Ahmet Tanpinar - The Time Regulation Institute

Selma Hanım raised her head and looked into my eyes.

“Why won’t you tell me the truth?” she said. “I know that Cemal was lying to me.”

Another silence.

Slowly she said, “Or rather I suspected so much. But now I’m sure. Your tone just now said it all…”

I did everything I could to soothe her, but she carried on.

“No,” she said. “This whole thing isn’t as simple as you might think. It’s really rather complicated. I don’t care what he hides from me. But finally he understood that I was fond of you. You always went out of your way to help me. We were such good friends! Perhaps he kept it from me, thinking that I would be upset, which is perhaps kind but still unforgiveable, because there were just too many lies. But why did he go and fire you when he was the one who brought you there in the first place?”

“Perhaps the others insisted that I go…”

“Impossible! If that were the case, then he wouldn’t have lied to me. But even so, how could he have let such a thing happen? No, there was definitely something else.”

Then she fixed her eyes on mine.

“Who knows how much pain and trouble it has caused you.”

“Don’t worry yourself about that,” I said. “Everything’s fine now. Don’t worry about me. There’s no need to make an issue out of it. In fact forget about our offer. Perhaps he would be displeased to see us together. I would hate to inconvenience you!”

Selma Hanım rummaged about in her purse for a tissue.

“I’m already inconvenienced!” she whimpered.

Such is fate. No one can remain a star forever. It is sure to descend from its place in our imagination and find a new one among the masses.

“All the same, I’m very pleased we were able to meet again. As for the job, let’s think it over. I’ll call you.”

We walked down the stairs together.

Outside she said: “It’s just so surprising. How can anyone tell so many lies?” And she left.

Surprising indeed.

III

Two months after the mayor’s visit to our office, a far more important and powerful figure — I might go so far as to say an absolute power — paid us a visit. But we were no longer in the old office: we had relocated to larger and more comfortable premises. And our staff had expanded. Nermin Hanım, Zehra, and Ekrem Bey, and I made up the core staff, and we had more work than ever. Halit Ayarcı came every morning and dictated all sorts of things to Nermin Hanım or Zehra. My daughter’s poor typing didn’t seem to bother him at all, and he was slowly getting Ekrem Bey used to the idea of the institute having a business plan.

The unexpected visit didn’t fluster Halit Ayarcı in the least. On arriving, he spent a few minutes at the entrance, detailing the institute’s fundamental aims for the mayor and the esteemed personage who accompanied him. But there was a clear difference between this visitor and the mayor: At first the esteemed personage did not speak but only listened with his eyes fixed firmly on your own, and if necessary, he approved what you had said by lowering his lashes. After the briefing he asked to have a look around. He was charmed by the maxims posted on the wall, declaring that they should be distributed, not just across the city, but throughout the country. In response to his suggestion, Halit Ayarcı only said, “We are planning to do just that, sir.”

But the mayor gave a different answer:

“Above all else there’s the matter of funding. Such a thing is just not feasible, considering the institute’s present financial state, even if we were to consider the entire budget for this fiscal year. But Halit Bey is doing all he can.”

Strangely enough, our roles had changed. I was now Halit Bey, while the mayor had become Halit Bey. I was the fourth man down the ladder. Yet Halit Ayarcı wasn’t going to leave me in the shadows. His questions to me were crystal clear, and clearly shaped to indicate the expected answer, which he fielded with his own particular style.

The esteemed personage turned to the mayor.

“Naturally,” he concurred, “but not everything depends on money alone. Human willpower can overcome material limitations.”

Oh, how much I prayed for him to carry on speaking just then. If I could only learn the secret behind this matter of willpower, everything would fall into place. But he stopped there. Clearly he expected us to solve this knotty problem on our own.

The mayor had no objection whatsoever. Thus bearing this accepted truth in mind — for he too seemed to have been able to overcome material restrictions through the application of willpower alone — he continued to remind the esteemed personage, in the most amenable manner possible, always acknowledging his interlocutor’s ideas as true, that a project as expensive as this could never be realized without financial support, and that, as it was willpower to be expended in the process, it would be a very expensive project indeed. In my opinion the mayor was right. When unemployed, I’d had to spend so much of this prized commodity — that is to say, my willpower — just to get by, so much so that my reserves had long since gone dry. Perhaps this explains why for months I was like a football bouncing around Halit Ayarcı’s feet.

Halit Ayarcı remained detached throughout this exchange. Perched on the corner of his desk, he looked about the room with calm indifference, as if taking pity on the time wasted in such frivolous debate. I never knew that boredom could be so lofty and noble. He waited for the conversation to finish as another might wait for a cloud of dust blown up by a gust of wind to settle. His look seemed to say, “I know just when to intervene. But first you’ll have to decide for yourselves! I can’t help you overcome your personality flaws. I can but sit here hopelessly and find a way to tolerate them. In any case, you’ll eventually come around to where I’ve been all along.” No one could have displayed such patient understanding with greater poise.

At last the esteemed personage made his decision:

“There’s no need to worry about the finances. We have already taken the first steps, and now we must make all necessary sacrifices. I would only like to emphasize the importance of being as economical as possible.”

The mayor thanked the great man for his simple wishes with a sentence that observed the meandering rituals we had first noted in his exchange with our own leader on the occasion of his first visit. Halit Ayarcı chose this moment to rise from his desk, abandoning his role as observer to say:

“When we do attain greater capacity, we plan to publish a very important work that is already written!”

Oh no, there was no way I could ever be like this man! There was no way I could ever attain such mastery.

“So you have something ready for publication? So fast!”

“First, we have quite a substantial study. A book my friend Hayri Bey has devoted most of his life to. It is a source of great happiness to us!”

The quick-thinking mayor took this opportunity to introduce me properly.

“No one knows more about the history of our watchmakers than our friend Hayri Bey. He has a capital understanding — not just of timepieces but of the philosophy that underpins them.”

Now all eyes were on me. By any legal definition, this was a classic case of deliberate misrepresentation. Caught red-handed at the scene of the crime… Oh, good God! If only I could escape. But why? Never before had I been the subject of such rapt attention.

“What is your book called, Hayri Beyefendi?”

The question sent me tumbling down a hill in the dead of the night, grasping anything and everything to stop my fall, until Halit Ayarcı answered on my behalf:

“It is a study of Ahmet Zamanı Efendi— The Life and Works of Ahmet the Timely .”