“Nothing broken, God be praised,” he said. “When my patients break something, we shoot them.”
Preen had laughed for the first time since her attack. Laughter wasn’t the only medicine the horse doctor used, either: he had salved her shoulder and neck with a preparation of horse chestnut. He had then applied the bandages and painted the result with hot gum.
“Tastes dreadful,” he observed. “And stops the loops from sagging and coming apart. Whether or not it is medically necessary, who knows? But I’m too old to change my prescriptions.”
The gum had set and dried, and now it creaked whenever Preen moved her shoulder. At least she could work her fingers: two days ago they had been swollen and immovable. Mina had come to help her eat, bringing the tripe soup she loved in an earthenware bowl. Apart from the horse doctor, and her friend Mina, Preen had no visitors: she had resolved to turn even Yashim away, should he come. Without her war-paint she felt sure that she looked a fright.
She looked different, certainly. Her own hair was cropped close to a downy fluff, and her skin was very pale; yet Mina could see in the shape of her head and the high-boned face more than a trace of the boy she had once been, eager and fragile at the same time. With her big brown eyes she had pleaded with Mina to stay the night, and Mina had curled up beside her friend and watched her sleep.
On the third morning Preen had had to tell her landlady that she had no intention of paying extra for her so-called guest. The conversation had been conducted through the door, because Preen refused to let the old woman come in.
“Perhaps I should deduct rent when I am not home for the night?” she called out. “It is your fault, anyway, that I have to have a nurse. I trusted you to keep an eye on people coming and going! And you let in a murderer!”
There was an outraged silence, and Preen grinned. Nothing could be more mortifying to the landlady than to be accused of slackness when it came to peering through her lattice. It was like doubting her faith.
That was earlier. Now Mina was coming in with bread and soup for their supper.
She helped prop Preen upright on the divan, and handed her a bowl.
“You’re missing a lot of excitement, darling,” she said, sitting on the edge of the divan. “A positive invasion of handsome young men.”
She arched her eyebrows. “Men in tight trousers! The New Guard.”
Preen rolled her eyes.
“Doing what, exactly?”
“That’s what I asked them. Taking up positions, they said. Well, I couldn’t resist it, could I? I said I could show them a few they hadn’t thought of.”
They giggled.
“But what does it mean?” Preen demanded.
“It’s for protection, apparently. All that plotting and killing, it’s coming to a head. Oh, Preen, I’m sorry—you look white as a sheet. I didn’t mean…I mean, I’m sure it’s got nothing to do with what happened the other day. Look, why don’t you ask your gentleman friend?”
“Which one? Yashim?”
“That’s right, dear. Yashim. Come on, eat your soup and put on your face. I’ll help you. You can walk, can’t you? We’ll get a chair and go and find him right now.”
The truth, of course, was that Mina was getting just a tiny bit bored of her nursing duties. She fancied an outing, especially when there was something exciting going on outside. So she was her most persuasive, and overruled Preen’s doubts.
“It’s just that…I don’t feel safe,” Preen admitted.
“Nonsense, darling. I’ll be with you, and we’ll find your friend. It’ll be fun, who knows? You’ll be perfectly safe going out. Just as safe as staying here. Safer.” Later, Preen was to remember that remark.
[ 116 ]
Yashim, as it happened, was already dealing with his second visitor of the evening.
Palewski had come up the stairs to sniff the aroma on Yashim’s landing, but for once he was disappointed. There was a faint smell of onions, he imagined, and perhaps boiled carrot, but the insubstantial clues failed to geclass="underline" it could be any number of recipes. Then he noticed the shoes, a pair of sturdy leather sandals.
Company, he supposed. He knocked on the door.
There was a slight delay, and the door opened an inch.
“Thank God it’s you,” Yashim said, pulling the door open and scooping Palewski through into the room.
Palewski almost dropped his valise in surprise. Yashim was holding a large kitchen knife, not that it mattered. What struck his notice instead was the body of a huge man, face down on the carpet, largely enveloped in a knotted sheet.
“I’ve got to do something about this maniac,” Yashim said shortly. “I’ve tied his wrists with the corner of a sheet but now I’m out of ideas.”
Palewski blinked. He looked at Yashim, and back at the body on the floor. He realised that the man was breathing hard.
“Perhaps what you need,” he said quietly, fumbling at his waist, “is this.”
He held out a long cord, made of twisted silk and gold thread.
“It went with my dressing gown. My Sarmatian finery, I should say.”
Together they bound the man’s wrists tightly behind his back. Yashim undid the sheet and wrapped it round his legs: the man was so docile that Palewski found it hard to credit what Yashim was saying.
“A wrestler?” Then he silently mouthed the word: “Janissary?”
“Don’t worry, he can’t hear, poor bastard. No, not a Janissary. It’s odder than that. Worse than I thought. Look, I have to reach the palace immediately. I don’t know what I could have done with this fellow if you hadn’t come. Will you stay? Keep an eye on him? Prick him if he tries to move.”
Palewski was staring at him in horror.
“For God’s sake, Yash. Can’t we get him to the night watch?”
“There isn’t time. Give me an hour. There’s bread and olives. You can leave him here after that. If he gets free, so be it -though you could try knocking him on the head with a saucepan before you go. For my sake.”
“All right, all right, I’ll stay,” Palewski grumbled. “But it’s not what I joined for, you know. One night, intimate conversation with the sultan. Next night, quiet evening with friends. Third night, silent vigil over murderous twenty-stone wrestling deaf mute. I think I’ll have a drink,” he added, sliding his valise closer.
But Yashim was hardly listening.
“It’s two I owe you,” he said over his shoulder, as he cleared the top flight of stairs in a single jump.
[ 117 ]
The Kara Davut was always busy on a Friday night. The shopkeepers and cafe owners set out lanterns above their doorways and after mosque families paraded up and down the street, stopping for a sherbet or an ice, queuing for hot street food and thronging the coffee shops. Children chased each other in and out of the crowds, shouting and laughing, only occasionally called to order by their indulgent parents. Young men gathered round cafe tables, those who could afford it sitting with a coffee, the others at their elbows chatting and trying to catch a glimpse of the local girls, decorously swathed in chador and yashmak, who walked accompanied by their parents, but all the time signalling with their gait and the movement of their heads and hands.
Yashim didn’t think he was imagining that the atmosphere tonight was different. The street was as full as ever, even more crowded than usual; but the children seemed quieter, as if they were playing on a shorter rein, and the knots of youths in the cafes seemed larger and more subdued than usual.
This impression of subdued expectation didn’t evaporate as Yashim hurried towards the palace. He had failed to find a chair, and guessed that the chair-men would contribute to the confusion approaching the city: if not ex-Janissaries, they were still a rough crew, the sort of men who went to swell a mob or serve the rabble if they scented an opportunity.