by Ahmet Altan
“I am hungry.”
“Let’s eat first, and then we can talk.”
As they ate pilaf with chickpeas and tahini they talked like children about old friends and acquaintances, Ragıp Bey’s mansion’s garden and memories, school and their neighborhood. Over coffee Cevat Bey stroked his moustache and continued from where he’d left off as if there’d been no interruption.
“Everyone’s aware of what’s going on, but they have trouble making decisions: I told Talat many times that it won’t work this way, that we should overthrow the Sultan and take over the government, but—between me and you—they don’t dare, and indeed they may be right, no one’s ready to take positions of authority. Let’s say we took over the government, who would we put in the cabinet, won’t they be disappointed when they see the men behind the legend of the Committee? Who would be minister of public works? Who would be forestry minister, who knows enough about any of these things? In fact these things aren’t too difficult to learn about, but as far as I understand Talat is in fact afraid that we’ll get involved in power struggles and fall out with each other, and if you think about it, it’s not so far-fetched. So, you could ask if it’s better that way, no, it isn’t, you’d be right about that, it’s not clear who’s governing the country.”
Cevat Bey lit a cigarette.
“To tell the truth, we were caught unprepared, as if declaring constitutional monarchy would solve everything and there would suddenly be peace and prosperity. Our constitutional monarchy is like an old woman praying to saints, I guess we saw it as a kind of prayer, we would pray for it and God would solve everything. But it doesn’t work like that, so despite Talat’s misgivings, I still say the same thing, we have to take over the government, we left the nation ungoverned, it’s our responsibility. It’s almost reached the point when people will say it was better under the Sultan, they’re saying this, don’t you read the newspapers they’re putting out, they curse the Committee every day, as if we were the ones who’d been oppressing the nation for thirty years, as if we were the ones who impoverished them, as if we were the ones who tyrannized them.”
Cevat Bey stroked his moustache and put out his cigarette.
“The person behind all this is that devil they call the Sultan, he stirs up the religious fanatics and then they go stir up the soldiers. That useless Dervish Vahdeti has established a reactionary society called the Mohammadan Union Society, I read about it a few days ago, the entire fiftieth regiment signed up as members. We have to stop these fanatics and reactionaries at once, otherwise what happened today will start happening every day, this nation’s children will start killing one another. We have to start with the mullahs in the madrasas. Don’t worry, we’re also thinking about what to do, some of our friends are saying we should draft the madrasa mullahs into the army, we’ll take them and give them military training.”
“Do you think these mullahs who’ve been exempted from military service are just going to agree to this, won’t they put up a struggle?”
Cevat squinted his eyes, and there was a cold glint in them.
“They’d pay the price, Ragıp, a lot of them would be killed. Perhaps it would be better that way, perhaps we need to settle accounts. We have nowhere else to go, after that these mullahs and the Sultan who’s stirring them up will step back or we’ll send them to their maker. I don’t see any other solution, this isn’t the time to be soft, the weakest link is the one that’s going to break.”
“A lot of blood will be shed, I’m not reluctant to engage in this, you know me, but making soldiers kill each other is a big price to pay. More and more people in the army are supporting the mullahs, the officers who didn’t go to military schools and the sergeants listen to them and see us as infidels. Sometimes I wonder if this was what we wanted constitutional monarchy for.”
“They say that if blood must be shed it will be, Ragıp. Should we hesitate to shed blood and let the nation slip back under the tyranny of the evil Sultan? Don’t worry, we’ll take precautions. This nation is our responsibility, we can’t and won’t shirk this responsibility and we will stand against anyone who moves to betray it. Of course we don’t want the people of this nation to die, but if they have to die in order for the nation to be saved, then they will. We all owe our lives to this nation, if we have to we will pay, perhaps with our lives, perhaps by taking the lives of others, but one way or another we’re prepared to pay the price.”
Ragıp Bey finally brought up the topic he was interested in.
“What’s going to happen to the army, have your people thought about this as well? The army is going down the drain, brother, you might not see it because you’re involved in politics, but I’m there, the soldiers are no longer soldiers, there’s no obedience, no discipline, no respect, no real training, no morale, no equipment, no weapons, the sergeants talk back to the officers, the officers despise the sergeants. God forbid, but if this army went to war it would be destroyed. What are you going to do about the army, everything from top to bottom has to be changed. You know I’ve seen the Prussian army, compared to them we’re like a leaderless flock, this army makes me ashamed to be a soldier, I’m worried my soldiers will start to be insubordinate. Let me be more specific, when officers summon a sergeant or a private to headquarters, they load their guns before letting them in. The Pashas do nothing, they’re not aware of what’s going on, I tell you, brother, if you can’t fix the army right away the future is dark for us.”
Cevat Bey seemed pained by what he’d heard.
“We know about the state of the army, Ragıp, we’re going to work on that too, Enver has ideas about this, but everything takes time, we’ll rejuvenate and renew the army, but first we have to crush these mullahs, then we can turn our attention to the army.”
