The Janissary Tree

[ 75 ]

His Excellency is not at home,” the butler rumbled.

He stood with the door ajar, peering at the Turk who had rung the bell.

“I would prefer to wait,” Yashim said. “My time is of no consequence.”

The butler weighed up this remark. On the one hand, it implied a compliment to his master who was, of course, a busy man. On the other, nobody in Istanbul ever said quite what they meant. He studied Yashim. His clothes were certainly clean, if simple. He’d like to rub that cloak in his fingers, to make sure it was really cashmere, but yes…he might be a man of consequence, after all.

“If you will step in,” the butler intoned, “you may find a chair in the hall.”

Yashim did, and sat down on it. The butler closed the door behind them with an audible click. Yashim sat facing the door he had just come through, and two enormous sash windows that descended almost to the floor. The staircase to his left swirled up at his back to the vestibule overhead. The butler walked majestically across to a bewigged footman, in breeches, who stood solemnly at the foot of the stairs, and murmured a few words in Russian. The footman stared out straight before him, and made no response.

“I trust you will not have too long to wait,” the butler said, as he passed Yashim and disappeared through a door to his right.

Yashim sat with his hands folded in his lap.

The footman stood with his hands by his sides.

Neither of them moved for twenty minutes.

At the end of that time, Yashim suddenly started. He raised his head. Something had attracted his attention at the window. He leaned slightly to one side and peered, but whatever it was that caught his eye seemed to have gone. He kept a watch on the window nonetheless.

About thirty seconds later he was almost on his feet, staring. The footman’s eyes slid over him, and then to the window, but the window was black and revealed nothing to him.

But Yashim’s attention was called to something almost out of sight. Curious, he leaned further over to the right, to follow it better. From where he stood, the footman realised that he couldn’t see what the foreigner was looking at.

He wondered what it could be.

Yashim gave a little smile, whistled through his nose, and continued to watch, craning his head.

The footman rubbed his ringers against his palms.

The foreigner, he noticed, had jerked his head slightly, to keep up with the event occurring outside. It seemed to be moving away, out of his line of sight, because the fellow was leaning forward now.

Very slowly, Yashim leaned back in his chair. He looked puzzled. In fact, he simply could not imagine the significance of what he appeared to have seen.

Something within the grounds, the footman knew.

When there should be nothing. No one.

The footman wondered what it could have been. It had to be a light. A light in the dark, in the grounds. Going round the side of the embassy.

What would the butler have done? The footman glanced at the Turk, who was still sitting exactly where he had sat half an hour before. Wearing a slight frown.

Having seen something he hadn’t expected. That nobody else had observed.

The footman took a measured step forwards, hesitated, then continued to the front door and opened it.

He glanced to the left. The spaces between the columns of the portico were dark as pitch. He took a step out, and another, craning for a better view.

He sensed a darkness at his back and half turned. The Turk filled the doorway.

The Turk held out his hands, palms up, and shrugged. Then he gestured to himself and to the gatehouse.

“I’m going,” he said in Turkish.

The footman understood the gesture. His anxiety increased.

The Turk descended the steps.

The footman waited until he had cleared the portico, and then ran very quickly down the steps himself, and headed left, into the dark.

Privately he relished the little cold wind which hit him on the face but could not in a thousand years ruffle his artificial hair. Still he saw nothing. He darted to the corner of the building and looked down the side of the east wing.

It was as far as he dared to go.