Henri wakes to the call for prayer.
He hears the crackle of the loudspeaker first, followed by the voice of the muezzin. His eyes closed, he remains still, listening, and for a moment, he is back in Oran. He feels the sun on his face, feels the breeze from the port spilling in through the opened French doors. He hears his parents, his father opening the newspaper, the sound of the printed page rustling in the breeze, his mother at the stove. He smells the sharp scent of lemon flooding the room.
Henri opens his eyes and returns to the present, to a hotel room in Istanbul where he lies, alone. Where he has managed to pass an entire night without any nightmares, any disturbances at all. He can tell already, even before rising, that she is gone. Her leather satchel is also missing, which means she does not intend to return. He should have suspected, should have been prepared, but it feels as though she is always one step ahead, that he is only following her lead. He searches for his clothes, finds them on the floor near the room’s only window. Morning light filters in and he pauses for a moment, allows himself to linger in the slice of warmth that pours through the curtains.
He had stood in this same spot only the night before, had pushed the coat down and off her shoulders, had known—finally known—for certain, what he had suspected for days. The money was not in the leather satchel, only her passport and a few odds and ends—including a needle and spool of thread. He thought back to that first day on the train, from Belgrade to Istanbul, as they had made their way to the dining car and found themselves momentarily thrown against each other, the way she had flinched when his hands reached for her waist. She had been wearing the coat then, had probably worried that he would feel it, the stacks of money sewn into the lining. No wonder she had never taken it off, had made sure to wear it wherever she happened to be. Except that night by the Sava, when she had left her coat lying on the bank. He wonders whether she knew he would be there, that he would find her, eventually.
He had felt the weight of the coat last night, had seen the look in her eyes—watching, waiting, to see what he would do, how he would react. A challenge. Henri had let the coat fall to the floor, had not looked down at it again.
Later, in bed, he asked her, “Do you remember the first time we spoke?”
“In Paris.”
“No, before that.”
“The rest stop,” she said. “When you gave me your sandwich.”
“Yes. And do you remember what you said to me, on the bus?”
She laughed. “Something about being able to take care of myself, I think.”
“You said, or you meant to say, ‘Keep your coin.’”
She frowned, looked as though she were trying to recall. “And what did I say instead?”
He thought back to that day, how he had known she wasn’t French just from that one expression, though her accent had hinted at it as well. “You said: ‘Keep your corner.’”
She shook her head, reaching for her cigarettes. “Mon français est bon.”
“Oui, c’est très bon,” he allowed. “And yet, coin, as you meant it, is actually pièce in French. While coin is—”
“Corner,” she said, exhaling.
“False friends.” She frowned then and he tried to think of how best to explain it. “Two words that look the same but have very different meanings.” When she raised her eyebrows, he admitted: “I studied linguistics for a bit at université.”
She had laughed then, and he watched her, his face turning gradually more serious. “I need to tell you something,” he said. “About the man following us.”
But she had shaken her head, had refused to hear more. “Not now. Later.”
Now, as he dresses, he curses himself for not insisting. He had meant to, the words on his lips, the plans he had begun to form, but then they had all fallen away. It had been easy to pretend that they weren’t who they were, that the situation wasn’t happening. It had felt good, indulgent, even if only for a few hours. Now, he regrets remaining quiet—though not the moment itself—berates himself for not telling her about what he had learned in the hours before he joined her at the hotel, the ones he had spent with the man who called himself Fulano.
At the train station—only the day before, he has to remind himself, for to Henri it seems somehow much longer, as if days and weeks have already passed—he had lingered, had not followed her, knowing the man would eventually emerge. He had wanted their conversation to take place as far away from Louise as possible. He had positioned himself on a stoop outside, where a gray-and-white cat was sunning itself. Absently, he stroked the cat’s fur and waited.
Henri was right. It did not take long.
Fifteen minutes later, as the sun began to near its zenith, the man had rounded the corner, had joined him on the stoop, bending down to stroke the stray’s head.
“Ça va, Fulano?” he had asked.
