Black Amber

by Whitney, Phyllis A. ;

  “This is the place where the Bosporus begins its course between the Sea of Marmara and the Black Sea.” Miss Erim indicated roiling gray waters. “If you look closely in that direction, you can see Seraglio Point and the walls of the old palace showing through the mist. The site of ancient Byzantium was up there.”

  Tracy stood in the door of the cabin and gazed with interest upon the Marmara and the dividing protrusion of the famous point of land they were leaving behind as the boat moved toward the opposite shore. Crumbling stone walls ran down to the water, while in the mists far above rose palace roofs and windows.

  “Of course visitors are always interested in the Seraglio and its stories,” Miss Erim said. “It was just off that point that ladies of the harem who happened to be in disfavor were put into sacks and dropped into the Bosporus.”

  Tracy glanced at the girl beside her. Nursel Erim was regarding her with a somewhat sly amusement, as though she had told the story with deliberate intent to shock an American visitor and now awaited her reaction.

  “At least it’s a custom—you’ve discontinued,” Tracy said dryly.

  The Turkish girl shrugged. “The Bosporus has always invited tragedy.”

  “Do you live very far from Istanbul?” Tracy had no desire to think about Bosporus waters at this moment.

  “Not too far. Our yali is in Anatolia, the area which makes up the Asian side of the strait. It is a very old house which has been in the family for more than a hundred years. You know the word yali? It means a villa on the water. There were many such villas on the Bosporus occupied by wealthy pashas in the old days.”

  “You live there with your sister-in-law?” Tracy wanted to bring the talk around to Miles Radburn, but she dared not plunge too hurriedly.

  “My brother Murat and I live in the yali. Sylvana—Mrs. Erim, the wife of our older brother who is dead—has built a kiosk for herself, a land house, on the hill above. Thus we keep separate households, though my brother has his laboratory on the lower floor of the kiosk, where he can work in undisturbed quiet. He is a doctor but he does not practice medicine. He is well known for his contributions to medical research,” she added proudly.

  “Where does Miles Radburn stay?” Tracy ventured.

  “Mr. Radburn’s rooms are in the yali also,” Nursel Erim said. There was the faintest change of tone in her voice as she spoke the name, but Tracy could not tell what it portended. The girl was on guard in some way and far from openly friendly.

  By now the boat had slipped past Leander’s Light—a squat white tower that rose near the entrance to the Bosporus. Oddly named, since Leander had drowned in the Hellespont, at the other end of the Sea of Marmara. As the boat swung wide with the swift current and nosed into shore at the town of Üsküdar, several small mosques with their attendant minarets were visible through the rain and the aspect looked more like the Turkey of Tracy’s imagining.

  They left the boat and the car followed a road that ran north along low hills above the water. Small villages clustered along the way, with snatches of open country between, and now her companion drove faster as if she were impatient to end the journey. There was a half hour more of winding road before they stopped beside a grilled iron gate set into a stone wall. It was opened for them by a gateman who flashed white teeth in a smile beneath his thick black mustache. From the gate a private road dipped steeply toward the water, then straightened around a curve, ending before the door of a square, three-storied wooden house. The house had weathered to a soft silvery gray and its veranda rows were broken by a repetition of curved Turkish arches.

  They left the car for a servant to put away, and Nursel Erim ushered Tracy into a long marble-floored passageway. A little maid bobbed into view, dressed surprisingly in a bright red skirt and darker red sweater, a red kerchief, flowered in white, covering her head.

  Miss Erim spoke to her in Turkish and the girl answered, ducking her head shyly as she spoke.

  “Halide says your room is ready,” Miss Erim explained, turning toward the stairs. “Come, please—I will take you up. We do not live down here. The kitchens and storage rooms are here, and some quarters for the servants.”

  The stairs ran upward against the wall in a single graceful curve, a wrought-iron railing of fanciful design winding beside them as they climbed. Overhead, two stories above, an old-fashioned chandelier shed a pale glow upon dim stairs.

