Samira poked him gently in the shoulder with her foot.
“What are you doing?” she said. “Don’t you belong to the Vineyard Family? They’re up ahead of us.”
“I’m resting,” said the boy. “I’ll get up and come along when most of the line has passed.”
The boy was not very big, and Anna reached down and lifted him up by the shoulders.
“You’d better get up and walk now,” she said. “You’re practically asleep and you might wake up and find yourself all alone. Would you like that?”
The boy shook his head. “But I’m tired. Why won’t Miss Shedd let us stop and rest?”
“We have a long way to go and winter is coming. That’s what she’d say if you asked her,” said Anna.
“I don’t want to hear about it,” said the boy. But he walked off to find his family.
Samira knew that Miss Shedd was right. They had to keep walking even though it was hard.
A few days later she said to Anna, “Every day I can walk a little faster and I think we go a little farther. Sometimes I even worry that Benyamin and the other boys will never catch us. We’ve been gone for ten days and we don’t know if they’ve even left Hamadan.”
“They’ll catch up with us,” said Anna.
The country they were walking through was changing. The road was rising slowly, up and up. One day Samira found herself thinking that she didn’t care about getting to Tabriz. She just wanted to stop walking. Going up this road was harder than it should have been, but she didn’t know why.
That night they stopped in a caravanserai. It had been built in the days when camel caravans had traveled this road and needed places to stop for the night. There was a big walled yard and stables for animals. On one side of the yard were low buildings with small rooms where travelers used to sleep. Now their roofs were falling in.
The Rooftop Family found a corner where the walls offered shelter from the wind. They quickly arranged their sleeping mats on the ground. They ate lentil stew and had just crawled under their quilts when Miss Shedd came by to see that everyone was settled for the night.
She looked around at the old walls.
“Thousands of people have slept here over the years. Before the war these buildings would have sheltered people traveling between Turkey and Hamadan and farther east.”
Turkey.
“Miss Shedd,” Samira called. “Are we on the road to Turkey now?”
“Yes. If we kept on over the mountains we would get to the city of Urmieh. But in a few days we’ll turn north and take the road to Tabriz.”
“I knew I remembered,” Samira said, almost to herself. “We took this road when we came down from Ayna. I have been here before.”
She wondered why she hadn’t seen this caravanserai when she came past on that other journey. It seemed so big now. But then she was not seeing the things around her. Only the road. Only the other frightened people.
“Will we go to Sain Kala?” she asked.
“You remember Sain Kala? It’s just a village. But, yes, we’ll be near Sain Kala. We’ll stop at the river and you children can go swimming. I want to spend a little time there myself. After Sain Kala we’ll turn toward Tabriz. That will be in two or three days. Now, go to sleep.”
She stood there for a few minutes. Samira could see her dark shape, tall against the starry sky. She closed her eyes so that she wouldn’t see Miss Shedd move away.
The next day word spread among the older children that they were walking on the same road most of them had taken when they fled from the war. How it spread Samira wasn’t sure, because no one talked much. They were very quiet that day, each person remembering or trying not to remember.
In the middle of the morning Malik hurried up to her and said, “Shula is sitting in the road back there. She’s crying.”
Samira found Shula crouched with her hands over her face, wailing, “My mother. My mother.”
The younger children gathered around her, their eyes wide and worried. Anna appeared and said quickly, “See if you can calm her, Samira. I’ll take these children and go on. Malik, Avram must have gone on ahead. Find him.”
Samira knelt down beside Shula. “Come. Move out of the road. We must let the others pass.”
Shula rose with tears streaming down her face and let Samira lead her to a patch of grass. There she sank down and sobbed, “My mother died along this road. Leave me so I will die here, too. The journey is too hard. I can’t go on.”
Samira didn’t know what to say. What Shula said was true. Her mother had died and the journey was hard.
She sat down and put her arm around Shula’s shoulders.
“We could sit here thinking of our mothers and cry together,” she thought. “But if I cry, how will I stop? I don’t want to stay here crying.”
“Shula. Why have you stopped walking?” It was Miss Shedd’s voice, not unkind but wanting an answer.
Samira stood up. Avram was standing nearby looking helpless.
“Shula is remembering her mother who died on this road. She wants to give up. This journey is too hard for her, she says.”
Miss Shedd sat down on the ground. She took Shula’s hands away from her face and looked at her for a long time.
“Shula,” she said. “This journey is not easy but it is not dangerous, not at all like that other journey. When you think of your mother remember how glad she would be to know you are going home. You may be sad but you must think of the other children. They need you to be with them.”
She lifted Shula to her feet and guided her back to the road.
