The Historian

Chapter 42

"But can't you get the police to help? This place is overflowing with them, it seems.' Hugh James broke a piece of bread in half and took a hearty bite. 'What a dreadful thing to have happen in a foreign hotel.'
"'We've called the police,' I assured him. 'At least I think we have, because the hotel clerk did it for us. He said no one could come until late tonight or early tomorrow morning, and not to touch anything. He's put us in new rooms.'
"'What? Do you mean Miss Rossi's room was ransacked, too?' Hugh's great eyes grew rounder. 'Was anyone else in the hotel hit?'
"'I doubt it,' I said grimly. "We were seated at an outdoor restaurant in Buda, not far from Castle Hill, where we could look out over the Danube toward the Parliament House on the Pest side. It was still very light and the evening sky had set up a blue-and-rose shimmer on the water. Hugh had picked out the spot - it was one of his favorites, he said. Budapestians of all ages strolled the street in front of us, many of them pausing at the balustrades above the river to look at the lovely scene, as if they, too, could never get enough of it. Hugh had ordered several national dishes for me to try, and we had just settled in with the ubiquitous golden-crusted bread and a bottle of Tokay, a famous wine from the northeastern corner of Hungary, as he explained. We'd already dispensed with the preliminaries - our universities, my erstwhile dissertation (he chuckled when I told him the scope of Professor S¨¢ndor's misconceptions about my work), Hugh's research on Balkan history and his forthcoming book on Ottoman cities in Europe.
"'Was anything stolen?' Hugh filled my glass.
"'Nothing,' I said glumly. 'Of course, I hadn't left my money there, or any of my - valuables - and the passports are at the front desk, or maybe at the police station, for all I know.'
"'What were they looking for, then?' Hugh toasted me briefly and took a sip.
"'It's a very, very long story.' I sighed. 'But it fits in pretty nicely with some other things we need to talk about.'
"He nodded. 'All right. Unto the breach, then.'
"'If you'll take your turn, as well.'
"'Of course.'
"I drank half my glass for fortification and began at the beginning. I wouldn't have needed the wine to erase any doubts about telling Hugh James all of Rossi's story; if I didn't tell him everything, I might not learn everything he knew himself. He listened in silence, with obvious absorption, except when I mentioned Rossi's decision to conduct research in Istanbul, when he jumped. 'By Jove,' he said. 'I'd thought of going there myself. Going back, I mean - I've been there twice, but never to look for Dracula.'
"'Let me save you some trouble.' I refilled his glass this time and told him about Rossi's adventures in Istanbul and then about his disappearance, at which Hugh's eyes bulged, although he said nothing. Finally I described my meeting with Helen, leaving out nothing about her claim to Rossi, and all of our travels and research to date, including our encounters with Turgut. 'You see,' I concluded, 'at this point it hardly surprises me to have my hotel room turned upside down.'
"'Yes, exactly.' He seemed to brood for a moment. We had made our way through a multitude of stews and pickles by this time, and he put his fork down rather sadly, as if regretting to see the last of them. 'It's most remarkable, our meeting like this. But I'm distressed to hear about Professor Rossi's disappearance - very distressed. That's dreadfully strange. I wouldn't have sworn before hearing your story that there was more involved in researching Dracula than the usual stuff. Except that I have had an odd feeling, you know, about my own book, this whole time. One doesn't want to go just on odd feelings, but there it is.'
