Dear Shameless Death

by Latife Tekin

  ‘Water pump, if I went to visit Elmas, would she throw stones at me too?’

  ‘Oh no, she’d never do that, Dirmit girl.’

  ‘But I won’t go.’

  ‘Why not?’

  ‘Because she might throw stones.’

  ‘Do you miss her a lot?’

  ‘I miss her a lot.’

  ‘Then go and see her.’

  ‘No, I won’t.’

  But Dirmit could no longer stand it. She paced round and around the water pump for days, trying to decide whether she should or shouldn’t. Then, one noon, she tore off like a flying wind through the wing-gate, charging like a rushing stream over to Elmas’s house and knocked on her door. Elmas didn’t stone her but she wouldn’t open the door or gather her up in her arms either. Dirmit started to run back home, and the village children stopped her in the narrow alley, tearing out her hair, ripping off her clothes, battering her head with stones, then ran, shouting and scattering through the village. Atiye found her daughter in the alley crying and covered in blood. Furious, she picked her up and brought her home. No sooner had she laid Dirmit down on the divan than she rushed out the door again, hollering. She knocked on all the doors in the village and any child she caught she thrashed on the spot. She also complained to the Headman and the elders, and swore that she would call the gendarmes if anyone ever again dared to lay a hand on her daughter. Then she returned home and at once wrote a letter to Huvat, calling him back to the village. Huvat raged as he read the letter. He set out in the middle of the night and made it to the village in two days. Immediately upon his arrival he took his daughter by the hand, stuck a pistol in his belt, and in no time flat was scouring the village. ‘Who stoned you? Who stopped you on your way? Who bashed your head? Show me!’ he demanded again and again, but Dirmit cast down her head and spoke not a word. And the longer she stayed silent the more Huvat bellowed and raged. He fired away at walls and doors, turning the village upside down. And for a few days he took Dirmit out for walks, strolling hand in hand with her to the spring, the vineyard and the fields. But when at last he had to depart once more, she was just pale skin and bones, hanging her head down. Before setting off, Huvat told Atiye to keep him informed about everything that went on in the village. If they didn’t leave Dirmit alone, he resolved to send Seyit or Halit for her so that she could be by their side in the city. He also hinted to Atiye that their sons weren’t being properly looked after in the city, so he was thinking of moving house there.

  Atiye had no sooner heard Huvat pronounce the word ‘city’ than she started to prepare. Before Huvat reached the sheep fold on his way out, she had given the good news to her children and daughter-in-law. Zekiye at first jumped up and down, clapping her hands and rushing around the house, but when she suddenly thought of her kinfolk in the village, her face became ashen and she sat down, pressing her hand to her side. Pinning her embroidery needle onto the tip of her headscarf, Nuǧber turned and listened to her mother in silence. Then she bent her head over her canvas once more and toiled on at her needlework until midnight, stitching ‘cross sisters-in-law’. Dirmit left the room quietly and walked down to the water pump, while young Mahmut was dancing all around the house.

  ‘Water pump, did you hear? Father’s taking us away.’

  ‘I did, Dirmit girl, I did.

  That’s why I pointed my muzzle at the moon

  and howled like a dog while you looked out the window.’

  ‘Don’t worry, I’ll take you with me.’

  ‘No, you can’t do that, Dirmit girl.’

  ‘Then I won’t go.’

  ‘Oh yes, you will.’

  ‘I’ll kick and stamp and cry.’

  ‘But, all the same, you’ll go.’

  ‘No, never. I’ll run away, you wait and see.’

  ‘Where will you run off to, djinned girl?’

  Atiye started packing after the grape harvest. The news spread throughout the village in no time flat. Starting the farewell ritual, women came to knock on her door. Meanwhile, men went into the stable in ones and twos and drove out the cows, the goats, the lambs and the water buffalo along with her calves. They yanked their tails and ears, pressed down on their backs, bent over to peer at their bellies and squatted on the ground or leant against a wall to appraise the animals from a distance. Then they quit the livestock and climbed up on the roof or wandered about in the garden. They clustered around the water pump, examining the spout and handle and listening to it squeak as they pumped up some drinking water for themselves. Then they disappeared, only to come back again. After leading the animals from the stable one by one, they forked down the pile of dried grass from the roof and emptied out the hay from the loft.

