No Man's Land (70 page)

But it was not the same with Shemsy. He would constantly make fun of the nasal tone in her speech; and she would approach me with great warmth, sensing that the defect which was the cause of his mockery used to please me, and she would let me touch her freely all over with my hands.

And she would laugh.

And the blue stream which flowed from heaven would babble away…

*

Sometimes Shemsy and I would fight together. We would do so without any particular cause.

He would suddenly call me: ‘Infidel!' And I would immediately retaliate with: ‘Cur!'

We had learnt these words from our homes and schools. All Turks used to call Armenians ‘infidels', and all Armenians used to call Turks ‘curs'.

When Turks visited my father, he would receive them with hospitality. But after they had gone, parting with friendly and respectful greetings, my father would grunt: ‘Curs!'

And, of course, when my father had received similar hospitality from them, the Turks would grunt: ‘Infidel!' after he had left.

The ‘giavour' and the ‘eet' – Turkish for ‘infidel' and ‘cur' – could not live together.

If any Turk called me an ‘infidel', I would automatically retaliate with ‘cur', except for Sanié.

Sanié was the acacia-blossom which scented the cool air of the nights in springtime.

When an Armenian or a group of them were taken to prison in chains, they would hang down their heads as they went by, whilst the Turks would stand in the streets and laugh at them with delight.

And when a Turkish coffin was taken by, the Armenians would look skywards and murmur: ‘Thank Thee, O Lord!'They would be pleased that there was one Turk less.

I did not understand why this should have been so, but, without questioning it, my hatred for the ‘curs' grew more intense inside me, as it did with Shemsy towards the ‘infidels'.

Sanié disappeared behind latticed windows: a grim cloud had covered the silvery moon, and I was not able to unravel the mysteries of the scented, the intoxicating, the blossoming stranger; the deep hidden folds, the lines, the velvety expanses remained concealed from me; I was not able to dominate that field of marble in its entirety…

Sanié would go past our front door, enveloped in the violet cloud of her long veil; and my eyes would penetrate through this veil to wander in the hidden starry regions of an unknown world…

*

Every morning and every evening, an eye would peer through a latticed window; a hand would stretch out and throw a flower at my feet.

The house where this latticed window was belonged to a Turkish mullah, and it was a few doors beyond ours. On Fridays – being the Mohammedan day of worship – the mullah would not greet any Christians, nor would he reply when they greeted him.

But on Fridays, as on other days, the same hand, delicate as a jasmine in the morning, would stretch out, throw a flower, and withdraw.

Through the latticed window would be heard her gentle laugh and suppressed scream of delight.

It was the mullah's third wife, a youthful girl, imprisoned inside a cage.

A longing would be set ablaze within me. I would develop an urge to see her, to speak to her.

I would pick up the flower she had thrown down. I would take it home, and smell it incessantly. An unfamiliar tremor, a shudder filled with ecstasy would flow from that flower into my soul.

The mullah was over sixty years of age, with a bent back and yellow, evil eyes. He used to shave his prominent cheek-bones, trim his beard to a rounded shape, and dye it with henna.

Every time he went out of the house he would give strict orders to the other two women to keep guard over Bahrié and not to allow her to go near a window; not a fly was to enter the house!

But Bahrié, fired by the spring, found ways not only of approaching the window but of sliding her hand out, throwing a flower, and sighing.

‘Come into the garden tomorrow; the old witches will be out,' I heard her say from behind the window one day.

That voice chirruped in my ears, and it awakened within me… woman.

I heard her and went on my way, but she seemed to have struck at my heart and dragged it inside through the closely-latticed meshes of the window.

I moved away, but her voice continued to ring in my soul, louder and louder.

I stopped in the shadow of a tree. The sun had woven a pattern of flowers on the ground, and I could see Bahrié in that pattern. The wind whispered in the leaves – it was Bahrié saying:

‘Come into the garden tomorrow…'

At night I stood on the roof: the branches of the acacia-tree are bent down; the moon is immediately above our roof. I can see Bahrié's face on it, with large, black eyes; her hair, cut short, is strewn across her forehead. She is smiling.

