Between the Two Rivers: A Story of the Armenian Genocide

by Aida Kouyoumjian

  “La, la, effendi,” Mahmood rejected the satchel and handed him a gunny sack. “You deserve a bag.”

  “Won’t you need it?” Mardiros objected.

  “You bring it back next time you ride to our village,” Hakim said, dismissing the argument.

  “Well, in that case, we’ll leave the haggling to other customers. How much do you want for the candy?”

  “For you, effendi? Whatever you want to pay.”

  Mardiros felt as generous as the salesman and wanted to treat the children before they went to sleep. He handed over 500 Fils and waited for the vendor’s reaction. When the man praised Allah, Mardiros slung the bag of candy across the saddle and mounted his horse. “Inshah Allah, God shall bring me back.”

  He cantered south toward the orphanage.

  Within the hour, Mardiros heard the children’s voices wafting from the orphanage. Singing?

  A group of children crouched between the tent lines facing Diggin Perouz, intoning vespers.

  He tethered his horse by the guest tent and, careful not to disrupt them, quietly blended in behind a group of girls.

  The melisma in the youthful voices soothed his psyche, transcending any body aches accumulated throughout the day. The chanting filled an emptiness deep, deep within him. The endless void he experienced in Baghdad society must have taken up residence inside another person—it vanished in this primitive environment. He felt complete, whole, and no longer sensing a chunk missing from his soul. Had he arrived at the true meaning and purpose of his life?

  The children hummed or just sang la-la-la in tune. Only a few of them uttered the lyrics. As with him, the melancholy Gregorian chant remained melodically rooted in their memories, but not the ancient Biblical vernacular. Immersed like them, he hummed along until the concluding Lord’s Prayer—the portion he liked best in the entire Armenian liturgy, notwithstanding the high notes in the finale. Having memorized the last phrase, he sang loudly, oblivious as to how his husky tenor overpowered the children’s voices. His passion was compelling, and all eyes were riveted on him.

  “Barone Mardiros has returned,” Diggin Perouz said. “Everyone stand up!”

  “No, no, no!” Mardiros objected in vain, even as she approached him and the children applauded.

  “I should have stayed in the tent,” he whispered to Diggin Perouz, loosening his tie.

  “No, no, no,” she said. “You are part of us and very important to everyone.”

  He showed her the sack with the treats. “Since the children have congregated around you, should we give them the candy now?”

  “You are the Father of the Orphans.” She responded to his whisper with a nod.

  

  Mannig stood among the last in line, not questioning the purpose of the queue. She assumed all activities had a purpose and all were designed to prepare the children for the future. Without jockeying ahead as she normally would, she followed at the heels of the sisters from Van in silence, focusing on her new shoes. They hugged her feet in beautiful leather with a black buttoned strap. She adored their shine even in the darkness of the night.

  As soon as Diggin Perouz had fitted them earlier that morning, Mannig knew she and the shoes had become one—they were as inseparable as her arms. Melded into them, her feet were a model of decorum. She was proud of owning this pair and promised herself never again to discard them. Never again would she free her feet from the weight of shoes. Maybe removing her shoes had helped her escape the gendarme’s whips during the deportation, but she couldn’t forget how the scorching desert engulfed her and how thorns and thistles had pierced her shoeless feet.

  Besides, these shoes were different; their newness inspired her to imagine stepping into exciting paths and seeing fanciful sights. She wiggled her toes. But being confined, they could not dance. She yearned for their animation. Step in, step out … she emulated the sisters, visualizing a replication of the dance steps they had proposed to teach in the morning. Ah! I can hop and jig wearing real shoes, just like in Adapazar.

  Mannig kept her place behind the sisters more by sensing their forms than observing the actual activity of the pale shadows ahead. The lantern on the pole beside the latrine failed to illuminate anything but its immediate location and the suicidal moths fluttering in its beams. Too distant to see or hear the procedure at the head of the line, she guessed the orphans shook the Barone’s hand or maybe kissed it as one would a bishop.

  Closer to the front, she finally heard Diggin Perouz prompt the Van sister, “Say thank you to the Father of the Orphans.”

