The Laughter of Carthage: Pyat Quartet

  The gloomy streets leading steeply up to Pera were mysterious canyons. Many were broken by crazy flights of steps to ease their sudden ascent. They sheltered mendicants of every description, sellers of carpets, oil-jars, sweets. In some of them boys on bicycles with car-horns attached to their handlebars tried to clear a way through the press of automobiles, donkeys, bullock carts, elegant carriages and even an occasional sedan chair. These alleys stank of horse-droppings, dogs, human urine, coffee, roasting mutton, tobacco, spices and perfumes. Veiled women with swift eyes like pebbles on a tide were almost as numerous as men. Since I knew it was unwise for foreigners to show interest in Turkish ladies I avoided looking at them. I already risked having my throat cut for my gold; I did not want it cut for a misplaced glance.

  At long last, crackling and sputtering, the dirty green Number One drew up at the stop. Its brass and wooden sides were so battered it might itself have served at the Front. As I made to mount the footboard I was engulfed. From everywhere suddenly came Turks in fezzes, Greeks in bowlers, Armenians in astrakhan caps. I was swept upward, having time only to offer my silver piastre piece in exchange for a first-class ticket printed in French. The conductor carelessly accepted my money, took me by the arm and pushed me towards the back of the tram where there were fewer people. As I began to sit on one of the wooden benches, there came a great wave of hissing from behind me. Black eyes glared over veils. I realised with horror that I was in the Ladies Only section. The conductor had seen me. He shouted in Turkish, pointing a severe finger at the sign so faded it was unreadable. Blushing, I eventually settled beside a dignified Circassian, in bandoliers, long-skirted coat, soft riding boots, who held a brief-case in his lap and stroked at grey moustaches, which lay against his nose like suckling rodents, and stared out into the teeming street. I said ‘Good morning’ to him in Russian, but he made no response. It began to drizzle. The tram juddered, whimpered, then continued its painful journey up steep, winding streets. On all sides of the vehicle men and women, youths and girls, swarmed apparently at random. Most wore some form of Western clothing, frequently blended with Oriental dress, and none was particularly clean. But at least I was witnessing ordinary life; life as I had known it in, say, the backstreets of St Petersburg and in my native Kiev before the War. Conquered though they were, the Turks continued about their ordinary business. They had not been forced to creep cautiously, looking over their shoulders in terror for their lives and liberty, as was the case in so many Russian cities now. Indeed the contrast was increased for me since Pera was also Constantinople’s main Russian quarter. Many of my countrymen still wore their uniforms. Others wore suits of typical Moscow and Petersburg cut. Aristocrats and peasants were equal here as they would never be in Russia, all desperate for passports or work, for someone to buy what remained of their treasures. I would have recognised them as easily from their dazed expressions, their haunted eyes, their uncertain movements, as by their clothes. I put one hand into my coat pocket to grasp the butt of a pistol. I had looked at such faces for too long and was determined my own should never again resemble them.

  Leaving the water behind, the tram approached another, coming from downhill. I thought they must certainly crash head-on. The two vehicles passed so close, swaying wildly in the narrow street, that their sides almost touched. There was a general clanking and whining and ringing of bells. Our tram swung round a corner to the left then almost immediately took another to the right. I was shaken, disoriented, uncomfortable, but happy to be in a city again, no matter how strange. Everywhere I looked the unstable wooden buildings, several storeys high, often unpainted, their foundations shaken by half-a-dozen earthquakes at least, seemed about to collapse into the street, yet from time to time appeared a magnificent Islamic dome, a mosque which had stood like a rock for centuries; elsewhere were marble towers, a little green park; and everywhere, suddenly, were clumps of poplars, cypresses and pines. We passed ragged, blackened gaps where houses had been razed by fire; there were piles of rubble, as if from shelling, new buildings half-constructed then apparently abandoned; elsewhere grandiose modern façades were already cracking and crumbling. Pera might have been the back lot of a run-down cinema company. What was substantial was in poor repair, what looked imposing was a sham, what looked most theatrical was probably the best piece of architecture in the town. This ‘new’ ghetto, where successive Sultans had confined their foreign visitors since the treaty with Genoese traders in the sixteenth century, had been allowed to exist in deliberate contrast to the Moslem city on the Golden Horn’s opposite bank. I glimpsed Stamboul occasionally through gaps in the buildings as the tram swerved this way and that. From Pera the view of ancient Constantinople was unspoiled and magnificent. I was reminded of some dreaming, elegant Caliph swaddled in sensuous luxury, carelessly unaware of the noise and poverty, the common stink from which he was separated only by a short expanse of water, a couple of narrow bridges.

