Forty Days of Musa Dagh

by Franz Werfel

  "I know of no food."

  "You must know of it. I mean the silver boxes with the fish, swimming in oil, the wine-jars, and the oatmeal."

  "I know nothing of wine or oatmeal. Who sent you?"

  "What business is that of yours? The commandant."

  "The commandant had better come himself."

  "Well, come on -- out of the way! I warn you for the last time, you silly bitch! You're not going to be let squat here for ever with all that grub. It's ours now."

  Shushik said nothing more. She followed, with the eyes and hands of a wrestler, the movements of the long-haired thief, who, having cast away his rifle, was looking for the best attacking point. So that when he tried to bear down on the giantess from the left, she had already gripped him round the middle; her iron hands lifted the miserable creature up and hurled him back among his fellows so violently that he tore two of them to earth with him. The gigantic Shushik stood on as before, not even breathing a jot more quickly, her arms spread, waiting for the next. But before Shushik even knew she would die, she was dead. A sly attack, delivered sideways with a rifle-butt, smashed in her skull. She died in a flash, at the very summit of her happiness, since even in these combative moments her heart was still brimful of the one feeling: Haik's going to live. Her body, hurtling to the ground, blocked the way to Stephan's less happy mother.

  And now Pastor Aram understood. With wild cries, brandishing his stick, he rushed on the pack, which at that instant, scared by the murder, was drawing apart. Now Tomasian should have thrown his whole influence into the scales. He was the pastor, and one of the chiefs. But Aram had long since ceased to control himself. He did exactly what he should not have done -- ran blindly upon them, striking, with his ridiculous stick, on all sides. The answer was a bayonet thrust, in the back, just under his right shoulder.

  What's that, he thought, and what have I really to do with all this rabble? I am a man of God, the Word is entrusted to me to preach, nothing more. Let's leave all these strangers to their devices. His stick had dropped out of his hand. But fully aware of his spiritual dignity, he squared his shoulders, turned away again, and went back stiffly. Ah, yes, the women there! Well? Had Iskuhi at last made up her mind? Had she decided to be obedient? But why was she dressed in white? Yes, they must live again in friendship with one another, just as in Zeitun. Hovsannah would see that for herself. The way to the third tent seemed uncommonly long. The pastor smiled encouragingly at his wife. But she seemed to look past him with terrified eyes. Just three paces from her Aram collapsed on the dry grass, staining it with his blood. Though his wound was nothing much, he fainted. Hovsannah cowered down over him, helpless, at a loss, her child in her arms. When Iskuhi saw the blood, she ran back screaming into the tent, brought clean linen and scissors, and knelt by her brother. Only now did Hovsannah pull herself together and put down her suckling on the grass. They slit Aram's coat. Iskuhi pressed the cloth with all her strength against his wound. Her right hand reddened with the blood of her brother, from whom she was for ever alienated.

  The long-haired thief, Sato, and a few deserters crowded over Shushik's body into the hanum's tent. Juliette, half-aroused from a heavy sleep, had heard the dispute, the shouts, the scufflings. "The fever, thank God! The fever back again!" she thought astutely. And even when the tent filled with stinking people, her lethargy could make stand against any fear. "Either it's the fever, and then I'm delighted. But if it's the Turks, it's better it should come now, between sleep and sleep." Nobody even thought of harming the hanum. They did not so much as notice the invalid. Their one concern was to find those culinary treasures, of which envious fables had gone the rounds. They dragged the big wardrobe trunk and the rest of the luggage outside the tent. There every box and chest in the sheikh-tent had already been piled. Only Sato and the long-haired thief stayed on for a moment with Juliette, the one because he hoped to find something useful on his own account, the other from malice and curiosity. Since nothing more cruel occurred to her, Sato suddenly stripped the bedclothes off Juliette. The man should see the stranger's nakedness! He meanwhile had picked up a big tortoise-shell comb, as a souvenir, no doubt to comb his own long, matted hair with it. Lost in his contemplation of this treasure, he whistled his way out of the tent without touching the woman. Outside, the pack had rummaged and rummaged in the contents of the many trunks. Juliette's clothes and linen lay defiled, just as they had been by saptiehs in Yoghonoluk. The loot was miserably inadequate: two boxes of sardines, a tin of condensed milk, three bars of chocolate, a tin of broken biscuits. That couldn't be all! Quick, into the third tent! Sato gesticulated. But now the little cracked bell had begun to ring across from the altar square, summoning to the Mass of petition. This signal, prearranged with the other group, called the deserters to the second half of their day's work. They would have to hurry to get there in time. Each of them snatched up something, not to have to go off empty-handed -- spoons and knives, a dish, and even a pair of women's shoes.

