Chapter 22: A Merchant in Dangerous Times

Chapter 22: Chapter 22: A Merchant in Dangerous Times

I

Constantinople, Rüstem Pa?a — 15 February 1906

Ayaan laid the plan before his family on a Thursday evening, after the lamp was lit and the dishes were cleared.

He had written it on a single sheet, in plain figures, because his father trusted figures more than speeches.

"There are three rules," he said. "I wish to adopt them for the shop and for the grocery, beginning this month."

Mehmet raised his eyebrows. "Rules."

"The first is that we keep in gold the cost of three months of running both businesses. The second is that no customer owes us more than thirty days. The third is that no single supplier provides more than two-fifths of what we sell."

His father read the sheet slowly, as he read everything that bore a sum.

"Three months of costs," said Mehmet. "That is more than we have in the strongbox, and a great deal more than I would care to take out of stock. Gold in a box earns nothing."

"It earns the ability to pay on a day when no one else can, Baba."

"What day is that?"

Ayaan had prepared for the question, and he had prepared an answer that did not require him to say what he knew.

"The day that fear reaches the lane," he said. "The fleets at Midilli frightened the insurers in November, and the Sultan yielded within nine days. Another dispute will come, and when it does, the banks will call their loans before anyone has been harmed. Those who are caught holding stock and no coin will sell the stock at whatever price is offered."

"You speak as though it were certain."

"I speak as though it were likely, which is all that a merchant ever needs to do."

Fatma, who had been mending a sleeve by the lamp, set down her needle.

"He is right, Mehmet. Your father kept a purse under the floor for twenty years, and you never once laughed at him for it."

"I was a boy. I did not know what it was for."

"It was for this." She turned to Ayaan. "I would not keep all of it in one place. Some in the shop, some in this house, and some in the Imperial Ottoman Bank under your father’s name, where no thief or fire can reach it."

Ayaan looked at her in surprise, and she lifted one eyebrow.

"A strongbox, a chest, and a bank," he said. "That is a better plan than mine, Anne."

"Most things are." She took up the sleeve again. "Go on, Mehmet."

Mehmet looked from the sheet to his wife, and from his wife to his son, and he sighed, outvoted in his own house.

"One month of costs," he said. "We will begin with one, and we will see how it feels to sit upon it."

"One by March, Baba, and two by the summer."

"You have already arranged the months."

"I arranged them to be modest," said Ayaan.

II

Constantinople, Beykoz — 8 March 1906

The paper mill at Beykoz stood on the Asian shore of the Bosphorus, a long yellow building with a chimney and a landing stage, and it had been making paper for more than sixty years.

Zeynep stepped from the caique before Ayaan did, and she carried the satchel of samples herself.

"You will let me speak first," she said.

"I had intended to."

"You had intended to speak second, which is not the same thing."

The mill’s clerk was a stout man named Ra?it Efendi with ink on both cuffs. He regarded the two young visitors with the patience of a man who expected to waste his afternoon.

"Our Bohemian paper comes through Trieste on a single steamer line," said Zeynep, "and a single line can be closed by a quarrel between governments. We wish to buy from you the coarser stock, for school exercise books."

"Exercise books," said Ra?it, with some surprise.

"The new elementary schools in the city have three hundred pupils to a building, and most of them write on slates. A book that costs less than a kuru? would put paper in front of every one of them." She laid a sample on his desk. "We will print the margin rules, bind the sheets with thread, and sell through the schools’ administrators."

Ayaan noted that she had not yet named a quantity, and he waited.

"Five hundred reams over twelve months, at the price on this sheet, delivered monthly," she said. "We require a written contract with a fixed price and a penalty for late delivery."

Ra?it Efendi looked at the sheet, and then at Ayaan. "Does the boy not speak?"

"She is my partner, Efendi," said Ayaan. "I speak when she tells me that I may."

Zeynep’s expression did not change, but the corner of her mouth moved.

The bargaining lasted an hour. Ra?it lost a fifth of a kuru? on every ream, and he recovered it by insisting that the penalty clause bind the buyer as well as the seller, which Zeynep accepted at once because it was fair.

The contract was signed in triplicate, and the ink was still wet when they reached the landing stage.

On the caique back across the water, Zeynep sat with the folded copy on her knee.

"The Ministry of War buys from us because Lieutenant Sermet likes you," she said. "A schoolmaster buys because the book is cheap. I wished to know which of the two would still buy from us if the Palace changed its mind about the first."

"And now you know."

"Now I know that we have two customers who do not depend upon each other." She watched the shoreline pass. "It is a small thing, but it is the first time that I have felt that the shop could not be knocked over by a single hand."

"That is the purpose of the third rule."

"I know. I helped to write it." She smiled at the water. "I would have made it a third and not two-fifths."

