An Evil Eye: A Novel

by Jason Goodwin

  George Compston adopted a mulish expression. “The bet says the sultan has to get across the bridge. Isn’t that right, Fizerly?”

  “I grant you they built it,” Fizerly added. “But will it stand? That’s the question, Esterhazy.”

  Esterhazy’s pale face betrayed the hint of a smile. “I think you will pay the forfeit, gentlemen. Look!”

  A vermilion eight-oared caïque appeared, flying brave pennants, carrying important dignitaries of the empire: the grand vizier, Husrev Pasha; the mufti of Istanbul; the military chiefs of Rumelia and Anatolia.

  Behind it came the imperial caïque itself, with young Abdülmecid and two veiled women; it was rowed by twelve men, who barked like dogs in the traditional manner, so that the sultan’s conversation would go unheard.

  As the cavalcade approached along the Bosphorus, ships anchored in the roadstead dipped their colors. Six caïques, vermilion and eight-oared, bore the ladies, who turned their veiled heads regally this way and that, to appreciate the lively scene. Among them could be seen some of the harem children: little boys in silk jackets, little girls in furs.

  The sultan’s caïque passed momentarily from sight, then swept out of the shadows below the bridge and into the basin of the Golden Horn. The crowd began to chant its approval: “Hu! Hu!”

  The third, then fourth caïque slipped beneath the bridge. As its prow passed under the parapet, two garlanded caïques that had been milling in the lower basin shot forward and fell into flanking positions, one on each side of the caïque as it went under the bridge.

  Eight seconds later, straddling a crossbeam of the bridge’s superstructure, Erkan, the Strongest Man in the World, took hold of Kadri’s ankles and lowered the boy toward the water.

  The ladies in the caïque gasped as the swinging figure of a boy jostled against them. Then he was gone.

  The caïque shot out into the Golden Horn. The ladies looked about them, uncertain what had happened in the fifteen seconds it took them to go underneath the bridge. The rowers blinked—and kept on rowing, for there was nobody aboard to change their orders.

  Invisible from the shore, Kadri, Erkan, and the little girl they had just snatched from the harem caïque scuttled along the gantry below the planked surface of the bridge and made their way to the far side. The girl was lowered into a waiting caïque. Low and black, it had not been spotted moored up against the pontoon.

  Spyro the caïquejee twitched a blanket over Kadri and the little girl and applied himself to his oars. They came out from beneath the bridge, heading to the open water, as the last imperial caïque emerged on the other side.

  Erkan scrambled through the final span of the bridge and stepped onto land, where he was soon lost in the crowd.

  Spyro rowed vigorously toward the Tophane stage. “There you are, princess,” he said, swinging her out of the caïque.

  Kadri took Roxelana by the hand.

  She dragged slightly. “Where are we going?”

  “Come on,” Kadri said. “I’ll race you up the hill.”

  135

  “I think I feel a little better, Tülin, now.”

  Tülin folded the shawl and laid it tenderly on the divan. “Yes, valide. I’m glad.”

  “When this business of the bridge is over, would you send to the Kislar aga? I think he and I need a little talk.”

  “Yes, valide. What do you want to talk about?”

  The valide let her eyelids droop. “What about? Oh, your future, my dear. And mine, too.”

  Tülin stood respectfully at the foot of the divan. “The Kislar aga is expecting us at Besiktas tomorrow, valide. Perhaps you should talk to him then?”

  The valide cocked her head. “Tomorrow, is it? Tiens! Time flies so fast.”

  “Yes, valide. Would you like a tisane, now?”

  “No, thank you, my dear. I’m quite comfortable.” Her eyes roamed around the room she knew so well. “I’m very comfortable, right here. You’ll send for the Kislar aga, won’t you?”

  Tülin turned to the fire and put another log on the blaze.

  “Tülin?”

  “Yes, valide. Yes, I’ll send for the Kislar aga, right away. Just let me light the lamps before I go.”

