Between the Two Rivers: A Story of the Armenian Genocide

by Aida Kouyoumjian

  Mannig dared to glance at him, thinking he must be the most selfless person alive. She believed he sacrificed much more than a seat for her. She felt his presence could alleviate any unforeseen discomfort. Partly by accident and partly on purpose, she let her arm brush against his khaki shirt. She felt blood rushing to her cheeks, forcing her to cast her eyes downward.

  “Please, Barone Mardiros,” Adrine called, tiptoeing through the bundles in the aisle. “Here’s a seat for two—I can stand.”

  Mannig in tow, he moved ahead, tripping over bundles and losing his balance once or twice. “Thanks,” he said to Adrine and, shaking his clasped hand in the air, he winked. “You and I can take turns standing—if Mannig ever releases me!”

  “Your bag, Barone Mardiros!” Adrine said, pointing out the window. “I’ll get it,” and she dashed out.

  Mannig’s gaze followed her sister down the steps, out the car, and toward the solitary suitcase. She grabbed it and, in spite of its weight, lifted it. She hobbled on a few steps before balancing the weight. Finally, she dragged it the last few yards from the car.

  The train whistled.

  Mannig felt a lump of fear in her throat. Would her sister be left behind? But a flash of white ten yards from the tracks shifted her gaze. The pages of a notebook flipped in the desert wind. She checked her bundle in her lap. Her cherished notebook was not there. Her notebook contained all her precious notes from Mr. Eghishe’s classes about geography and history. She read and re-read them like Haji-doo read her Bible. The notebook was her only possession of value. She couldn’t survive without it.

  Without further thought, freeing her hand, she jumped to her feet and pushed her way to the window. With both fists pounding on it, she yelled, “My book! Adrine! Get my book!”

  30—Modern Man

  An hour from Ba’qubah, the orphans piled against Mannig’s side of the train, eyeing the group of dignitaries at the Baghdad station.

  Vanouhi jiggled the wood frame of the window and squeaked it down until it was stuck halfway open. The jabbering of the girls induced Mannig to peek. She craned her neck above and then below the wood-window-frame and settled after a quick glance. She preferred to concentrate on her immediate past and recall the thrill of sitting next to Barone Mardiros, feeling the warmth of his presence while the train wheels clanged. As soon as the train hissed to a stop, he had disembarked.

  Her eyes followed him as he escorted Diggin Perouz off the train. Once on the platform, he clutched his khaki Topy in his armpit and shook hands with the gentlemen wearing top hats and black suits. Then he approached three elegantly dressed ladies in wide brimmed hats.

  “That Barone Mardiros is a ladies’ man,” Vanouhi said. “How he hobnobbeth from lady to lady.”

  “… And chit-chatteth endearments!” Takouhi added.

  “Maybe they commeth to the station to be flattered by him,” Vanouhi snickered.

  “One of those ladies is not a lady.” Adrine’s voice hushed everyone.

  Her sister’s words surprised Mannig. Having dropped her usual aloof composure, Adrine, too, kept her focus on the dignitaries. Might she becoming sociable? Mannig relished this change in her sister.

  “Do you see the two children getting out of the motorcar?” Adrine asked, pointing to a boy of ten and a younger girl dashing to hug Diggin Perouz on the platform. “She is their mother.”

  “The girl’s dress is beautiful!” Takouhi said. “I never owneth anything so fluffy and modern.”

  I have. Mannig thought of her yellow dress, but quickly refocused on the intense affection displayed by Diggin Perouz, kissing her children. Everyone in the train was silent —no whisper, no breath. All eyes gazed at this mother who could still love her own children, feel them and hear their longing voices.

  “The woman with those children is their nursemaid,” Adrine said, breaking the deep silence. “She attends to them day and night. She is like their second mother.”

  “Those children have two mothers?” Vanouhi gasped.

  “That canst not be!” Takouhi wailed. “No one amongst us has even one mother.”

  A hush ensued as if everyone were grieving. Could it be that all her friends’ mothers died in the death city of Deir Zor, like Mannig’s mama? A lump formed in her throat. She remembered how her beautiful and talented mother had sacrificed so much to keep her family together. Alas, only Adrine and she had survived. At least I have my sister. Mannig grabbed Adrine’s hand, sealing their togetherness.

