The Doves of Ohanavank

by Vahan Zanoyan

“Any other girl in your position would have taken the money without a second thought.”

  “Perhaps. I can even give you some examples of girls who would take it in a second—Anastasia for one, Susannah in Dubai, Nadia, Farah, Sumaya, and tens of others that I met in that year-and-a-half. Do you know what they all have in common? They are all real prostitutes. They applied for the job, as some of them told me. Did I? Did I apply for the job, Edik jan? Why would you expect me to react the same way as those who did?”

  For the first time, Laurian sees Lara’s youth as an asset. Only an eighteen year old could be this idealistic, he thinks. A thirty-something would have found it much easier to opt for the money. He leans over toward the passenger seat, grabs Lara and holds her tight. He does not care what it looks like. “I am so proud of you,” he finally whispers in her ear, and Lara relaxes, stops resisting his hug, and allows herself to wind down in his arms.

  After a few minutes, he lets go.

  “Now I know,” he says. “Not only do I know where you stand, but I know how you can burn the canvas and save the painting. I really do.”

  Anna freezes when she sees her photograph on the table in the back room. She instinctively looks around, as if expecting to uncover a bad practical joke. For a split second she imagines Hovo has found her, walked into the store and put the picture there just to terrify her. But no one is there. She then looks at the picture carefully, at her long hair and thick-rimmed glasses, and wonders if it is possible to tell it is her. Thank God she does not wear glasses any longer.

  Lucy walks in and sees her holding the photo to the light.

  “Oh yeah,” she says casually, “if someone looking like that walks in the store, let me know. Try to get her address and phone number, if I’m not here.”

  “Who is she?” asks Anna, wondering if her voice is shaking, but relieved that Lucy has seen no resemblance.

  “Her name is in the back of the picture.”

  She flips the photo over so fast that she wonders again if Lucy noticed her nervousness. “Anna Arturi Hakobian,” she reads aloud. “But who is she, I mean, what do we want with her?”

  “I have no idea. Yuri wants to know. I don’t ask Yuri why.” She shrugs and walks out of the room.

  ‘Yuri wants to know’ means Madame Carla wants to know, thinks Anna, and she’s been warned about both. This photo could have come only from Hovo. She has been warned about that risk too. But what good are the warnings? What’s she supposed to do now? And didn’t Laurian say that Hovo was working for LeFreak? Then how come Yuri is asking about Anna Arturi Hakobian?

  Anna is in a cold sweat. She puts the photo back on the table. She goes to the mirror hanging on the back wall, and takes a long look at herself. Very short hair and no eyeglasses are the only changes since that photo was taken. That may be enough to fool Lucy, but not a more observant person. Hovo would certainly recognize her if he saw her in the street. Her parents would recognize her too. The man who raped her could recognize her, even though he was not that interested in studying her face.

  She has to call Lara. Overseas visitor or not, this is an emergency.

  There is no doubt in Yuri’s mind that LeFreak orchestrated the killings in Sevajayr last fall. He could not prove it, but he is convinced. His informants’ consistent reports of methodic attempts to take over the Ayvazian operations are a good indication. Hov’s reports of the snide remarks of LeFreak’s men about Ayvazian, saying what an idiot he must have been to have gotten himself and his men killed, serve as an added indication for Yuri. They sound almost like they’re bragging.

  Carla listens to Yuri with her feet up on her desk. She’s lost some weight in the past few weeks, and takes pride in her new looks. She has stopped wearing stockings since the temperatures have risen in Yerevan in early May. Her skirt slides up her thighs as usual as she shifts her feet from left on right to right on left. Every additional inch of exposed skin adds to her own arousal as much as to Yuri’s, but she enjoys building expectation a lot more than he does. Build the pressure and control it at the same time, like pulling an arrow in a bow. Tension like that has its uses.

  “We cannot take any chances with this, Yuri,” she says, in a tone that would make one think she’s in a boardroom in a formal meeting. “LeFreak may be inexperienced when it comes to our business, but he is not a clumsy man. Don’t forget that he has built a formidable empire of his own.”

