by Orhan Pamuk
Ka expected Blue would now rise, shake his hand, and see him to the door. But instead there was a silence.
Tipped back on the hind legs of his chair, Blue was now rocking happily back and forth. “But if your mediation efforts come to nothing, and you don’t escape this dreadful city in one piece, it won’t be because of me, it will be because of your loose-lipped atheist boastfulness. The only time people in this country brag about atheism is when they know the army is behind them.”
“I’m not the sort of person who takes pride in being an atheist.”
“I’m glad to hear it.”
Both men fell silent, smoking their cigarettes. Ka felt he had no choice but to get up and leave. But instead he asked, “Aren’t you afraid of dying?”
“If that’s a threat, the answer is no, I’m not afraid of dying. If you’re asking me as a concerned friend, the answer is yes, I’m very afraid. But whatever I do now, these tyrants will still want to hang me. There’s nothing I can do to change that.”
Blue gave Ka a damningly sweet smile. The message Ka took was, Look, I’m in a far worse fix than you are, but I’m still taking it better than you!
Shame forced Ka to admit to himself that his panic stemmed from the sweet, aching hope for happiness that he’d been carrying around since falling in love with Ïpek. Was Blue immune to that sort of hope? I’ll count to nine and then I’ll get up and leave, he told himself. One, two.… By the time he reached five, he’d decided that if he failed to dupe Blue, he’d never be able to take Ïpek back with him to Germany.
Suddenly inspired, he began to talk, saying whatever came into his head. He began by describing a luckless mediator he remembered from a black-and-white American film he’d seen as a child; he went on to remind Blue that—once things were straightened out—he was sure he’d be able to get their Hotel Asia statement printed in Germany; then he remarked that those who go through life making bad decisions out of some stubborn intellectual passion sometimes live to regret it. He recounted as example the time in a fit of pique he’d quit a basketball team, never to return; the time he would have spent on the court, he elected to idle away at the Bosphorus, watching the sea for hours on end; and once he’d said this he could not stop himself from telling Blue how very much he loved Istanbul, and how beautiful the little Bosphorus town of Bebek could be on a fine spring evening. All the while he struggled to keep Blue’s cold-blooded stare from crushing him into silence. It was like the final visit before an execution.
“Even if we broke all precedents and did everything they asked, they’d never keep their word,” said Blue. He pointed to the paper and pens sitting on the table. “They want me to write down my whole life story, every crime I’ve ever committed. If I do, and they decide I’m sincere, they could pardon me under the remorse law. I’ve always pitied the fools who fell for such lies, only to spend their last days on trial having betrayed themselves. But since I’m going to die anyway, I want to make sure those who follow get to hear a few things about me that are true.” On the table there were several sheets already covered with writing, and now he picked up one of them. With the same grave and rather ludicrous expression he’d assumed for giving a quote for Hans Hansen and the German press, he began to read:
“MY EXECUTION
“On the subject of my execution, I would like to make it clear that I have no regrets about anything I have done for political reasons at any time in the past, not excluding today, Thursday, the twentieth of February. My father is a retired clerk, formerly of the Istanbul Regional Treasury Office, and I am his second child. During my childhood and early youth, my father maintained secret links with a Cerrahi lodge and I grew up inside his humble, silent world. In my youth I rebelled against him by becoming a godless leftist, and when I was at university I tagged along with other young militants and stoned the sailors coming off the American aircraft carriers. Around the same time I got married; then we split up and I managed to survive the crisis.
“For years no one noticed me. I was an electronics engineer. Because of the hatred I felt for the West, I admired the revolution in Iran. I returned to Islam. When the Ayatollah Khomeini said, ‘The most important thing today is not to pray or fast but to protect the Islamic faith,’ I believed him. I took inspiration from Frantz Fanon’s work on violence, from the pilgrimages Seyyid Kutub made in protest against oppression, from the same man’s ideas on changing places, and from Ali Sheriyat.
