Blue Voyage

by Diana Renn

  I broke into a jog, then a run. Vendors called after me:

  “Slow down, beautiful girl!”

  “Stop, stop! Why in such a hurry, my friend?”

  Then it dawned on me that maybe I looked as if I’d stolen something. I could attract the wrong kind of attention if I kept running. I slowed down to a fast walk, my eyes fixed forward. One more corridor and I would be at the Café Mozaik, according to my map. And finally I would see Sage again.

  Suddenly, I heard a hissing sound off to my right. Like a cat, or maybe a snake. I looked all around me, and the hissing continued. I saw a small, dim shop filled with elaborately decorated plates and tiles, and ornate hanging lanterns made out of glass. In the doorway was a rack full of blue nazar boncuu amulets. There were tiny earrings, bracelets, and necklaces; amulets hanging from strings; and even glass eyes that were the size of dinner plates.

  The hissing sound came again. And then, from behind a rack of dangling evil-eye amulets, another set of eyes emerged, blinking slowly at me.

  Eyes that belonged to Lazar.

  27

  I stared back at him, paralyzed with terror.

  “Come here,” he said, looking down his nose at me and beckoning with one long finger. “I must talk to you.”

  He must have followed me here, and waited for an opportunity to corner me. I couldn’t talk to him now, or I’d miss my chance to meet with Sage. I shook my head and backed away. My eyes darted around. Tourists were admiring wares, and vendors were tidying their stalls or chatting on cell phones. No one seemed to have any clue that I was in danger.

  Lazar stepped out from behind the amulet rack. The glass evil eyes clinked, clattered, and danced. “This is my friend’s store,” he said, gesturing to the storefront behind him. “We can talk inside, in confidence. This is the easy way.” He opened his leather jacket, and I glimpsed the hilt of a knife sticking out of an inside pocket.

  I glanced longingly in the direction of the Café Mozaik, just three doors down. What if I just brought Lazar directly to Sage? Then I could wash my hands of this mess.

  Catching my look, he laughed. “Your friend Sage, she is not there. But the writer I hired did an excellent job with her English, yes?”

  My face burned. I’d fallen for yet another con. “You wrote both those notes, didn’t you,” I whispered. He’d wanted me to come to a place where he could confront me, where my family wouldn’t be in the way. Where everyone would be too busy to notice us talking, or where maybe nobody would care because strange business transactions happened all the time.

  Lazar smiled, pointing at the backpack slung over my shoulder. “You have a package with you?”

  I didn’t answer. I felt numb. Sage was still missing. She hadn’t tried to get in touch with me at all.

  His smile fell. His eyes glittered. “You did not bring the package?”

  I lifted my chin. Fine. Let him wonder about me and about the gold figurines.

  “Come with me,” he said in a low voice. “And do not run,” he added sharply when I turned toward a shop that sold water pipes and tobacco, thinking I’d ask for help. “I have many friends here.”

  I swallowed hard and followed Lazar into the tiny store.

  I looked in all directions, trying to scope out an escape route. For a place that sold crafts and souvenirs, the store was weirdly empty of people, unlike all the other shops and stalls I’d seen in the Grand Bazaar so far. This store was dimly lit, the air thick with a haze of pipe smoke. What the shop lacked in people it made up for in clutter and goods for sale. Shelves along the walls and in the middle of the store were bursting with glassware, ceramics, and painted plates that swirled with red tulips, blackberries, and vines. From the ceiling hung lanterns made of cut glass and iron, in all shapes and sizes and various colors, casting strange and colorful designs on the walls as the dim ceiling lights shone through them. It was like being inside some strange cave, a treasure trove hoarded by dragons.

  As Lazar led me deeper into the narrow, hallway-like room, I spotted an old man smoking a pipe behind the counter. My other non-favorite person these days, Vasil, was sitting across from him, his bulky frame somehow balanced on a delicate stool. They were playing backgammon, and the dice clicked on the board as they rolled. Vasil gave me a long, dark look, so cold that it made me shiver. The old man just ignored me.

