Forty Days of Musa Dagh (32 page)

 

 

"My friends, the sun went down two hours ago, and it will have risen again
in another six. We have only about six hours to get through the whole of
our thinking. When we go out tomorrow morning, to face the people again,
there must be no more uncertainty. Our will must be clear and unanimous.

 

 

"But this is the most necessary measure. In the very first hours of
tomorrow morning all who are young and strong enough must go up to the
Damlayik and begin to build the fortifications. I beg you, therefore,
to save time. It is an advantage to all of us that some time ago I worked
out all the details of our plan of defence. I can give you my suggestions
at once, I think that in these sittings it will be best to work by the
same rules as those at our communal meetings. I ask Ter Haigasun's leave
to explain my plan. . . ."

 

 

Ter Haigasun, as his habit was, half shut his eyes, giving his face
a tired and agonized look. "Let us hear Gabriel Bagradian."

 

 

Gabriel spread out the best of Avakian's three maps. "We shall have
a thousand minor tasks to perform, but, if once we look at the thing
correctly, we find that they all come under two main headings. The first
and most important is our actual method of defence. Even our second,
the way we organize our life together, must serve that struggle above all.
I'll begin with it. . . ."

 

 

Pastor Aram Tomasian raised a hand to interrupt. "We all know that Gabriel
Bagradian, as an officer, knows most about military matters. The fighting
leadership goes to him. . . ."

 

 

All hands went up in assent to this. But Pastor Aram had not done yet:
"For some time Gabriel Bagradian has been concentrating his whole mind
on the plan of defence. It would be best to leave him to arrange our
resistance. I therefore suggest that we postpone all discussion of
his tactical scheme till we've a clear idea how, and for how long,
five thousand people, cut off from the rest of the world, can live on
the Damlayik."

 

 

Gabriel, who had been in full spate, sighed and let his maps fall back
on the table. "My arrangements included that problem. I've made notes on
these maps for everything necessary to maintain life. But, if Pastor Tomasian
likes, I'm perfectly ready to put off explaining my scheme of defence."

 

 

Bedros Altouni, the doctor, had not long managed to sit quietly in his
parliamentary seat. He wandered, growling, about the room, to suggest
that, at this moment of urgent peril, debates, with a show of hands and
speeches, seemed to him ridiculous frivolity. His growling impatience
was in sharp contrast to the dignified impassivity of Krikor, who sat
immobile, in an attitude which seemed to ask: "When shall I be free to
escape in peace from this barbarous encroachment on the one thing in life
which beseems me or makes it worth living?" The doctor, fidgeting round
the room, made a sudden remark, which had nothing whatever to do with
present business: "Five thousand people are five thousand people, and the
heat of the sun's the heat of the sun. And cloudbursts are cloudbursts."

 

 

Gabriel, to whom these problems of housing, of the town enclosure, the
care of the children, had caused so many sleepless nights, took up this
remark of the doctor. "It would be best for our protection to keep all
the children between the ages of two and seven in one shelter."

 

 

The hitherto silent Ter Haigasun rejected this suggestion most decisively.
"What Gabriel Bagradian has just advised would mean the beginning of
very dangerous disorders. We must not sunder what God and time have
bound together. On the contrary, it seems to me highly essential that
single parishes, and in fact, single families, should not be separated
more than is absolutely necessary. Relations ought all to have their
own separate encampment, every village its camping-ground. The mukhtars
to be responsible to their own people, as usual. We ought to change the
relationships to which we are accustomed down here as little as possible."

 

 

