Between the Two Rivers: A Story of the Armenian Genocide

by Aida Kouyoumjian

  She pulled her knees to her chin, covered her ears with bent arms, and retreated into the fortress of her thoughts. What makes me different from them?

  Garina fanned the blinking embers with a frond of palm leaves. Her swift movements revived inflamed passions and hidden pain. The girls prayed and wailed, groaned and retold the tales of their massacred families. “They drowned my brother …” one girl wept. “They beat my uncle to death …” another sniffled. Lament followed lament.

  Time after time, when the brazier of coal found its way back into her area, Mannig tried to turn things over and over in her head, fixing her eyes on walls blackened with cobwebs. She resisted being swept down the slopes of her own tragedy.

  What was the purpose of this orphanage? Why survive the massacre? Mannig curled up under her quilt, while the rest memorialized their loved ones. She wanted to hear their stories but resented the details. Even though she thought she’d heard everyone’s accounts, she prayed they’d speak of them again.

  It never occurred to her that the orphanage had evolved to gather survivors in one place to commemorate the massacred. It pained her to revive the memory of her family—it was enough that the others were consumed by their agony. She wanted to remember hers only wrapped in the splendor of Adapazar. Were the orphans really honoring the memory of their loved ones?

  She sat apart but remained a part of the weeping meetings. The dreamless voices of crosses and losses poured into her ear, but refused to run out the other.

  Mannig re-awakened to a blinding insight. Her sadness, too, deserved a place of recognition. She must honor her family’s harrowing narrative. Inflamed with passion, she, too, immersed herself in all-encompassing agony. Ah! The loss of beautiful Adapazar! Did she really have a home? Where? As far away as the lives of seven precious members of her family. Mama and Baba, Setrak and Sirarpi, Aunt Anna and Agope-john, grandmother Haji-doo ...

  The images of her massacred beloved—private, personal and hidden in her memory until now—poured into the orphanage. Her eyes beheld torture; her nose, the whiff of death. Her ears heeded agony and hands felt pain. The taste of being alive soured against their misshapen corpses. She shared their suffering but coped with their memory alone. Their legacy belonged to her now. Bearing the pain by herself overwhelmed her. Might talking about the tragedy lessen the burden? She felt compelled to preserve their identity. What is my responsibility?

  A cold draft blew in. The flames leaped to the height of hands domed above the brazier, then flickered down. Ashes fell silently upon ashes while rain splashed in big rapid drops. Voices and eyes drowning in grief wrung Mannig’s heart. Tears warmed her cheeks and wet her chest. Although her suffering emerged more awful than bearable, she felt a deep inner peace.

  Mannig let herself become immersed in the weeping meeting.

  “They deported us from Adapazar,” she said. “My sister, Sirarpi, suffocated to death—too small to fight for air in the packed train. Haji-doo fell off the donkey on the deportee route—the gendarmes shot her for slowing the caravan. They whipped the soles of my father’s feet until he bled to death because he traded his coat for bread to feed us. The guards called for “all boys twelve and older,” which included Agope-jahn, and shoved them off the cliffs into a big river. My brother, Setrak, died of typhoid in the tent city of Deir Zor; Aunt Anna of influenza. Mama, too, died in Deir Zor—I’m sure more from sorrow than disease.”

  “Are you the only one still alive in your family?” a tearful voice rang in the back.

  “Adrine …” Mannig gasped at her own utterance and appeared dazed at the here and now—no longer trekking the deportation route, but in Mosul, where the orphanage provided refuge and tears, tender solace. How could she remember every dead member of her family yet forget the one and only surviving sister?

  Adrine! Adrine! To be alive had a purpose, after all. She jumped to her feet, shouting, “I have a sister among the Arabs … they call her Adi … my own sister! She is my family. She should be in the orphanage. She is Armenian.”

  14—A Sister among the Arabs

  The stormy sky cleared into a gentle, hazy pink—washed clean and blushing.

  The sun lipped the horizon’s rim, and a wisp of mist rose with soft, crackling noises from the courtyard. Mannig awakened filled with optimism—every bit of herself aroused and driven by purpose. Her eyes, ears, hair, and skin, even nails and nipples, as much as her pulse and consciousness—every cell in her body focused on reuniting with her sister.