  “I’m not saying he’s clumsy. I’m saying he killed Sergei and Viktor. How is that clumsy? I’m also saying his men are demoralized and frustrated. We have a chance to strike now, and we should take it.”

  “Yuri, that’s why I asked you before if you’ve ever killed anyone, and you never answered me. You acted like a spoiled child who’s denied his candy, if you remember. Why do you think I was asking? Just to be nosey? If you think the time is right to strike, have you also thought of how and when and where?” Carla shifts her legs again, offering a glimpse of her bright red thong in the process. Yuri fights the urge to get out of his chair and have her right there on the desk. But the last thing he needs is another insult delivered in the form of a rejection. He gathers himself and keeps his eyes on hers.

  “I have killed before,” he says so coldly that Carla takes notice. “And I can kill again, if there is a well thought-out plan that I have faith in, a plan that won’t blow up in our faces.” Then, keeping his defiant gaze on her, he adds, “Have you?”

  Carla ignores the question. He should know better than to challenge her like that, because she has never taken the bait and never will.

  “Good,” she says, “that will come in handy when we’re ready. Leave the planning to me, Yuri. This is not something you can rush. I doubt that his men will suddenly find motivation any time soon. We still don’t have enough information about him. His weaknesses and, more importantly, his routine. What does he do on a typical day? Who can take over from him if he dies? What do they do on a typical day? I admit that what you’ve uncovered in the past week has been impressive. But it is not enough to strike. Gather this information and we’ll regroup. I have a specific team in mind for this operation.”

  “Any progress on the documents for Dubai?” asks Yuri.

  “Yes,” says Carla, but makes sure Yuri sees her displeasure. Only she can change the subject like that, and only she can ask for progress reports. Nevertheless, she explains. “Three documents are ready. He’s working on the fourth.”

  She then takes her feet off the desk and walks toward him.

  Alisia confirms Laurian’s reports that Avo has moderated his drinking. Actually, moderation is not the right way to describe it, because he avoids alcohol altogether for four or five days in a row, and then drinks a bottle of vodka in a few hours and gets senseless drunk. But at least he does not drink everyday, and he does not get violent when he drinks. He just passes out and sleeps for twelve hours.

  Most of the pigs are sold. Only one remains with her litter of piglets. Avo has decided to keep them, using the feed he had purchased before the prices rose, augmented by household refuse, such as potato peels, outer leaves of cabbages, wilted carrots, beets and turnips from their winter storage bin, and as much as he can gather of the same stuff from Martha’s house.

  The proceeds from the sale of the pigs have generated less than twenty percent of what Avo borrowed from Laurian. But Laurian does not accept any payment.

  “Use what you have to cover your other debts,” he tells Avo. “The interest will accumulate and it will become a much larger burden on you later. What you and I need to talk about is not the old debt, but a new business plan.”

  “What’s the point?” says Avo. “They’ll destroy anything else that we start.” He sounds so depressed that Laurian is torn between his feelings of sympathy and anger. Anger not at LeFreak, but at Avo himself, for not showing the will to start oevr, to fight back, for what appears to Laurian as a defeatist, fatalistic resignation and acceptance of conditions as they are. That is the problem with the whole
country, he thinks. The LeFreaks and the Ayvazians would not survive for one day if people didn’t acquiesce so easily.

  Laurian checks his anger by reminding himself that Avo is in fact different from the vast majority of the population. He has shown two major acts of defiance, both violent. One during the killings of last fall, and the second through his attack on LeFreak’s fence, an utterly hopeless act driven by nothing other than extreme desperation.

  “Of course there is a point,” he tells him calmly, “since when do you give up like that? Haven’t we overcome much larger problems?”

  Chapter Twenty-Seven

  Ahmed spends hours at the Madenataran, pouring over not only old Arabic manuscripts, but also ancient Armenian texts written on lambskin, old Bibles with miniature art filling the margins, handwritten and painstakingly copied by one priest over his entire lifetime.

  He has done his homework before coming here.