  At the back of the store, Lazar cornered me, breathing heavily, staring at me with an expression I couldn’t read. The only sound I heard was the roll of the backgammon dice, as if the roll were deciding my fate. I pressed myself against a shelf of pottery to put as much space between us as I could.

  “If you have the package, give it to me, now,” he said.

  “I don’t have it,” I said, unzipping my backpack and showing him the contents.

  “Then talk to me about your friend,” Lazar said. “What do you know?”

  “Sage and I weren’t friends!” Now I knew for sure that the “Your friend” part of her forged signature in the note wasn’t real; it had all been Lazar’s doing. Friends didn’t make up their names, their hometowns, their entire histories. Real friends didn’t offload stolen goods on you and set you up to get interrogated by police at the airport.

  Lazar took a step closer. “I ask you again. Where is she?”

  “Look, I’m as confused as you are. All I heard was, she went back to the States.”

  “She did not,” snapped Lazar. “My police contacts would have alerted me. She has not yet crossed a border.”

  Police contacts. I froze. Inspector Lale had mentioned there were some police who worked with smugglers. Inside jobs. Now Lazar was suggesting the same thing.

  “So you came all the way to Istanbul to see if I could lead you to Sage,” I guessed. “Because you think we’re such good friends, right?”

  “That is correct. She will return and look for you, because you have something she gave you. Temporarily.”

  “Why would she have given me those gold figurines if she wanted them back?”

  “She thought you would be a better carrier for them. You were traveling with an antiquities expert’s widow. The contents of that package could be easily explained at an airport.”

  “Not really, it turns out.”

  He made a dismissive gesture. “All right. Fine. These trinkets, I can let them go. But Sage I must find. And I have no doubt she will come to you to try to get them back.”

  I felt light-headed. It was clear to me now that Sage had gotten in over her head with Lazar. My anger toward her lessened as my anger toward Lazar grew. And I thought, suddenly, of how all my friends had bailed on me when I needed them most. Maybe we weren’t real friends, after just two days, but even though I was disappointed that Sage hadn’t reached out to me yet, I wasn’t going to bail on her until I heard her side of the story. I’d have to keep trying to find her.

  “I don’t have the figurines. I don’t know where Sage is. Are we done here?” I said.

  “Not quite,” he said, licking his lips. “I also came to give you a warning.” Abstract shapes of light from one of the lanterns splayed an odd pattern across Lazar’s angular face. He opened his leather jacket again and slowly drew the knife out of the interior pocket. It had an ornate handle, encrusted with colorful gemstones; it was almost beautiful. Except for the fact that it was a knife.

  No. A dagger. I gasped as the crescent-shaped blade came fully out of its sheath.

  “In case my English is not so clear. You will not communicate with police about this conversation,” said Lazar. “And when Sage returns, you will bring her directly to this shop. My friend at the counter will alert me. I will come for her personally. Do you understand me?”

  My throat was dry, my tongue as rough as sandpaper. “I—I understand,” I managed to choke out.

  “Good.” He slid the dagger back into its sheath and inside his jac
ket pocket.

  I pushed past him, knocking my wrist against a shelf in my haste to get away. My nazar boncuu bracelet broke, scattering little blue eyes all over the floor as I ran out of the shop and back into the crowds of the Grand Bazaar.

  It took me almost forty-five minutes to find Milton and Maeve. Still shaken, I took one wrong turn after another. I pushed past men who offered me leather jackets, purses, slippers, candy. Finally, almost in tears, I found the pashmina stall, where Milton and Maeve were talking to a police officer.

  “Crap,” I hissed, ducking behind a rack of shawls. I pressed myself into them, willing myself to be invisible. Then I worried the police officer or a shop owner would see me and think I was trying to steal something.

  I stepped out from behind the rack, and Maeve’s face relaxed the moment she saw me. “There she is!” she cried, pointing to me. “Oh, Zan, where were you? We’ve been so worried.”

  “Any problems, miss?” the policeman asked me.

  Yes! I wanted to say. There’s a high-level antiquities smuggler lurking here in the middle of the bazaar, and he just flashed a dagger at me!