"'I can see I haven't stretched your credulity as much as I feared I might.' "'And these books,' he mused. 'I count four of them - mine, yours, Professor Rossi's, and the one belonging to that professor in Istanbul. It's damned strange that there should be four such alike.' "'Have you ever met Turgut Bora?' I asked. 'You said you've been to Istanbul a few times.' "He shook his head. 'No, I've never even heard the name. But then he's in literature, and I wouldn't have come across him in the history department there, or at any conferences. I'd appreciate your helping me get in touch with him someday, if you would. I've never been to the archive you describe, but I read about it in England and was thinking of giving it a try. You've saved me the trouble, though, as you say. You know, I'd never thought of the thing as a map - the dragon in my book. That's an extraordinary idea.' "'Yes, and possibly a matter of life or death for Rossi,' I said. 'But now it's your turn. How did you come across your book?' "He looked grave. 'As you've described in your case - and the other two - I didn't so much come across my book as receive it, although from where or from whom I couldn't tell you. Perhaps I should give you a little background.' He was silent a moment, and I had the sense that this was a difficult subject for him. 'You see, I took my degree at Oxford nine years ago, and then went to teach at the University of London. My family lives in Cumbria, in the Lake District, and they are not wealthy. They struggled - and I did, too - so that I could have the best of educations. I always felt a bit on the outside, you know, particularly at my public school - my uncle helped put me through there. I suppose I studied harder than most, trying to excel. History was my great love, from the beginning.'
"Hugh patted his lips with his napkin and shook his head, as if remembering youthful folly. 'I knew by the end of my second year of university that I was going to do rather well, and this goaded me further. Then the war came and interrupted everything. I'd finished almost three years at Oxford. I first heard of Rossi there, by the way, although I never met him. He must have left for America several years before I came to the university.'
"He stroked his chin with a large, rather chapped hand. 'I couldn't have loved my studies more, but I loved my country, too, and I enlisted right away, in the navy. I was shipped out to Italy and then home again a year later with wounds in my arms and legs.'
"He touched his white cotton shirtsleeve gingerly, just above the cuff, as if feeling the surprise of blood there again. 'I recovered rather quickly and wanted to go back out, but they wouldn't take me - one eye had been affected when the ship blew up. So I returned to Oxford and tried to ignore the sirens, and I finished my degree just after the war ended. The last weeks I was there were some of the happiest of my life, I think, in spite of all the shortages - this terrible curse had been lifted from the world, I was almost done with my delayed studies, and a girl back home I'd loved most of my life had finally agreed to marry me. I had no money, and there was no food anyway, but I ate sardines in my room and wrote love letters home - I guess you don't mind my telling you all this - and I studied like a demon for my examinations. I got myself into a great state of fatigue, of course.'
"He picked up the bottle of Tokay, which was empty, and set it down again with a sigh. 'I was nearly done with the whole ordeal, and we'd set a wedding date for the end of June. The night before my last examination, I stayed up until the wee hours looking over my notes. I knew I'd covered everything I needed to already, but I simply couldn't stop myself. I was working in a corner of the library in my college, sort of tucked away behind some bookshelves where I didn't have to watch the other few madmen in there looking through their own notes.
"'There are some awfully nice books in those little libraries, and I let myself get distracted for a moment or two by a volume of Dryden's sonnets just a hand's reach away. Then I made myself put it back, thinking I'd better go out and have a cigarette and try to concentrate again afterward. I tucked the book back into the shelf and went to the courtyard. It was a lovely spring night, and I stood there thinking about Elspeth and the cottage she was fixing up for us, and about my best friend - would have been my best man - who'd died over the Ploiesti oil fields with the Americans, and then I went back up to the library. To my surprise, Dryden was lying there on my desk as if I'd never put it away, and I thought I must be getting pretty noddleheaded with all the work. So I turned to put it up, but I saw there was no space for it. It had been right next to Dante, I was sure, but now there was a different book there, a book that had a very old-looking spine with a little creature engraved on it. I pulled it out and it fell open in my hands to - well, you know.'
"His friendly face was pale now, and he searched first his shirt and then his pants pockets until he found a package of cigarettes. 'You don't smoke?' He lit one and drew heavily on it. 'I was caught by the appearance of the book, its apparent age, the menacing look of the dragon - everything that struck you, too, about yours. There were no librarians there at three in the morning, so I went down to the catalog and dug around a bit by myself, but I learned only Vlad Tepes's name and lineage. Since there was no library stamp in the book, I took it home with me.
