Istanbul Was a Fairy Tale (86 page)

When they had decided to move to Asmalımecsit in the days that followed the fire, his father said: “We must have Lilica with us. She would be at a loss otherwise.” This was a request; a request expressed somewhat diffidently for the sake of their communal life and days gone by; the request of someone who had been compelled to hand over the function of ‘head of the family’ at the least expected moment. He had felt somewhat piqued . . . Anyhow, there was nothing to worry about, since any other alternative was out of question. He knew perfectly well that Lilica could not go on living all alone, torn from the family, that she could find shelter nowhere and that no stranger would be willing to give it to her. Aside from all these concerns, she had made herself a special room in his heart, of which his father had no idea; this fact was to remain a secret.

I believe Lilica had a history of her own, different from every member of the family.

She had had some difficulty in getting accustomed to her new abode, which had no garden or cistern; she couldn’t experience the smell of the sea; the apartment had no large shaded or spacious rooms. These scarcities had been felt by everybody in actual fact; but for her, it was a bit different as she had no secluded corner in this new apartment; she would have to live exposed henceforward. She had no other choice but to get used to the new circumstances. She would eventually make a room for herself, although there remained traces of a latent revolt buried in her despite the resignation and submission to her fate. She had lately developed a new habit: having finished her chores, she settled by the window of the living room and looked out at the street outside, at that well delineated narrow space, and kept muttering incomprehensible words, sometimes breaking into a wide applause until she felt exhausted; was she applauding someone outside or inside herself, it was impossible to determine. No one could identify the person she applauded. The first reaction of those who saw her had been disgruntlement but they tried not to let her take cognizance of it. His mother admonished her at times with such remarks as
“
Ayde! Ya basta loka!!
”
(Enough now! Silly fool!) or
“
Estate keda, bova arastada!
”
(Easy now, come on, cool it!), but to no avail. Despite occasional outbursts of temper, his mother had always been kind to her and that gave her the impression of a safe haven. There had been times when she broke down and began sobbing after long applauses. At such moments, his mother kept a low profile, trying to calm her down by gently coaxing her and saying soothing words like:
“
Ya eskapo hanumika, ya escapo . . . Ayde, va lavate la kara I ve a komer kon mozotros!
”
(Come, come; easy now! there’s a good girl! Come on, go and splash some water on your face and come to sit at the table with us!) These words calmed her down, she was soothed to hear that she would be eating with the entire household at the same table; she suddenly assumed the air of a little girl pardoned for her offense. His mother brought about this radical change in her; no one else could do it. However, in time, such an occurrence became a daily habit and everybody got accustomed to it. Different histories were being recorded through different touches, different voices, and different experiences.

Lilica was to have a long life. She would bear witness to many a death in the house. During her life, she would have the opportunity to applaud many a final exit through her introversion and unexpressed latent storms. Among those who had passed away, the loss of Nesim, Rachael, and their daughter was to be very hard for her. She had been among those who had felt these losses deeply and tried to find a room for them in herself; details difficult to explain and to which no one could simply plaster over. At such times, she used to sit by the window singing a song; or rather humming a tune to be precise; it was one of the songs she used to sing when she was busy washing him. Those times were known only to the two of them. Had Nesim been alive now, he would be the third person sharing the secret; the real meaning of the song had been disclosed by her only at the time. They had spoken of death only within the context of that song. The song mentioned a sea of milk, of milk alone.

The confessions of consul Fahri Bey

To the extent their power of imagination and their recollections allowed, everybody in his or her way had lived the experiences that the loss of Nesim, Rachael, and their daughter had given rise to, while the family was still living in the house at Asmalımescit. Theirs had been very different from other deaths. They had their witnesses and photographs at various places. The reason for the survival of these deaths must have been found in the photographs concealing their forms and voices. (He could never forget his experiences at that house at Salacak. How had he spotted that house? Why had he been so insistent on returning to that house after so many years, conscious of the fact that it would open up a scarred wound? It was certainly not so easy to share with people the memories of such a distant past. But man always wanted to acquire as much knowledge as possible about the people he loved, for whom he had felt special affection, whose place could never be filled. To acquire as much knowledge as possible, even though what he could glean brought along with it new pains and heartaches.)

