The Gaze (18 page)

Annabelle’s twin brother, her mother and her father lined up in the courtyard and watched the troupe move off into the distance. When the carriages turned the corner and disappeared, the three of them sighed with relief. Only the village woman who’d once been her nurse and who hadn’t left the mansion since was concerned about her and called out to them: ‘Where are you taking her?’ The owner of the troupe replied cheerfully without taking his eyes off her full breasts.

‘To the East! To the city of Istanbul.’

The men entering Keramet Mumî Keşke Memiş Efendi’s cherry-coloured tent through the eastward-facing door one by one were here to see the dazzling La Belle Annabelle, the great beauty, the only beautiful
jinn
of the poisonous yew forest. She was the last to take the stage. Before her there were other beauties.

The opening was performed by the masked woman. The mask she wore was truly marvellous with the lock of hair on its forehead, its almond eyes, arrow eyelashes, inkwell nose, cherry lips, the dimple flowered for its smile and with the candy pink spreading across its cheeks. She stood on the stage without saying a word or doing anything. It was as if she had been told to wait, and she was obeying and waiting without knowing why or for what. Then, at the least expected moment, she dropped the mask on her face. A cry of amazement rose from the audience. The face they saw now was exactly the same as the one they’d seen before. The faint sound of a distant violin was heard. When the violin stopped playing, the beautiful woman whose mask was her face, her face her mask, saluted the audience in a graceful manner. At her sign, the purple-fringed curtains opened slowly.

While the spring breeze was blowing on the ivy swing hanging from the branches of a wild pear tree in the middle of the blood-red poppy field, and the sun was setting on the horizon, a tiny lady star danced
kanto
, rabbits frolicked and butterflies flew around her. Her name was Hayganoş; her voice was shrill.

When the
kanto
ended, the wild pear tree started walking; it stepped aside with Hayganoş swinging on its branches, the blood-red poppy field round it, the rabbits and butterflies following. While Hayganoş was getting drowsy, the three beauties took the stage. The three beautiful sisters, each more beautiful than the other: Lisa, Maria, Rosa. Lisa, Maria, Rosa. All three sisters were so beautiful that whenever they stood side-by-side, they diminished each other’s beauty. Even so, they never separated for a moment, and had never known jealousy. Their hearts were as beautiful as their appearance. Arm in arm, smiles on their faces, flowers flowering in their smiles, they sang songs of how beautiful life was, songs that flowed like a thick liquid. At this point of the show, which went on and on, the teeth of the audience were set on the edge, everybody became bored. Everything was so smooth, so clear, that some of the victims of fate whose lives had gone wrong had to restrain themselves from jumping onto the stage and assaulting the three sisters.

Then, Hoyrat Aruzyak jumped onto the stage. Rather she opened layer by layer just like a seducing skirt instead of jumping upon to the stage. Of all of those who performed in the cherry-coloured tent, she was the most experienced on the stage. She was still just a little child when she first appeared in front of an audience; her hair was curly and golden. As she grew up, she became more beautiful, as she became more beautiful, she became more seductive, and was soon famous throughout the huge city. Stepping on the hearts she’d broken, she moved from one troupe to another, from one embrace to another, adding the sugar of passionate kisses to the sulphurous taste of life. She liked glittering jewellery, bright dresses, ostentation and compliments. Not paying attention to what people said, fulfilling every wish of her flesh, she got whatever she wanted in the world, and more. She knew by heart the secret passages, shortcuts and alleyways of the city of love. However, one day, unexpectedly, the gates of this city were closed to her.

When this event that turned her life upside-down occurred, Hoyrat Aruzyak was on stage. Her role called for her to weep at the edge of the stage while two musketeers drew their swords and fought over her. She was in tears on the edge of the stage while two musketeers drew their swords and were fighting for her. As they had performed the same play for months, there was no chance she would forget her lines. But she did; no one ever understood why. All of a sudden, though there was no such part in the play, Hoyrat Aruzyak jumped up with a shrill cry and jumped between the two musketeers. At the same moment, the hostile swords met on her face. Not only in the play, but also in life, the swords of the two men who hated each other because they were in love with the same woman caused wounds along the length of each side of the face of the woman they had been pursuing. Hoyrat Aruzyak fell to the middle of the stage in pain.

