Dancing for the General

by Sue Star

  Anna plunged past the servers and their bar tables. She shoved her way into the crowd of women. “What is it? What’s happened?”

  Soft voices rippled under the lanterns. Someone cried. The ripple grew to a buzz. Then to a roar.

  One of the women Anna had bumped said, “It sounded like Eve screaming.”

  “Remember how she screamed at the bridge party that time?” another said.

  “She’d seen a mouse.”

  This was no mouse, Anna thought. Judging from the shrill index in her scream, Eve had seen something far worse.

  Anna followed the direction of their stunned gazes, aimed at the edge of the yard, where the children had set up their playhouse as a spaceship tonight.

  Oh God.

  The playhouse barely held together. Had it finally crumbled? With the children inside? Her pulse hammered, and she pressed on, past the gossiping women, onward through the lantern light.

  “Priscilla?” she called.

  A man in a white suit separated from the group of men who gathered near the boundary between this yard and the general’s. It was Hayati, and he trotted toward Anna.

  She turned her back on him and called, louder this time. “Priscilla!”

  “She’s okay,” he said, breathing heavily as he reached Anna’s side. He laid his hand on her arm, a gentle move to prevent her from investigating any further.

  She shook it off and kept marching toward the children’s playhouse. “Priscilla! Come out of there this minute.”

  “She’s not in there.”

  Anna stopped in her tracks. Wheeled around to face him. “How do you know? Where is she, then?”

  “With the lady of the house, Mrs. Wingate.”

  Anna breathed again. Priscilla was safe.

  Then jealousy flared through her in a flash. Her niece had sought out someone else for comfort. Not Anna. She pushed aside her unfair thought and focused on Hayati’s words: She’s okay.

  “You’re cold,” Hayati said, stepping closer.

  “On a night this warm? Of course not.” Yet, she trembled and spoke in breathless spurts. “What’s happened?” she asked, trying to keep her teeth from clattering.

  “There’s been an accident.” He took her by the arm and forcibly steered her away from the murmuring voices in the tangle of weeds. “The men will take care of it. You should go back with the other women.”

  Anna flung off his restraint and dug her heels into the grass. “I won’t hear such nonsense. If someone’s hurt, why are we wasting time when we can—”

  “It’s too late. If anyone needs help, it is Mrs. Matheson, who is in a state of shock. She found him.”

  “Found who?”

  Hayati gave her a sad look. “The photographer for this evening. He’s...dead.”

  Anna gasped. Emin! Ozturk Bey’s employee. He’d known Umit.

  Her trembles grew to a shudder. Remembering. The scolding. The hidden tripod and camera. The talk of a coup. Paul Wingate had told Fran to get rid of the photographer.

  But surely not this way.

  Rainer, whom she no longer knew, had overheard their discussion, too. And now he was gone. But perhaps he’d never been here in the first place. Had she imagined him?

  Swaying on her feet, she took a deep breath to steady herself and asked, “How did it happen?”

  Hayati shrugged. “It’s not apparent yet. Someone from the medical dispensary is here tonight, fortunately, and he’s looking at him now.”

  “So he wasn’t shot?” As the gypsy at the tomb had been shot.

  “No, no. He went into convulsions, and then collapsed. Maybe he had a massive heart attack.”

  “I doubt it,” Anna said.

  Hayati narrowed his eyes at her, evaluating her, probing her mind. She wouldn’t let him in. She clamped her hands together to still the trembling.

  Just because the man was dead didn’t mean he was murdered, she reminded herself. “Someone had better call the police,” she said.

  “Mr. Wingate is handling everything.”

  “Did anyone see the photographer collapse?” She was willing to bet it wasn’t a heart attack.

  Hayati’s mouth drew itself into a tight line, making his voice terse. “The children, I believe.”

  Dear God, Anna thought. How much more could her niece take?

  Just then, a commotion erupted at the table set up as a bar. Two Turkish servers raised their voices at a third man, short and tired-looking in a rumpled, gray suit with no tie. He wore sunglasses, even though it was night.