"'I slept poorly and couldn't concentrate in the least on my examination the next morning; all I could think of was getting to the other libraries and perhaps to London to see what I could find out. But I didn't have time, and when I went up for my wedding, I took the little book and kept looking at it at odd moments. Elspeth caught me with it, and when I explained she didn't like it, not a bit. That was five days to our wedding and yet I couldn't stop thinking about the book, and talking to her about it, too, until she told me not to.
"'Then one morning - it was two days to the wedding - I had a sudden inspiration. You see, there's a great house not too far from my parents' village, a Jacobean pile people come to see on bus tours. I'd always thought it sort of a bore on our school trips, but I remembered that the nobleman who'd built it had been a book collector and had things from all over the world. Since I couldn't go to London until after the wedding, I thought I'd get myself into the house library, which is famous, and poke around, perhaps even find something on Transylvania. I told my parents I was going for a walk, and I knew they'd assume I was going to see Elsie.
"'It was a rainy morning - foggy, too, and cold. The housekeeper at the great house said they weren't open for tours that day, but she let me come in to look at the library. She'd heard about the wedding in the village, knew my grandmother, and brewed me a cup of tea. By the time I had my mackintosh off and had found twenty shelves of books from that old Jacobean's Grand Tour, which had reached rather farther east than most, I'd forgotten everything else.
"'I turned through all these wonders, and others he had collected in England, perhaps after his tour, until I came across a history of Hungary and Transylvania, and in it I found a mention of Vlad Tepes, and then another, and finally, to my joy and astonishment, I came across an account of Vlad's burial at Lake Snagov, before the altar of a church he had refurbished there. This account was a legend taken down by an English adventurer to the region - he called himself simply "A Traveller" on the title page, and he was a contemporary of the Jacobean collector. This would have been about 130 years after Vlad's death, you see. "'"A Traveller" had visited the monastery in Snagov in 1605. He had talked a good deal with the monks there, and they had told him that according to legend a great book, a treasure of the monastery, had been placed on the altar during Vlad's funeral, and the monks present at the ceremony had signed their names in it, and those who could not write had drawn a dragon in honor of the Order of the Dragon. No mention, unfortunately, of what had happened to the book after that. But I found this most remarkable. Then the Traveller said that he asked to look at the tomb, and the monks showed him a flat stone in the floor before the altar. It had a portrait of Vlad Drakulya painted on it, and Latin words across it - perhaps painted also, since the Traveller didn't mention engraving and was struck by the lack of the usual cross to mark the gravestone. The epitaph, which I copied down with care - out of what instinct I didn't know - was in Latin.' Hugh dropped his voice, glanced behind him, and stubbed out his cigarette in the ashtray on our table.
"'After I'd written it down and struggled with it a while, I read my translation aloud: "Reader, unbury him with a - " You know how it goes. The rain was still coming down hard outside, and a window that had got loose somewhere in the library slammed open and shut, so I felt a breath of damp air nearby. I must have been jumpy, because I knocked over my teacup and a drop of tea spilled on the book. While I was wiping this up and feeling dreadful about my clumsiness, I noticed my watch - it was already one o'clock and I knew I ought to get home to dinner. There didn't seem to be anything else relevant to look at there, so I put away the books, thanked the housekeeper, and went back down the lanes between all those June roses.
"'When I got to my parents' house, expecting to see them and perhaps Elsie gathering at the table, I found things in an uproar. Several friends and neighbors were there, and my mother was weeping. My father looked very upset.' Here Hugh lit another cigarette, and the match shook in the gathering darkness. 'He put a hand on my shoulder and told me there had been an automobile accident on the main road as Elsie was driving a borrowed car back from some shopping in a nearby town. It had been raining hard, and they thought she'd seen something and swerved. She was not dead, thank the Lord, but badly injured. Her parents had gone at once to the hospital and mine had been waiting at home for me, to tell me.