“Ça va,” the man replied. “Too many cats here,” he said, after a moment’s reflection, cupping the creature’s head. His fingers tightened.
“Leave it,” Henri warned, in Spanish, to make sure the man understood.
The man paused, the cat hissing between his grip, then let it go, holding up his hands in mock surrender. He leaned back against the wall, lit a cigarette. “Tell me the plan.”
“The plan?”
“We’re in Istanbul. Isn’t this where the money will be?”
Henri nodded.
“So why didn’t you follow her?”
“There’s a date on the wire transfer. It’s for tomorrow. An address as well.”
The man paused, then nodded. “All right. We’ll keep each other company until then.”
Henri had expected as much. “And what do you propose we do with the whole day ahead of us?”
“What the tourists do.” The man shrugged. “Let’s see the sights.”
They had walked after that. Without any real purpose, any real aim. They slipped between French and Spanish, sometimes reverting to hand gestures when the words refused to translate, Henri still reluctant to acknowledge just how proficient his Spanish was. He thought that the man was clever enough not to take anything personally; after all, they weren’t the ones giving orders, only obeying and disobeying. The man did not ask if Henri knew where Louise was, and Henri did not offer any information to indicate whether he was in possession of such knowledge.
They walked to the Galata Bridge, watched the fishermen in the early morning light, casting their reels into the Bosphorus below. They followed the shouts of balik ekmek to where a number of boats sat in the water, vendors grilling fish and placing them between bread. They ordered two, along with a drink—something violent red that tasted both salty and sour. They stood eating, the man spitting out the tiny bones, one by one, Henri crushing them between his teeth. After, they walked through the old district of Sultanahmet, to the park that lay between the Hagia Sophia and Blue Mosque. They stood in front of the great red mosque and its dome that seemed to fill the sky, the blue of the Bosphorus at its back. They turned around, took in the view of the Blue Mosque and its legendary six minarets. They stayed outside, never venturing in.
“I don’t know you well enough,” was the response the man had given when Henri had asked about purchasing a ticket. “Too many people, too many distractions. Lots of opportunities.” He had cocked his head to the side and said, “Let’s see what happens after.” They ordered a café from one of the stalls, drank standing up with the locals, the man complaining all the while that the coffee was too sweet, that everything in this country was too damn sweet.
Eventually they tired, and the man said, “Enough with the postcards. Let’s find a place to drink.” They asked around for somewhere local, somewhere cheap, and they were directed to the city’s Anatolian side, across the Bosphorus. They bought tickets at the Eminönü dock for the ferry to Kadiköy, and on the ride over, Henri fell asleep—only for a few minutes—but he jolted awake with such force that the man turned to him and laughed. From there, they selected from one of the many bars that lined Yeldeğirmeni, sat down, and ordered beers. They sat for a while then, drinking, eating lahmacun and pide, not speaking much. The smell of hookah tobacco wafted around them.
“I’m curious,” the man said at one point. “Why didn’t you take the money?”
“I told you, the wire transfer.”
“No.” The man shook his head. “I mean before.”
Henri considered lying, telling the man something that would not arouse suspicion, but then he figured that it didn’t matter, not really. He thought back to that moment, standing in the gardens of the Alhambra. “I was curious, I suppose,” he said.
The man drank. “About?”
“I don’t know.” He searched for the words to explain. “Her, I guess. What she would do, where she would go. And how far I was willing to let her get, so that I didn’t have to return.”
The man didn’t respond, only continued to sip his beer. The weather was cold, but not as cold as where they had come from, and so they sat outside, on a wooden bench, watching the people as they went about their day. There was a market nearby, and many of them passed carrying bags filled with groceries. It seemed strange, Henri thought, to be faced with such normalcy, given the situation they found themselves in. At last, his curiosity got the better of him and he said to the man, “It’s a long journey home.”
The man nodded in agreement.
“How can you be so sure you will be able to get her back? There’s a lot of opportunity for her to escape, to make a scene.”
The man sipped his beer. “I agree.”
Henri stopped. “Oh?”
