Short, middle-aged and fat, with wiry black facial hair, his appearance belied his behaviour, which was frequently beyond what anyone would agree was outrageous. Süleyman’s wife, who had seen him several times over the years in and around İstiklal Street, described him as being ‘as camp as Christmas’. To Süleyman himself, this appellation did seem rather sacrilegious coming from a Christian woman, but he knew what she meant. Flower was someone you met away from other people, in a darkened room. Not that the Yerebatan Saray, the Byzantine cistern underneath the streets of Sultanahmet, was exactly a darkened room. But it was sufficiently anonymous and dimly lit to give both the policeman and his informant a measure of security. The Yerebatan Saray had been built by the Byzantine Emperor Justinian in ad 532 to store water for the city during times of drought. A complicated series of pipes and aqueducts, some still extant, ensured that water could be carried to every part of İstanbul.
