‘In an evidence vacuum like the one we’re in at the moment, everyone has to be a suspect,’ İkmen said, ‘including you and me.’
‘Well . . .’
‘Taking it a bit far, I know,’ he said with a smile, ‘but working on the premise that the last person to see a murder victim alive is the person most likely to be his killer . . .’
‘Yes, but we’re not talking about murder, are we?’
‘No, but if we extend that premise to abduction . . . Look, I’ve always been and I remain very dubious about this idea that the children left the house at six a.m. on Saturday morning. People get up early in places like Balat; they would have been seen. I’m not saying that Melih Akdeniz is lying. Mistaken, maybe . . . But the gates to that house were open that night so that Eren’s brother could load his van with one of Melih’s pictures. How do we, or they, know that someone didn’t get in?’
‘We don’t.’
‘Which is why we need full forensics on the whole house. Had I known that the gates had been open on the Friday night, I would have ordered it sooner, but Melih didn’t bother or want to tell me.’
‘You really, really don’t like him, do you, sir?’ Ayşe said with a smile.
But İkmen ignored her. ‘Forensics will go in as soon as I get approval,’ he said. ‘We’ll need to speak to Mrs Akdeniz’s brother too. Oh, and by the way, I do apologise for disturbing you, Ayşe.’
But before she could answer he pressed the end button and threw the phone back down on to the floor. It was far too late to listen to her lie to him about how his call hadn’t inconvenienced her in the slightest.
İkmen lay in the dark completely still and awake.
‘Every profession must have its legends,’ Yiannis Livadanios said as he leaned across the table towards Arto Sarkissian. ‘For embalmers, it is Dr Pedro Ara.’
Arto placed his glass of Coke down on the table and leaned back into his chair. Yiannis wasn’t drunk but he did smell strongly of rakı which, no doubt, was proving an interesting addition to all that ouzo he’d drunk earlier.
‘So he was Argentinian . . .’
‘No, Ara was a Spaniard.’ Yiannis paused to signal for the waiter to bring him more water for his rakı. ‘He went to Argentina, I don’t know why. But anyway, while he was there he was asked by the dictator Juan Peron to preserve the body of his wife, Eva.’
‘Evita Peron.’
‘Yes.’
Arto took some pistachio nuts from the bowl in front of him and shelled them into the ashtray. Even though he didn’t drink himself, he really enjoyed coming to these little Bosphorus-side bars.
‘I vaguely remember hearing that her corpse was very well preserved,’ Arto said.
‘Well preserved! Well preserved!’ Yiannis gulped down what was left of his drink and then poured himself another, adding just a touch of water at the end. ‘It was a miracle!’ he said. ‘I’ve only seen photographs, you understand, but I tell you . . . A “liquid sun” is how Ara himself described it. Supple, ageless – a masterpiece, just like that boy would be if the treatment were continued.’
Arto threw a couple of naked pistachios into his mouth and chewed. ‘So how did he do it? Preserve them so well?’
‘Dedication, time, skill, the right combination of chemicals and, most importantly,’ Yiannis said conspiratorially, ‘a barrier balm, an emollient applied daily, something entirely of his own, to stop the contamination getting in. You know, he once embalmed a ballerina, a beautiful girl, and posed her on full pointe. The Russians wanted him to put things right with poor old Lenin, but he wouldn’t go. No amount of money could persuade him.’
‘But he worked for Peron.’
Yiannis beckoned Arto towards him. The Armenian inclined his head across the table.
‘It is said that Ara was besotted with Evita,’ the Greek hissed. ‘It is said that he may have had “knowledge”, if you know what I mean, of that corpse.’
Arto, despite having come across this sort of thing before, cleared his throat in an embarrassed fashion.
‘I see,’ he said. ‘But going back to the boy from Kuloǧlu . . .’
‘Ara could have done it,’ Yiannis said. ‘Like I said, it is possible that body could be older than you. I will have to consult with my colleagues.’
‘But if Dr Ara embalmed the body of Eva Peron then he must be really quite old now,’ Arto said.
