by Suat Dervis
Ahmet said nothing. His ears were ringing. He had buried his face in his hands. He could barely hear what Muhsin was saying.
Celile loved Muhsin. From one day to the next, she had decided to leave her husband of ten years, and without a single word of explanation—without so much as a goodbye—to live with another man.
And she had sent that very man to impart this intimate news.
Celile, now with her lover, had been too ashamed to tell him herself! Celile, whom he had always thought to be the most honorable, refined, and honest wife in the world. Whom he had worshipped and lived to serve, for whom he would have willingly died. His beloved wife, who held herself so high above all others.
His partner in life, for ten years!
His aim in life, his pride, his universe, his wife!
This just couldn’t be. No, it was impossible. Celile would never do this to him.
Even if she’d just said “I don’t love you anymore,” he wouldn’t have believed her. And now she was going to leave him?
You wouldn’t throw away an old dog like this—or a sick cat! How could Celile cast him aside like this, after ten years of marriage?
“Ahmet Bey, I see I have upset you. But these things happen. I…”
“Please, sir. Shut your mouth. Shut your mouth and feel some shame!”
Muhsin turned a deeper red.
“You’re taking my wife,” Ahmet continued. “You—a man I trusted, and invited into my own home, and thought a friend. How can you deceive my wife and take her away from me and feel no shame? My angel of a wife, who has never told a lie, and never until now deceived me—you have led her astray, turned her into a concubine. Then you call me in to inform me—without shame—that she’s not coming home again. What gives you this right? You amaze me, you really do. No—you enrage me. So my wife doesn’t want to come home. Why? Because she’s doesn’t like it there anymore? Tell me this…My wife, who never wanted to step outside the house, who never felt at home anywhere else. How has it come to this—that a woman like that would suddenly not wish to come home? You say it’s because she loves you? Well, then, let me laugh in your face. My wife doesn’t want to come home because you’ve seduced her. First you rob her of her dignity, and then you sink so low as to tell me she’s never coming home. Let me tell you what I think. I think you’ve taken advantage of a passing moment of weakness. How you did this, I cannot say. What did you want from me? Or that innocent I call my wife? How did you deceive her? Did you get her drunk last night and take her home? So she came to herself this morning, and she felt so ashamed that she couldn’t face going home. My honest wife, so distressed at this stain on her honor that she no longer feels worthy of her marriage and decides not to return to the home she no longer deserves. And so she stays where she is, in the claws of her debauched rapist? And now you want me to leave that pure, innocent, helpless creature in your safekeeping? Is that how it is? Tell me, sir. Why this silence? Tell me, what did you expect, that I would just go along with this? That I would give you my wife, with my compliments, and walk away? Is this what you call honor? We’re civilized people, you say. What sort of civilization is this? Let me tell you this. I cannot live without Celile. I cannot. Tell me straight now. Admit what you have done to me. What drove you to invade my happy nest? Celile is my pride, Celile is my life. Celile is my only reason for living. What am I without her? Has this never crossed your mind?”
Muhsin said nothing. For five minutes, Ahmet said nothing either. They were like two men struggling to catch their breath. After five minutes, Ahmet lifted his hands from his face and turned to look at Muhsin with the pleading eyes of a dog.
“Muhsin Bey,” he said. “What’s done is done. My wife spent last night with you. This is a terrible thing. I know. I know it but I am prepared to forget it. I have not just been her husband all these years. I have been her father and her older brother. For ten years she has carried my name. For ten years she has been mine and mine alone. I cannot bring myself to leave her on the street after just this one sin. I am honor bound to save her. Yes, we are civilized people, so let us be civilized, let us put this matter behind us without staining our names. I can erase this from my mind. All of it. Just give me back my wife. Go back and tell her that I forgive her, and that I promise never to mention this again. Tell her that I shall be waiting for her at home. And then you can give me your word, like the honorable man you are, that you will never meet with her again, or make any attempt to see her. And then we can all three of us do our best to put this terrible evening behind us.”
Muhsin could not believe his ears. What a tolerant husband this man was.
No one had asked Ahmet for forgiveness. But here he was, forgiving everyone all and sundry.
No man could do that, not if he truly loved his wife.
If he loved her, how could he ever forgive her?
In Muhsin’s mind, this made no sense.
If this was love, it was so base as not to deserve the word.
Was this love?
This man, he thought, had stooped so low that he could hardly be called a man.
Or did he love his wife so much that he’d lost all will? Did he love her so much that he couldn’t even see how it debased him, or if he did see it, did he love her so much that he was willing to live with the humiliation?
It seemed as if he was willing to contemplate any assault to his dignity, so long as he didn’t lose Celile.
This being the case, Muhsin now saw that this man was prepared to go to any lengths to get Celile back.
Having realized that he would gain nothing by punching or suffocating or killing his rival, Ahmet had clearly decided to cut his losses by taking Celile back. Avoid public shame by hushing things up.
Who was this man to speak to him of shame? What did he have to learn from this man who had already so dishonored himself, and who was soon to suffer such ridicule?
