Forty Days of Musa Dagh (88 page)

 

 

Yet this droning sound seemed to ease his heart, since it never ceased
until the minute at which, as a rule, the August sun pierced the chink
in the door with a long ray.

 

 

This ray darted through the tent, and Juliette's face lay flaming under it.
Then Iskuhi saw that the sick woman's state had suddenly changed. Beads of
sweat stood on her forehead. Her eyes, wide open, stared; her head was
raised, listening. Something had roused Juliette's deepest enthusiasm.
But she was finding it very hard to express this emotion. Her sick tongue
made what she said scarcely intelligible.

 

 

"Bells . . . Gabriel . . . Listen! . . . Bells . . . Hundreds of bells
. . . You hear?"

 

 

The dirge on the couch broke off, suddenly. Juliette, full of excitement,
tried to sit up. She strained her weak voice to a cry of triumph:
"Now the whole world's French!"

 

 

And what she said was true enough in its way -- though her ear was deafened
to its truth by the carillons of her patriotic dream. With Stephan's spilt
blood, with the death of this only son, whom she had given the Armenian
people, the whole world had indeed become French for her.

 

 

 

 

 

 

4. DECLINE AND TEMPTATION

 

 

Stephan was buried on the thirty-first day of Musa Dagh. On the
thirty-second came the great catastrophe.

 

 

Whose fault was it? That was never really cleared up. The mukhtars blamed
one another. It remained, however, undeniable that one of the first,
most important orders of the Council had been contravened with criminal
negligence, with catastrophic results to the whole community. And not only
had the responsible mukhtars failed to put a stop to this "new custom,"
they had winked benevolently -- let them say what they liked, accuse one
another, keep on insisting that the pasturage in the Town Enclosure was
all used up. Perfectly true. The sheep needed fresh fodder. And this new
grazing-ground was close under the North Saddle, well ensconced among
rocks in the barren region of Musa Dagh, as good as unknown to strangers
and inaccessible. That was no excuse for trusting the shepherds, who
here as everywhere else in the world were dreamy old men, with a few
little boys to help them. This sleepy fraternity, whose very nature
inclined to the sheep it tended, still fancied that these were piping
times of peace. Never should the flocks, the most precious of all the
people's possessions, have been left without an armed guard -- not
even in the camp grazing-ground. But the mukhtars had trusted in God,
in the closed-in pasturage, in the natural indolence of the Turks,
and had, as usual, neither among themselves nor with other leaders,
discussed these secret infringements behind their backs. So that the
Turks, thanks to excellent spies, had an easy job and very profitable.

 

 

Two infantry platoons and a saptieh detachment were given orders to turn
out at night and quietly climb Musa Dagh, behind the pass, by Bitias.
Neither men nor officers needed reminding that quiet was necessary.
The half-company, carrying muffled lanterns, stalked its way to the sleepy
shepherds and their sheep. To the very last minute the mülasim in command
did not believe that they could ever get there without a struggle. All the
greater, therefore, the soldiers' astonishment at finding only a few old
men in white sheepskins, who quietly, without any fuss, let themselves be
killed. Before sunrise, at double-quick time, as though their booty might
still be torn from them, they drove the herds safely back to the valley.

 

 

This cut the nerve of those on the Damlayik. Every sheep, wether, lamb,
of the community, most of the goats, and all the donkeys -- these used
from time to time as carriers and riding animals -- had disappeared. By
the widest calculation of all the animals of any kind still left in camp,
they might manage with the greatest economy to last out another three
or four days. After that, stark famine.

 

 

Early that morning, when Ter Haigasun heard this appalling news,
he summoned the Council immediately. He knew exactly the effect that this
would have on the people's minds. Since the outburst of hatred against
Juliette, a causeless, purposeless embitterment had been growing hourly
in the enclosure. It only needed a spark to fire the mine.

