Siro by David Ignatius (short books to read txt) 📕

So a woman tries hard to remain a virgin until she’s twenty-five or so. During that time she’ll do almost anything with her boyfriend. Blow jobs, anal sex, whatever. But no penetration of the vagina. Absolutely not. That, she saves for the wedding night. And if she gives it away to a man who doesn’t marry her, she has a major problem.”

“That’s pathetic, don’t you think?”

“I don’t have an opinion. In these matters, I am simply an observer.”

“And when she’s older than twenty-five?”

“By then, a Turkish woman stops caring, according to Tina. She assumes the worst—that she’s never going to get married—and starts to live for herself. She assumes that anyone who’ll marry an old bag over twenty-five probably won’t even notice whether she’s still a virgin.”

“How old is Tina?”

“She’s twenty-three.”

“So why does she sleep with you? Or are you a pederast?”

“Of course not!” said Taylor. “Tina has discovered the existence of a revolutionary medical technique that is going to change life in this part of the world.”

“And what is that?” asked Anna, not sure she really wanted to know.

“Hymen reconstruction. The fancy gynecologists in Istanbul already have a fee schedule for it. According to Tina, the standard fee is sixty dollars. Two days before the wedding is ninety dollars. If you want it on the wedding day itself, God forbid, it costs a hundred fifty dollars. Of course, it’s more for Saudis and Kuwaitis.”

“Yuck,” said Anna. There was a long silence as the car bumped and weaved the last few miles toward Polish-land. Eventually, they glimpsed the green fields of Polonezkoy, rising like a fair mole on the dark body of Asia.

Blond, blue-eyed men stood outside each of the big houses in the village, beckoning tourist to stop for food and rest. Taylor stopped at a house on the crest of a hill: it was owned by a sturdy fellow named Thaddeus. He welcomed them enthusiastically and hurried them inside.

“Upstairs or down?” asked Thaddeus.

Taylor looked at Anna, as if seeking guidance. But Anna, relaxed and unaffected, paid no attention. She was looking at the Polish airline posters tacked to the wall. “Why don’t you give us the tour,” said Taylor.

Thaddeus led them up a creaky stairway to a long hallway. He flung open the first door on the left. It was a small room, with a single bed at one end and a little table and two chairs at the other, next to a window that looked out over the mock-Polish countryside.

Anna entered the room first. She walked to the window, then back to the bed. It was a steel-frame bedstead, low to the floor, with a rough corduroy bedspread, a lumpy pillow and no sheets. What a sad little room, she thought.

“We can bring food up,” said Thaddeus coyly, “or we can leave you alone.”

Anna looked at Taylor. What was this all about? Could it be that Taylor—this man she had met several hours ago—was hoping to screw her in that dumpy little bed? Taylor said nothing. He was looking out the window, pretending not to be listening.

“Let’s try downstairs,” said Anna abruptly. “I think that’s more what I had in mind.” Taylor turned toward her. There was a sheepish, naughty-boy look on his face.

Thaddeus walked them back down the creaky stairs to the dining room, which had a half dozen tables. It was a low-ceilinged room that seemed too small to hold all the furniture it contained, and it felt cramped and hot.

“What about outside?” asked Anna, pointing to a garden with several small tables arrayed under a grape arbor. “Can we sit outside?”

“As you like,” said the Turko-Pole. He escorted them out to the garden and, a few moments later, returned with two enormous bottles of beer.

“Is this where you bring your women?” asked Anna.

“Sometimes,” he answered. He still had that sheepish look on his face.

“Do they like it?”

“Sometimes.”

“Are you trying to screw me?”

“Not necessarily. I just thought you’d like it here.”

Anna looked around. The air was cool and crisp and clean, unlike the dirty air of Istanbul. A red rooster was ambling around the garden, looking for crumbs.

“I do like it here,” she said. “But I’m just passing through.”

Taylor nodded. “Whatever you like,” he said.

They smoked cigarettes and drank beer and talked. With the sex question defused for the moment, Taylor throttled back a few degrees. The muscles in his face relaxed; the rhythm of his speech slowed and softened. But on this calm, leeward side of Taylor, there was a whisper of restlessness, like a breeze blowing through an empty courtyard.

“How do you like the business?” he asked.

“I liked it fine, until last night.”

“That’s the good part, hitting people over the head with bottles. Wait until you get to the bad part.”

“What’s the bad part?”

“Filling out the paperwork to explain why you broke the bottle.”

Anna laughed. “Seriously,” she said, “what’s the bad part?”

Taylor thought for a long moment. “You want the truth?” Anna nodded. “The bad part is feeling like you’re wasting your time.”

“How often do you get the bad part?”

“Lately? Most of the time.”

“You can’t be that disillusioned. You’re not old enough.”

“Or young enough. Cynicism is a young man’s game.”

“What are you going to do about it?”

“I dunno. Quit, maybe, if I can’t find anything interesting to do on the inside. I’m becoming convinced there’s a big problem back home, but I can’t figure out what it is. It sometimes seems like they’ve sent everybody off to eunuch school.”

Anna nodded. There was a pause. “Not that it matters,” she volunteered, “but as a point of historical fact, there was no ‘eunuch school.’ ”

“What are you talking about?”

“The Ottomans. The Palace School was for the janissaries. The eunuchs stayed in the harem. The head eunuch, the kislar aga, simply told everyone what to do. There was no school.”

“What are you, a eunuchologist?”

“Ottoman history was my field, before I became a NOC.”

“No shit,” said Taylor.

“No shit.”

“What sort of life crisis pushed you into the CIA? Too many overdue library books?”

Anna gave her standard answer.