Nobody's Child

by Marsha Forchuk Skrypuch

  “Then either I must disguise myself as a woman, or you two must dress as boys,” said Kevork, “but we must stay together.”

  Mariam regarded Kevork’s height, muscular shoulders, and bristled face. “You would make a singularly unconvincing girl.”

  Kevork looked from Mariam to Marta and had similar concerns. Marta was tall and solid, and her face was more handsome than pretty. With her hair cut and dressed in men’s clothing, she could pass for a tall boy. Mariam was far too delicate. Her narrow fingers would look feminine even if their almond-shaped nails were cut short and smudged with dirt. And her figure. How much would boy’s clothing hide? But what else could they do? He swallowed back his doubts.

  “We all need to dress as males,” said Kevork.

  Mariam nodded.

  “I will go to the boys’ laundry and see what I can find for you,” said Kevork.

  “Thank you,” said Mariam.

  “My father left me some money,” said Kevork, patting his shirt pocket. “Perhaps these coins will help us bribe our way to safety.”

  “How much do you have?” asked Mariam.

  “Nine gold coins,” said Kevork. He drew them out of his pocket and showed them to her.

  Mariam picked one up and felt its weight. “You should sew them into your clothing so they won’t be stolen.” She handed it back to him, then turned to her sister and said, “Come back with me now so we can pack food and supplies.”

  Marta was about to follow her, but Kevork caught her hand.

  “I need to talk to you in private,” he said.

  They walked side by side to the shoemaker’s workshop. When they got inside, he closed and locked the door.

  “Sit,” said Kevork, indicating one of the work stools.

  Marta sat.

  Kevork leaned forward and clasped her hands. “You know what Anna was going to ask your grandmother today.”

  Marta nodded, then looked down at their intertwined hands.

  “And I want to do this properly. Our families must agree to our marriage, but right now, we’re nobody’s children.”

  Marta looked up at him with tear-filled eyes.

  He let go of her hands, then stood up and walked over to an oilcloth-covered bundle on the shelf. He lifted the bundle up and brought it over to where Marta sat.

  “This was to be my betrothal gift to you.”

  Marta looked in wonder from the bundle to Kevork’s eyes. “Then I shouldn’t open it now.”

  “Times are different,” he said. “You’ll need these.” And with that, he flipped open the cloth.

  Marta’s eyes widened with delight when she saw the handmade boots. “They’re beautiful!” she said.

  Kevork smiled sadly. “I only wish I could have given them to you under happier circumstances.”

  She reached out her hand and touched one of the boots with her fingertip as if to make sure they were real.

  Then she lifted her skirt and stuck out her feet. The boots she wore now were a mismatched set. For over a year, Marta had been wearing a tan-coloured lady’s boot from England on her right foot, and a boy’s brown boot on her left. Kevork had taken off the original heels from each boot and replaced them with new, more comfortable low heels, but the boots themselves had become not only unbearably tight, but worn. A week ago, the side of the lady’s boot had split beyond repair.

  Kevork knelt down in front of her and took the split tan boot in his hand. He unlaced it, then pulled. It didn’t budge.

  “Just a minute,” said Marta. She wedged the tip of her brown boot at the base of the heel of the tan boot and pushed while Kevork pulled. It slid off. Marta wiggled her toes. “It feels good to get that off,” she said.

  The brown boot wasn’t quite as tight, plus it was made of firmer leather, so it slipped off with less difficulty. Kevork placed the new black boots in front of Marta and she slipped her feet in. Kevork laced them up.

  “Stand up,” he said.

  Marta stood up. She lifted her skirt up again and peered down at them with a sad smile. She walked over to Kevork and wrapped her arms around his neck. “Thank you,” she said, then kissed him on the cheek.

  Kevork wrapped one arm around her waist, and with the other, he gently placed her head on his shoulder. “I will protect you,” he said fiercely.

  As Mariam walked to the long, low building that housed her dormitory room, she saw Mr. Karellian leading an empty ox and cart.

  As she passed him, she noticed the look of fear in his eyes. “Is that for tomorrow?” she asked him.

  “Yes,” he said. “It is the only cart we have. I must fill it with all the food and supplies it will carry.”

