Salman cleared his throat. “I agree with my Aunt Hatije. His initial hostility to me is of little concern now. Naturally, I, too, wished I had seen my mother, though from what I have heard it is perfectly possible that she might have packed me in a bundle and run away from Istanbul. Hasan Baba knows this well. My mother shared the nomadic instinct of the early Ottomans. She was never happy in one place. It is pointless speculating about such matters. What worries me is the streak of insanity that runs through our family. Uncle Memed, when we were children you often spoke of one of our great-great-great-uncles whose insanity was legendary. The same blood courses through our veins.”
Memed began to laugh. “Great-great-great-uncle Ahmet. Well, he was very special. Even the Sultan smiled at his escapades. How many of you here know the story? Only Salman? This is odd. Perhaps the rest of you were shielded from it for your own sakes.
“Ahmet Pasha was a warrior. He had participated in numerous wars and was renowned for his foolhardiness which, alas, is usually referred to as courage. When he grew tired of fighting he began to write poetry. Some of it must still exist somewhere. His poems were far removed from war. He wrote exclusively of the natural beauty of animals. Birds, deer, fish, geese, dogs, cats, turtles, horses, elephants and ants all formed part of his anthology. He celebrated their innocence and wrote of how dependent man was on each of them. It is said that the Sultan began to laugh while Ahmet Pasha was reading an ode to the snail. He laughed so much that the courtiers cleared the chamber. Our great forebear was enraged by this behaviour. As we know, our family has a tendency to take itself very seriously. We can produce paintings that embarrass, poetry that pains the ear, love letters that destroy passion, but death to him who dares criticise our work. I suppose this attitude mirrors that of the palace where the Sultan is always above criticism. It is this dullness and inertia that has killed the Empire and retarded our development. It has done the same to our wretched family. We, too, have seen our faculties decline for a few hundred years. Pardon me, children, I am beginning to sound like the Baron.”
We laughed, since we had always regarded the two men as interchangeable. It was rare to find them in disagreement. The Baron, as if to prove this point, stroked his moustache and took over the story.
“We will be here all night if Memed continues at this pace. Ahmet Pasha was so angry that he never went to pay his respects to the Sultan again. Instead he recalled two dozen veteran sipahis who had served with him and told them to prepare for a new war. They were bemused, but they were very fond of him and whatever doubts they might have entertained were settled when he sent a purse each to their families. He armed them and dressed them in the special uniform of the Sultan’s bodyguards. He dressed himself like the Sultan and ordered a new coach modelled on that of his ruler. He began to travel the country in this style and everywhere he went people assumed he was the Sultan. They followed him in large flocks when he went to pray in the local mosque on Friday, because they thought that Allah was more likely to listen to them if they prayed with the Caliph of Islam. When Ahmet Pasha addressed his subjects he denounced hypocrisy and corruption. They say that in three villages he had the collector of taxes executed by the sipahis. It was news of this that panicked the Grand Vizier. Till now the Sultan had been greatly amused by Ahmet Pasha’s antics and instructed the Vizier to leave him alone. As news of the executions spread, however, it created a wave of expectation throughout the Empire. The Sultan sent a messenger to Ahmet Pasha, summoning him to the palace.
“Your great forebear responded in great style. He asked the messenger to wait while he composed a letter to the Sultan. Then he dismissed the retainers for the day and said farewell to his sipahis. When the house was empty he hanged himself. The letter was read by the Vizier and destroyed. It never reached the person for whom it had been intended. A great pity. It would have been the first time the Sultan heard the truth. Was my summary accurate, Hasan Baba?”
The old man nodded. “To this day Ahmet Pasha is remembered in those villages. When it became known that he was not the Sultan, some began to ask ‘why not?’, while others went so far as to question the need for a Sultan. So even in the case of Ahmet Pasha the madness was not without a purpose. A version of the letter began to circulate in many cities. People used Ahmet Pasha’s sacrifice to speak their own grievances. If he was mad, we need many more like him now. Everything is crumbling nowadays. We are heading towards the abyss. We need a Bismarck Pasha!” And pleased with his own joke and his knowledge of the outside world, the old man cackled with delight. We contained our mirth.
Halil decided it was time to close the day. “Enough of all this talk. You could be arrested for treason and shot, Hasan Baba. I am not at all convinced that our father is either deranged or heading in that direction. There is something new. He’s embarked on a new stage of his life. His inner world is in complete turmoil. All we can do is try and help him as much as he will let us, so that we can ensure that he lives in peace.”
As we disbanded, I accompanied my mother to her bedchamber.
“Did you ever talk to him about Suleman?”
“Often.”
I was surprised. “And?”
“He was always very sympathetic. He understood.”
“And did he ever talk to you of Salman’s mother?”
“Yes, but not very often. He did so only when the pain he felt at her loss became overwhelming. Then he would come and I would stroke his head and let him talk of her till calm returned. We both knew that neither of us could love like that again and this realisation had drawn us closer to each other.”
“Do you think he knows that I am…”
My mother placed her hand on my mouth. “Shh. He never asked. I never told him. This doesn’t mean that he is ignorant. I simply don’t know. Even if he did know, his affection for you would not alter in the slightest. He has never been possessive of me in the least. What are you intending to do about Selim? It seems he is not really a barber at all, but a singer.”
“I will speak of him some other time, Mother. We have had enough surprises for one day.”
NINE
Nilofer and Selim learn to know each other and she realises that her emotions are out of control
I PANICKED WHEN I first looked out of the window that night. It was past midnight. Dark, ugly clouds had disfigured the sky. Behind them I could see the very faint outline of the full moon. A summer breeze was blowing across the sea and might yet clear the sky. The chimes of the big clock in the entrance hall had woken me up about half an hour earlier. How would Selim determine the time of our tryst?
My room was in a wing of the old house which, in the past, had been used to entertain princes and noblemen. It looked out in the direction of the mountains and the road, which led to the entrance. When we were children, Zeynep and I would quarrel over who had this room, because Salman had told us that when the Grand Vizier came to stay, this was where the captain of the janissaries slept so he could keep an eye on arrivals and departures. Later Salman confessed he had been teasing, but the room remained invested with military authority: his joke made sense.
The Baron and Uncle Memed were in the old royal suite below me, but here on the top floor I was alone. Orhan, by special request, slept in his grandmother’s dressing room. I was trembling slightly as I wrapped a shawl round myself and left my room. The last time I had left the house clandestinely was to meet Dmitri in the orange grove. Why had I insisted on meeting Selim at the same spot? Was it to drive out the past or to debase the present?