I dropped the wet daypack containing the evidence I had gathered and stripped down, wrapping the light, checkered cotton towel around my waist. A Turkish bath was essentially a steam room, so I knew it was going to be hot in there. I decided to bring the bottle of water in with me. The backpacks I figured I’d leave where they were, but regarding the amulet, I wasn’t so sure. I decided to drop it into the plastic bag with the water on the off chance that I could figure out what it meant.
I locked the flimsy changing room door behind me, and the thin guy directed me to a door at the back of the lobby. I was glad I wasn’t wearing anything more than a towel, because the warmth hit me from the moment I stepped inside, rising steam making it difficult to see the white marble floor and walls through the mist. There were a few benches in the long rectangular space, with showers on one side of the room and toilet stalls on the other, like a locker room at a swimming pool.
I could see a second door entering the hammam proper, steam curling out from underneath it. I decided to rinse off briefly before going into the next room. I turned on the single faucet, the cool water feeling strangely good on my skin in the warm room. A shower also gave me a chance to survey the space. One of the things they pounded into us back at the Farm was the importance of being aware of your surroundings. Entry points, exit points, places for an adversary to hide, the whole thing. From my vantage, I could see the Turkish toilets through their swinging doors and the long benches to the left of me. Short of squeezing up through the sewer, there was no other way into the room.
I turned off the shower, refastened the cotton towel around my waist, and picked up my plastic bag. The misty glass door into the next room was so wet with condensation that water rolled down it in little rivulets before hitting the steam rising from the crack at the bottom of the door. I was still a good forty minutes early so I was in no hurry. I took a final cool breath and pulled open the door, a wall of hot steam billowing out to greet me as I entered.
The hot air was so thick with steam that it took several seconds before my eyes adjusted. When they did, I saw that I was in a round room. There were no windows, but there was light. It shone down from cylindrical holes in the domed plaster ceiling. The heat was overpowering. Instantly I felt the hot steam opening my pores. A white marble octagonal slab, about the size of a king-sized bed sat in the middle of the room, steam rising off it, while individual washbasins and faucets ran around the outer wall of the room in a wide ring. I counted eight stations laid out around the room like numbers on the face of a clock.
I wasn’t alone. Across from me, in the mist, a man squatted at a far washbasin running a shallow brass bowl of water over his head. The towel around his waist was wet, his body glistening in the fog. He looked to be in his sixties, lean and tall, with gray stubble growing from his chin and a few stray strands of silver hair still left on his head. He didn’t pay me much heed. Just a brief moment of eye contact and he was back to his ablutions.
Taking my cue from the old man, I sat down on the ledge ringing the round room like a single stair. There was a stone washbasin immediately behind me and an embossed brass bowl sitting on the ledge, pretty much every seat in the house provided a good view of everywhere else. Another door led out to a second room, similar to the one I was already in, yet smaller. The second room was empty and I ignored it. I was already getting too hot in the steam. Way too hot. I reached behind me and turned on the brass faucet, filling the stone basin with water. Even the metal of the faucet was warm to the touch. I could barely see the stubbly gray guy through the mist, but I could hear the water fall from his brass bowl as he poured it over himself.
I followed his movements, pouring the cool water from my own brass bowl over my head and down my neck. The cool water quickly relieved the heat and I soon felt myself beginning to relax. Either it was the steam, my adrenaline was finally wearing off, or I was plain exhausted, but I felt my eyelids grow heavy. I watched as the grizzled guy slowly rose in his wet cotton towel and tossed a bowlful of water on the octagonal marble block in the center of the space. The water ran off the marble in steamy, bubbling streams as he lay down on his back, his head facing toward me, his knees slightly bent as he stared up at the ceiling.
I knew that this was my opportunity to rest. I was nearly alone and as anonymous as I was going to get. I reached into the stone basin with the shallow brass bowl and dumped another round of water over my shoulders. I’d be getting scrubbed down at some point. That’s what they did in these bathhouses. Big strong fat men laid you on a slab and scrubbed your skin with a rough loofa until you were as clean as you’d ever be. They let your pores open first, though, which is what they were doing now. I reached into the crinkled, red plastic bag and cracked open my bottle of water. The water felt good going down, but seeing the amulet at the bottom of the bag brought me back to the problem at hand.
The Turkish Eye. I let the thought of it flow over me. Why had it been hidden in the lamp? I could speculate, but the truth was, I had no idea. I gave in to my fatigue, allowing my eyes to close to narrow slits, my back leaned against the marble as I sat on the low ledge. Shafts of light shot through the tiny round skylights in the cupola illuminating the clouds of dancing steam. It was like a Rorschach inkblot test for the lethargic — you could see what you wanted in the billowing steam. And I saw a feather bed. A blissful respite from the stresses of the world. The heat suffused my bones as I smiled inwardly, secretly hoping that my rendezvous would be delayed.
I heard a grunt, and the grizzled old man picked himself off the marble slab and shuffled slowly through the door to the smaller room. I could see the entrance to it from where I sat. It was set up the same as the room I was in, round with basins and a ledge and a cupola-shaped ceiling. The only difference was that it was about half the size. There was no need to explore it. Instead, I took a page from the old man’s book and reached into the basin behind me with my brass bowl, tossing a bowlful of water on the octagonal slab. The water sizzled as it landed, making a shallow pool atop the slab. I tossed a second bowl of water on the slab and rose. I felt limber, more limber than I had for a while, but I had to say I was happy to have the drinking water. I took another swig of it and lay down on my back on the slab.
The marble was hot on my back, but not so hot as to cause pain. Obviously the slab was heated, probably with some kind of radiant-water system running below the tiles. I looked up to see that the light coming through the round glass holes in the cupola had changed. It was more diffused. I guessed a cloud had passed in front of the sun, but at that point I couldn’t say that I really much cared. I was too tired. I watched as dust motes danced in the steam, my hair slicked back, the marble slab hot on the tips of my ears and the back of my neck. I felt as if I was in a hot tub without the weight of the swirling water. It was perfect. And then I felt a waft of cooler air blow over my chest and everything changed.
Chapter 6
“Mike.”
It wasn’t loud, but I heard my name. I turned my head to see my unit leader standing there in a blue, checkered hammam towel. His dreadlocks were tied back and he was cleanly shaven, a tattoo of Earth as seen from space on his pale chest. We called him Crust, and though he was in charge of our little unit of covert backpackers and technically my boss, I still didn’t know his real name. I’d last seen him four or five days earlier in Yangshuo, China, and he didn’t look like he’d slept since.