The Greek laughed. ‘Oh, Ara was a sad middle-aged man when he was in Argentina.’ He took a sip of rakı and then coughed. ‘He died sometime in the nineteen seventies.’
‘Without, I assume from what you’ve said, imparting his secrets, of the balm, for instance, to others.’
Yiannis looked up from his glass, his face suddenly and strangely sober.
‘That’s right, or, at least, that’s what I always believed,’ he said. ‘Ara wasn’t just a clever anatomist, an inspired preserver of bodies; Ara was a genius. Somehow, we don’t know by exactly what means, he could actually imbue his subjects with life.’
‘You make him sound like Dr Frankenstein.’
‘Which is what, in a way, he was,’ Yiannis replied. ‘He practised a kind of reanimation.’ He looked across at the deep, black waters of the Bosphorus before continuing softly, ‘He fought to capture the spirits of them, with chemicals and balms. Wrestling decay for years . . .’
‘Yes,’ Arto said, ‘although if what you say is correct he can’t have “wrestled” with my boy for many years. Certainly not on the daily basis you have suggested.’
‘No, and so someone else, someone who knows Ara’s techniques very, very well, must have been maintaining the body.’
‘Yes, but if, as you say, Ara’s exact method isn’t really fully understood . . .’
The Greek smiled. ‘Ah, yes,’ he said, ‘or so it has always been thought. But what if I’m wrong? What if there is someone who knows exactly what he did, who knew Ara maybe?’
‘Yes, but—’
‘An Argentine connection has been established. The police will find a jar or a tub of something in the apartment where he was found. Maybe that dead woman, the Argentine woman you found with him, applied the stuff. Perhaps she knew Ara, or the person he passed his secrets on to. I would urge you to investigate this,’ Yiannis said. ‘Although the person isn’t likely to be a Turk, is he?’ he laughed. ‘They like their dead really dead and rotting.’
Arto thought about the small and elderly body of Rosita Keyder and frowned. Not a strong candidate for a professional embalmer. But appearances, as Arto knew only too well, could be deceptive. He’d need to speak to Sergeant Çöktin again, after the policeman had interviewed Rosita Keyder’s sister-in-law. He hoped that conversation would shed some light upon what was shaping up to be a most bizarre situation.
Metin İskender was almost completely unrecognisable. Indeed, when Mehmet Suleyman looked around the cheap, smoke-sodden room he found it very difficult to locate his colleague. He looked so like them – the hard, leather-clad gangsters who habitually patronised places like this. But for all of his acquired polish, Metin was a boy from the slums. Letting his voice revert to rough tones, talking too loudly and swearing with gusto came easily to him. Not that Suleyman was trying to be like that himself. He didn’t need to. If Masha knew who and what he was then so did a lot of other people in this place. As the target of whatever game the whore and her master were playing with him, he needed only to play along until the end – wherever that might lead him. The trick was to try to outwit Rostov, which was why Metin İskender had turned up at this ghastly place of expensive, desperate flesh and barely drinkable alcohol. It wasn’t as if anyone but Metin really knew what Mehmet was doing. İkmen was too involved in his own case and Suleyman’s deputy, Çöktin, didn’t need to know the finer details. Like this . . .
Suleyman looked about him – at men buying cheap champagne at two hundred dollars a bottle for women who looked like inflatable sex dolls. Their faces bloated with drugs and alcohol, the women whispere
d both their areas of sexual expertise and their prices into the ears of the men who never, ever smiled. Later, the men would go to the back of the premises with their choice or choices for the night and relieve themselves into various orifices. To his horror, just the thought of it made him feel aroused. He was determined that nothing like this was going to happen to him. Metin İskender had come along specifically to prevent any harm coming to him. Metin, as Mehmet knew that he would, had insisted upon it.
‘You can’t go to a place like that on your own,’ he’d said when Mehmet had told him about his encounter with Masha in the İç Bedesten, ‘especially without Ardiç’s knowledge. These types could murder you and have your body burned to dust by morning. No one will talk – it will be as if you’d never been in the place. At the very least this tart, if she says you’ve had sex with her, could compromise what you’re trying to achieve here. I know it’s her word against yours, but even a hint of sexual impropriety would destroy what you’ve done.’ It was all true . . .