“Go and walk with your family,” she said. “Sitting by the road wailing will do you no good.” She looked at Samira. “I’ll come back soon and see how you’re doing.”
She strode off and Samira saw that her horse was waiting for her.
Shula was still sniffling but she didn’t sit down and wail again. She looked at Samira and said, “She didn’t even say I was right to cry for my mother. She doesn’t know how we suffered.”
“No,” said Samira. “She doesn’t. But she knows that if we don’t go home we might always be sad. That’s why she is taking us on this journey. She’s trying to take us home.”
When the travelers finally stopped for the night it was raining, but the outriders had found dry stables for everyone to sleep in. The women of the village had swept the stable floors and brought enough fuel to make a fire where the children could take turns warming themselves.
The fire and the smell of the stew in big iron pots seemed to reach out to the ones who had been remembering the last time they had walked this road. They sat down together without talking. The little children who remembered nothing of that journey ran up and down the long stables shouting until it was time to eat.
Mr. Edwards came and stood beside the fire.
“Children,” he said. “Friends. I have to say goodbye. Tomorrow very early I will begin riding back to Hamadan. In a day or two Mr. Shields from Tabriz will join you and take my place for the rest of the journey. You are on a great adventure and I’m glad I could come with you part of the way. I wish you well as you travel home.”
The children crowded around him to say goodbye.
When Samira had her turn she said, “I wish you
were coming all the way, Mr. Edwards. We have known you so long.”
“Since the fields of Kermanshah,” said Mr. Edwards. “Happy traveling, Samira.”
When the girls were going to bed, Anna said to Samira, “You know why Mr. Edwards came on this trip instead of Miss Shulman, don’t you?”
“Why?” said Samira.
“Because he’s a man. Miss Shedd takes care of everything but there has to be a man to talk to some people.”
Samira thought of the chavadar who treated her as if she was invisible. He would only talk to Malik.
“Yes,” she said. “You’re right.”
THE NEXT MORNING Samira went with Malik as she always did to help him carry the bedding to the chavadar. They were just coming into the area where the mules were stabled when they heard a loud and angry voice. The chavadar who looked after the Rooftop Family’s mules was shouting at Miss Shedd and shaking his fist.
Miss Shedd was listening. Sumbul stood beside her. He was listening, too, and his ears twitched nervously.
The man was shouting in Persian so Samira couldn’t understand what he was saying. She knew that Miss Shedd didn’t speak very much Persian, but she was standing as if she was planted in that spot and would not move until the man was quiet.
The chavadar shouted louder. He held out his hand and rubbed his thumb against his fingers. Then he said some words in Syriac.
“He wants her to pay him more money,” Samira whispered to Malik.
Malik nodded. His eyes were fixed on the chavadar, and Samira knew that skinny and young as he was, he was ready to leap on the man. She put her hand on his shoulder.
Miss Shedd was shaking her head vigorously. She said no in Syriac in a low, firm voice.
The man leaned toward her and gestured to the mules and shook his head. If she didn’t give him more money his mules weren’t going anywhere.
Miss Shedd just stared at him. He took a small step toward her and put his hand on the dagger that was stuck in his belt.
Suddenly, without turning, Miss Shedd reached over to Sumbul and pulled her little whip out of its loop in the harness. She said no again, a little louder, and lifted the whip. Its lash whipped through the air but the man jumped back and it did not touch him.
He looked at Miss Shedd for a moment, then turned, spat on the ground and walked away.
Miss Shedd watched him go. Then she put the whip back in its loop and patted Sumbul’s neck.
“Thank you for standing by me, old friend,” she said. She turned to Samira and Malik. “And thank you for keeping still. I know you wanted to help but I had to deal with that man. He’s been paid. They’ve all been paid the whole amount we agreed on. But he thought he could get more while I was on my own with no man to back me up. We have no money to spare, of course. We have to buy food and fuel from the village people with what little we have. And anyway, I would not let him push me around just because he thought he could.”
She looked beyond Samira and Malik toward the road.
“I won’t be stopped from getting you children home. You can believe that.” She went over to Sumbul and put her foot in the stirrup. With one motion she was on the horse, looking down at them.
“Well, that was an invigorating start to the day, wasn’t it?” she said. “Now it’s time for us to be on our way.” She clicked her tongue and Sumbul walked briskly out of the camp as if he, too, wanted to leave this place.
Later as they tramped along the road, Samira told Anna what had happened. Their feet kicked up dust, and the gusty wind lifted it and then let go and dumped it on their heads.
Anna said, “Well, if anyone can get us there it will be Miss Shedd. But sometimes it looks pretty well impossible. Look.”