  Women started meeting together to cut up and dry the pastry for erişte and couscous. They helped Atiye get her flour and bulgur ready to go, ripped the wool out of the mattresses and hauled it away to be washed, then took everything out of the storeroom and put it in sacks. Zekiye departed to visit her parents in Dizgeme, and Nuǧber hurriedly wove her last carpet. After she had made the finishing cut, they sold the loom. As the coarse sieves, the pitchforks, the winnowing forks and the millstone were distributed, each to a different household, Zekiye’s beauty once more became the talk of the village, and Dirmit’s djinn was forgotten. Now the villagers fretted that it was a pity Seyit hadn’t been able to marry his love Elmas. Matchmakers came to see Nuǧber, and Mahmut was passed from one embrace to another. Weeping and laments mingled with türkü singing. No longer cowering by the walls, Dirmit moved about the village freely, as children competed with each other to play picnic and stickball with her. Men lifted her up in their arms, as they had done once before, and affectionately called her ‘goat girl’. But Dirmit shunned the men, women and children and roamed about the village on her own. As she wandered about, she chatted with the walls, the waterways, the faded rosebushes that had shed their buds, the wind and the stream. And while she talked, she was also searching for a place to hide. Dirmit drifted in and out of all the stables and the gardens in the village, as well as through the vineyards and in and out among the rocks. Fearfully she trod the path to the school every day, sat at each desk, one by one, and stood in front of every window, looking out at the village and sobbing each time she looked.

  As Atiye ran frantically about the house like a wild mare, Dirmit’s despair deepened, and she started to believe that they really would leave the village. On the day the menfolk came and led the last cow out of the stable, she went howling about the garden like a wounded dog. She tried to block the cow’s way and then threw stones at the men. Once the men had dragged the cow away, she spent the rest of the day inside the stable and finally fell asleep, crying, in the manger. The water buffalo’s calf came to Dirmit in her dream.

  ‘The calf is crying, Mother dear.’

  ‘That’s not crying, good-for-nothing.’

  ‘I saw tears as big as fists in its eyes.

  It let them drop onto the hay when it saw me.’

  In Dirmit’s dream the calf had broken away from its rope and run out of the stable, trampling the lambs and billy goats as it went. It thrashed its hooves in all directions and rubbed its nose on the ground, its eyes flashing fire. Pursued by a crowd carrying pitchforks and stout ropes, the calf charged through Neighing Boy’s Rocks and, cutting away from the path where the hard pears grew, made a break for the slope and the vineyards. No one was able to lasso the black buffalo calf or stick a pitchfork in its belly.

  As soon as Dirmit woke up, she walked down to the water pump to have her dream interpreted. From the water pump she discovered the stable where the black calf was tied and crept over secretly to visit it. She caressed its belly and leant down on its back to sniff it. The next morning she visited the black calf again and asked why it had come back down the path where the hard pears grew and not run away. The calf turned and gazed at Dirmit for a long time with huge black eyes streaming tears. Dirmit couldn’t bear to watch the calf cry, so she ran up int
o the mountains, where she asked the henna-coloured rocks with water-filled crevices if they would hide her in their hollows. ‘Our hollows are nests for rabbits,’ they replied, but swore to hide Dirmit anyway because they couldn’t resist her pleas. They confided to Dirmit that the rag bush was cross with her because she had forgotten to visit it and to stroke its branches and make a wish. Dirmit ran straight to the rag bush and sat against it with her back turned, chatting to it. She tore a piece from the hem of her dress, offered it to the bush and made her wish. The rag bush sent her off to the vetch grass, the stinging nettle and the long-stemmed cactus. That day Dirmit went to visit every herb and tree on the hillside and in the fields. She washed her face at Üçoluk spring, plunged into Sat stream, croaked with the frogs and wove a djinn’s cap for herself from the reeds. She set out walking in the Savmanı pasture, which had been mown, and sang türküs and laments to the nests abandoned by the migrating birds. Then, in the evening, she rode back home on the backs of the greyhounds. Before passing through the wing-gate, she learnt from Mahmut that her father had returned, so she darted off again and raced towards the fields. Huvat took off after Dirmit, chasing her and shouting all the way to the ruins. He caught up with her by the blind well and, despite her struggling, lifted her in his arms and carried her home.