  The tram now began to move up a wider street containing better proportioned, more evidently European stone buildings. There were well-ordered trees, shops selling better-quality goods, yet still thoroughfares were crowded, smelly, full of vagrant noise. The conductor yelled at me from the far side of a dozen greasy fezzes. ‘Arrive,’ he shouted. ‘Arrive, monsieur!’ He gestured towards the wall of a small park which I could just see through the windows. I pushed through hard, unhelping flesh towards the exit, climbed down the tram’s wooden steps, checked my possessions were still about me, and as the vehicle moved on, stood upon a broken flagstone looking up and down the street. I was in the Grande Rue de Pera, the avenue of embassies, hotels, and popular legend. My childhood thrillers had not properly prepared me for the reality. I had expected something closer to the Nevski Prospect or the Nicholas Boulevard, something wide, imposing, secluded. But I had forgotten the cleverness of Turks, who put all foreigners together where they might fight amongst themselves, where they could be subjected to daily inconvenience. I wandered back and forth across the street, dodging bicycles, horsemen, dogs, a kind of rickshaw, and at last recognised the wrought-iron balconies of the Pera Palas, said to be the best hotel in the city. (And also, I was soon to discover, a notorious haunt of Kemalists and foreign agents.)

  Lack of serious trouble in finding my hotel, however, dispersed the remains of my poor temper. I had become almost jaunty as I walked into the cool lobby, going straight to the reception desk. The place was relatively peaceful after the noise outside, and fairly clean. The cacophonous streets were somehow muffled, giving the place that proper sense of untroubled tranquillity and security, the mark of any first-class hotel. In common, too, with many other hotels of its day, the Palas had a tendency towards plush, black rococo cast-iron and gilt. Uniformed porters, in frockcoats, tarbooshes, and wearing white gloves, were in abundance. Even the Greek manager, waxed and fat, contrived to look French. I announced myself. He consulted his register. At length he nodded. ‘So pleased you were able to find us, m’sieu.’ He handed my key to an Armenian porter and the man, looking like some janissary from the Sultan’s guard, strode to the lift with an air of quiet dignity. We ascended smoothly to the third floor. My room was displayed with a touch of ceremony by the porter who appreciated my mumble of approval. The room was small, looking out over the Grande Rue, and was opulently comfortable for what it was, with its own wash-stand and toilet facilities. Again I used a silver rouble to tip the porter. Silver of any currency was perfectly acceptable to Turks, though I learned French Napoleons and British sovereigns were (perhaps since Lawrence) the common coin of larger dealings.

  I ordered some hot water. The bed, with its carved and gilded headboard, its red velvet coverlet, was luxurious. I had an armchair, a little writing-desk, a box-room for my trunks and a large wardrobe. The little dressing-room had solid, if old-fashioned, facilities, including a full-length mirror. While I waited for the water, I took from my toilet case my razor, hand-mirror and a packet of cocaine. For the first time in a month I could enjoy my drug in r
elaxed and pleasant surroundings. A good-looking youth brought my water, some fresh towels, and soon I felt completely myself again. I had on a clean shirt, a smart dark brown three-piece suit, and I had oiled my hair. Now I was myself again: Colonel M. A. Pyat, late of the 13th Don Cossack Regiment, scientist and man-of-the-world.

  I was arranging my brushes and boxes in the dressing-room, when there came a knock on the door. Adjusting my tie I went to answer. It was only the bellboy with a note on a salver from Mrs Cornelius. Welcome ashore, Ivan. Sorry I’m not here to show you around but I know you’ll do all right by yourself. Back in couple of days. Love, H.C. I was disappointed. Doubtless she was visiting her Frenchman. But I refused to become depressed. I would have time now to see something of the city before we continued on to England via the Orient Express (or by another ship). I had of course looked forward to having my first meal with her, but consoled myself: Soon I would be dining with Mrs Cornelius as often as I liked in London. All that really mattered was that I was at last in a true metropolis. There was no immediate threat from an invading enemy for the police of five Allied nations kept the peace. In Constantinople, too, one might enjoy every conceivable form of pleasure. I remembered the old saying that here the Moslem lost his virtues and the European added to his vices. There is nowhere quite as thrilling as a city recently emerged from War. Men and women develop eager habits of living to the full. From my window alone I could see dozens of restaurants, little theatres, cabarets. It was not yet lunch-time and already music came from the cafés. Fair-skinned, uniformed young men walked up and down the Grande Rue with unveiled, laughing Turkish girls on their arms. Everyone seemed so carefree. It would never be possible to capture the joy of my youth in Odessa, but Constantinople promised at least a taste of that old exhilaration. In fact it would be here I really discovered my ability to become quickly at home in any great metropolis. It would take me a few hours to learn the chief streets, a few days to discover the best restaurants and bars. A cosmopolitan city has a common language frequently making speech unnecessary. People come to be entertained, to buy and sell, to exchange ideas, to be artistically replenished, to embark upon sexual adventures. The complexity of trade is in itself the central stimulus. This is true of the poorest citizens as it is of the well-to-do. Only the very rich seem to know the kind of boredom which comes upon me, for instance, in the countryside; but such people would be bored anywhere; they have nothing to buy, nothing to sell, no nemesis save the ennui itself. To my joy I could hear Russian being spoken in the Grande Rue de Pera; I could hear French and English, Italian, even Yiddish, Greek and German. My blood quickened as it recognised its natural environment and I began to experience the rush of pleasure which accompanied the almost immediate revival of my complete old self. For too long I had experienced a half-life. Now I was about to set elegant patent leather upon real streets again.