  I’ll be with family again. How strange the word sounded.

  The two siblings, four years apart, had never been close, even in Adapazar. Mannig had resented how Mama and Baba doted over their oldest child and bragged about her achievements in school. After the slaughter of seven members of their family, the sisters had escaped death independently of each other and subsisted without each other’s support. Following the war, an Arab family hired Adrine as a live-in maid—a great fortune in famine-stricken Mosul. Mannig accepted that it was her fate to forage the alleys. Nobody wants me. I’m not like her—tall and strong. Mannig had fought starvation for nearly two years with her own wits and with Dikran’s heartfelt attentiveness—he had cared for her more than any blood relative. She had even contrived her own entry into the orphanage. Why the sudden desire to reunite with Adrine now?

  The intensely emotional weeping meetings at the orphanage had changed her outlook. The nightly gatherings of the children, mourning the mass murder of their loved ones, released Mannig from the sadness pent up inside her.

  She awakened to the amazing fortune of having a family member.

  My own sister is still alive. Sharing a future life linked her with her legacy.

  Mannig leaned pensively against the balcony railing as the orphans’ chattering signaled the start of the day. Babbling voices mingled with early morning smells. Dikran piled up twigs to start the fire for breakfast tea. The scent of flowers filled the air until fumes of burning dung filtered through the myrtle tree’s pink and white blossoms.

  The supervisor threw a handful of tea leaves into the boiling water and voilà! A simple, instant meal was ready. The spiraling blue wisp of the ginseng tea twirled above the deep amber beverage bubbling in the same black caldron she had used to simmer last night’s soup.

  Everyone craved extra sweet tea. Someone always diverted the supervisor’s attention so Dikran could scoop his tin cup into the sugar sack and dump it into the steeping beverage. Then innocently, he would ask her, “Khatoon Supervisor, did you put in sugar?”

  “Yes, yes, yes!” she replied, shaking her head, jingling the decorative coins sewn to her white head kerchief. “Taste it.”

  He scooped a ladle full into his cup and took a noisy sip, nodding approval.

  The supervisor then created the opportunity for his subterfuge by turning her back to him, pretending to straighten something on the ground. Dikran quickly scooped his hand inside the sack and dumped a palm full of sugar into the caldron. She would continue to stir as though nothing had interfered with her recipe. The game was repeated every morning like a ritual, to the hidden delight of all.

  While the orphans received their ration of tea and a chunk of bread for breakfast, Dikran squatted against the wall and lit his pipe. He dragged voraciously in a non-stop series of puffs.

  The supervisor stirred extra sugar into Dikran’s cup but not into her own. She sat beside him and rolled her own cigarette, confident that a serving of sweetened brewed tea with a chunk of yesterday’s bread would fortify the orphans to improve their skills in various crafts.

  “The priest is coming! The priest is coming!” Dikran chanted like a town crier, from one chore station to the next, making sure everyone would have time to groom themselves and tidy up their rooms. The priest visited the orphanage intermittently to give communion, bring supplies, and enroll a new batch of orphans rescued from Mosul.

  Unlike on previous occasions, his visit excited Mannig. She combed her hair and belted her
sack-dress with braided cord she had salvaged from discarded yarn at the Spindle Dingle. Her heart fluttered, and like many resident girls, she held her breath and observed the group who trailed in at the priest’s wake, awaiting the arrival of her lost sibling.

  The priest was hunched over as his horse passed through the creaky gates and click-clacked into the courtyard. The supervisor’s effendi followed him, leading a donkey laden with one gunny sack.

  No one else trailed in.

  Mannig dashed outside, searching for stragglers in their dusty path. Disheartened at not seeing her sister emerge, she dawdled back into the orphanage, sulking.

  Resigned, she watched Dikran pull on the rein to steady the horse while Garina placed a wooden crate beside it.

  To dismount, the priest swung his right leg toward the horse’s rump and cautiously set his foot on the crate, exposing a hairy leg. Do priests wear undergarments? He freed his other foot from the stirrup and stepped onto solid ground; quickly, he drew together his black priestly robe, gathering his dignity. He reached inside his vestment, pulled out a glittering cross that hung on a chain around his neck, and then brought out a plain black mitre for his semi-bald head. The tip of his head cover matched the end of his healthy black beard. Does he tuck all that hair under or above his quilt at nights?