  Iskuhi and Hovsannah had stanched the wound with their clothes. The pastor came to himself. He looked most surprised. He could not realize what a mad dog had just been killed in him. No stubborn defiance forced him now to commit afresh the grave sin of cutting himself off from his people. Blood had been spilt. This spilt blood was the grace that saved him from the test that had not yet taken place. He watched Hovsannah. She was cleaning her hands with grass tufts, so that her child's swaddling clothes might not be stained. Araim Tomasian felt surprised that a whole heap of rugs and cushions should have been thrust in behind his back, so that now he was sitting almost upright. Iskuhi, with her right hand, was still pressing the compress against his wound, and so prevented his lying back. Her thin, wasted face looked taut with the effort. Aram turned his head away and said: "Iskuhi," and, five or six times, only sighed out: "Iskuhi." He spoke her name with the sound of a tender "Forgive!"

  The sacristan jerked at his little bell like a lunatic. It swung from a pole beside the altar. These urgent peals were quite unnecessary, since the congregation of old men, women, and children had long since collected for Mass. But still, jerked fanatically by the sacristan, the little bell pealed on and on, far and away across their heads, as though not only Turkish infantry, but land and sea, had been called to witness that this was the hour of death for a Christian people.

  From a cord strung between poles right and left on the top step of the altar, the curtain strung on rings hung down, waiting to be drawn before the priest, as it is in the Armenian rite at the Consecration, when he is hidden from the eyes of the faithful. The heavy fabric of this curtain kept being blown against the altar. Between the gusts long, anxious stillness. Shot could be heard from the North Saddle.

  Ter Haigasun, in his presbytery hut, next door to the government barrack, had long been vested for this Mass. The singers and deacons who were to serve it had waited some time around the door for him. Yet a deep uneasiness still prevented his coming forth to ascend the altar. What was this? His heart, which as a rule was not perturbed, thumped against his priestly robes. Did he fear the unknown, which was now so close?

  Did he doubt if he had acted rightly in deciding to call directly on the people at this moment of their dying need? Ter Haigasun's lids fell heavily over his eyes. He saw himself alone among the dead, in his stiff Mass robes. Horrible as it was, he had always known he would be the last of them. His heart had begun to beat more evenly. But in exchange he was filled with the indescribable sense of mortality, a surer expectation of death than he had known in the worst minutes of battle.