"'I found a car and drove there so fast I almost had an accident myself. You don't want to hear all this, I'm sure, but - she was lying with her head bandaged and her eyes wide-open. That's how she looked. She lives at a sort of home now, where she's very well treated, but she doesn't speak or understand much, or feed herself. The awful thing about this is¡­' His voice began to tremble. 'The awful thing is, I've always assumed it was an accident, really an accident, and now that I've heard your stories - Rossi's friend Hedges, and your - your cat - I don't know what to think.' He smoked hard.
"I let out a deep breath. 'I'm very, very sorry. I wish I knew what to say. What a terrible thing for you.'
"'Thank you.' He seemed to be trying to recover some of his usual demeanor. 'It's been some years now, you know, and time helps. It's simply that - '
"I didn't know then, as I know now, what hung at the other end of that sentence, which he did not finish - the futile words, the unspeakable litany of loss. As we sat there, the past suspended between us, a waiter came out with a candle in a glass lantern and set it on our table. The caf¨¦ was filling with people, and I could hear shouts of laughter from inside.
"'I'm stunned by what you just told me about Snagov,' I said after a while. 'You know, I'd never heard any of that about the tomb - the inscription, I mean, and the painted face and the lack of a cross. The correspondence of the inscription with the words Rossi found on the maps in the Istanbul archive is extremely important, I think - it's proof that Snagov was at least the original site of Dracula's tomb.' I pressed my fingers to my temples. 'Why, then, why does the map - the dragon map in the books and in the archive - not correspond to the topography of Snagov - the lake, the island?'
"'I wish I knew.'
"'Did you continue your research about Dracula after that?'
"'Not for several years.' Hugh stubbed out his cigarette. 'I didn't have the heart to. About two years ago, though, I found myself thinking about him again, and when I started working on my current book, my Hungarian book, I kept an eye out for him.'
"It had grown quite dark now, and the Danube glowed with reflected lights from the bridge and the buildings of Pest. A waiter came to offer eszpressz¨®, and we accepted gratefully. Hugh took a sip and set his cup down. 'Would you like to see the book?' he asked.
"'The one you're researching?' I was puzzled for a moment.
"'No - my dragon book.'
"I started. 'You have it here?'
"'I always carry it on me,' he said sternly. 'Well, almost always. Actually, I left it at my hotel during the lectures today, because I thought it might be safer there while I was lecturing. When I think it might have been stolen - ' He stopped. 'Yours was not in your room, was it?'
"'No.' I had to smile. 'I carry mine around, too.'
"He pushed our coffee cups carefully aside and opened his briefcase. From it he took a polished wooden box, and from that a parcel wrapped in cloth, which he placed on the table. Inside it was a book smaller than mine but bound in the same worn vellum. The pages were browner and more brittle than those in my book, but the dragon in the center was the same, filling the pages to their very edges and glowering up at us. Silently, I opened my briefcase and took out my own book, setting its central image next to Hugh's dragon. They were identical, I thought, bending close to each.
"'Look at this smudge over here - even that's the same. They were printed from the same block,' Hugh said in a low voice.
"He was right, I saw. 'You know, this reminds me of something else, which I forgot to tell you just now. Miss Rossi and I stopped by the university library this afternoon before going back to the hotel, because she wanted to look up something she saw there a while back.' I described the volume of Romanian folk songs and the weird lyrics about monks entering a great city. 'She thought this might have something to do with the story in the Istanbul manuscript I told you about. The lyrics were very general, but there was an interesting woodcut at the top of the page, a sort of thicket of woods with a tiny church and dragon among them, and a word.'
"'Drakulya?' Hugh guessed, as I had in the library.
"'No, Ivireanu.' I looked it up in my notebook and showed him the spelling.
"His eyes widened. 'But that's remarkable!' he cried.
"'What? Tell me quickly.'
"'Well, it's just that I saw that name in the library yesterday.'
"'In the same library? Where? In the same book?' I was too impatient to wait politely for the answer.
