Diamantis looked up. “How about you? Have you ever been scared like that?”
Yes, of course. Abdul Aziz had known storms. He could talk about them, too. But the memory that came into his mind had nothing to do with being scared. It was to do with being ashamed. It was to do with a shipwreck that hadn’t been the work of nature but human greed. It had happened twenty years ago.
He was only a first mate in those days. On the Cygnus, an oil tanker sailing under a Liberian flag. The international embargo was still in force against South Africa, and the country was desperately short of oil. The Cygnus, full to bursting with Iranian crude, had unloaded its cargo at Port Elizabeth during the night. Then they’d filled their tanks with water and had set off again, via the Cape of Good Hope. There, they’d waited for a wind, a swell, the slightest hint of a storm.
On the sixth day, they got what the captain wanted. The ship was rolling six degrees. Not much for a ship like that. The Cygnus was an oceangoing vessel, built to withstand bad weather. The captain ordered them to sail with the hatches open, then, at daybreak, to open the floodgates. The crew members were told to pack their bags. Distress signals were sent off. The lifeboats were lowered, and they all got into them.
The Cygnus sank majestically. Almost reluctantly. “A pity.” That was the only comment the captain allowed himself. They didn’t drift for long. Three ships were heading in their direction. They hadn’t even waited for the SOS. The exact position of the Cygnus had been communicated to them hour by hour. All three were sailing under Liberian flags. On behalf of the Tex Oil fleet, as Abdul had learned later. They were picked up as heroes. Apart from the ship’s boy, a twenty-year-old named Lucio. It was his first voyage. He had panicked and ended up in the water. The winds had pushed the lifeboats in the opposite direction, and no one could save him.
It was the insurance company that had put the ball in Abdul’s court. All he had to do was back up the captain’s testimony about the shipwreck. He would get a big bonus, and promotion. There were also bonuses for the rest of the crew. For some—he discovered later—it was the third ship they’d been on that had sunk.
“If I refused, I’d be outlawed by the merchant-navy community worldwide. Everyone seemed to know that kind of thing went on.”
“But how did you explain that there was no oil slick, nothing?”
“It didn’t matter. The insurance company was in on the scam. No one would have listened to me. And I’ll tell you something, Diamantis, the insurance didn’t just pay for the boat, but also the whole of the cargo of Iranian crude!”
“So you signed?” Diamantis asked, but not in any nasty way.
“I threw up, then I signed, then I threw up again. I threw up every day, for more than a month. Every evening, I’d feel nauseous.”
He looked at Diamantis in despair. He was still sickened by this business, even now.
“The bonus helped Cephea and me to settle in Dakar. Quite comfortably, too. I’d have had to work ten years to get to that point. And you know how hard it is to save money.”
“And you became a captain.”
“Yes, I became a captain. Under the same flag, for the same fleet, Tex Oil. Then, as soon as I could, I quit.”
Diamantis recalled that the first time he had sailed under Abdul’s command, one of the crew—the chief engineer—had said to him, “He’s a good captain. He’s very experienced at maneuvers. He treats the crew well, and he doesn’t wet his pants when he has to deal with the owner.” Since that fake shipwreck, he had learned to stand up for himself. He wasn’t the kind of person who’d agree to sink a boat now. He’d never abandon ship. If necessary, he’d stay on it and rot, the way he was doing now in Marseilles.
“I’ll tell you something else, Diamantis, nothing I’ve done since has wiped out the shame of it. The dirty money I pocketed, my promotion, all that. There comes a time when you have to pay for the bad things you’ve done in your life.”
“You pay only if you want to, Abdul. That’s what I think. The world is full of corrupt people. That’s all you read about in the papers. The higher up you are, the more corrupt you’re likely to be. Look at the owner of this ship, the bastard. And what do you think? That all these people are lining up at the cash desk to pay their debts? Bullshit, Abdul! Bullshit!”