  That Turkish detective. Yaziz. How had he gotten here so fast?

  Chapter Thirty-Four

  Tears wet the corners of Meryem’s eyes. He dragged her to her feet by her hair, but she refused to cry out. How dare the old man treat her like this!

  “So this is where you hid it,” he said. “I let you go free from those brats so you could lead me to it.”

  “You’re a thief and now a liar,” she said, stomping on his foot.

  He swore and loosened his grip on her, but not enough for her to slip completely free. Even in his drunken state, his size overwhelmed her. His arm circled around her chest and her arms, and a leg wrapped around her legs. His strength surprised her.

  With his other hand in the frizzy tangles of her hair, she felt immobile with her head tilted back. But she still managed to jerk her chin to one side and chomp down on his inner arm. It stank and was too solid for her teeth to penetrate.

  He swore again and threw her to the ground. Pain pricked her back, and then he sat atop her. His weight cut off her breath.

  “You can’t get away, so you might as well stop fighting me,” he said.

  She responded with a scream, although who would come to the aid of a gypsy?

  He grabbed one corner of her tsharchaf and stuffed it in her mouth, down her throat until she heaved with gags. By the time she’d coughed the cotton out of her throat and her choking spasm settled to mere discomfort, he was tying her wrists together with rope, and then her ankles. He pulled so tightly that she thought her flesh would peel away.

  He wrapped the rope around and around, binding her arms to her body, her legs to each other. Finally, the struggle in her died, and her body felt limp. Still, he did not lessen his hold on her until she remained limp for what felt like forever.

  He climbed off her, and she took in a deep sigh of air.

  “All right,” he said, watching her as he reached inside the hollow stump. “Let’s see what you have.”

  His hand scraped the inside of the stump. “There’s nothing there. You lied.”

  “Let me go.”

  “You’ve lied all along.” He drew his arm back, as if he meant to hit her.

  “Yes.”

  “You’re still lying.”

  “No. There’s no gun.” Too bad it was gone. She could’ve used it to bargain for her freedom.

  Without the gun...what would happen to Mustafa? And to the rest of the family?

  The asker’s eyes rolled up in his head, and he contemplated her in silence while her mind replayed the mystery of the gun’s disappearance. Someone must’ve followed her. Here, to the water hole. Yesterday. Someone had known where she’d hidden the gun.

  Not the gunman from Anit Kabir. He hadn’t known.

  “Where’d you get a thing like that?” the asker finally said, suddenly sounding sober.

  “Let me go! I’ve done you no harm.”

  “Oh, but you have. And now you pay. The general wants to have a little talk with you.” The old soldier plucked her from the ground and tossed her across one shoulder as easily as if she weighed nothing more than Priscilla’s kitten.

  Thinking of the kitten, she felt the flutter of her heart as he bounced her along the path, toward the street. Her life was worthless to him. She was no more important than one more stray from an unwanted litter. When the general was done with her, the asker would probably bring her back here.

  To the stream.

  Head ti
ed in a sack. To drown her. No one would ever notice if she disappeared forever.

  * * * * *

  Anna moved swiftly across the lawn toward Detective Yaziz. She wanted to intercept him before the others discovered who he was.

  Paul beat her to it. Emerging from the house, he paused in the light of the back door for only a moment before striding across the verandah, catching up to the detective. “Ah. We meet so soon, efendim. I only just now got off the phone from summoning the authorities.”

  “What is the problem?” Yaziz asked, stepping away from the servers who’d detained him.

  “They didn’t send you? But of course not. You couldn’t have arrived that fast.”

  “Nothing moves so fast in my country,” Yaziz said with a soft chuckle. “But you are right. I was already in the neighborhood when I heard a cry for help. How may I be of assistance?”

  In the neighborhood, Anna thought. Doing what? Something underhanded with Rainer? He had not reappeared yet from whatever task had drawn him across the street.

  “This way, efendim.” Paul cupped the detective’s elbow in his palm and led the way across the lawn.