“Yes, that’s why everything will be resolved here.” He cut Henri with a glance. “As you said, too many opportunities. Too many loose ends,” he said, though he tried to say the expression in French, saying threads instead. Too many loose threads.
Something occurred to Henri then. “And the woman? From Granada, I mean.” He hadn’t thought of her since, but now, with all this talk of threads, his mind was humming, remembering, as he tried to work out what the past meant for the future.
The man met his gaze. “Taken care of, same as what we’ll do here.” He leaned back, sighed, and looked around them. “We should start to look for a hotel. Somewhere close to the address on that receipt. You still have it on you?”
Henri nodded, said yes, wondering if the man meant to shock him with the casualness of his words, if that was the point. Or perhaps he really did believe him, about the wire transfer, about waiting for the money. He didn’t know, found it impossible to read the man in front of him. He waited for another twenty minutes to pass, for them to finish and settle the bill, before he said, “I need to find a toilet first.”
As he rose, the man reached out and grasped his wrist. “Just make sure you don’t take too long.”
Henri held his gaze, nodded.
In the restaurant, he looked for an exit and found one next to the toilets. He made his way through the crowds, through the market, ignoring the vendors’ calls, pushing away hands that reached out—holding up an olive to be sampled, a piece of fish to be marveled at—back to the port, where he bought a ferry ticket that would return him to the European side of Istanbul. Standing on the ferry, he removed a crumpled piece of paper from his pocket. Pera Palace Hotel.
He had found it after they had said their goodbyes, in the breast pocket of his coat, no idea when she had placed it there. It had been careless of him to keep it, particularly when the other man could have demanded to search him, but he had not wanted to part with it, liked, even now, looking at the cursive handwriting—strong, unrushed—knowing that she had decided, somewhere along the way, to pass this on to him. That it had not been a last-minute, hastened impulse.
He looked up, out across the Bosphorus, where the sun was already beginning to set. He didn’t yet know how he would get her out of the city, how he would get himself out, away from the man who called himself Fulano. An indication, perhaps, that he was only one of many.
Henri pushed such thoughts from his mind. He would only think of the night ahead. That was enough. It had to be.
Now, in the lobby of the Pera Palace Hotel, Henri tells the concierge, “My wife was supposed to leave instructions for me.” The man behind the counter obviously does not believe a word of what he said. “I’m supposed to meet her. Room 411,” he hastens to add.
Something shifts in the man’s face as he says, “The lady from 411 asked for directions to Lale Restaurant this morning.”
Henri narrows his eyes. “Could you write down the address for me, please?”
The concierge does so, then hesitates—and Henri knows for certain that something is amiss. “What is it?”
“I feel I should tell you, monsieur. You are not the only one to inquire after mademoiselle this morning.”
Henri stops. “What do you mean?”
“There was another man, shortly after mademoiselle left. He spoke to the bellhop, asking where she was headed.” The concierge pauses. “He’s new to the hotel and young. He didn’t know what to do.”
“He told him?”
“Yes.”
Henri curses. “Call me a taxi.” He fixes the concierge with a stare. “A good one. Someone who will take me straight there, no detours.”
“Yes, of course.” The concierge hesitates. “Should I ring the police, sir?”
“No police.” Henri doesn’t ask how long ago this conversation between the man and the bellhop took place, but he knows it’s been long enough, knows there is a good chance he will arrive to the restaurant only to find both of them already gone.
The restaurant is nondescript, tucked into a larger building that houses a hotel on one side and another restaurant on the other. For a moment, he wonders whether he is in the right place. For while he was not surprised to find her gone from the hotel, he is surprised to find that it is only to this restaurant in front of him. He had imagined she would have used the time to make her escape—that she would have by now boarded a ferry or bus out of the city. That she had stopped for a meal beforehand was a decision that he cannot work out—she is clever, Henri knows, too clever for this. Which leaves him wondering just what it is that he is missing.