Isidor had spoken about that elderly retired consul with some diffidence. Isidor was one of his true friends whom he paid occasional visits to enjoy the bracing sea breeze. The number of his acquaintances was great. His main line of business was the paper trade; but in actual fact he was a handyman; he settled the problems of people with the police in no time, the municipality, and the utilities. How come that he had known and endeared himself to all these people, what sort of relationships had he cultivated with them? Isidor never revealed. That was the rule of the game. Nobody could hazard a guess about who would lend an ear to whom. He also knew the story. It would be useful to appeal to him and hear what he had to say and have an insight into another aspect of the reality if possible. He had desired to prove to himself once again how attached he was to his acquaintances. To make headway toward that house meant striding in its direction; it also signified purposefully treading the path that led to the individual, to the hero, in a sense, concealed within him.

He would always bear in mind what he had heard from consul Fahri Bey; his words had given birth to his ghosts once more.

“I remember having saved a multitude of people. Difficult days they were. We had become accustomed to subsist in depths of misery and in the midst of massacres. I knew your elder brother. I’d been acquainted with him during a visit myself and my wife had paid to Biarritz. He had a shop, ‘Les bas Nisso’ it was called. We had heard of it quite by chance as we had been shopping elsewhere. He was nicknamed ‘Le petit Turc.’ We were curious to know more about him. We went to the address indicated; there he was in person. He welcomed us with great diligence and warmth. Then, he returned our visit in Paris when business took him there. We had a long talk. Developments were making us restless. The far-sighted had begun predicting the imminence of war. The approaching war portended far greater bloodshed than the first one and was pregnant with dreadful disasters. Yet, we had to face the fact that the turn of events were beyond our control. I distinctly remember. For the first time in my life, I’d seriously begun considering and brooding over what we called fate. Up until then, it had been my conviction that man was the maker of his own fate. I was perfectly convinced of it. But when faced with the hard facts . . . that was my philosophy on life. The fancy of your brother had conjured up a world, much different from the dystopia looming ahead . . . What was looming ahead did not tarry in showing up. We were in a position to save him up until the end of 1943. They had to decide to go back to Turkey or defect to another country on surer ground. I’d warned him. He relied on his German connections. He was prepossessing. The German language and culture were the
sine qua non
of his life. We had no inkling of the touchy situation reigning in the zones of death. We did, however, receive gloomy news that leaked out now and then; but frankly, we couldn’t imagine the extent of the abject horrors committed by the enemy. Perhaps, we were reluctant to believe them. How can I ever forget those terrible days . . . how strange . . . Your brother had an unshakable belief in his immunity. He was wrong. Those German ‘friends’ refused to extend him a helping hand. Everybody was in dread of the possible evil that might be looming ahead. We had all lost self-reliance. Everybody tried to save his own skin, hoping for the best on scanty evidence. We were all despondent. To cut a long story short, they were taken away exactly ten days after December 31, 1943. Just ten days . . . imagine! Years have gone by; like my peers I’m confusing certain details. I believe my memory is beginning to fail me. Whenever the said day, that specific time comes to my mind, I prefer to believe that my notes and warnings had surely not reached him. I don’t know why, really, I don’t. Am I trying to ease my conscience? Am I trying to find an excuse for my shortcoming? I don’t know . . . It may be self-justification perhaps . . .

“It isn’t altogether impossible; my notes may not have reached your brother; we were in the middle of a war, after all. Regardless we have to give those days their due. How else can one interpret the whole thing as listlessness? But believe me, I’d done my best to divert the paths that would lead to a fatal end.

“I’d been informed that in the group heading for the Drancy prison there were people that I knew, your brother being among them; I handed over a list to the concerned. I realized that life sometimes hung by a thread; I realized my impotence and the hidden aspects of men. To the men in the Indian file ready to set out for the land of the departed spirits; a German had begun calling out the names of the individuals I had picked out; they were the last Turks I had been able to reach. Every name called out meant a saved life. One had to witness and experience that scene: Albert, Isaac, Suzanne, and Nesim. I was on the point of making it. I was firmly convinced, until the moment when something unexpected happened. A man I didn’t know came forward reporting to be Nesim Ventura. They had collected the identity papers; there was nothing to be done under the circumstances. I couldn’t step in and try to prove the false identity of the man. Everything was hanging by a thread. Any intervention on my part might endanger the lives of others. The Germans now and then connived at certain cases within diplomatic niceties, but one should also consider that there was a war going on. The people enjoying some authority might get it into their heads to send the greatest number possible to death. I couldn’t ignore the fact that in front of him stood a man struggling for his life, a man, you see? How could I send him to death now when he thought he was on the brink of salvation? What carried weight for me at the moment was to save as many lives as possible. I had to find the most relevant solution to the problem that confronted me. Time ran at a dizzying speed. You should have seen the passion for life his eyes expressed. We had eventually arranged their journey back to Turkey. The rest did not interest us so much. Unfortunately, I didn’t see Nesim afterward. Their sojourn at Drarcy had been brief; they had been transferred elsewhere; to Auschwitz, I believe . . . it was only a guess, we’d never been able to know the true state of affairs,” said Fahri Bey.