“I escaped to Germany after the military coup. Then I returned to Turkey. I was wounded while fighting in Grozny with the Chechens against the Russians, and as a result of that wound, I have a limp in my right leg. When I was in Bosnia during the Serbian siege, I married a Bosnian girl named Merzuka and took her back to Istanbul with me. Because my political obligations and my ideas on pilgrimage meant that I was hardly ever in any given city longer than two weeks, my second wife and I eventually separated.
“After cutting off relations with the Islamist groups that sent me to Chechnya and Bosnia, I set out to explore all four corners of Turkey. In spite of the fact that I believe it is sometimes necessary to kill the enemies of Islam, I have never killed anyone, nor have I ever ordered anyone’s death. The man who assassinated the former mayor of Kars was a deranged Kurdish driver who was angry because the mayor was threatening to take all the horse-drawn carriages off the streets. I came to Kars for the girls who were committing suicide. Suicide is the greatest sin of all. I leave behind my poems as my testament, and I would like them to be published. Merzuka has them. And that’s all I have to say.”
There followed a silence.
“You don’t have to die,” said Ka. “That’s why I’m here.”
“Then let me tell you something else,” said Blue. Once he was sure he had Ka’s full attention, he lit another cigarette. Did he know about the tape recorder whirring silently on his chest, working as unobtrusively as a dutiful housewife?
“When I was living in Munich, there was this cinema I went to a lot. They had discount double features after midnight,” Blue said. “And you know that Italian who did The Battle of Algiers, about the French oppression of Algeria—one day they showed his latest film, Burn! It’s set on an island in the Caribbean where they produce sugarcane, and it’s about the tricks the colonialists played and the revolutions they staged. First they find a black leader and get him to rise up against the Portuguese, and then they sail in and take over. After failing the first time, the blacks rise up again, this time against the English, but the English defeat them by setting the entire island on fire. The leader of both rebellions is arrested, and soon it is the morning of his execution. Then who should arrive but the man who first discovered him, the man who talked him into the first rebellion and went on to crush the second one for the English. Before you know it, Marlon Brando has gone into the tent in which they’re keeping the black captive; he cuts his ropes and sets him free.”
“Why?”
Blue bridled at the question. “Why do you think? So he wouldn’t hang, of course! Marlon knew very well that if they hanged this man, they’d turn him into a legend, and then the local people would use his name as a battle cry for years to come. But the black leader, knowing exactly why Marlon has cut his ropes, rejects his chance for freedom and refuses to run away.”
“Did they hang him?” asked Ka.
“Yes, but they don’t show the hanging in the film,” said Blue. “Instead they show what happened to Marlon Brando, the agent who, like you, tried to tempt the condemned man with his freedom. Just as he was about to leave the island, one of the locals stabbed him to death.”
“I’m not an agent!” Ka said, unable to hide his annoyance.
“Don’t be so sensitive about the word agent: after all, I see myself as an agent of Islam.”
“I’m not an agent for anyone,” Ka insisted, still perturbed.
“Do you mean to tell me that no one even bothered to put some amazing drug into this cigarette to make me dizzy and sap my willpower? Ah, the
best thing America ever gave the world were these red Marlboros. I could smoke these Marlboros for the rest of my life.”
“If you use your head, you can smoke your Marlboros for another forty years.”
“This is just what I meant by the word agent,” said Blue. “An agent’s main job is to talk people into changing their minds.”
“All I mean is that it’s stupid to let yourself be killed by these crazed, bloodthirsty fascists. Don’t count on becoming a revolutionary icon either; it’s not going to happen. These meek lambs here—they may have strong religious beliefs but at the end of the day it’s the state’s decrees they obey. And all those rebel sheikhs who rise up because they fear our religion is slipping away, all those militants trained in Iran, even the ones like Saidi Nursi who enjoyed long-lasting fame—they can’t even hold on to their graves. As for all those religious leaders in this country who dream of the day their names turn to emblems of faith, the soldiers load their bodies onto military planes and dump them in the sea. But you know all this. Those Hezbollah cemeteries in Batman to which so many came on pilgrimage—one night was all it took to raze them. Where are they now, those cemeteries?”