  Adrine squeezed it back.

  “Those children will have a new sister for a while,” she commented again. “Sebouh Effendi’s little daughter will be living with Diggin Perouz while he goes with us to the Basra orphanage.”

  “Which mighteth Sebouh Effendi be?” Vanouhi asked.

  “That very thin gentleman,” said Adrine. “He got off the train with Barone Mardiros. Don’t you remember how he supervised the Mosul orphanage? The Moslawi orphans on this train are his responsibility. I was surprised when he recognized me and asked me to assist him with his work in Basra. He told me that since his wife’s death in childbirth, his daughter accompanies him everywhere. But in Basra, he needs to be free at the orphanage. Diggin Perouz, who is his sister-in-law, offered to take care of his little girl in Baghdad while he devotes his time to us. He is a very nice person.”

  “First time mine eyes see-eth such noble clothing.” Takouhi said, pointing to a lady in a long dress made of brown lace, a straw hat spanning across her shoulders.

  Like Mama’s dress. She had donned a fashionable European garment and a hat when she had gone to the mayor of Adapazar to plead for her family. She had convinced the Turk that, as Protestants—like Turkey’s German allies—her family should be exempted from deportation. The Mayor agreed to grant her and her children the request, but denied the same privilege to her husband, who was not a Protestant, but a follower of the Armenian Apostolic church. Naturally, her mama had refused such a separation, and the fate of the whole family of nine had been sealed.

  Mannig tightened her grip on Adrine’s hand, the one remaining link to her family.

  “Those people reeketh of money,” Vanouhi said.

  “I am sure they are wealthy,” Adrine replied. “By virtue of geography, Baghdadi Armenians escaped the massacre. Baghdad is very far from the Ottoman government seat in Constantinople. Spared deportation, many in these territories profited from the war. Some did business first with the Turkish military and later continued commerce with the British troops.”

  “I thinketh Barone Mardiros can tend to the business of the orphans,” Takouhi said, “because his family is wealthy and he needeth not work for his living.”

  Hearing his name thrilled Mannig. She was glad Barone Mardiros was rich enough to devote his time to the orphans. He’ll be with us again. She suppressed her smile. She’d prove herself as an outstanding student and coordinate students’ shows for the dignitaries. He’ll notice me.

  She scanned the welcoming delegation on the platform. They were elegant, European, and eminent. She scowled. She wished the Barone would stop flirting on and on with the ladies. She wanted the train to keep going and yearned for him to climb back into the train. She even fancied him looking for his seat beside her. Ah! Might his khaki trousers rub against my bare calves again?

  She shoved the girls off her bench in preparation for his return.

  

  Barone Mardiros had not reappeared on the train. Mannig concentrated on the clatter of the train wheels. It soothed the sting of his absence but not the wound in her heart. Was he still hobnobbing with the “ladies” on the platform or perhaps sitting next to one of those elegant ladies who might have boarded the car with him? How could she find him on this long train, transporting 600 orphans? Maybe he was hobnobbing with the orphans in another car. Hobnob, hobnob … she disliked the new word. She wasn’t sure of its meaning, but she refused to ask anyone.

  Her ears perked up only when the orphans praised the Barone’s
dedication to the Armenian cause—his determination to see the orphans settled properly, his contributions to their welfare.

  I know all that. But where is he?

  The slightest jerk of the train induced her to swivel her head from side to side in search of him. She repressed her desire to ask about his whereabouts, lest her tone reveal her infatuation. It hurt to feel so much for him. Matters of the heart were kept secret in Armenian culture. Seeking a confidante to vent her pain would have been taboo.

  Concealing her interest in the Barone in deference to decorum was proving difficult. Her cheeks burned in fear, lest her friends suspect her obsession. She feared someone might have noticed how attentive he had been. Above all, she worried that someone had noticed how she exchanged glances with him and allowed her knees and elbows to touch his throughout the train ride.

  Mannig cast her focus inward and concentrated on her longing. Hope stirred her heart and desire made her cling to the belief that he would eventually return. She refused to give him up. She tucked his image into a deep spot in her head and wrapped her heart with fantasies.