  In those days I had not discovered the consolations and demands of religion. For me my soul and my senses were the same and God’s work could only properly be accomplished by means of the investigations and applications of Science. Perhaps this was the form of hubris Prometheus suffered. Perhaps that was why I, too, came to be punished. I wished to enlighten a world I believed had a positive will towards peace and knowledge but, as a young man, I was also full of unexplored emotional and physical desires. I wanted to discover the limits of my appetites. In 1920 the political fate of Constantinople did not at all concern me. I naturally assumed the Turk was conquered forever; Britain or Greece would run the city until Russia was sane again and ready for the task. In the meantime, I hoped to taste as many of her pleasures as I could. I had been starved for too long. In Kiev, after the Revolution, I had frequently managed to entertain myself, but my enjoyment had been coloured by the pervading uncertainty of the times. This had also been true in Odessa just before I left. But in Constantinople there were no Bolsheviks or Anarchists threatening my peace of mind. I had never heard of the so-called Committee of Union and Progress. I knew certain Young Turk officers and soldiers had refused to lay down their arms and disappeared into the Anatolian hinterland, but I assumed they would soon be rounded up. My overriding thought was that I was free. I had been resurrected as a citizen of the world. Russia’s tragedy was no longer mine. I unclipped my plan-case to look afresh at my drawings and equations, my neatly written notes. Here was my fortune and my future. My nose would be against the grindstone soon enough. In the meanwhile I deserved a small vacation. Dressed and groomed to perfection, I locked my door behind me, took the lift to the ground floor, handed in my key, said I would be back before dinner, and joined the life of the city outside. I had no real fear that anyone I had known in Odessa might casually recognise me out of uniform (or, if they did, I knew they would be wary of me) and could not really believe there was any immediate chance of meeting enemies from my Kiev or Petersburg days; most of those, after all, must have been killed by now. In fact I was perhaps a shade over-confident, certain I could easily overcome any danger, drunk on the freedom of the captured Turkish capital. Yet I cannot say I was a fool. My eye, from habit, was forever cautious. In the steppe villages I had been afraid because I could not interpret most of the gestures, signals and subtleties of their environment; but here, though the place was new to me, I could read most signs very readily and those not immediately recognisable could be rapidly learned.

  Instinctively I took a side street here, a main thoroughfare there. Crossing a little park I entered a shadowy café, ordering a cup of coffee while looking at everything and everyone, absorbing information swiftly and steadily: the little ways people had of using their hands, inflexions of speech, when they adopted passive mannerisms, when they felt able to seem aggressive. I knew I too was the object of their interest, because I was dressed so well, but I did not worry about that. Good spirits are one’s best protection anywhere. An open heart frequently saves you in the most appalling confrontations. In that sense it is always better for a city-dweller to be an innocent rather than to carry a gun. And one must be a good, natural actor: every day in a large metropolis we are called upon to play a variety of subtly different roles. It is nonsense, all this modern talk of what is a ‘real’ identity and what is not. We are the sum of our backgrounds, our experience and our environments; the self we present to the greengrocer is merely a different aspect of the self we present to the police inspector. The more conscious one is of this necessity of city life, the less one is confused, the easier it is to take action when action is called for.

