Good Night, Ester (Night, Day 12)

I was so stunned and my heart so filled with grief that I would have postponed my rendezvous with Arşak if I knew I could see him another time. But the fact remained it was highly unlikely that I would ever get the chance to see him again. For years we had been classmates, sitting next to each other in class, wandering the same corridors and sitting and chatting in the same playgrounds. Just as Fuad had been a central figure in my early adulthood, so Arşak had been an irreplaceable part of my adolescence. Whenever I left Salonika and came to Dersaadet, he had been there for me and had never held back in his help, whether it be material or emotional. He is one of the few people in this world to whom I owe a life debt, so I was happy to be seeing him. Talking to him would perhaps help me a little as there was nobody else with whom I could share my woes. I had yet to work out Fuad's true aims and even if he was telling the truth, he was approaching me not out of friendship but for his own personal gain. Mehmed Esad was no different. Only Arşak was seeing me as an old friend, without any secret agenda or political subtext. Or so I told myself as I stood by the gates of the Maksim five minutes before our agreed meeting time. Arşak had yet to turn up but the venue's lights were on and smart, beautifully dressed men and women had already started making their way inside.

‘Why don't you step inside?’ a voice asked. I turned around and saw a stocky and affable-looking black gentlemen staring kindly at me. ‘It must be tiring standing around like this’.

He spoke Turkish with an accent but was otherwise quite fluent and assured. I assumed he was one of the musicians as it would have been odd for him to be picking up customers from the street. I was about to tell him I was waiting for a friend when I heard Arşak.