In the morning, I climbed on to our garden wall and jumped down into our neighbour's garden. My clothes were moistened by the morning dew. I had to cross three gardens before I came to Bahrié's.

I stood on her garden wall. I was shivering, but it seemed to me that I could have flown into the air.

Bahrié saw me. She ran down.

I am inside, under the blossoming pomegranate-tree. A little beyond, a lilac-tree is hiding me. Bahrié appears. She stops. She is panting, shivering, with her hand on her swollen breast. I embrace her. I become drunk with her scent; my lips are aflame…

‘Let's go,' she whispers. ‘Let's go inside!'

The mullah had gone to the old town by night with his two other wives – in connexion with some hereditary lawsuit. They had locked the front door on Bahrié, and there was no way of her leaving the house.

Bahrié took me by the hand and led me inside, into the bedroom.

She threw her arms round me; she cried; she laughed; she kissed me. The bed was not yet made, she had only just flown out of it. I embraced the fresh, youthful girl, and we rolled on to the bed. A woman's scent is intoxicating…

I was set aflame by a woman for the first time in my life…

I was surrounded by a sense of fear and the first happiness.

Everything was in song; every object cried out with ecstasy:

‘Bahrié!'

She is lying there motionless. Silently, within a few minutes, she is living the joy of centuries.

‘Go quickly, go!'

She begins to cry.

‘They will be back in the evening,' she adds.

Her tears mingle with the azure drops of her happiness.

She seems to be seeing the old man, with his yellow eyes.

She accompanies me to the blossoming pomegranate-tree. I pick a red flower and put it on her bosom. I take her hand and kiss it…

I climb the wall; I can hear the sound of her crying and her gasp of happiness. She stands under the dark-green shelter of the lilac-tree, casting a longing look.

I jump down into the next garden and part for ever from the first woman.

*

The following day, I met Veronica – Christina's cousin. Veronica was an ethereal being, as feathery as a fawn; she had pale-chestnut eyes and the complexion of a rose. I used to bare my soul to her every time we met; but on this occasion it was covered with a pink veil of shame. I could not look into her eyes. I took hold of her hand, kissed it, and cried. I wanted to confess, but I could not expose my soul to her, instead I stood firmly before its sealed doors.

‘Is your mother ill?'Veronica inquired innocently.

‘No, she isn't.'

She could not possibly have guessed the truth. She was probably roaming in the blue hills of innocence. No doubt some bewitching, enchanting song of nature was also whispering within her bosom, but she was far from suspecting my sin. Veronica could never, never have imagined that a woman, a blossoming woman had displayed the hidden treasures of her body before me without shame.

We go to the bottom of the garden together, crushing flowers under our feet. The fruit is hanging from the trees. I decide to confess my sin when we reach the mulberry-tree; but once we are there, Veronica begins to run about and cry: ‘Catch me!' I run after her, but I am reluctant to catch her quickly. In the end, I do. And our lips cling to each other through some unknown urge. All the leaves seem to applaud, and the fruit seems to sing, whilst the garden vibrates like a cymbal.

‘Veronica!' a voice is heard to say quietly.

We turn round. It is Christina. We go to her. She is shaking with all her body. She can hardly breathe:

‘Benon is coming.'

‘Let him,' says Veronica, and lifting up her arms she picks a fruit. Her bosom seems to want to fly skywards with emotion.

Benon was Veronica's brother and my school-friend. Christina was not shaking because of him, but because of our kiss.

Benon arrives. Together we climb the mulberry-tree. Its fruit has been scorched by the sun; it has dried and sweetened it.

The turquoise of the sky crumbled on to Veronica's head, too. The deadly, parching winds blew from the desert and covered her body under the sands…

Only the morning star shed a few tears upon her, after which, evening fell with blood-stained eyes…

*

It is morning. The sky is grey and dark. But the snow has fallen all night and the countryside seems to be covered with lilies.

