An Oriental Murder

by Jane Bastin

  “Quick, this way. It’ll take us to the old kitchen. There’s a way out through there.”

  Sergeant Mehmet ran after Sinan. Five or six sailors, Sinan was unsure of the count in the half-light jumped off the boat in pursuit. Sinan pushed open the heavy kitchen door, stopping to bolt it from the inside. Sweat poured from Sergeant Mehmet’s face. No gun, nothing other than a stick he’d used earlier to protect himself. Copper pots lined the surfaces and Sinan grabbed one. A rattle of machine gun fire. The door swung open on its hinges. No security guards yet. Perhaps, they were playing an online game and mistook the machine gun fire for special effects, muttered Sergeant Mehmet. Sinan looked back. The heavy thud of footsteps was getting closer and the incomprehensible words of one of the sailors caught him unaware. They were close. Too close. Sinan knew they could not outrun them. If the sailors caught them, they would dispose of their bodies in the Bosphorus to avoid a diplomatic incident. One last chance, he thought quickly. The pounding of footsteps, the clatter of artefacts falling in each of the rooms they raced through. Sinan turned. Sergeant Mehmet almost collided with him. Sinan pulled him into an alcove. The sailors’ voices hummed louder. Their heavy boots drummed the floor. The sound of Russian voices grew louder. Sinan pushed the wall. Sergeant Mehmet froze. There was no way out. How could they fight off five or six Russian sailors? No security guards and no guns. Sergeant Mehmet saw his life flash before his eyes. The pounding of footsteps was just behind. A flash of an outline of an arm and Sergeant Mehmet fell backwards out of sight. The wall had opened. Sinan had remembered the way some of the walls had been artificially constructed by Sultan Mehmet III to evade his courtiers. Sinan drew mentally on the map of the palace and hazarded a guess. Sinan and Sergeant Mehmet stood behind the thin wall, hearts beating as the sailors rushed past.

  Once Sinan was confident that the sailors had gone into another part of the palace complex, he led Sergeant Mehmet along a labyrinth of corridors to the old hippodrome. Still reeling from the closeness with which they came to being attacked by the sailors, they crept as closely to the walls as possible, fearful of the sudden glare of streetlights. Clambering quickly into the police car, they drove as fast as the car could manage to a small clearing near the old city walls where they sometimes met away from the office. The mist was heavy and Sinan could feel the wetness of the Bosphorus against his skin.

  “Shall we take a look?” Sinan smiled as Sergeant Mehmet fell back against the car door, exhausted. The box was fastened with a wax sealant which Sinan melted with a flick of his lighter. Pushing the lid open, Sinan hypothesised what might be inside. Reason and logic were his forte but he had not considered the reality they were now presented with. Land deeds. Hundreds, if not thousands of land deeds. Sinan let loose a long, sharp whistle.

  “Sergeant Mehmet, this is incredible!”

  Sergeant Mehmet peered over the top of the box, tired and irritable. He wanted the warmth of his bed and the softness of his wife.

  “Turn the light up on your mobile phone a little. Not too much. We don’t want the neighbours to call the police, do we?!”

  Sergeant Mehmet did not laugh. He always laughed at Sinan’s rare jokes but he was tired. Sinan looked up, patted Sergeant Mehmet on the shoulder.

  “This will be worth it, you know. I really appreciate you coming out with me.”

  Sergeant Mehmet felt the weight of sleeplessness lift. Thanks from Inspector Sinan was priceless. Just like his jokes, they didn’t come very easily but when they arrived, their worth was all the greater. Sergeant Mehmet composed a small speech in his mind but when he opened his mouth, Sinan let loose another protracted whistle.

  “Land deeds for each of the main mining sites around Hakkari. Do you remember I mentioned the place up in the mountain where I saw Rick McFarlane? Well, that place is included here even. Swathes of land across Thrace, mountains across the Aegean…”

  Sinan stopped, the thought of his mother’s mountain, sold for wind farms. The industrial-sized windmills were already dwarfing everything around his mother’s house. More? He could see no familiar names.

  “The proxy companies, their names recur time after time. Ramadan Gift Holdings, Futures Ltd, Wind Mechanisms Holding. Rick McFarlane.”

  “Yes, sir?”