"'Yes, in the university library, but not in the same book. I've been poking around there all week for material for my project, and since I always have our friend in the back of my mind, I keep finding the odd reference to his world. You know, Dracula and Hunyadi were bitter enemies, and Dracula and Matthias Corvinus after that, so you run into Dracula now and then. I mentioned to you at lunch that I'd found a manuscript commissioned by Corvinus, the document that mentions the ghost in the amphora.'"'Oh, yes,' I said eagerly. 'Is that also where you saw the word Ivireanu? '
"'Actually, no. The Corvinus manuscript is very interesting, but for different reasons. The manuscript says - well, I have copied a little here. The original is in Latin.'
"He got out his notebook and read me a few lines. '"In the year of Our Lord 1463, the king's humble servant offers him these words from great writings, all to give His Majesty information on the curse of the vampire, may he perish in hell. This information is for His Majesty's royal collection. May it assist him in curing this evil in our city, in ending the presence of vampires, and in keeping the plague from our dwellings." And so on. Then the good scribe, whoever he was, goes on to list the references he's found in various classical works, including tales of the ghost in the amphora. As you can tell, the date of the manuscript is the year after Dracula's arrest and his first imprisonment near Buda. You know, your description of that same concern on the part of the Turkish sultan, which you detected in those documents in Istanbul, prompts me to think Dracula made trouble wherever he went. Both mention the plague, and both are concerned with the presence of vampirism. It's quite similar, isn't it?'
"He paused thoughtfully. 'Actually, that connection with plague is not so farfetched, in a way - I read in an Italian document at the British Museum Library that Dracula used germ warfare against the Turks. He must have been one of the first Europeans to use it, in fact. He liked to send any of his own people who'd contracted infectious diseases into the Turkish camps, dressed like Ottomans.' In the lantern light, Hugh's eyes were narrow now, his face shining with an intense concentration. It rushed over me that in Hugh James we had found an ally of the keenest intelligence.
"'This is all fascinating,' I said. 'But what about the mention of the word Ivireanu? ' "'Oh, I'm so sorry.' Hugh smiled. 'I'm a bit off track. Yes, I did see that word in the library here. I came across it three or four days ago, I think, in a seventeenth-century New Testament in Romanian. I was looking through it because I thought the cover showed an unusual influence of Ottoman design. The title page had the word Ivireanu across the bottom - I'm sure it was the same word. I didn't think much about it at the time - to be frank, I'm always running across Romanian words that mystify me, because I know so little of the language. It caught my attention because of the typeface, actually, which was sort of elegant. I assumed it was a place-name or something of the sort.'
"I groaned. 'And that was all? You've never seen it anywhere else?'
"'I'm afraid not.' Hugh was attending to his deserted cup of coffee. 'If I run across it again, I'll be sure to let you know.' "'Well, it may have little to do with Dracula, after all,' I said, to comfort myself. 'I just wish we had more time to examine this library. We have to fly back to Istanbul on Monday, unfortunately - I don't have permission to stay beyond the duration of the conference. If you do find anything of interest - '
"'Of course,' Hugh said. 'I'll be around for another six days. If I find something, shall I write to you at your department?' "This gave me a turn; it had been days since I'd thought seriously about home, and I had no idea when I would next be checking my mail in my departmental box there. 'No, no,' I said hastily. 'At least, not yet. If you find something you really think might help us, please call Professor Bora. Just explain to him that we talked. If I speak with him myself, I'll let him know you might get in touch with him.' I took out Turgut's card and wrote the number down for Hugh.
"'Very good.' He tucked it into his breast pocket. 'And here's my card for you. I do hope we'll be running into each other again.' We sat there in silence for a few seconds, his gaze lowered to the table with its empty cups and plates and flickering candle flame. 'Look here,' he said finally. 'If all you've said is true - or all Rossi said, anyway - and there is a Count Dracula, or a Vlad the Impaler - extant - in some awful sense, then I'd like to help you - '
"'Eradicate him?' I finished quietly. 'I'll remember that.'
"There seemed to be nothing left for us to say just now, although I hoped we would talk again someday. We found a taxi to take us back to Pest, and he insisted on walking me into the hotel. We were saying a cordial good-bye at the front desk when the clerk I'd talked with earlier suddenly came out of his cubicle and grasped my arm. 'Herr Paul!' he said urgently.
