Istanbul Passage (32 page)

There were police cars in the consulate courtyard, as many as there’d been after Tommy had been found, drawing the same crowd of onlookers outside the gate.

“What’s going on?” Leon said to the marine as he showed his ID.

“They got the cops here again.”

“What, asking questions?”

“Yeah, they—”

“Corporal! They’re coming down. Give us a hand here. On the double.”

He waved Leon in and started running toward a group of people near the elevator, two full cars at least. Leon headed up the stairs instead, taking them two at a time. More questions about Tommy. Hours he didn’t have to waste, Alexei waiting. Enver’s papers in his pocket.

Upstairs there was an odd quiet, no typewriters clicking, as if everyone were on coffee break. Dorothy had stepped out too, all the lights on, a sweater draped over the back of her chair. Leon went through to Tommy’s office, rummaging through the top drawer for Tommy’s appointment books. May, last year. Donald Price had supposedly entered the country in April and needed, or knew he would need, the box in May. He flipped through the pages, midmonth, then further, then went back. Routine appointments. But the others would hardly be the sort of meetings he’d record. Look for the money instead. He opened the bottom drawer and pulled out the files he’d gone through before, looking for something else now. Mr. King was proud of these. Having it every which way, crossing the last line.

“Oh!” Dorothy stood in the door, her hand raised to her chest in a cartoon movement. “You’re here. You gave me a turn. Thank heavens. The police have been asking.”

“In a minute. I just want to see—”

“What?” she said, noticing the files.

“Last spring. Did Tommy take any trips?”

“Trips?” she said, the idea itself implausible.

“Out of the country.”

“Last year? During the war? No. Mr. Bauer, the police. They’re down in the conference room. You’d really better tell them you’re here. They’ve been phoning the Reynolds office.”

“Reynolds? Why?”

“You don’t know?” She started fingering the button on her blouse. “It’s Mr. Bishop. He’s dead.”

“Frank?” Leon said, not taking this in.

“Last night. Well, I suppose last night. That’s what they’re asking about anyway. Where everybody was last night.”

“Asking here?” Leon said, still trying to make sense of this. “But he was in Ankara.”

“No, here. In the consulate. They found him this morning. Poor Mary. Just opened the door and— They had to give her something. See a thing like that. No warning. The lights are on and she walks in and there he is. Blood, everything.” She shuddered.

“He died—here?” Leon said, as if he were feeling his way along a wall in the dark.

“Why he’d want to do it here, I don’t know. Think what it feels like for everybody.”

“What?”

“Oh god, you don’t know, do you?” she said, her voice breaking.

“Dorothy.”

“He shot himself.”

For a second he had no reaction at all, his mind blank, then a rush of pictures: Frank at Karpić’s, taking an envelope, smoking a cigarette in Tünel Square, Kay’s pale skin against the morning window, hand over her breast, Leon lying on his elbow, watching her. He felt blood leap to his face. Had Frank known? Where was Kay?

“Mr. Bauer—”

“Shot himself,” he said dully. “In his office?” Maybe there when Leon had come for the passports, one of the lights pouring through the transoms into the hall. But how could he have been? “Mrs. Bishop?”

“She’s downstairs. With the police.”

Leon started for the door, a file still in his hand, just following his feet. Frank sitting at his desk with a gun. Writing a note?

“Mr. Bauer—”

Not hearing her, already walking down the hall. There were police photographers in Frank’s office, flashbulbs lighting up the pushed-back chair, a small overnight bag, a few files in the outtray, no note on the blotter, no signs of any disturbance at all, except for the dark stain on the carpet where he’d bled. Two policemen with measuring tape and plastic bags were going through the rest of the room. Leon walked over to the desk. Personnel files, Frank hunting to the end, but leaving a clean desk, tidying up loose ends before he picked up the gun. Had he called the Pera Palas?

“Don’t touch anything,” one of the policemen said in Turkish.

Leon moved his hand back.

“No one’s allowed here,” the policeman said, cocking his head to the door.

Leon looked at the chair again, trying to imagine it. Had he slumped over on the desk or been thrown back against the chair? Did it matter? A policeman wearing gloves. Kay downstairs.

There were a few consulate people waiting in chairs outside the conference room talking in low voices. Leon brushed past the police guards, barely noticing them.

