Istanbul Passage (17 page)

He took the Istiklal tram to the office and went through messages with Turhan, then got a
dolmus
taxi out to Aksaray, waiting until the other passengers found their buses, then waiting a little while longer to make sure he was alone. The Emniyet wanted you to think they knew everything, watched everywhere—wasn’t that the point of Altan’s meeting?—but no one could watch all the time. Only one man at the station seemed fixed in place, a possible plant, but then he got on a bus headed to the airport and Leon started back toward Laleli, twisting first down to the aqueduct, then up the hill.

Alexei opened the door, a half-filled chessboard behind him. “Nothing hot?” he said, looking into the bag Leon had brought. He was clean shaven, his shirt pressed, military crisp. Leon thought of the grizzled Armenian.

“Heat up a can of soup.”

Alexei opened the cigarette carton, tearing the cellophane off a pack. “The food isn’t much, but your cigarettes are excellent. They’re easy to get here, American cigarettes? In Bucharest, like gold.”

“I have a good source.”

“So,” Alexei said, taking a puff. “Why the face? There’s trouble?”

“I’ve just been to a funeral.”

“Ah, your friend? How did that feel?” he said, almost amused.

“Then I had a visit from the Emniyet.”

“Why you?”

“They’re seeing everybody who knew Tommy.”

“And?”

“They’d like to find you. So they can play us off against the Russians. Odds on the Russians this time. You’d be a kind of peace offering.”

“Feeding the beast to keep him quiet. And my new friends?”

“You’re Topic A with them too. The embassy just sent a man from Ankara. The name Bishop mean anything to you? If it does, I need to know.”

“To protect me?” Alexei said, smiling a little, then shook his head no.

“He canceled your plane.” Alexei looked up. “There are a few ways to think about that. Depends whether you feel like trusting him.”

Alexei waved this off, not worth answering. “And your Tommy? No one suspects?”

“They still think he died in the line of duty. Keeping you from the Russians.”

“Who now have me?”

“Except they’re offering money for you, which Frank’s bound to hear. I did. So, no.”

“Then it’s as before.”

“Not exactly. He wants to bring me inside to take over Tommy’s desk. Find out who shot him.”

Alexei raised his eyebrows at this, then looked over to the chess game. “A complicated board now. Every move.” He stood up. “Every time you take your fingers off a piece. Very dangerous for pawns. Would you like some tea?” He moved over to the stove. “So now we’re careful. That’s how you survive. There’s a leak in Turkey. Somebody told the Russians I was here.”

“Well, Tommy would have.”

“But that’s the interesting thing,” Alexei said, sitting down, sipping tea. “I don’t think he did.”

“What?” Leon said, a delayed reaction.

“There were no Russians there that night. Just him. One man. Not even a good shot. The Russians don’t work that way.”

“Go on,” Leon said quietly.

“You leave me here alone all day, so what is there to do but think? Turn things over. Your Tommy was the Istanbul link? Think how this
works.” He took another sip. “He knows the fishing boat is bringing me to Istanbul. He keeps me here, he puts me on a plane. Nothing before, nothing after, so the chain is secure. Everyone works this way. But why shoot me in Istanbul? So public. Always a risk of being seen. Why not the coast? Not one night there, two. A delay in the weather. If they wanted to kill me, or take me away, why not there? He knew where we were. He called to see if we were coming. How easy to make another call. Have his Russian friends take care of things then. When everyone is inside, keeping out of the rain. But he waits for Istanbul. An odd decision, no?”

“But he came. With a gun.”

“Alone. You can believe me, the Russians aren’t known for restraint. So what does it mean?”

Leon waited, silent.

“They didn’t know. They never would have handled it that way.”

“But you agreed he must—”

“Yes, so I thought about it. Prisoners have time to think. Why here? The fishing village, a perfect moment. Bebek, still possible, but not as good. And not alone.”

“Then why pick it?”

“Because he wasn’t alone. He had you. No suspicions attach to him. If they attack at the fishing village, the leak might be traced. But here he’s protected. He had you.”