  Sinan appeared unsure whether he had voiced his thoughts or whether they remained unspoken. He looked at Sergeant Mehmet. His face looked pinched and drawn in the half light of the mobile phone.

  “Rick McFarlane. I am sure he was there. At Topkapi Palace.”

  “With us?”

  “No, with the fairies! Of course with us!”

  Two jokes in the space of minutes, Sergeant Mehmet was uncomfortable but forced a smile.

  “How do you know, sir?”

  “The stetson, I saw its shadow by the light of the security light. It is an unmistakable shape. I could also smell the distinctive odour of Texan Armadillo cigarettes. He always has a packet in one of his pockets and he did not feel the need to hide the smoke. He is definitely working with the Americans to buy up land in Turkey. And the Russians? Some of these proxy companies are Russian. Are they parcelling up the land between them? The Islamic government is allowing this? Or maybe, the turmoil of changes in the government have facilitated this? Deliberate changes? Murders of representatives of the state of Turkey by foreign states to gain land?”

  Sinan leant back against the cold metal of the car and shivered. Sergeant Mehmet stood, eyes wide, as Sinan voiced aloud his thoughts.

  Bea woke before Sinan. She had a faint memory of him having left the flat at an ungodly hour but nothing more. Perhaps she dreamt it, she thought as she wrapped one of Sinan’s shirts around herself. Wandering through into the small kitchen, opening cupboards to find nothing other than a pack of half-eaten biscuits, she thought of how she had succeeded in inching herself into his life. He met the criteria for husbands, she thought, slipping a biscuit into her mouth before spitting it out into the sink. Stale biscuit with a hint of mould was something she could not stomach. But Sinan… she could manage him, she thought, smiling. Handsome certainly but she still knew so little of him. He had mentioned maybe taking her to visit his mother, something about trouble in her village but then nothing more.

  “Hey, you’re up early.” Sinan pulled himself up on the pillow.

  “Early but there’s no food and nothing to drink!” Bea pouted the way she had with each of her husbands before she tired of them.

  “Shower and then I’ll take you to the best breakfast place in Istanbul.”

  An old woman with a headscarf covered in coloured mosques pointed to a small table at the edge of the jetty. The frenzy of Istanbul, its traffic and street hawkers was diluted by the ebb and flow of water and the occasional swoop of seagulls. Bea squeezed Sinan’s hand and he smiled as the breakfast tray arrived. Pots of walnut jam, fig jam, oregano honey, mulberry jam, clotted cream, sliced tomatoes, sliced cucumber, green olives, ripe olives, black olives, tomato paste flavoured with mountain herbs, walnuts and garlic, butter, boiled eggs, white cheese, soft cream cheese, cheese from Izmir and herb cheese from Van. The old lady brought glasses of tea and a basket of fresh bread.

  “It’s wonderful here, Sinan.”

  “I thought you’d like it. Aunt Aliya has been serving breakfast here since she was a young bride. And to look out at the sea when you’re eating makes the food all the more delicious.”

  “Did you go out last night after we…?”

  Sinan looked over the rim of his tea glass at Bea. The sun caught the red of her hair.

  “Only for a short time.”

  “Where to?” Bea knew he would not answer.

  “I need to go soon. Inspector Haris will be waiting and he cannot be kept waiting.”

  Even though Bea had not spent much time with Haris, she knew the tone of his voice and laughed as Sinan imitated him. Such a change from the taut, repressed Sinan she was usually presented with, she thought as she bit into a slice of bread smeared with clotted
cream and walnut jam.

  “Delicious.” Sinan smiled at Bea as he spooned honey over his bread.

  The phone call was not completely unexpected. The constant roar of traffic bled through the cracks of the car and Sinan had to pull over to hold the phone firmly against his ear. Olga Teremenko: platinum blonde, crimson lipstick and young. Sinan pictured her in the wood cabin in Belgrade Forest on the outskirts of the city although she could be now anywhere.

  “Yes, Olga, what can I do for you?”

  A slight crackle on the line. Someone listening or the spark of a satellite connection? Sinan was not concerned.

  “I will come straight to the point, Inspector Sinan. You took something that belonged to the Russian Government last night and we urge you to return it immediately or—”

  “Or what, Olga Teremenko?”

