Death became life again. She was normal within a couple of days. We went to Buenos Aires in December 1946.
When Saadeh decided to return to Lebanon before the parliamentary elections it was also decided that my daughters and I would travel later. We had very little time to prepare for his travel. I remember this incident only to show how frustrated we were while living in Tukoman. Elisar's episode showed us, if anything, that what Jubran Massuh did to us was nothing. Yes, he was the reason of our misery there. However, we were able to uncover his treachery and to recover our capital.
Our return to Buenos Aires and from there to Lebanon was to continue the struggle that we had begun years ago. Our struggle was a noble and honest one. It was for the cause of a nation and the people of that nation.
Saadeh traveled to Brazil to get his return visa. He got it only after much effort was spent on that matter, since all Lebanese consulates and embassies had received instructions not to grant him one. However, some influential friends were able to get it through the offices of Fu'ad Lutfallah, Consul General of Lebanon in Brazil. It must be mentioned that Saadeh got his visa under the name Muja'es, the name on his travel documents when he left Lebanon.
The leader wrote to me about when he intended to travel to Lebanon and that he would write to me as soon as he reaches Beirut. His answer was very late. It had been twenty days and no news from him had yet arrived. I was in a very disturbed mood and was talking to nobody. Moreover, I had read in a Maronite magazine published in Buenos Aires that the leader “Muhammad Antoine Saadeh” had been arrested. Others said that he once again secluded himself in the mountains and that the authorities were relentlessly trying to arrest him…
It was twenty days later that I received a note from some party members that the leader was OK and that he had asked them to drop the note to me. They informed me that the leader indeed had to relocate to his mountain retreat in order not to be arrested. Saadeh later wrote to me himself detailing all the difficulties that he had to endure on his return. He wrote at length about the political situation and the climate surrounding the parliamentary elections and how the national front did. In the last part of his letter Saadeh wrote to me that Naameh Tabit and Ma'mun Elias were no longer honest toward him and the party. He also informed me to prepare myself and the kids to return to Lebanon by plane, since it was now more convenient and took a much shorter time.
I wrote him back asking what I should do with the furniture, since I did not know where and how he was living. He answered that I should return as soon as possible. He did not mention anything about the furniture. I traveled with my daughters, fourteen crates of books and other stuff.
When I reached Beirut I found that the leader had no bed, no furniture, not even a chair. Nobody was able to give us anything, while prices of goods were high because of the World War. I asked him why he did not write to me to bring the furniture. He said that he asked about that to our friend, who did not give him an answer on time and so he could not inform me regarding them.
It is years later now and I am telling you how I was sorry not to bring our furniture with me. Indeed, these pieces had memories all over them. My memories with the leader! I asked George Abd al Masih, the friend who did not answer my husband on time on why he did that. He told me that he did not think that it was an important issue at the time. He also said that how could he think at the time that those pieces of furniture would be so important for all of us, since the leader has now gone forever. It was therefore very hard for us to live like a family in Lebanon at the time... Was it not Naameh Tabit himself that advised my husband on not to bring the family home to Lebanon, because it was too risky. All these small things create the doubt that never leaves my mind regarding the leader and the actions of his closest associates. I can be wrong. But I can also be right in my suspicions…
We prepared to travel and took the ship to Genoa. There I went ashore and looked for an Italian person, whose family had sent a gift to him from Argentina. I asked the person to reserve us a room in a nearby and cheap hotel. He did what I asked him to do.