  In time, she relinquished the seat beside her to Adrine and reconciled herself to the security of her sister’s proximity. She scooted closer and leaned her head on her sister’s shoulder. Vye! Vye! Her thoughts echoed an older woman’s gasp. She had almost lost her one and only family member when Adrine had stopped to pick up her notebook. As it was, Adrine had glanced at the flipping pages of Mannig’s notebook, hesitated, but seeing the train jerk to a start, grabbed the upright bar. She flung Barone Mardiros’ suitcase for an orphan to clutch. As the train gathered speed, Adrine barely was able to drag herself up onto the metal step.

  Mannig sighed over losing this concrete souvenir from her stay at Ba’qubah. But her sister’s presence was far more important. Besides, Adrine reminded her repeatedly that Basra promised great educational opportunities.

  At sunset, the train stopped.

  “Basra! Basra!” A surge of excited voices rose among the orphans.

  Mannig perked up slightly, hoping to see Barone Mardiros among the few men in European suits assembled on the platform. His British-style khaki uniform ought to make him stand out among them. But he did not surface. She regretted being transported to Basra. She missed him. She longed to return to her life in Ba’qubah—dancing, reciting and entertaining ... and the Barone. She wondered if she’d ever perform again and if he’d ever again be seated in the front row with a glitter in his hazel eyes, watching the show.

  “Why did we leave Ba’qubah, anyway?” she asked Adrine.

  “This is a better place for us,” her sister replied. “Sebouh Effendi worked very hard to improve our lives. They, he and Barone Mardiros, began their mission in Mosul … and you remember the Mosul orphanage? Nothing but a collection site. In Ba’qubah, we got some education. In Basra, everything will be better.”

  Will it?

  Sputtering British army trucks, as many as ten, spewed fumes along the platform until they lined up and stopped their motors. Arab drivers, heads wrapped in red-checkered kerchiefs, rushed to drop the tailgates of the flat-bedded trucks. “Ya-allah! Ya-allah! Get on the lorry,” they urged the orphans. “Hurry. Everybody. Nightfall is at hand.”

  Mannig held onto Adrine’s sleeve. The uniform felt as coarse as the rough ride the lorry promised. Holding her sack of belongings, she scurried to climb up. Traveling in a truck promised novelty, but being loaded onto a motorized vehicle jogged memories from the deportation. She feared becoming overwhelmed as on the train ride from Eski-sehir. She glanced at her sister, whose demeanor stayed calm and gaze reflected confidence. Well, Adrine must know something. After all, at eighteen—four years older than she—the remnants of her Adapazar education had proved to be a great asset to the local philanthropists. Most of their future plans for the orphans would require Adrine’s assistance. If her sister feared nothing, then clinging to her would be the right thing to do. Mannig stayed close to her, wondering at the novelty of traveling standing up.

  Together with thirty girls, Mannig squeezed herself between Adrine and the railing of the flat-bed truck. Soon she discovered that facing forward put her at a disadvantage. The similarly crammed truck leading the convoy spewed desert dust. Granules mixed with fine soil, and twigs twirled behind the wheels and pricked her face. She struggled to rotate her whole body until she faced the rear.

  Squalls rising from the sides and back of her own lorry also assaulted her every time the vehicle hit ruts and potholes. Noticing how the others used rags to shield their eyes and heads, she reached for her bundle, but was too hampered by bodies to rummage around for a wrap. Instead, she ducked her head and closed her eyes. The rumble of the wheels and the erratic motion as they negotiated the rocky terrain added to her discomfort. Amid the occasional choking cough, she thought fleetingly of Barone Mardiros.

  She wondered why he hadn’t returned to his seat in her car. It saddened her to think that his wants and desires differed from hers. After all, he was an aristocrat. Modern. Rich. The automobile at the Baghdad station might have belonged to him. He could have traveled in it instead of enduring that stifling journey.

  He’ll be coming to Basra, she assured herself.

  Wherever this lorry stops, he and his Topy will be there.

  31—New Place, New Awareness

  The Basra orphanage at Nahr-el-Omar housed 900 orphans in a British military barracks in the center of a boundless field of white Army tents—just like Ba’qubah. And like Ba’qubah, at sunrise Mannig ran to the latrine section dubbed “Turkey” to relieve herself and then splashed her face in the cold river water.