  The supervisor dashed over and, kneeling, clasped his hand to her lips.

  “Asdvadz orhnayl,” he murmured.

  Mannig knew Asdvadz meant God. How about the rest? Must be Grapar—the ancient Armenian of the Bible, seldom studied by non-clerics.

  The children hovered around him like a swarm of crickets, touching his robe and kissing his hand. He loves their adulation. Mannig approached him, too, more swept up in the courtyard mood than prompted by her heart. Beside the gurgling spring, he swung the incense vessel, tinkling and spewing curls of gum fragrance. Delicious. His robust Gregorian chant vibrated off the veranda from the four sides of the open courtyard. Were these the sounds of the Adapazar church? She had seldom gone into the sanctuary with Mama and Haji-doo, but played in the church-courtyard with her school friends, not far from Baba and other men smoking and discussing big people’s affairs. I wish I knew what they talked about. Even more, I wish I had sat next to Mama. Her mother had donned a wide-brimmed hat and heels and, corseted like Europeans, wore a fitted ankle-length ensemble. She had modestly sat next to Haji-doo, who in her brown tunic and headscarf, had proudly observed how everyone looked at her daughter-in-law with admiration.

  Mannig guessed the orphans observed the priest with similar wonderment. Were they entranced by the liturgy? They watched his mouth opening and shutting beneath the straggly hairs of his moustache while he signaled for everyone to repeat after him. Stirred by his baritone, Mannig mouthed the refrain in the wake of his reverberating voice. What do the words mean? The children kept their eyes cast down, heads covered and reverently bent low like a band of early Christians gathered furtively in the hinterlands to renew their faith.

  Mannig held her place beside the clump of myrtle, her eyes darting every which way, fidgeting nervously with the fringes of her head kerchief. Her thoughts about Adrine smoldered like the cloudy incense, rolling aloft, curling upward, its mysterious aroma escaping into the open air. Images of a real family replaced the incomprehensible incantations she mouthed with the orphans. Her thoughts wandered; then conscience pricked. Am I wicked in ignoring Asdvadz? I’ll be religious when I grow up. She longed for her sister. Her thoughts dwelt on her. But now, how could she, among 200 others, get the priest’s attention?

  He, meanwhile, wet his hand in the stream, let a drop fall on one child, and crossed the forehead of another with his right thumb before sprinkling the final drops across several heads. He warbled sing-song phrases, pleasantly melismatic but unfamiliar to Mannig’s ears. Signaling Dikran to approach, he said, “Hold two corners,” and handed him a lustrous purple cloth while the supervisor held the other two edges. “It will catch the communion wafer should it fall.”

  The priest held an aged and stained chalice of olive wood in one hand, while with the other he dipped a white chip of lavash bread into the wine and put it into the mouths of the orphans, who kneeled before him one at a time.

  Mannig salivated. Would there be enough for her? The pile of lavash beside his elbow would suffice, but not the wine. Unless he diluted it with water. More than his blessings, she needed his attention today to approach him about Adrine. She shouldered her way ahead of a few girls. As soon as she knelt by the edge of his black robe, fear sealed her throat. Her legs trembled, stomach churned.

  The priest’s hand reached her face. He put the mass in her mouth.

  She choked. Tears rolled down her cheeks.

  Garina whacked her back.

  The wafer flew out—landing on the purple cloth that Dikran and the supervisor held.

  The supervisor patted her. “Are you all right?”

  Mannig nodded, looking up at the priest. Heart, head, and throat together, she croaked, “Venerable f-a-t-h-e-r …”

  “Asdvadz bahe kezi, my child,” he said with a smile and motioned her with a wave of his sleeve for the next orphan to kneel and receive communion.