  136

  THE outing had made everyone slightly hysterical. Many of the girls had seen more in one afternoon than they could quite take in. Crowds of men, for a start.

  “Did you see the dragoon, by the bridge?”

  “The man lolling in the window, showing his private parts!”

  “Go on!”

  “Never!”

  “I told you to look, but by then he’d disappeared.”

  “I only saw the sultan. So handsome, in the landau.”

  “Oh, yes!” Their voices were shrill with agreement: everyone wished that they’d said it first.

  “So handsome!”

  “So imperial!”

  Ibou, the Kislar aga, moved uneasily among the chatter. “Has anyone seen Roxelana?”

  “The little girl?”

  “She’s upstairs asleep, with all the kiddies.”

  “Somebody pushed her over the side.”

  “Watch what you say—young men dangling all over you, under the bridge! Whoo!”

  “I told you, aga—somebody lifted her off the caïque.”

  “What?”

  “I didn’t really see. It was all dark under the bridge, after the sunshine.”

  “That’s right, aga. There was something funny under the bridge.”

  “And Roxelana was gone?”

  “How could I tell? She wasn’t with us when we got into the carriages. Maybe she’d run on ahead. Children! In the carriage, I peeped!”

  “You didn’t!”

  “You would!”

  Ibou gave up, in despair. Everyone had their version. No one had been remotely interested in the child.

  And yet no one had seen her all afternoon.

  He was worrying about nothing, he thought to himself.

  137

  YASHIM stood listening to the sound of the muezzin calling the Friday prayer.

  Only a fortnight, he thought, since he had gone to Friday mosque at Topkapi, to escape his awkwardness with the valide’s handmaiden. The day, of course, that Hyacinth had died.

  He remembered the sound of the muezzin rising and falling as Melda told him that Elif had been pregnant.

  That, too, had been Friday.

  Hyacinth and Elif had died a week apart. Hyacinth had been trying to talk to him, the old eunuchs had said.

  Hyacinth had died in Topkapi; Elif in Besiktas.

  Yashim leaped, as if he had been stung.

  “Hats!” he exclaimed. “Roxelana never liked the hats!”

  138

  THE Grande Rue was still full of people, many of them in a holiday mood after the ceremony of the bridge; many of them from Istanbul, visiting the European quarter for the first time. Loafers sizing up the opportunities; knots of veiled ladies peering into the unfamiliar vitrines of the European shops, with their regimented displays of hats or pastries or upholstered chairs; dignified gentlemen astonished by the height, and apparent solidity, of the stuccoed buildings.

  The crowd moved like treacle: Yashim dodged and weaved, veering around the groups of visitors and diving between startled families. The road seemed longer than it had ever been, but eventually it began to slope downhill. He raced, panting, past the base of the Galata Tower, and flung himself down the long flights of steps leading to the waterfront.

  He had saved Roxelana, for the moment.

  But with Roxelana gone, everything was changed.

  139

  HE heard pounding footsteps behind him, and glanced back.

  One of Fevzi’s caïquejees was vaulting the steps three at a time.

  At the bottom of the stairs Yashim skidded out onto the icy thoroughfare. The caïquejee behind him gave a piercing whistle, and suddenly the roadway ahead was full of men, bare-fisted and bowlegged, stringing themselves out across the w
ay that led to the bridge.

  Their caïques rocked unattended at the stage.

  Without a second glance, Yashim dashed to the stage and flipped the painter on the leading caïque. He snatched up an oar and drove it against the wooden jetty. With a heave he shot the fragile craft out into the Golden Horn.

  The caïque gave a lurch. Water splashed over the gunwale, and Yashim very nearly overbalanced: his arms flailed and he sat down abruptly in the stern. He fitted the oars to the rowlocks, and pulled—almost tumbling over again as the fine-keeled caïque, improbably light, began to twist through the water. He drew it in line with the central arch of the bridge, dipping his oars too deep; at the next stroke his blades scudded over the surface like lifting teal.