The curtains descended, the audience left but the pain remained. Hoyrat Aruzyak could not hold a mirror any more, she could not look at her face again. There was no need though; she could see how she looked in the eyes of her friends and enemies. She attempted suicide many times, but she was always rescued by the former fans who appeared wherever she went. She didn’t want to live, but couldn’t manage to die. She could not bear that the women who used to smile at her even though they were envious now looked at her face in pain and smiled inside. She was harsh to anyone who showed her compassion. She learned words she hadn’t previously known. As her heart grew harder, her words became sharper. Because she spoke her mind without thinking, no one wanted her near. In any event, she dropped out of sight after a while. It was said that from time to time she was seen near expensive restaurants, knocking at the doors of acquaintances and begging, throwing stones at theatre companies whose stages she had once graced, doing anything imaginable in exchange for a drink. Even though the things she did were spoken about, she was being forgotten even as she was being spoken about, and lurched through their memories like a restless ghost.

‘Sometimes…suddenly, out of the blue, we’re wounded. But all wounds heal. In time, a scab forms and covers it. It hides itself. Because no wound wants to be seen.’

Hoyrat Aruzyak was sitting on the pavement. She was apathetic. She did not raise her head to look at the person talking to her. She hated those who gave her advice even though it was none of their concern, the ones who said how beautiful life was in spite of everything.

‘At least your pupils weren’t damaged. Because if your pupils are damaged, you can never see the world through the same eyes. You begin to see the bad side of everything. You’ll even be able to see dirt that’s remained hidden. Others will sense that you don’t see what they see, and also that you don’t love them any more. This makes them uneasy. They can no longer look at you through the same eyes. For this reason, no one wants to see you near them. In fact the picture is the same picture, what has changed is your eyes. If you can remove yourself from the picture, everything will be as it was before, and everyone will be relieved. In my opinion the best thing to do in cases like this is to leave. To leave and to keep going. Out of stubbornness!’

Hoyrat Aruzyak looked in amazement at the face of the man who was talking away at her. It was his face rather than his words that held her attention; or, to be precise, his eyes…his eyes which were like two thin slits, and which seemed as if at any moment they could deny anything he had said as if he believed it with all his heart. His eyes expressed no feeling whatsoever; neither mercy nor bitterness, neither anger nor hope. Because he never sowed any seeds, he never sought to reap any benefits. But at the same time he didn’t seem false. He wasn’t playing a game. Even Hoyrat Aruzyak thought that of all the people she’d ever met, she’d never seen anyone so far from being false. The eyes of the man standing in front of her were at least as real as those rare scenes in a play that make the audience forget they are in a theatre.

This is how Keramet Mumî Keşke Memiş Efendi entered Hoyrat Aruzyak’s life. In the following days, he never gave her a moment’s peace, and talked to her without pause. He also brought her acrid-smelling ointments and pastes made of mysterious ingredients. It didn’t seem as if these would cover up the wounds, but at least they weren’t as raw looking as when they’d been left untreated.

Then Keramet Mumî Keşke Memiş Efendi began bringing her the make-up that was used by the actresses in the tent. He covered the wounds with face powder and lively colours. For the first time in ages, Hoyrat Aruzyak had the courage to look at herself in a mirror again. She looked. She looked, and, like anyone who is seized by a desperate hope just at the point when they’ve become accustomed to being cowed, she cursed, first herself, then the person who had given her this hope. Nothing had changed. Both of the wounds were there just as ugly as ever. Keramet Mumî Keşke Memiş Efendi picked the mirror up and passed it to her stubbornly.

‘Your ugliness is beautiful enough to thrill us. Aruzyak, you are as beautiful as the night of the apocalypse. Take the stage! And play us a life that does not end in death.’