Even though his brother insisted he stay the night, Ragıp Bey left toward midnight, saying he had to get back to the barracks; the snow was falling in large, heavy flakes, he stood in front of the door and listened, there was no sound, the city had fallen into a silent, innocent sleep; streets, houses, and rooftops were covered in white; this white silence reminded him of the fairy tales he’d heard as a child. Compared to the events of that day, the night really was like a fairy tale, peaceful, calm, and carefree, like a child who forgets at night what he’s experienced during the day, but Ragıp Bey knew the city would wake the following morning, the white would be polluted, and the peace would vanish.
What Cevat Bey had told him didn’t put him at ease, on the contrary he was even more concerned; even Ragıp Bey, who was always stern and uncompromising and who could kill a man in the blink of an eye if he had to, found something frightening in his brother’s severity. He felt as if they were preparing for events they would not be proud to have lived through, like any officer who loves his job, he was not afraid of death or killing, rather he feared he would be ashamed of what he would do.
As he walked through the snow along that dark and deserted street, the first thing that came to mind was to go see his Sheikh, he needed his calming voice, his air of not being concerned with worldly affairs, his prayers that proclaimed God’s existence, but he thought it was too late, although even at that hour Sheikh Efendi would have woken, sat next to him, and listened to what he had to say without asking any questions, he didn’t have the heart to disturb him.
Ignoring the cold and the snow that was accumulating on his fur cap, he walked at a leisurely pace down Babiali Hill. In front of the prime minister’s office, weary sentries waited like dark shadows, they’d only just been put on sentry duty by the sergeant of the guard and hadn’t fully woken yet, they might even have still been dreaming as they stood there. Ragıp Bey realized that some of them would die in a bloody fight that they would never really understand; he knew they would die but it was not in his power to save them, he doubted he could even save himself; death was approaching everyone step by step and it was not certain who it would take.
&n
bsp; Sheikh Efendi had once told Ragıp Bey, “Death always surprises people.”
“We’re not surprised by the night, by the day, by weddings or wars, but we’re surprised by death even though we’ve been dying ever since we were created. Even as he creates us the creator tells us he will take back the soul he has created, but even though people can prepare themselves for everything, they can’t prepare for death. Perhaps this is the grace of God, if you ask why, well, otherwise people wouldn’t be able to enjoy the lives they lived. God tells people they are going to die, but he doesn’t allow them to believe it, he allows people to live as if they were never going to die. Who else could have the power to make people manage to live with such a terrifying reality?”
Ragıp was confident enough of their friendship that he objected in a joking manner.
“If God has the power to kill, why doesn’t he have the power not to kill, Sheikh Efendi?”
“Of course he has enough power, but if there was no death how would anyone appreciate the value of life? We started, the end is certain, we will end . . . Infinity is nothing for mortals, Ragıp Bey, ask yourself if you would like nothingness.”
Then, softening his voice even more, he added:
“For us, eternity begins after death, it only gains meaning then. The world is too small to contain infinity, neither this world nor those living in it can grasp the meaning of infinity, we’re not strong enough, perhaps when we leave this world and go to the next we’ll see that an endless life has meaning, but not here, here everything beautiful owes its beauty to being ephemeral.”
As he walked past buildings that had been turned into shadows by the sparse gaslights, he was still thinking about what Sheikh Efendi had said.
“The Sheikh said that death gives life meaning and even beauty, but he’s never seen how these young men killed in a skirmish will experience that beauty and that meaning. He’s never seen bodies torn apart, severed arms, and the bloody whiteness of gouged eyeballs or heard the moaning of wounded soldiers . . . He might know about life, perhaps even about life after death and the next world, but he doesn’t know about death, we know death, we’ve seen it. What he said was true, we’re also always surprised by death, but, to tell the truth, we’ve never ascribed meaning to it because we’ve never seen any meaning in it,” he said later.
When he reached Eminönü, the wind from the sea made the night even colder, the condensed breath from his nose had formed tiny icicles on his moustache.
There was no one around, no carriages or caiques in sight. That night as usual the capital was like a deserted ghost city; Yeni Camii, with its large dome and its minarets reaching toward the sky, stood on the shore like a pitch-black giant opening its hands and beseeching God; the mosque made Ragıp Bey suddenly feel very alone and very small.
He jerked his bandolier into place and put his hands in his greatcoat, and, as he became whiter from the snow, crossing the bridge like a white ghost moving through the darkness, he decided to go to the barracks.
He heard the snow crunching under his feet, dogs barking here and there in the distance, the lapping of the waves, and his own breathing. The cold moved from the soles of his feet and spread throughout his body, he was so cold he could think of nothing but a warm room, a stove to sit by, and this longing for warmth made him think of Dilara Hanım and the mansion in Nişantaşı.
Indeed lately, whatever he thought about inevitably ended up reminding him of Dilara Hanım. His world was like a small village with a single square, wherever he set out from he ended up in the same square, with this red-haired lady, and he wondered what she did and who she saw when she wasn’t with him.