Yes, it was important to be civilized.
To stay calm and cold-blooded, to repair his wrecked nest, and to rescue Celile from the cesspit into which she had fallen. Oh yes, it was so much better, wasn’t it, to spell things out? This man wanted to rescue himself from a life without Celile. There was a word for this: cuckold!
Muhsin could call him that to his face, and then spit in it.
What could he do? This man was madly in love with Celile. He would die for her.
As for sending her home…
“So that is what I ask of you,” Ahmet said. As if he’d not made enough of a fool of himself already. “Tell Celile to come home.”
Muhsin was losing his patience now. He needed to bring this tiresome conversation to an end.
“Ahmet Bey,” he said. “As far as I can see, Celile’s decision is final. There is no need to prolong the matter any further.”
Once again, Ahmet felt the urge to punch this man.
Instead, in a dry voice, he said: “Did she ask you to tell me this? Did she say, ‘I’ve decided not to go back to Ahmet, so you go and tell him?’ I need to understand this.”
This stopped Muhsin short. Celile might have told him she wanted to stay, but she had no idea he’d taken it upon himself to inform Ahmet.
They’d not discussed it. How had it come to this, that he’d picked up the phone so fast, and called Ahmet in for a meeting, without first asking Celile what she thought of the idea? She hadn’t even agreed to stay yet.
Why had he done this?
Had it not been to get the upper hand from the outset, and stop Ahmet from doing anything crazy that might lead to ugly gossip?
Yes, but he might have thought to discuss the matter with Celile first.
Perhaps Celile had just wanted to spend the one night with him. She could already have gone home while he was here talking with her husband.
What had possessed him to commit such a rash act?
He had th
ought Celile spending the night with him was the point of no return. When actually it was his impulsive act the morning after.
This man was prepared to take this “innocent, chaste, and honest” woman back into his house at any cost.
And it seemed that he was willing to do so because this was the first night Celile had ever spent outside the house.
Not even the most tolerant husband would forgive his wife so quickly for a first betrayal. And even if he did, he wouldn’t speak as if he were this desperate to forgive her.
Suspicion and jealousy ate into Muhsin’s skin. He wished this man had never been Celile’s husband. If Muhsin had met her when she was still single, he might even have wished to make her part of his life.
But Ahmet was for Muhsin the most loathsome creature in the world. No matter how much he had loved Celile during their ten-year marriage, he had never, and could never, give her the trust and respect that were her due.
“Aren’t you going to answer me? Why don’t you speak? Did my wife give you permission to speak on her behalf?”
“Ahmet Bey!” Muhsin said. But he still didn’t know what he was going to say. Until he had gone back to the apartment and spoken with Celile and gained a clear idea of her views, he did not want to say anything definite.
But things had gone too far now. There was, he felt, no going back.
Why was this thought so enchanting?
And at his age. He was following his whims like a feckless twenty-year-old boy.
“Muhsin Bey! I asked you a question!”
“If I were not sure of Celile’s intentions, would I dare to speak to you?”
Again Ahmet’s head began to spin.
“Shouldn’t this have been a bit more difficult for her to decide? I’ve been her husband for ten years! Whatever else, Celile would have felt closer to me than to a lover of two days, or maybe just one night. Wouldn’t you say?”
“I have no idea.”
“You yourself have no idea what it means to spend ten years with someone. To have savored the pure delights of first love. To dress her in bridal white, to stand beneath the tinsel and hold her tight. Have you ever held such a woman in your arms for ten long years? Day and night. From dawn till dusk. Do you have any idea? We shared a bed. For ten years, we shared a bed. Every night, she would rest her head on my shoulder and drift off to sleep.”
Muhsin closed his eyes, the better to erase that tableau. A terrible jealousy raged inside him. He raged with jealousy against that bride in white.
Suddenly Ahmet stopped speaking. Suddenly he remembered that Celile had escaped from their marital bed some time ago.
Separate bedrooms!
Which meant…
Which must mean that she’d been deceiving him ever since?
In a cracked voice, he began to shout: “She’s a serpent! A serpent! This woman I clasped to my chest—she’s been a serpent all along! I’ve devoted my life to a serpent! Oh, I know them well. Those dissolute Ottoman families. Her father died at the gaming table. And her mother? Yet another crazy pasha’s daughter. Her grandmother? A palace lady, they say. I say, a palace slave. An odalisque!”
Muhsin said nothing. Instead he waited patiently for Ahmet to say his piece.
“This is getting ridiculous,” he thought, “especially if I get home and Celile isn’t there!”
In his mind, he corrected himself. “If she’s not there when I get home, I’m the one who’ll look ridiculous!”
Ahmet was still talking. “Shall I tell you,” he was saying, “shall I tell you how I came to meet this ingrate? Do you know what her situation was when we met?”
Muhsin knew nothing about Celile’s past. But now this man who had been waxing poetic only moments ago about brides in white waiting virtuously under the tinsel seemed ready to divulge details that Muhsin had no interest in hearing.
