The lady Talfa had familiarized them with each part of the building she knew so well. Baths had a key; so did the dressing rooms, where the sultan’s linen would be stored, properly folded and stacked away, and his frock coats, brushed every day and inspected for any sign of moth or dirt, with lengths of silk and muslin for his turban. There was even a slipper room, to which a slipper kalfa would possess the key.
The girls who followed the lady Talfa were used to luxury, but the scale of Besiktas bewildered them; the number of potential responsibilities and duties excited them. Some of them had forgotten their training and wandered openmouthed, eyes darting from precious silks to the immaculate polished parquet and marble on the floors. All of them were feeling weary, and slightly overawed.
Which was just how the lady Talfa wanted it, as she turned a key in the cellar door.
“Bring the lantern,” she said, “and follow me.”
They descended a stone staircase. Some of the girls reached out to clutch each other: it was quite dark, and the shadows that raced across the vault overhead seemed sinister and demonic. Somebody tripped and squealed.
At the bottom of the steps, the lady Talfa turned and held the lantern at her shoulder. Her face was plunged into dark shade. The girls, feeling the cold, shivered; they wondered why they had been brought down here.
“I have a duty, as the senior lady in the palace, to pass on a warning. The harem has many rules, as you know, and many traditions. Some of these ensure the smooth running of the sultan’s household. Some are upheld for your comfort and protection.”
The girls stood still, listening.
“There is one rule above all that you will be expected to obey, and that is the rule of silence. We are a family. We will have our disagreements and our rivalries, no doubt, as a family will. But what goes on here, in the sultan’s harem, is a matter for us and for no one else. You will see and hear things that will surprise you. Perhaps they will even upset you. But these are for us, and for us only. Do you understand?”
The girls murmured assent. They understood they had to keep their secrets.
Now, they hoped, the lady Talfa would lead them all upstairs, out of this dank cellar.
But the lady Talfa had turned, swinging the lantern. “The penalty for a girl who talks, or infringes the most serious regulations, is severe and horrible. Look.”
The lamplight settled, and the girls craned their heads, peering into the gloom.
“Do you see the table?” Talfa demanded.
They nodded. It was a plain wooden table with four stout legs. On the table lay several coils of thin cord.
“Can you see that the table stands on a block of stone?”
Talfa crossed to the table and set the lantern down.
“A girl who disobeys the regulations here will soon find herself on this table. She will be strapped down, unable to move. Then, one of the eunuchs will engage the engine.”
The girls were wide awake now. They shuffled closer together, unwilling to come too close to where the lady Talfa stood behind the table like a priestess at the altar.
“The engine, hanum?”
“A turning engine. When the lever goes down, the table will start to spin. Around and around, faster and faster. The stone here”-she tapped her slippered foot-“slides back, and as the table turns it begins to sink down through the floor.”
She paused, as if she expected a question: but the girls were far too nervous to ask it.
“Under this floor there is a tunnel, from the Bosphorus.” She held up a finger and rotated it in the air. “Once it is set in motion, the engine cannot be stopped. The table sinks into the water, and the girl is drowned.”
The girls stared at the table wide-eyed.
“Some of you may have heard about this place already. It would be better that you had not: the girl who spoke of it-well.” She pursed her lips; there was no need to spell it out. “None of you, I am sure, would want to make the same experiment.”
She picked up the lantern and walked back to the steps. The girls behind her jostled for position, each of them trying to climb hard on the lady Talfa’s heels. No one wanted to be the last to leave that cold, dark vault.
11
When Mullah Dede knocked on the wicket gate, a hatch slid back instantly. Eyes surveyed them through the grille. A moment later, the door opened and they stepped inside.
The monk quickly shot the bolts home and leaned back against the door.
“I am Brother Palamedes,” he gasped. “I will take you to the abbot.”
Brother Palamedes led the way through a door in the side of the gateway, and they entered a large, cool room with a flagged floor and a vaulted ceiling. In the middle stood a long oak table, flanked by benches, and at its head stood the abbot.
“You are most welcome,” he said. “You will take coffee?”
Mullah Dede smiled. “I do not touch stimulants,” he said. “But if my friend Yashim wishes…?”
Yashim shook his head. “Thank you, no.”
The abbot leaned on the table. “For several days, my friends, the brothers have been falling sick. They have stomach pains, vomiting. One of our oldest monks has died.”
Mullah Dede murmured an invocation.
“In the end, I had to suspect the water. So yesterday we sent a monk down the well to investigate. He found the body of a man.”
The mullah raised his eyebrows.
The abbot nodded. “He was-far gone, efendi. It was by no means easy to bring him out of the well, and so-” He wrinkled his nose and snorted, as if expelling an unhappy memory. “We are at a loss.”
“But you informed the civil authorities?”
“We sent word to the governor, but at a time like this…”The abbot spread his hands, and shrugged. “The sultan has died. Perhaps this death seems small. We need to bury him, God rest his soul.”
Mullah Dede coughed. “The people are saying that the man is a Muslim.”
“We do not think he is a Muslim, mullah,” the abbot said. “If he were to be a Muslim, that would cause difficulties. It would be out of our hands.”
The mullah nodded, and stroked his white beard. “I am thinking of the man’s soul.”
Yashim said: “You have taken steps to determine the man’s faith?”
The abbot glanced at Brother Palamedes. “It is-indistinct, Yashim efendi. He must have been dead for quite some time.”
Yashim squared his shoulders. “It would be better if you let me see.”
“It is not a good sight.”
“I imagine not.” Yashim paused. “A riot on the island would not be pretty, either. Anger feeds on speculation.”
The abbot nodded. “Very well,” he said, in a low voice. “Mullah Dede?”
“You understand my position,” Mullah Dede said. “If the dead man is a Muslim, he must be buried with the appropriate prayers, and in the proper place. While there is doubt, speaking as a man of faith, this seems to me to be the safest course. But we will let Yashim efendi decide. I do not wish to make trouble for the monastery, but neither can I allow a Muslim to go unburied.”
The sun beat down mercilessly on the first court, bleaching it almost to invisibility as they stepped out of the dark gateway.
“I told the abbot we should have dealt with this ourselves,” the monk burst out. “I am sorry, Mullah Dede, but it is true.”
12
Brother Palamedes turned the key in the lock, and stood back.
“Once, efendi, is quite enough.”
Yashim reached up and tugged the end of his turban loose, unwound it several turns, and wrapped the length of cloth over his mouth and nose. He pushed the door.
On the floor of the empty room, lit by a shaft of sunlight streaming through a barred window, the corpse lay on its back in a puddle of water. It seemed, at first glance, to have melted into the floor. Loose skin sagged around its legs and arms, the head a deliquescent lump.