Emphatic, unanimous assent, which implied a minor failure for Bagradian.
Ter Haigasun had guaranteed them as close an approximation as possible
to their normal life. The prospect had a very soothing effect. For, to
peasants, the worst, most cruel thing that can befall them is expressed
in the one word -- change. But Gabriel would not give way so easily. He
sent round the map, with his drawing of the town enclosure. Everyone
recognized the wide meadow pasturage of the communal flocks. It began
to dawn on them that this big, stoneless expanse of grass was the only
possible camping-ground. There would have been room enough for two
thousand families, let alone one thousand, on it. Gabriel skilfully
compromised with Ter Haigasun. The allotment of family and communal
camping-grounds could easily be arranged as the priest desired. And
he found himself agreeing with Ter Haigasun. On the other hand, they
would have to admit that the thousand families could not possibly
run separate establishments; that it would never work if the common
resources were not pooled. They need only work out the saving in food
and fuel, the gain in free labor power. Apart from this, there would
really be no possibility of holding out for a long time if it were not
arranged that beasts must be slaughtered, bread and grain distributed,
goat's milk allotted to children and invalids, only according to strictly
determined regulations. Whatever else might be done to classify people
according to family, the ticklish question of private ownership could
not be got round. Since he, Bagradian, was willing to place his whole
possessions, in so far as they were obtainable and divisible, at the
disposal of the common defence -- all the cattle on his farm, all the
supplies in his house and cellar -- everyone else must contribute his
share. These circumstances imperatively demanded the communal distribution
of goods. It would be quite impossible for each individual family to
slaughter its own sheep. Milk must go to those who needed it, and not,
for instance, to any strong, well-fed people who happened to own a couple
of goats. The notion, which some perhaps still cherished, that up on the
Damlayik it would still be possible to buy certain privileges for money,
was a childish dream. From the instant the communes arrived in camp, money
would cease to have the remotest value. And all barter would have to be
strictly forbidden, since from that day on all goods would be the goods
of the people, to be used to defend their lives in battle. No one who
had clearly perceived that exile meant the loss of all he possessed would
surely think the demands of Musa Dagh worth another second's hesitation.

 

 

But at once it was plain that in making these just demands Gabriel had
erred most sadly. It had not so much as entered these peasant minds --
though a few hours back they had known with such inevitable certainty
that they stood face to face with exile and death -- that now their
own would cease to belong to them. It was more than the mere loss that
produced their obstinacy -- it was the disciplined inevitability, the
"European," in Gabriel's words. This led on to a time-wasting argument,
which was fruitless, if for no other reason than that the most determined
peasant skull could conceive no alternative. A bandying of words which
only served to vent disgruntlement. Ter Haigasun waited a certain time.
A short, warning glance across to Gabriel: "It's necessary to be rather
careful in making these people see the obvious." Then he interrupted
their empty chatter:

 

 

"We are going up to the mountain and shall have to live there. Many things
will arrange themselves which we needn't bother our heads discussing at
present. It would be better if you mukhtars would begin to think out the
most urgent matters: Will it be possible to have enough supplies taken
up there? For how many weeks do you think they'll be likely to last?
Is there any possible means of supplementing them?"

 

 

And here Pastor Tomasian had another, very feasible suggestion. It was
the mukhtars' business to get together and work out their own estimate
of provisions, and scheme for the commissariat. And this not only applied
to the commissariat, but to all other matters to be discussed. This general
council was unwieldy. They were not here to talk and argue, but to work.
He, Aram Tomasian, therefore proposed that the various departments should
get together, and each form a separate committee. Each of these committees
to be presided over by a head, named by Ter Haigasun. The heads to form a
closer, separate council which should have in its hands the actual
management of affairs. There would be five departments: First, Defence;
second, Legislation, which concerned Ter Haigasun alone; then came
Internal Order; then all that concerned Public Health and Sickness;
and lastly the special affairs of single communes, as against those
of the whole community. Gabriel enthusiastically welcomed the young
pastor's inspiration, and for the first time Dr. Altouni also gave some
signs of assent. No one demurred. Ter Haigasun, to whom the inevitable
chatter of a big council was as uncongenial as to Aram, at once endorsed
this legislative arrangement. Chaush Nurhan, the teacher Shatakhian,
and two younger men, whom he selected, were assigned as a military
committee to assist Gabriel. Aram Tomasian also made one of this
Committee of Defence. In the same way Gabriel was himself a member of
the Committee of Internal Order, led by the pastor. This committee
made itself responsible for everything connected with the obtaining
and rationing of supplies. Therefore, Thomas Kebussyan and the other
mukhtars were members. The elder Tomasian, the builder, found himself
solely entrusted with the business of erecting huts. It need scarcely
be said that Dr. Altouni and the detached apothecary, Krikor, had to
form the Committee of Public Health. With that they had all achieved a
rough and ready division of labor. In the next few hours these isolated
groups were to make what provision they could for their departments. So
that then, in the early morning, a short sitting of the General Council
would be enough to estimate results. The mukhtars went outside to get
directly from their villagers a possible estimate of supplies. Gabriel
was to follow them later and, with their help, to muster the youngest,
strongest men, who, early next day, were to begin digging-operations on
the main line of trenches between the north peaks. Meanwhile, map in hand,
he eagerly explained his plan of defence to Ter Haigasun, Aram Tomasian,
and the rest. Even Krikor began to be curious and came across to listen.

