The Woman Who Lost Her Soul Hardcover (32 page)

Abu Theeb, eh?
the voice said, sarcastic, switching to English but carrying the same tone. Daughter
of the son of the wolf. Who knew that Americans could have such names?

His face loomed forward into the egg of candlelight, his mouth stretched expansively
into a grin that revealed the gleam of his teeth, and she saw that he was only a few
years older than she and, she thought giddily, gorgeous in the way Arab boys could
be—smooth-faced with a full-lipped sensuality and eyelashes like a woman—when they
weren’t shouting their idiot heads off and complaining about the most piddling thing
and trying to be despicable little thieves.

I am Mohammed, he said.

Of course you are, she said, tossing her hair. Who isn’t?

Don’t be blasphemous,
welaadee.

Stop calling me your child.

You must choose a fish, he said, getting down to business, and she pointed to one
in the basket and he said no, choose another, and she pointed to a second one and
he said no and she stamped her foot and demanded he choose a fish himself.

This one, he said, lifting a mackerel that seemed to her the same as all the others.
This is a number one fish.

I can’t tell the difference, she said.

Ah, he said, you will never know the difference until you look in its mouth.

Her reluctance came not from squeamishness but from the thought of having her fingers
stink of mackerel. You do it, she said. You open it and I’ll look.

Oh
welaadee,
he said, prying the jaws. If we could only see what this fish has seen. This fish
has swum through the sunken ruins of a lost city, fabled Tanpinar. This fish swam
through the portal of the emperor’s palace, past the great hall containing the mosaics
of paradise, swim swim, and into the queen’s chamber, where it swallowed a treasure.

Yeah, sure, she said, looking into the mackerel’s mouth. There’s nothing in there.

Really? said Mohammed, aghast, raising the fish to examine its mouth himself, becoming
more alarmed, shaking the fish, tail up, as if it were a Christmas stocking with one
last chocolate inside the toe, saying one moment, please, one moment, while her face
began to hurt as she tried to keep from laughing and then couldn’t stop herself.

Maranian was out of the Mercedes, pacing, and when he saw her returning from the fishmonger
he glanced at his wristwatch and opened the rear door for her and even though he did
not smile when she declared they were friends now which meant she should ride up front,
his face turned kind and he allowed her what she wished. Look, she said, excited,
fluttering her right hand in front of his nose, and he switched on the overhead light
to admire the gold-banded ring, mounted with an unusual pink pearl like a lozenge
set in a cage of braided gold wire. Isn’t it fabulous!

They call this pearl baroque, he said. Very rare. He turned off the light and said
now they must go, her father was waiting. Super, she said, not having eaten the mussels
or olives to avoid being disrespectful to the violinist. I’m starving. She chattered
as they sped back toward Sultanahmet, saying that boy was so funny, he had stuck the
ring inside a fish but couldn’t remember which fish until he grabbed the right one
and out came this lovely ring but dripping slime, ugh, and he popped it into his mouth
to wash it and she thought she would gag. Then he put it on her finger and said now
we are married,
welaadee,
and she said in chiming tones,
Don’t think so,
and he told her she must always buy her fish from him and she told the boy but didn’t
tell Mr. Maranian that perhaps one day she would buy his fish and cook it for him
à la français.
Agreed, he said. From this minute on, I wait for you,
welaadee
.

Never marry a Saracen, said Maranian. The Muslim man will make you his slave.

That’s harsh, she said, but there was no time to discuss Mr. Maranian’s backward point
of view because the ride, and today’s game, had come to an end. What’s going on here?
she asked, frowning at the flashing lights of police vans, the line of Turkish soldiers,
a row of limousines. What happened? What is this place?

Your father is inside, said Maranian.

Is he all right? she asked, her heartbeat rising in her chest.

He is very well, I think, said Maranian.

