Dr. Munir's Home

Maksood the Arab was about to ring the bell. He stopped and said, “I won’t come. It is not necessary to go together and I have lots to do here anyway. I have a lot of paperwork to do.”

“Don’t put me off with your paperwork. You have to come. In case I need to be separated from Patriot you should know the address, so that you can take him there yourself. We have to think about the worst case scenario, as well. I don’t know the address myself. I can’t write it for you on a piece of paper. I went there two years ago. Only once. I am not sure if I can find the house myself.”

Arab’s eyes widened with surprise; “That’s right! I can’t believe our luck.” He started to ring the bell loudly; while he was shouting, “You guys come here at once, it is urgent. Hey, I need you.” He was looking at both Jamil and the Lieutenant in confusion. “When you look for them; they are never here” He pressed the bell again. He shouted at the Officer when he came, “I need a carriage right away! We need strong horses. Go! Quick!”

“What are you laughing at, Captain? You think it is easy to run this Station?”

“I am not laughing at that!”

“What then?”

“They say history repeats itself. It is the second time that I am helping a friend to run away disguised as a woman.”

Arab looked preoccupied, but asked; “Who was the first one?”

“I helped Atif after he shot Shemsi Pasha.” Jamil laughed nervously.” If somebody had told me I was going to do the same thing after the Revolution, I would be really pissed off.”

Farouk was listening; he was interested in the story. Jamil lit another cigarette. He didn’t want to appear to be bragging about old stories on a day like this. Arab was chewing his lip and pulling his moustache. Lieutenant Farouk asked timidly,
 “Captain, did you help Atif escape in woman’s clothing from Monastir?”

“Yes, he was disguised in women’s clothing.”

“Was it at night?”

“No.”

“Wasn’t it better to escape at night?”

“No, it wasn’t, because at that time ladies in Monastir didn’t go out at night.”

There was silence for a minute. Farouk was intrigued, waiting to hear the end of the story. He asked with a smile, “I heard Atif was injured. Is that right?”

“That’s right.”

“What happened? I mean how come he didn’t get caught in spite of his injury?”

Jamil started telling the story, without really wanting to, but then he got enthusiastic as he was telling it. “When Atif fired his gun, suddenly there was gun fire all around. Shemsi Pasha was down and Atif was frozen for a second. I yelled “Come on, quick! Run!” I was nervous. Then Atif snapped back into reality. He checked himself to see if he had any injuries, and then sprang to his feet. There were carriages waiting. He ran under the horses’ bellies and fled into the side streets.  He was crouching and running. I saw one of General Shemsi’s bodyguards aiming his shotgun at him. I thought about shooting the guard in the head but then changed my mind and shot him in the leg. The guard fell on his knees when he was shot but at the same time fired his gun. Atif was still running so I thought he was alright. I took a deep breath. He didn’t realize that he was hit while running. Imagine how difficult it was for the guards to shoot somebody in that crowd. There was a lot of commotion. The guy shot Atif even though he himself was hit.  Atif accomplished something incredibly difficult when you consider how skilled Pasha’s Albanian guards were at shooting. Atif was wounded in the leg, but the bullet entered in and out of the leg without causing major damage. It didn’t rip the blood vessels. They could have followed the blood stains on the street. God helped us! It started to rain heavily. With that rain, the blood stains were washed away and the level of panic increased in the town square.  We got back to the house to wait for the news. We were very worried. Because the moment they caught him, they would have killed him for sure. I wasn’t so worried about being caught and sent to be tried in a Court Marshall. We were waiting, listening outside for footsteps. Then we heard a knock at the door. When I answered the door it was a Lieutenant named Omer. I asked him what he wanted. He scanned both sides of the room and entered the house quickly. He was a shoemaker, he owned a shop. When he heard the shots he decided to close his shop. As he was closing the metal doors somebody entered the shop, pulled his gun and told him to be quiet. He pulled up a chair and sat down. When they saw the blood running through his leg, they bandaged the wound the best they could. Lieutenant Omer told me that he would never call the cops on a hero like Atif. Patriot didn’t trust him at first and told him that we knew nothing about this issue. He said to him that whoever sent him to our place must be wrong.”