  As they reached the second floor, a man suddenly confronted them. He wore a black, somewhat shabby European suit with a dark gray sweater and white collar showing beneath the jacket. His olive-skinned face was notable for its flourishing black mustache and eyes that were darkly vital and observant. No welcoming smile broke the somber quality of his expression, but Tracy felt that she was being weighed and assessed.

  “This is Ahmet Effendi, our kahya—that is to say, our house man, who is in charge of all the details of our lives. If you wish anything, Ahmet Effendi will procure it for you.”

  There was a note of fondness in her voice and she spoke to him respectfully in Turkish before they went on. To Tracy she explained further as they mounted the second flight of stairs.

  “My brother and I have our apartments on the second floor. Mine is over the water, his at the back. I have suggested to Mrs. Erim that we give you our third-floor room, since it is a pleasant one—and empty at present.”

  Again Tracy caught the odd, sidelong glance, as though the Turkish girl awaited some reaction.

  The stairs ended in a large bare salon, drafty and gloomy, serving perhaps more as a vast hall than as a room in itself. A tall blue porcelain stove which sent out a glow of warmth soon lost in the wide reaches stood against a wall. A few stiff chairs were drawn up about a round table covered with red velvet that dripped silken bobbles toward the floor. At either end of the salon were closed doors, and along the side opposite the stairs French doors opened upon an arched veranda.

  “In the old days,” Tracy’s guide explained, “the haremlik, the women’s quarters, was up here. The selamlik was in the more convenient rooms on the floor below—where the men stayed. Of course women had the run of the house, except when male visitors outside the family appeared. Then they retired to their rooms up here.”

  She turned toward the end of the house that overlooked the water, pausing before a vast wooden door with an ornamental brass doorknob. This knob was apparently a stationary handle. The latch was near the floor and Nursel Erim operated it with a quick flick of her toe.

  She saw Tracy’s interest and smiled. “We are very old-fashioned here, as you will soon find. Please enter. We hope you will be comfortable.”

  The room was huge, with a high, distant ceiling. A little to Tracy’s surprise, its furnishings were of a light-grained modern wood. A thickly piled gold carpet occupied a good part of the floor and there was an exquisite dressing table equipped with folding mirrors and a stool padded in gold satin. Doors opened on three sides of the room—one to the salon, one apparently to an adjoining room, and double doors upon the arched veranda that seemed to run all about the house.

  Miss Erim opened the door to the next room and gestured. “This was Mr. Radburn’s study at one time. Now it is unused. He has now moved away from the water. It is rather cold on this side of the house in the winter months, though I do not mind. I never tire of the Bosporus. And soon spring will be here. In the meantime there is an electric heater, if you wish, and I see that Halide has already brought coals from one of the stoves to burn in the mangal.”

  She indicated a large brass brazier rather like an open lotus flower, in which glowing red coals sent out a surprising amount of warmth. When she had closed the door to the adjoining bedroom and locked it, she turned about.

  “This was Anabel’s room. His wife, you know.”

  Tracy stood very still in the middle of the gold carpet, waiting for a sudden chill to go away. The Turkish girl was watching her, waiting. For what, Tracy was not sure. Perhaps for some remark about the recent and tragic death of Ana
bel Radburn. She knew that this was a moment for caution. There was nothing the people in this house could know about Tracy Hubbard. She must speak naturally, pass over the moment quickly.

  “You knew his wife well?” she asked, and hoped that she sounded casual.

  Nursel Erim bowed her smartly coiffed black head in sorrowful admission. “But of course. I knew her very well,” she said, and was silent, suddenly remote.

  She went next to the French doors that opened upon the veranda and set one of them ajar. There was still gray daylight outside, and the sound of rain falling on water. The Bosporus sped its winding course immediately below the jutting of the balcony, but Tracy did not step outside to enjoy the view. She shivered slightly at the draft and clung to the relative warmth of the room. As Miss Erim closed the door, a white cat darted suddenly through it and jumped upon the bed. There it sat erect, watching them out of huge, unblinking green eyes. Tracy liked cats and she made a move toward this one, but Miss Erim stopped her.

  “Please! It is not a friendly cat. It is what we call here an Ankara cat—or, as you might say, Angora. But this one does not like people.”