“You don’t understand, Diamantis,” Abdul said, getting to his feet. “You don’t understand a thing!” He was on the verge of tears. “Cephea is leaving me. My life’s collapsing around my ears. Everything’s collapsing, fuck it! That’s how I’m paying! Stuck here on this fucking heap of old metal!”
He left without finishing his beer. Shoulders drooping, as if crushed by a heavy burden. He was no longer the same man who had addressed the crew. By arranging for his men to leave, he had limited the damage for each of them. He had gone as far as he could in what he considered his duty as a captain. Now the Aldebaran could sink. And himself with her. But Diamantis had stayed. And neither of them knew yet if that was a good thing. For either of them.
The rain had stopped. It was five-ten. On Place de l’Opéra, the door of the Habana opened and Nedim was thrown out onto the sidewalk by a huge, muscular black guy. The door closed again. Nedim didn’t have the strength—or the guts—to go back in and ask for his bag.
6.
LIKE A GLASS OF RUM, DOWNED IN ONE GO
Nedim had known as soon as he set foot in the Habana that he’d been screwed. The place was cramped. A bar counter to the left. Two girls were sitting on high stools, chatting with the barman, a big bald-headed guy with a moustache. In front of them, a small dance floor, where three couples were wriggling their hips. A dozen booths around the walls. He noticed a couple embracing. Lalla had said it was intimate, and you certainly couldn’t get more intimate than this. But he had to admit that the music wasn’t bad at all. He thought he recognized the warm voice of Ruben Blades. When it came to rhythm, Marseilles had a good ear.
Nedim let himself be led to one of the booths by Lalla and Gaby. He wondered how he was going to get out of this. Or rather, he did know. He was expected to buy drinks. He’d been in a few bars like this, cocktail bars, in his time. Never alone. Always with two or three other sailors. At the end of a night in a port, after a good fuck. The last drink before going to sea again. The girls never bothered them.
“Will you buy us a drink?” Lalla asked.
“A gin and tonic for me.”
He needed it. To come back to his senses. “Have a drink and then get out of here,” he said to himself. Lalla went off to the bar. He couldn’t help watching her as she walked. He loved the way she swung her hips. He remembered how they’d embraced at the Perroquet Bleu. His body longed for more.
“Pretty, isn’t she?”
Gaby was sitting opposite him, smiling.
“You’re hookers, right?”
“Hookers?” Gaby said. “Have you looked at us, Nedim? Huh? Is that what you thought, that you could just flash your money and we’d open our legs for you. Huh, Nedim?”
She had leaned toward him. She had a strong, musky smell. A smell that seeped into him. Into his blood. Like a glass of rum, downed in one go. It made him feel hot under the skin. She must be good in bed, he told himself. But without looking at her, for fear she’d see what he was thinking in his eyes. He imagined her offering herself to him.
“What are you, then?”
He’d lit a cigarette, and as he breathed out the smoke he looked up at her. Again, he noticed her scar. A star-shaped scar, near her eye. He’d have liked to know how she’d got it. And why. He couldn’t take his eyes off it. Her scar, far from making her ugly, made her face look even more beautiful. Nedim was enthralled by it.
She let him stare at her in that insistent way. Then she passed her hand through her hair, which she wore very short, and smiled.
“Friends, Nedim,” she murmured, her lips almost on his. “We’re just fr
iends. Don’t go thinking anything else, all right? We’re out enjoying ourselves. A night on the town. And you’re paying, handsome.”
She stroked his cheek with the backs of her fingers. They were cold. She smiled at him again, and her smile was as cold as her touch. He’d lost any desire to be in bed with her. Or anywhere else.
Lalla slid in next to him, and put her arm around his shoulders. She pressed her thigh against his and Nedim felt his body temperature rise by several degrees.
“It’s cool here, isn’t it? Do you like it?”
He wanted to say something nasty in reply. But he didn’t say anything because just then the barman appeared. On the tray, there was a gin and tonic, but also a bottle of champagne and two glasses.
“Did you two order this?”
