On the Bone by Barbara Nadel

Author:Barbara Nadel [Nadel, Barbara]
Language: eng
Format: epub
ISBN: 9781472213815
Publisher: HeadlinePublisher
Published: 2015-12-09T23:00:00+00:00

Chapter 17

Halide Can put her phone down. The lab technician she’d spoken to had been certain the meat she’d taken from the Imperial Oriental Hotel had been wild boar. She immediately picked her phone up again and told Cetin İkmen. She also told him her other news.

‘I met a junior chef who actually liked Celal Vural,’ she said.

The missing waiter had been generally avoided by his colleagues, but this chef had a different opinion.

‘Vural even told him that his father was Jewish,’ she said.

‘Interesting. Who is this man?’ İkmen asked.

‘Bülent,’ she said.

‘Bülent who?’

‘I don’t know. But he and Celal were close.’

‘How did you get into conversation?’

‘On a cigarette break,’ she said. ‘I noticed this guy standing apart from everyone else and I went over to talk to him. He said he was thinking of refusing any more shifts at the Imperial Oriental now that his friend had left.’

‘Left?’

‘Yes, sir, he thinks that Celal has disappeared intentionally.’

‘Why?’

‘Hated his job and was having marital problems, apparently.’

‘Well that’s new,’ İkmen said. ‘Wife says differently. Find out who this Bülent is, Halide. We may need to speak to him officially.’

‘Yes, sir.’

Even by day, the place made him tired. It had been many years since Imam Ayan had been to Esenler bus station. He’d only ever travelled to and from the vast Istanbul terminus at night. But daytime was no better. Maybe the toilets were a little bit more sanitary, but …

‘Gaziantep,’ Radwan said. ‘You got tickets to Gaziantep?’

He was looking at the wretched things, but of course he couldn’t read or speak Turkish.

‘Yes,’ the old man said. ‘Twenty hours.’

‘Took me four days,’ Radwan said.

The boy had hitched lifts and insinuated himself inside melon trucks to get to Istanbul. The imam didn’t like to think about what he might have had to do to persuade drivers to let him into their cars.

‘This will just feel like four days,’ the imam replied.

The boy laughed. The old man had dressed him in some of Burak’s old clothes, but even they swamped him. He looked exactly what he was, an undernourished displaced Arab child. And because he could only speak Arabic, everyone probably thought they were both Syrians.

The old man sat down on a bench. Their bus didn’t leave for five hours. Even taking prayer time into account, that still left oceans of empty time to kill.

The only person the imam had told of his plans was the Twisted Boy’s mother, Aylin Hanım. Over the years, Imam Ayan and Aylin Hanım had shared much that was painful. Her son’s illness coupled with her husband’s desertion had almost driven Aylin to despair. The imam had helped her in practical ways, like obtaining work for Ramazan, and offered a kind word when she needed one. But then he owed Aylin Hanım. And he would be in her debt again. She had after all agreed to look after his house and his cats while he was away.

Aylin Hanım knew where he was going and the old man knew that she hadn’t approved.

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