  The next morning they sold the house, and Zekiye returned with Rızgo Agha and his wife Sose on the same day. So big was the crowd gathered in the house that there wasn’t even enough room to drop a needle. The women congregated around Atiye, the menfolk around Huvat. Trays of food were brought in from other households, and everybody stayed up until the early hours weeping, laughing and talking. Atiye, Nuǧber and Zekiye were given pinked headscarves and handkerchiefs. A rag doll had been made for Dirmit, and Mahmut was given a slingshot, a hand-carved whistle and a shepherd’s pipe. Halit and Seyit were each remembered. Pledges and promises were exchanged…

  Dirmit rested her head against the windowsill and silently watched the water pump wag its tail and point its muzzle towards the moon and howl. She watched so intently that her heart overflowed, and she went quietly down to the garden and leant her head against the water pump’s. First one wept, then the other. And as they wept, the moon fell, scattering its light across the fields, and the stars blinked out.

  Early the next morning, they all visited Nuǧber Dudu’s grave. They cleared it of weeds and stones, and planted on it irises from their garden. Then they recited prayers and promised Nuǧber Dudu that they would come and visit her every year at springtime. In the wake of their weeping, they handed out dried nuts and figs for her spirit. Everybody then moved on into the fields and the vineyards, sighing beside each field, vine and tree. From there they continued towards the pasture, Sat stream and Üçoluk spring, where they knelt down on the soil and fixed their eyes on the sky. They wound green and red rags onto wishing bushes, as birds with green heads and ash-coloured breasts sailed and soared above them. Down below, greyhounds ran, lizards wagged their tails and frogs croaked. The young girls and married women of the village gathered on the rocks and anointed Nuǧber and Zekiye in sisterhood with henna. Then they crowned them with garlands of little flowers. After that they leapt hand in hand from the rocks and made their way down to Dölek, where they all danced ‘The Lousy Shepherd’ and wept.

  The morning after that, Huvat set out early with Rızgo Agha and the rest of the men in the village on his last hunt in Akçalı, and in the afternoon the hunters tramped back bearing partridges and hares. The women cooked arabaşı together. That evening Huvat organized wrestling matches with the men and, when he grew tired of that, he started playing the ring and egg games again. Women carried trays of food into the men’s lounge. Then they sewed up the bags and sacks that were already filled and bundled up the mattresses and quilts. That night Huvat and Atiye were offered hospitality at one household, while Nuǧber and Zekiye, Mahmut and Dirmit were lodged at two others. Dirmit tossed and turned in her bed and didn’t close an eye all night long. As she tossed and turned she kept trying to think of a place where she could run away and hide. She couldn’t decide whether to take off in the direction of Buǧlek stream, conceal herself in the ruins or climb up on the rocks. Anxiously she lay staring up at the ceiling and waited for dawn.

  The following morning they all rose early and went to visit the shrine of their saintly ancestor. They made a sacrifice for Nuǧber Dudu’s spirit by the grave. Then they cooked the meat with rice and ate it together. Dirmit slipped secretly away from the shrine and returned to the village, where she drifted about quietly. First she climbed the walnut trees, then walked on the rooftops. She went down to the school, ambled up to the sheepfold and finally returned to sit beside the water pump. Propping her face in her hands, she fixed her eyes mournfully upon it. Unable to look at Dirmit’s pale face, the water pump lowered its head towards its pool and remained quiet. So did Dirmit, and her long silence drained the water pump’s spirit. Bone dry, the water pump hung its tail dejectedly and hunched its shoulders, its low and heavy breathing broken only by sounds that softly implored, ‘Get away from me, Dirmit girl!’ Dirmit caressed the water pump’s arm, its head, muzzle and neck. Then she leant her waist against the water pump’s and wept. Still sobbing, she picked herself up and went into the stable, where she brushed her hand all over each of the mangers. She lingered by the post where the cows and the water buffalo had been hitched and roamed in and out of the manure pit. Then she inched on her tummy through the chicken-coop door and crouched there, remembering her frolics with Ömer, the son of Grimy Rıfat.