The shoemaker said, “The person who shot Pasha sent me here to give you this “He showed us the good luck charm that Atif’s Macedonian girlfriend gave him. Patriot asked where Atif was. The Lieutenant told us that Atif was in the shop. We wanted to know who was staying with Atif, since he was wounded. He answered by saying that his son was with him. Then we were relieved to learn that he was safe. We were lucky that day! First he was able to shoot and kill Shemsi Pasha. As you know you can’t always hit your target. Even if you shoot a man, you can’t always kill him. Secondly, he was lucky to be strong enough to escape even though he was wounded because his wound was not serious. Third, there was the rain, washing away all the blood stains. And finally, he entered a shoe shop where the owner was willing to help him. Another thing was that the shoemaker was working with his son! If it had been an apprentice he couldn’t have trusted the guy. After hearing the whole story we wanted to know the location of the shop. It was right behind the Telegram Office so we went there at once. Atif was all smiles. Next day I wore an Albanian Gentlemen’s clothes, and Atif had a woman’s veil on for a disguise! We left Monastir in a  carriage!”

Monastir, Macedonia

The Officer came and informed Maksood the Arab that the carriage was ready. Arab wanted his coat. While leaving the Office, he asked Farook to stay by the phone and answer the calls.

The wind stopped blowing. The city was covered with snow. Istanbul at the time of the truce was old, disorganized, in piles of ruble and dirty. All that was covered temporarily by the snow.

The carriage was going fast without shaking too much. Arab looked depressed; his lower lip hanging.

From time to time he looked at Jamil out of the corner of his eye. “Jamil?”

“Yes?”

“Brother, we are going to that place, but...”

“But...”

“I really don’t want to do this...”

“Why?”

“Because he left the Party at such a bad time. We must be crazy to ask for his help? What if he says yes and then plays a trick on us? Did you think about this business thoroughly? If this turns disastrous we would be in shame like no other. Worse than that, we will let Patriot down. It will be such a bad situation.”

“Don’t worry. If I didn’t trust the man I wouldn’t go to his place.”

“Look what this world has come to. At a time like this we are going to ask the enemy for help. Yes, I have come to the conclusion that we are really out of our minds! When I heard that The Generals fled, I was upset. I thought they should have stayed, they should have stood trial. They should be held accountable and they should have faced the charges. That’s what I thought, but it is a different situation now. Things have changed. Who is going to judge them? Will there be a fair trial? They don’t want to judge the Unionist, they want their heads! He was quiet for some time and he covered his face with both hands. Then he continued. “How did we lose the war? Nobody thought of defeat. We would have been better to die than to lose a war. It is a terrible situation. It is all our doing! What does the opposition say? They say that those men are accustomed to gang fights and don’t know about politics. They say those thugs finished the Empire in ten years. The mighty empire that has lasted six hundred years! They managed to collapse it in ten years! When the country was still recovering from the Balkan wars, when that defeat was still in front of us lying like a dead animal; how could the Unionist go into the Great War head first? What kind of craziness is that? They were like mad dogs. They were like lions eating whatever is in front of them and beating up whatever is around them. They were acting courageously and yet when they couldn’t face defeat they fled the country! We know the big shots in the Party very well.  Were they better than the Vizier’s of the bygone era? In the past even porters, forest men and musicians became viziers without proper education.  Did our leaders run the country better than the Viziers? Why did they flee? Is it because they were cowards? I asked everyone that I know who had been to Sarikamish about Enver. They told me that he was fighting like crazy; nobody could take him from the line of fire. All around him were very courageous soldiers. All the strong soldiers who could have killed the lions were hiding while Enver was so courageous. The Batallion Commander had to warn him to get out of the trenches which were in front of the artillery. He was afraid the enemy would see Enver and start firing on our troops. You know Jamal better than anybody and you know Talat from the Babiali (Sublime Porte) coup d’etat.There is no doubt that they are brave individuals. They teased the Angel of Death. If it comes to intellect, there is nobody in this world who is more stupid than the British Prime Minister Lloyd George. Why did we have to be defeated? Was it fate?”

“I think the war is not only a question of courage. The camels carried the water to the Suez Canal. We had to carry the artillery on wooden planks. Every fifty feet, we had to go back to bring the wooden planks from the back to the front. They had installed water pipes as large as my waist at Gaza. They transported their arms by train. We weren’t defeated by the artillery Batallion or the cavalry in Gaza. We weren’t defeated because we were outnumbered. We lost the battle because of the water pipes and because of the train tracks. Forget about feeling sorry for the past we have to look to the future!”

“Why should we think about the future? It doesn’t look bright.”

“Maksood, you get softened by just being a Commander of the Police Station”.

“The future looks very bleak to me, Jamil. The more I think about it the more confused I feel.”

Arab lit a cigarette. He was uneasy about asking for help from somebody who had not been faithful to the party. They were passing through the Mercan Street and Sultan Hamam. There were foreign soldiers walking on the bridge and the sea was crowded with foreign ships. They caught the Haydarpasha ferry, at the last minute. In the ferry there were a lot of foreign navy personnel. Many of them didn’t have coats on, even though it was cold. They looked like they were having a good time. It was as if they were never had been to war. Their faces were red from the cold. There were a couple of black soldiers among them.

