The Oracle of Stamboul (13 page)

She took hold of the banister with her free hand and made her way carefully down the stairs to a room with a small iron door bolted into the wall. Not much taller than herself and only about twice as wide, the door was rusted orange around the bolts and frosted with a layer of dust. It was rather warm to the touch and looked as if it hadn’t been opened in a long while. The source of the breeze, she saw, was a crack between the frame of the door and the wood of the house—a result, she supposed, of the house settling into its foundation. There was a small sliver of daylight streaming through the crack, and the smell of hay pervaded the space around it. Glancing back over her shoulder, Eleonora knocked at the center of the door. It made a deep, hollow sound, like a large bell. She put her ear to it, but aside from the echo of her own knock, she couldn’t hear anything. Eleonora stood for a long while with her hand on the
door handle before deciding not to venture through, into what she imagined was the Bey’s stables. That was enough exploring for one day, she told herself as she scurried back up the stairs and retraced her steps along the corridor. Indeed, it was more than enough for one day.

Summer slipped into Stamboul under the cover of a midday shower. It took up residence near the foundations of the Galata Bridge and drifted through the city like a stray dog. Ducking in and out of alleyways, the new season made itself felt in the tenacity of fruit flies buzzing about a pyramid of figs, in the increasingly confident tone of the muezzin, and the growing petulance of shopkeepers in the produce market. Summer could be found in the sticky smell of cherry sherbet, in roast squab, and in rotting loquats. Like a freshly tanned hide pulled tighter and tighter, each day was imperceptibly longer than the previous, each morning earlier, and the sun stronger. Trees budded, bloomed, and gave fruit, while the straits were busy with migratory birds. Wave upon wave of hawk, stork, swallow, and cormorant flocked up the Bosporus on their way to old breeding grounds in Europe.

Gazing out on those languid straits, Eleonora watched a cast of white-collared falcons ride unseen gusts of warm air like bumps in the road. She saw a swoop of black kites steer between the domes of the Süleymaniye Mosque and a siege of snake-necked purple herons spread their wings wide as the caïques below. That morning, in the back recesses of the Bey’s library, she had discovered a calfskin-bound copy of William Swainson’s
On the Natural History and Classification of Birds
. Matching his lithographs to what she saw out the window, she was able to identify the falcons, the kites,
and the herons as well as a convocation of white-tailed eagles and a lone peregrine falcon with a seabird in its talons.

As the sun softened and dipped into the trees behind Üsküdar, Eleonora saw a flash of amethyst at the corner of her eye, and a purple hoopoe with a crown of white-striped feathers landed on her windowsill. The bird cocked its head to the left as if indicating a point of interest, and she watched her flock come into view around the bend of the Golden Horn. As they steered toward her, looping and darting through the orange-gray sky, Eleonora felt something give inside her, like an ice floe breaking up. When she opened the window, the scout flew off to join its brethren.

Pushing a strand of hair from her eyes, she rested her elbows on the windowsill and watched the dusk unfold beneath her. That evening, the city felt charged with the energy of a new purpose. Instead of flagging with the sun, as it usually did, the boat traffic seemed to rise, and the passengers appeared anxious to get where they were going. She noticed a team of men stringing what looked like lanterns between the minarets of the New Mosque. And a series of barges docked along the Beşiktaş Pier. By the time the bottom of the sun touched the horizon, the city was empty. The Bosporus was shorn of boat traffic and the roads empty of carriage. The hawkers were quiet; the only sound she heard was the steady bleating of a lamb tied up outside the Beşiktaş Mosque. Then, as the last light of day escaped beneath the curve of the horizon, just as the sun disappeared, a cannon blast rang out from the vicinity of Topkapi Palace. Eleonora fell to the floor in fright and, struggling under her desk, covered her head with her hands. If there were more cannon shots, if there was a war, she wanted to be as safe as possible.

She was in this same position when Monsieur Karom came to her door with dinner.

“Is everything all right?” he asked, placing her tray on the bedside table.

Eleonora reached above her and fished a piece of paper out of the top drawer.

The cannon.

Monsieur Karom stifled a smile.

“The cannon shot,” he said, helping her up, “marks the end of the fasting period. Today is the first day of Ramadan. You knew that, didn’t you?”

Eleonora shook her head. She knew about Ramadan, the fasting during the day and the sumptuous meals at night, but she had never heard of using a cannon to mark the end of the fasting period. What Muslims there were left in Constanta employed a pious man to tromp through the town beating a large drum.