Are you coming? she asked, hoping he was, because what was happening outside on the
street seemed terribly ominous, so many awful things kicking you in the gut these
days: Libyans arrested in Ankara last weekend outside the American Officers Club before
they could blow it up with their bombs, the embassy urging Americans in Turkey not
to leave their homes except for necessary business, the bombing three weeks ago of
the discotheque in West Berlin, the assassination at the embassy in Khartoum, the
bombings and kidnappings in Beirut, the hijacked TWA flight in Greece, which ended
with the execution of an American sailor, the massacre last year at the airport in
Rome two days after her father had been reassigned to Turkey, and, just a few days
ago, the bomb outside the bank here in Istanbul, enough to give anyone what her mother
called a major case of the nerves, not to mention the government’s nasty attitude
toward students, planting MIT agents and undercover finks throughout the universities
and cafés. She certainly didn’t like the looks of the men in black leather jackets
milling around, smoking their cigarettes with unsavory expressions, plainclothes whoever,
secret whatever, nothing more obvious than their brutish instincts.

No, said Maranian. I am not coming. I am invisible again.

But what’s the military doing here? That’s not good, is it?

He is waiting for you, said Maranian. Go. You will be happy, I promise you.

The army was the source and protector of secularism in Turkey, but to go among these
uniformed men it helped, she knew, that she had dressed conservatively, changing after
her afternoon swim team practice into an ankle-length skirt and bulky sweater that
concealed her breasts. The Turkish girls at school, obsessed with Western fashion,
lived for the weekend hours when they could shuck their gray skirts and white blouses
and squeeze themselves into jeans and short skirts and busty tank tops, but the Muslims
in the neighborhoods of Uskadar were old-fashioned and disapproving, the women in
their head scarves hissing at any girl they thought immodest, and the men were worse,
unable to decide what they wanted from females—celestial virgin or gutter whore—and
the infuriating impossible answer seemed to be
both
.

She walked as her father had taught her, as a free person fully in her rights to do
what she was doing. Behind the cordon on the sidewalk were two policemen and one asked
her name and then relayed it to the other one who held a clipboard and crossed out
her name on a list and she thought,
How stupid.
The first policeman said please wait and descended a set of stone steps to a large
wooden door and went in and she asked the policeman with the clipboard what was happening,
why such heavy security, and he said he did not know, and she said respectfully, why
won’t you tell me? I think you should. The first policeman returned and said please
follow me and they went down the stone steps and through the old wooden door and down
another set of shadowy steps to another old door within a stone wall, the policeman’s
voice echoing slightly in the musty, cavelike air. Please go ahead, he told her and
she put her hand on the door pull but turned around uncertainly and said please tell
me where we are.

A Byzantine cistern, he said. Rented for occasions. You will see, and he nodded for
her to open the door and she did, stepping out onto a landing that resembled an interior
balcony suspended beneath the vaulted brick ceilings of a magnificent cavern, torches
in sconces making an undersea light that danced over the long communal dinner tables
attended by tuxedoed waiters balancing trays of drinks and across the cheering, whistling
faces of the crowd below, these wonderful people, dear God, applauding, her father
and a large group of men in dark suits on one side of the room underneath a blue cloud
of cigar smoke, her best friends from school and it looked like her entire class on
the other, her favorite teachers, even some of the entel boys (the self-styled
entellectuals
) from the lycée and cafés, surprise, surprise. Oh, my God! she said under her breath,
a rosy heat spreading on her cheeks. Her eyes, now misty, returned to the commanding
presence of her father, his hands stuffed into his trouser pockets, and met his sparkling
eyes and she knew that look better than she knew herself, the boyish radiant smile
under lifted eyebrows that said,
Look where we’ve found ourselves this time, Kitten!
and he winked at her and she flew skipping down the last set of stone steps and into
his arms.