Haydarpasha Train Station

“Hey Arab, are these youngsters all from your tribe?”

“If the blacks look like they are from my tribe, all the rest are from your tribe!”

“Whenever I see them all well fed and rosy cheeked, I wonder how our poor soldiers won the battle. I also wonder what they think of us.”

“I think the English think of us as Indians, Italians as Habeshis, French as Algerians, and Japanese as Chinese. That’s what a German Officer friend of mine told me.”

“How about the others? Americans and the Germans?”

“I wouldn’t be surprised if the American’s think of us as the Native Indians. I think German’s consider us the same as Jews.”

They drank some tea. The ferry approached the shore with difficulty.

Then they boarded a train which was not crowded. The employees on the train were all minority ethnic groups. Things had changed. Once again they were running the train service. Their demeanor had changed. During the war time they were humble, now they were proud.

A Greek employee punched Jamil’s ticket as if he was doing him a great favor, like he was giving him a farm for free. Arab looked at him for some time.

“We shouldn’t have lost that war.”

When they reached Goztepe train station, it was snowing heavily.

They wrapped their scarves around their faces and pulled their coat collars up. They decided not to take a carriage, because they didn’t want to be noticed.

They were walking swiftly.

As Maksood’s discomfort increased he became more agitated and began to walk even more quickly. He had thick boots on and with his military winter coat he was not cold. Jamil suddenly noticed that he was missing his uniform very badly. He was caught off guard by this. He was afraid he would never wear his uniform again. He envied his friend. His brand new coat didn’t warm him anymore. He felt frozen. When he was in the desert enduring the summer heat he would dream about Istanbul’s winters. At the time he wished to be that cold. He wished to be out in the snow with only his shirt on.

Even though it was still snowing, it didn’t feel as cold. When they turned into Bagdad Road, they had the wind at their backs. While crossing the street they stepped into slush up to the ankles twice.

This was the famous Bagdad Road that stretched from Istanbul to Bagdad, crossing almost all of the Empire. Yavuz Sultan Selim went to the Battle of Chaldiran using this road (in the year 1514 against Shah Ismail). After conquering the Holy cities and Egypt he became Caliph and brought its emblems (the sword and mantle of Muhammad) on this road.

Maksood said that these neighborhoods had become rough recently.” You could get robbed, not only that, because of the holes in the street you could fall and break your leg.”

“Do you know the house?

“Yes, why do you ask?”

“I was hoping you wouldn’t find the place so we could have turned back and sought out a solution to our problem somewhere else.”

“Then you will be disappointed because I know where the house is.”

“I still am not convinced that you can find the house.”

From Bagdad Road they turned on to Caddebostan, near the dockside. Munir rented a large house by the sea. Jamil rang the door bell. He waited and tried again. The house must have been far away from the door at the outer gate. They didn’t hear bells ringing from there.

“I think nobody is in.”

Jamil rang the bell for the third time.

“I am coming, Wait...”

Then they heard footsteps approaching, it was a woman’s voice with a Circassian accent; “Who is it, Doctor?”

Dr. Munir sang loudly the Army of Action’s march that had been popular after the Events of March 31st;

“Army of Action...Army of Baraka...”

They heard a woman’s voice who was the housekeeper Gulnihal, “God damn Army of Action! I don’t approve of them.”

“Don’t get scared woman. I am only joking. What a stupid Circassian you are! First I joke, then I explain the joke then I have to tell you where to laugh at the story. Then we would have to wait ten minutes and you will finally laugh. Then I will ask whether you understood the joke and you will say, “I don’t get it, Sir!”

He lifted the heavy iron bar to open the door. And one side of the door slowly moved.

Dr. Munir had a fisherman’s rain coat on. He had  put the hood up. He was short and skinny. He wasn’t handsome but you had the impression that he was fit, fast, strong, and intelligent.

First he looked calmly at Maksood and he tried not to notice the changing looks on Arab’s face confused, nervous, suspicious, and worried. Then he turned his attention to Jamil. “Hello Jamil! Jamil the Cannon Man. Welcome. What brings you here in this weather?”

“Anybody could have come on a nice summer day; I chose to come on a day like this! Let me introduce you to my friend...Maksood Bey. You might have heard his name before. Some call him ‘Uncle’ some ‘Sipahi’ ”

Munir hid his smile. He showed them the way to the house. While they were walking, he looked at Maksood out of the corner of his eye and said:”I think I remember you from somewhere? Where were you during the war? In which Fronts did you serve?”

“I wasn’t in the war zone. Well, not much...”