  Mannig’s turn came quickly after that. She curtsied, as in concluding a dance. “Thank you. Oops! Father of the Orphans,” she said, and passed on.

  Barone Mardiros touched her shoulder. “Don’t you like candy?”

  Candy?

  She looked at him, bewildered. The word was not part of her vocabulary. Yet its taste lingered in her memory. He put three mini-marble-size balls in her palm and sent her on.

  She kept her fingers locked, cuddling the candy until she entered her tent.

  The sisters from Van were already sucking theirs, purring, their eyelids half-shut.

  Mannig relaxed her fingers. Her gaze froze at the pearlescent yellow, pink and green orbs. Sweet and sour? She remembered being bribed with similar sweets … to scratch the khatoon’s feet. No. That can’t be. Even if that were the case, there were many girls ahead of her who could fill that obligation.

  Upon deeper reflection, they reminded her of her own father, on a train ride from Adapazar to Constantinople to visit her cousins. She had been scampering between the isles, among the passengers, chasing her brother, being chased by her little sister, squealing, giggling, when Mama had forced her to sit. She complied when Baba brought out a paper bag from his valise and placed several pieces of the sweet and sour candy balls in her palm. They emitted rainbow sparks of yellow, pink and green—exactly like the candy in the tent.

  Who really gave these to me?

  She dashed outside.

  A beam from the lantern shone on his face, the Barone. He was still standing there, the bag of candy in his hand.

  24—Not All Good Deeds Meet All Needs

  Melodic echoes and rhythmic thumps from the camp diverted Mardiros’s attention as he dipped his pen into the inkwell. I can finish my report later. He blotted the last paragraph and lifted the entry flap of his tent. The glimpse from the sidelines of the city of white canvas enticed him to put on his boots and step out.

  A long serpentine line of orphans, without a beginning or end, swayed in-and-out of his sight. Children sang and clapped with a pulsating tune; others danced and bobbed between the tent cables. Small fingers linked each child to the next, all melding together in a circle dance. Their steps followed a predictable pattern set by a leader, peek-a-booing into view. The ensemble replicated her moves and if a dancer modified a step—clumsily or independently—the rest resisted the change until uniformity ensued.

  The lead dancer waved a tattered floral handkerchief. Taking two steps forward and one step back, short and fast first then long and slow, she undulated toward the inner circle, the chain of dancers in step with her. She bowed her head and, arching her neck heavenward, flaunted a flirtatious glance behind her. Retracting her steps backward to the outer circle, she smiled at the dancers in tow.

  The girls’ zest and the gleeful tempo overwhelmed Mardiros. He marveled at the mutual yet elusive charm of teamwork. Every dancer blended with her neighbors. He moved forward for an uncompromised view and enjoyed the triune of rhythmic movement, sweet young voices, and his cigarette. He recognized some melodies and wished he could contribute, perhaps accompanying them with his flute. I’ll pack it on my next ride from Baghdad.

  The orphans plunged into an unfamiliar folk song. He suspected the forceful beat and the weighty guttural lyrics represented the style of mountain people. A song of Van? Only a native of the eastern region of Anatolia could improvise in the traditional manner. He
was vastly relieved. Someone from there had survived the carnage, after all.

  While lighting another cigarette, he spotted a child outside the swaying dancers, sitting on the ground, hugging her knees. She peeked at the circling girls, lowered her dewy eyes to her feet, then looked again at the frolicking group before looking back down at her shoes.

  Why isn’t she dancing?

  “Mannig!” he heard a girl from the circle call. “Come ye and dance with us.”

  The little girl shook her head while casting her glistening eyes back down to her feet. With the hem of her khaki skirt, she dusted a speck off the toe of her black leather shoes, and then slid her finger atop the strap to the button before she cupped the stumpy flat heel.

  Happiness is new shoes. He could foresee much more joy after she slipped on a new dress made out of the colorful bolts of cloth piled up in Diggin Perouz’s tent.

  Her stance prompted him to approach her. “What kind of a dance is this?”

  Upon seeing him, she rose slinkily to her feet—unlike an energetic youngster—and curtsied. “The dance of Van, Father of the Orphans.”

