Joseph Kanon - Istanbul Passage

“He sold the Guard out, you said.”

“When it was convenient. A fine point.” He paused again. “You decide.”

Leon was quiet. “I can’t,” he said finally. “It’s not my decision.”

“It’s somebody’s.”

“Not yours, either.”

“No, I just speak Romanian and drive the car. And keep my mouth shut. That was before. Help a man like this escape? I won’t be part of that. Whoever sent you-maybe he doesn’t know, either. He needs to know. So somebody can decide.”

“You’re not part of it. They don’t even know you were there.”

“That’s not so easy now. Maybe you didn’t think about this, either, what it means for me, what this is now.”

Leon looked at him, waiting.

“So more thinking. I had this time,” he said, waving to the room, “while you were having your drink. Who were they tonight? Russians? All right. Who else would have such an interest? Stop him before- So they send a unit, three, four men. In which case they’ve already cleaned up the mess, got rid of the body. But no one followed us. It’s more important to get Jianu than worry about the fallen comrade. But no one follows. So he must have been alone. Think what that means.”

“I know what it means.”

“Yes? You have thought about this too? No one moves the body. It lies there to be found. And it will be found. Now something for the police, even Emniyet. And what are they looking for? My gun. My car. Who protects me now? The boss you can’t tell me about? Who wants me to help the butcher? I’m working for him now too. I have a right to know.”

“I never meant-”

“It’s too late for that. Do we want to tell the police it was self-defense? Then we have to tell them what we were doing there.”

Leon stared at his drink for a minute. “Can they trace the car to you?”

“This is your response?”

“They can’t, can they? Where is it?”

“The garage.”

“Where it’s been all night, as far as anyone knows. There’s nothing special about the car, if they saw it from the café. Unless they got the plate number. It could be anybody’s.”

“So I have nothing to worry about.”

“There’s nothing to connect you to this.”

Mihai looked over. “Except you.”

“If it comes to that, we’ll protect you. I promise you that. I’ll talk to-”

“Protect me. A Palestinian helping the Americans, killing Russians. I’d be out of the country in a day.”

“At least you wouldn’t be in jail.”

“Those are my choices. And my work here? Who does that?”

“You were never there,” Leon said, his voice level. “Nobody knows except Alexei and he’ll be gone.”

“The butcher goes free. And we protect ourselves. So we protect him. That’s what I’m doing now, protecting someone like that. A knot,” he said, twisting his fingers, “not so easy to pull apart.”

“I didn’t know.”

“That’s what the Germans say,” Mihai said wryly. “Every one.” He put down the glass, ready to go. “So, a good night’s work. He’s safe and so are we. Only the Turks have this problem. This body. One thing, though, still to think about. How did they know, the Russians? The arrangements? Where he’d be? Just you. No guns. So easy they could send one man. If they knew all that, what else do they know? So maybe we’re not so safe. And neither is he,” he said, getting up.

The phone rang, twice as loud this late, startling them, like an unexpected hand on the shoulder. Leon glanced at his watch, then looked at Mihai, who shook his head, a tic response. Another clang filling the room, waves of sound. He picked up the receiver, snatching it.

“Leon? I’ve been trying to reach you.” Ed Burke. At this hour.

“I was at the Park.” Accounting for himself to Ed Burke, already making alibis. “Do you know what time-”

“It’s about Tommy,” Ed said quickly. “I thought maybe you’d know something.”

“Know something?”

“Since you were in Bebek. With your wife. We couldn’t get past the police.”

“Police?” Just an echo.

“You haven’t heard? He’s dead. Killed.”

“What?” A first wave of heat rushing through him. Tommy hit too, the one who was supposed to meet the boat, not a freelance. They’d known where he was. He looked over at Mihai, who was watching him.

“Leon, you there?”

Say something. “Killed? In a crash?” he said, trying to keep his voice steady.

“No, that’s the thing. Shot. In Bebek. That’s why I called. I thought you might have heard something before they blocked the whole place off. By the water, just down from that fort.”

“Rumeli Hisari,” Leon said, an automatic response, not hearing himself. “Shot?” His mind racing now, his blood seeming to travel in two directions. “By the water?”

“The boat landing. That’s what I wondered too. Hell of a place to be, that hour. Tommy leaves his own party, I figure he must have something going on. But, Christ, you never know, do you. Maybe somebody saw the car and said, there’s money there. So if he hadn’t left then. But maybe something else.”

“God,” Leon said blankly. “Shot?”

“You don’t expect that here.”

“No,” Leon said. “You don’t.” Fire into the dark and wait for a thud, the crack of a head on the pavement.

“Well, I didn’t mean to bother you.”

“No, no, I’m glad you called. Thanks.” Police cars and lights, questioning people in the café. His head filling with blood, face hot.

“I’ll let you know if I hear anything about the arrangements.”

“Arrangements?”

“Well, Barbara will want to bury him here, don’t you think? I mean, shipping a body home-”

“Barbara,” Leon said vaguely. The widow, a bottle blonde who flirted after the second drink.

“She had to identify the body,” Ed said, in the know. Who else had he called? “It’s a hell of a thing. One minute you’re at a party, the next you’re-”

“I can’t believe it,” Leon said. What you were supposed to say.

“You never saw anything? They must have had half the force out.”

“Not while I was there.” He waited a second. “When did it happen?”

“Right after he left the party, I guess.”

“I must have already gone. Jesus, shot.”

“Well, I’ll let you go,” Ed said, slightly disappointed, hoping for details. “I still say, it’s a funny place to be, that hour.” Fishing.

“Thanks again, Ed,” Leon said, not responding.

He put down the receiver, moving slowly, and turned to Mihai.

“What?” Mihai said, looking at his face.

“You have to think some more. It wasn’t a Russian.”

HE SPENT ALL MORNING waiting for a call-somebody from Tommy’s office at the consulate, maybe even the Consul himself. The account in Hürriyet had been skimpy, a businessman shot, but the details were already racing through the foreign community. Why hadn’t Barbara been invited to the party at the college? Why had Tommy left early? Heading away from town? Suspicions percolated up and down the phone lines, but no one believed Tommy was seeing another woman, certainly not one who would shoot him. Which left robbery. Except, according to Barbara, his wallet had been in his pocket when the police found him. His gun had been fired, so he must have scared them off. But why was he carrying a gun?

A full morning of it, pacing, then staring at the phone, expectant. Turhan, Leon’s secretary, one of the Atatürk new women who didn’t cover her head, but still went home to her family at night, gave up any pretense of working, answering calls in a breathless voice, eyes wide with interest. During a normal day not much happened at R.J. Reynolds; today the phone kept ringing. But not with the call he wanted.