The Architect's Apprentice (47 page)

Pulling her cat closer, she sat still as a stone.

‘Why did you do it? For riches? For mightiness? Who bribed you? Was it the Italians? Did they want to stop my master?’

‘Oh, shut up … What nonsense,’ Hesna Khatun said. ‘You want to know the truth? Hear me out. You think I could have done it without the consent of your Princess?’

‘You are lying. Mihrimah is dead. She can’t defend herself,’ Jahan said. ‘How can you blame her? I thought you loved her.’

‘I loved her more than anyone. More than anything. That’s why I did as she told me and never asked why.’

‘Liar!’

‘We believe in what we choose to believe,’ she rasped.

Anxiety gathered on Jahan’s face like a brewing storm. ‘Why would Mihrimah wish to weaken my master?’

‘She had nothing against your master. Lots against her own father.’

‘Sultan Suleiman?’

‘He was the greatest of sultans and the greatest of sinners, may God forgive him. I never begrudged him, for I knew he was misled by that hellcat Hurrem. But Mihrimah didn’t see it that way. She could not blame her mother. So she blamed the person she loved the most – her father.’

‘I don’t understand.’

‘Sultan Suleiman and Mihrimah were very close. She was his only daughter, his jewel. When she was a child he used to take her everywhere with him. But then everything changed. He became strict, fearful. He saw enemies everywhere and began to neglect his daughter. Mihrimah was hurt, though she never complained. Then the Sultan executed his Grand Vizier. The man whom Mihrimah had called uncle and loved so much. He killed another Vizier. Your master made a mosque for him. And then he put to death his own sons – Mihrimah’s brothers.

‘She was devastated. Torn between her love for her father and her
hatred of him. How many times my beautiful daughter moved her quarters into the harem, just to get away from the Sultan. Then she moved back … She loathed him. She adored him. My confused child.

‘Mihrimah was richer than the treasury. None stronger than her. But her heart was broken. It didn’t help that they married her off to that Rustem. What an awful marriage that was, God knows. Unhappy till the end. She never wanted him. Never.’

Feeling dizzy, Jahan walked towards the chest in a corner and sat on it. From here he could see the cat on the old woman’s lap. It had strange eyes – one eye jade-green, one blue and glazed over.

‘The accidents began with the Suleimaniye Mosque,’ Jahan muttered. ‘You tried to disrupt our work.’

‘Mihrimah knew she could never triumph over her father, and she had no intention of doing so. All she wanted was to make things more difficult for him. The mosque your master was building was going to immortalize Sultan Suleiman and show his grandeur to posterity. We decided to slow you down. It was a little revenge.’

‘And you needed an apprentice to be your pawn,’ said Jahan.

‘We considered each of you. Nikola was timid. Yusuf we couldn’t approach; like a clam, he wouldn’t open up. You, we kept aside. Davud was the best. Angry, ambitious.’

‘But Davud wouldn’t obey you forever!’

‘At the beginning he did. Then he got greedy. We didn’t touch him. We could have. It was a mistake, now I know. After Sultan Suleiman’s death, Mihrimah called him and said it was over. He swore he would stop but he didn’t. Secretly he defied her orders. He had an issue with your master, I believe.’

A feeling of nausea took hold of Jahan. ‘I smelled your herbs on Davud
after
my master’s death. Why were you still seeing him?’

It was a moment before she responded. ‘Davud wanted me to help him become the Chief Royal Architect. He said if I didn’t help him he would tell everyone what we had been doing for all these years.’

‘He blackmailed you!’

Her jaw went slack.

‘What happened to my master’s will? Did he want Davud as his successor?’

‘No,’ she said calmly. ‘He had you in mind.’

Jahan regarded her, at a loss.

‘Your master had written it down. He wanted you. That was his wish. He kept one copy in his house. One in the archives of architects in Vefa.’

‘Is that why Davud took the entire library? He destroyed the wills.’

‘He wanted to make sure there were no other copies anywhere else,’ she said. ‘Now you know everything. Leave, I am tired.’

She turned towards the window, no longer interested in him. In the light of the setting sun her face was carved stone. Her ways pierced Jahan to the quick, not so much her coldness as her air of nonchalance. She did not regret anything, not even when she was, at her age, so close to death.

Jahan said, ‘Did she ever love me?’

‘Why do you ask such a stupid thing?’

‘I need to know if that, too, was a lie. For years I felt guilty if I desired another woman.’

