Evan's Gallipoli (7 page)
When we got back we couldn't find Father. I was frantic. I know I ought to have more faith in God, but I haven't. I even wondered if we were looking under the wrong tree, but our swags were still there. We searched for ages and at last found him drinking tea with a most peculiar man under a different tree.
The man looked up and said, âShalom,' which is Hebrew for peace. He was old with a white beard. He was dressed in bright colours, red and purple and blue, all worn and tattered. He was leaning against a big flat peddler's pack. A merchant, then. I had met pack peddlers in Australia. They were always cheerful men who brought news and nice things to the lonely farms. This trader and Father were drinking real tea, not mint. Abdul scowled at him. I smiled.
âHe is a Jew,' Abdul said to me.
âSo?' I asked.
He gave me a strange look and went away. I sat down next to the man. Father gave me a vague look as though he sort of remembered who I was, then he said in English, âEvan, my son.' The man said, âIsaiah,' and gave me a cup of tea. It tasted wonderful. I sipped it slowly. I hadn't tasted real tea for so long. It reminded me of home. Father and Isaiah talked in Hebrew. I don't understand it but they sounded cordial. I finished the tea and was about to go and find Abdul and ask what was wrong with him when Isaiah seized my sleeve, as if to say, quite clearly, âDon't go.' So I stayed.
We are ten miles further along the road now. Isaiah knows where the border is. He is going there, too. All Abdul said when I asked him what was wrong was that Isaiah was a Jew, which is true but not helpful. I am not pleased with him. He walks along behind us, trying to look like he doesn't know us, and growling that we walk too slowly and in bad company. Isaiah is an old man and he does not walk fast but neither does Father and they seem to like each other. Besides, Isaiah is carrying that heavy pack. When we camped last night he told me that Father needed to get out of Turkey and that we might like to travel with him as far as a place called Kadikay. As that was where Abdul was intending to go, I agreed. Abdul was angry with me, but he still won't tell me why. Father does not seem to care where we go. He is now reciting the beatitudes: âBlessed are the peacemakers, for they shall be called the children of God.' I can't see any way for us to make peace with the great nations which are intent on killing everyone. I cooked my bean stew and Isaiah liked it too. He gave us more tea. I suddenly missed Australia so badly that I had to turn my face away. No one was trying to kill us in Australia. Abdul wouldn't join in the storytelling but the old man told us about Ezekiel and the burning fiery chariot. Father seemed to be listening, too.
The old man says that we are coming into the fast of Ramadan, which starts at the rising of the new moon. We must not be seen to be eating or drinking during the day or everyone will know instantly that we are not Muslims. Sick people and children are not expected to fast. Everyone else refrains from food and water while it is daylight; they have big meals at night and before dawn so they can manage. This must be hard on soldiers. The reason for the fast is to remind people that they should be mindful of the hungry and poor. This is very virtuous, I suppose. Considering that they are pagans. Abdul should have told us that it was Ramadan. He isn't talking to me. Surely not because of Isaiah? That would be foolish and I hadn't thought that Abdul was foolish.
It is indeed Ramadan. We saw the goat herds go out with their flock and they weren't carrying their bags and flasks. Isaiah stopped at a farmhouse and bargained with the lady for needles and pins. He speaks fluent Turkish. She finally got her needles for a reasonable priceâa scrawny chicken and a pot of yoghurt. She did not offer tea, even though Isaiah is a Jew and therefore not fasting. We can't do any cooking until this evening so we kept walking. We came into the village of Bolayir and there were no old men sitting in the shade drinking tea. We heard the muezzin calling people to prayer and Abdul made an excuse and left us. I suppose he will catch up later. I think he has gone to church. We rested for a while and then went on. The old men are so slow. My feet are itching to move faster. Behind us our pursuers may be gaining on us and we potter along so slowly that a snail would zoom past us. Father and Isaiah talk all the time but I do not know Hebrew. I wonder where Abdul has got to?
