The Istanbul Puzzle Read Online Free PDF

have been out of place in Manhattan or Shanghai.
    Mixed with all this modernity, on every ridge, were spot-lit minarets and the illuminated domes of mosques, each a mini Hagia Sophia. Every district seemed to have one. Some were half dark and had fewer minarets; others were lit up like football stadiums. But none of them came anywhere near Hagia Sophia’s beauty.
    ‘Alek loved this city,’ I said.
    ‘He was right to. This is the city of the future,’ the inspector replied. ‘We are growing fast. And we’re managing it well.’ His finger jabbed the air.
    ‘Our birth rates aren’t low, like the rest of Europe.’ He raised an eyebrow, gave me a toothy grin.
    ‘People are still moving here?’
    ‘More than ever. From Turkey and this whole region. Everyone deserves a future.’
    Who could argue with that? I went back to staring at the cars streaming past. People were changing lanes as if they were on a racetrack.
    ‘And you’re not sweeping aside the past,’ I said.
    ‘No, not at all. You Westerners think you are the best at conserving things, but you forget we saved Hagia Sophia, the greatest building in the world. Tell me, which 1300-year-old building is still in use in England?’ He looked smug.
    ‘I think the Greeks were already a beaten empire by the time they lost this city,’ I said.
    ‘It is true, Mr Ryan. And it was foretold. That was the Greeks’ fate. And they were fortunate too. Mehmed’s tolerance, the freedom he allowed different races and religions, was something your European kings and inquisitors could have learned from.’
    He pointed at a skyscraper the size of the Empire State Building. It was lit up in electric blue and had a giant Islamic crescent on top.
    ‘Look, this is the future. Islam and capitalism married at last. Faith and money intertwined. What our people can do will surprise you all.’
    ‘I just want to find out what happened to my colleague.’
    The motorway became elevated again. We were bowling along high up over a muddle of buildings. Then the road swung to the left. The lights of the city were spread out in front of us, as if a sack of diamonds had spilled over dark velvet.
    ‘Where are we going?’ I asked, as we powered through the traffic, sounding our horn at anyone who strayed into our path.
    ‘The morgue at the New International Hospital,’ was the inspector’s reply.
    I thought about telling him to postpone the identification, that I was too tired. I’d have preferred to speak to Fitzgerald before I did it, find out what the process was in Turkey, if there was anything I had to make sure to do. But maybe it was better to get it over with.
    We turned off the motorway onto a dual carriageway running between pencil-thin office buildings, fifteen, maybe twenty storeys high. There wasn’t as much traffic now. Soon I lost all sense of direction. We were driving through a warren of narrow streets with old buildings crowding in on each side.
    ‘The Galata area,’ said the inspector, motioning at the hodgepodge of old and new around us.
    I’d seen pictures of the Galata Tower poking its head up above the tiled roofs of old Istanbul. Venetian traders had built the stone tower on the top of a hill to the north of the Golden Horn, Istanbul’s natural horn-shaped harbour.
    We pulled up with a squeal in front of what looked like an office block. I saw a green cross sign. I wasn’t looking forward to what was going to happen next. But I held on to a paper-thin hope that the body wouldn’t be Alek’s.
    I followed the inspector through an oddly empty reception area into a marble-floored lift. We’d left his colleagues in the car. They’d smiled at me like factory workers who’d been given a day off.
    The hospital looked new. There wasn’t a scuff mark on a wall or a scratch on any of the shiny floors.
    For a second I wondered if we were too late to visit the morgue. Then I remembered who I was with.
    A moon-faced attendant in a loose virgin-blue uniform was