CHAPTER TWENTY

It took some minutes to understand that her birthday party had been attached to a
second event, not a celebration but an unfolding crisis, something disastrous that
the men were reluctant to discuss in her presence. Her father took her elbow and introduced
her to his circle of special guests, the type of distinguished, soft-spoken, and elegant
men who were always appearing on the periphery of her life, clean-shaven faces (except
for the mustachioed Turks, this general, that general, so many generals) dilated with
an attention that was soon withdrawn, the wineglasses and champagne flutes in their
manicured hands tipped her way ever so briefly in royal salute, their smiled murmurings
fading behind the gravity of their eminence. One was her father’s colleague from Ankara,
a gangly dweebish man she knew to be the embassy’s station chief, the resident spy-guy
actually, as unlikely as that seemed to her. Two were the fathers of her schoolmates,
one a businessman but the other, like every one else, a member of the diplomatic corps
of their respective countries. Only fat Mr. Kirlovsky, the émigré businessman who
was also the father of her best friend, wrapped her up for a much-appreciated hug,
providing her the opportunity to ask under her breath, It’s not another bomb, is it?
To which he replied while kissing her moistly on each cheek, Worse, but not to worry.

I’m sorry you had to drive around, her father whispered in her ear, his warm breath
making her shiver. There was some difficulty rounding up all these gentlemen, he said,
and he didn’t want her surprise interrupted by the Swedish ambassador’s grand entrance,
you know how these fellows can be. Join your friends, have a good time, we’ll talk
later, he said, letting go of her arm and turning back to his mysterious conclave
of statesmen. Bathroom, she said to herself, and asked a waiter for directions to
the toilet as she slipped a flute of champagne off his tray.

The door to her stall banged open and there she was, squatting, one hand holding her
skirt bunched at her waist, sipping champagne with the other, looking up into mock-scolding
eyes, her best friend Elena dressed as usual in a style Dottie called Soviet Goth,
military boots and black Levis from the Kapaliçar
ş
i and a lilac angora sweater, ghoulish makeup emphasizing her cadaver’s paleness,
black nail polish and chintzy red plastic barettes from Eastern Europe pinning her
wavy hair at her temples.
There
you are, said Elena, speaking English in her thick accent, her voice hoarse and deep,
almost mannish, like a man trying to sound like a girl. You
never
lock the door. Because you have
no
shame, eh? I am thinking those men with our fathers
never
let you go. You should see the look on your
face
when you come in the door, oh, my
God
. All week, it was
so
hard not to tell you, and make the other girls not to tell you. Your father is so
fucking
handsome and nice, you know. My father is like a slobby bear. Now tell me, how did
you get this champagne? The waiters only bring children’s drinks to our side of the
room. Okay, stop pissing already. How do you carry so much piss, like a cow. Where
is the old woman with her scrap of tissue to scream at you for ten lira? Okay, stand
up and kiss me now.

Laughing, she rearranged herself and they embraced, her blonde head and Elena’s glossy
black curls bobbing sideways as they kissed each other’s happy faces.

Dottie pushed them out of the stall. I can’t believe I keep the secret, said Elena.
I never keep the secret.

Dottie paused to check herself in the mirror that hung above the sink, a wistful searching
gaze, balling her golden shoulder-length hair behind her head, the experiment ending
in frustration. I’ve looked this way since I was thirteen years old, she despaired.
She twisted to inspect herself from a different angle and dropped her hands. I want
to cut my hair, she said, but my father won’t let me.

Tell me about, said Elena, misstating one of the American expressions she had learned
from her friend. My father, he would be furious.

Daddy wouldn’t be angry, she said. I think it would just make him sad. She whirled
around, her unsatisfactory moment of reflection dissipated. Wow, speaking of secrets,
she said, what’s going on out there?

Some bad thing has happened in the Soviet Union, said Elena. Too bad, yes? she added
facetiously.

What kind of bad thing?

An explosion, something, I don’t know.

Where? In a city? In Moscow? Are you worried about your relatives and friends?

It is the Soviet Union, they are Jews, said Elena. I am always worried about my relatives
and friends. Now listen, she said as they walked arm in arm back to the party. You
are the queen. You must get me a glass of champagne.