  “Where will they be deporting us to?” she asked.

  Mr. Karellian’s eyes filled with tears. “Beyond the desert,” he said. “That is all I know.”

  The warmth of the sun streaming in through the window woke Mariam up with a start the next morning. Her heart fluttered as she bolted to a sitting position. The room was too silent and still. She looked around and saw that she and Marta were the only ones left in the dormitory. Of all the days to sleep in, this wasn’t it. She threw off the bedcovers and stood up. On top of her chest lay a set of boy’s clothing: a coarse linen shirt smelling of soap and a pair of loose trousers. Mariam couldn’t even remember Marta coming in the night before and didn’t remember her bringing the boys’ clothing. Instead of putting them on, she set them aside and drew out her own skirt and blouse. Once she was dressed, she tucked her mother’s sickle into the back of her skirt.

  She walked over to Marta’s bed and gazed at her sister’s untroubled face. What she would give to preserve her sister’s happy innocence. If only there was some place they could hide — some way to avert their fate — but she knew that could not be. Better to face it. She gently shook Marta’s shoulder. “Marta!” she said. “Wake up.”

  Marta slept.

  Mariam walked over to the dressing table at the far end of the room and picked up the earthen jug. There wasn’t much water left in it. Mariam carried the jug over to her sister’s bed and splashed the water into her face. Marta sat up with a jolt.

  “What did you do that for?” Marta asked, shaking droplets of water from her hair.

  “You cannot sleep any longer,” said Mariam urgently.

  As Marta’s covers fell off her, Mariam was surprised to see that she was already wearing a boy’s shirt and trousers. Holding up Marta’s trousers was a belt made of tiny scraps leather painstakingly hand-stitched together. A gift from Kevork, no doubt.

  “When did you change?” she asked.

  “Last night, before I went to bed,” said Marta, pulling the covers back and getting out of bed. She quickly rolled her bedding into a bundle, then drew her new boots from under the bed.

  Mariam looked at the sturdy new boots in wonder. They were identical to the ones that Kevork had been making for himself. She knew instantly that Kevork had wanted to give these to Marta as his betrothal gift. She swallowed back a sob as she thought of how circumstances had changed in the last twenty-four hours. But one thing she knew for sure: Marta was in good hands with Kevork. He would never let anything happen to her.

  “Hurry,” said Mariam in a brusque voice to hide her tears.

  She stood and watched while Marta quickly laced up her boots, and then they grabbed their bedrolls and walked out the door. They ran through the courtyard and back to Beitshalom to find Kevork.

  They found him in his room, reading his father’s letter one last time as he held the gold coins to his heart. Like Marta, he was dressed in a coarse linen shirt, trousers held up with a leather belt, and sturdy new black boots on his feet.

  He looked up when they came in, set the coins and letter on the bed, then drew out a pair of scissors from his shirt pocket. “Sit here, Marta,” he said, patting a space beside him on the bed. “It’s time to cut your hair.”

  Mariam watched as hunks of Marta’s long hair fell to the floor. To her surprise, with the h
air cut short, her sister could pass for a young boy without too much difficulty. Her shoulders relaxed just a bit. Perhaps their plan would work.

  “You’re next,” said Kevork, looking at Mariam.

  “No,” said Mariam.

  “But we agreed,” said Kevork.

  “I’ll take my chances as a girl,” she replied. She hoped that Kevork and Marta thought she was simply vain. The last thing she wanted was heroics on their part. She knew that she would never successfully pass herself off as a boy, and she was afraid that if she tried, the Turks would twig onto her sister’s disguise.

  “Your coins, Kevork,” she said, changing the subject. “You haven’t sewn them into your clothing.”

  “I decided that we should each take three,” he replied. “That way, if we’re separated, we’ll each still have something to live on.”

  A sob caught in Mariam’s throat. Kevork’s generosity was overwhelming. Mariam took the first three coins and held them reverently in her palm. These coins could be the difference between life and death.

