"I told him to have it swept. He never liked the snow. Did you know that, Yashim? It used to frighten him, as a little boy. That's why he was called Hyacinth."

"I'm very sorry, valide," Yashim murmured.

"Yes, yes. Et moi aussi." She paused. "He fell from the bal.u.s.trade, you say?"

"Yesterday. They found him this morning."

"The question is, Yashim, who pushed him? An old man ..."

Yashim shook his head. "The bal.u.s.trade is low, and the ground was slippery. Hyacinth was not so steady anymore."

"Rubbish," the valide snapped. "I have never heard such a thing. When Hyacinth arrived he could barely see over the top of that rail. C'etait un nain, pratiquement."

Almost a dwarf? She was going a little far, Yashim thought; but yes, Hyacinth was never quite full size.

"He could have simply slipped through the gaps," the valide added. She looked thoughtful.

Yashim said nothing. Of all the ways the valide could have reacted, this was not the way he would have expected. Nor wished for, either. She was turning the shock into a kind of puzzle.

The valide had always enjoyed Yashim's investigations. He had learned not to spare her the grisly details, either, for she had the stomach for them. She liked stories about the city, about other lives, the crimes and peccadilloes of the people, and Yashim had come to realize that the valide was unshockable. But this was Hyacinth; this was a man who had shared her own life, to a degree.

It was Yashim's turn to be shocked. The dead man, he felt, deserved better.

"I thought you ought to know, at least," he concluded, a little lamely.

"Quite right, Yashim. And now I want you on the case. Who pushed him? Keep me informed."

She closed her eyes.

104.

MELDA startled at his approach.

"Don't worry. It's me again. Yashim. I just came to see how you were."

There was no need to ask, he thought: she looked startlingly thin, the skin drawn tight over the bones of her face, her shoulders narrow and sunken. She was only twenty, but in a week she had aged like the valide herself.

Her eyes flickered toward him once, and then settled back, to stare dully at a spot on the opposite wall.

Hyacinth had placed her in the harem hospital, in a small, plain room without tiling or decoration. The high window was protected by a wooden shutter. Apart from the narrow cot on which she sat, there were two small octagonal tables and a stool with a plain woven seat.

He drew the stool closer to the girl and sat down quietly.

"Have you been eating, Melda?"

She shivered, and drew her wrists across her stomach.

"Are you cold? It's a bit cold in here, isn't it? Let's get you to a fire," he suggested gently. There must be better rooms than this, he thought.

Melda gave a jerk and looked away. Yashim bit his lip.

"You're thinking about Elif," he began slowly. "When you're alone like this, you can think things and feel things that make you more worried and afraid."

Her eyelids quivered: she was like a wild animal caught in a trap.

"I thought you would be better here," he said. "You are safe." He was about to add that she was being looked after, when he reflected that Hyacinth was dead. Had they forgotten her, in the pandemonium?

"Let's get you to a better room," he said. She needed food and warmth.

Melda gave a compulsive shake of her head, and shifted her gaze to stare down by his feet. She slowly twisted her head until she was looking out of the corner of her eye. As if she were afraid of what he would do next.

"I won't hurt you, Melda. I want to help."

She blinked. Her white lips moved.

Yashim strained forward to catch a sound. "What is it, Melda? What did you say?"

"Elif-had a baby."

"How? How could she have a baby, Melda?"

"Not-that one," Melda stuttered; her head jerked as she spoke. "A-stare-baby."

"A what? What is that?"

She glanced at him in surprise. "Elif-she-she looked. At him. That's what's happened. That's where it began."

"What began, Melda?"

"It grows inside you, just like a real baby-but it's not. It's a demon. It's from the demon in the man."

"The demon, Melda? Tell me about the demon." He took her hands in his and chafed them softly, struggling to keep the astonishment off his face as Melda explained, falteringly, what had happened to Elif: how Donizetti Pasha's glance had sowed the seed of a stare-baby, and how Elif had become sick.

"It was growing," she said. "Donizetti Pasha can't help it; he's a man, it's in his nature. But she-she wanted to get rid of it."

She covered her face and began to weep hot, real tears. Yashim welcomed them: anything, he thought, was better than that frozen impa.s.sivity.

"And then-what then?"

Melda wiped her eyes. "Then she took some things to drink, to make-to make-the stare-baby come out."

"What drinks? How-"

"They made her bleed." Her mouth twisted into a horrified grimace. "They. Made. Her. Bleed. She-said-she was on fire."

Yashim gazed at her, aghast. Elif 's death had always seemed to him to be perverse, unnatural-but he had never imagined it like this.

"I'll get you somewhere warmer, and you should take something. Some soup. We can talk again later, if you like."

