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rattling up the valley. ‘Seit Ahmet! Your father has three sons, and now the tsar needs your youngest brother to serve in his army.’
    “Seit Ahmet’s middle brother was a school-teacher by this time, with a wife from the village who had once worn gold thread in her plaits. But now their youngest brother was studying in the Zindjirli
medresse
. Seit Ahmet lay on the cool Crimean earth and pondered the laws of Islam: honour Allah above all, and His prophet, and next honour the family, the homeland and education. ‘What must be, must be,
inshallah
,’ said Seit Ahmet, and he rode away a third time to the wars.”
    “So many wars,” Mama murmured.
    “He fought for three more years, and he came back with a hole where a bullet had gone right through him. When he rode into the village he said, ‘I’m an old bachelor of thirty-eight; what girl will look at me now?’”
    “Those heartless girls.” Mehmed nudged Refat again. Refat was in his thirties, and his mother was always on at him to get married.
    “Wait till the end of the story,” Safi said. That was her favourite bit.
    “Seit Ahmet sat at the edge of the freshly ploughed tobacco field, and he said, ‘I’ve fought alongside the Russians against many different countries, and all I’ve learnt is that none of them keep the promises they make to us. I’ve learnt that there’s nowhere in the world finer than Crimea, and there’s no one to love and defend Crimea but us Crimean Tatars.’
    “‘And one day perhaps we’ll die for Crimea; but for the moment, how about helping me plant this field instead of sitting there philosophizing like a great lump?’ said a voice behind him.
    “My father jumped half out of his skin to see a young girl, not eighteen if she was a day, in the field with a bag of seeds tied round her waist. When he had returned to Adym-Chokrak before, the girls had stayed at home, peeking out through their windows at the world and the handsome soldiers riding by, waiting for a husband to come courting. Yet here now was a girl out in the field frowning and smiling at him, pretty as a painting and bold as brass. Seit Ahmet felt his stern heart stirring, and wondered if thirty-eight was perhaps, after all, not so very old. Ah, what must be, must be,
inshallah
!”
    “And that was my great-grandmother!” said Safi.
    “She was a fighter too,” Grandpa said. “And sometimes she fought with Seit Ahmet, but never over the things that really matter.”
    “What matters is Crimea,” Papa said to Mama.
    Grandpa looked at him. “My mother knew that what really matters is kindness. One day I’ll tell you a story about that too.”

7

WHO LIVED THERE?
    S afi woke up to a strange new brightness. When she looked, the other two beds in the house, where Mama and Grandpa slept, were already empty. Safi pulled the quilt up almost to her eyes and peeked overhead, frightened that the plastic sheeting had blown away in the night. But the pale morning light was slanting in through the window; the boards fixed over it had gone. When she wriggled out of bed and went outside she discovered why. Lutfi was painting on them. The big red letters spelt out the unfinished message: REBUILD OUR ANCIENT TATAR V—
    Refat was working on a second board. His read: RECAIM OUR CRIMEAN TATAR LAND!
    “What are you doing?” Safi yawned and shivered, her toes curling in the damp grass.
    “Put some shoes on,” Refat said distractedly. His broad, high-cheekboned face was anxious, and he was trying to put the missing ‘ L ’ into ‘ RECAIM ’ so it wasn’t too noticeable.
    “Yes, but what are you doing?”
    “Protesting,” Lutfi said. “Down by the pond.” He sounded pleased, probably because at last something different was happening in their monotonous valley.
    “Put some shoes on first!” Refat called after her as she went to investigate.
    There was a police car parked by the pond. Three policemen were standing in front of it. Opposite them stood Safi’s