 

 

Only one leader besides Bagradian did not take part in this critical sitting,
although he was present at it. Apothecary Krikor had been unable, since the
previous morning, to leave his bed. Neither warmth nor medicine availed him.
The one thing he longed for was peace, relief from pain. But, since he
lived in the government hut, almost in the house of parliament itself,
peace was precisely the thing most unobtainable. He had put up a thick wall
of books between his bed of pain and the cares of the world. He lay unable
to move a limb. But once again it was apparent that no wall of the spirit,
no poetry, science, no philosophy, is impenetrable enough to keep away
the vulgar din of political strife. Today the din, even from the first,
was alarming. The mukhtars especially raised their voices. Each, and as
a body, they did their best, by shouting, to stifle their own conscience.

 

 

Ter Haigasun at last came out into the middle of the room and commanded
them all to sit down. He found it hard to control his voice.

 

 

"Any army in the field," he began, "punishes such a crime as this with
instant shooting. But we aren't a mere military battalion, but a whole,
suffering people. And we're waging war, not against an equal force, but
a force a hundred thousand times stronger. Now realize what your lying
carelessness means! I ought not to shoot you, you miserable mukhtars --
I ought to have you torn slowly limb from limb. And I swear to you I'd
do it with pleasure, without the slightest fear of God's punishment,
if it would be of the least use to any of us. But I'm forced to keep the
appearance of unity in this Council to save our authority as a body.
I'm forced to leave you treacherously careless mukhtars to your office,
because every change of membership might be a danger to public order.
I'm forced to take the blame of this on myself, and, with lame reasons and
base excuses, defend the Council against the just wrath of the whole people.
What Wali, Kaimakam, bimbashi, yüs-bashi, could not succeed in doing, you,
the responsible leaders, have managed brilliantly. This is the end of us!"

 

 

The subdued village mayors sank into their seats. Ter Haigasun's eyes
commanded Tomasian to speak. Aram was feeling very uncomfortable. Though he
had nothing directly to do with the herds, he was the chief superintendent
of the enclosure and held responsible for everything connected with food
supplies. The pastor's narrow face looked extremely pale. His long, pointed
fingers were playing with his black moustache, which he seemed to hate.
The air at that moment was electric with a still antipathy between Gregorian
priest and Protestant pastor, which usually never came to the surface.

 

 

Aram Tomasian stood up. "In my opinion it would be better to say nothing
more about who's to blame. Since what's the use? What's done's done.
Ter Haigasun himself tells us that we've got to show unity. We can't look
back, we must look ahead, and rack our brains to find alternative supplies."

 

 

This sounded reasonable enough. But the pastor's speech had been unsteady.

 

 

Ter Haigasun's fist crashed down, dismissing it: "There are no alternative
supplies."

 

 

But suddenly in a quiet corner an ally rose to support the mukhtars.
Hrand Oskanian, who once, for Juliette's sake, had shaved every day,
which, without soap, was in itself a quietly heroic proceeding, now looked
like a wild man of the woods. His huge black beard fuzzed out round his
nostrils; uncombed, wildly bristling hair crowned his low forehead. This
somber schoolteacher, pigeon-breasted, with long, swinging arms, really
did look not unlike a dressed-up ape. Perhaps this usually silent little
man meant what he said. Perhaps he was only seizing his chance to revenge
himself on Juliette and Gabriel, or on Ter Haigasun, or on all his other
superiors. In any case the same old story came out of him, in a fierce
rush of exploding syllables:

 

 

"Do you still refuse to see the truth? I've been preaching it for the last
week; I've been shouting my lungs out to convince you. Now at last you've
your proof! Yet Ter Haigasun wants to shoot our own people! I ask him now,
what reasons has he for wanting to hide the truth from the Council? Why does
he keep on saying we've been betrayed? Who's he trying to shield? If there'd
been no traitor in the camp, would the Turks ever have known of this new
pasturage? Never! Never! These meadows are completely hidden; shut in among
rocks. No one, unless he knew the ground, could ever have found them.
But Gonzague Maris nosed about all over the place. And this is only the
beginning. Next thing will be, we shall have the Turks in the middle
of the camp. That Greek will lead them up the steep paths, on the rock
side, which he knows every inch of -- where the mountain isn't even
defended. . . ."