On his way in, Henri passes a board of notices and his eyes drift to the handwriting there. He stops to read a few of the messages. Missed connections, mostly, but there are others too—rides offered, journeys overland, to places like Kabul, Nepal, and farther, even. Her choice of venue starts to make sense. He wonders whether she has had time to connect with anyone, whether she has managed to find a ride out of Istanbul, after all, away from all this, from him. He wonders whether he will even find her inside, whether she is already across the border, gone.
He pushes through the restaurant, where there is no sign of her. Eventually, he finds her in the garden, a milk pudding in front of her, uneaten.
Louise smiles when she sees him, though her face is pale, and he thinks there is a slight tremor in the hand that holds her coffee. “What took you so long?” she asks, her voice aiming for lightness, her words cracking slightly.
He takes a seat beside her. “That man,” he begins without preamble.
“I know. The one from the train.” She takes a sip of her coffee, careful to leave the grinds. “Why do you think I’m still here?”
He curses, calls for the waiter, and orders a coffee. “Where is he?” Henri asks, scanning the area.
“Outside, presumably. I only noticed him when I got out of the taxi. For some reason I didn’t think to look before. I rushed inside the restaurant as quick as I could, then headed outside to the garden. He hasn’t shown his face since.”
“He’s waiting.”
“For?” She raises her eyebrows in question.
“I fed him a line about the money. Told him you didn’t have it on you, that you had wired it to Istanbul from Paris.”
It had been a last-minute decision, spurred on by the incident in the bookshop in Paris, where he had confirmed the suspicion that he was being followed. After, he had sat in a tabac, the caffeine from his café flooding his system, and come up with a plan. He remembered a bureau de change he had seen near the train station, and when the waiter returned with his coin, he had asked where the nearest one could be found.
Henri had followed the waiter’s instructions, which took him down one street and then left onto another. Once at the exchange, he had asked for a wire transfer receipt, requested it be stamped, flashing his credentials at the young woman behind the counter, hoping she would not inquire further or ask to see the piece of paper up close. She hadn’t. Instead, she nodded dully and called for the next person in line, her eyes red and tired. Henri thanked her and moved on. He filled the rest out later, back in his hotel room.
“That was smart,” Louise observes. “But what do we do now? Surely at this point he’s realized you’ve lied.”
“We need to lose him,” he says, considering how it will affect his plan. “How far away is the Grand Bazaar from here?”
She looks confused by his question but does not ask him to explain. “Ten minutes, maybe, on foot. Less in a taxi.”
Henri nods, drinks the coffee the waiter has only just placed before him, and thinks some more. During that time, neither of them speaks. They sit and stare at the view, the Blue Mosque and the Hagia Sophia just beyond, fighting for attention. Eventually, coffee finished, grinds coating the bottom of the cup in a thick sludge, he signals to the waiter, speaks to him in hushed Arabic.
When the waiter departs, Louise leans forward and asks, “What did you say?”
“I asked him to call a taxi.”
“And then?”
“We head to the Grand Bazaar and do our best to disappear.” He leans back, gives a weak smile. “Isn’t that what you said you wanted, to disappear into Istanbul?”
She returns the smile. “I said sail away across the Bosphorus.”
“Not so dissimilar, then.”
She looks at him. “Why don’t you just hand me over?”
He holds her gaze. “Why don’t you just give me the money?”
She gives a smile in response. He thinks she looks sad—regretful, maybe.
“Come on.” He stands. “We’ll make a run for it now.”
“He’ll only follow.”
“I know.”
“And even if we lose him in the bazaar, he won’t give up.”
“I know.”
“Then—” She stops.
“Then what?”
She shakes her head, refuses to finish.
He knows, though—or at least, he thinks he knows—what it is that she was about to say, to ask. She wants to know what the point is, whether this whole thing is futile, because in the end, if this man does not catch her, then another man will be sent, and another after that. He wants to tell her that he has been thinking the same thing, that he has been trying to figure it out, that he may have even found a way—but there is something else he needs to know first. “Have you found a connection yet, out of Istanbul?”
“What?” The surprise is evident in her voice.
“Louise,” he intones, his voice sharp. “Did you?”
