The Winter Thief

25

While they waited for the orderly to be found, Director Levy gave Feride, Elif, and Doctor Moreno a tour of Eyüp Mosque hospital. He was proud of the facilities. “You see we have a lot of room, many beds. The Mosque Foundation is very generous. We have bandages and food and water. But it’s not enough for a hospital of this size. The foundation doesn’t understand that the sick don’t just lie in a bed until they get well. They have to be treated.” He emphasized the word. “The burn victims especially need continuous care. Poisons build up in their bodies. We should do tests to identify the toxins, so we can counteract them. We need a laboratory, and most of all, we need a bigger staff.

“I pay the orderlies very little,” the director explained as they walked back, “and I suspect they supplement that with some pilfering of supplies, but I have no choice.”

Feride was fascinated by the way the hospital worked. It was like a healing machine, despite the blood-soaked cloths in buckets, the unemptied bedpans, and the dirty floors. She pictured it clean and properly supervised. “How much assistance would you ideally need?” she asked.

“A pharmacist, trained nurses, orderlies, cooks, laundry workers. You can’t imagine how many sheets we go through every day. Another surgeon would be nice,” he added wistfully, looking at Doctor Moreno, who smiled in return.

Imagining the hospital’s needs, Feride was surprised to learn that she enjoyed hearing about how things worked after a lifetime of having the mechanics of living hidden behind the servants’ walls. It salved her mind, which was raw with fear about Huseyin’s fate and, she was ashamed to admit, pent-up anger. If she was honest with herself, a mistress wasn’t strange at all. She had heard complaints from many women in her circle. It seemed that almost every man of consequence eventually found one, especially now that taking a second wife was increasingly frowned upon as unworthy of a modern man. She supposed mistresses were also cheaper than second wives, who demanded their own separate households. She should have been suspicious at Huseyin’s uncharacteristic gift of a jeweled hairpin. Had he bought Rhea her own apartment, then, and was the pin for his wife meant to assuage his guilt? Had he bought Rhea a pin too? She would speak with the vintner with whom Huseyin had discussed his precious girl. The thought that he would confide such personal matters to a tradesman sent a spasm of anger through Feride.

Feeling suddenly weak, she caught herself on a bedframe. Why was she so angry at him now when she should care the most? He put up with her bleak humors with a wink and a fond pinch. She knew many, even Kamil, found him boorish. Feride would never have believed such a man could draw her out of herself, make her laugh. Now, even if he were returned to her alive, that joyful rapport would be gone. She wanted to hate him for that. If she didn’t find him, she thought, these feelings would eat at her soul.

Elif came over and laid a hand on her arm, her face questioning. “Are you all right?”

Feride nodded. Elif had taken off her hat but kept on her greatcoat in the chilly hospital. She looked like a child, a young boy in a too-large coat.

Only the patient wards were kept warm with braziers, Feride realized. “How much does it cost to heat the hospital?” she asked the director. “It must be quite expensive to heat such a large stone building.” Secure that he couldn’t see her expression behind her veil, she tried to concentrate on the director’s response.

It was two hours before Director Levy’s assistant found the orderly and brought him back to the hospital. He was obviously drunk. “What’s so important that you take me away from my family?”

“Come with me,” Director Levy said, and led the way to Ward Three. He pointed to the empty bed marked with Kamil’s handkerchief. “Where is this patient?”

“How do I know?”

“He was your responsibility. You were on duty.”

“Well, I can’t watch everyone all the time. Maybe he got better and walked out.”

To everyone’s surprise, Elif stepped up to him and backhanded him hard in the face. She stepped nimbly aside when the orderly grabbed for her. Feride was astounded. Her friend seemed at times to be two quite different people, one calm and tenderhearted, the other impatient and fierce.

The director and Doctor Moreno moved between Elif and the orderly, who looked confused and fell back, overturning a stool. Several patients craned their necks and looked on curiously.

Feride said something to Elif, who pulled a silver coin from her pocket and grudgingly handed it to the orderly. An avaricious gleam passed through the man’s eyes.

“Now, please tell us where the patient is.”

The orderly raised himself up and crossed his arms. “Only if I keep my job.”

Feride turned pleading eyes toward the director, who told him, “All right. But one more infraction-big or small-and you’re out.”

“His relatives took him away,” the orderly announced.

“Why didn’t you note that in the log?” the director asked.

The orderly shrugged. “I was going to. The family said they wanted their son treated by believers, not by infidels.” He glanced with sly satisfaction at Director Levy.

“Where did they take him?”

The orderly didn’t answer until Elif dropped another coin in his hand. “Üsküdar.” He claimed to know nothing more than the name of the neighborhood, nor did he know their names. It was clear to Feride that he was lying. How could he have entered the patient’s move in the log if he didn’t know the name. Perhaps, ashamed of their prejudice against Jews, the family had paid him to hide their identity.

Üsküdar, she thought with dismay, was on the other side of the Bosphorus. It was getting dark.