  “You don’t have to call me ‘Father,’ ” he said, “or stand up. We are not in a classroom now.” He gestured to her to go back to her sitting position. “Are you from Van?”

  The girl pointed to the lead dancers in the circle. “They are—the Vanetsi sisters. I am from Adapazar.”

  “Adapazar—a nice town. When I was in Robert’s College, one day I traveled to …” He stopped mid-sentence, wondering if he was repeating himself. Who was I speaking with about the town near Boleess? Someone from Adapazar, and recently. Maybe in Singapore. Which society lady?

  He eyed the little girl. “Why aren’t you dancing?”

  She raised her shoulders, feigning indifference.

  Her resignation reeked of sadness. He scooted down, crouching beside her, looking at the dancers’ feet. “Those are complicated steps, aren’t they?”

  “I can do them,” she mumbled wiping a shoe with her sleeve.

  “But you don’t want to dance?”

  “I can’t,” she whispered.

  He leaned toward her. “You confuse me, young lady. You say you can do the steps, and then you say you can’t. Now which one is it?”

  A shadow crept over her face. She hung her head between her knees.

  Puffing on his cigarette, he glanced at her. She loves her shoes.

  One of the lead dancers broke her link in the circle and, hopping into a two-step gait, sing-songed, “Mannig, Mannig. Why art thou denying thyself the fun of dancing?”

  Amused by her regionalized vernacular, Mardiros listened in. He’d heard about the archaic use of pronouns by the people of Van, but had never known anyone who spoke with this peculiar accent.

  Focused on her dialect, he remained oblivious to Mannig’s demeanor, when suddenly the Vanetsi came down to her knees. “Why art thou crying, Mannig-jahn?” she said, wiping the girl’s tears with her sleeve.

  Mannig spluttered a troubled sound, squeezing her knees close to her chest.

  “Thou wert so happy and excited this morning when I showeth thee this dance,” the Vanetsi said. “Thou learned the intricate steps fast and wanted to go on and on. Thou continued even when we stopped. Where hast thou hid thy liveliness and passion? Might ye not like to dance anymore?”

  “Vanouhi, I like to dance,” Mannig sniffled between words. “I want to dance. I know the steps. I am eager. Everything is the same.”

  “Why art thou not dancing, then?”

  Mannig coughed tear-filled words. “The shoes hurt my feet.”

  Mardiros held his breath—ashamed of his lack of awareness. How callous to have misinterpreted the little girl’s agony as pleasure in owning a new pair of shoes! She had stared at them all evening, grunted while rising to pay her respects then crouching again with relief. He had not noticed any of the signs.

  Mannig’s tears trickled down, her eyes guarding the shoes.

  How could her pain escape me? Had he been by himself, he would have bombarded himself with profanities and vociferously reprimanded himself for focusing on his own self-aggrandizing image. How dare he project his own thoughts, feelings, and behavior onto this child?

  “Let me remove them for thee.” Vanouhi reached to pull the shoes off.

  “Nooooooooo!” Mannig screamed, tucking her feet further under her seat. “They’re mine. I want them. I will never take them off.”

  Mardiros’s heart ached. How dense of him to believe the children accepted his generosity with complete contentment. This suffering child had refused to show ingratitude to the Father of the Orphans and tolerated discomfort for the sake of her heart’s desire. She preferred to endure pain in order to own a pair of shoes.

  “They are thine and thou may keep them, forever,” Vanouhi said. “But let me take them off for thee, now.” She cupped Mannig’s face in her palms and cajoled with looks and voice. She unbuttoned the strap and, bit by bit, wiggled the shoe off.

  A swollen foot, splattered with ruptured blisters, hung at the end of Mannig’s leg.

  Dumbfounded, Mardiros stared, his eyeballs nearly bursting from his head. “Amahn, Amahn!” His gasp and Vanouhi’s coincided.

  “Thy foot hath forgotten how to be caged,” Vanouhi said, dismissing the painful sight.

  That the children lived without footwear was not one of Mardiros’s concerns. Barefoot, they had rambled in deserts, alleys or mud-paths, for three, four, or many more years. Naturally, their feet would retaliate when disciplined by brand-new shoes. He cringed as if someone had sprinkled salt onto his wounded soul.