"Then we will revise it in the summer."

"We will revise it when I say," said Zeynep, and she was not entirely joking.

III

Constantinople, Rüstem Pa?a — 20 April 1906

Mustafa Efendi sent for Ayaan on a Friday evening, and the message came through his daughter, who delivered it with an expression of careful indifference.

"My father wishes to see the table that I have been keeping," she said. "He says that he wishes to see it, and not to be lectured. I do not believe that he means it."

The importer’s study was small and lined with ledgers. Mustafa sat at the desk with his spectacles pushed up on his forehead, and he did not rise.

"Zeynep tells me that you set a number of days beside every debt," he said. "I should like to see mine set out in that manner."

It was said stiffly. It was plain that the request had cost him something.

They worked for two hours. Mustafa dealt in lamps, glass, and tinware from Austria and Germany, and his books were honest and well kept, and Ayaan found what he had expected to find.

"Three-quarters of your goods come from the one Vienna house, Efendi, on credit of one hundred and twenty days." He laid the sheet on the desk. "Your retailers pay you in ninety, when they pay on time, and a third of them are late."

"That is the custom of the trade."

"It is, in quiet years. But suppose that the Vienna house shortened its terms to thirty days, as houses do when they are frightened." Ayaan touched the second column. "You would owe eleven hundred liras within the month, and you would have collected four hundred."

Mustafa took the spectacles from his forehead and set them down.

"The house has been my supplier for twelve years," he said. "Its principal ate at this table."

"I do not doubt that he is a friend, Efendi. But twelve years of friendship is not a clause in the contract."

"You are sixteen, and you are instructing me on friendship."

"I am showing you the table, Efendi," said Ayaan. "The decision is yours."

A silence followed. In the doorway, Zeynep had not moved.

"Baba," she said quietly. "I checked the figures twice."

Her father looked at her for a long moment, and the stiffness went out of his shoulders.

"What would you do?" he asked Ayaan.

"Three things, and none of them is large. Ask the Vienna house to fix its terms in writing for the year. Open a second account with a tinware house in Nuremberg, for a third of what you buy. And offer your retailers a small discount for payment within sixty days, so that the late third has a reason to hurry."

Mustafa wrote the three items on a slip of paper, in the unhurried hand of a man who had written ten thousand invoices.

"I will write to Vienna tonight," he said. "And I will write to Nuremberg tomorrow."

He folded the slip, and he looked at Ayaan over the desk with the grave attention that Ayaan remembered from July.

"You have two years before you may speak to me again on the other matter. I begin to think that I shall not be the one who is waiting."

Ayaan did not trust himself to answer, and Zeynep, in the doorway, turned and went away quickly down the passage.

IV

Constantinople, Emin?nü — 4 May 1906

The news came with the first customers after the Friday prayer.

The British ambassador had delivered an ultimatum to the Porte over the frontier in Sinai. Ottoman troops were to withdraw from Akaba within ten days, and British ships were reported moving in the eastern Mediterranean.

By midafternoon there was no one in the lane who did not know it, and a good many who knew it wrongly.

"They say that the English will bombard Beirut," said a customer who had come to buy a pencil.

"They say that the Powers will close the Straits," said another.

Ayaan sold the pencil and said nothing to either of them.

At four o’clock, an agent of the Viennese ink house came in, a thin, anxious man named Brandt, who had dealt with the shop for two years and who now would not sit down.

"Hassan Efendi, I must ask for payment in gold, today, for the whole of the spring consignment." He wiped his forehead. "My principals fear that the exchange will close. If you can pay at once, they will allow a discount of five in the hundred."

Ayaan did not look at the strongbox. He had learned long ago never to look at the place where the money was kept.

"The whole consignment, in gold, today?"

"I would not ask it in another week."

"Then I will pay it," said Ayaan, "and you will add the summer consignment at the same discount, and I will pay for that in gold as well."

Brandt stared at him. Then he sat down heavily and began to count.

Zeynep came in as he left, and she read the receipt twice.

"You have taken the whole of two consignments from the strongbox."

"I have taken a quarter of what is in it, and I have bought at a discount a good that will be dearer by August."

"And if the English do bombard Beirut?"

"Then ink will be scarcer, and we will own it." He set the receipt in the drawer. "That is why we keep the gold, Zeynep. A reserve is not for hiding. It is for buying when others are obliged to sell."

She considered this for a moment, and then she nodded.

By evening, the lane had begun to show what the day had cost.

Three of the small customers asked for more time, and Ayaan gave it, because each owed less than a month and each had always paid. The grocer next door, a gentle man named Osman, came to the doorway with his hat in his hands.

"The wholesaler wants cash for the tea and the sugar, Mehmet Efendi," he said to Ayaan’s father. "I have only half. Could you lend me eight liras until the end of the month?"