Samira looked ahead. The road had been climbing uphill steadily for the past day or two and now in the distance she could see nothing but mountains.
“Where does the road go? I can’t see it at all,” she said.
“See that faint brown line? We’ll be up there before long, if we make it.”
“Of course we’ll make it,” said Samira crossly. “We can’t turn back now. Look how far we’ve come.”
She flung her arm out and turned to point back along the road, then stopped as if her arm had turned to stone.
“What is it?” said Anna.
“It’s men on horses. Many horses. Coming fast!”
She shaded her eyes to see better, but the horses were raising so much dust that the riders could not be seen clearly. Up and down the line boys and girls were stopping and turning. Now they could hear voices rising out of the whirl of dust.
Some of the children dropped to the ground and covered their heads. Samira could hear a thin, screeching voice cry out, “It’s the Kurds! Tell them the war’s over. It’s the Kurds.”
But as she listened to the shouts from inside the cloud of dust, Samira knew that it wasn’t Kurds. It wasn’t soldiers.
Suddenly she cried out, “It’s the boys! It’s our boys. They have found us.”
Within moments the horsemen were so close that everyone could see that it was their own boys. Children were calling out, “There’s Maruse. There’s Matthew.”
Then Samira saw Benyamin. He was standing up in the stirrups looking over the crowd of children. She waved madly and he saw her. He got off the horse so quickly that he nearly stumbled, but he caught himself and ran over to Samira.
“You’re all right!” he said and gave her a hug.
“So are you,” said Samira. She looked at him. “Did you think something might happen to us?”
“Of course,” he said. “We weren’t here to help. But you’re all fine!”
“Are you disappointed?” asked Anna, but she smiled. Samira knew that she was glad to see Benyamin, too.
“Where’s Ashur?” Samira asked.
“I’m right here,” said Ashur. “We all made it. Now I’m checking to see that no one in the Rooftop Family got lost along the way. Everyone’s here but Malik, I see. I guess he hasn’t changed.”
Samira started to answer but she saw Miss Shedd coming. She was walking among the children, greeting each boy. When she got to Benyamin and Ashur she reached out to clasp their hands.
“Welcome to our caravan,” she said. “You did well to catch up, even on horseback. Now the chavadar will take the horses back to Hamadan and you’ll have to walk with the rest of us.”
“How much longer is the journey?” asked Ashur.
“We’ve come almost half way. The next part will be harder because we’re coming into the mountains and the road will be steep. You got here just in time.” She smiled at the boys again and moved on.
“Just in time, indeed,” said Anna. “Why did it take you so long?”
“The permit didn’t come for a whole week,” said Benyamin. “We nearly went crazy thinking you would need us and we might never get away from Hamadan. When we finally could go we were a whole week behind you. Even on horseback we were afraid we wouldn’t catch up until Tabriz.”
Miss Shedd came back riding on Sumbul.
“We have to keep going, children,” she said. “We have a village baking bread for us and a good camping place. Save your stories for evening.”
As the line started to move, Samira could fee
l a change in mood. Every family had been feeling the gap left by their older boys. Now they were together, and even though the road grew steeper and steeper, their feet were lighter.
She looked around at her own family. Elias was hanging on Benyamin’s arm and Avram was keeping pace with Ashur.
Malik was not with the others. He had stayed faithfully with the family all the way from Hamadan. Until now.
“Do you see Malik?” she asked Anna.
Anna shook her head. “Maybe he thinks we don’t need him now that the big boys are here. He’ll come back when it’s time to eat. He knows he belongs with us.”
Samira wasn’t so sure. Malik had cheese and dried fruit in his bag just like everyone else. He wouldn’t need food until they stopped for the night. Where would he be then? She worried all day.
“Why are you so quiet?” Benyamin asked her. “I was looking forward to all your questions.”
“It’s Malik,” said Samira. “He’s gone off on his own just the way he used to. This whole journey he’s been different. He’s been with us, helping all the time.”
“How has he been helping?” asked Benyamin.
“He deals with the chavadar and helps load the mules. The mules listen to him and never make trouble when he’s there, so even our mean chavadar likes him. And Malik keeps track of all the children in our family. If one strays off the road or sits down for a rest Malik is always right there. He’s never let anyone get lost or left behind.”
“Like a shepherd,” said Benyamin.
“Yes,” said Samira. “It’s because he really was a shepherd before he had to leave his home. I think he spent most of his time away from his village, with the sheep. He has no father, he says, but I don’t know what that means.”
Benyamin frowned. “It probably means that his father went away and left him and his mother.”
“He never says anything about his mother. He lived with his grandmother,” said Samira.
Home Is Beyond the Mountains Page 15