In the main square groups of terrified citizens had fallen to their knees: they were arranged in ranks about an ornamental fountain, still placidly playing. Soaked through and grinning, Çerkes Ethem stood on the pedestal in the middle of the fountain, striking one of his more melodramatic poses. From out of a large Greek Orthodox church in the middle of a group of burning houses a line of men and women carried boxes and bundles. These people were either Greek, Armenian or both. Submissively, and to Ethem’s evident pleasure, they arranged their treasure along the edge of the fountain. His men still came and went through the smoke and the ruins, firing as they ran into buildings, whooping as they ran out. Even as I dismounted from my horse I saw one screaming young girl raped in the street by a fat bazhi-bazouk who had more trouble pulling down his breeches than controlling his prize. I averted my eyes.
Çerkes Ethem noticed my discomfort. ‘See how gladly your co-religionists pay for your machines, Christian!’ He was in his element. He shouted something in dialect to one grinning lieutenant, then splashed back through the fountain to put his arm around my shoulders. ‘These people are ignorant. You mustn’t worry about them. Now I’ll show you why we fought so hard for this town.’ He guided me out of the square and down a dusty sidestreet, pausing with a benevolent gesture to display what was left of some kind of garage. On a bench just inside lay a small petrol engine, very similar to the one I had drawn in my designs. ‘Here’s your chance. You’ll stay for a day or two and build a plane in peace. They’ll be too scared to bother you. I’ll leave a couple of men.’
Behind us the screams and firing began again. I was terrified, nodding dumbly by way of agreement and thanks. I wished desperately, with all my being, that I was not where I was, that I might never suffer such terror. How could I have escaped it in Russia merely to find myself plunged into it again in Turkey, where I had even less chance of survival? How I hated the Orient and all it meant!
Ethem patted me on the back. ‘Tell Hassan what you need.’ He beckoned a boy of about fourteen from the shadows of the workshop. Hassan smirked at me. ‘I’ll be back in three or four days. Some Greek soldiers need killing.’ With a strange, avuncular gesture, he returned to the square.
To shut out the awful sounds, which grew in variety and intensity as the day progressed, I made Hassan help me close the flimsy doors of the machine shop. I told him to bring lamps, to find people to clean the place. There were oily wood shavings on the floor, a few antiquated tools in a rack on the far wall. The place had probably been the only one in miles where people could find the services of a mechanic. Whoever had owned it had either been killed or had run away. There were very few spare parts, but a small crucible and bellows remained alive in one corner and here and there were the implements of the blacksmith’s craft, a clue to the workshop’s origins.
Thankfully, I was able to do what I had done more than once in recent years, and make myself blind and deaf to anything but the immediate job in hand. I concentrated my attention first on the engine, to see how it could be properly adapted to turn the propeller. I now knew a great deal more about aerodynamics than when I built my prototype. By that evening, when Çerkes Ethem returned, I was beginning to get some idea of my problems and how they might be solved.
‘Work well, Christian,’ he said. He placed a large, embroidered bag on the bench. ‘This will keep you going until I’m back.’ The bag was full of dead fowls, part of a lamb, a leg of a goat, all just slaughtered. I was revolted. Hassan, on the other hand, was ecstatically grateful.
The bandit left, displaying amusement as always, and a few moments later I heard him yelling to his men. There was that disturbingly familiar sound of rapid hoofbeats, followed by an equally familiar pall of silence; whereupon the wailing began.
Not much later, my spirits improved considerably, for it had struck me suddenly and with some irony, that for all his cunning Çerkes Ethem had not allowed for a simple fact: Once I built my plane I could fly clear of his disgusting horsemen and their rifles, rise as magically as any Thief of Baghdad into the clouds, mocking all below, and be in Constantinople within a matter of hours! This cheerful notion set me to working with much greater confidence and enthusiasm; no longer was I building a war-machine for Islam: I was constructing the means of my own salvation.
Over the next two days, supplied by what was left of the cocaine, I worked virtually without sleep. Hassan proved himself a conscientious if rather clumsy assistant. Trembling wood-carvers and carpenters were brought to me by the guards Ethem had left behind. I had seamstresses. The whole town (or at least its survivors) was at my disposal and as a result it was not long before almost every piece of equipment was assembled. Parts which could not be found or adapted were forged in the crucible. The propeller, of some local hardwood, was turned and polished to perfection, exactly as I had specified; the wings would have made Daedalus himself envious. It was remarkable how those townspeople lent themselves to the work (especially the Greeks and Armenians); it was as if some dim racial memory drove them to their task of aiding me in my escape from that modern equivalent of the Cretan monster. I became impressed by the correspondences as I worked, thinking that whereas Daedalus had built Minos a labyrinth, the maze I built my captors was one of illusion and abstraction in which they themselves might with chance become lost.
I now realised I might easily be ready to escape before the bandit chief returned. The machine, almost the cause of my destruction, was to become my salvation. I would certainly demonstrate its efficiency! With Ethem’s gold in my pockets, I would not only soar away from this desolate place but would arrive back to amaze Constantinople’s entire population! I would glide between the minarets of Hagia Sophia and the Blue Mosque; I would alight on the Galata Tower, on Leander’s Tower, on all the towers of Byzantium and the air would be filled with the murmur of their wondering voices, the hum of my glittering screw. I would receive so much publicity I would never need more. When I offered my valuable information to the British I should have an open visa to any country in Europe. It would give me intense personal satisfaction to denounce Count Siniutkin for the traitor and spy he was.
By the morning of the third day there was no news of Ethem’s return. The hush of hopelessness which had fallen over the town was gradually changing to the ordinary sounds of domestic life, though the faces of the population remained utterly expressionless, reminding me of masks in some old Attic tragedy. Carefully, I tested each part of the machine. Then I assembled it on the bench and had Hassan pour in a little fuel. The engine turned sweetly; the propeller whirled as smooth as steel through oil. I had the wings strapped on to me, as well as the frame which would take engine and blade. I ensured I would be able to direct myself wherever I wished to go. I had made some important modifications. What had happened to me in Babi Yar would not happen in Turkey. When I was satisfied, I ordered a party of local men to carry my equipment carefully to the nearby wool exchange overlooking the fountain and the Greek church, this being the tallest and most substantial building still in one piece.