“In the people’s hearts.”
“Empty words. Only twenty percent of the people give their votes to the Islamists. And to a moderate Islamist party at that.”
“If it’s so moderate, why do they panic and send in the military? Please explain that! So much for your impartial mediating.”
“I am an impartial mediator,” said Ka, raising his voice.
“No, you’re not. You’re a Western agent. You’re the slave of the ruthless Europeans, and like all true slaves you don’t even know you are one. You’re just a typical little European from Nişantaş. Not only were you brought up to look down on your own traditions, you also think you live on a higher plane than ordinary people. According to your kind, the road to a good moral life is not through God or religion, or through taking part in the life of the common people—no, it’s just a matter of imitating the West. Perhaps from time to time you say a word or two reproaching the tyrannies visited on the Islamists and the Kurds, but in your heart of hearts you don’t mind at all when the military takes charge.”
“What if I did this for you: Kadife could wear a wig under her head scarf, and that way, when she bared her head, no one would see her real hair.”
“You can’t make me drink wine!” said Blue. He’d raised his voice, too. “I refuse to be a European, and I won’t ape their ways. I’m going to live out my own history and be no one but myself. I for one believe it’s possible to be happy without becoming a mock European, without becoming their slave. There’s a word Europhiles very commonly use when they denigrate our people: To be a true Westerner, a person must first become an individual, and then they go on to say that in Turkey, there are no individuals! Well, that’s how I see my execution. I’m standing up against the Westerners as an individual; it’s because I am an individual that I refuse to imitate them.”
“Sunay believes so deeply in this play that I can even do this for you. The National Theater will be empty. The live TV camera will show Kadife’s hand pulling off the scarf first. Then we can do some tricky editing, and the hair we show will really belong to someone else.”
“I find it rather suspicious that you are prepared to go through such contortions just to save me.”
“I’m very happy right now,” said Ka, and just saying this made him feel as guilty as if he’d been telling a lie. “I’ve never been so happy in my entire life. I want to preserve that happiness.”
“What is it that’s made you so happy?”
Ka did not give the answer that later occurred to him as wise: Because I’m writing poems again. But neither did he say, Because I believe in God. Instead he blurted out, “Because I’m in love!” He added, “And I’m taking my love back to Frankfurt with me.” For a moment, he was glad just to be speaking so openly about his love to a virtual stranger.
“And who is this love of yours?”
“Kadife’s sister, Ïpek.”
Ka could see confusion in Blue’s face. He regretted his joyous outburst, and was silent.
Blue lit another Marlboro. “When a man is so happy that he is willing to share his happiness with someone about to be executed, it is a gift from God. Let’s imagine I agreed to your proposals and fled the city to save your happiness, and Kadife found a way to take part in the play using some trickery that saved her honor and also secured her sister’s hope for happiness. What guarantee do I have that these people will keep their word and let me go?”
“I knew you would ask this!” cried Ka. He paused for a moment. He brought his finger to his lips and signaled to Blue to stay quiet and watch. He undid the buttons of his jacket and made a great show of turning off the tape recorder taped to his chest. “I’ll be your guarantor, and they can release you first,” he said. “Kadife can wait before going onstage until she hears of your release and that you have gone back into hiding. But to get Kadife to agree, you will need to write her a letter saying you’ve approved the plan—I need to deliver it to her personally.” He was making all this up as he went along. “And if you would tell me how this release should happen and where they should leave you,” he whispered, “I’ll make sure they do as you ask. And then you can stay underground until the roads have opened again. You can trust me on this; you have my guarantee.”
