Elisabeth Kostova - The Historian

“‘I’m thankful to them, too, that you’re here,’ I responded, sinking into a chair near him. ‘But what on earth brings you so early?’

“‘Ah, I could not stay away when I have news for you.’

“‘I have news for you, too,’ I said grimly. ‘You go first, Dr. Bora.’

“‘Turgut,’ he corrected me absently. ‘Look here.’ He began to undo the string on the portfolio. ‘As I promised you, I went through my papers last night. I have made copies of the material in the archives, as you have seen, and I have also collected many different accounts of events in Istanbul during the period of Vlad’s life and directly after his death.’

“He sighed. ‘Some of these papers mention mysterious occurrences in the city, deaths, rumors of vampirism. I have also collected any information I could from books that might tell me about the Order of the Dragon in Wallachia. But nowhere last night could I find anything new. Then I called my friend Selim Aksoy. He is not at the university-he is a shopkeeper-but he is a very learned man. He knows more about books than anyone in Istanbul, and especially about all books that tell the history and legends of our city. He is a very gracious person, and he gave me much of the evening to look through his own library with me. I asked him to seek for me any trace of a burial of someone from Wallachia here in Istanbul in the late fifteenth century, or any clue that there might be a tomb here somehow connected with Wallachia, Transylvania, or the Order of the Dragon. I also showed him-not for the first time-my copies of the maps, and my dragon book, and I explained to him your theory that those images represent a location, the location of the Impaler’s tomb.

“‘Together we turned through many, many pages about the history of Istanbul, and looked at old prints, and at the notebooks in which he copies so many things he finds in libraries and museums. He is most industrious, is Selim Aksoy. He has no wife, no family, no other interests. The story of Istanbul eats him up. We worked late into the night, because his personal library is so large that even he has never dived to the bottom of it and could not tell me what we might discover. At last we found a strange thing-a letter-reprinted in a volume of correspondence between the ministers of the sultan’s court and many outposts of the Empire in the fifteenth and sixteenth centuries. Selim Aksoy told me that he bought this book from a bookseller in Ankara. It was printed in the nineteenth century, compiled by one of our own historians from Istanbul who was interested in all the records of that period. Selim told me he has never seen another copy of this book.’

“I waited patiently, sensing the importance of all this background, noting Turgut’s thoroughness. For a literary scholar, he made a damned good historian.

“‘No, Selim does not know this book from any other edition, but he believes the documents reproduced in it are not-how do you say?-forgeries, because he has seen one of these letters in the original, in the same collection we visited yesterday. He is also very adoring of that archive, you know, and I often meet him there.’ He smiled. ‘Well, in this book, when our eyes were almost closing with fatigue, and the dawn was about to arrive, we found a letter that may have some importance for your search. The collector who printed it believed it to be from the late fifteenth century. I have translated it for you here.’

“Turgut pulled a sheet of notebook paper from his portfolio. ‘The earlier letter to which this letter refers is not in the book, alas. God knows it is probably not in existence anywhere, or my friend Selim would have found it long ago.’

“He cleared his throat and read aloud. ‘”To the most honored Rumeli Kadiasker -“’ He paused. ‘That was the chief military judge for the Balkans, you know.’ I didn’t know, but he nodded and went on. ‘”Honored One, I have now carried out the further investigation you requested. Some of the monks have been most cooperative for the sum we agreed upon, and I have examined the grave myself. What they reported to me originally is true. They have no further explanation to offer me, only repetitions of their terror. I recommend a new investigation of this matter in Istanbul. I have left two guards in Snagov to watch for any suspicious activity. Curiously, there have been no reports of the plague here. I remain yours in the name of Allah.“’

“‘And the signature?’ I asked. My heart was beating hard; even after my sleepless night, I was wide-awake.

“‘There is no signature. Selim thinks that perhaps it was torn off the original, either accidentally or to protect the privacy of the man who wrote the letter.’

“‘Or perhaps it was unsigned to begin with, for secrecy,’ I suggested. ‘And there are no other letters in the book that refer to this matter?’

“‘None. No previous letters, no subsequent letters. It is a fragment, but the Rumeli Kadiasker was very important, so this must have been a serious matter. We searched long and hard after this in my friend’s other books and papers and found nothing that is relating to it. He told me he has never seen this wordSnagov in any other accounts of the history of Istanbul that he can remember. He read these letters once a few years ago-it was my telling him where Dracula is supposed to have been buried by his followers that made him notice it while we were looking through the papers. So perhaps he has indeed seen it elsewhere and cannot remember.’

“‘My God,’ I said, thinking not of the subtle probabilities of Mr. Aksoy’s having seen the word elsewhere but rather of the tantalizing nature of this link between Istanbul, all around us, and faraway Romania.

“‘Yes.’ Turgut smiled as cheerfully as if we’d been discussing a menu for breakfast. ‘The public inspectors for the Balkans were very worried about something here in Istanbul, so worried that they sent someone to the grave of Dracula in Snagov.’

“‘But, goddammit, what did they find?’ I pounded my fist on the arm of my chair. ‘What had the priests there reported? And why were they terrified?’

“‘Exactly my perplexity,’ Turgut assured me. ‘If Vlad Dracula was resting peacefully there, why were they worried about him hundreds of kilometers away, in Istanbul? And if Vlad’s tomb is indeed in Snagov and always was, why do the maps not match that region?’

“I could only respect the precision of his questions. ‘There is another thing,’ I said. ‘Do you think there is indeed the possibility that Dracula was buried here in Istanbul? Would that explain Mehmed’s worry about him after his death, and the presence of vampirism here from that era on?’

“Turgut clasped his hands in front of him and put one large finger on his chin. ‘That is an important question. We will need help with it, and perhaps my friend Selim is the person to help us.’

“For a moment we sat looking silently at each other in the dim hall of the pension, with the smell of coffee drifting across us, new friends united by an old cause. Then Turgut roused himself. ‘Clearly we must search more, further. Selim says he will lead us to the archive as soon as you can be ready. He knows sources there from fifteenth-century Istanbul that I have not much looked at myself because they lie far afield of my own interests in Dracula. We shall look at them together. No doubt Mr. Erozan will be happy to bring out all these materials for us before the public hours if I call him. He lives close to the archive and can open it for us before Selim must go to work himself. But where is Miss Rossi? Has she risen from her chambers yet?’

“This speech prompted a confused rush of thought in my brain, so that I didn’t know which problem to address first. The mention of Turgut’s librarian friend reminded me suddenly again of my librarian enemy, whom I had nearly forgotten in my excitement about the letter. Now I faced the peculiar task of straining Turgut’s credulity by reporting the visitation of a dead man, although surely his belief in historical vampires might be extended to contemporary ones. But his question about Helen reminded me that I had left her alone for an unpardonably long time. I’d wanted to give her privacy as she awoke, and had fully expected her to follow me downstairs as soon as possible. Why hadn’t she reappeared by now? Turgut was still talking. ‘So Selim-he never sleeps, you know-went for his morning coffee, because he did not wish to surprise you right away-ah, here he is!’