She regarded him with a mixture of contempt and disgust. ‘Who the hell were you? An animal-tamer? A mouse reaching for a mountain! A servant of the Sultan in love with the Sultan’s only daughter! And you have the nerve to ask me whether she loved you? What a simpleton.’

As she moved her arm, Jahan had a full view of the cat. It was Cardamom, the same grimalkin from years ago. Stuffed. In place of its eyes were two gems – one sapphire, one emerald.

‘She
liked
you, like a pet, like a gown. Like the
lokum
she tasted. But you’d get bored if you ate it every day. Nay, she never loved you.’

Jahan pursed his lips, wordlessly.

‘Fool,’ she whispered. ‘
My beautiful fool
. That’s what she called you. That’s why she adored you so. But would you call that love?’

Rising to his feet, Jahan staggered. He could bring this to an end. He could kill her there and then. Strangle her with her scarf. The door was closed. No one would know. Even if they did, no one would lament her passing. He took a few steps towards her, saw the fear in her gaze.

‘How old are you,
dada
? You must be way over a hundred. Is it true you were damned with eternal life?’

Hesna Khatun was about to laugh when a dry cough stopped her midway. ‘I … wasn’t the only one.’

‘What do you mean?’ Jahan asked in panic. But even as the words left him he knew the answer.

‘Think, which artisan, which artist, which man of great ambitions wouldn’t want to live for as long as I have?’

Jahan shook his head. ‘If you are referring to my master, he was an exemplary man. Nothing to do with a witch like you.’

‘At what age did he die?’ Her cackle turned into a cough.

Before she could catch her breath, Jahan snatched the stuffed animal from her hands and hurled it into the fire. Cardamom’s fur was set ablaze, the gems glowing amid the flames.

‘Don’t,’ she screamed too late, her voice splintered.

‘Let the dead rest in peace,
dada
.’

As she watched the burning cat, Hesna Khatun’s chin quivered with fury. She said, ‘May you suffer from my scourge, Architect.’

Jahan headed towards the door as fast as he could. He opened it, but not before he had heard her last words.

‘May you beg God the Almighty, down on your knees, to be taken, for it is enough … it is too much. May He hear you pleading … may He see your agony and pity you, oh, poor apprentice of Sinan, but still … still may He not let you die.’

Every morning Balaban sent one of his men down to the harbour: ‘See if the storm’s passed and the clouds’ve left.’

Each time the beagle came back with the same news: ‘The clouds are there, chief. Not goin’ anywhere.’

Davud’s henchmen were prowling around, inspecting the passengers, checking the freight being loaded. Having learned this, Jahan knew it would have made more sense to give up travelling by sea. He should have slipped into a cart heading out of the city gates. Once out of danger he could try his luck at another port – perhaps Smyrna or Salonika. Yet, dangerous as it was, he was bent on departing from Istanbul the way he had arrived. And somehow Davud, knowing him well, understood this.

Together Balaban and Jahan hatched a plan, deciding it would be safer to arrive at the port in disguise.

‘I could pass as a Roma,’ Jahan suggested. If they went around in similar attire and banded together, they might pull it off.

Balaban wasn’t convinced. This could make things harder – on land and in the water. ‘You don’t want to be treated like us, brother. It’s no paradise being a Roma.’

Next they considered dressing him up as a merchant. If he gave the impression of being wealthy and important, he might have less trouble while boarding. But as soon as the ship was riding the waves, the sailors would rob him blind. Jahan had to look respectable without looking rich. In the end, it was decided he would pose as an Italian artist – a dreamer of sorts, who had been roaming the Orient selling his talents and was now returning home, older and wiser. Should anyone inquire about his paintings, he would say they had been shipped earlier. If things went as expected, he should reach Florence in ten days.

Finding him the right costume was no problem for Balaban and his men, though getting the correct size proved tricky. They handed
Jahan a sack of clothes – a shirt of linen, a doublet with odd sleeves, a leather jerkin and breeches that could be tied above the knee. Each of fine fabric and each too big.

Balaban grinned when he saw Jahan. ‘Signori Jahanioni, you’ve shrunk!’

They laughed like the boys they were deep inside. Balaban’s men had robbed the Venetian Doge’s clerk in plain daylight – a man clearly sturdier than Jahan. Yet, after a few alterations by Balaban’s wife, everything fit perfectly. She insisted on dyeing Jahan’s hair and beard with henna. When she had finished, Sinan’s apprentice could barely recognize himself in the mirror. His outfit was crowned with a velvet hat – purple on black. By now his bruises had healed. Only the scar on his cheek remained, a reminder of a night he would rather forget.