The ‘tart’ pushed her way through the greasy, beaded curtains that led, Suleyman imagined, to unmentionable rooms at the back of this terrible place and walked towards him, smiling.
‘Come to the bar and have a drink with me,’ she said as she slipped one of her arms through his. ‘I like champagne, what about you?’
‘Does it matter what I like?’ he said as he forced something resembling a smile on to his features.
‘No,’ she laughed, and then barked something at the blond barman who brought her a bottle sporting a label covered in Cyrillic characters.
Russian champagne – even the thought of it made Suleyman’s stomach turn. If it was anything like the stuff he’d had before it was probably a mixture of low-grade Georgian grapes and glycol. Masha led him to a nicotine- and ethanol-scented booth in the corner of the room and placed the bottle, together with two large glasses, down on the table. A small young man whose face was almost as hard as his heavily gelled hair watched Masha and her ‘mark’ sit down with interest. It was a revelation just how seedy Metin İskender could look in this context.
Masha poured ‘champagne’ for them both and immediately started sipping from her glass. It was said that stuff like this could make a person go blind, which was why Suleyman contented himself with just looking at his glass. Even the bubbles looked greasy and unnatural. He looked away from the glass and into Masha’s greedy, sexual face. He had to get out of here and soon.
‘So,’ he began, in a low voice, ‘this information you have for me.’
Masha looked around nervously. ‘You don’t think I’m going to give it to you here?’
‘Well, you suggested that I come to this place.’
‘Yes,’ she drew closer to him, placing one of her hands firmly on his thigh, ‘to meet.’
‘But—’
‘We can only talk in my room,’ she said as she took a large swig from her chipped champagne saucer. ‘It’s too risky out here.’ She smiled. ‘And, anyway, in my room who knows what may happen?’
‘What will happen is that you will give me the information that I need to avenge your friend,’ Suleyman replied sternly.
‘You know you’ll have to pay to make it look—’
‘I’m not stupid!’ he hissed as he pushed her hand roughly from his leg. ‘I’ve got money for you and for this filthy stuff too.’ He nodded in the direction of the champagne bottle.
Masha frowned. ‘I like it,’ she said.
‘Well, you can drink it then,’ Suleyman replied. ‘Now can we get on with this business? I want to leave this place as soon as possible.’
‘All right! All right!’ She smiled again, a dull-eyed heroin grimace. She reached for his hand as she rose slightly unsteadily to her feet. ‘Come on then, my eager prince,’ she said, as she led him past the hard little Turkish gangster who seemed so very taken with her friend Raisa.
Masha’s room was obviously not her home – if indeed someone like her had a home.
‘Where can I sit?’ Suleyman asked as Masha shut the door behind them.
‘On the bed,’ she replied.
He did as he was told, turning just in time to see her remove both her dress and the bra beneath it.
‘Masha . . .’
The strained expression on his face made her laugh. He could try as hard as he liked to fool himself that he didn’t want sex, but he couldn’t fool her.
She walked over to him and then lowered herself quickly into his lap.
‘The information . . .’
Her hand moved swiftly to the front of his trousers, and began massaging what was already hard.
‘I thought you’d like some of this first, Inspector,’ she said as she raised one of her large breasts up to his face.
‘No . . .’
‘Oh, come on,’ her hand was moving now, slowly, expertly, ‘you can come inside me.’
‘No . . .’
She was a cheap, heroin-addicted tart – a creature from and of Rostov. Probably riddled with disease, maybe even HIV positive. And yet when one of her heavy nipples touched his lips, when he looked at her pubis moving rhythmically towards the penis in her hand . . . It had been such a long time, such a long frustrating time . . .
He took her breast into his mouth as she slipped him inside her. It felt so good. As she rose and fell with his ever-increasing thrusts, she even gasped with what could be pleasure. He shouldn’t be doing this! This was dangerous! He should, had to push her away, get the information and get out of this place . . .