“Mr. Bauer.” Gülün, the burly policeman who’d been on Tommy’s payroll, looked up from the table, a stenographer next to him, one of the consulate secretaries being questioned across from him. “A late start this morning.” His cheeks dark with stubble, maybe called out too early to shave.

Kay was at the end of the table, a coffee cup in front of her, face white and vague, like someone who’s been sick.

“I just heard,” Leon said.

“You can go,” Gülün said to the secretary. “Mr. Bauer—”

But Leon was looking down the table. Kay winced, her dazed expression now filled with something else, the guilty apprehension of someone about to be punished.

“Dorothy said he—” Kay looked away. “Shot himself,” he finished to Gülün. “Is that right?”

“He was shot, yes,” Gülün said, officious, enjoying himself. “By whom is another matter.”

“What do you mean?”

“I mean that is not yet determined. There are things to consider—the angle of the shot, technical matters.”

“He means that suicide is not likely. In fact, not possible.” A voice from behind. Colonel Altan got up from a chair and walked toward them. “You can be frank with Mr. Bauer,” he said to Gülün. “He was Mr. Bishop’s colleague. Both, you know, were cooperating with us. On another matter.” He turned to Leon. “Lieutenant Gülün thinks it best for the staff not to be alarmed. So, a simple suicide for now. Nevertheless, he asks questions,” he said with irony, but in English, an effect Gülün would not pick up. “He wants to eliminate possibilities.”

Leon looked at Gülün. “Someone killed him?”

“I’m trying to establish the facts,” Gülün said, a strut in his voice. “Please.” He opened his palm and indicated a chair.

Leon sat, glancing again at Kay, head down, fingering her ring.

“When did you see Mr. Bishop yesterday? An approximate time,” Gülün said with a small wave.

“I didn’t. I thought he was in Ankara.”

“But he called your office. Your secretary says.”

“You talked to Turhan?”

“It’s important to be thorough. A man’s death. So, he called—”

“I thought from Ankara.”

“No. A local call. According to your secretary.”

“She never told me that. I had no idea he was here.” Looking at Kay, talking to both of them.

“Ah. And yet you went from your office to the consulate. Not to meet him?”

“No, I had some work to finish up.”

“Saydam, the night guard, said you came here about seven, is that correct?”

“Yes, about that.”

“But he did not see you leave.”

“He wasn’t at the door. I don’t know where he was. Maybe having a pee.”

“He said he was always there.”

“Well, he would, wouldn’t he? Look—”

Gülün waved this off. “So we don’t know. An hour? More? How long were you here?”

“Not long. Twenty minutes, maybe half an hour.”

“And then?”

“Then I went to the Pera Palas.” He glanced down at Kay. “For a drink.”

“You were seen at the bar?”

“I don’t know. Ask the bartender. Why? Are you suggesting I killed him?”

Gülün made a calming gesture with his thick hands. “And after?”

“After? After I went home,” he said, looking at Gülün.

Gülün held his gaze for a second. “Not according to Mr. Cicek. It’s correct, yes? Cicek? The
bekçi
at your building?”

“You’ve had a busy morning,” Leon said.

“Lieutenant Gülün is methodical,” Altan said quietly. “It’s correct?”

“That he’s the
bekçi
, yes. That he knows where I am night and day? No. Look, what is this? I was at the consulate half an hour at the most. Say till seven thirty. When was Frank shot? Didn’t anybody hear it? A shot?”

“Unfortunately the police cannot be accurate about the time of death,” Altan said. “Mr. Bishop had been dead for some time when his body was found. The police doctor says yesterday evening—early, not so early, it’s impossible to say which exactly. Maybe when the
cleaning staff is running the vacuum, maybe the guard thinks he heard a sound in the street. We don’t know.”

“But we do know he was shot,” Gülün said. “And we know you were here. So we must account for your time. So, the Pera bar. And after?” Another steady gaze.

“I went home. Mr. Cicek must not have heard me.”

“No. He heard your telephone. Ringing. Until the caller gave up. Do you often do that, not answer your phone?”

A standoff minute, Leon facing him down.

“He couldn’t,” Kay said. “He was with me.”

Leon shot her a look, a slight shake of his head. Don’t.

“Madame?” Gülün said, surprised.

Altan sat up, eyes moving from one to the other.

“He wasn’t at home. He was with me. All night. I can swear to it.” Her voice getting fainter.

“Let me understand. You spent the night with Mr. Bauer.”