“We felt a little thirsty,” Lalla replied, letting her head drop against his. She barely dipped her lips in the glass. “Do you want to dance?”
Nedim’s good resolutions flew out the window as soon as she was in his arms. She clung to him, stroking the back of his neck with her fingertips. He felt happy with this girl. He’d never felt this way before. But he kept telling himself that she was working. She could have gone with anyone.
“You’ve lost your hard-on,” she whispered in his ear.
“It’s because of the champagne. It’s too expensive.”
“It’s the only thing we’re allowed to order when we bring friends.”
“Suckers, you mean.”
“Well, for the money you’re paying, you ought to take advantage.”
“And what do I get for the money I’m paying?”
She laughed, her head thrown back slightly. He wanted her lips.
“Nothing! You can dance with me. And get a hard-on. It doesn’t bother me.”
“Doesn’t it have any effect on you?”
“There are girls fucking men all night long just around the corner. I like this better. Just drinking with guys and giving them a hard-on.”
“There’s a little hotel not far from here. We could have some more champagne there.”
“I never go to a hotel. It’s a rule.”
“Even if I had money? A lot of money?”
“Guys with money don’t hang around here.”
“Then I’ll take you away and we’ll live together.”
“You just want to fuck me, Nedim.”
“No. I—”
“And you’re a liar! A real sailor!”
“No, Lalla—”
“Drop it, Nedim. Love at first sight, all that kind of thing. You want to fuck me. I understand. It’s O.K.” The song finished, and she freed herself from him. “You should ask Gaby to dance.”
“I want to stay with you. Can I?”
“If you like. It was just a suggestion.”
They clung to each other for three slow Latin numbers. Fifteen hot minutes. Nedim had decided not to ask any more questions. He relaxed against Lalla, his cock hard again now against her stomach. The slow rhythm of their movements was almost as sweet as if she were jerking him off.
When they got back to their table, a short, plump woman of about sixty was standing by the booth, a full champagne glass in her hand. Her name was Gisèle. The manager of the Habana. Gaby was watching Nedim with an amused look in her eyes.
“Do you like it here?” Gisèle asked.
“It’s O.K.”
Lalla’s glass, which she had barely touched, was empty. She grabbed the bottle. It was empty, too.
“When I’m alone, I drink,” Gaby said, staring at Nedim. “How about another one?” She held out the bottle to Gisèle without waiting for an answer.
“Yes!” Lalla said. “I’m really thirsty.”
Nedim collapsed onto one of the seats.
“Another gin and tonic?” Gisèle asked.
“Champagne will be fine.”
He was screwed. Completely. More than anything, he felt as if he was without will. His eyes again met Gaby’s. She still had that fucking smile on her lips. He felt like slapping her. Just to see if the bitch kept smiling.
“Will you dance with me?” she said.
Nedim didn’t hear her. Everything was getting mixed up in his head. The alcohol and the desire. The desire to fuck Lalla and hit Gaby. He was losing his erection again, and he was overcome with sadness. He felt the way he did just after making love. Alone. And sad. And there was no ship waiting for him to help him forget he was just an idiot, lost in life. He looked at his watch.
“Shit!” he cried.
Four-ten. He had fifty minutes to get to the harbor. He stood up. Gaby was already standing. In front of him. She took him in her arms.
Perla marina que en hondos mares
Vive escondida entre corales . . .
One of Francisco Repilado’s best songs.
“Let go of me. I have to split.”
“You’ve got a minute, haven’t you? You paid for my bottle, you might as well take advantage.”
“Fuck off!” He pushed her away, roughly.
“Hey!” she cried. “That’s enough of that!”
“What’s going on?”
A big black guy had appeared. He was easily two heads taller than Nedim. A good twenty pounds heavier, too, and all of it muscle.
“Nothing,” Nedim said. “I think I’m going.”
“No problem, pal. No problem.”