  One of the two assistant priests kept poking his head round the door of the presbytery hut to warn him. It was long past Mass time; there was danger that the following general assembly might have to be prolonged till after nightfall. Yet still Ter Haigasun could not manage to tear himself free. It was as if some inner power would not let him go, as it strove to prevent this Mass of petition. Giddiness and weakness threatened to force him full length on the bed. He was ill,
famished. Should he cancel the Mass, or let another priest say it instead of him? Ter Haigasun perceived that this time it was not weakness, but his fear of being unequal to the task which today lay before him. And something else, something vague. He stood up at last and gave the sign. The acolyte took up the tall cross to carry it on ahead of the procession. Slowly, with joined hands and downcast eyes, Ter Haigasun followed deacons and singers. That sacerdotal, inward-turning glance, as he passed on his way through dividing crowds as indifferently as though he had walked between bushes, was still aware of it all, with the sharpest intensity. Ter Haigasun had not more than fifty paces to reach the altar. Yet, with each of these, the spiritual state of the people round him seemed to pierce him like a radiating agony. That morning's lethargy had dissolved, replaced by restlessness and excitement. Human nature, in this final hour, had drawn up out of itself some last reserve or show of energy. The smallest children especially were becoming most artfully unmanageable. They kept bellowing with all their strength, throwing themselves flat on the ground. It was perhaps the swollen pain in their small bellies. Their angry mothers shook and slapped, since that was the only way to quiet them. Some grown ups were just as restless. These were old men -- mostly the familiar "small owners" -- who launched out into long, rambling speeches, not stopping respectfully, as they once had, when the priest came past them to the altar. Ter Haigasun perceived that demoralization had kept pace with hunger. "A good thing," he reflected, "that the decads won't be coming to this meeting. As long as they hold out, all is not lost." In the midst of which consoling reflection he raised his eyes and stood for an instant, rooted. What did it mean? Armed men in the congregation! Singly, to be sure, or in little groups, but in any case in the flattest contradiction to his and Bagradian's definite order. Who had sent these men out of their trenches? Since now the women had conquered that morning's lethargy well enough to put on their Sunday best for this Mass, the brown streaks these warriors made were lost in the brightness of the whole. Ter Haigasun saw with his next glance that these were not trusted men from the nearer sectors, but deserters from the South Bastion, those strangers to the valley of Yoghonoluk, always kept on the farthest edge of the people, who luckily scarcely ever came into camp, and never to Mass. Were they grown pious suddenly? Ter Haigasun turned his head sharply to the government barrack on his right. Where was the guard? Oh, yes, of course. Bagradian had needed everyone, some reservists even, in the trenches. Turn back! it flashed into his mind. Make some excuse! Put off this Mass! Send for Bagradian! Call together the mukhtars! Take precautionary measures! But, in spite of these reflections, he still kept on, in silent, hesitant steps. There, close round the altar, stood the notables, the mukhtars and their wives and daughters, those lines of grey, respected heads, in the order in which they had always gathered, in church, in the valley.

  As to Gabriel Bagradian, he had promised to be in time for this Mass, but something must have made him unpunctual. As the lines of village elders drew apart to make a lane for the procession, Ter Haigasun's soul got its second warning. Between an unknown deserter and Sarkis Kilikian, Hrand Oskanian stood, hemmed in like a man under arrest. Again Ter Haigasun had the feeling that he must stop and sharply turn on the exiled teacher. "What's all this? What have you to tell me, Teacher Oskanian?" And again Ter Haigasun went on, scarcely lifting his eyes, guided by some power, or powerlessness, which now, for the first time on the Damlayik, sapped his strong will.

  His foot on the first altar step, he remembered that he had forgotten Nokhudian's letter, left it behind in the presbytery hut. This wrought in him excessive confusion. The forgotten screed and these ill omens shook him so that it lasted a sheer eternity before he climbed on up to the tabernacle. The people behind seemed to sense acutely the wandering thoughts and feebleness of their priest, since now children's howls, restless shuffiings, importunate gossip, grew every instant more unabashed. And into such hollow hearts as these the fervent spirit must seek to force itself, which was to pray down God's miracle from the skies! Ter Haigasun turned in agony. As he did so, Gabriel Bagradian came hurrying breathless into the square and stood in the first row. For a second he felt relieved. Behind his back the choir had begun the anthem. It was a short respite; he closed his eyes. Tired, hollow voices rose to the sky:

  "Thou Who extendest Thy creating arms to the stars, Give our arms strength, That they, held out, may reach unto Thee.

  "By means of the crown of the brow, crown also the spirit, Deck the senses with prayer, With Aaron's blossoming, golden robe.

  "We, as all the angels of God resplendent Are panoplied, robed about in Love, To serve the secret, the holiest."

  The choir was silent. Ter Haigasun stared at the little silver ewer which the deacon held for him. He dipped his fingers and kept them so long in the water that at last the astonished deacon drew it away from him. Only then did he half turn to the faithful, to make the sign of the cross above them, three times. He turned back to the altar and raised his hands.