“Yes,” she said to Leon.

“Your husband’s colleague.” He paused. “You are lovers?”

“We spent the night,” she said, looking down.

Gülün glanced at the stenographer, embarrassed, and stood up. “Your husband knew this?”

“No, of course not.”

“But he comes to Istanbul. A sudden trip. So perhaps a surprise. For the lovers.”

“He called Mr. Bauer,” Altan said calmly.

Gülün looked at Kay, then at Leon, not sure what to do with this.

“A moment, please,” Altan said to Gülün, drawing him toward the door. “You will excuse us? More coffee?”

Kay shook her head. The stenographer got up and went over to the window, as if she were leaving the room too, out of earshot.

“Why did you say that?” Leon said quietly when they’d gone.

“Why not? It’s true, isn’t it?” she said, her voice flat. She pushed
the cup away. “A surprise for the lovers,” she said with Gülün’s inflection. “It would have been, wouldn’t it? Quite a surprise.”

“Kay—”

“The nuns had it right,” she said to herself. “You pay one way or the other. Maybe not this way, though. Even they wouldn’t think of this.”

“Are you all right?”

“I was still in bed. When the phone rang. Could I come down? There’s been an accident. Accident. So I wouldn’t become hysterical, I suppose. And I’ve got the smell of you on me.” She got up, hands on the table. “Not that they’d know that.”

“They do now. Why did—”

“Do you know what they asked me? Did he have any enemies? And I thought, I don’t know. I don’t know that. My husband, and I don’t know anything about him. So maybe you do. Did he? Have enemies?”

“He must have had one.”

She looked down, then put her hand up to cover her eyes. “Imagine not knowing that.” Not crying, but quiet now, receding.

Leon went over and touched her shoulder, but she swung away, out of reach.

“An accident,” she said, taking out a handkerchief and blowing her nose. “‘What kind of accident?’ Then this. ‘Last night,’ they said. So he must have been lying there, dead, while we—”

“Kay,” he said.

“I had to make the identification. ‘Is this your husband?’ ‘Yes.’ And all the time I’m thinking, I don’t know this man. A man who gets shot. He had some other life to do that. Like you,” she said, lifting her head. “I don’t know you, either.”

“Yes you do.”

He took the handkerchief and wiped the corner of her eye.

“And they were asking for you. I thought maybe they knew.
About us. But you weren’t here. And I thought, why not? You left me and then what? Where were you?”

He said nothing, finishing with the handkerchief.

“Tell me!” she said, her hands suddenly on his chest. “I hate this. ‘Don’t ask.’ ‘I can’t say.’ First Frank and now you. And now look.”

“I had some errands.”

“Errands,” she said, not believing him, her voice rising, caught up in it. “What errands? ‘Don’t ask.’ Tell me!” Hitting his chest.

He took her arms. “I went to the bank,” he said, looking straight at her, breaking whatever spell had taken her, so that she almost laughed at the simple unexpectedness of it, then lowered her head onto his chest, not sobbing, just letting go, her body limp against him.

“Kay, listen to me,” he said into her ear so that the stenographer could only hear whispers. “We need to be careful. Calling Turhan. Mr. Cicek. They’re going to a lot of trouble to prove I was here. Could have been here.”

“But I told them. You were with me.”

He nodded. “And now they have a motive.”

“What motive?”

“You.”

Her eyes clouded. “I’m sorry. I didn’t mean—”

“I know.”

“They’d think that?” she said brooding. “Then why not me. The unfaithful wife.”

“They don’t think anything yet. We have to be careful, that’s all. It’s not just police. Altan’s Emniyet.”

“But he was at Lily’s party,” she said, a reaction so off the point that he didn’t know how to respond.

She turned away, holding her arm. “This place. Who knows who anybody is?” She stopped, shivering a little, then looked up, reading his face. “Tell me one thing. The truth. You had nothing to do with this. Tell me that. I couldn’t live with myself if—”

“Nothing,” he said.

A quiet second.

“My god, and I believe you. Just like that. You say it and I believe you,” she said, lowering her head again to his chest.

“Mrs. Bishop,” Altan said, coming through the door. “You’re not well?”

Kay jumped. Gülün shuffled behind, his face in a kind of pout, watching them.

“She’s had a rough morning,” Leon said, still holding her. “She ought to rest.” He looked at Gülün. “Do you need her much longer?”