An Evil Eye

93

Hyacinth shuffled across the frozen cobbles. The lady Talfa had gone home but the valide had been fretful all afternoon and he was feeling tired. His feet ached and the cold assaulted him when he stepped outside.

One little thing, Hyacinth thought, might cheer him up right now. The old lala s were drinking coffee, but coffee was always bitter, however much sugar you put in.

Tulin would never mind if he took a little piece of chocolate.

He would have asked her to prepare him some, the way she did; but there was orchestra rehearsal at Besiktas and Tulin was not due back until later.

He reached her door and turned the handle. It was almost dark inside, but the room was small and he had no doubt that he could find the chocolate easily. There would be a jar somewhere, and he could dip a finger into the dark, bitter flakes. Perhaps she would never have to know.

There was a jar. Hyacinth opened it expectantly, and shook it, and sniffed. It wasn’t chocolate.

He set the jar back on the floor and squatted on his hams, surprised. The corner of the room was full of jars. Not only jars: there were packets in paper, and little wooden boxes, and clay pots, and some tiny brass containers with lids. He opened one at random: it was a sticky paste that smelled familiar.

Hyacinth’s mouth turned down at the corners.

Chocolate was one thing. But as he opened one pot after another, and poked his fingers into packets and boxes, the turn of Hyacinth’s mouth deepened.

It was his duty now to talk to the girl, he thought.

But his desire was to speak to Yashim.