  Ter Haigasun's being stood divided. One part of him, the celebrating priest, went through the prescribed and ancient ritual of this exceptional service of petition, scarcely delaying a response. The other part was in several layers; it was an exhausted struggler, putting out his last ounce of strength, so that the priest might still be able to do his office. First and foremost this second Ter Haigasun carried on the struggle against his body. It warned, with every word of the liturgy: "So far, no further! Haven't you noticed that I've not a drop of blood left in my head? Another minute, another two, and I may shame you, by collapsing here at the altar." With only his body to contend against, the fight could easily have been won. But far wilier enemies lurked behind it. One of these was a juggler, perpetually shifting the sacred vessels here and there, before the eyes of the priest. Suddenly the tall silver candlesticks had become fixed bayonets. From the finely printed page of the missal there leapt the names of the dead in the parish register, crossed off with huge red pencil crosses, drawn over everything. A gust of wind from time to time scampered through the leaves in the leaf-screen, behind the altar, and these dead leaves, eddying past, settled irreverently on the tabernacle, on the gospels stamped with the golden cross. Ter Haigasun, the celebrant, reached the psalm. His entirely separated voice was intoning:

  "Judge me, O God, and plead my cause . . ."

  The deacon sighed the response: "Against an ungodly nation: O deliver me from the deceitful and unjust man."

  "Why dost Thou cast me off? Why go I mourning because of the oppression of the enemy?"

  "Then will I go unto the altar of God, unto God my exceeding joy."

  Whilst Ter Haigasun continued this long alternation of responses, impeccably to the end, with the deacon, his eyes showed the other Ter Haigasun intolerable sights. Those dead leaves, strewn over eveiything, were not dead leaves, but dirt, dung, some kind of indescribable filth, scattered about the altar by God's enemies, by criminals. No other explanation was possible, since dirt cannot rain down from heaven. Ter Haigasun stared at the missal to avoid this horrid sight of desecration. But had not the people seen it too? And here he made his first mistake in the text.

  The deacon had sung: "My Almighty God, keep us, and forgive us Our sins."

  Now the priest should have given his response. But the priest was silent. The deacon turned wide-eyed to the choir. And, since still Ter Haigasun did not raise his voice, he came a step towards him and whispered sharply: "In the house of the most holy . . ."

  The priest seemed to hear nothing. And now the deacon whispered in desperation, half aloud: "In the house of the most holy, and in the place . . ."

  Ter Haigasun woke.

  "In the house of the most holy and in the place of songs of praise; in this dwelling of angels, this place of repentance of men, we prostrate ourselves before the resplendent and glorious sign of this God, in reverence, and pray . . ."

  Ter Haigassin drew a deep breath. Under his miter sweat streamed down his neck, stood out on his
forehead. He dared not wipe it away. And behind him there ascended the nasal voice of Asayan, the chief chorister:

  "In this consecrated place of sacrifice, in this temple, we are gathered together, for praise and prayer. . . ."

  Asayan's voice rasped Ter Haigasun as never before. Christ help me! Ter Haigasun stared in agony at the altar crucifix. The voice of one of the beings who composed him warned: "Don't look away from it." But this very warning made him look away, further out, to the high screen of beech leaves which shut off the altar. Someone stood there leaning against the framework, with folded arms, smoking a cigarette. Unheard-of insolence! Ter Haigasun swallowed down this interjection. In the next instant this somebody had ceased to be Sarkis Kilikian, whom he loathed, whom he had put in irons; this somebody was, for the time being, nobody. The screen confronted him, empty. But then the Russian came back, to turn into all possible kinds of people -- once he even seemed to be Krikor -- till at last a priest in Mass vestments stood there. And at first it seemed ridiculous to Ter Haigasun that the robed priest should really be himself. Nor was it he, since he wore no soldier's lambskin kepi, but a miter embroidered with gold.