The thought that Dilara Hanım might see other men made him feel a tightness in his chest, it hurt his pride whenever he thought about it; even though he avoided confessing this to himself, he was aware that he was jealous. What bothered him most was how accustomed the staff were the first day he went to the mansion; he thought about how other men had been welcomed into that house and more would come after him and he didn’t have the power to do anything about it, then occasionally as he became aware of this helplessness he would begin to hate Dilara Hanım and swear never to see her again, but he could never keep his oath.
He only felt peace when he saw Dilara Hanım and when he was with her, because it was only when they were together that she had no chance to be with other men, when he was with her both his love and his hate diminished, when they were together he felt as if it would be easy not to be with her, but as soon as they parted, both love and hate began to dominate him. He carried within him two contradictory feelings about the same person, and his soul, unaccustomed to carrying even a single feeling where women were concerned, was wearied and disquieted.
Lately it was as if the feelings he had about the nation and the army had been nourished by his feelings for Dilara Hanım, the pain, anger, and desperation he felt for that woman was reflected in every aspect of his life and made him unhappy and uneasy about every aspect of it. Dilara Hanım had altered his untroubled nature and his untrammeled soul and he’d become an anxious person.
He was so absorbed in these thoughts and in the anger they aroused that he picked up his pace, walking not as if he was trying to get somewhere but as if he was attacking an enemy.
He was no longer conscious of the cold, he was aware only of the darkness and the silent whiteness, his back was perspiring, when he looked around he saw he’d reached the barracks, he hadn’t even been aware of his surroundings, from the dry thorns in his trouser cuffs he must have strayed from his path and passed through fields and gardens.
There was something sad and isolating about the way it was snowing, as if the snow was concealing those with secrets. Suddenly he worried about what Dilara Hanım was doing at that moment, what was she doing at that moment in a secluded room in a mansion in this silent, snow-covered city; was she offering another officer cognac that she’d warmed in her palm, had she let down her red hair so that the yellow light of the fire could play on it, was she speaking in her husky voice about one of the strange and mysterious novels she’d read, was she pulling someone onto herself the way she had with him? The thought of another man touching her was enough to drive him mad; he felt a strong desire to make love and a strong desire to kill, the two feelings were similar, and they were directed at the same person.
If he’d fallen for a whore in a Galata brothel he’d be strong enough to keep her to himself and not let anyone approach her, but he felt he was powerless to keep a lady from being flirtatious.
These wealthy ladies were like a maze of corridors in which all the doors had been closed; he couldn’t find a way in when he wanted to enter and couldn’t find an exit when he wanted to leave, the power that drew him into the maze or drove him out of it was not his own.
He began walking decisively, he’d decided where he was going and this decision put him at ease, even though he’d walked so far in the cold he didn’t feel tired. Not making a decision about Dilara Hanım had made him tired, had made him uneasy about everything without realizing it, and now making a minor decision concerning her had revived him and made him stronger.
He walked at the same determined pace until he reached her street, he walked without stopping, listening to the wind in his ears, but when he reached the end of her street he stopped suddenly. He thought it would be inappropriate to frighten the inhabitants of the mansion by knocking on the door at this hour of the night, he decided to walk past the mansion and return to the barracks. Even though he wasn’t going to knock on the door, he wanted to pass near her, to feel the warmth of the woman he knew was within those walls.
He turned down the street slowly, almost dragging his feet, feeling the cold and aware of how far he’d walked; on both sides of the street were large, snow-covered gardens and unlit mansions.
The white of the snow illuminated the sky, that light descended on the rooftops as snowflakes; as
soon as the snow touched the rooftops it lost its lightness, then settled on the cobblestone street like white shadows.
Ragıp Bey walked down the deserted, snowy street, he planned to walk to the end and turn back, but then as he was passing Dilara Hanım’s mansion, he saw a red light glowing at the intersection of the dull lightness of the sky and the whitish darkness of the street, there as a light on in Dilara Hanım’s window.
What he felt at that moment was almost the same as what he’d felt the first time he was shot during a border skirmish; he felt first as if a strong hand had picked him up and thrown him backwards, then he felt a pain in the upper part of his chest, the pain spread like corrosive smoke and took his breath away, he felt dizzy, weak in the knees, he could no longer see, and he collapsed, angered at the thought that this would sideline him from the battle and that he would be humiliated.
When he saw that light, he felt the same sharp, physical pain he felt when he was shot, mixed with this physical pain was the same sense of humiliation at being sidelined from the battle. Snow had filled his mouth and his nose, he could barely breathe, he leaned on a nearby wall.
Anyone else might have left at once and spent the rest of his life troubled about what might have been happening in the red light of that bedroom on that snowy night, suffering from all the things he imagined, but it was not in Ragıp Bey’s nature to quietly accept defeat, or to quietly accept being sidelined from the battle. Despite the strong attachment he felt to Dilara Hanım, despite how indecisive and confused he’d become, he could not countenance her turning him into a wretched victim, an underdog.
After leaning on the gate to catch his breath he brusquely brushed the icicles off his moustache and went in through the iron gate to the crunching of the pebbles that had turned to ice under the snow, reaching the thick wooden door and pounding on it with his fist.
Soon he saw a trembling light in a window on the ground floor.