Divorce Turkish Style (4 page)

“Don't I just!” I said. “Especially Turkish mothers and sons.”

One of the reasons I'd settled in Istanbul was that my lover's mother couldn't accept her son being abroad with a “foreigner”. To her dying day, the poor woman did her best to prise us apart, and then pegged out before seeing us separate.

“What did Sani Hanım do? I mean at the office in Tünel,” I asked.

“People with loads of money never know what to do with themselves,” said Murat sullenly, possibly out of jealousy. “Cem was into extreme sports like bungee jumping, skateboarding, mountaineering and so on. I think Sani tried to keep up with him. You know, ‘anything you can do, I can do better'.”

“You mean she organized extreme sports tours? In her office at Tünel?”

“Tours? No, no! Sani organized trips for people interested in environmental issues. She set up an environmental association called GreTur to fight against pollution in Thrace.”

“Interesting. Did they have any success?”

“You heard what happened to the Ergene Basin, didn't you?”

“Of course,” I said. “Leather workshops and factories were set up there without proper clean-up facilities, causing an unbearable stench and the destruction of first-class agricultural land.”

“Well, at least Sani achieved something,” said Murat. “A few years ago, hardly anyone could have placed the Ergene Basin on the map.”

2

As soon as we left Murat's office, I called the shop to see if Pelin was there. She said a group of Spaniards had just been in and bought up our entire stock of Spanish crime fiction.

“Hey, Fofo! You missed a group of Spanish tourists at the shop,” I said.

Fofo loved having opportunities to chat to his compatriots.

“Never mind Spanish tourists. What do you think about Sani?” he said.

“What can I say? It's interesting. As an industrial engineer with an American PhD, she could have had a marvellous career, yet—”

“Having married into the Ankaralıgil family, she probably didn't want to work for a rival company, but at the same time didn't want to work under her husband.”

“Very likely,” I said, my attention more on the rumblings of my empty stomach than Sani Ankaralıgil.

“What do you say to calling in at her office?”

“Let's eat something on the way,” I said.

“It'll only take two minutes. Two more minutes of hunger won't harm you,” persisted Fofo.

“Okay, but let's avoid the main road and go by the backstreets.”

“Do you really think the backstreets are any better? At least on the main road there's room to escape if a truck comes along. Come on, let's go!” said my dear friend, tugging at the sleeve of my cashmere sweater.

*

The Tünel Business Centre was like a labyrinth. We lost our way twice in its dark corridors before finding the GreTur office.

“I wonder what GreTur means?”

“Probably an abbreviation of Green Turkey or something.”

“Aren't you the smart one?” remarked Fofo.

Was he mocking me?

After passing rows of brown doors, we finally came to one with a small GreTur plaque on it.

“We should have eaten something first,” I said despondently. “Anyway, we've found the office. Now what?”

“How often does Professor Langdon eat in
Angels and Demons
?”

“How should I know? Do you think I count every mouthful consumed by Dan Brown's heroes?”

“He drinks a glass of hot chocolate on page three and has his first meal on page 710. There are pages and pages without even a mention of hunger. The man even parachutes out of a plane on an empty stomach. This business takes discipline and professionalism.”

“Okay, but I don't subscribe to puritan self-denial,” I protested.

“Nor did Professor Langdon. Now ring the bell and let's get this over with,” said Fofo.

I reached out for the doorbell, but my hand stopped in mid-air.

“Oh, that's just great!” I exclaimed, elbowing Fofo back out of the way.

Fofo's expression changed from bewilderment at my apparent hesitation to wide-eyed apprehension on seeing that the door latch was broken and dangling uselessly.

“Someone's been here before us,” I whispered.

“Didn't I tell you?” whispered Fofo in reply.

“What?”

“That it was hotting up.”

Deciding not to argue with him, I knocked at the door.

It immediately swung open and a young woman, her eyes red from crying, stood before us as if she'd been waiting for someone to knock. I instantly assumed that she was a secretary, though I was later to question why I'd jumped to that conclusion so quickly. Perhaps it was the air of transience about her. Something was odd. She didn't look as though she belonged there, and would certainly never have been a contender for an office manager prize. Giving the appearance of being a visitor at one's place of work isn't exactly the best way to advance a career. At my shop, the situation was quite the opposite, because my employees were so involved that I was almost redundant. But that's another matter.

The state of the office looked no more promising than the woman. Files, papers, folders and general office paraphernalia were strewn all over the floor. The woman looked me, as if expecting me to say something.

I cleared my throat, in preparation for telling a little white lie.

“We've come to enrol as members of GreTur,” I said, peering into the office as if I'd only just noticed the chaos, and asked with feigned concern, “What's happened here?”

“I thought you were the police,” said the woman.

Even the humblest of employees should have recognized that Fofo and I were not the police. Still, our appearance was irrelevant.

“I'm waiting for the police,” she said. “We're not allowed to touch anything.”

“Looks like a break-in,” said Fofo, “but what would anyone steal from an office?”

“What do you think? They've taken the computers.”

“There was a security guy downstairs when we entered the building,” I said, craftily nudging the woman inside. “Isn't anyone on duty during the night?”