  “Tell me its name,” Tracy said and moved quietly toward the bed.

  “It is named Bunny,” Nursel Erim said, smiling slightly. “A strange name for a cat, is it not? It is one Mrs. Radburn chose. She found the cat when she first visited here, and she made it her pet. Turkey is full of stray cats, and I think she wanted to adopt them all. But Miles—Mr. Radburn—would let her have only this one. Sylvana is not fond of cats.”

  Tracy fumbled with the buttons of her coat and did not look at either the cat or Nursel Erim. If she kept her hands busy, perhaps the cold sickness would go away. She had not dreamed how hard this was going to be, or what an assault there might be upon her emotions at every turn. Bunny! Of all things, Bunny!

  Miss Erim looked at her with alert concern. “I will leave you now. You must be weary from your long flight. Please rest—and I will return in half an hour to bring you to Mrs. Erim.”

  “Yes,” said Tracy in a small voice. “That will be fine. Thank you very much.” She did, indeed, feel the need for rest.

  She waited until her hostess had gone, then flung off her coat and lay cautiously down on one side of the great bed. The cat did not move. It neither scratched her nor leaped away in fright. It simply scrutinized her with that reserved and critical gaze. Nothing about it lived up to the frivolity of its name.

  Bunny, Tracy thought, and felt suddenly helpless and alone. The coming meeting with Miles Radburn loomed as a frightening prospect, and all her cool reserving of judgment seemed an exercise in futility. Why shouldn’t she believe the worst she had heard about him? Why shouldn’t she be afraid?

  She lay staring at the distant ceiling where an all-over design of diamond shapes had been decoratively outlined in strips of dark wood. Only the ceiling and the arched windows of the veranda beyond spoke of old Turkey. This was a modern room, a feminine room, perhaps furnished to please the woman who had once occupied it.

  She looked at the cat again. “Bunny?” she said tentatively.

  The cat did not seem to recognize her name. At least not in Tracy’s intonation, but she raised her pink nose slightly and twitched her whiskers as if she drew in some impression by means of these antennae. Coming to a decision, she sprang gracefully from the bed and removed herself to a cushioned chair across the room, rejecting untoward advances from a stranger.

  The room seemed to draw about Tracy, weighing in upon her with a sense of ominous oppression. Slow warm tears gathered at the corners of her eyes and spilled back into hard Turkish pillows. At the realization that she was giving way to gloom and self-pity, she rose and went in search of the bathroom Nursel Erim had indicated earlier.

  Here there was plentiful tile and a huge old-fashioned European tub with massive fixtures. Behind it stood an iron stove, with a pipe running out through the wall. Apparently one bathed in hot water only by appointment with the stove. Sure enough, when she turned the basin faucets the water ran icy cold.

  Nevertheless, it refreshed her as she bathed her face, and she reminded herself that she was tired. Tomorrow she would feel more courageous and ready to face Miles Radburn. She could only hope that the ordeal of meeting him might be postponed until she had a night’s rest behind her. She glanced at her watch, wondering what time it was in New York. But only Turkish time mattered from now on, and she returned to her room and shrugged the thought aside, surrendering still another link with home and all that was safely familiar.

  When Nursel Erim came for her, Tracy was ready. Her eyes were dry, her emotions under control. She did not speak to the white cat in parting.

  2

  “Mrs. Erim will see you now,” Nursel said.

  Again they traversed the big drafty salon. This time her guide went to one of the side doors and opened it to step out upon the veranda. Rain blew through the arches and the garden below was already dark and shadowy as daylight died. Hurrying, they rounded the house to the rear veranda where a passageway, covered with a roof and enclosed by glass windows, made its way over the private roadway that ended at the door of the yali, thus forming a bridge from the third floor of one house to the ground floor of the house higher on the hill. The kiosk, the land house, was very large, with trees growing all about.

  “My brother’s laboratory is down here,” Nursel Erim explained, as they entered a marble corridor. “My sister-in-law’s rooms are on the floors above. Our older brother built this house for her and gave it to her so that she holds it in her own name. Fortunately, he stipulated that Murat, his younger brother, be allowed this space for his laboratory.”