Jamil knew that Maksood always worked for the secret service and he didn’t want to talk about the fronts so he changed the subject. “He is with the Military Police Force; he works at the Hasan Pasha Station.”

“Is that right? I think I might have seen you somewhere? Have we ever met?”

Maksood stuttered, “No...I don’t think so....”

The yard was quite large. You could clearly see under all the snow that it was disorganized and overgrown. There were two cherry trees on both sides of the entrance.

Dr Munir let them enter the house and welcomed them. Munir closed the door and pulled the iron bar. Maksood elbowed Jamil and said, “Don’t tell him about our problem. Talk about something else and try to leave as soon as possible. I will tell you the reason later.”

Munir said; “Take your coats off...Come on, let me take your coats...I was thinking about you the other day. I thought you might come by but didn’t know when you returned to Istanbul. I was thinking about how mad I was about your nickname.”

“Why?”

“You know they call you “Jehennnem”. We used the greatest cannons of the time when Mehmet conquered Istanbul. When we were building those huge cannons nobody used the term” Jehennem” the Cannon Man...Then the westerners got better at making cannons. As a result, we started buying these heavy weapons from them. Now they are better than us so what did we do? We started bragging about what we had done...If the cannon could fire one shell in an hour and if we could send the bomb fifty feet away we thought we had the best artillery. The people who can use these guns start to get the nickname “Jehennem”. As I was thinking about this matter I found another question to consider: The concept of “Hell.” Our imagination on this is not very impressive.”

Gulnihal was standing by the kitchen door. She was looking like she was looking at the enemy. It was as if the guests were not Jamil and Maksood but the Army of Action itself! She said; “Army of Action... Damn it! They didn’t let us have peace. We had blessed a country, look what happened to it? Muhammad’s people are suffering from hunger...Balkan Gypsies....”

Dr. Munir took his fisherman’s raincoat and hung it on the hook. He was wearing a Cossack shirt and had a Circassian belt adorned with silver. Those clothes made him look even shorter. He went to open the door of a room overlooking the garden. There was porcelain stove in the corner. They also had a copper stove situated in the middle of the room with some wood burning in it.

“Come and sit somewhere. It is warm in here...He remembered something. “We missed the winter when we were at the desert, didn’t we?”

“I was thinking the same thing and laughed, while coming here.”

“Do you still feel the same way?”

Dr. Munir seemed laid back about the situation and he was somewhat ignoring Maksood. Maksood, however, looked increasingly uneasy about being there. His desperation was apparent.

When the door was closed, Maksood hit his knees and said, “Damn it, Jamil! We are in trouble.”

“What happened?”

“You are asking as if you don’t know. Don’t talk to him about Patriot. Make up something and let’s get out of here soon. We need to go. This is a complicated matter. I will let you know later.”

“Tell me now!”

“I am telling you, this is serious...”

“Is it about the Doctor?”

“Yes.”

“Do you know him?”

“I know him quite well...”

“How did you meet him?”

“I will tell you later. Tell him we were just passing by and stopped in. I will be angry if you don’t do as I tell you. You shouldn’t have told him about where I was working. That was a huge mistake. We are in trouble. I shouldn’t have come with you. It was stupid of me.”

Then he heard a voice and made a gesture by putting his finger in front of his lips. “Hush...”He looked around trying to change the subject, “So many books...Even if he lived until he was a hundred years old, a person still couldn’t read all these books.”The walls were covered with bookshelves all the way to the ceiling. He was looking at them with disapproval. When the noise coming from outside ceased, he said, “You see, I know what kind of a man he is... Look at all these books...I never trust bookworms. You know why? They read too much and forget themselves. Nothing good comes from the likes of him...”

“So you think he is no good?”

“He is no good! Even if I didn’t know him, after seeing all these books, I wouldn’t trust him at all Jamil, I know I am not very smart; however, I am not as stupid as you are! That’s for sure. All my years at the secret service I dealt with all kinds of people...”

“You are the expert!”

“Yes, what do you think? If a man reads so many books, let him go. Because he will learn a little from this book, a little from the other and at the end he will be all confused. His brain will become mushy! He wouldn’t make sense. One day he will say something next day he will say something else...I am very sure of the fact that he is not a good doctor as well. I don’t trust these types…They are trouble. Don’t let any secrets out! I am glad I came with you or else there would be irreparable damage.”Then he listened outside. “Hush...Be quite...”

The door opened Jamil and Maksood saw General Halil entering the room. General Halil was General Enver’s uncle and he was one of the leaders of The Committee of Union and Progress.  He said to Maksood, “Oh! Is that you Arab?”

“Oh! I was surprised to see you Pasha.”