  “This is one of the largest repositories of old manuscripts in the world,” he tells me, oblivious to the irony of acting as my tour guide in Yerevan. “More than seventeen thousand manuscripts, thirty to forty thousand documents virtually on every subject, and what’s most surprising to me, well over two-thousand historical documents in non-Armenian languages, including over a thousand Arabic manuscripts.” He catches me watching him and stops.

  “Are you listening to what I’m saying?” he asks with a smile.

  “I’m listening.” I smile back.

  I admit to him that this is my first visit to the place as well. He looks at me, surprised at first, then smiles.

  “I love it that we can share a first experience,” he whispers.

  We go to lunch at a French restaurant near the Cascade. He talks nonstop about the Arabic manuscripts, which, he says, include both complete and partial Quranic scripts and life stories of the Prophet Mohammed. “We don’t have this many ancient manuscripts in Dubai,” he tells me.

  After lunch, he drops me back at my place, because I tell him I need a few hours for some personal errands.

  “Thanks Ahmed,” I say as I leave the car, “I’ll meet you in the lobby of your hotel around four. No need to send the car to pick me up.” The Mercedes sedan has begun to be noticed in my neighborhood.

  I don’t know why I never thought about the fact that Ahmed and Edik are staying at the same hotel. Edik always stays at the Marriott. That’s where Ahmed is. As I walk up the steps to enter the hotel, I wonder what I’d do if they’re both there. Do I introduce them? Do I pretend I don’t know Edik?

  I walk in, and Ahmed is with Manoj as expected, having a coffee. Edik is not around. I wait for them to finish and we walk over to the Art Gallery across the Square. Here too, Ahmed has done his homework.

  “There is far too much to see in just a few hours,” he says. “Let’s focus on the 5th and 4th floors. The 5th floor is the classical Armenian artists and some 19th century art. The 4th is twentieth century Armenian artists.” He sees me staring at him again and starts laughing. “All you need, Lara jan,” he says, stressing the jan, “is to think like a tourist. It is all there. But those who live here will never open a tourist flyer!”

  “And who taught you to say ‘jan’?” I ask.

  “That’s how everyone talks around here,” he says casually. “That’s much easier than ma.de.na.ta.ran! Anyway, I think we should start with the 5th floor and walk down. What do you say?”

  On the fifth floor, we start from the left wing, which happens to host the Gallery’s Aivazovski collection. He is fascinated by the shipwreck scenes. He spends a long time in front of each painting. I hear an occasional ‘incredible’ or ‘genius’ coming out of his mouth, but he finds it difficult to let go of one painting and move to the next. He stops the longest in front of a painting of a storm, with a large sailing ship tilted on its side, the mast bare of any sails, waves and mist rising from the ocean, merging with a sky full of thick white clouds, a long log is floating in front of the ship, waves gushing over it—the entire painting is a presentation of concentrated, angry nature and danger. “Look at that,” whispers Ahmed, in awe. “Every single point on this canvas is moving. You feel the waves in your bones.”

  Something else catches his eye. It is a painting of Noah leaving the ark. Noah is in the foreground, in flowing robes, long white hair and beard, accompanied by his sons, and in the background a long caravan of the other family members and all the animals, winding through the wet fields, with Mount Ararat in the background.

  He walks closer to the painting. “You can feel the exhilaration, the joy, the victory of having survived the flood, and most of all, you can feel the power of their faith. Wouldn’t you love to have this painting in your bedroom, right in front of your bed, so every morning when you open your eyes, you live this same feeling of having survived something huge? Can you imagine that?”

  I did not know about Ahmed’s infatuation with paintings. During the time that I was with him, he had talked about music, poetry, and sometimes philosophy. He had brought CDs for us to listen together. Towards the end, right before I escaped, he had begun to introduce verses from famous Arab poets, to augment my language lessons. He’d read and translate them to me, then ask me to read them. But his ability to walk straight into a painting and be engulfed by it is news to me.

  “On second thought,” he says, looking at Noah’s painting again, “I could never have this in my home.”