  Kevork had a spool of thread and a needle ready. “Turn around,” Mariam said to him. “I want to open up the seam in your collar and hide one there.” With the scissors that had recently made her sister look like a boy, Mariam carefully opened up the seam on the underside of Kevork’s collar and tucked in one coin, then stitched it back together. She hid another one in the cuff of his shirt, and another in the waistband of his trousers. She did the same for Marta.

  When she lifted up her own skirt to sew a coin into her seam, the sickle dislodged and fell to the ground. Marta reached down and picked it up.

  “Are you taking this?” asked Marta, running her finger along the sharp edge.

  “Don’t,” said Mariam, grabbing the sickle. “You’ll hurt yourself.” She tucked it back into the waist of her skirt, then said, “Are we ready?”

  “We’d better be,” said Kevork. “The assembly is being inspected in mere minutes.”

  The three grabbed their bedrolls and ran out.

  They were among the last to assemble in the courtyard.

  Most of the two hundred orphans were quite young, and they were sitting in neat rows on the ground, using their bedrolls as cushions. Mariam was struck by the fact that she had never witnessed such silence in these children before. Two hundred pairs of eyes followed Mariam, Marta, and Kevork as they took their places in the front row. Directly behind Mariam sat Paris, the little girl who had first greeted them six years ago. Mariam turned and gave her an encouraging smile.

  Anna, Miss Younger, Mr. Karellian, and the other missionaries and teachers stood to one side.

  Just then, the gates were thrown open, and a Turkish officer on a white stallion entered in a swirl of dust, followed by soldiers on foot. While the soldiers were dressed in coarse uniforms of dull brown, the officer was smartly dressed in a dark blue uniform with a stiffly starched red upright collar and matching red cuffs, knee-length black leather boots, a black leather belt holding a bayonet and a pistol, and a tall tasselled red fez on his head.

  Mariam knew who he was by reputation alone: Mahmoud Sayyid, captain of the Turkish army in Marash. The sight of his handsome, mustached face and signature white horse instilled fear wherever he went. There were stifled whimpers from the children sitting behind Mariam.

  His eyes looked cruel, but the skin on his face and hands were soft and pampered. His uniform was clean and crisp, and even his boots, although covered with a fine mist of dust, looked barely walked in. Mariam could imagine him standing in front of a mirror and preening like a woman.

  Captain Sayyid dismounted and handed his reins to one of the soldiers. First, he approached the group of adults. “Where are the Armenians?” he said.

  Anna stepped forward. So did Mr. Karellian. The laundress, Tante Maria, also hesitantly stepped forward, as did the two other Armenian teachers.

  “Where are you hiding the rest?” asked Captain Sayyid, staring fiercely at Miss Younger.

  “These are all,” she said.

  “You lie,” he said.

  Then he turned to face the rows of trembling children. “Stand,” he ordered.

  The children all stood, clutching bedrolls to their chests.

  With his hands clasped behind his back, Captain Sayyid walked to the end of the first row, then strutted forward between the rows of frightened children, stopping now and again for a second look. When he got to the front of the row, he found Kevork and stopped.

  Kevork tried to minimize his height by keeping his knees bent, but even so, he was a head taller than the Captain.

  He turned to Miss Younger. “This is no child.”

  “He is merely fifteen,” said Miss Younger.

  “I don’t believe you.” With a motion of his hand, he ordered Kevork to join the adults.

  Next, he stepped in front of Marta. Like Kevork, she was consigned to the adult group.

  Mariam’s heart beat wildly as he stopped in front of her. She held her bedroll to her chest and tried to relax her face into childlike innocence. She and the Captain were nose to nose in height. He leaned in so close to her face that she could smell the sickly sweet pomade in his hair. A smile formed on his lips. He reached out his hand and gently brushed her cheek. She cringed.

  “Where have you been hiding this one?” he asked Miss Younger.

  Mariam reached one hand behind her, and, unobtrusively as she could, she felt the outline of the sickle through her skirt.

  “You will come with me,” he said.

  “I will not go,” she said firmly. She slipped a finger through the belt of her skirt and worked the handle of the sickle loose.

  With a cold smile, he drew out his pistol. Mariam held her breath. Perhaps this was the best way to go. To be killed now and have it end. But he pointed the gun directly behind her and shot.