Abdul arrived as I was cooking the chicken. It just fitted into my pot. I found some leaves to flavour it. Father had the leftover bean stew from yesterday. I was so hungry I could have eaten the whole bird myself. Abdul came into the camp and just sat down as if he hadn't been away. He had brought some bread and grapes with him. I served out the chicken. Then he said, âIn my home, we always had chicken to break our fast. My mother's cook had a special recipe. This tastes like it. How did you do it?' And I was pleased because he was talking to me again and I told him about the herbsâmarjoram and mintâI had found growing by the wayside. Isaiah called me a wise boy. Then Abdul said that any mother would be pleased to have me as a son. He still edges away from Isaiah, though. He says it's because Isaiah is a Jew. I told him that Father and I were Christians really. He already knows that. Abdul said that we are all People of the Bookâ
Kitabin Insalari
âbut that Jews and Christians pay a special tax because they are not Muslims. Isaiah said that it was cheap at the price because Turkey was a beautiful country and Abdul agreed. It was a nice dinner. Father prayed after we had settled down to sleep. His prayers are always for peace. I prayed, too. So did Abdul and maybe that was what Isaiah was muttering also. Someone should be listening.
It has got so hot that we have divided the day differently, just as we would in Australia in the summer. We walk in the early morning, then sleep in some hedgerow or olive grove until later in the afternoon, then walk until dark. In this way we covered I reckon about ten miles today. There were no villages, just little farmsteads. A Turkish farm is just like any other farm, except there are never any pigs. Jews can't eat pork either, I find, so there's only me pining for bacon. Abdul has never tasted it. This seems a pity. The farmhouse is usually a little white stone building with a red roof. There are always storks building nests on the roof. There is a big vine over the back door and a fig tree and maybe a lemon tree, some olives, a chained fierce dog, a scatter of chickens, a well, and a vegetable garden with a thorn fence to keep out the goats. This does not always work very well as the goats eat the thorns and get in anyway. Goats are like that. Determined. Father actually said something to the purpose today. He said, âEach man shall sit down under his own vine and fig tree and the nations shall study war no more.' Father seems to be happy enough. He will walk if I lead him, sit down and eat and sleep when he is told to. But his mind seems to have gone away. I have to get him back home. I shall just have to be determined, like the goats.
We had a scare today. We had stopped outside a little farm for Isaiah to sell his wares to the household when a boy shot out of the door and danced around us, chanting, âInfidel! infidel! Kill the infidels!'Anywhere else he would have got a clip over the ear for impudence but we just stood and stared at him. My heart was in my mouth. All he had to do was to tell any passing bey about us and we would be killed. Our lives were in the grubby hands of an eight-year-old boy.
His mother, fortunately, supplied the clip and he ran off howling. We have to hurry and get out of this country. I wonder if Father could walk further tomorrow? He seems healthy enough but he will not allow himself to be hurried. And Isaiah needs to sell his pins and things. He stops at every house. They all know him. Some people offer him tea, even though it is Ramadan and they cannot drink it themselves. Travellers are exempt from the fast. Also Jews, of course. He always refuses, though. That is nice of him.
The village we are heading for is called Kadikoy. We want to stay close to the coast, not go inland where the big road goes. We haven't seen any officials on this path, which runs more or less next to the actual road. It's not a very good road, mostly potholes and bumps, but a cart can go along it. Abdul says that when we reach Ipsala and cross the river Evros we will be in Bulgaria. Thrace used to belong to Turkey but it lost the land in a war in 1913. Do the nations do nothing but war with each other? And what happened to the people? The ordinary people, like these farmers? I can imagine what happened to them. The only good thing I know about Bulgaria is that it isn't Turkey and we aren't hunted there. And the Bulgarians probably won't shoot Father as a traitor. Also, from that coast we may be able to get a boat to take us into Greece and thence to Alexandria, where we can get a ship home.
We nearly got caught as we crossed the main road today. I heard hooves and dragged Father off the path into the bushes and we just managed to hide as a whole crowd of soldiers marched past. Their officer was riding a beautiful chestnut mare. Father tried to get up to preach to them but I summoned Abdul and we sat on him until they were safely gone. I saw their faces as they came. Young men, I thought. None of them looked evil. They just looked like people. But they all had guns and they were going to kill men like Bluey and Curly. Isaiah stood by the side of the road, leaning on his staff. Some of them spat at him. They are barbarians. The officer flicked a coin wrapped in a bit of paper to Isaiah and he snatched it out of the air. The old man seemed very pleased with himself, he was humming as we resumed our march. It must have been a silver coin.