“Yes,” said Monsieur Karom. He leaned out the open window and peered down at the barges. “You will have a perfect view of the fireworks.”

Eleonora ate her lentil soup alone at her desk, watching stars light up the empty darkness like so many wordless candles. Stamboul was silent for the length of her dinner. Then, as she was finishing her date pastry, the city burst to life. The lanterns strung between the minarets of the New Mosque were lit, spelling out the words
HAPPY RAMADAN
. Sherbet vendors and fortune-tellers set up stalls along the water. Tents of swirling red and blue fabric sprung up in the courtyard of every neighborhood mosque. The streets filled with young children and their parents, cousins, great-uncles, and older boys in ragged packs pushing through the crowd. The first firework went up with the sound of a yowling cat and exploded in a burst of green. Then there was another, this one white, and the crowd let out a cheer. Launched from the barges beneath Eleonora’s window, shoots of red, blue, green,
and white illuminated the Ramadan night sky with smoky phosphorescence, continuing with the festivities until dawn.

Whether it was the sight of her flock that evening, the beginning of summer, Ramadan, or something else entirely, Eleonora didn’t know. All she knew was that she felt different now. Standing in front of her closet that next morning, she touched a bare floorboard with the tip of her big toe and shivered. She had woken up late, and sleep lingered still at the corners of her eyes, but however sleepy she was, she could not deny that something inside her had shifted, the ice sea was breaking up. She stood considering her closet for a long while—a pale garden of silk, lace, and chiffon, seeded at the far left with a boy’s wool suit—before choosing an elegant light purple dress from her second visit to Mme. Poiret. Slipping the dress over her head, she stepped into a matching pair of shoes and turned to look at herself in the mirror. Without Mrs. Damakan’s assistance, she couldn’t properly fasten the back of the dress, but she went downstairs regardless. There was something she intended to ask Moncef Bey and she wanted to do it now, before she lost her nerve.

“Good morning, Miss Cohen.”

The Bey had already begun his breakfast, and was spreading cherry preserves on a piece of bread.

Good morning
, she wrote on a scrap of paper. She paused for a moment and looked up at him, then continued with her question.
Moncef Bey, may I come with you today? Out to Pera? I promise I won’t be a bother.

He tightened his gaze and rested the jammy knife on the edge of his plate.

“Of course,” he said. “You are always welcome to join me. And you are never a bother. I only worry you will be bored.”

I won’t be bored. Not at all. And I will be as quiet as a mouse.

The Bey took up his knife again. Spreading the remaining preserves on the edge of the bread, he broke off a piece of crumbly white cheese.

“All right then,” he said. “But you must promise to keep quiet as a mouse.”

She nodded her agreement and the Bey turned to Monsieur Karom.

“Tell the stable boys to prepare the carriage. Miss Cohen will be joining me.”

“Yes, sir,” the butler replied, bowing out of the room.

Before either of them could reconsider, Eleonora found herself seated in the Bey’s carriage, watching the world pass through the latticework screen. As the last yellow of his house receded behind the Beşiktaş Mosque, she felt a cord inside her tug and snap. She had left. She was outside, a cool touch of wind on her forearm and the sharp, salty smell of the Bosporus in her nose. Purple wildflowers lined the edge of the road and the clouds overhead were white as spun sugar. She folded her hands in her lap, following along with the mosques and municipal buildings, mansions, fountains, plane trees, and fishermen. They passed a donkey pulling a cart laden with mounds of bright orange loquat, a string of Ramadan tents, and the remnants of the festivities from the night before. Eleonora looked down at her hands, her own open palms. She cupped her face and inhaled their soft soapiness.

“We must disembark here,” said the Bey as the carriage rolled to a stop. “Beyond this, the streets are too steep.”

The Galata funicular station was just a few steps from where the carriage stopped. Shaded by a gilded grotto of pink and yellow tile, European ladies, their porters, and an assortment of uniformed men stood in groups of two or three. Glancing occa
sionally at the dark cavern from which their train was supposed to emerge, the passengers spoke in hushed tones and watched each other with suspicion. After a few minutes, a gas light appeared at the top edge of the tunnel. With a pneumatic screech, the red-lacquer trolley stuttered to a halt in front of them. They boarded the front car and, although there was little to see through the darkness, Eleonora rode the whole way with her nose against the glass, straining to make out what lay ahead.

“Here we are,” the Bey announced when the funicular stopped and they filed out of the station.