“I don't know if it was night or day when the burglary happened. We weren't open on Saturday because it was our president's funeral that day, God rest her soul.”

“Why do things all happen at once like that?” I mused sympathetically.

“Was your president elderly?” asked Fofo, with an air of innocence.

I had difficulty suppressing a smile.

“No, she was young. You must have read about her in the papers – Sani Ankaralıgil,” replied the woman.

“Ah yes, of course. My condolences. We obviously couldn't have chosen a worse time to apply for membership,” said Fofo.

“We don't take members, anyway.”

“What do you mean?” said Fofo. “All associations are out to increase their membership, collect subscriptions and encourage members to outdo each other with voluntary work like organizing dinners, giving tea parties, holding sales of hand-knitted socks and home-made paper lampshades—”

“Why don't you take members?” I asked, interrupting Fofo's foolish patter.

“There are three of us working here. Sani Hanım is president, Aylin Hanım is vice-president, and there's me. I answer the phone and deal with correspondence. You know, general office work.”

“Yes, but that doesn't explain why your association doesn't have members.”

“Well, that's what I was told,” she said with an air of finality, obviously hoping to close the subject.

“Didn't you ask why?”

“It's illegal for an association to have no members,” said Fofo, almost threateningly.

The woman looked hard at Fofo, then me, before collapsing
onto a chair. She seemed truly distressed by the idea that the association might have been operating illegally, yet her reaction seemed altogether too naive and extreme for the twenty-first century.

“I don't know what I'm saying any more. I've been all over the place since yesterday, so why don't you come back later?”

“We can wait with you until the police come. That is, if you don't like being here alone…” I said, with an angelic expression.

The woman's face lit up.

“Oh, would you? I've got a terrible headache,” she said, and tears started rolling down her cheeks right on cue. “I'm scared they'll think I did it. No one had a key to the office apart from us three.”

“You mean Sani, Aylin and you?” I asked.

She nodded.

“But they didn't enter with a key. They broke the lock. Why would anyone think you did it?”

The woman was clearly very ingenuous. No one could put on such a convincing act.

“You're right,” she said, brightening up. “They didn't come in with a key, so why would they think I did it? Rich people always make me feel so guilty. If they have anything you don't have, they act as if you're about to run off with it. Oh, I don't know, I just panicked when I saw the place had been burgled.”

“It obviously had nothing to do with you, so stop worrying,” said Fofo, placing a comforting hand on her shoulder. “But I know exactly what you mean. My boss rules my life with an iron rod.”

“Women bosses are the worst,” said the secretary.

Fantastic! Not only was she anti-rich, she was also a misogynist.

“So it was your bosses who told you not to register members?” asked Fofo, trying to coax a bit more out of the secretary.

“Yes. But they're right, whatever you're thinking. I've worked for other associations and I know what it's like. Friends and relatives start turning up and wanting to make changes. They register as members and then, before you know it, they've formed a majority, overturned the board of directors, and are running it themselves.”

“Like political parties,” I commented and, since the woman obviously had no idea what I meant, I turned to Fofo and continued, “It's the members who elect the delegates and delegates who elect the chairman. Therefore, the chairman surrounds himself with delegates who support him. That way, he remains in the chair until he dies. How do you think third-rate people keep getting themselves elected?”

“Yes, that's how it works. But how else can it be done?” said the woman.

“What was on the computers that were stolen?”

“Everything. We kept everything on the computers.”

“What kind of things?”

“Lists of the factories and workshops polluting the Ergene Basin, letters to factory owners and petitions to attorneys. Sani Hanım was preparing court cases against many of the factories and went round speaking to the villagers, often a couple of times a week. Her father and sister, who live out there, are both environmentalists too. She put a lot of effort into it.”

“So the names and addresses of villagers who supported her were on those computers.”

The woman nodded.

“Was it difficult to persuade the villagers?”

“That was the hardest part. Even though Sani Hanım grew up there, she still found it difficult. Villagers either just don't care, or their children work at the factories and are bringing in steady money. They don't want to get into a fight with the factory boss,
even if their land and farm equipment are being affected. They're right, of course, if you think about it, because the rich always come out on top.”

“Who's the lawyer for your association?”

“Aylin Hanım's husband Remzi Bey was going to take care of everything. As I said, Aylin Hanım is our vice-president.”

“I suppose Aylin will look in today, since there's been a burglary?”

“No, she won't. She went abroad after the funeral. I let Remzi Bey know about the burglary, but he's busy with other work and isn't likely to show up here.”

“What's Aylin Hanım's surname?”

“Aköz. It was Aylin Hanım who introduced Sani Hanım to her husband. I overheard them say that once. When Aylin Hanım's father was living in America…” said the secretary, tailing off at the sight of two uniformed policemen.

The policemen looked us over as if we were all suspects.

“Did you call the police?” asked the shorter of the two policemen.

“What a mess! You have quite a job on your hands here, madam,” said the other.

I think the term “madam” was intended for me, but I pretended not to notice.

“It was me who called you,” said the secretary, jumping up from her chair. “There's been a burglary.”

“Sorry to hear that. What did they take?”

“They took the computers, messed up all the files, and threw things about so it's impossible to tell what's here and what isn't.”