She shakes her head, avoids his gaze. “There wasn’t time.”
He nods, disappointed, and also relieved.
“We run,” he says, his voice filled with more conviction than he feels. “We run, into the heart of the city, and then, when it’s safe, we leave. I have a plan, or the beginning of one, if you’re willing to trust me.” He watches her as he speaks, carefully, searching for anything—any sign of deception, any betrayal that she does not feel the same at this proposal that explicitly means, without actually saying the words, that they are in this thing together, for however long they might have left.
“Partners, then?”
He thinks he can hear the hesitation in her voice. “For now,” he says, with a small smile.
She returns his gaze, then gives a quick, sharp nod.
It’s enough, he decides. He stands, offering his hand. “Then we need to be quick. I don’t suppose he’ll wait much longer.”
She stands, motioning to the exit. “Gentlemen first.”
Henri pushes ahead, out the door, and toward the waiting taxi.
Despite the early hour, the bazaar is teeming with people.
Normally, the crowds would irritate him, but today Henri finds himself grateful for the presence of so many bodies, so many spaces in which they might disappear. The taxi driver has taken them on a circuitous route through the city, dropping them on Çadircilar Caddesi, nearest the Beyazit entrance. As they step out of the taxi, Henri guides them toward the opening of the bazaar, anxious to be inside. He glances around them—there is no sign of the man, no other taxi pulling up to let a passenger out. He had looked when they departed the restaurant, but hadn’t seen the man—knew that didn’t mean he hadn’t been there, somewhere in the shadows, watching them.
Inside the bazaar, Henri blinks, trying to adjust to the dim lighting, trying to get his bearings, trying to ignore the chaotic scene of vendors and customers before them. He glances up, sees they are on Kalpakçilar Caddesi, the main street in the bazaar. This is good, he decides, recalling the map he had asked the concierge to draw while he waited for the taxi, a contingency plan in case something like this happened. He knows where they are, where they need to head from here.
He grabs her hand, pulls her forward. They rush past stalls selling jewelry, the gold catching in the light. The smell of frankincense and myrrh fills the air, thick and cloying. He feels momentarily overwhelmed but pushes ahead, searching for the heart of the bazaar. It’s the best plan he has been able to come up with—to hide in plain sight.
At the heart of the bazaar, surrounded by dozens of others, they should be able to keep themselves safe. They will be in the open, yes, but hidden as well—by the people, by the stalls, by the chaotic atmosphere that defines the place. The man would not, Henri has since decided, be so brazen as to take out a weapon and threaten them here. And then there is the matter of an exit. At the heart of the bazaar any such escape will be far off, but Henri doesn’t see this as a problem, thinks it will work to their advantage because again, the man won’t be willing to risk the chance of being noticed, which will be impossible while walking two hostages through labyrinthine twists and turns, a pistol at their back. At least, he hopes.
They walk up Sipahi Caddesi at a clipped pace, not quite a run. Henri doesn’t want to attract attention, but nothing so slow as a leisurely walk, either. The vendors don’t bother them; he doesn’t give them enough time.
He glances over. She is wearing those damn sunglasses again, and that same coat, but while the latter doesn’t jump out, it’s easily recognizable to someone who has been watching her now for several days. He pauses at one of the stalls, silk scarves stacked from floor to ceiling. “Here,” he says, motioning her to come closer. He picks a scarf at random, something dark blue—silk, by the feel of it. He asks the price, hands over the money, not bothering to haggle.
Louise accepts it obligingly, draping it over her coat, her hair. It hides the blond, anyway, he thinks, which stands out among the crowd. “And take off those sunglasses.”
“Why?”
“Because they’re impossible to ignore.”
She takes them off, places them in her purse.
“And I wouldn’t advise wearing them again,” he warns her, “unless you’re looking to be found.”
“All right, point taken.” She glances around. “So will you tell me the plan now?”
He nods. “We stay here, in the bazaar, until enough time has passed, until we’re certain he is no longer following, and then we head to the docks. There is a ferry that leaves for Bursa at noon.”