‘I think I’m in love,’ Masha murmured into his ear.
And even though he knew that it wasn’t, couldn’t be true, that statement moved him on to a place of no return. Just the relief of that moment made him scream.
CHAPTER 6
Melih Akdeniz looked, with a critical eye, at the huge swathe of material stretched tautly between the two largest trees in his garden. The morning sun shone strongly on its blank whiteness, causing the artist to squint as he considered it.
‘I’m wondering whether it will be big enough,’ he said, before tipping the liquid from a small brown bottle in his hands into the back of his throat.
The thin, black-eyed woman at his side looked dully on.
‘I don’t know,’ she said, ‘I don’t know much right now.’
Melih handed her the bottle.
‘Just drink, Eren,’ he said without looking at her, ‘drink deep.’
He walked over to one of the trees and adjusted the tapes holding the material so that it was stretched even more tightly.
Eren Akdeniz put the bottle to her lips and drank. Afterwards, her face wrinkled in disgust at what she’d just done, she threw the bottle on to the flagstones at her feet. It smashed into many sharp, tiny pieces.
The noise caused her husband to look round. ‘What did you do that for?’ he asked.
Eren sat down on the patio table, her eyes heavy and glassy. ‘Because I shouldn’t be doing that,’ she said. ‘I should be feeling—’
‘Feeling is just what you shouldn’t be doing,’ Melih cut in sharply. ‘Start that and Allah alone knows where it might lead.’ He walked over to her, across the broken shards of glass and placed a hand on her shoulder. ‘The work is all that matters,’ he said earnestly. ‘It’s important, we agreed. It will stand for eternity, for us, for the children . . .’
At this, she looked up, her eyes filled with tears. ‘I’m losing everything that I love.’
‘No, you’re not!’ He took his hand roughly away from her. ‘You’re losing nothing, gaining everything – becoming part of everything. When we first met you were an ignorant art student – a dauber. Now you’re on the threshold of reaching the stars! If you’d stop talking to that mother of yours and take my advice—’
‘Like drinking your medication?’
Melih turned back to look at the material once again. ‘We have always shared everything, Eren,’ he said as he moved in closely to look at the details of the weave on the cloth.
‘I am the greatest artist this country has ever produced. I took you, a child and made you my muse. I have given you everything.’
‘I know,’ she said. She reached out and touched him just lightly with the ends of her fingers. ‘You are the owner of my soul. I would die in agony for you.’
‘Your pain would be an exquisite thing,’ he said as he turned again to face her. ‘Just your grief inspires me.’
She stood up and leaned into his arms. They kissed, unaware for several seconds that they were being watched.
‘I’m sorry, I let myself in,’ İkmen said as he, followed by Ayşe Farsakoǧlu, made his way up the steps from the main gate.
Melih tore his face away from Eren’s, frowning. ‘What do you want?’
‘I’d like to know why you’re standing on broken glass,’ İkmen said, shaking his head at the sight of Melih’s feet, bleeding over the shards of smashed bottle.
Both Melih and Eren looked down and, although her eyes remained rooted to the gory sight, the artist glanced away almost immediately. ‘That isn’t your concern,’ he said. ‘I repeat, what do you want? My wife and I are busy.’
İkmen, now level with the artist, surveyed his thin features sternly. ‘I want your co-operation, Mr Akdeniz,’ he said.
‘In what?’
‘I want to perform a full forensic examination of this property.’
‘Why?’
İkmen sighed and lit a cigarette. ‘Because I want to find your children, Mr Akdeniz,’ he said. ‘As I’m sure you’re now aware, I’m not convinced that your children left this property at six a.m. last Saturday.’
‘But I told—’
‘Yes, I know what you told me, sir,’ İkmen said, ‘and I do believe that you believe that to be true. But I’m not convinced. I think it’s possible that someone may have entered this property sometime during the course of Friday night and—’
‘Abducted my children?’ Melih laughed. ‘How? Even if Eren and I didn’t hear these “abductors” the children wouldn’t have just allowed themselves to be taken.’
‘No,’ Eren agreed, ‘they’re not babies.’
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