Hidden below the world, the ancient cistern seemed to her a glowing chamber of lovely
secrets and concealed passions, its warm wavering luminosity—the image struck her
as curiously religious—like the light encircled within a communion chalice. With Dottie’s
arrival, its sonorous buzz had increased in volume, a festive trio of musicians playing
traditional music, the bell-like ringing of tableware, the high-pitched melodies of
raucous schoolgirls, like entering a shop that sold songbirds. There was caviar and
kebab and every kind of meze imaginable, her piggy school chums cramming it in, and
she floated merrily down the length of the tables, accepting a lifetime’s worth of
double-cheek kisses, thanking everybody, accepting salutations and little gifts, a
cassette of seventies rock and roll, a pack of highlighters for studying, a bottle
of bubble bath, makeup she wouldn’t use, a beaded change purse, and sat for an awkward
moment with jolly Mrs. Naslun, her history teacher, and the
très bohemian
French instructor who was the object of her infatuation, unable to be anything but
shy and formal in their presence, exceedingly Turkish of her she knew.

Then, with Elena and Jacqueline and Yesho in tow, she broke the vestigial stricture
of purdah etiquette—ladies sit with ladies, et cetera—and moved on to the corner of
the room where the lycée boys had a table to themselves, some in coats and ties and
others in jeans and leather jackets, most too young to be served beer but all of them
drinking anyway, blowing smoke rings from their Marlboros, arguing soccer. The American
boys struggled to be cool and the Muslim boys struggled to imitate them and the European
boys were too cool to even bother, all of them sweet puppies but her interest inclined
more toward two of the older boys from the university: Osman, who had somehow gotten
an invitation, and Karim, who had somehow not. Osman, the classic
entel
—long hair, the Ortakoy leather bag on his shoulder with at least one book inside—who
shared her love for photography, and the always sulky, sleepy-eyed Karim, the son
of a Moroccan father and Turkish mother, who dreamed actual dreams of going to Afghanistan
and joining the mujahideen to chop off the heads of Russians. Just by looking at her
Karim made her muscles bunch with tension and sent fantasies through her mind she
couldn’t begin to explain.

Another barrage of kisses, less polite, more grabby. Osman, the least polite, who
quickly wiped her cheeks with a serviette—
What are you doing?
she laughed nervously—before kissing each one, and then stood back apologizing,
I’m sorry, the general
.

What are you talking about? she said, and he stammered,
He kissed you, the pasha, the chairman of the Turkish army. Excuse me, you understand,
he is a criminal, and how could I, I cannot—

She rolled her eyes at Osman’s weirdness, which she forgot about the moment he handed
her a present, a stranded bracelet of Turkey’s ubiquitous dark blue beads centered
with white circles to ward off the
nazar,
the evil eye. Oh, how sweet! she said, slipping it onto her left wrist, pecking him
on the cheek as she swirled away.

She tapped a waiter as he walked by and asked for a round of champagne and returned
his stern look with a bright boldness and said, This is my party, please just bring
a bottle and glasses and when he still seemed to hesitate she said, my father’s over
there if you need to speak with him, and that took care of it.

The four girls toasted one another again and again, and the lycée boys talked rock
bands and boasted about colleges they would be attending next year in the States and
France and Germany or England or here in Istanbul and lamented with borrowed nostalgia
that the revolution in Iran and the war in Afghanistan prevented them from the summertime
adventures they had dreamed of having on the Silk Road. They compared notes on connections
for hash and opium until Elena and Jacqueline stopped ignoring them and began to flirt.
Osman pulled a chair up next to Dottie’s and asked if she wanted to go with him to
the secondhand book market in Sahaflar next weekend (yes) and the music bent itself
into contortions, a slithery Middle Eastern cadence punctuated by the bash and rattle
of a tambourine and
darbuka
drum.