Pera was just as Eleonora had remembered it. The arcades were draped with painted cloth banners. Store windows jostled to advertise the new summer stock. And posh ladies glided up the boulevard in their dainty cream-colored dresses. She felt as if she were surfacing finally after a long dive, emerging from the silent, watery depths of herself into a hot and salty world. As she stood at the base of La Grande Rue de Pera, taking it all in, Eleonora felt the weight of a new sadness crushing down on her. She had stood in this very place with her father just a few months ago. He had taken her hand and walked with her up the boulevard. The tears welled up in her eyes as she recalled his smell, the feeling of his palm against the back of her neck. She and the Bey stood for a moment in silence. When it passed, Eleonora wiped her tears away. The Bey offered her two fingers. She reached up to take them, and they walked together up the boulevard toward the Café Europa.

Holding the red double doors for her, the Bey led Eleonora through the clattering, smoke-filled main room of the café, out the back door, and down a steep wooden staircase into a cobbled patch of foliage he called the back garden. As they descended, Eleonora noticed shreds of green-and-white fabric waving from
the handrail, perhaps the scattered remnants of a Ramadan celebration. A pair of wizened old men in fezzes smoked narghiles under an almond tree, and directly beneath the staircase, a bespectacled young European man read the paper while his companion took notes in a small book. The Bey chose a table near the back of the garden, next to an empty birdbath, and they gave their orders to the waiter: two teas and a croissant. When the waiter left, the young man who had been taking notes approached their table with a backgammon board under his arm. He was a slight, nervous man dressed in a short blue frock coat, light gray pants, and a velvet smoking cap embroidered with tiny flowers. Eleonora couldn’t quite place his accent, but it hinted toward the Caucasus. After exchanging a brief stream of greetings with the Bey, he pulled up a chair and began setting up the board. As he did, a stark-white cat with one blue eye and one yellow eye jumped into his lap. He stroked it absently with one hand, and with the other continued setting up the game.

Glancing into the cat’s eerily unmatched eyes, Eleonora sat on her hands, the cold black metal of the chair indenting itself into her palms. This was not how she had expected the Café Europa to look, this sleepy tableaux of iron furniture and vines. She wasn’t sure exactly what she had imagined, but it was not this. In any case, it was nice to be outside. There was so much she had forgotten. The warmth of the sun on her neck, the smell of grapes. As she took in her surroundings, the call to prayer echoed out across the city like a low, wispy cloud, and a member of her flock landed at the edge of the table. It stayed for a moment, twitched its head at the cat, and flew off, but neither the Bey nor his opponent noticed.

“Three-four,” said the young man and bumped one of the Bey’s pieces off the board.

The Bey scooped up the dice and blew into the cavity of his palm. He needed a five or a one to bring the bumped piece back into the game.

“The Viceroy,” said the Bey’s opponent, referring apparently to a previous strand of conversation. “He is not without options.”

“Indeed,” said the Bey. He rolled, a three-five, and moved the bumped piece back onto the board. “But perhaps the best option is to wait.”

“One can only wait for so long.”

For a few rolls, the two men played in silence. The Bey was winning. His pieces were unexposed and moving steadily toward home. Leaning in, Eleonora let herself fall into the rhythm of the game, the clatter of pieces and the click of the dice. She burrowed into it as she might a dense philosophical argument, letting the walls of the simple wood board close around her. A breeze rustled through the vines and she could feel the warmth of the chair against her shoulders.

“I see you are not fasting for Ramadan,” said the young man, indicating the tea and croissant.

The Bey stirred his tea and sipped it.

“No,” he said. “I abandoned that practice many years ago. Though I would prefer you not mention my lack of observance to any of our colleagues. Fasting for Ramadan is like tithing. No one truly does it, but society depends on the illusion that we all do.”

“Surely the lumpen classes fast.”

“They might,” said the Bey pensively, rubbing the dice together. “But I can guarantee no one you know does.”

“And your young friend?”

Eleonora was raising a piece of croissant to her lips.

“What about her?”

“Is she not Muslim?”

“No,” said the Bey. “She is a Jewess.”

He paused, weighing whether this explanation would suffice. When he saw that it would not, he continued.

“She is the daughter of my former business partner, Yakob Cohen. You remember the boat accident a few months ago?”

“The one the Tsar is upset about?”

The Bey nodded. He did not, apparently, need to elaborate beyond this. Their conversation continued, thrusting and parrying obliquely around the cause of the boat accident, for a few more rolls. When they had reached a stalemate, the young man turned to face Eleonora directly.