I have come out of the house to run to school, with my satchel on my back. The dogs are there to greet my morning.

I can see men walking with hurried steps, silently, their minds preoccupied. A woman is standing at the corner of the first street. There is a silence as deep as a chasm in her eyes.

A general stillness reigns everywhere, as if the snow were the gigantic shroud of a coffin. Instinctively, I sense that there is something amiss in the air, which fills me with awe – a fear which grows with every step I take.

Someone draws a curtain mysteriously from behind a window, as if they do not want the daylight to penetrate inside. Another opens a front door, looks up and down the street with frightened eyes, and shuts it.

I meet Krikor Agha, who is normally a man with slow movements, but he is hurrying.

‘Where are you going?' he asks.

‘To school,' I reply.

He wants to say something, but he clasps his hands together and continues on his way. This leisurely man is running like an ox, as if fleeing from some impending danger.

A group of people, cowered, but with hurried steps, are coming away from the square of the town. I want to ask them something, but none of them lifts up his head. They go past hurriedly.

The shops are shut: it is neither Sunday nor Friday. There are one or two half-opened ones here and there. I look inside through the shutters.

The people there are sitting curled up in corners, without uttering a word; they are merely smoking.

No one speaks to me – no one. Each one looks at me, and smiles painfully.

The nearer I approach the square, the more profound the silence becomes.

A woman emerges; her hair is uncombed and she is almost in her night-attire; she takes hold of a ten-year-old child by the shoulder and hastily drags him inside. The door shuts.

I reach the square.

In the middle of the square, in the overall whiteness of the snow, there is a black mass. Four soldiers with gleaming bayonets stand round this black mass. One by one the huddled-up and terrified men approach it; they look; they shut their eyes and hurry past silently.

I go near.

I see a body without a head!

The blood has congealed on the snow and turned black… The head is lying on one side, as if asleep.

I look back again: the body without a head has its arms thrust into the snow…

I am rooted to the ground – petrified! My feet refuse to move.

One of the soldiers orders:

‘Go away!'

I go away.

In the twilight of the morning, the Sultan's tyranny had cut off the heads of two revolutionaries.

The other was in the upper square of the town.

For the first time, I see the picture, the horrifying picture of the cruel tyranny.

My childhood soul is saddened.

I want to go back home, but a noise rises from another part of the square. A crowd gathers. I too run there.

‘It's Fouad Bey, Fouad Bey!'

Fouad Bey is a handsome Turk, with dreamy, tawny eyes and a wide forehead. He is young, slightly built, but virile. He is dressed in Circassian clothes, and walks slowly and proudly. He is one of the Turkish revolutionaries, exiled from Constantinople, who had raised his voice in protest against the beheading of the two revolutionaries.

He climbs the stone steps of one of the shops and speaks to the crowd gathered before him. His eyes are no longer dreamy; they have assumed a look of fierceness, sublimely savage. With his fur cap in hand, his tawny hair is scattered across his wide forehead. I can hardly catch and understand a few words here and there. The faithful soldiers of tyranny arrive and surround Fouad Bey. They push him about and tie up his hands and drag him away.

Horrified and frightened, the crowd disperses.

The silence descends once more, heavy and deep.

I return home. The curtains of all the windows are drawn.

I go in.

No one speaks.

I throw my arms round my mother.

She strokes my head silently.

The silence chokes me.

I want to scream, but I am chained by the very silence. The whole town has turned into a cemetery.

Every now and then a pounding is heard in my heart. It echoes dully, and dies down.

A head cut off… Do they not only cut off sheep's heads?

Who had done it?

‘Ahmed Tchavoush! Ahmed Tchavoush!…' they whisper.

To my eyes, Ahmed Tchavoush becomes that fabulous monster about which I had heard so much, but which I had never seen and could not visualize.

*

One rainy night the headmaster of our school, Hagop Simonian, was stabbed to death under the thorny tree in front of his house.

In the morning, the news spread like lightning: the Turks had stabbed Hagop Simonian to death. The Turks, the curs…!