  But I remembered Lazar’s warning, and Inspector Lale’s words of caution about police who might be working with smugglers, and I shook my head. Inspector Lale was the only person I’d tell about my scary run-in with Lazar—and as soon as we got back to the hotel, I’d be placing another call to her. “Sorry,” I said to Milton and Maeve. “I just wandered a few stores away to see something, but I took a wrong turn and got lost.”

  “Yes, this is very easy to do,” said the police officer. “I am glad you are all right now.” Satisfied that there wasn’t a major issue to deal with, he gave us a sympathetic smile and a more detailed tourist map before walking away.

  I let out a long breath. The officer hadn’t detained me, or wanted to search my bag, or looked at me in any other way than as if I was some lost kid.

  “Thank God you’re back,” Milton said. “Your mother would have had our hides. What do you say we get ourselves a treat? I saw an ice cream stand outside at the gate.”

  We hurried outside and found the stand. The ice cream vendor wielded an absurdly long scoop on a stick, dipped it into a bin of ice cream, and handed the cone with the scoop of ice cream on the stick. When I reached for it, the stick and cone flipped upside down. Strangely, the ice cream didn’t drip or spill. He swooped his arm down, flipped it up, turned it, and offered it to me again. I reached for it, and it darted out of my grasp again. Up high, down low, too slow, just like that old grade-school game. And the ice cream never changed. A crowd of onlookers started to gather, laughing, and I felt as if they were laughing at me. My cheeks burned. Finally the guy took pity on me and let me have the cone from the scoop.

  I didn’t even feel like eating it anymore. Instead I wanted to cry. The ice cream game reminded me of my whole experience with Sage and the lost urn. You’re close, you’re far, you’re hot, you’re cold. It’s real, it’s fake.

  I wished I knew where she was staying, or if she was even in Istanbul right now. Where did a girl with dwindling funds, an expired visa, an alias, a police warrant, and a gang of criminals breathing down her neck seek refuge?

  And why hadn’t she reached out to me yet, when that’s what everyone seemed to think she was going to do?

  28

  The Lobsters went out to a restaurant that evening, and Mom and I had take-out dinner in Aunt Jackie’s apartment, since she wasn’t up to going out.

  While we ate, we watched a Turkish version of American Idol. Or pretended to watch, as we each grappled with our private problems. Aunt Jackie looked a million miles away, massaging her belly, clearly consumed with her health and hotel worries. She’d had a financial check-in from Uncle Berk’s siblings that afternoon, which sent her blood pressure soaring; she said they wanted to see real numbers in three days. And I’d seen the paper on the coffee table before Aunt Jackie stuck it between the couch cushions, out of Mom’s sight. It was a map of Zelve National Park in Cappadocia, with trails she had highlighted and notes she had scrawled. I couldn’t let her keep going down wrong roads and dead ends. I had to get to the bottom of this. And it looked like I might have to do so on my own. Mustafa said Inspector Lale had called the hotel while I was at the Grand Bazaar, but when I called her mobile number again all I got was voice mail. I’d left her a quick message about the new run-in with Lazar, though I didn’t dare leave details about the urn or my Uncle Berk murder theory in case some corrupt person on the police force intercepted her phone.

  Remembering Lazar’s warning to me today, I suddenly sat up straighter. A new theory jolted me. What if there were no undercover cops watching out for me in my neighborhood, or protecting me from that encounter with Lazar, because she’d never sent them? Because she was working with Lazar, too?

  The parts of this new theory clicked into place, making my breath come fast. Maybe that was why she’d told me to call only her, and not the main number at the Istanbul police station. Maybe she was the corrupt one, not others in her department. And maybe that’s why she was in no particular hurry to call me back. She was helping to run this show!

  I glanced at Mom, wishing I could tell her all this. But she looked miserable, probably still processing the conversations with Dad and me, which her self-help books had obviously failed to prepare her for.

  I wasn’t going to waste another thought on Dad or Victoria. I was done giving him the power to use me as a convenient prop in his life. I was here, in Turkey, with a stalker-slash-murderer on the loose in my neighborhood, a police inspector I suddenly didn’t feel I could trust, and a missing person to find before she became the next victim.