Very hot today. We managed only a few miles before we swooned into the shade of this pine forest. It's almost cold under the trees. We can stay here until tomorrow, when it might be cooler. I found a well. We need to buy some more food tomorrow. Abdul made it all worse by remembering the lavish breaking-of-fast dinners which his mother used to cook. I'm very hungry. But at least there is water to drink. I will draw enough to have a wash, too. It is so hot that any garment dries on the body. I don't have a spare shirt any more. Perhaps we can find someone who will sell me one.
Much better today. It rained overnight. The air is nearly cool. We walked along briskly and reached a cluster of houses. A wealthy household. There the old man bartered for a new shirt for me and Abdul and food for all of us. He even accepted tea from the lady of the house. She was dressed in deepest black. Her sons had all been killed on the Gallipoli peninsula. Three of them. Her husband is gone away, too. Poor lady. She made us welcome. She seems to have met Isaiah before. Perhaps this is his tucker track. She didn't drink the tea, of course, and she kept her veil on all the time so it was hard to see her expression. But her eyes were red with weeping. Now that I think about it I haven't seen any women but girls and widows everywhere we have been. There are men working on the farm but they are all old or very young. The tea was wonderful and now I have a new shirt and trousers and a sack of food. The clothes belonged to her youngest son. She cried as she brought them out. She had embroidered a beautiful pattern around the hems. It made me sad.
We have come out into fields of sunflowers. They are so bright and cheerful. On the other hand, they afford no cover if anyone comes along the road. I started out liking them, but now I find them worrying. There is nowhere to hide in these sun-bright fields. Also, we are approaching a big house where the local bey lives. He owns all these fields. We are sleeping tonight in his cowshed. Isaiah says the cowherd is a friend of his.
LATER It was nice to spend a night under a roof. We had quite a jolly dinner with the cowherd, who welcomed Isaiah like a brother. Perhaps he is his brother; they looked similar, both old men with long white hair and beards. Abdul said he wouldn't sleep with us and went away. I wish he wouldn't do that. Is it because he won't sleep under the same roof as a Jew? He'll be sorry because it is raining quite hard and he is going to get wet. And it serves him right. Here it is dry and snug and smells of cattle dung. We had a lot of preserved food which Isaiah had bought and we shared it with the cowherd. He talked a lot about his landlord. He is mean and cruel to his tenants but luckily he isn't there a lot. And the sunflower harvest looks likely to be good so that will please him. Not if it keeps raining, however. I was homesick when I heard him say that. Farmers sound just like that where I come from. It seems to be so far away. I almost think that I dreamt it. The sun and the sea and the peace. And here I am, sitting in a Turkish cowshed, writing by the light of an oil lamp. Still, a barn was good enough for the baby Jesus, so it's good enough for Father and me.
Abdul caught up with us on the path in the mid-morning. He did not say where he had been but he had got wet, I was meanly pleased to see, God forgive me. We rested under a hedge and went on until dark to this place, in a grove of lemon trees. We must be going inland because I can't hear the sea any more. I miss it. My father says I was born within sound of the sea. Isaiah is telling a story and Abdul is listening despite himself. I realise that I have read this story before. It is the tale of Sinbad the sailor. He has just got to the bit where Sinbad fastens himself to a cow carcass so that the Rocs will carry him to their nest. It's very exciting. I'm going to stop writing to listen properly.
LATER More soldiers passed us. Going the other way, this time, away from the front. A terrible sight. They were all wounded and some were in carts which creaked and bounced over the ruts so that they groaned and cried. Poor boys! And my friends Bluey and Curly had probably shot one or two of themâjust for being in the other uniform. This is a mad world. I said so to Abdul and he told me that we had invaded his country and the soldiers were patriots and heroes. I did not want to start a fight so I sort of agreed. Then I caught the old man Isaiah looking at me with such a smiling twinkle in his eye that I was sure he had heard what was said. But Abdul and I were speaking English. Does Isaiah speak English? I asked him. He just shrugged and smiled at me again. His eyes are startling, very brown, so you cannot see what he is thinking. He must have had dark hair before he went grey. There are streaks of black in his hair and beard. I do not know how old he is. He walks like an old man, but then so does Father. Adbul says Jews are puzzling. He is right.