Leon said nothing.

“We were there to kill each other. That’s what would have been found. And Tommy’s still safe. He wasn’t there. Just us.”

The setup Leon had already imagined. He nodded.

“You were the only one who knew where the actual landing would be,” Alexei said. “That’s correct?”

“That’s what he said.”

“So think some more. He goes to an outsider. Someone he trusts. For such a job.”

“Maybe he didn’t want to lose one of his own men,” Leon said, his voice sour.

“No, who gets killed—you, someone else, what does it matter? Not a time for niceties. The trust is the point.”

“He didn’t trust his own people?”

Alexei opened his hand. “So he doesn’t tell them. Then how do the Russians know I’m here? They didn’t know Bebek or they would have been there. But now they’re offering money. So how do they know?”

“Someone else told them.”

Alexei nodded.

“But only Tommy knew when you were coming. And me.”

“But the operation itself—others must have known about that. Not when, but the fact of it, that Tommy would be alerted, that he would pass me on. And then, when he’s killed, the obvious conclusion—I must be here, in Istanbul. Maybe running. Maybe snatched by someone else. But not by them.” He looked across at Leon. “I’m safe in the next link. The problem is here. I knew this from the first, even before I thought things through.” He walked over to the board and put his fingers on one of the pieces. “So, the next move. The Russians are looking, now the Turks, you say, so we have to get out of Turkey. You have people in Greece. It’s not far, Edirne. But we’ll need papers.” He leaned over to his duffel and pulled out a passport. “It’s a risk now, using this name.” He opened it. “The picture’s still good, only a little of the seal. Not hard to remove. Turkish this time, I think. Anyway, not Romanian.” He handed it to Leon. “You can do it?”

Leon nodded.

“Then a contact name in Athens. For later. After we’re there. Not before. No one knows, not here, not there. A surprise visit. You understand?”

“I’ll need a day or two. For the papers.”

“No more,” Alexei said, the officer in charge.

“You have enough food? I don’t want to come back here.”

“Yes,” Alexei said, then froze, lifting his hand up, a traffic cop.
He crossed to the door in two steps, silent, leaning back against the wall, listening, drawing a gun from his pocket in what seemed to be slow motion, holding it up. Leon didn’t breathe, staring at the gun. A sound outside he hadn’t heard. Alexei listened for a few seconds more then lowered the gun, moving away from the door.

“The couple at the end,” he said quietly. “They stopped in the hall. Maybe carrying something.”

“You heard them.”

“You learn to listen. Living like this.”

“I see you found your gun.”

Alexei nodded. “It’s not much. Two would be better. You never know how many of them would come.”

Leon said nothing. What it was like, day to day, waiting.

“And another gun would make a difference?” he said finally. “In that kind of shoot-out?”

“No, it’s better to escape. But not always possible. So you listen. No surprises.”

“Escape how?” Leon said, looking around the room.

“The bathroom window drops to the courtyard. But there’s only one way out to the street, and they’d have someone there. You have to assume that. Utility stairs to the roof—they might not expect that—and it’s easy over to the next.”

“How do you know?”

“I tried it. A test.”

“You went out? You’re supposed to stay here. I told you to stay here.”

“Without a plan. Playing chess all day.” He shook his head. “How do you think I’m still alive? Listening to people like you? Who knows? Maybe waiting for you to bring them.”

“Trust nobody,” Leon said, still imagining his life. “Then what do you do? Sit on a roof or walk around Istanbul? It would be a matter of time.”

“A map would help. Also your phone number.” He fixed his eyes on Leon, a kind of challenge. “If we’re going to help each other.”

Leon hesitated, then pulled out his wallet and handed him a business card.

“Your home?” Alexei said, glancing at the telephone number. “Or the dried fruit?”

“Office,” Leon said. “Someone would be there, if I’m not.”

Alexei held the card for another minute, memorizing it, then handed it back.

“Keep it.”