  The three of us blinked slowly in the hot-pink glow of the screen, watching some wildly attired Turkish band singing some kind of synth-pop song.

  “This show is inspiring me. I’m getting a vision, you guys,” said Mom.

  “Oh, God,” moaned Aunt Jackie. “A vision.”

  “A party!” Mom said, clapping her hands together. “We need to blow the dust off this place, and put you on the map of hot destinations. We’ll have a party. On the rooftop, in the evening, with music and dancing under the stars.”

  Aunt Jackie blinked at Mom. “I’m on bed rest.”

  “You can recline on a divan. We’ll dance around you!” Mom was getting that glint in her eye. “I could hire a band. Caterers could serve all kinds of meze. We’ll throw the doors open and people will come. They’ll see that this isn’t a crumbling, run-down place, but hip and romantic—”

  Aunt Jackie looked horrified. “Don’t,” she begged. “Please. Just don’t.”

  “Jackie. Hear me out. Mustafa told me you have no advertising budget, and your social media presence is dismal. You’re at barely fifty-percent occupancy in high season. Your brother- and sister-in-law are ready to bring in the bulldozers. If you want to stay in business, and support your baby, people have to find out about the Mavi Konak! You have to stand out in some way from the other boutique hotels around here.”

  “But it doesn’t work like that,” Aunt Jackie protested. “You can’t just wave a magic wand and have a party.”

  “Publicity is my profession. I know what I’m doing. There are international business councils I can contact. I can find people with deep pockets and get invitations out. Not to mention tourist bureaus. You want not just businesspeople but also travelers. You want them to go home and tell all their friends about this charming boutique hotel in the heart of Old Istanbul. I could get it organized and spread the word in two days flat. I’m that good, Jackie. Come on. Give me a shot.”

  “I don’t know.” Aunt Jackie looked skeptical.

  “Neighbors and local shop owners can come, tour operators can bring information. We’ll even raffle off a couple of great prizes and solicit donations for hotel renovations. It’ll be great!”

  “Oh, Kitsie.” Aunt
Jackie rubbed her forehead. “You’ve just had a stressful phone call from Marcus. If you have something to prove, please don’t choose my hotel as your platform.”

  “That’s not what this is about! I’m not trying to prove anything. This is all about helping you!”

  I shifted uncomfortably as the two of them argued. Party planning right now seemed so pointless. Sage and the urn were still out there somewhere. The urn could be linked to Lazar and to Uncle Berk’s death. I couldn’t get sucked into Mom and Aunt Jackie’s drama.

  Looking at a closed door down the short hallway, I realized I was sitting mere steps away from Uncle Berk’s office. There was probably a computer in there. I could see if Sheila Miller had written back about Sage. But also, Uncle Berk had kept the urn in his office. And he’d been hired by Lazar to write up fake documents for it. Maybe I could find those documents, or even some kind of business agreement between the two of them. I wasn’t yet sure whom I’d bring them to, now that Inspector Lale was on my list of suspicious characters, but I could worry about that later. Right now I just needed some proof that Lazar had hired my uncle to help with his smuggling operation.

  “Hey, Aunt Jackie,” I said, “I need to check my email.”

  “You can use Berk’s office,” she said. “That is, if you dare. The place is a disaster. It’s just a converted closet, and it’s heaped with relics of his old career. He never could get rid of anything.”

  She rose slowly to her feet, with a grunt.

  “No, don’t get up,” I protested. “I can just go in.” My heart pounded, but I tried to look calm. If Uncle Berk never got rid of anything, maybe the documents were still in there!

  “I can walk a few yards. I’m not paralyzed,” she said. “And I keep the office locked,” she added, fumbling for a key chain in her pocket as she led me to his door. “I didn’t want any of our cleaning staff to get in there, and Berk never did, either. It drove him crazy if people moved his papers around. Now, don’t trip over anything,” she advised me as she unlocked the door and switched on the light. She stared around the small, messy office and sighed heavily. “Someday I’m going to have to deal with all this stuff.”