  Anna matched the speed of their step. “Detective Yaziz, are you always on duty?”

  He paused, aiming his face in her direction. Through the dark lenses of his glasses, she couldn’t tell if he saw her or not. If his eyes registered recognition or not.

  “I regret that it seems that way,” he said.

  “How fortunate for us. Once again.”

  He shrugged and continued along with a limp behind Paul, toward the darkened area of death. A place, Hayati had said, that was not suitable for women’s eyes.

  Anna hurried after them. “How fortunate that you respond so quickly to a call.”

  “Miss Riddle.” Paul stopped and turned around, stepping close to her. “The detective happened by at the right moment. Perhaps you and the other women should wait inside with Cora and the kids.”

  She moved away from his face and tried again. “Detective, is it a purse thief that brings you to this neighborhood?”

  “If you like.”

  “What purse thief?” asked Paul.

  Anna smiled. “Hadn’t you better attend to more pressing matters now?”

  “Yes. Of course. Well, come along, efendim.”

  Moving on toward the group of men, they hurried their step, as if anxious to put distance between them and Anna.

  Anna picked up her pace and trailed along behind them.

  “Miss Riddle!” Paul shouted, stopping again. “This isn’t a pretty sight. Go on inside with the other women.”

  “I’ll decide for myself what I happen to look at and where I go, thank you. Unless Detective Yaziz doesn’t want anyone around to disturb his investigation.” She glanced significantly at the huddle of men by the fence. Still, no Rainer. “They’ll have to go, too.”

  Yaziz’s sunglasses looked at her, then to the men, then back to her again. He shrugged. “One eye is as good as another,” he said.

  It was a small victory for Anna, but an important one. It had been impossible for her to establish her authority, either with Priscilla or with gossipy Cora and her friends. This was one way to do that. Not that it mattered so much to her whether or not she was admitted to some sort of male club, but just that she had the freedom to make her own choices.

  Two deaths in two days. Death asphyxiated the air. Followed her. Tormented her with its nearness. Rainer’s gypsy, first, and now the photographer. They were both connected, somehow. Along with the purse thief and her very own sister, who teased death with an opium addiction. The common denominator was...Anna. Not Rainer, after all.

  Perhaps she needed an evil eye.

  The photographer’s body lay in broken weeds beyond the reach of grassy lawn. At first she thought he was only asleep. She thought that the men who hovered over him had made a dreadful mistake. There was no blood, not as there’d been the day before at the tomb.

  It wasn’t until she saw his camera lying smashed to one side of his still body that Anna felt her own desire to scream boil from within. Even with her knees thus weakened, she would not allow herself to succumb to hysteria, not as Paul expected from her. She jerked her head to one side and stifled a sob. Yaziz turned away from the body and gave her a gentle push toward the house.

  “Please do me the favor of seeing that no one leaves the premises.”

  She started to protest, but then a wave of nausea stirred, and her hand jerked to her mouth. She couldn’t lose it now. Couldn’t lose everything that she’d gained by tromping out here with the men. She’d made her point. So she nodded, then scuttled away to organize everyone, guests and servants.

  Trapped. Hours passed, unfolding the night. Teams of police and medical personnel arrived.

  The phone call placed to Nairobi never came through. Naturally. It had never been placed because Mitzi and Henry were in Switzerland. No calls arrived from Switzerland, either.

  Why had Henry lied to her?

  Fran had lied, too. She’d known all along that Mitzi wasn’t in Nairobi, yet she’d pretended—no, lied—about helping Anna with the call. As if there was an urgent, a hidden reason to make sure that Anna came here tonight. And stayed.

  Well, she was staying, all right, whether or not she wanted to. Thanks to Yaziz.

  * * * * *

  Bound, Meryem rode across the asker’s shoulder as he carried her upside down up the hill. After many bruising bounces and several squeaking gates and doors, she was dropped like a shovel full of manure.

  Meryem landed on her face in the toilet. The rough cement edge of the footprint cut her cheek. Blood streamed down the side of her nose and sopped into the kerchief, fastened tightly round her mouth. The asker was done with her for now, but he’d be back.

