CHAPTER 92

I Am Ayse

On the morning after the Christians departed there were very many of us who were left bewildered, and we were very sorry, and we began to be frightened about what would happen to them. They had so many things to carry and such a long way to walk, and as well as that, we knew that when Levon the Armenian and the other Armenians were taken away, they were killed only a day’s journey away, because Stamos the Birdman found them when he was going to Telmessos with a cage of finches, and out of modesty he went into the woods to do his business. He said that he found skeletons with holes and cuts in their heads, and there was clothing, and he recognised the headscarf of the wife of Levon the Armenian, and he said that when he looked at her bones he saw that her feet had been nailed to donkey shoes, and I know I’m no one to have an opinion, but when I heard of that I thought it was a good thing that Rustem Bey had brought back the daughters of Levon the Armenian even though at the time I didn’t care if every Armenian in the world got killed, because we hated them so much, but now when I think about it, it wasn’t our Armenians in this town who ever did anyone any harm, but the ones who attacked our army when we were fighting the Russians, and Levon was a good man and his wife was a good woman and his daughters were sweet-natured girls.

So some people decided to follow the Christians and help them on their journey by carrying things, and some of the men took their guns and swords because they wanted to make sure that the escort was behaving, and they followed on after the Christians and caught them up quite soon. Some of the women went, but I couldn’t go because, since Abdulhamid Hodja my husband died, I had no man who was a relative to protect me, and for the same reason my daughters didn’t go either, but we wanted to go very much and it caused me great pain that I might never see Polyxeni again, and so I gave an embroidered scarf and a coin to Nermin the wife of Iskander the Potter so that she could give them to Polyxeni as another farewell gift, and I sent pitta bread stuffed with cheese and honey, and I asked Nermin to ask Polyxeni to come back whenever she could, and to tell Polyxeni that I would always keep the trunk she left in my care that has all the things from her dowry in it, and I will keep it until I die and after I die I will give it into the care of my eldest daughter, and like that it will be safe for all time. I am proud to say that even though the trunk is not locked I have never lifted the lid once, and neither will I ever lift the lid and that way my hands and my conscience will be clean and I will have no temptation even though I am poor. I wish I had had more money to buy things from her before she left.

It turned out that the Christians were not being badly treated, because the escort were gendarmes and not tribesmen, but they were still weary and desperate, and so it was that our people helped them to carry their things. They were astonished to find that Leyla Hanim was with the Christians, and she had nothing except a bundle and her oud, and I think to this day that Rustem Bey does not know why she went. They also found that Polyxeni was weeping and crying out because her daughter Philothei had vanished and had not come with them.

At Telmessos some Christians kissed the earth, and some Christians took a leaf or a flower or even an insect or a feather or a handful of the earth because they wanted something from their native land, and when the time came for the ship to leave the quay, there was much hugging and weeping, and promises were made, and the little boys who could swim swam out after the ship for a little way, and the women who had mirrors took them out of their sashes and they held them up to the sun so that the little flashes could sparkle on the ship until it was out of sight, and that way the sunlight of their native land followed the exiles even when they left it. And there were people who were saying, “A curse on all those who are responsible for this, we curse them and we curse them and we curse them,” but I never did find out who was responsible except that it was probably the Franks.

And it was said that the ship took our people to Crete, which is a land in the west, and it was from that land that some Muslims came to replace them, but not as many as the number we lost. And these Cretan Muslims are rather like the Christians that we lost, so that we wonder why it was necessary to exchange them, because these Cretans dance and sing as our Christians used to do, except that they have a new dance called pentozali which it lifts the heart to watch. A few of these Cretans speak only Greek. At least all of our Christians knew how to speak Turk. Not that I am anyone to have an opinion of course, and one good thing is that my daughter Hasseki has found a good-looking husband among them who is a good Muslim and knows how to make locks and hammers and ploughs and all sorts of useful things made of metal.

And when our people came home from seeing the Christians leave, two very strange things happened. One was that the bell of the church fell off the bell tower of St. Nicholas, and broke into two pieces on the paving stones, and the other thing is that for days afterwards all you heard at night was the crying of the cats. They drowned out the bulbuls and nightingales, crying and crying, lamenting and complaining, complaining and lamenting. They were on the roofs and in the alleyways, they were on the walls and in the almond trees, in the courtyard of the mosque and in the cemetery of the Christians, and they were wandering about, distressed, crying that low moaning cry and some of them wailing, and it was a terrible sound and it was frightening, and I lay on my pallet listening to them, and I couldn’t sleep, and I understood why they were crying in the great sudden loneliness and strangeness of the town, and that is what I remember more than anything else, the crying of the cats.