She smiles, weakly. “And we sail away, across the Bosphorus.”
“Something like that.”
“But why here?” she asks, looking around them, unease evident on her face.
“We’re surrounded by people. There isn’t much he can do with an audience watching.”
And yet even as he says the words, he already sees him, already knows that he is wrong.
The man is standing just behind Louise now, though she hasn’t noticed him yet. Henri feels his heart sink, feels his stomach churn, as he tries to figure out what to do, whether they should run or stand still—knowing all the while that there is no way out of their current situation.
“What is it?” Louise asks, her face filled with fear. He hasn’t seen it before—she’s always so defiant in her expressions, turning angry when she should be afraid—but it’s there now, fear turning her features into something that makes his stomach ache. Her eyes widen then, and she gives a small gasp. Henri knows the man has placed the pistol in her back. She raises her eyes to Henri. He does his best not to look as hopeless as he feels.
“Straight ahead, toward the shop just there,” the man says. He waits until Louise begins to turn, keeps close to her, his pistol hidden. “The three of us need to have a chat.”
Together, they sit outside the café on Yağlikçilar Caddesi, at one of the wooden tables covered with an Anatolian cloth. Henri glances inside and sees a room with no exit—apart from the cavernous ceiling, chipped and peeling, at the top of which a bit of light shines through from a window above. Useless, then.
The three of them sit in silence until the waiter appears. When he does, Henri speaks first, in Arabic, hoping he understands. “Thalaatha Qahwa bi-Duuna Sukkar,” he says. “IttaSil bi-ShshurTati, min FaDlika. Haadha ar-Rajulu yuhaddidunaa.”
The waiter frowns slightly, before giving a short bow.
“What was that?” the man asks, in Spanish, once the waiter has left. “What did you say to him?”
“I ordered coffee,” Henri replies.
The man nods, smiles. “You speak Arabic now as well?”
Henri shrugs.
The man narrows his eyes. “That was a lot of words for just an order for coffee.”
“I told him not to put in any sugar.” He pauses, watches the man. “I remember that you don’t like it too sweet.”
The man nods at this. “If this is true, you are fine, but if it is not—” He gives a small shrug and they fall into silence, Louise watching both of them with a deepening frown.
The waiter returns a short while later, placing three cups before them, a piece of lokum sitting on the saucer of each. The man picks up his sweet with his right hand—his left has remained firmly beneath the table—and places it onto Louise’s saucer. “It makes my teeth ache,” he says by way of explanation.
“How did you find her?” Henri asks. He knows how the man followed her to the restaurant, but he means before that, even. He’s curious to know how the man found the hotel she was staying at when he had been so careful not to mention it before.
“The porter from the train.” He levels his gaze at Henri. “Do you really think I would let her slip away, let you slip away, if I didn’t know where you both were going?” He looks between them. “Where is it?”
Neither of them responds.
“The wire transfer, have you done it yet?” he presses.
Louise lifts her chin. “There is no wire transfer,” she says in English.
The man frowns, looks to Henri. “What is she saying?”
Henri looks down at his coffee, though he wants to look at her, to examine her face, to try and ascertain what it is that she is doing, whether she is saving both of them or only herself. He doesn’t know, can’t decide, but there isn’t time to learn. “She said there is no wire transfer.”
“There never was a wire transfer,” she says, switching to French. “I only put the receipt in my bag as a way to throw off anyone who might come looking.”
The man shakes his head, turns to Henri. “Tell me.”
Henri doesn’t know how much the man can understand. He suspects enough, but he translates the words into Spanish, knowing that this is the point, that he wants to hear it from Henri himself. “There never was, she said. It was only to stall.”
The man lets out a noise of disbelief. “What did she promise you?” he asks Henri. “A cut of the money? Something else?”
Before Henri can respond, Louise turns to the man, asks in French, “Vous pouvez me comprendre, n’est-ce pas?” He hesitates, then nods. “Good. Then I will tell you myself. No need for him to translate,” she continues, indicating to Henri with a nod of her head. “There isn’t any money to promise.”