  Crawling out of the rear of the coop, she stood beneath the poplars and swung on the cypresses’ branches. She picked at the leaves and pulled up the dried stems of cucumbers, beans and linseed. First she laid them aside in a little pile; then she crumbled them in the palm of her hand and flung them into the wind. She bent over ant holes and cracks in the earth and called out to the djinns. Then she shinnied up the lime-washed pear tree and sat on its forked branch, swinging her legs, her gaze fixed upon the purple mountains. At that moment the crowd had reached the wing-gate, and shouting children burst through it. Dirmit drew her legs up and clambered back to the pear tree’s djinn branch at the very top. Then she noticed a big truck behind the ash heap with her father standing upon it. At once she jumped to the ground with a thud and started running down the garden path towards the fields. Racing through them, she scrambled breathlessly up Kara Hill. There at last, she crouched behind the white rock at the top, looking down at the village. First she leant her elbows on the white rock, then she hunched down behind the rock with her back against it. Gradually fear overtook her in the twittering of the birds, the sound of distant water breaking into her ears and the hissing of the snakes. As she grew more and more frightened, she thought for a moment that the ground was slipping out from under her feet and the weeds were closing in on her. So she turned back to cower behind the white rock again. With each lizard that came gliding by, she leapt to her feet. With each floating butterfly her heart flew up into her mouth. The dirt suddenly burnt beneath her feet, and the sky ripped apart at the centre. Rocks cracked open, weeds blazed and the scarecrows in the fields toppled over. Dirmit sprang screaming from behind the white rock and started to run like a greyhound down Kara Hill. She raced across the fields back to the village, sobbing breathlessly, until she reached their garden wall. Pressing her ear to the wall, she heard people calling out to each other. When she made out Atiye’s voice she took a deep breath. Then she collapsed against the wall, stretched out her legs and leant back, listening to her own hoarse breathing. With one hand she took hold of her left side and waited for the ache there to let up.

  As she waited she gazed out at the distant mountains, who shook their heads at her. Dirmit smiled softly and turned down her eyes, promising herself that she would never run away again. As soon as she got back onto her feet, she could hear Atiye’s voice, then Nuǧber’s mixed in with her mother’s, and Nuǧber’s with Mahmut’s, before all were los
t amidst Huvat’s coughing. Then Dirmit heard her father shouting out her name. Moving towards his call, she bounded over the wall into the garden, but as she did she slipped and fell tumbling into the waterway. Suddenly she heard a thin, quavering voice and turned her head towards it. Right there by the waterway, standing on a very thin stem and looking up at her, was a red flower she had never seen in the village gardens before and whose name she didn’t know. She bent down, letting her fingers gently touch the flower, and caressing its leaves and fine stem. The flower nodded coyly, closed its eyes and breathed very, very slowly. Dirmit stood up and began to run. In its thin quivering voice, the flower called out to her.

  ‘Goodbye, Dirmit girl…’

  Without ever looking back, Dirmit crossed the whole length of the garden, climbed over the wall and let herself drop onto the ash heap. She fell crashing onto her knees on top of the ash heap djinn, crushing its belly and head. The djinn was so angry that it picked up Dirmit and flung her among the bound-up mattresses and bedding on the truck, while it indignantly scattered all the ash from the heap into the air. Dancing about with bells on its fingers, it rallied all the djinns in Akçalı, who instantly flew up from their holes. Garbed in tasselled, many-coloured outfits and with tambourines in their hands, they circled around the ash heap djinn. Shouts were drowned out, lost amidst the sound of djinn bells. The children swinging on the truck’s tailgate fell off one by one and were buried in the dust-cloud as the truck tore off down the long, long road. It left all the houses of Akçalı flying and scattering behind it in all directions. Nuǧber Dudu stood leaning on the graveyard wall, scratching at the ground with her walking stick, from time to time shaking it angrily at the truck as it sped away. Neither the roaring of the engine nor the devil wind’s shrill whistling could drown out the groaning of the water pump. To keep from hearing it, as it spread all across the earth and sky, Dirmit blocked her ears with her hands and buried her head between the mattresses. Once past the sheepfold and the mountain pass, the truck slowed down to a swaying pace, like a coquettish lamb. As it cruised fearlessly along Buǧlek stream, Dirmit stuck her head out from between the mattresses and unblocked her ears. But as soon as she did so, she heard donkeys crying, ‘Ninnisare, ninnisare!’ and saw a whole herd of donkeys that kept growing taller and shorter strewn out behind the truck. So she covered her ears once more, shut her eyes and dug her head into the bedding.