On the day of Jahan’s departure, Balaban and his men climbed on a carriage pulled by a donkey. In his honour it was garlanded with flowers and ribbons. So many had huddled into the wagon that the poor donkey could barely move, let alone trot. Cursing the law that forbade Gypsies from riding horses, then quarrelling among themselves, they tried to persuade one another to stay behind – to no avail. Everyone wanted to escort Jahan. In the end, they arranged three carriages. Up and down the streets they proceeded in a gaudy convoy, ignoring the stares of the townspeople, who gaped at them, half in amazement, half in disdain, as if they had descended from a different Adam and a different Eve.

Midway through, Balaban’s uncle began to sing; his voice – rough and hoarse but mellow – carried in the breeze. One of the boys produced a reed pipe from his sash and picked out the melody.

When Jahan asked what the song was about, Balaban said in a whisper so quiet that Jahan had to crane forward to hear him, ‘This man goes to a wedding. Everyone is happy, dancin’, drinkin’. So he dances, too. He cries.’

‘Why does he cry?’

‘’Cause he loves the girl, dolt. And she loves him. They are marrying her to another fella.’

Jahan’s chest felt heavy as the music subsided – first the lyrics, then the tune. The gloom must have been contagious. An awkward silence fell. Close to the port, on a lush hill, the carriages came to a halt.

‘We’ll drop you here; better this way,’ said Balaban.

One by one, they hopped down. Jahan took off the cloak he had been wearing to hide the Italian garments underneath. He hugged each of them, kissing the hands of the elderly and the cheeks of the children. Balaban, meanwhile, didn’t budge, leaning against the cart, chewing a straw. When Jahan had said farewell to all, he strode towards Balaban; then he noticed the Gypsy had something in his hand, round and blue as a robin’s egg.

‘What’s this?’

‘An amulet.
Daki dey
made it for you – to protect you from the evil eye. Wear it upside down on the sea; and the right way up when you reach the shore.’

Jahan bit his lip to choke back the sob rising in his throat. ‘I’m grateful.’

‘Listen, about the harlot … We made inquiries. Seems there were eight women in that
hamam
of sorrows.’

‘Right?’

‘Well, there’re still eight, I hear. No one left, no one came.’

‘What are you saying?’

‘I’m sayin’, there was no funeral. Something’s queer. I don’t want you to suffer all your life. Maybe you didn’t kill anyone, brother. It was a fraud.’

‘But the dwarf lady …’ said Jahan. ‘She was on my side.’

Balaban sighed. ‘Sad you’re goin’. Glad you’re goin’. You are too trusting to survive in Istanbul, brother.’

Clumsily, the Gypsy chief pulled Jahan close and punched him teasingly on his stomach, brother to brother. Balaban said, ‘Who am I goin’ to save from trouble now?’

‘You can save Chota’s son. Will you take care of him?’

‘Oh, don’t you fret. We’ll tell him what a great pa he had.’

While Jahan fumbled for words that didn’t come, Balaban jumped on the carriage, grabbed the reins, his eyes cast down. His men followed suit, patting Jahan on the shoulder. Once they had settled, the carriages sallied forth. Everybody waved – but Balaban. Jahan waited for him to turn and glance back one last time. He didn’t. His long, dark hair flapping in the wind, the Gypsy chief stared ahead. As they were about to round a bend, the carriage stopped and Balaban peered back. Although it was too far away for Jahan to be able to tell, he thought he saw the trace of a smile on the Gypsy chief’s face. He raised his hand in valediction. Balaban did the same. Then they were gone.

Pain surged inside Jahan, sharp as a knife thrust into his flesh. He sat on a tree stump, thinking. He did not know what Providence had in store for him, and once again he was diving into it with the recklessness of the ignorant. Even so, there was no going back. As the sun made its way up, he, too, set forward on his way.

As always, the harbour was teeming with voyagers, seafarers and slaves. No sooner had he stepped on to the wharf than its vibrancy and vastness swallowed him. It was one of the best ports, they said. Ships could get in without having to use their oars or pray for the winds to fill their sails. Captains could trust the current to bring them in. The two opposite tides of the Bosphorus, unlike the city itself, were predictable, dependable. On this day, there were plenty of vessels about, though only a few kept their sails ready-rigged. There was a three-masted carrack, sleek and majestic, that was destined for Venice. That was the one Jahan was aiming for.

