Chapter 33: New Friendships

Four of the hostages want more space than their suite provides. They demand that their maids be provided accommodation in the small outbuildings with us. Bekir approves the requests and leaves Nur to try and find suitable space. The countess, however, is one of those who insists that her maid, Margit, has sleeping quarters within her suite. The countess is quickly getting a reputation for being demanding and awkward, and before long nearly everybody avoids her whenever possible. It’s easy to see why the guards who escorted her here were eager to leave.

Fortunately, the Hungarian maids assigned to quarters with us seem willing to try and get along with the house servants. This is despite the frustrations caused by language difficulties. Even the simplest of requests or instructions often requires translation, and Nebi says that he’s too busy to bother with exchanges between servants. I’m soon called on to help, which, in return, quickly improves my own understanding of the Hungarian language.

None of the hostages know each other, and at first they distrust each other as much as they distrust their jailers. Hasan says that their wariness of each other won’t last forever, and that he and Nur must remain vigilant. Everybody settles down into a routine by the end of the second week. Apart from a regular flow of demands from the countess, the hostages remain passive and reasonably content. Even the two youngest hostages, who are only 12 and 13 years old, seem to be coping well. Fortunately, their maids double as governesses, and they keep the girls fully occupied.

While Hasan watches for suspicious activity that might lead to an escape attempt, Nur gleans information through regularly talking with the hostages and their maids. Nur’s periodic attempts to interrogate the countess and Margit are foiled as much by their isolation as by the language barrier. Nebi insists on attending to all the countess’s interpretation work alone, and he rarely assigns time to help Nur’s efforts. However, Nebi is overworked and he can’t be everywhere at once. It’s only a matter of time before I’m called on to translate at a meeting between Bekir and the countess.

It’s a difficult meeting. Partly because my knowledge of the Hungarian language is still limited, but mainly because the countess uses the meeting in order to make yet more demands on Heyreddin Pasha’s hospitality. Some of her demands are ridiculous, but others are not unreasonable. Because he must pay for the upkeep of the hostages out of his own pocket, Heyreddin Pasha is being very frugal when it comes to providing items such as clothing for the hostages and their maids. The countess isn’t the only hostage to complain about the lack of new clothing, although most of the others have set about repairing their damaged garments, and making new ones from whatever material they can scrounge.

Bekir has neither the authority nor the means to approve the countess’s demands. Rather than report the matter to Heyreddin Pasha, Bekir simply refuses all the demands made by the countess, and the meeting draws to an acrimonious close. The only positive feature of the meeting from my point of view is that I’ve been able to improve my tentative acquaintance with her maid, Margit. Her temperament is almost the exact opposite of the countess. I find Margit to be charming and graceful, but she doesn’t seem to be very skilled in the duties of a lady’s maid. I suspect she owes her position more to being able to cope with the volatile countess than anything else. Whatever the reason for selecting Margit as her maid, the countess seems to tolerate Margit’s shortcomings far more readily than the real or imagined deficiencies of everybody else.

The limited supply of clothes and material isn’t the only way that Heyreddin Pasha tries to economise. He sends word that he won’t be hiring any more guards. Instead, he has arranged for the Grand Vizier to keep Kosta and his men here for a while longer. Needless to say, Kosta and his men aren’t happy at the news, but they don’t seem unduly surprised.

None of us know how long we might be here at the lodge. The pessimists among the house servants suggest that our stay will be for years rather than months. Even Hasan admits that there is little likelihood of the hostages being released soon. Furthermore, there are rumours that Sultan Suleiman is preparing for a war in the east. If that’s true, then ordering the early release of his Hungarian hostages is likely to be far from the sultan’s thoughts. Not that I would mind an extended stay here. We are comfortable enough, and Hasan and I have each other for company. Our virtual imprisonment here is no worse than I endured while I was in the Imperial Harem. However, not all the house servants are so content, requiring Nur to keep a close watch on the situation.

Despite Hasan’s and Nur’s concerns, Bekir starts to ease some of the restrictions on the movements of the hostages and their servants. Walks around the grounds are permitted, and the hostages’ maids are allowed into areas of the lodge which had initially been off-limits to them. Nefise isn’t the only person to realise that allowing the maids into the kitchen presents a risk of our food being drugged. Nur reassigns Huban to the kitchen as a precaution, but she admits that it isn’t a foolproof defence.

The overall effect of the less rigid living arrangements means that friendships soon start to form within and across the different groups of people living in the lodge. The exception is Kosta and his men, who still keep apart from the rest of us. Some of those friendships blossom into romantic entanglements, which quickly become the source of gossip and intrigue. Huban’s name is associated with more than one such relationship, although money rather than romance is often the supposed motivation for the relationship. She neither confirms nor denies the gossip, which only adds to the speculation.

Hasan and I are also the subject of much gossip, some of it false and unpleasant. While Hasan and I confine our intimate games to our own room, they haven’t gone unnoticed by the other servants. I’ve experienced worse innuendo while I was in the Imperial Harem, but Hasan is more than a little sensitive about some of the comments. The less flattering rumours about me finally die when I casually mention to Emine, who is one of the more notorious gossip-mongers, that my skills in seduction are as a result of my training in the Imperial Harem and not from some back street brothel.