“What does that mean?” he demands.
She speaks slowly. “It means the money is gone.”
The man bangs the table, curses. A group of men to their left look over and frown. When he recovers, he demands, “Where exactly has it gone to?”
“There was an accident,” Louise says. “In Belgrade. The money was lost then.”
It is a moment before the man speaks. “An accident?” he asks, frowning, as though he has misheard, or perhaps mistranslated.
“Yes.”
“What type of accident?”
“In the Sava River. I fell into the water. It was late, and I had been drinking.” She reaches for her coffee, and Henri can see that her hand is trembling. “I had taken some pills.”
Another curse. The man lifts his hands, sets his head between them.
Henri looks to Louise, knows they are both thinking the same thing—the pistol. The one that has since disappeared but that Henri suspects he has kept a hand on, just underneath the table, perhaps resting on his knee, perhaps hidden away in his pocket. Now, for the first time, he has released it from his grip.
“Why would you have had the money on you?”
“I wasn’t going to leave it in my hotel room—not when I was being watched. I put it in my purse.”
“All of it?” The look on his face indicates that he does not believe her.
“I rolled it into bundles.” She shifts. “If you want the money, that’s where you’ll have to look, I’m afraid. At the bottom of the Sava.”
The man shakes his head. “And is that where I should put you, as well?”
She shrugs, places the piece of lokum that he set on her saucer into her mouth.
It happens suddenly then, all at once. A flurry of sound, of movement—the call of prayer filling the air—startling them all from their conversation. It causes the man to start in surprise, as one by one, the people around them begin to move, to lower themselves to the ground. It’s a small moment, lasting no more than a few seconds, but it shakes them all from the intensity of their conversation, gives Louise and Henri time to look to each other, to decide. The rest unfolds quickly.
Henri stands—jumps, really—taking the table and its contents with him. Louise throws her leather satchel, which manages to connect with the man’s face. Chaos erupts. Louise is gone, running up Yağlikçilar Caddesi, rounding the corner. Henri runs, following her lead. Behind him, he can hear the tumult he has just caused—angry words thrown in the air, followed by shouting. He pushes on, turning on Halicilar Caddesi, just as she has. He passes a stall selling Turkish lamps, the glow from the glass mosaics throwing patterns against the plaster walls. He passes vendor after vendor selling carpets, some hanging, pinned on the wall, others stacked from floor to ceiling. An idea begins to form in his mind. He slows, glances over his shoulder. There is no sign of the man yet.
“Louise,” he calls ahead to her. She is only steps away now and she turns, panting, her face covered in a sheen of sweat. He motions to one of the shops. “In here,” he says, doing his best to lower his voice, glancing over his shoulder once again to make sure they have not yet been discovered. “Quickly.”
The man inside the shop says something in Turkish, Henri shakes his head, not understanding. He points to Louise. “Yukhfiiha,” he says in Arabic. When the man hesitates, Henri takes a number of Turkish liras from his pocket, presses them into the man’s hands. “Hiya Barii’atun.”
The man nods.
“What is it, what’s happening?” Louise demands. “We shouldn’t stop, should we? We should keep moving, or else he’ll be here soon—he’ll find us.”
The old man turns to one of the rugs hanging on the wall, in the corner of the shop. He motions to Louise.
“He’s agreed to hide you,” Henri explains.
Louise glances toward the man and frowns. “What about you?”
“I’m going to run.”
“Run where?”
Henri looks behind him. It was a good question—one he couldn’t answer. “Just stay here and wait.”
Louise makes a face, but allows Henri to lead her over to the carpets hanging from the wall. The old man and Henri work quickly, making sure that no part of her can be seen, setting a stack of carpets that rises to her knees in front of her. It might work, he thinks. Like the other shops in the bazaar, this, too, appears cavernous in its design, one carpet leading to another carpet, with row upon row, stack upon stack of varying designs and colors filling the otherwise small space. It is disorientating, he thinks. If Louise remains here long enough, if he can, in the meantime, lead the man away from the bazaar, there is a good chance this plan will work, that she will remain safe.