  I studied the traffic. I stood in the cemetery of the Petit Champs, beneath poplars and plantains, and looked across the glinting Golden Horn at old Stamboul on her seven, misty hills. I turned to my left and saw the Bosphorus lying between me and Asian Scutari. I marvelled at the volume of shipping. It crowded the waters as densely as any city-street. Yet it was nothing compared to the unguessable vastness of the ancient city. I had never realised any metropolis could sprawl so far in so many directions and in this case on three distinct shores. Russian cities, even St Petersburg, were tiny in comparison, virtually embryonic. Constantinople had no visible limits. She seemed spaceless as well as timeless, inhabiting a universe of her own devising: an infinite island existing outside the planet’s ordinary dimensions, where all races, all ages coincided at once. So strong was this impression that I found myself trembling with pleasure at the notion and became reluctant to leave the gardens until, somewhere beyond a wall, a donkey (or perhaps an imam) began to bray, destroying my mood. I continued up a narrow, shady street cleaner than most, its terraces of apartments apparently occupied entirely by European families. At the end of this street was a parade of shops selling stationery, books, perfume, flowers, sweets and tobacco, reminding me of any decent middle-class part of Kiev. The titles of the books were in every European language, including Russian. I bought a packet of papyrussa and thus changed one of my Imperial roubles, knowing I was cheated on the rate but not caring. I turned back, eventually, into the Grande Rue. From a lit
tle boy who squeaked at me in an unidentifiable language I purchased a button-hole; he made strange smacking sounds with his lips. I bought Russian-language newspapers at a kiosk. Sitting at an outside table of a coffee-shop, I drank sherbert and read the papers, amused by their grandiloquent Tsarisms and empty pomposities. I smiled at girls with heavily painted faces and cheap finery who winked at me as they passed by. Every other woman appeared to be a whore and every whore looked beautiful to me. There were also dozens of upper-class ladies in expensively cut Parisian clothes and elaborate hats and even some of these spared me a glance. I loved such an ambience. It is gone completely from modern life.

  Tolerantly I waved away street-sellers offering me everything from their brothers’ buttocks to their sisters’ second-hand dolls. I bought some candy for a few kuruş, tried a little and handed it to the first child who begged a coin from me. Soon I had a reasonable sense of my location. The high part of town, Pera, was predominantly European, full of embassies and the mansions of the rich, offices of banking houses and shipping companies, better-quality shops. Sprawled below this, its border marked by the Galata Tower built by the original Genoese traders, were the mean, twisting alleys and jerry-built warrens of the poor. Further up the hill, beyond Pera, were suburban villas in spacious gardens, a predominance of lawns and parks. From the waterfront Galata Bridge led across the Horn to Stamboul, dominated here by Yeni Cami, the so-called New Mosque, with its unbelievably slender towers and clustered domes of different sizes. Stamboul was the Turkish city, though it also possessed a Greek quarter whose occupants traced their ancestors to before the time of Christ. Here were most of the older Orthodox Churches; the ancient, vaulted cisterns which were still in use, and the original walls of Byzantium, all productions of a superior culture the Turks might frequently imitate but never better. The most magnificent building of Stamboul remained Hagia Sophia, visible from Pera and distinguished easily by her bright yellow dome. This most beautiful of Christian churches the Ottomans continued to use as a model for their mosques. Although the majority of famous monuments were in Stamboul, making her the true site of Byzantium, perhaps Pera was the real Constantinople. Pera was where the Byzantines had buried their dead (it was still full of vast cemeteries for most races and religions), where the Osmanlis had hidden foreigners necessary to their trade; a city which flourished between dusk and dawn, given over to subtle diplomacy, exotic pleasures, obscure crimes and even more obscure vices, yet during the day the outward appearance of dignity and moral respectability, one of the marks of a typical European capital, was preserved. I was curious, of course, to visit Stamboul, but the pleasures of Pera took priority. I made no effort to restrain myself. I was a child given limitless credit in a sweetshop. I considered some sort of programme. It would not be wise to break immediately with the Baroness, unless her clinging proved inconvenient, neither must I lost contact with Mrs Cornelius. However, there would be no harm in my making fresh acquaintances. The more people I knew the more possibilities for self-improvement could present themselves. I reminded myself of every habit I had developed during the War and the Revolution. I remained wary of acquaintances from my former life, whether they displayed friendship or not. So many refugees filled up Pera I must inevitably run into some who might embarrass me. They would know me under a former name or might have met me when I posed as a Red or a Green. People were untrusting and might easily refuse to believe I had been forced from necessity to play these roles. It did not suit me to become again an object of suspicion. Thus I gave particular attention to Russians, surreptitiously inspecting every face. It would have been difficult if I had bumped into the young women I had known in Petersburg, for instance, or some radical bohemian who believed me a Bolshevik pederast because I had kept company with my dear friend Kolya. I could still see Brodmann, pointing his finger at me, screaming ‘Traitor’. This had been the direct cause of my precipitous flight from Odessa. Nevertheless, I remained confident that in most cases I could bluff out any such confrontation.