The Museum of Innocence Read Online Free Page A

burden.”
    Fearful of the sexual beast now threatening to rear its head, I took my hand from her hair. She understood at once and collected herself; we both stepped back.
    “Please don’t tell anyone I cried,” she said after she had rubbed her eyes.
    “It’s a promise,” I said. “A solemn promise between friends, Füsun. We can trust each other with our secrets….”
    I saw her smile. “Let me leave the handbag here,” I said. “I can come back for the money later.”
    “Leave the bag if you wish, but you had better not come back here for the money. Şenay Hanım will insist that it isn’t a fake and you’ll come to regret you ever suggested otherwise.”
    “Then let’s exchange it for something,” I said.
    “I can no longer do that,” she said, sounding like a proud and tetchy girl.
    “No really, it’s not important,” I offered.
    “But it is to me,” she said firmly. “When she comes back to the shop, I’ll get the money for the bag from Şenay Hanım.”
    “I don’t want that woman causing you any more upset,” I replied.
    “Don’t worry, I’ve just worked out how to do this,” she said with the faintest of smiles. “I’m going to say that Sibel Hanım already has exactly the same bag, and that’s why she’s returning it. Is that all right?”
    “Wonderful idea,” I said. “But why don’t I say the same thing to Şenay Hanım?”
    “No, don’t you say anything to her,” Füsun said emphatically. “Because she’ll only try to trick you, to extract personal information from you. Don’t come to the shop at all. I can leave the money with Aunt Vecihe.”
    “Oh please, don’t involve my mother in this. She’s even nosier.”
    “Then where shall I leave your money?” Füsun asked, raising her eyebrows.
    “At the Merhamet Apartments, 131 Teşvikiye Avenue, where my mother has a flat,” I said. “Before I went to America I used it as my hideout—I’d go there to study and listen to music. It’s a delightful place that looks out over a garden in the back…. I still go there every lunchtime between two and four and shut myself in there to catch up on paperwork.”
    “Of course. I can bring your money there. What’s the apartment number?”
    “Four,” I whispered. I could barely get out the next three words, which seemed to die in my throat. “Second floor. Good-bye.”
    My heart had figured it all out and it was beating madly. Before rushing outside, I gathered up all my strength and, pretending nothing unusual had happened, I gave her one last look. Back in the street, my shame and guilt mixed with so many images of bliss amid the unseasonable warmth of that May afternoon that the very sidewalks of Nişantaşı seemed aglow with a mysterious yellow. My feet chose the shaded path, taking me under the eaves of the buildings and the blue-and-white-striped awnings of the shop windows, and when in one of those windows I saw a yellow jug I felt compelled to go inside and buy it. Unlike any other object acquired so casually, this yellow jug drew no comment from anyone during the twenty years it sat on the table where my mother and father, and later, my mother and I, ate our meals. Every time I touched the handle of that jug, I would remember those days when I first felt the misery that was to turn me in on myself, leaving my mother to watch me in silence at supper, her eyes filled half with sadness, half with reproach.
    Arriving home, I greeted my mother with a kiss; though pleased to see me early in the afternoon, she was nevertheless surprised. I told her that I had bought the jug on a whim, adding, “Could you give me the key to the Merhamet Apartments? Sometimes the office gets so noisy I just can’t concentrate. I was wondering if I might have better luck at the apartment. It always worked when I was young.”
    My mother said, “It must be an inch thick with dust,” but she went straight to her room to fetch me the key to the building, which was held together with