He swallowed a gulp of lemonade and then said, ‘It’s called trachoma. Our living conditions are pretty bad in the mellah and lots of people get ill. My mother is ashamed because she feels she caught trachoma on account of where we live being so poor and dirty. But it’s hard to keep things clean when it’s so crowded and we don’t have a proper bathroom.’
Nina asked, ‘What is trachoma?’ And Felix told us it’s a very unpleasant infection where germs get into the eyelids, causing scars. When they are badly scarred, the lids turn inwards so that the lashes scratch the surface of the eyes. Felix’s mother was in so much agony that, in desperation, she’d pulled out her eyelashes with a pair of tweezers, but as they’re now growing back it’s even more painful. Slowly this torment is making her go blind. Felix said this is just one of the conditions that the people living in the mellah are having to suffer. There are many other diseases too and several people have died as they wait for their visas.
I understood, then, why he didn’t want me and Nina to visit his home at the bakery.
He looked very sad and a bit frightened – not at all like his usual cheerful self – and I realised how brave he must be. Then I said, ‘Well, it’s a very good thing your mother has come to tell the meeting today about these problems. I’m sure Madame Bénatar and my maman and all the other ladies will want to do everything they can to help.’
I passed Felix the plate of honey cakes and he took another one. Then Nina asked him to teach us some more juggling （we still can’t manage three oranges at once） and things went back to being a bit more normal between us all again.
I asked Nina to tell Felix the story about the brother and sister who turned into turtle doves and the sister who saved them and married the king. She really is an excellent storyteller, much better than I am, a bit like Scheherazade herself, who told stories for one thousand and one nights to save herself from being killed by the king who’d married her. Felix agreed that it was a good one and for a few moments we all looked up at the doves on the roof and listened to them talking softly to one another. Then Felix showed us how he’s trying to learn to juggle four oranges at once and by then he looked a lot happier.
When we heard sounds of the meeting ending, we went back inside and said goodbye to Madame Bénatar and Felix’s mother. It was nice to see she looked a bit happier too and she even managed a smile, although her poor eyes still looked so sore.
After they’d left, I asked Maman what could be done to cure Madame Adler’s trachoma and she sighed and said there was some medication that could help but it was very hard to get supplies because of the war. The ladies who had attended the meeting were deeply moved by what Madame Adler had told them about the terrible conditions in the mellah, though, and they were going to try to help as much as they could. I felt very glad then that there are still people in this world like Madame Bénatar and my maman who are kind and caring. I think maybe I would like to find out more about becoming a doctor when we get to America and then I could come back to Africa to help people who are suffering from horrible things like trachoma.
We are so lucky to be able to live in this nice house with proper bathrooms. I just hope our good fortune doesn’t run out. I’m not sure I’d be able to be as brave as Felix if I had to live in the mellah.
Annette has said to Maman that she’d like to do something to help the committee ladies too, so that’s what I believe Lord Peter Wimsey would call a jolly good turn up for the books.
Zoe – 2010
In the peace and quiet of the library, I read up about the progress of the war. By the end of April 1941, the simmering struggle for territory in North Africa was reaching boiling point. Rommel’s Panzer divisions had pushed back the British and Australians, forcing them to retreat into Egypt and leaving the troops holding the port of Tobruk, in Libya, surrounded by the enemy. But they continued to hold out, stubbornly refusing to surrender; it was a siege that would last more than a year until the Afrika Korps finally managed to overrun the city in June 1942.
How much of that would people like the Duvals have been aware of, I wonder. The radio broadcasts they listened to would have been filled with propaganda on both sides. It must have been very tempting to try to believe the messages put out by the BBC, but the reports on Radio Maroc of German victories and the edicts issued by the pro-Nazi Vichy government in France must have been a constant, terrifying threat for the refugees in Morocco, whose options were rapidly running out.