  For someone so young, she had an extraordinarily deep voice. The voice of one who had smoked high tar cigarettes for years.

  “Or we will take action. You do realise that this could cause a major diplomatic incident. You have stolen the property of a foreign state.”

  Sinan held the phone from his ear and laughed.

  “Stolen and foreign state are not two words you can take the moral high ground on, I suspect. Hundreds if not thousands of land deeds registered in puppet companies of the Russian and American governments designed to strip Turkey of its strategic assets is what constitutes stealing foreign assets.”

  “These are legal documents and we demand their return immediately. Huseyin warned me not to trust you.”

  Sinan smiled at the mention of his friend. The man who betrayed his wife and child for a Russian spy was hardly one to be trusted.

  “Russia and America are so clever at playing the parts of enemies but the reality is far less exciting but all the more pernicious. You collude to dominate the world while we, the poor bit players are destroyed. No, I don’t think I shall be returning anything just yet. Are you gathering the land deeds to pass on to Rick McFarlane to divvy up between your two countries?”

  “The speech of an ethicist but not of a pragmatist. Bring them back and you shall be rewarded handsomely.”

  Sinan felt the weight of his breakfast rise in his stomach.

  “No. Your men trespassed on Turkish government property at Topkapi Palace and I need to retain the deeds as evidence of a crime.”

  Sinan did not wait for her response. Closing his eyes, he thought of the sweetness of sleep. But Haris and the prosecution service jolted him back to reality and he swerved out into the path of oncoming traffic.

  Chapter Twenty-One

  The moment you're born

  they plant around you

  mills that grind lies

  lies to last you a lifetime.

  Sinan saw the outline of Haris. Standing against the photocopier in the office, holding court in front of a large group of police officers and administrators, white drool forming in the centre of his thin bottom lip, he appeared robotic. Sinan watched the performance from the doorway. Haris’ hands tapped a large folder on the side of the photocopier before picking up an old wooden stick and pointing at various bullet points, maps and pictures on a large white board. He rattled through a narrative replete with embroidered descriptions of various people who contributed to the deaths of the Prime Minister and the civil servants. Fevzi Cakmak, the young waiter with the slight stoop took prime occupancy in the narrative. No loose end was left untethered. Fevzi Cakmak, according to Haris was a cold-blooded, ruthless killer who had killed before and had he not been captured, would have murdered again. It was down to the expert guidance of their superiors – “Otherwise known as Haris,” whispered Ruhi to Sergeant Mehmet – that the right culprits had been locked away. Sinan stepped forward as the narrative moved into detail about the misplaced direction of the previous lead inspector. Some of the police officers pursed their lips as Haris voiced a litany of mistakes made by the team under the direction of Sinan. Haris stopped at the sound of chair legs scraping the concrete floor and looked around. Sinan stood and smiled.

  Away from the gathering of officers, Haris was evidently not in the mood for small talk. His sarcasm seemed to have eluded him for the morning, thought Sinan as he stood to attention in his office. It had been newly painted a pale green with paint splattered across the back of the chair, sides of the desk and the top of the bare lightbulb.

  “You have overstepped the mark once again, Inspector Sinan.”

  The spit in the middle of Haris’ bottom lip had hardened to a thick crust. Sinan said nothing.

  “I do not accept insubordination in my team, do you understand.”

  Sinan nodded.

  “Wipe that smirk off your face, Inspector Sinan. You have been nothing but trouble since you started and I shall make it my personal endeavour to make sure that you never work as a police officer let alone inspector ever again, do you understand me?”

  Sinan loosened his knotted fingers and breathed slowly. He knew why Haris was riled and he knew why he had called him in but to confront him without the full evidence would not be wise.

  “Could I please ask you, sir, to explain exactly what it is I am supposed to have done?”

  Haris’ bony cheeks flared red. The bone of his knuckles appeared transparent as they pushed through the thin veil of skin. Sinan slowed his senses. Small droplets of mucus dripped from Haris’ nose as he breathed fast.

  “You know very well, you snivelling toad.”

  Sinan did not move. Haris was needled, he knew.

  “I set you a task to collate the requisite documentation for the prosecution of Fevzi Cakmak.”