He stood up. She gave no sign of hearing him. At the door he turned and she was still sitting like a frightened hare, showing the whites of her eyes as she watched the place where he had been.

At the end of the corridor he tapped at the door of the orderly's room. There was no reply. He opened the door and checked: it was empty.

He let out an exasperated sigh. Hyacinth had seemed so ineffective, but his death revealed just how much the running of the harem had depended on him. Sweeping the ground, feeding a girl in the hospital, getting the other eunuchs off their backsides: since he'd gone the whole place seemed to have ground to a halt.

With a flash of anger he surged down the corridor toward the eunuchs' quarters and burst into their common room.

Within three minutes, alarmed old men were running hither and thither in pursuit of their duties. Yashim went to the kitchens, where he found a cook washing rice while another sc.r.a.ped carrots.

"Soup. What have you got?"

The man stirring the rice looked at him stupidly and shrugged, mouth open. The man sc.r.a.ping carrots jerked his chin. "The stock's all there. What do you want?"

Yashim lifted the lid and sniffed: good chicken broth.

"Can you clear the broth?"

The carrot man nodded.

Yashim had visited the kitchens before, but this was the first time he had hefted a palace pan or wielded a palace knife. He selected a small heavy iron pan.

"We use those ones for the sultan, efendi."

"The sultan is no longer here, my friend," Yashim replied. "Where are your spices?"

He laid the ingredients out on the chopping board: onion, garlic, a long red chili, and a carrot that the man had sc.r.a.ped clean. He set the sultan's pan on a gentle heat and covered its base with olive oil, adding a small k.n.o.b of b.u.t.ter before he chopped the onion into very small pieces.

The knife, he noticed, was as keen as his own, and heavier: it would split a silk scarf.

Finding himself in the greatest kitchen in Istanbul, Yashim set about making one of the simplest dishes he knew: lentil soup.

He sc.r.a.ped the seeds out of the chili and chopped it together with the garlic, admiring the balance of the knife and the slight feathered curve toward its tip. The b.u.t.ter had melted; he shook the pan and swept in the vegetables, with a big pinch of c.u.min and coriander.

He cut the carrot into small dice, and stirred it into the onions as they began to turn.

The cook pa.s.sed him a small bra.s.s grinder. Yashim smelled the fenugreek: he gave it a few twists and handed it back.

"Thank you," he said. "You have the lentils?"

The cook nodded. He handed Yashim a cup of lentils, which he poured into the pan like a cascade of treasure, stirring them around for a few moments with a small spoonful of white sugar.

The cook brought him a bowl of the clarified stock.

Yashim smiled. "When you like," he said; and then: "enough." The steam rose in a puff, and drifted into the vast cool vaults overhead. "Now, a lid-and I'll help you with the carrots, if you like."

When they were sitting together, side by side, Yashim asked him what he was cooking.

The cook gave a lopsided grin. "It's not how it is done," he explained. "I am only the peeler. But one day, I shall be a cook."

"You were a cook today," Yashim reminded him.

The man stole a glance at the man washing rice. "Yes," he said quietly. "Yes, perhaps I was."

When the soup was done, Yashim ladled it into a bowl and sprinkled it with chopped parsley.

He put a bowl over the top, to keep it warm, and carried it carefully back to the harem.

He caught sight of Tulin at the entrance to the Golden Road as she came out of the valide's courtyard. She stopped in front of him, and smiled.

"I came to ask for wood," she said. "But it seems to be taken care of, now."

Yashim bowed politely. "I hope they'll send in someone from outside," he remarked. "To replace Hyacinth. It turns out he was something of an administrator, after all. These fellows are just like chickens."

"Yes. We need a fox, Yashim efendi."

She smiled again, and Yashim smiled, too. Out in the open air, the girl was remarkably pretty: she had a freshness about her that was more than youth, or the crisp winter air.

"I'm worried about Melda, in the hospital."

"Yes." She nodded gravely. "I have been thinking about her."

"I've had her moved to a warmer room, and I'm taking her this soup, but she's-I know you have plenty to do, Tulin, but I'd be grateful if you'd look in on her now and then."

"Hyacinth didn't encourage anyone to talk to her. But I'd like to help if I can."

"That would be good. She's been too much alone, I think."

Tulin c.o.c.ked her head back. "The lady Talfa spoke with her," she said. "She was very kind."

"The lady Talfa?" Yashim was surprised. "She came here?"

"Oh yes, she came over from the Besiktas palace to visit the valide. With her daughter. Later on she met all the ladies, and took Melda off for a chat."

Yashim grunted. "I'm sure she meant well."

Tulin giggled. "I am sure of it, too, Yashim efendi. She is a very-grand lady."

"Quite."

She held his gaze. "I'd better get back, now that they are bringing wood."