This account had lingered in him for years never losing its pathos. Was this an account that Fahri Bey had concocted making a point not to recall bare facts, hiding behind certain visions or was it a true story, an old legend lived and shared of which he remained faithful to every detail? Did life depend on such simple and meaningless relationships? The fact that a delay of ten days had sufficed for the appropriation of somebody else’s identity in order to survive . . . This visit had enabled him to fill in certain missing parts of the story. Nesim, according to Enrico Weizman’s account, was not the type of man who would be resigned to his fate in Auschwitz, a man who would have snubbed the alleged ten day delay. “Had he been aware that his fate would not have been sealed, if he had been conscious that an inaccuracy had played a trick on him . . . that he would be driven to his grave by a simple mistaken identity . . . ” he thought. Nevertheless, he might have felt some gratification at the fact that this had escaped Nesim’s notice and that he had failed to take stock of this aspect of affairs. One should not forget also that one preferred to ignore certain facts sometimes. At all events, he had more than one reason to rise up against his fate, against the adversities he had fallen victim to.

He wondered where that nondescript man might have gone. He mulled over the possibilities “It may well be that we have come across him somewhere in this long life, in this odd life, who knows,” he thought. He smiled. In order to be able to hear his own voice, he raised it while smiling again. He believed in coincidences, but such an encounter seemed to him a bit too far-fetched. Furthermore, when one took into consideration the remaining facts of life that lent meaning to certain things, the man who had usurped Nesim’s place was not so important. For instance, there was another viable fact in Enrico Weizman’s account. “If you can find a way to escape, please tell my brother in Istanbul that I’ve missed the days when we used to invite the guys of the district to our home at Halıcıoğlu to watch movies. I dreamt of those days last night; I tried to recall the films we showed, but I couldn’t. The only thing that I remembered was the event itself. How distant all those things seem to me now,” Nesim was reported to have said to his last companion. Distant as they were in fact, they seemed to belong to another world, those moments and experiences. Everything seemed to have melted away; all those lives projected on the screen . . . what had remained behind . . . yes what had remained behind were but scattered memories.

Letters from Spain

Not only the childhood days, but also the days that followed Nesim’s death seemed to be very far removed. Separation had once again been on the cards; separation that gained meaning through their plays; separation that had come to knock on their door once more. He hadn’t disclosed the news of those deaths to his parents, disguising and putting them in a different picture frame. According to the story he had concocted, Nesim had immigrated to Spain with his family. They had been confronted with certain bureaucratic formalities when taking up residence there. Apparently it would take some time before they would eventually be settled. What was needed was patience. Not to despair, but wait . . . Life was no more as it used to be, everything did not run as smoothly as before. Men had to put up with the aftereffects of the war and try to heal the wounds they had received during it. Actually the war was still going on. For the moment all he could do was write letters. They had to be satisfied with the letters they would be receiving. This was their fate. Nesim’s letters from Spain would henceforward arrive intermittently. He would be the author of the letters no doubt. He would write and read them. He would make comments after reading them, together with his father. His father would be giving advice to Nesim and in the correspondence exchanged the counsel offered was to be duly commented upon. This ‘mystery play’ had to be perpetuated
ad libitum
. There was no end to what had been concocted in the letters. Paulette had got married, she was happy, and the son she had brought into the world had been circumcised, although with some difficulty. Rachael gave French lessons and Nesim, German lessons. They were getting back on their feet; soon, they would be on a much better footing. If they knew that those in Istanbul took care of themselves, they would be more than happy.