  But he had it now: two firm bites of the blades, and the caïque was skimming toward the bridge.

  He glanced up. Some of the caïquejees were racing to the bridge, others piling into caïques waiting at the stage. One, two, then three shot forward, and slipped into his wake.

  Yashim battled against the nervous movements of the boat. The shallow gunwale dipped and the caïque shipped water again. With an effort he steadied his stroke, forcing himself to slow down. He glanced up: the caïquejees were gaining on him now.

  As he slid into the shadow of the bridge he began drawing firmly to the right, zigzagging so that the men above would misjudge the point where he emerged. As he shot out on the other side he looked up—his maneuver had not been wasted. A man on the bridge dashed to catch up with him, and seemed ready to jump; but it was too late. Yashim had cleared the bridge by a boat’s length.

  He leaned to the oars, and felt the current of the Bosphorus take him as he moved out of the Golden Horn. It was sweeping him slowly toward the opposite shore, toward Seraglio Point, where the very tip of Istanbul jutted into the strait, and he bent with it, willing it to whirl him toward the little jetty that stuck out beneath the walls of the seraglio.

  For a few moments, with the help of the current, he left his pursuers trailing; but once they emerged into the stream they began to advance rapidly. One hundred and fifty yards. One hundred and twenty. One hundred.

  One of the pursuing caïques began to pull in toward the shore. There were riptides and eddies all along the shores of the Bosphorus, and no doubt the caïquejee knew exactly where to find one that would speed his pursuit.

  Yashim could only keep rowing, grimly, back cracking, hands raw against the wooden sculls.

  140

  “I—don’t—think I—can take much—more—of this,” the young man gasped. A wavelet slapped his face and he swallowed another spoonful of the Bosphorus.

  “Think of Byron—Compston—old man.”

  “Byron did it—in summer.” The acting third secretary at the British embassy kicked out with both legs; but his energy was waning. His lips were blue. Compston could hardly remember why he was here, slowly freezing to death in the gelid waters of the Bosphorus.

  “Damn—that wretched—Esterhazy.”

  Compston could not have believed he could ever be so cold. Before they waded into the water, he and Fizerly had smeared themselves in a liberal coating of mutton fat until Fizerly said they looked like prize porkers from his father’s model farm. For the first hundred yards or so, the fat had done the trick.

  “Damn—that—blasted bridge!” Fizerly glanced around. In the dusk, he could see only the glowing disk of Compston’s face in the water. “Keep—going, Compston. Old man? Compston?”

  141

  “IT’S late, Tülin. I feel tired, I want to sleep.”

  Tülin hovered. “Yes, valide.”

  The valide turned her head. “You can go now. Leave a lamp.”

  She gestured to the lights.

  “The Kislar aga did not come?”

  “No, valide. I sent the message.”

  “Well, well. No doubt he is busy.”

  “No doubt, valide. Perhaps you should tell me what you wished to talk about, and then—”

  “And then?” The valide’s glance was quizzical.

  Tülin shrugged. “He has many calls on his time.”

  “Ah, yes.” The valide turned over and rested her face on her pillow. “I suppose you are right.” She closed her eyes and nestled down. “I wanted to tell him I can’t go to Besiktas.”

  “Valide?”

  “Too old, Tülin. Too much change. It makes me ill.”

  Tülin’s fingers twisted the button on her jacket. “Once we’ve made the move, you’ll feel much more comfortable.”

  “Nonsense.” The valide munched her lips. “Let’s talk about it in the morning.”

  “You promised me, valide. You promised the Kislar aga, too.”

  “Promised? I promised nothing, Tülin. I made a plan—and now I have changed my mind. You may still go to the orchestra, every week.”

  But Tülin didn’t want to go to the orchestra every week.

  For months she had sat at the feet of the woman who had been—still was—the most powerful woman in the Ottoman Empire. Old as she was, and frail, her memories had been instructive.

  Tülin certainly had made plans.