For a moment, Hoyrat Aruzyak was left looking at the inexpressive eyes of the man who was not at all like any man she’d ever met. She didn’t understand a word he said, but there was a tart taste in her mouth. As soon as she was alone, she unpacked the dresses she hadn’t touched for so long and tried them on one by one. And the next day, dragging her many trousseau boxes behind her, she honoured the cherry-coloured tent on top of the hill with her presence as if she were a princess visiting a palace in a neighbouring country. The first night she appeared on the stage, she was dumbstruck. The eyes of the audience shone like stars on a moonless night. A warmth she thought she’d forgotten long ago spread through her slowly. She hadn’t the patience to wait; she drank in the pleasure of winning approval. She was so merry that night!

From that day on, she waited her turn with a dignified smile and when the time came, she opened layer by layer just like a seductive skirt. The audience was thrilled. Hoyrat Aruzyak presented a night of the apocalypse on which life was killed and death was resurrected, on which men, women and children, indeed the entire population of the ruined city were massacred while its riches were being plundered, and while a baby lizard scurried about scattering seeds of hope that were as tender as its skin.

After Hoyrat Aruzyak, it was the turn of the snake-charmer. Every evening the snake charmer behaved as if he’d had to do something somewhere else first, and had come running at the last moment. As soon as he appeared on stage, the audience was invigorated to see the silver amulet on his biceps, the hoop on his ear and the silver belt round his waist. Even the scrawniest and most timid of them dreamt of rushing out into the streets and bellowing savagely. As the men daydreamed, the snake-charmer proceeded to the middle of the stage, frowned distractedly, bowed his head in salute, and lifted the lid of the basket. The snake emerged from the basket, slithered towards the edge of the stage, and stared with its emerald-green eyes. As it stared and stared, the audience began to see.

In the snake’s eyes, the world was reflected in reverse.

In the mirror of its eyes, widows were virgins and slaves were masters. The soil was playful; it tickled the souls lying beneath it. As long as hail flowered on tree branches, the cheeks of the birds with raindrops trembling on their feathers became redder with each glass, and copper coins were gems, and sack-cloth was satin. Rays of light that pierced the clouds tenderly embraced the old and the young, the rich and the poor alike. They were everywhere. They left a faint glitter on all they touched; they could use this faint glitter to weave golden crowns for their uncombed, unwashed heads. There was beauty even in the name of the most wicked man on earth, and a piece of heaven even in the most ravaged land. A startled silence echoes at the heart of every tumult. In the heart of all troubles a timid quietness echoes, at the end of every tunnel there’s an unexpected breath of freedom. Life begins as it ends; sometimes falling into the sky; sometimes rising up to the ground, stopping to catch its breath, warming itself in its own ashes. And when it was warm enough, it moved forward again; trudging on like a complex puzzle that did not like its own answer. As it remained, the people could continue to live. It didn’t matter whether the stay was long or short, because time wasn’t the issue.

This was a portrait of heaven; not of an afterlife but of the heaven at the heart of life.

At this point in the show, all of the men who had seen the reversed world in the eyes of the snake began sobbing; they wept more than they’d ever wept before, and in a way they’d never wept before. Most of them fell to their knees in remorse. The cool smell of cistern water filled the room. It was as if all evil would end, and all would be well. Even if for the briefest moment, all of the men in the tent felt they had the unique chance to be absolved of all their sins, and in order to demonstrate the sincerity of their desire for purification, they threw all of their money onto the stage. Then, the mirror closed just as it had opened. The snake-charmer bowed with a slight smile, deliberately picked up the money that had been thrown onto the stage and put it into his basket, and then, in contrast to his slowness of a moment before, rushed off the stage as if he was fleeing. The snake slithered after its master like a whistled melody.

After the snake-handler, Betri Han1m came on with her puppets. She had ten small puppets on her ten fingers. She would represent the natural world through them. She would become rain, and rain down blessings; become a rainbow and open a passage for the impossible; become a dew droplet and stroke the cheek of the grass, become a breeze and thrill the foot of the mountains, become herbs and restore to health; become snow and spread consolation in large flakes; become sun and cause swan-necked flowers to open; become fog and lower silvery curtains of mystery; become climate and have all of its conditions loved, become water and increase life. There was no favour that nature could not bestow on man.