Oh, my God! the three foreign girls said at once, their hands flying to their mouths
and then grabbing at Yesho—Sit down! My God!—who had jumped to her feet and exposed
her abdomen—She is auditioning for school slut, said Jacqueline—its muscles performing
an undulating rise and fall beneath her taut skin, the smooth tawnyness of her flesh
defiled by a hedgerow of coarse black hair that began at her navel and disappeared
beneath the belt of her jeans. Their Turkish schoolmates squealed on cue, the boys
hooted and jeered.

That is called
gobek atmasi,
Yesho said proudly, sitting back down. Throwing the stomach. Men become sex maniacs
when they see
gobek atmasi
.

I want to learn this dance, Elena said, looking at the boys for their approval. Yes?
It’s good?

All belly dance is not
rakkass,
with the sparkle bikini and shaky ass, said Yesho. Every Turkish person dance with
the wrists like this—she demonstrated, twirling her hands—and the arms like this and
the ass like, I don’t know, happy. But if I teach you, she said, you will require
bodyguard.

Okay, guys, said Elena wickedly, slapping the table to get their attention as she
rose to her feet with an erotic tilt and glide of her pelvis. So who is getting erection?
Dottie blushed, Yesho smirked knowingly, Jacqueline spit her mouthful of champagne
back into her glass, shrieking, and the lycée boys laughed nervously and Osman put
his lips to her ear and whispered I am, but it is because I am sitting with you. Under
the table he placed his hand on her knee but when she didn’t respond he returned to
her ear and said have I offended you and she seemed to reenter reality and smiled
at him and said no, taking his hand off her knee but holding it loosely in hers and
she sighed, thinking, these girls, every time someone touched them between the legs
they couldn’t stop themselves from proclaiming
I love you,
but not her.

At the other end of the room, she watched a courier deliver a message to her father.
Then the waiters appeared with an immense cake and she heard her father’s clear tenor
begin to sing and the room joined in but when she tried to focus on the candles they
swam like fireflies in her vision and she almost set her hair ablaze when she leaned
forward to blow out the flames. By the time the word passed around that a fleet of
taxis had arrived to take everyone to the ferry station or back to Uskudar she had
forgotten what she had wished for, peace on earth or going steady with Osman or getting
accepted to Yale—her father’s alma mater—or still the Vespa. Her father came to stand
behind her where she sat with her uneaten slice of cake and massaged her shoulders,
telling her we can’t go yet, honey. Our most important guests have informed us they’ll
be a few minutes late.

How’s mom?

Didn’t she call you?

Daddy, she said circumspectly, I want you to meet Osman, and Osman stood up with congenial
good manners and shook her father’s hand. The two other fathers came over to the table
to tell Elena and Jacqueline to take taxis if they didn’t want to wait, but the girls—except
for Yesho, who was headed off to a club with one of the European boys she fancied—announced
they would keep Dottie company. She insisted on walking Osman out to the street, for
some reason thinking she needed to protect him from the authorities, and on the sidewalk
saying good-bye he tried to kiss her but she turned her face so that he kissed her
cheek, knowing that to do otherwise was not smart in public, and really dumb with
all the cops standing around, any one of them ready to go fundamental on you. Then
she went back inside, her concentration set on not falling down the steps, reminding
herself she had forgotten to thank her father for the pearl ring—well, he hadn’t asked
about it anyway.

He was still at their table, talking to Elena while he stood behind Jacqueline, rubbing
her shoulders as, minutes before, he had his daughter’s and she could see that Jacqueline—what
a clotheshorse she was, with her Benetton scarves and water-colored dresses and enviable
short hair and self-absorption—was enjoying his touch and the sight upset her. Are
you okay? her father asked as she sat back down and because he seemed to expect that
she was she simply nodded and manufactured a pleasing smile and he said our guests
should be here any second now and there will be a short meeting and then off they’d
go. As soon as he returned to the men she waved to a waiter for another bottle of
champagne but there was no more champagne and he came back with three glasses of sugary
white wine.

Osman, said Jacqueline slyly.
Très
hot, yes? You think so?

Yes, but, said Elena, her accent making the words sound like
yizboot,
an automatic way to make her friends giggle. Turkish boys have repression.