Nedim had sobered up. He had to get out of here as quickly as possible. He mustn’t miss his appointment with Pedrag. He had to leave Marseilles. Suddenly, he felt afraid. He realized he was the only person left in the club. No, there was another customer, leaning on the bar, talking to Lalla. She was sitting on a stool, her back to Nedim. The waiter served the man a glass of water. “A glass of water! The bitch!”
He went back to the booth to get his cigarettes. The bottle of champagne and the two full glasses seemed to mock him. He turned. Gaby was behind him. She handed him the check.
“Cash or credit card?”
Celaje tierno de allá de Oriente
Fresca violeta del mes de abril
One thousand eight hundred francs! Two bottles, one thousand eight hundred francs. He looked up at Gaby.
“The gin and tonic’s thrown in,” she said.
“I don’t have enough.”
He could hardly speak. His head was spinning. He felt groggy. He didn’t even have the strength anymore to wonder how he was going to get out of here without rough stuff. And what about Pedrag? What was he going to do about Pedrag?
“We don’t give credit.”
“I don’t have enough,” he said again.
Gaby kept looking at him. He was starting to panic. He should have danced with her, he thought. He’d have sweet-talked her. He should have realized that, of the two of them, she was the one who made the decisions. Lalla had tried to make him see that, hadn’t she? He’d have gotten away with one bottle. No shame. And no rough stuff.
“Doug! Can you come here a minute?”
The black guy reappeared as quickly as he’d disappeared earlier. “Yeah?”
“This idiot doesn’t have enough.”
“I’ve got . . . maybe a thousand . . .”
Nedim collapsed on the seat, took out his money and started counting. Nine hundred and fifty. Doug leaned over and put his broad hands flat on the table. Nedim didn’t dare look up. Keep a low profile, he told himself. Play the idiot, don’t insist. He heard the girls laughing behind him, at the bar. Lalla and Gaby. And the other customer. He was laughing, too.
“What are we going to do?” Doug asked.
“I’ll give you this and we’ll be quits,” Nedim said. “It’s all I have.”
“Do you have your papers?”
Nedim handed him his passport.
“Turkish.” He turned to the
counter. “This asshole’s Turkish.”
“They’re all dickheads,” the guy at the bar said, and laughed.
Doug put the passport in his shirt pocket. “Are you a sailor?”
“On the Aldebaran,” Nedim said.
“When’s your boat leaving?”
“It isn’t.”
“So what are you doing, lugging your bag around?”
He couldn’t answer that. He stood up. He had to get out of here. There was still a chance he could catch Pedrag. He’d sort things out with him. Once he was in the truck. Right now, the only thing that mattered was getting home. Not to Istanbul. No, home. To the mountains. The endless roads of Anatolia. His mother’s face appeared in between him and Doug. This time, he told himself, I’ll go visit Dad’s grave. He’d always said he would, but never had. He’d never had time to go up there, to the plateau beyond the gorges of Bilecik.
His father’s eyes were on him. Blue eyes, like his. Salih the blacksmith. Master Salih. He knew the five pillars of Islam by heart. People came to his forge to listen to him. He would hammer the iron and recite. And everyone would praise God as they left. “Mâliki yevmiddîn iyyâke nabüdü ve iyyâke nestaîn, ihtinâssirât elmüstakîm . . .” These strange, incomprehensible words, which he had forgotten, came back to him now. “It is You we adore, You whose help we ask, lead us in the Right Path . . .”
The Right Path.
Nedim shuddered. He couldn’t remember the final amen. You always had to finish a prayer with an amen. His father was still looking at him. He saw himself standing in front of him as a child, stammering, scared that his father would deny him, disinherit him, if he forgot the words of the prayer. And cast him into the Hell of the unbelievers. “Hell must be like that,” Ali the woodcutter had said one evening, pointing at the forge. “The fires of Hell are not like the fires of this world,” his father had replied. “They’re a thousand times hotter.”
A thousand times hotter. The Right Path. “Bismillâh irrahmân irrahîm . . .” Praise be to God . . . The words came back to him. He had to visit his father’s grave.
The Lost Sailors Page 5