Now that he was an Italian artist, he stared with fascination at each curiosity and doffed his hat at every woman – nun or damsel. He saw pilgrims, Jesuit priests with hair shirts and cowls, and dignitaries with the permanent stain of ink on their fingers. There was a scribe sitting behind a makeshift desk. People had gathered around him, watching his plume compose magic. Jahan struck up a conversation with an Albanian vendor, from whom he bought honey sherbet. A man was
trying to lead a hooded horse – a thoroughbred black stallion – up the ramp from shore to ship. Where were they taking the animal, Jahan wondered, and would the beautiful creature survive the voyage.

It was as he was standing there watching the scene that Jahan noticed, at the periphery of his vision, Davud’s two deaf-mutes. They were wending their way through the crowd, coming in his direction. Jahan held his breath, sipping his drink. They passed by, paying him no attention.

A moment later the shrillest scream pierced the air. ‘Stop, you bastard!’

That magnificent horse had risen up on its hind legs and knocked the page straight into the water. Laughter rippled through the port, quickly muffled by yells and cries as the horse, still hooded, cantered down the ramp, running headlong into the spectators. Blocked by bodies and boxes on every side, he was not able to bolt as freely as he could have wished. Still, unwilling to stop, he trampled whatever was in his way.

The page, saved from the water and dripping with fury, was shouting orders and curses. Jahan caught up with him. ‘What’s the horse’s name?’

‘What the hell you askin’?’

‘Tell me its name!’ Jahan said, losing patience.

The man raised his eyebrows. ‘Ebony.’

Jahan scurried after the horse. The hood had slipped off but seeing its surroundings had only increased its panic. ‘Ebony,’ Jahan called, over and again, keeping his voice as level as he could manage. Horses did not exactly recognize their names. Yet they could catch a familiar tone when they heard one, just as they could perceive the intention behind it.

Hemmed in, the stallion was revolving, neighing and tossing its head nervously. Jahan stood in front of it, showing his empty hands. He approached step by step, one soothing word after another. Had it not been tired, the horse would not have allowed him to get near. But it was. Grabbing it by the reins, Jahan caressed its neck tenderly.

On an impulse, Jahan turned back. There, only a few yards away, stood the deaf-mutes, staring at him without so much as blinking, their expressions impossible to read. Were they suspicious or simply
intrigued? Having glanced once, Jahan dared not do so again. A knot gripped his chest. A trickle of sweat rolled down the nape of his neck. His clothes felt ridiculously heavy as it occurred to him what a nuisance they would become should he need to make off quickly. He had two pouches, one inside his robe, the other sewn into the hem of his shirt – courtesy of Balaban’s wife. If he were to run now, the coins would jingle, adding to his discomfort.

It was as he was contemplating his options that the crowd, as if slit from side to side by an invisible knife, parted. The French ambassador was coming. The man who had dissected Chota’s body with a dispassionate curiosity. Beside him was his wife, attired in an embroidered jacket-bodice and the greenest velvet gown, holding a handkerchief to her nose against the stench, her eyebrows puckered. They sauntered by without recognizing him, heading for the ship he had set his sights on. A flock of servants were at their heels, carrying boxes and cages in which hissed, cooed and squawked creatures of all kinds. Monsieur and Madame Brèves were returning to France, taking their private menagerie with them.

There were peacocks, nightingales and parrots, their feathers bright as springtime. There was a falcon, a hawk and an exotic bird with an enormous beak – a gift from the Sultan. But it was the monkeys that everyone was jostling one another in order to see – a female and a male, dressed as a miniature noblewoman and nobleman. Clad in silk and velvet, the two monkeys were watching the crowd with partly frightened, partly mirthful eyes. The female monkey bared her teeth from time to time, as if she were laughing at the humans the way they were laughing at her.

Taking advantage of the commotion, Jahan slipped away, setting a steady, swift pace. Not once did he glance back. He steered a zigzag path through crates, ropes and planks, amid sailors, porters and beggars. There was another carrack far ahead. He had no idea where it was bound, but he felt pulled towards it. It occurred to him that Davud might have guessed his intention to go back to Rome, and advised his guards to keep a close eye on all vessels to Italian ports. It would
probably be wiser to take a ship in a different direction. He could then disembark at the first port and make his way to Michelangelo’s land. With this conviction he reached the carrack and climbed up the plank.

‘We don’t take on strangers,’ said the Captain after listening to him. ‘How do I know you’re no criminal?’