Mehmet glanced at his son. It was a brief look, and in it was the whole of the argument that they had had in February.

"Come in, Osman," said Mehmet. "Sit down."

That night, Fatma brought tea to the back room, where Ayaan sat over the day’s accounts.

"Your father counted the sacks again before he closed," she said. "Then he counted the coins in the box, and he slept very well."

V

Constantinople, Galata — 7 May 1906

The moneylenders of Galata began to call their loans on the Saturday, and by Monday the street of the banks was full of men who had not slept.

Salih Efendi found Ayaan at the shop door at seven o’clock in the morning. He was not wearing his customary heavy coat, and his collar had not been fastened properly.

"I owe four hundred liras to Alkalay in Galata," he said. "He has recalled the whole sum, and he will take my carpets for a third of their value if I cannot pay by Wednesday."

"I am sorry to hear it, Efendi."

"You are not sorry. You told us in November, and you are the only man in the lane who was correct." The big shoulders sagged. "I did not come to be told that I was foolish. I came to ask whether you will lend me the money."

Ayaan did not answer at once. He had no wish to humiliate the man, and he had no intention of giving him what he asked.

"I cannot lend you four hundred liras, Efendi. I do not have it, and if I did, I would be placing the safety of three households against one carpet warehouse."

Salih said nothing. His jaw worked.

"But I can offer something else, if you will walk with me to Hovsep Efendi’s warehouse. He has a correspondent in Trieste who buys Anatolian carpets for the Austrian market, and he has been looking for a good supplier since the winter."

"Hovsep Agopian," said Salih. "An Armenian."

"A man with a warehouse and a correspondent, Efendi."

There was a long pause.

"Let us go," said Salih.

Hovsep received them in his office, and he heard the case without interrupting. He examined Salih’s inventory list, asked three questions about the dyes, and took a sample of the weave between his fingers.

"Sixty pieces of the Kayseri and the U?ak," he said at last. "I will pay four-fifths of their value, in gold, today, and my correspondent will take them to Trieste in June."

"Four-fifths," said Salih, hoarsely. "Alkalay offered one-third."

"Alkalay is a moneylender, and I am a merchant. We calculate differently." Hovsep opened a drawer. "The sum will cover most of what you owe. For the remainder, I suggest that you ask Alkalay for sixty days, and that you take Ayaan with you when you do."

"Why him?"

"Because Alkalay will see a boy with a ledger beside you, and he will understand that you have people who keep accounts." Hovsep smiled slightly. "It improves a man’s credit more than a new coat."

They did it that afternoon. Alkalay was an elderly man with a spotless collar and a precise voice, and he looked at the two of them for some time.

"Sixty days," he said. "At the same interest, and with the carpets’ payment delivered to me directly."

"Agreed," said Ayaan, before Salih could object.

Outside, in the street of the banks, Salih Efendi stood with the receipt in his hand.

"I called you a boy who tells us to hoard while the Empire is insulted," he said.

"You did, Efendi."

"I should like to say that I was wrong." He drew a breath. "I find it more difficult than I expected."

"You have said it, Efendi," said Ayaan. "It is enough."

VI

Constantinople, Rüstem Pa?a — 14 May 1906

On the fourteenth of May, the Sultan accepted the British demand.

The troops would leave Akaba, and the frontier would be drawn as London wished. The ships turned away from the eastern Mediterranean, and the news traveled through the bazaar with a sound that was partly relief and partly shame.

By noon, the shutters that had been closed for a week were open again.

Ayaan stood in the doorway of the shop and counted them. In the lane there had been eleven shops closed during the crisis, and none of them was his.

Mustafa Efendi passed in the afternoon, and he paused at the door without coming in.

"The Vienna house shortened its terms to sixty days on the fifth of May," he said. "I had signed the Nuremberg account on the second."

"I am glad, Efendi."

"So am I." He inclined his head, and walked on.

His father came up the lane from the Spice Bazaar with a parcel of tea under his arm, and he stopped beside his son.

"Osman’s shutters are up," said Mehmet.

"I saw them, Baba."

"He brought back the eight liras this morning, and he insisted on adding a packet of sugar." Mehmet shifted the parcel. "I had not wished to say it before the matter was finished, but I was afraid in the first days. I stood in the grocery and counted the sacks, and I thought that you had taken away a month of our safety to put it in a box."

"I know, Baba."

"You knew?"

"You counted the sacks twice every evening."

Mehmet laughed, and then he was grave again.

"Your mother said that the gold in the box was a month of food in the pantry and a month of rent in the drawer. I did not understand it until Osman stood in the doorway, and I discovered that I could say yes without being ruined." He looked at the lane. "It is a strange thing to be able to help a neighbor. I had not known how much of it was only a matter of having the coin."