  “Why?” I ask. “I mean, obviously not this exact one, but a perfect duplicate. The guide below told me you could commission duplicates of the paintings. They will be identical, except for the size, she said. They change the size, otherwise it would be considered a forgery.”

  “That’s not what I mean,” he says. “Noah’s story is in the Quran also. In Islam, he is considered one of the prophets. God spoke to him. And we cannot have a physical portrayal of any prophet. It goes back to the prohibition of worshipping idols.”

  A guard walks in to say it is closing time. We have not even finished viewing Aivazovski yet.

  We walk out. It is already dark in the Square.

  “It is too late to go to the Genocide Memorial,” he says. “I will not even try to pronounce the name again. There is too much to see here. I’ll have to extend my stay by a day or two.” He looks at me, hoping for a happy reaction. I give him a warm smile.

  “I think you’ll enjoy meeting my friend Edik,” I say. “He’s like you. Interested in everything.”

  “I’m not interested in everything, Lara,” he says seriously. “Only in the things that are part of you.” After a minute, he adds, “Of course, I’d still love to meet your friend.”

  We walk slowly around the Square and back to the hotel.

  “Where shall we have dinner?” he asks.

  “You seem to know more about Yerevan than I do,” I say, laughing. “You decide.”

  “Do you feel like anything in particular?”

  “No, but I’d prefer somewhere quiet. I have something important to discuss with you.”

  “Oh? Good news or bad?”

  “Would I give you bad news when you’ve come all the way here to see me?” I ask, paraphrasing him.

  He chooses a quiet restaurant on Charents Street. It is around fifteen minutes drive from the hotel. Manoj does not come along. Ahmed’s driver will have to figure out where it is from a map, instead of following Armen as usual. He finds the address without any difficulty.

  I like the feel of the place. It is an old house turned into a restaurant, with separate dining areas with just a few tables in each. There is also a terrace, where we sit. He orders several dishes for us to share, and looks at the wine list.

  “They have some interesting foreign wines here,” he says. “What type of wine do you feel like?”

  “Ahmed, if you don’t mind, I’d rather not drink tonight. I think I still have some of that cognac from last night in my veins.”

  “That’s fine,” he says, “I won’t drink either.”

  I d
on’t know why I automatically compare Ahmed and Edik in almost everything. This, for example, would never happen with Edik. For him, wine is more important at dinnertime than the food. He won’t go to a restaurant that has a poor wine list, even if the food is excellent. Ahmed does not seem to care one way or another.

  We’ve spent almost the entire day together without talking about us. I think he feels the need for a break from last night’s serious conversation as much as I do. His seemingly boundless interest in old and new, and his deep appreciation of the arts remind me of Edik. But the two men could not be more different in every other way. Edik’s endless curiosity springs in part from his profession, and in part from his being an expatriate Armenian trying to understand today’s Armenia. Ahmed, on the other hand, is first and foremost a businessman. His interest in history and art comes from a nostalgia toward a once glorious history that he fears is lost. He used to talk to me about the Arab renaissance in the first several centuries of Islam with great passion. One way or another, all of his non-business interests can somehow be traced back to that history.

  Aivazovski’s paintings are still on his mind. His desire to wake up every morning to the same sensation as Noah must have had at the hour when he finally left the ark fascinates me. I wonder what it would be like to have the freedom to think about that kind of possibility. What type of outlook on life should he have for that thought to even occur to him?

  Equally surprising is to hear him talk about idolatry. Ahmed is not religious in that way. He does not follow dogma. He has no problem drinking alcohol, even though it is prohibited by Islam. He does not pray five times a day, like he’s supposed to. But he won’t hang a picture that he admires with his heart and soul in his bedroom. His bedroom, which neither I nor, as far as I know, any of his many other concubines have ever seen, must be the inner sanctum. What is permissible outside the bedroom is not allowed inside. Maybe he does not take a glass of wine to his bedroom either. Or maybe it is something else altogether. I have to stop trying to understand contradictions in a man like Ahmed. He is made of contradictions. His being here to see me contradicts his entire way of life.