  Mariam felt something warm and wet on the handle of her sickle. She turned, then screamed. Blood.

  Paris. Dear Paris. The little girl had been shot. Her neck gurgled with blood and she gasped, trying to get a breath of air. She fell into the arms of the girl standing behind her.

  Captain Sayyid pointed his pistol towards the adults. “No one move, or you will be next.”

  Mariam watched him with tear-filled anger as he decided the fates of the rest of the children. Some who were as young as ten were assigned to the “adult” group and set for deportation.

  When he was finished, he grabbed Mariam’s hand and pulled her towards his horse. He lifted her as if she were no more than a doll and pushed her onto his saddle. Then he put his boot in the stirrup and nearly kicked her as he got on the horse in front of her.

  Mariam leaned back on her hands to avoid his boot, and as she did so, her one bloodied hand branded the horse’s rump. The sickle slipped out of her skirt. She tried to grab it, but she was too late. All she saw was a flicker of metal disappearing in a swirl of dust.

  As the stallion galloped through the gates, she was forced to hold the Captain’s belt so she wouldn’t fall off. Unaware of the last bit of blood that had smeared on his clean uniform, he smiled approvingly at her. “That’s more like it,” he said.

  She turned her head. The last thing she saw was her sister and Kevork and the other “adults” herded together by soldiers with bayonets. Their desperate plan had not worked at all. All three of them had been deemed “adults” and they had been split apart. Her one comfort was knowing that Marta had successfully hidden her gender and that she and Kevork would — for the moment — be together.

  CHAPTER TEN

  Mariam felt nauseous when she looked down and saw the ground moving under her. She tightened her grip on the officer’s belt, but felt a wave of bile rise in her throat. The smell of his pomade mixed with sweat was overpowering. For a brief moment Mariam considered loosening her grip from the officer’s belt and falling off the horse, but then she looked around she saw that the Marash she knew no longer existed. As the stallion travelled down a street in the Turkish di
strict, Mariam saw that the houses were shut tight. There were no children playing in the streets or housewives gossiping behind courtyard gates. Even the roofs were empty. Once, Mariam saw a veiled women’s eyes peeking out at her through a latticed window. After that, Mariam had a vague sense of being watched.

  When they left the Turkish district and entered the Armenian section, things changed again. It was silent and still as it had been in the other parts of the city, but here the silence was from emptiness rather than hiding. While in the Turkish district, the only smell that Mariam had been aware of was that of the officer’s sweat and hair, but now there was another odour. One that lingered on the tip of her memory. Faintly metallic. Faintly rotting.

  The stallion came to a dead stop. Mariam craned her neck to see over the officer’s shoulder. The road was blocked by an oxcart loaded to overflowing with household goods. A chandelier, bolts of rich cloth, a large intricately carved wooden wardrobe, kitchen pots.

  What confused her was that the man holding the reins of the oxcart wore an ill-fitting Turkish army uniform, but he didn’t look like a soldier.

  “Move aside,” said Captain Sayyid firmly.

  The man whipped the ox and its bellow echoed in the eerie silence, and it took a few steps forward, clearing a space in the road just wide enough for the officer’s horse to step through. As they passed, the man grinned lewdly at Mariam, revealing rotted teeth. He turned to Captain Sayyid and said, “I see I’m not the only one gathering up Armenian riches.”

  Mariam trembled.

  The stallion got just a few houses further down the narrow winding street before there was another obstruction. This time, it was a small pyramid of household goods abandoned in the middle of the road. There was bedding, a half-empty sack of grain, worn and patched clothing. Whoever had plundered it wasn’t satisfied with the meagreness of his loot.

  As Captain Sayyid manoeuvred the horse around it, Mariam couldn’t help but visualize the terrorized family who had been ordered out of their home and then robbed of these poor items. Where was that family now?

  They continued down the street, through scenes of abandonment and plunder, until they arrived at a stately home in the oldest part of the Armenian district. Mariam knew that this house belonged to Hagop Topalian, a wealthy Armenian jeweller. Hagop’s brother had been the mayor of Marash before the Young Turks overthrew the Sultan, but the family’s influence had diminished in the last years.