  She twiddled the button very fast, between her fingers; and her eyes grew narrow.

  The valide lay back on her cushions, her eyes closed.

  Tülin picked up a pillow, and very slowly she crept toward the divan.

  142

  YASHIM closed his eyes, and closed his mind: he was a machine, an automaton, back, forward, back. His lungs were ready to burst. Back again!

  His mind was fixed on the old jetty beneath the seraglio gardens. Once, in former years, it would have provided him with an instant sanctuary: two Janissaries at the gate, a couple of hefty bostancis to guard the imperial caïque. These days the jetty was likely to be deserted; the gate sealed. It was many years since the valide had expressed a wish to go scudding across the Bosphorus.

  And the water gate was now his only hope.

  His pursuers were almost on him. Two caïques running almost side by side, twenty yards behind him. He could see the muscles bulging in the rowers’ necks. He glanced back, over his shoulder.

  It would never work. He still had two, three hundred yards to go.

  He grunted, and dragged the sculls through the water. They had to board him first, of course. Yashim set his mind to the coming fight when something quite unexpected occurred.

  The caïque nearest to him gave a sudden lurch, and the rower was almost hurled overboard; at almost the same moment the second caïque swung around with such force that spray flew into the air. It was as if some unseen hand had reached out from the depths and taken both caïques in its iron grip.

  As they bobbed and dipped, Yashim could hear shouts of anger, or surprise. One of the caïquejees stood up and appeared to be driving his oar into the water.

  Yashim pulled hard, not letting up, almost superstitiously eager to get away from the commotion that had overtaken his pursuers.

  He cleared another hundred yards. Over the icy waters he could hear the shouts of the caïquejees. One of them, indeed, seemed to have regained his stroke: but the distance was on Yashim’s side.

  He turned his head and saw a lamp at the landing stage, with a knot of men around it.

  His heart sank.

  They’d beaten him to it.

  And then, with a second glance, he saw something else: the bobbing prow of an imperial caïque, with its boxlike pavilion, tethered to the stage like a thoroughbred in its stable.

  He pulled up. A man bent down to gather in the painter, and Yashim half crawled from the pitching craft onto the stage.

  “On the sultan’s service,” he gasped. “Yashim, for the valide.”

  143

  NOT far away two very cold, very unhappy young men crawled out of the icy water and sank down in the mud.

  Fizerly’s knuckles were covered in blood. He thought he’d lost a tooth.

  “Blasted caïquejees!” Compston spat. “Think they’d want to save
a life—almost killed us!”

  Dark figures approached, gingerly, over the slippery ground.

  “Towels, gentlemen. And my congratulations!” Esterhazy snapped his fingers. “I have brought rubbing spirits. My man will see that you get warm as quickly as possible.”

  “Rubbing be damned,” Compston gasped, and shot out a trembling arm. “Good man!”

  The bottle rattled against his bloody mouth.

  144

  YASHIM reached the garden door of the harem and crashed on it with his fist.

  A startled eunuch stood in the open doorway.

  “Yashim!” he squeaked. “But how—?”

  Yashim brushed past him and began to run down the Golden Road. He darted out into the court of the valide, and swerved to his right.

  He heard a noise like a champagne cork being popped.

  He dived at the valide’s door and flung it back.

  In three steps he crossed the vestibule and entered the valide’s apartment.

  Tülin was standing by the divan with a pillow clenched against her chest.

  On the divan the valide was half sitting up, half lying, on her elbow.

  She held a little gun in her hand, and the gun was pointed at Tülin.

  145

  BOTH of them glanced at Yashim as he came in.

  But when Tülin turned her head, she kept on turning. Her eyes swept glassily over the valide, over the little gun, over Yashim standing in the doorway, and then, without another sound, she subsided onto the floor.

  Yashim sprang forward and the valide reached out, dangling the gun from a slender finger.

  “Take it, Yashim. I won’t be needing it again tonight.”

  Yashim took the gun mechanically. “She was going to kill you,” he said.