"They've made a mess of you, friend." He sat cross-legged on the floor in front of me and swabbed at the open wounds dotting my face. "I don't want you to take this the wrong way, but I'm very glad to see you, well I'm glad to see anyone, to be more specific. They keep the foreign prisoners together, infidels they call us. That's rich. The bloke before you was Dutch. And for the last..." He left the sentence hanging as he looked up and tallied the chalk marks on the wall above his bunk. "Seventeen months I've been alone. I enjoy the extra space and all, but the lack of conversation can be maddening." His face exploded into emotional expression as he spoke.

"What happened to the Dutchman?" I mumbled through swollen lips.

"He died. Dysentery it was. He made a real mess of it in the end. Gave it to me too. Can't you tell? I must have lost thirty pounds. What am I talking about, how could you know," he laughed nervously. "Never mind me. I have a tendency to ramble, at least that's what Steen used to say. He was the Dutchman we were talking about. I'm just excited at the possibilities of conversation, especially with an English speaker."

"I don't feel much like talking right now."

"Oh that's okay you just listen and rest for now," he said, cleaning blood matted hair away from a scalp cut. "But I do look good for what I've been through don't you think?"

I had no idea what his eyes had seen, but looking around, it wasn't hard to imagine. And through it all, he had been deprived of such a simple and basic comfort as his own reflection in a mirror. I knew that's why he asked and why I lied. I nodded and slowly laid my head on my arm, surrendering into a fitful sleep under the stream of his ramblings.

The first sunlit rays of dawn lit the streets of the Istanbul I had known. Thousands of peddlers stood watch behind their wares that covered the sidewalks on both sides of the street. I walked down the middle of the narrow cobblestone avenue, the cane tapping out a rapid rhythm beside me. The brass tip on worn stone and my own shuffling footfalls provided the only sound to the scene, as though the milling merchants on either side operated in a vacuum. They remained oblivious to my presence, mouthing unspoken words and clanging silent pots.