  A faintly resentful note was evident in the Turkish girl’s voice. Apparently feelings were not completely amicable on the part of the younger Erims toward their sister-in-law. Tracy stored away the fact to be considered at another time, as all such facts about this household must be stored and considered.

  Again curving Turkish stairs with wrought-iron railings took them upward. Again there was a central salon, apparently unused in the cold months. A sound of vehement voices speaking in Turkish came from a room at the rear of the house.

  Tracy’s companion knocked and then opened the door as a voice called to them to come in. The room had upon Tracy an impact of light and perfumed air, bustle and sound that was overwhelming. As she stepped into its brilliantly lighted expanse she saw that there were a number of men in the room, all talking at once. And there was one silent woman.

  It was a huge room, high-ceilinged, but brightly lighted against the dusk by means of a crystal chandelier and several imported table lamps. Turkish divans ran about the walls, heaped high with colorful silken cushions. All about were little tables, inlaid with mother-of-pearl, or set with mosaic designs in tile or fine wood. The carpets were richly Oriental and several had been piled one upon another to give layers of luxury and warmth. Upon these carpets knelt several shabbily dressed men, their garments patched and repatched, as nondescript and baggy as Ahmet’s had seemed, displaying their wares as if before a throne. Sitting on a cushioned divan, slightly raised by a platform that enabled her to survey the room, sat Sylvana Erim.

  She wore a dark red, embroidered robe of wool that flowed over the curves of her figure. Beneath its floor-length hem showed comfortable Turkish slippers with red pompons on the toes. It was her face, however, that drew and held the eyes of the observer once they had rested there. She was, Tracy suspected, the sort of woman who came to full bloom in her early forties and was now at the peak of her years. Her fair hair was golden in the brilliant light, without any hint of gray, and she wore it waved softly back from a smooth wide forehead. Her eyes were startlingly blue and very deep and lustrous beneath heavy lids. An aura of calm assurance seemed to lie upon her in the midst of confusion. She sat relaxed, without moving, while bedlam reigned at her feet. The kneeling men called her attention to scarves spread out here, a bevy of embroidered handbags there, brass tray
s beyond, all being energetically praised by their owners. Yet Sylvana Erim regarded all this in calm silence.

  She saw Tracy and beckoned with a hand that moved without suddenness. “Ah—Miss Hubbard? Good afternoon. Please sit here beside me. I am sorry to receive you in the midst of my little bazaar. But it will soon be over. Ahmet Effendi—if you please—”

  At once the mustachioed houseman stepped from behind the kneeling villagers and stood listening without servility as Mrs. Erim spoke to him in Turkish.

  Since it seemed to be expected of her, Tracy seated herself on a lower divan next to the mistress of the house. Nursel Erim smiled with vague uncertainty at Tracy, and went away.

  “If you will excuse me,” Mrs. Erim said, “I will finish this small business.”

  Quietly Sylvana Erim singled out this article or that, rejected another, praising and blaming with equal calm. The men at her feet rolled up their goods, piled their brass and copper trays together, picked up their silver filigree jewelry, and took everything away that was not wanted.

  When they had gone, Mrs. Erim reached for an elaborately shaped glass bottle from a nearby table and offered it to Tracy. “Cologne for your hands,” she said. “Our pleasant Turkish custom.”

  The odor added further scent to the already perfumed air as Tracy sprinkled it upon her hands. It was fragrant and elusive.

  “You like this?” Mrs. Erim asked. “It is attar of roses, but with an addition or two of my own. Myself I have distilled the essence from which it is made. A small amusement in which I take pleasure.”

  Tracy murmured her appreciation, finding herself somewhat in awe of this impressive woman. Mrs. Erim picked up a silken scarf that lay among the articles the men had left behind and shook out its bright yellow folds with a faint moue of distaste.

  “A pretty thing, but the material and weave are of poor quality. I try very hard to restore our weaving of materials to the fine quality of the past. But we have lost some of our art and we have a long way to go. In articles of brass and copper we excel. For these I can always find a market abroad. But the weaving of silks has not yet reached a standard to be well received in America.”