  She felt like a kindergartner on her first day of school, and her own boldness terrified her. Not knowing what she intended to say or do, she stepped aside, yielding to his hand gestures. The trace of wine soured in her throat. She put on a mask of indifference, swept past him with bowed head, and retreated to the scented myrtle. She tossed a pebble into the running water. Clouds of tiny insects rose to the sky, dove down, scattered over the courtyard, and hovered like meandering clouds along the shores. The coughing and choking left no more of an impression on the priest than a dunked fist would make in a bucket of water. He’d never notice her.

  Gurgling water often filled time to think. What a wasted day! And all because a little puny fear had tied her tongue! What frightened her? Unable to pinpoint it, she recalled Haji-doo saying, “One who is afraid cannot be saved.” Is that my fate?

  Even after her death, Haji-doo’s admonishment sparked fire in Mannig’s belly.

  She dashed ahead, preceding the priest to his next ritual—the blessing of the rooms. Like a sentry, she waited for him at the head of the stairs.

  “Venerable-Father, your grace,” she said, pulling on his flowing sleeve before he stepped onto the threshold of the veranda. She placed passionate kisses all over his hand. “Your grace, I have a sister among the Arabs.”

  “Asdvadz bahe kezi, my child,” he said. Freeing the kissed hand and swinging it behind him, he sauntered into the first room, holding the cross off his necklace with the other.

  He did not hear me.

  While he blessed the air, waving his cross, Mannig shoved aside a few girls surrounding him. “Venerable-Father,” she said, brushing a quick kiss on his sleeve. “I have a sister among the Arabs.”

  “Asdvadz bahe kezi, my child,” he repeated—monotone.

  He’s either esh (donkey) or doesn’t understand my Armenian. She eyed him, then the supervisor. Neither changed their expressions.

  Mannig remained deaf and mute but engrossed in any movement the priest made. When he was midway across the balcony, she stepped in front of him. “Venerable-father, I have a sister among the Arabs.”

  “Asdvadz bahe kezi, my child,” he responded—same voice, same pitch.

  I wish I spoke his language.

  She dashed downstairs and waited at the landing for his descent to bless the rooms at the courtyard level. She pressed on his hand while it was still on the banister. “Your grace,” she raised her voice, and in one breath, assailed him with a string of declarations. “My sister is among the Arabs. Her name is Adrine. She is my blood family. Sisters ought to be together. You must bring her to the orphanage. You’re the only one who can save her. Venerable-Father, you must save my sister. Venerable-Father? Please … She is Armenian.”

  “Restrain yourself, child,” he said, catching Mannig by surprise
, actually uttering words of her language.

  “Forgive me, your grace,” she said after a loud breath. “I do have a sister among the Arabs.”

  “Impossible, my child,” he said. “We collected all the homeless orphans. Everyone is here now. My scouts scoured every alley and many abandoned khans in Mosul. All parentless Armenians are in the orphanage.”

  “But my sister is NOT here. I know where she lives. She is a maid for an Arab family.”

  “Well!” he pontificated. “She is lucky to have a job and a roof over her head.”

  Mannig remembered how at first the registrars at the church denied her admittance to the orphanage because she looked clean, bright, and self-sufficient.

  Tears ran down her cheeks. “The Arab family treats her very badly. They beat her when she speaks with Armenians … they forbid her to share her daily piece of bread with Armenian orphans. You must bring her to the orphanage before she is lost. She is a pitiable Armenian orphan.”

  “She cannot be,” he said, brushing his robe past her. He held Mannig at bay and then signaled to the supervisor to lead him to the next room.

  Mannig waited in the courtyard for his exit. She darted to him, crying, “Believe me, your reverence. I do have a pitiable sister in Mosul, and she is an orphan. If you don’t bring her here, she will become a-a-a-Arabicized. She will perish.”

  He ignored her again, and facing the horde of orphans, said, “God bless you all, my children. I am finished here … until next time.” He held his cross to be kissed by the supervisor. “My job of collecting orphans is finished. Now I can do the normal business of God’s work.” A few ‘Amens’ from here and there made him pause. “I have neglected my regular flock in Mosul too long—many funerals, much weeping.” Groping inside his robe, he retrieved a frayed Bible. His lips touched its leather cover before he flipped a few pages, in preparation for his final blessing. The reading sounded more like incantations than reflections upon the passage.

  Everyone’s eyes became fixed on the movements of his lips again.