  “It shan’t be long,” Vanouhi said, while attentively relieving Mannig’s other foot from its shoe. “The twain shall become accustomed to each other very soon—thy feet as well as thy shoes. Ye shalt wear them again and ye shalt dance in them every day.”

  Mannig released an adult-like sigh of relief.

  Mardiros pulled a starched monogrammed handkerchief from his pocket and handed it to Vanouhi. “Wrap her foot with this while I get bandages from the infirmary.”

  “Thank ye, Father of the Orphans.” Vanouhi rejected the hanky. “Mannig-Jahn need not tread on her feet. Mine sister and I wilt carry her to bed.” She stood up, facing the circle of dancers and, at the top of her voice, yelled, “Takouhi! I need thy help.”

  Her sister broke her link in the circle and dashed toward Vanouhi. She flinched at the sight of Mannig’s feet but, without comment, linked arms with her sister, devising a seat with interlocking limbs. The two urged Mannig to scoot her buttocks onto the portable seat.

  Mardiros lifted Mannig up and onto the girls’ arms. She was as light as a scarf and compliant, the shoes cuddled to her chest.

  “I shall wash thy feet,” Vanouhi said, moving in step with Takouhi.

  “I shall salve them for thee,” Takouhi chimed in staccato, matching her sister’s stride. In everything, they mirrored each other, and every time, one echoed the sentiments of the other.

  “Tomorrow, thou shalt not walk,” Vanouhi said.

  “Neither shalt thou work,” Takouhi completed the plan, doting over Mannig.

  Mardiros’s gaze followed the departing threesome—Mannig, seated on a pedestal formed of human limbs, holding her head high and bobbing taller than anyone. Her legs dangled freely as she wrapped her left arm around Vanouhi’s neck and clutched her shoes with the other. They moved away from him, beyond the dancers and across the cables, until the female make-shift pyramid veered behind a row of tents.

  He hoped the pampering she received would lessen her pain. He despaired at his inability to sooth the blisters caused by his generosity. His shoulders slumped, and his thoughts shriveled.

  Mannig moved out of his sight, but her blisters remained engraved in his vision. He despised himself for being so deeply engrossed in his own good deeds. Why else had he projected gratitude into the feelings, thoughts, and behavior of that child? Those shoes fell far short of the manna
from heaven he had presumed. He had witnessed the suffering of one child but suspected there were many more. His arrogance ripped at his heart. Not all good deeds meet all needs.

  Empathizing with the pain he caused Mannig, he kicked off his boots as soon as he entered his tent. He lit the lantern, pulled off his socks, and checked his feet. No blisters. But the girl’s traumatic experience had gotten under his skin. He shuddered. The sting in his brain surpassed the chill of his loneliness. The silence of his solitude compromised the quietness of the tent city at night. He lit a cigarette. Paced the floor. Smoked puff by puff and paced inch by inch …

  Suddenly he stared at the entry flap of his shelter.

  He was not alone, after all.

  His shadow, large and distinct, flickered at him.

  Am I really the Father of the Orphans, or just the shadow of one? An honest assessment emerged, drowning in the pits of his beliefs. There wouldn’t be a remedy until his silhouette and self became one.

  He flipped the pages of his dossier to a blank sheet. He sat at his table, dipped his pen into the inkwell and, with the beautifully trained penmanship of an engineer, wrote at the top:

  Urgent Needs at the Orphanage in Ba’qubah.

  Below the title, he marked a vertical line and titled the left column, ‘Achievable,’ the second, ‘Elusive.’

  Without further thought, he wrote in the ‘Achievable’ column: “400 pairs of socks” They’d pad and protect the children’s feet in new shoes, he assumed. And keep their tiny feet warm, before the onslaught of chilly evenings of autumn.

  Pen in hand, he placed his wrist in the adjacent column, labeled “Elusive” …

  No words flowed through the ink of his pen. He scanned the walls of the tent … stared at the lantern … closed his eyes. He had no idea.

  What were the children’s heartfelt needs?

  25—Childlike

  Mardiros corked the inkwell and closed his ledger.