"It is the reason for the plan, Baba."

"Then we shall have the second month by June, and not by the summer." He put his hand on his son’s shoulder, briefly, and then took it away. "I should like you to teach me the rest of your rules. Not for the grocery alone."

"What would you like to know?"

"How a man decides what a thing is worth when everyone about him is frightened." Mehmet considered. "I have always thought that was the business of Allah alone. I begin to think that it may be partly arithmetic."

"It is partly arithmetic, Baba. The other part is patience."

"That," said Mehmet, "I have already. It is the one thing that you have not needed to teach me."

VII

Constantinople, Emin?nü — 28 June 1906

Cevdet came in on the last Thursday of June, and he bought nothing.

He walked slowly along the shelves, examined a box of nibs, and replaced it with care.

"Eleven shutters were closed in this lane in May," he said. "I counted them from the coffee house opposite. Yours was not among them."

"I was fortunate, Efendi."

"You were prepared, which is a different thing, as you told Lieutenant Sermet of sincerity." The scar creased with the ghost of his smile. "I have written nothing about it. A merchant who keeps a reserve is not a matter for the state."

"I am glad to hear it."

"I hear that Salih Efendi sells carpets to the Armenian house in Sirkeci, and that the Armenian house is grateful to a certain stationer." Cevdet turned from the shelf. "A man who survives a panic gains credit with all those who did not. It is a form of power, young Hassan, and I advise you to be careful how you spend it."

"I have not tried to spend it."

"No. That is why I mention it." He paused. "Lieutenant Sermet has been posted to Monastir at his own request. He leaves at the end of July."

Ayaan kept his hands steady on the counter.

"I had not heard of it."

"Why do you tell me of it, Efendi?"

"Because I wish you to learn it from me and not from a rumor. And because an officer posted to Monastir will be paid late, like the rest of his regiment, and will have leisure to think about it." He lifted the box of nibs again, and set it down. "You will hear from him, I think. He is not a man who leaves without a letter." The scarred man put on his hat. "Monastir is a long way from here, and much closer to the trouble than this lane. If he writes to you, I would counsel that you answer with figures and not with opinions."

"I will remember, Efendi."

"I believe that you will," said Cevdet. "It is the habit of your memory that interests me most."

Ayaan did not allow his expression to change, and when the bell had stopped ringing, he found that he was holding the edge of the counter more tightly than he knew.

VIII

Constantinople, Emin?nü — 7 August 1906

The telegram from Tehran was printed in the evening papers, in the narrow column reserved for foreign matter.

Ayaan read it twice at the counter after the shutters were closed, and then he carried the paper to the storeroom, where Zeynep was bent over a sheet covered with columns.

"The Shah of Persia has granted a constitution," he said. "Two days ago, after a month of the merchants of Tehran sitting in the British legation."

"Merchants," said Zeynep, without looking up.

"The bazaar closed its shops, and the clergy left the city, and the Shah gave way."

"I see." She laid down her pencil. "Does it concern us?"

"It concerns every empire that has a bazaar and a treasury with nothing in it." He sat on the crate beside her. "It will not be the last, Zeynep. I think that there will be more of these before the decade is over."

Persia in August, then the Balkans, then us.

Twenty-three months.

"Then we should look at this sheet," said Zeynep, and she turned it toward him.

It was a table in her small, upright hand. She had listed every debt the shop was owed, every customer who owed it, and the number of days each had waited; beside it, in a second column, she had set the shop’s stock by supplier, and in a third the gold that lay in the strongbox, the chest, and the bank.

"The shop holds two months of costs," she said. "Your father holds a month and a half in the grocery. The exercise books have brought us three new customers, and the largest of them owes us nothing at all."

"It is a very good table."

"It is an incomplete one." She put her finger on the bottom row. "This is the part that I wished to show you. I have forty-one liras of my own, from the commissions that Hovsep Efendi paid me for the nib contracts, and I wish to put them in the strongbox under my own name."

Ayaan looked at the figure for a moment.

"Under your own name," he said.

"As a partner, and not as a debt." Her voice was level. "If there is trouble, I wish to be one of those who can pay."

"Then it will be written so," said Ayaan. "You shall have your own line in the book, and your own key to the box."

"My own key."

"I will have it made tomorrow."

Zeynep nodded, and she took up her pencil again and bent over the sheet. Only when he had turned away did she smile, and Ayaan, who missed nothing, pretended not to see it.

That night, he opened the blue book at the page where he had written the number in January.

He crossed out the first figure and wrote the new one beneath it. Twenty-three months.

Below it, in the smaller hand, he added what had been done since the winter.

Three rules, two suppliers, two customers, two keys.

Then he closed the book and sat for a long time in the dark, listening to the lane outside.