"'What is it?' Hugh and I both turned to stare at the man. He was a tall, drooping man in a blue worker's jacket, with mustaches that would have suited a Hun warrior. He pulled me close to speak in a low voice, and I managed to signal to Hugh not to leave us. There was no one else in sight, and I didn't especially want to be alone with any new crisis.
"'Herr Paul, I know who was in your zimmer this afternoon.'
"'What? Who?' I said.
"'Hmm, hmm.' The clerk began almost to hum to himself and to glance around, searching his jacket pocket in what would have been a meaningful way if only I'd understood his meaning. I wondered if the man was some sort of idiot.
"'He wants a bribe,' Hugh translated in an undertone.
"'Oh, for heaven's sake,' I said in exasperation, but the man's eyes seemed to glaze over, brightening only when I fished out two large Hungarian bills. He took them secretively and hid them in his pocket, but said nothing to acknowledge my capitulation."'Herr American,' he whispered. 'I know it was not only ein man from this afternoon. It is two men. One comes in first, very important man. Then the other. I see him when I go up with a suitcase to another zimmer. Then I see them. They talk. They walk out together.'
"'Didn't anyone stop them?' I snapped. 'Who were they? Were they Hungarian?' The man was glancing all around him again, and I suppressed the urge to throttle him. This atmosphere of censorship was taking a toll on my nerves. I must have looked angry, because Hugh put a restraining hand on my arm.
"'Important man Hungarian. Other man not Hungarian.'
"'How do you know?'"He lowered his voice.
'One man Hungarian, but they speaks Anglisch together.' That was all he would say, despite my increasingly threatening questions. Since he had apparently decided he'd given me enough information for the number of forints I'd handed over, I might never have heard another word from him had it not been for something that seemed suddenly to catch his attention. He was looking past me, and after a second I turned, too, to follow his gaze through the great window by the hotel door. Through it, for a split second, I saw a hungry, hollow-eyed countenance I'd come to know much too well, a face that belonged in a grave, not on the street. The clerk was spluttering, clinging to my arm. 'There he is, with his devil face - the Anglischer man!'
"With what must have been a howl, I shook off the clerk and ran for the door; Hugh, with great presence of mind (I later realized), plucked an umbrella from the stand by the desk and bolted after me. Even in my alarm, I kept a tight grip on my briefcase, and that slowed me down as I ran. We turned this way and that, dashed up the street and back, but it was no use. I hadn't even heard the man's footsteps, so I couldn't tell which way he'd fled.
"Finally, I stopped to lean against the side of a building, trying to catch my breath. Hugh was panting hard. 'What was it?' he gasped.
"'The librarian,' I said when I could manage a few words. 'The one who followed us to Istanbul. I'm sure it was him.'
"'Good Lord.' Hugh wiped his forehead with his sleeve. 'What's he doing here?'
"'Trying to get the rest of my notes,' I wheezed. 'He's a vampire, if you can believe that, and now we've led him to this beautiful city.' Actually, I said more than that, and Hugh must have recognized from our common language all the American variants of infuriation. The thought of the curse I was trailing almost brought tears to my eyes.
"'Come, now,' Hugh said soothingly. 'They've had vampires here before, as we know.' But his face was white and he stared around him, gripping the umbrella.
"'Blast it!' I beat the side of the building with my fist.
"'You've got to keep a close eye out,' Hugh said soberly. 'Is Miss Rossi back?'
"'Helen!' I hadn't thought of her at once, and Hugh seemed on the verge of a smile at my exclamation. 'I'll go back now and check. I'm going to call Professor Bora, too. Look, Hugh - you keep a close eye out, too. Be careful, all right? He saw you with me, and that doesn't seem to be good luck for anyone these days.'
"'Don't worry about me.' Hugh was looking thoughtfully at the umbrella in his hand. 'How much did you pay that clerk?'
