Lucine nods. It is a favorite story among the family, retold so many times that she is almost sure she witnessed it herself. He begins it anyway. “She came into your uncle Varouj’s store in Constantinople with her mother. She was planning to leave for that music school in Paris within weeks and needed fabric for her fancy new dresses. I was there delivering wool and taking inventory. I’d been in that store a thousand times, surrounded by rare silks and deep wools. I had been swimming in a sea of color for so long, nothing really stood out anymore. But the moment she stepped inside, every color and cloth in the room was crisp again and focused. Like someone had finally cleared my vision by giving me a pair of spectacles. Oh, I am not ashamed to say that I was love-struck immediately. Of course, it took a lot of hard work, especially with your grandmother, to take me seriously as a suitor,” he says. “I didn’t speak French and I had never been to a proper school.”
“Kemal touched my cheek.” The words spurt out of her mouth like discarded watermelon seeds. They drop into his story, interrupting it, staining its familiar beauty with their unwanted presence. Her words make Hairig’s mouth fall open and the kindness in his eyes disappears.
“What?” he says, his breathing shallow.
“He was only trying to . . .”
“What? He was only trying to what?” Hairig demands to know.
“Comfort me,” Lucine says, eyes lowered.
“Stop.” His voice is steady and firm. “Stop before I get any angrier.”
“But you’ve always liked him,” she offers, still not daring to look up.
“I like succulents as much as I like tulips, but you don’t see me planting both in the same patch of land.” Hairig’s body shoots up from the divan. “You stay away from him. This is no time to disgrace the family. There is an ocean of spilled blood between us, the blood of my brothers included.” His hand, still holding the leaflet, shakes violently.
“He is an employee, a common villager, and a Turk.” Hairig spits the last word out like a piece of phlegm. He takes Lucine’s chin between his thumb and forefinger, lifting her head until her eyes meet his. “Just because we live side by side, does not make us the same,” he says.
Lucine wants to object, but he holds her in his stare until she winces from the shame.
“It is a sin against God. We are Christians first, Armenians second, and only after, Ottomans. He doesn’t even have a last name, for God’s sake.
“Don’t disappoint me Lucine,” he says finally. “My heart could not take it.”
When he’s gone, Lucine thinks about his words and wonders where the longing in her own heart fits into the order of things.
The next four days are spent in a familiar fog of house chores, away from the courtyard and the river, away from her father’s averted eyes and far away from Kemal. A tray of green beans for de-stringing, a carafe of coffee for Mairig’s headache, a game of marbles with Bedros, and sometimes, when Anush allows it, a sweet cuddle with the baby. Lucine likes to press her nose into the soft fold of Aram’s neck, to breathe in his sweet tangy smell. She is enduring the way Hairig prescribed. But it is not enough to quell the foreboding and excitement of her nights, when she lies awake alternately reliving the moment when Kemal’s palm pressed her cheek and the dreaded night of Uncle Nazareth’s abduction.
On the fifth day, Lucine is busy soaking lentils, delighting in the way the smooth little pebbles slip through her fingers, when Bedros walks into the kitchen. His dark mass of hair, jutting in every direction, hangs well past his earlobes, covering the left side of his face where his scar hides. Even his eyes, so black they lack irises, wear an expression of neglect. In his hand, he holds the wooden slingshot.
“Kemal said to tell you thanks,” he says.
“What?” She can hardly believe what has just come out of the child’s mouth.
“For the book,” he says. She suddenly notices a small volume in his left hand. “I didn’t know he could read English,” says Bedros. “Anyway, he says thanks for lending it to him.”
“Yes. Yes, he can read English,” she lies, struggling to think of something else to say, but Bedros has moved on, the way children do. She runs her fingers across the volume, knowing that the same palm that caressed her cheek has fingered its pages. She knows, without opening it, that the book does not belong to Kemal. Most of the Muslim villagers cannot read, and Kemal is no exception. She knows, without opening it, that the book belongs to her teacher, Miss Graffam, the missionary. It’s not just the leather binding that is exquisite and foreign but also the title, The Missionary Herald, written in English, which gives the owner away. The thought of Kemal sneaking into the American girl’s school and taking a book for her makes Lucine’s chest swell with gratitude, and she smiles at his daring. She is about to tuck the volume in her apron, when a single leaf of paper floats to the ground.
Long graphite pencil marks, dark and light, weave seductively across the page, creating an image of her hair, wild like it was that morning. Hidden in the mass of hair is an image of her face, her deep-set eyes, mouth slightly open, an image at once familiar and disturbing. Lucine marvels at the skillful drawing she knows to be his and blushes when she tries to think about how carefully he’s looked at her. She folds the sheet of paper twice before tucking it in her sleeve.
“What’s wrong with you?” Anush is standing at the doorway. Aram sits on her right hip, sucking at the dimpled fingers of his right hand.
“What?” Lucine says, startled.
“I said, what’s wrong with you?” Anush repeats.
“I’m being helpful. Soaking lentils.”
“Since when are you helpful?”
“Since always.”