totally wrong. Turkey fought for the right to have her citizens returned from the camps, even in France. If you did such a thing, that would be your decision, but I’d have to report your actions to our embassy in Berlin. The embassy would have to make all sorts of inquiries and then send officials here to deal with the matter. We could all be stranded here for days. Not only that, but we’d delay one of your lines as well. All this for the sake of a few people. Is it worth it, I ask you? If it were up to me, frankly, you could take them all.”

“Didn’t you say earlier that Turkey wouldn’t jeopardize her position providing a carriage for Jews? Would she now go to all that trouble for a handful of them?”

“It’s a question of prestige,
Mein Herr
. Because we are a secular nation, we have to be seen by the world to be abiding by the rules of our constitution. As for providing a carriage for the Jews, surely no one can accuse Turkey for helping its stranded citizens. You understand this is just a token gesture, don’t you?”

“You certainly have a gift for bullshitting. I’m letting you go, because your documents are in perfect order and your wife is pregnant. Make sure you’re not a nuisance to your fellow passengers or the station personnel inside our borders. Is that clear?”

“Yes, of course,
Mein Herr,
rest assured.”

“Now take your wife and make sure she sits next to you for the rest of the journey.”

Ferit and Evelyn left the stationmaster’s office hand in hand, walking toward the Star and Crescent carriage waiting at the far end of the station.

“Why didn’t you tell me the truth, Ferit?” asked Evelyn.

“I didn’t want to put you in any danger.”

“Why would it be dangerous for me to travel in a carriage sent by Turkey to pick up Turks?”

“That’s not the whole story. There are people on board who have Turkish passports but who aren’t Turkish. If they’re found out, I didn’t want you to be traveling in the same carriage.”

“You made a big mistake,” Evelyn said. She was surprised to be feeling mixed emotions, both relieved and frightened at the same time.

At the end of the asphalt platform, passage became difficult. Stumbling over the railway lines, they held onto each other and walked toward the distant, dim yellow light.

People were leaning over one another, trying to look out of the windows. When they saw Ferit and Evelyn, they all applauded enthusiastically. Evelyn was taken aback. The conductor standing by the carriage door asked to see her ticket. Ferit wanted to tell him to mind his own business, because this carriage was the property of his country, but he put on his most courteous manner and presented it.

“Here you are. Paid for all the way through to Istanbul.”

“Is there room inside?”

“She’ll sit on my lap,” Ferit said, winking at the man.

As they passed Selva’s compartment, Ferit turned to Asseo and said, “I want it to be known, Monsieur Asseo—I expect a concert to celebrate our return.”

It wasn’t until the following morning that the carriage was on its way. The Star and Crescent carriage was hitched to a freight train destined for Bucharest. They would be traveling at a slower speed, but there were no scheduled stops on the way, which was a great relief to them all. Even if they were stopped randomly by the SS, the checks would be less stringent now. They would travel via Leipzig, Prague, Bratislava, Budapest, and finally Bucharest. Once they reached Bucharest, those going to Köstence would disembark, and those going on to Istanbul would wait to be connected to another engine.

Waiting, escaping, hiding, and waiting again for another departure, another way out; going, going, without resting; scattered to the four corners of the world, seeking refuge in every corner, struggling for survival. Uprooting, having to go somewhere else again. Was this the price to pay for not having a motherland?

Old Asseo’s eyes were closed. Those in the compartment thought he was sleeping, but he was only thinking. The train was going through countries neighboring his motherland, the motherland he hadn’t been able to return to since he was twelve.

Lech was born in Poland. His father had died when he was ten. Then his mother had met a German engineer while she was working as a secretary. They’d married and moved to Germany, taking Lech with them. Lech’s stepfather had been kind to him. He had sent his stepson to the Salzburg Music Academy when he realized Lech had a talent for music. Lech studied diligently so as not to let his stepfather down. His greatest ambition was to join the Vienna Philharmonic as a violinist.

When his mother gave birth to his brother, Lech was fifteen. Lech was never jealous of his brother, and when his brother started
school, they found out he was a genius. At this time, his stepfather died of a heart attack quite suddenly, much like his own father. After the funeral, when they returned home, his mother held his head between her hands.

“From now on, Lech, you must be your brother’s father. I’m entrusting him to you. I want you to protect him the way your stepfather protected you.”

From that day on, Lech abandoned his dream of becoming a famous violinist. He played anywhere where he’d be paid so that his brother could study. He played for his brother to continue his education in the best intermediate schools; he played to pay for summer schools, for special tuition, to see his brother through university. He kept playing and playing the violin, and never married. He had no children, but he never regretted anything. From the age of twenty, he had felt that his brother was his son. His brother’s success was his own success; his happiness was Lech’s happiness.

His brother managed to get his master’s in America through scholarships, and everyone expected that he would settle there, but instead he returned to Germany because he wanted to give back to his own country. He got married and started a family, and from that time on he and his family enjoyed happy days full of hope. Lech’s brother had reached the peak of his career. He had become famous, successful, and very wealthy. Lech’s sacrifices hadn’t been in vain. It was too late by then to follow his own dreams, but he had no regrets.

In Germany the brother lived happily and comfortably until Hitler came on the scene. Then all hell broke loose. The family first ran away to Belgium. When the brother lost one of his sons in a street skirmish, the family escaped to France, where he was offered an important teaching post at a university in Paris. They settled in well and got used to living there, until Hitler arrived. Then they fled south, farther and farther south. His wife, who had been ill since the loss of her son, finally lost the will to live during one of these flights and died.

This was just another example of the Jews’ endless flight, a flight that had lasted for five thousand years! The Germans were everywhere. They seemed to permeate Europe like smoke: Holland, Belgium, Poland, France, Czechoslovakia, Austria, and Hungary. There was no getting away. The Germans seemed to be working like a malignant cancer, spreading through the organs of a body. People were continuously on the run, running away under assumed names and holding false passports. Lech had reached the point where he only wanted to rest his tired, miserable body, to find peace pushing up the daisies. He wanted to rest somewhere in the Promised Land, away from German soldiers, SS officers, the Gestapo, and the collaborators.

Asseo became so tired of thinking that he eventually fell asleep. Four SS officers boarded the train. He didn’t hear Rafo and Ferit arguing with them.