"I laughed in spite of my breathlessness. 'Yes, keep it on you.' We shook hands heartily, and Hugh vanished up the street in the direction of his hotel, which wasn't far. I didn't like his going on his own, but there were people in the street now, strolling and talking. In any case, I knew he'd always go his own way; he was that sort of man.
"Back in the hotel lobby, there was no sign of the terrified clerk. Perhaps it was only that his shift had ended, for a clean-shaven young man had taken his place behind the counter. He showed me that the key to Helen's new room was on its hook, so I knew she must still be with her aunt. The young man let me use the phone, after a careful arrangement for the cost, and then it took me a couple of tries to make Turgut's number ring. It galled me to call from the hotel phone, which I knew could be bugged, but it was the only possibility at this hour. I would have to hope our conversation would be too peculiar to be understood. At last I heard a clicking on the line, and then Turgut's voice, far away but jovial, answering in Turkish.
"'Professor Bora!' I shouted. 'Turgut, it's Paul, calling from Budapest.'
"'Paul, my dear man!' I thought I'd never heard anything sweeter than that rumbling, distant voice. 'There's some problem on the line - give me your number there in case we are cut asunder.'
"I got it from the hotel clerk and shouted it to him. He shouted back. 'How are you? Have you found him?'
"'No!' I shouted. 'We are fine, and I've learned a little more, but something awful has happened.'
"'What is that?' I could hear his consternation, faintly, over the line. 'Have you been hurt? Miss Rossi?'
"'No - we're fine, but the librarian has followed us here.' I heard a swell of words that could have been some Shakespearean curse but was impossible to distinguish from the static. 'What do you think we should do?'
"'I don't know yet.' Turgut's voice was a little clearer now. 'Do you carry all the time the kit I gave you?'
"'Yes,' I said. 'But I can't get close enough to this ghoul to do anything with it. I think he searched my room today while we were at the conference, and apparently someone helped him.' Perhaps the police were listening in at this very moment. Who knew what they would make of all this anyway?
"'Be very careful, Professor.' Turgut sounded worried. 'I do not have any wise advice for you, but I shall have some news soon, maybe even before you return to Istanbul. I am glad you called tonight. Mr. Aksoy and I have found a new document, one neither one of us has ever seen before. He found it in the archive of Mehmed. This document was written by a monk of the Eastern Orthodox Church in 1477, and it must be translated.'
"There was static on the line again, and I had to shout. 'Did you say 1477? What language is it in?'
"'I cannot hear you, dear boy!' Turgut bellowed, far away. 'There was a rainstorm here. I will call you tomorrow night.' A Babel of voices - I couldn't tell whether they were Hungarian or Turkish - broke in on us and swallowed his next words. More clicking followed, and then the line went dead. I hung up slowly, wondering if I should call back, but the clerk was already taking the phone from me with a worried expression and adding up my bill on a scrap of paper. I paid glumly and stood there for a moment, not liking to go up to my bare new room, to which I'd been allowed to take only my shaving instruments and a clean shirt. My spirits were sinking rapidly - it had already been a very long day, after all, and the clock in the lobby said nearly eleven.
"They would have sunk lower still if a taxi hadn't pulled up at that moment. Helen got out and paid the driver, then came through the great door. She hadn't noticed me by the desk yet, and her face was grave and reticent, with the melancholy intensity I'd sometimes noticed in it. She had wrapped herself in a shawl of downy black-and-red wool that I had never seen before, perhaps a gift from her aunt. It muted the harsh lines of her suit and shoulders and made her skin glow white and luminous even under the crude lighting of the lobby. She looked like a princess, and I stared unabashedly at her for a moment before she saw me. It was not only her beauty, thrown into relief by the soft wool and the regal angle of her chin, that kept me riveted. I was remembering again, with an uneasy quiver inside, the portrait in Turgut's room  - the proud head, the long straight nose, the great dark eyes with their heavy, hooded lids above and below. Perhaps I was just very tired, I told myself, and when Helen saw me and smiled, the image vanished again from my inner sight."