Muhsin was not a child. He was a man of experience. Thanks to that experience, he was confident that he already understood Celile well. He knew what sort of person she was. The prospect of hearing things about her past that were worse than he’d imagined—it made him tremble with fear.
Ahmet did not know how to stop talking.
“No mother, no father. She had no one. She was an orphan. Her uncle had taken her in. I’m the one who brought her into the world. I dressed her and adorned her. I bought her jewels. I was her father and her mother and her older brother. I loved her as my child, my sister, and my wife. And now I discover she’s a serpent!”
He let his head fall against the back of his armchair.
“So you’re welcome to her, dear sir. Let her sink her dirty, poisonous fangs into you now. Take her. She’s bound to be as faithful to you as she’s been to me. As faithful as she’s been to her husband of ten years…”
His face creased up. Was that a smile? Muhsin couldn’t tell.
“This degenerate, who couldn’t even be bothered to tell her husband of ten years to his face that she didn’t love him anymore. And now you think she’ll be faithful to you? Please sir, go ahead and make her yours. Because one thing is sure—the day will come when she disgraces you as heartlessly as she’s disgraced me. That’s for certain. As for me, I’m pulling out. What point is there in our lawyers meeting? Is that how you divorce a prostitute? My lawyer’s not going to your lawyer. He’s taking her to court. I’m not going to hold her to her vows. I won’t stand in her way—you can be sure of that! I forbid you from even considering such a dishonor. I forbid you. Do you understand?”
He let out a short bark of a laugh.
“You mark my words. She’ll make a fool of you too one day. And that will be my revenge.”
With that, he fell silent. And neither did he laugh. His head was spinning. He was amazed at what he’d just said. How could he have uttered such harsh words against this woman he had loved like a dog? In a softer and more broken voice, he added: “I loved her so much. Do you have any idea how much I spoiled her? I devoted my whole life to her. I was her slave. I worshipped her like a goddess. I was hers and hers alone. Everything I earned, everything I said, every breath I took, it was for her. It was hers.”
He took a deep breath.
“Oh, how I loved her. Dear God, how I loved her!”
His eyes were burning: “Can you understand now what an evil, shameless woman she is? Doesn’t it open your eyes to her, to see her treat a man she loves as she’s treated me? How can you see what she’s done to me and want to throw yourself into the same fire? I didn’t know. I had no idea! Until this morning, I simply had no idea. If I’d known, would I ever have been so reckless as to give her my heart? How could I have made her mine, knowing what I know now? I loved her as I did because I thought her pure and good. And this is how she treats me! Without compassion. Without pity!
“Without so much as a word of explanation, she just upped and left. Is this a woman you can trust? She leaves her husband of ten years without seeing the need to say goodbye, and off she goes to her lover, and you still trust her. You manage to call her husband into your office and announce that you and she are in love. How long will that last, I wonder? Let me assure you, your turn will come, one day it will be a new paramour who calls you in to tell you that Celile and he are in love, and she is never coming back. But I’m done with believing anything. I’m done.”
In a hoarse voice, he added: “Because what can I believe in, if I can’t believe in Celile? When you’ve been left out in the cold as I have been, what is there left to trust? I can no longer believe in anything or anybody. And sir. Sir…above all, I don’t believe you. Celile belongs at home. That home is our house. You tell me you are sure she does not wish to come back, but I don’t believe you. Celile did want to come home. But after the madness of yesterday, she couldn’t find the courage. So tell her. Tell her I forgive her. She should come back to me…”
He extended his hands.
“Muhsin Bey, leave us be. Have mercy on us and remove yourself from our lives. Don’t destroy our little nest. Don’t pull our family apart.”
Family? Muhsin asked himself. He knows that his wife is with me, and that she doesn’t want to be with him anymore, and still he talks about families and little nests? Dear God, what a fool! And he called himself a man.
Now Ahmet had his face buried in his hands.
“I beg you, just leave us alone. Leave Celile to me!”
He burst into tears.
A grown man, crying like a helpless woman. Intolerable.
Muhsin had called him in so that he could witness his first reactions on hearing the truth, without anyone else in the room.
He’d hoped this would help him keep a lid on things. There might even, he thought, be room for negotiation.
He had been ready for everything Ahmet had said and done, until this moment.
Until these tears. These abject entreaties.
Seeing this man cry, he was sorry he’d ever wanted to speak to him.
He could not bear watching him.
There was no need to understand this man. Let alone accept him.
He did not doubt for a moment that Ahmet had used Celile as bait in his get-rich-quick schemes.
He was so convinced of this that Ahmet’s tears provoked no compassion in him. Only disgust. He didn’t believe them to be genuine. Even if they were, this was a man so immoral, dishonorable, and dissolute that he would most certainly be throwing her into the arms of others in no time, just to advance his career.
Whatever the truth of the matter, Ahmet was the vilest of the vile.
If he was ever again to take pleasure in his love for Celile, he had to sever her every link to this loathsome creature.