Free Istanbul Was a Fairy Tale by Mario Levi Page A

lived a life of licentiousness in all the aspects that his riches had afforded him, was indeed such a story. Some trite songs and fortuitous encounters may have marked that meeting in that spring evening . . . In the movie theater they had sat next to each other. The hall wasn’t crowded. They drank lemonade. Rita Hayworth called her admirers to a distant world. The evening was crowned with a dinner at Tokatlıyan, a dinner that was to leave an indelible impression on a young girl of high expectations. They had sauntered toward Taksim square. On their way, Olga had encountered a school friend. She had felt a reserved pride upon seeing her. Henry was a man about town, tall, dark and handsome, reminiscent of Valentino who had been the idol of many a young girl and whose physical beauty matched his elegance, his refined manners and costumes, which his tailor in Beirut had made for him; not to mention his big receptions and dancing style that would stand in comparison with many a professional dancer. The next morning, Olga received a bouquet of scarlet gladioli from the renowned florist Sabunjakis which she could never forget. To have met a celebrity like Henry Moskovitch and to dream of having been in his company was certainly a thrilling experience. This naturally had triggered a sequence of events . . . To get the feeling of the realization of a dream at an unexpected moment that opened a vista never dreamt of and to be able to share a life hardly imaginable with unpredictable individuals . . . dinners and the brightly illumined clubs of the time . . . It was Olga’s cherished fantasy just before going to sleep in her bed that the pale moonlight bathed, to dream of the long life she would share with Henry . . . However, Moses had some sort of an intractable presentiment of disaster; he was apprehensive about his daughter’s future, fearing that the course of events might not turn out as she would have planned ever since the moment Henry had intruded into their lives. You could not possibly convince an infatuated person bewitched by a fancy in which she had absolute confidence that a thorny path of return might be looming ahead. Maybe despair or affection might determine the line of demarcation between making a comment and refraining from doing so in a given situation. Would you take the risk of ruining the dreams of someone whom you cherish at the cost of causing her weariness of spirit? This conceptual thinking must have been the reason for Moses’ reservations. Time would bear out his premonition. Separation would be knocking on Olga’s door within about a year from the time of their meeting in the movie theater, before spring was in Istanbul, to the detriment of all the fantasies she had woven in the meantime. For those who had their heads screwed on the right way, this space of time was long enough to remain permanently printed on one’s mind. A diamond necklace bought at Diamenstein had marked the separation. She had suddenly remembered. Months ago, on one of the evenings when they were strolling arm-in-arm in Pera, they had caught sight of that necklace while looking for a brooch they would be making a gift of to a friend. “This must be meant to adorn the neck of a princess, of a heroine of a fairy tale,” she said, wandering her fingers over the stones. Henry had clasped her hand upon hearing these words but had said nothing. Those were the evenings when she was as proud as a young girl strolling in Pera could be . . . The short note that accompanied the necklace said that he had to leave for Vienna and sojourn there for some time and apologized for this misfortune, he thanked her for the time they had spent together which he considered a sort of gift, confirming the image she had of herself as a real princess in a fairy tale. Years had gone by before Olga was able to become aware of this unexpected severance which had left a deep scar in her. Life would certainly continue for her in the company of different