 

 

The mukhtars did not need to hear that twice. This new interpretation
of events, though they did not in the least believe in it, restored all
their former prestige. Thomas Kebussyan was delighted.

 

 

Anyone with a fixed idea has the chance of infecting other people with it,
even big crowds. That is the secret of successful political propaganda,
which obtains its effects by the simplest means: a limited, but telling,
vocabulary, a demoniacally penetrating voice. The mukhtars and several of
the others readily surrendered to the excitement induced by Oskanian's
loud persuasiveness -- on their behalf. Teacher Hapeth Shatakhian could
scarcely manage to make himself heard. He glowered with wrath against
his old rival, whom he had had to put up with by his side for eight
long years.

 

 

"Oskanian," he shouted, "I know you. You're nothing but a swindling
charlatan. You always have been -- at every hour of your insolent life.
You're trying to throw mud at innocent people. You spit at Gonzague Maris
because he's an educated man, almost a Frenchman, not like you and me,
born in a dirty village and forced to spend our whole lives in it.
I, at least, by the kindness of Bagradian's brother, had the chance
of studying some time in Switzerland -- but you weren't good enough,
so you've never stuck your nose farther than Marash. I won't have
foul-mouthed apes saying this against the Bagradian family, whom we've
all got so much to thank for. And, as for you, Oskanian, you're not
only slandering the Greek, but Madame Juliette, because she thought you
so ridiculous, with the pompous way you used to sit, saying nothing,
you silly dwarf -- you and your poems -- your calligraphy . . ."

 

 

This was unjust. Oskanian had never dared lift his eyes to Juliette. Now
he stopped jabbering and, with quiet dignity, replied: "I don't need your
Frenchwoman's good opinion. It's far more she who needs mine. We've had
to see with our own eyes what sort of people they are, by God!"

 

 

And now with accomplished demagogy the dwarf turned to the mukhtars.
"I bless our mothers, our wives, our girls, before whom that stuck-up
slut of a European ought to go on her knees."

 

 

The slogan was dexterously aimed. Applause!

 

 

Hrand Oskanian hurled himself full on his opponent. "I tell you, Shatakhian,
you fool, that you've made yourself look silly a hundred times, with your
'accent,' your 'causeries,' and your 'conversation,' your affected . . ."

 

 

He began to mimic Shatakhian's self-satisfied French to perfection --
with its lack of individual quality, its nasal vowels, and sonorous
consonants. Their discussion how to avoid certain famine had degenerated
into a farce. It was a proof of the ineradicable childishness in human
beings that some of the Council went off into fits of laughter at
Oskanian's parody.

 

 

Bedros Altouni growled, leaning on his stick: "I thought Ter Haigasun
called us here to discuss a catastrophe. I'm in no mood to see you
perform, Oskanian. I've got more to do than you teachers, who I've
noticed for some time have been playing truant from your own school --
and so have your children. As for you, Oskanian, I don't mind giving you
the benefit of thinking you're merely a little wrong in the head. That
young man came among us in March. He had a letter of recommendation to
the apothecary. At that time not even the Wali of Aleppo knew anything
about the deportations. Did the Greek come here then, fully intending to
betray the new grazing-meadows on Musa Dagh to the Turks? One sees what
logical heads they produce at the teachers' training-college in Marash!"

 

 

Hrand Oskanian, like the budding politician he had shown himself, knew
well enough that no illogicalities would damage him. It needs an effort
to think things out, and nobody likes having to make one. But if once you
can make the other man look small, that in itself is enough to get the
meeting on your side, since people enjoy it, and to rouse such feelings
is all that matters. So he answered sharply:

 

 

"It may be, Doctor, that fifty or sixty years ago you managed to pick up
a little bit of medicine. Who can prove that nowadays? Sometimes you seem
to be able to find something in that old book you carry about with you.
You've got that much in common with the apothecary, who for years did
nothing else but harp on his library. I wouldn't mind betting that half
those books of his are blank paper, neatly bound. But you old men are all
alike when it comes to life. Otherwise you'd have known that, since war
broke out, the government has been sending spies into Armenian districts
-- and Christian spies, what's more, so that they mightn't be noticed."