 

 

Only one person stood aside, with inscrutably folded arms -- Hrand Oskanian,
naturally. That somber schoolteacher had met with yet another rebuff.
No leading role had been allotted him -- no, not even a fairly respectable
second. While his colleague Shatakhian had been given a seat on the
Committee of Defence, Ter Haigasun, in his deep hatred of the other,
silent pedagogue, had condemned him to go on "teaching school" and keeping
the children in order. That was the priest's revenge for the fact that
at the communal elections Hrand Oskanian, the poet of Musa Dagh, had
been elected by hundreds of votes. Icily reserved, Oskanian was already
wondering whether or not to leave the assembly and go home. Then he grew
proudly conscious of the fact that the many by whom he had been chosen
looked up to him with trustful eyes and that, moreover, the priest would
be more riled by his presence than by his absence.

 

 

Shortly after midnight the council was suddenly suspended. As often
happens in such cases, it had occurred to no one to make sure of that
on which the whole future would depend. Fifty Mausers and two hundred
and fifty Greek service-rifles still lay buried in a grave in the
cemetery. They must be dug up instanfly and carried up the Damlayik
before morning, with the munitions. Though Gabriel did not mistrust
Ali Nassif's report, there was still always the possibility that in the
course of the next twenty-four hours fresh saptiehs might come to the
villages, to make a sudden search for arms. A deputation of six went
off, posthaste, to the churchyard of Yoghonoluk, situated beyond the
village on the road to Habibli. The two grave-diggers came last. The
rifles, thanks to Nurhan the armorer's foresight, had been laid in
bricked graves. They awaited their glorious resurrection enveloped in
rags, in air-tight coffins, bedded in straw. Only four weeks previously
Chaush Nurhan had inspected them summarily by torchlight and found them
in perfect condition. Scarcely one breech-lock had rusted. Nor had the
cartridges suffered in any way. That night these heavy chests, fifteen in
all, were hauled up forever out of the graves. It was hard work. Since
not many hands were there to do it, Ter Haigasun, who had flung off
his cassock, did a muscular share. Later a couple of the strong shaggy
donkeys of the district were fetched, so that at last, towards morning,
led by Chaush Nurhan, a secret caravan set out for the northern mountain
pass through the deserted villages of Azir and Bitias.

 

 

Not till an hour before sunrise could Ter Haigasun get back to the selamlik
of Villa Bagradian. The garden looked like a corpse-strewn battlefield.
Not even the people of Yoghonoluk had gone home. Ter Haigasun, like a
general among the dead, had to step across the motionless sleepers.

 

 

Thanks to the energy of Bagradian -- who kept urging them on -- the members
of the sub-committees had done some very useful work. The main lines of the
conditions of defence and rationing had been laid down. A muster of the
fighters had been drawn up and approximate calculations made of the amounts
and kinds of obtainable foodstuffs. Provision had also been made for the
building of a colony of huts, a hospital shelter, and a larger government
barrack. With Ter Haigasun's return the General Council reassembled.
Gabriel briefly reported decisions taken to the chief. With Aram Tomasian's
energetic support he had managed to get nearly all his suggestions accepted.
Ter Haigasun gave his assent to everything, with an absent-looking face and
half-closed eyes, as though he did not believe that this new life would
be made subject to resolutions. Both lights and men were on the wane, yet
their eyes still showed more excitement than fatigue. A glorious morning
began to glitter, deep silence descended on them all. The men stared out
of the window at the gentle light of this bud of dawn, unfolding petal
by petal. The pupils of their eyes shone, strangely dilated. No sound
in this selamlik of the night watch save the scraping of two pencils --
Avakian's and the communal clerk's -- engaged in drafting a protocol of
the most important resolutions.