Blue handed Ka a piece of paper. “Put it in writing: In securing my consent for Kadife to go onstage and bare her head without staining her honor, and to ensure that I am able to leave Kars in one piece, you, Ka, have undertaken to act as mediator and guarantor. If you don’t keep your word, if this turns out to be a trap, what sort of punishment should the guarantor expect?”
“Whatever they do to you, they must also do to me!” Ka said.
“OK, write that down.”
Now Ka gave Blue a sheet of paper. “I’d like you to write that you have agreed to my plan, that I have your permission to relay the plan to Kadife, and that the final decision is up to her. If Kadife agrees, she must make a written statement to this effect and sign it with the understanding that she must not bare her head until you have been freed in a suitable way. Write all that down. But when it comes to the time and place of your release, I’d rather not be involved. It would be better if you chose someone you trusted. I’d recommend Fazιl, blood brother of the dead boy, Necip.”
“Is that the boy who was sending love letters to Kadife?”
“That was Necip, the one who died. He was a very special person, a gift from God,” said Ka. “But Fazιl’s just as good-hearted.”
“If you say so, I believe you,” said Blue, and turning to the sheet before him, he began to write.
Blue was done first. When Ka finished writing out his own guarantee, he detected a contemptuous half smile flashing across Blue’s face, but he wasn’t bothered. He’d set things in motion, he’d removed all the obstacles, he and Ïpek were now free to leave the city, and he could hardly contain his joy. They exchanged papers in silence. When Blue folded Ka’s statement and put it in his pocket without bothering to read it, Ka followed suit; and then, making sure Blue could see what he was doing, he switched the tape recorder back on.
There was a silence. Ka repeated the last thing he had said before turning off the tape recorder. “I knew you would ask this,” he said. “But unless the two sides can establish some sort of trust, no agreement is possible. You’ll just have to trust the state to keep its word.”
They looked into each other’s eyes and smiled. Afterward, he would return to this moment many times, and each time he would feel great remorse; happiness had blinded him to the fury in Blue’s eyes; looking back, he often thought that if he’d sensed this fury, he might never have asked the question:
“Will Kadife agree to this plan?”
“She’ll agree to it,” whispered Blue, his eyes still bright with rage. There was another short silence.
“Seeing that you aim to make a contract with me that binds me to life, you might as well tell me more about this great happiness of yours.”
“I’ve never loved anyone like this in my entire life,” said Ka. His words sounded credulous and clumsy, but still he said them. “For me, there’s only one chance for happiness, and that’s Ïpek.”
“And how do you define happiness?”
“Happiness is finding another world to live in, a world where you can forget all this poverty and tyranny. Happiness is holding someone in your arms and knowing you hold the whole world.” He was going to say more, but Blue jumped to his feet.
At this moment the poem Ka would later call “Chess” came rushing into his head. He took a quick look at Blue and then, having left him standing there, took out the notebook in his pocket and began to write. As he jotted down the lines of the poem, which was about happiness and power, wisdom and greed, Blue peered over his shoulder, curious to know what was going on. Ka could sense Blue’s eyes on him, and that image too found its way into his poem. It was as if the hand that was writing belonged to someone else. Ka knew Blue wouldn’t be able to see it, but that did not stop his wishing Blue could know that Ka’s hand was in thrall to a higher power. It was not to be: Blue sat on the edge of the bed, gloomily smoking in the manner of condemned men the world over.
On an impulse he would spend much time trying (and failing) to understand afterward, Ka found himself opening his heart to Blue yet again.
“Before I got here, I hadn’t written a poem in years,” he said. “But since coming to Kars, all the roads on which poetry travels have reopened. I attribute this to the love of God I’ve felt here.”
“I don’t want to destroy your illusions, but your love for God comes out of Western romantic novels,” said Blue. “In a place like this, if you worship God as a European, you’re bound to be a laughingstock. Then you cannot even believe you believe. You don’t belong to this country; you’re not even a Turk anymore. First try to be like everyone else. Then try to believe in God.”