“You in there?” he asks, trying to keep his tone light.
“I can smell whatever they killed to make this,” she says, her voice muffled now.
“Ah, that would be sheep. It looks like you’re behind a kilim.” He pauses. “They don’t kill it, by the way. It’s only sheared.”
“Either way, I feel like Cleopatra.”
He smiles. “Stay here. Don’t leave until it’s safe.”
“And when will that be, exactly?”
He doesn’t answer, begins to back away. She says his name, but he does not respond.
Outside the shop, Henri begins to run. He needs an exit but doesn’t know which way will lead him there. He turns, runs, finds himself in a vaulted hall, the Cevahir Bedesten, the very heart of the bazaar. All around him are priceless antiques—candlesticks, clocks, even weapons made of copper, brass, silver—so that he comes to an abrupt halt, fearful that he might destroy the things around him. A vendor approaches him, but Henri shakes his head, calls out, “Cikis?” The vendor points down one of the many streets in response.
Henri is thanking him, preparing to leave, when he hears a voice behind him, still at some distance. “Stay where you are!” the man shouts. Henri doesn’t listen, only starts running once again. He can’t believe that the man would really use his pistol here, with so many looking on. If he can just outrun him, find his way out, maybe he will stand a chance. He runs, his chest pounding, his breath coming in short gasps—and then suddenly, he feels the weight of the man crash into him, feels himself fall to the ground. He hears, rather than feels, the shattering of a mirror as they collide, the sounds of other objects knocked to the ground—broken, no doubt, beyond repair. He hears, too, the shouts of the vendor, the accusations, the curses, the demands. Both men are on their feet then. The man grabs Henri by the arm, pulls him close.
“There’s nowhere to go now,” the man says to Henri, and Henri thinks he sounds almost weary, rather than angry.
“No,” Henri agrees.
“We’re going to find the exit.”
The vendor, still shouting, begins to approach them. Fulano waves his hand in warning and the vendor backs away, turning to survey the wreckage of his shop.
“Someone told me it was this way,” Henri says, pointing, anxious to get the man away from the irate vendor, worried for his safety as well as his own. And then, because there is nowhere left to go, nowhere left to run, Henri tries the only plan he has left: “I can pay you the money. Not all of it, not right away. I could pay it back, eventually, through work.”
The man shakes his head. “The money doesn’t matter anymore.”
Henri nods, knowing that it is true, knowing as well that this was always the conclusion. The man in front of him had never been tasked with just bringing back the money, doing away with the girl—no, Henri had been added to the list the moment he left Granada.
“We’ll leave together now, no tricks.”
Henri agrees. “No tricks.”
The man motions for them to step away from the shop, where even now the seller is standing, wide-eyed, as the two men prepare to make their way down the street. Henri walks just slightly in front, the man at his back. He tries to think, but he has nothing left.
“And the girl. Where will I find her?” the man asks as they begin to walk.
“I don’t know. She ran ahead and I couldn’t keep up.”
A laugh from behind. “Not so trustworthy a partner, was she?”
“No, I suppose not.” He thinks of Louise then, hopes she is still hidden behind the kilim, that she will remain there, that the man will not return in search of her. Perhaps she will make the ferry after all.
“Slowly,” the man behind him says. “Remember, no tricks.”
“No.”
“Just walk normally, and I promise it will be quick.” The man pauses. “If not, I make no promises.”
Henri thinks he is telling the truth. Something tells him that while the man behind him is not good—but then, neither is he—he is honorable, will keep his word if promised. That is something. And to not suffer at the end, that is also something. Henri nods, but even as he does so, he knows that something is amiss—the pistol, he realizes. He can no longer feel the sharp bite of it in his side. He thinks of the scuffle before, when they fell against the vendor’s shop, tries to remember whether he has seen the man in possession of the pistol since. No, it had not been there. He must have lost it, must have let it fall from his grip when they crashed into one another. Which means that Henri still has a chance. He stops walking, hears the man begin to protest.
Henri turns toward him, fists raised—when a shot rings out.