“If they kill me and they find it, it leads them to you. Don’t worry, it’s here now.” He tapped his temple.

Leon started for the door, then turned.

“If someone else told them, there must have been two inside. Tommy didn’t know?”

Alexei smiled faintly. “The Russians did that sometimes, put two in. More. You don’t want them to know each other—if one gets caught, it’s only one. He can’t lead to the others. Washington’s like that. They don’t know each other there.”

Said casually, sure of it.

“Sometimes it backfires. In Bucharest there was a case, they were watching each other. As the most suspect. Which was right, as it turned out. A typical Bucharest situation.” He snorted, the corners of his mouth creasing up. “I didn’t make the world. Someone else’s joke.”

“But Tommy shot you without telling them.”

“Yes,” Alexei said, nodding as if he were appreciating a move Leon had made. “I’m still thinking about that. Heroics, maybe. He liked to act alone? Of course they would want me dead. So he hands them a fait accompli. With you to protect his cover. Or something else. I don’t know—all we know is that he did. Maybe you can help. When you become him. Find out why he did it.”

“Maybe he thought you deserved it.”

“Maybe,” Alexei said, looking at him. “He also shot you.”

Leon left by the back, checking the courtyard to see if Alexei had been right. One exit. He imagined him racing up the utility stairs, across the roof, like a cat burglar. On his eighth life. Near the bottom of the hill, he turned into a side street and waited to see if anyone had been behind, but no one passed except two Turkish women in ankle-length coats, carrying string bags. He stood for a minute, making a list. New papers.

At the landing there were boats for hire to cross the Horn, the handful that hadn’t been put out of business by the bridges. Once the whole shore here had been lined with slips for caïques, Istanbul’s gondolas, slim and graceful in the old watercolor prints, the boatmen in turbans, ladies in veils on mysterious errands. Layers.

This caïque was a rowboat with a small outboard motor, the turbaned oarsman an overweight old man who smelled of raki and complained all the way across about the price of gas. How was an honest man to make a living? Or a dishonest one for that matter, Leon thought, then raised his head, remembering the boatman in Bebek. Who’d been promised more money, a loose end. But that request would end up on Tommy’s desk and now he was Tommy.

He got off near the Koç shipyards in Hasköy and walked the few blocks to Mihai’s office, an old industrial building given to Mossad by its Jewish owner before it could be seized for the wealth tax. During the war, Mossad had worked out of the Hotel Continental, and some of the staff still preferred it for the convenience, but Mihai had moved his unit down to the waterfront. Aliyah Bet, the illegal immigration, was like Noah’s ark, he’d said. It should have a water view.

Only a few of the top story windows had one, though, a scummy stretch near the repair docks. The rest of the office looked like the
sewing factory it had been, now divided by plywood partitions. Mihai’s desk, an old cutting table, was covered with what looked like passports stacked in piles and a clipboard of lists.

“Sorry I’m late,” Leon said, loud enough to be overheard.

Mihai looked up, surprised.

“Anna won’t mind. We can take a taxi. You really don’t have to do this, you know.”

“Yes, I know,” Mihai said, his eyes question marks.

Leon cocked his head toward the door.

“Give me a second,” Mihai said, a normal tone now. “I have to put these away. Destination visas. Gold.” He started to shelve them in a safe.

Leon picked one up. “Honduras? That’s new.”

“A generous host. No quotas.”

Leon opened the passport. “Josef Zula, born Lodz. Going to Honduras. They buy that?”

“The Romanians don’t care where he ends up, as long as he doesn’t stay there. The visas are official. Cuba’s drying up and we’ve got people ready to sail. Beggars can’t be choosers. How many would you like to take? The land of the free. Jews? All full.”

Leon put the passport down. “Wouldn’t they be surprised in Honduras. If you did come. This must have cost you.”

“What price would be too much for you?” He closed the safe’s door and twirled the dial. “So. Let’s not keep Anna waiting,” he said, raising his voice, then told the secretary he’d be at the clinic. Bases covered.