  “The stooge you mean?” Sinan spoke forcefully but Haris continued to grip the edge of his desk. Eyes focused on a distant spot on the far wall just below the lopsided picture of Ataturk

  “And you failed to complete it on time. You have jeopardised the success of the investigation.”

  Haris stood up suddenly. Twisting his neck to stare directly at Sinan, the threads of arteries and veins pulsed through his skin.

  “You have broken every rule in the police code. You trespassed in Topkapi Palace, stole property belonging to the Russian government – all without any permission from me. How dare you? “

  Sinan’s lack of response irritated Haris.

  “I will, however not be suspending you or Sergeant Mehmet just yet. But you have to remain quiet about this otherwise I will not be able to protect you, do you understand? I expect your absolute silence and I will do and say no more. I repeat, do you understand?”

  Sinan said nothing but stood up and left the room without closing the door behind him.

  “Embroiled up to his neck in the selling of Turkey’s assets,” Sinan whispered to Sergeant Mehmet back in his own office checking that the door was firmly closed. Ruhi barged through with a tray of tea and small bitter almond biscuits that he knew were one of Sinan’s favourites. Sinan patted him on the back ushering him quickly out.

  “The box is with Bea at the hotel. Not particularly safe either for her or the box but I had no time to think this morning.”

  Sinan saw Sergeant Mehmet’s face momentarily freeze, part way through chewing a biscuit. His mouth pursed with concern.

  “Don’t worry, I’ll get back there as soon as possible to move it. Haris is on the warpath but we’ve gained an inch of relief. He suspects we might know about his financial involvement in Ramadan Gift Holdings but he is not sure. He’ll be sniffing around. Keep everything away from him. We need to build the case with as much evidence as possible before we go for him and the others.”

  “The killer?”

  Sinan stopped partway through the door. Sergeant Mehmet often asked the most obvious and the most pertinent questions, the one that others evaded, partly thinking that others will have asked, partly to avoid embarrassing themselves, partly because they suspected nobody had the answer.

  “Hired possibly by the Russians and the Americans. Rick McFarlane certainly seems to be involve
d. We may never find the actual killer but we can prosecute those who organised the killings.”

  Bea always rang at the most inopportune times, Sinan thought as he struggled to locate his ear phones in his jacket pocket. Haris had a top of the range police car complete with Bluetooth and heated car seats for the cold winter mornings whereas Sinan had a fifteen-year-old Fiat with a dent in the middle of the bonnet and a radio that threatened to spill out of the front at every pothole. He certainly did not have to fish for earphones.

  “Hello?”

  It was not Bea’s voice. Sinan grimaced as a taxi overtook him on the bend into Istiklal Street.

  “Hello?” Sinan replied, but nothing. She, whoever it was, had put the phone down. Sinan checked the number. It was Bea’s. A germ of concern in his mind was pushed back as he beckoned to the doorman outside the Pera Palas hotel. He tossed the car keys into his hand and stepped into the entrance just as Ginge Allyson and Kylie Thwaite rushed through the swing doors. Their voices disembodied in a chorus of screams, Ginge and Kylie waved their arms at Sinan and in the direction of the birdcage lift. Confused, Sinan pushed past. More of the delegates drifted into the hallway from the conference hall. Roger McDuff stood at the reception desk with a life-sized bust of Tutankhamun, looking bemused at the sudden throng of people. Sinan slowed his senses. The smell of red mullet frying in a distant kitchen filled the air. The ebb and flow of human voices surrounding him were broken by the sudden, rapid words of the manager. Sinan feigned listening. He could see Francoise Gilberto slip back into the conference room. Why? Ginge Allyson, her fire red hair blew in the wind outside the hotel doorway and Kylie, her best friend, stroked her shoulder. Why? Comfort? For what? The incident at the British Consulate had sort of been resolved or was she still intent on vengeance? Cindy McFarlane brushed her breast against his arm. Deliberate? Where was her errant husband? Did she just wink? Sinan closed his eyes and opened them again. The box. He had to get to the box. Anyone here could be implicated and yet no evidence for such a thought. A rush of unaccustomed panic swept through Sinan and he felt a giddiness on his feet. The manager pulled violently on his arm. Wiping a tear away, the manager, unused to exerting any kind of physical force leant back on his heels and shouted.