  “Phew!” She exclaimed at the murky water. Is this supposed to be better than Ba’qubah?

  “This is not the Tigris by itself,” Vanouhi said, wiping a twig off Mannig’s face, “but conjoineth with its twin sister, the Euphrates.”

  “They call it Shatt-el-Arab,” Adrine said in her teacher’s voice, “meaning the Arab River.”

  “It looketh like a vast sea even before it falleth into the Persian Gulf,” Vanouhi said, scanning a body of water without shores.

  Mannig gazed at the seafaring ships that were visible from the camp. So what? Such novelty was an interesting diversion, but it caused no thrill. Although surrounded by joyous tent mates, she remained lethargic, meandering aimlessly through her routine. Day after day, longing for her life in Ba’qubah hovered in the back of her thoughts, against the backdrop of conjuring up excuses for Barone Mardiros’ absence.

  “What a breakfast!” Vanouhi exclaimed. “Canst thou remember tasting cheese as velvety as we eateth this morning?”

  “It’s the Basra water,” Takouhi said. “Even the bread tasteth divine.”

  “The best kind of wheat is grown in this southern region,” Adrine interjected.

  “And aplenty,” Vanouhi said, dunking the crusty Arabic bread into her sweetened tea and sucking it unabashedly. The tent mates often squatted on palm-frond mats and chatted, sipping tea brewed in a metal tea pot in their own private tent.

  Mannig mostly listened. Naïve desire for Barone Mardiros fed her loneliness, and all its pain left room for little else. She hid her feelings behind empty smiles, in memories and mostly in the back of her mind—she barely understood her own thoughts. She existed in a passive state, while remaining attentive to her tent mates, who fumed at criticisms, lost heart at rejections, smiled at praises, and reveled in successes. Through all this, Mannig remained aloof.

  “Art we fortunate that Mr. Eghishe is our teacher,” Vanouhi said, drooling over the fact that he graduated from the Varjabedanotz College of Van. “He is a master of history and geography.”

  “He is so good, one can even ignore his Van dialect,” Adrine teased the sisters, who themselves were from Van. “His fluency is commendable.”

  “I can never remember everything he sayeth,” Takouhi sighed.

  “Mannig seems to,” Vanouhi said. “She repeats his lessons without having to memor
ize them.”

  “Yes, yes,” Takouhi said. “We may seeketh her help any time.”

  On previous occasions Mannig would have prized their assessment. Now she remained unmoved. Her performance in class earlier that day had been her dream come true—her dream of raising her hand to answer the teacher’s question correctly … although the tent was her classroom, a hassock, her seat, and her knee, the desk. When called up to the slate blackboard—propped up on a makeshift easel, crudely constructed by the older boys at the camp—she was handed the chalk Mr. Eghishe kept in his pocket. She sketched and labeled the boundaries of Iraq on the blackboard. She zigzagged two feathery lines from the north to the south to show the sister rivers. Somewhere on the banks of the Tigris she marked a star for Baghdad.

  “Excellent! Excellent!” Mr. Eghishe Vartanian said, taking the chalk and putting it in his pocket. “You didn’t once peek at the big map against the tent for reference. I want all of you to memorize the shape of our new country the way Mannig has done. In the coming days, you must locate all the major cities of our Iraq and recite its history.”

  Everyone adored Mr. Eghishe—Mannig, too. Unimpressed by her own performance, she sat in the front row, gobbling up the words coming out of his mouth. Those sessions kept Mannig truly immersed in the moment. He pronounced some concepts with such vigor that his mouth watered and occasionally sprayed them—even so, she preferred to sit in the front. She remained focused, interested and involved until he departed to teach the boys’ highest class in an adjoining tent. On such occasions, she wanted to be in the neighboring tent, but as it was, only her imagination followed him. The boys, of course, occupied separate quarters and separate classrooms, so Mannig often wondered if Mr. Eghishe taught them differently.

  Yes, she excelled at reciting Iraq’s history backward and forward—from the Babylonian Empires and the Islamic invasion to the current occupation by the Western countries. Her tent mates benefited greatly, but her heart dwelt elsewhere. Pulling her pink muslin-covered quilt over her shoulders, she rolled onto her cot.