  She felt... She felt...

  Nothing.

  The sting of her cuts, the bruises against her hips, were nothing compared to the empty shell from which her soul had been ripped. Anger, hatred, humiliation—none of them fueled her anymore. Least of all, fear.

  She was a body waiting for the release of death.

  She wished he would’ve killed her. But it wasn’t time yet. The general hadn’t arrived. To speak with her. To learn what she didn’t know. About revolution.

  And so she waited for the release of death or the arrival of the general. Whichever came first. She didn’t care. As long as it wasn’t the asker.

  She closed her eyes, but she could not blot out the memories of evil.

  * * * * *

  Gossip raged like wildfire among the partiers held captive in the Wingates’ stuffy living room.

  The photographer was a student by night. That much Anna thought was true.

  A communist, some of her fellow detainees whispered.

  By day, he polished copper.

  And worked to support his ailing mother.

  He was a red journalist.

  Anna strained to listen, not to the surge of anxiety spreading in the snatch of stories around her, but to the sounds of police moving about outside. Beams of light swept through the night out there, occasionally striking the living room’s picture window, a dark rectangle against the blaze of interior lamplight. Anna twisted a handkerchief in her lap and sat silently, feeling Fran’s watchful gaze on her.

  Fran had given Emin Kirpat a chance at being a real photographer. Fran wouldn’t have killed him.

  Get rid of him, Paul had told her.

  No matter what her instructions, Fran wouldn’t have done it. She’d taken a risk by giving Anna the letters—Anna’s own letters. She felt their lump resting against her thigh, hidden inside the pocket of Mitzi’s black chiffon cocktail dress. Paul would not be happy once he found out that Fran hadn’t obeyed him. With that single gesture of friendship and trust, Fran had awakened a warmth inside Anna that had been lost to her too many years. No, Fran simply wasn’t capable of murder. Besides, she’d been upstairs with Anna at the time.

  When the body
was discovered. But, even so...

  Anna remembered Emin’s bias against gypsies in general and Umit in particular. He’d been outraged that his uncle, Ozturk Bey, helped the gypsy family, and outraged further that his uncle thought Emin should marry the sister. Emin hadn’t been sorry at all about Umit’s death. In fact, he’d been so emphatic that Anna wondered if he could’ve had a role in Umit’s death. She didn’t think that anymore.

  Now she wondered if Emin had died for what he knew about Umit’s death. Maybe for the photos he’d taken. The photos at the tomb, or even the photos taken here tonight.

  Get rid of him.

  Maybe Emin had photographed the general’s party, where a coup brewed. Was that why he had to die?

  Rainer, not the Rainer she’d once loved, but the new Rainer, Rainer the Spy, had been interested in that coup.

  Oh, God, had Rainer and Emin and Umit all worked together? Did that mean Rainer was next to die? She’d just begun to accept the fact that he hadn’t died all those years ago, and now she didn’t know how she felt about him. Even so, she didn’t want him to die this time for real.

  Finally, Yaziz entered the room, releasing her from her whirling thoughts. He held his notepad and thumbed through pages as he scribbled names and phone numbers of the guests.

  Anna marched over to him while he wrote the red-headed teacher’s information. “Detective Yaziz, how did that man die?”

  “Thank you, Mr. Davis, you may go now.” Yaziz turned from the teacher to Major Matheson. “I already know where to reach you, so you may go, too.”

  “Detective,” Anna said, “shouldn’t you excuse those with children first? It’s well past their bedtimes.”

  Yaziz looked up from his pad and finally aimed his gold-tinted sunglasses at her. “Why are you still here, Miss Riddle? We have your information.”

  She gave a short sigh of frustration. “And we have none. No one has told us anything. We deserve to know what happened. For our peace of mind.”

  “That is what we are trying to find out.”

  She glared at him. “When are you going to start asking questions, then? You should find out what people might have seen, rather than send them home.”

  “I will remember that.” He shuffled over to the next cluster of people.