1997 - The Red Tent (23 page)

There was one great gift that my teachers learned from the women of Shechem’s valley. It was not an herb or a tool, but a birth song, and the most soothing balm that Inna or Rachel had ever used. It made laboring women breathe easier and caused the skin to stretch rather than tear. It eased the worst pains. Those who died—for even with a midwife as skillful as Inna some of them died—even they smiled as they closed their eyes forever, unafraid. We sang:

Fear not, the time is coming

Fear not, your hones are strong

Fear not, help is nearby

Fear not, Gula is near

Fear not, the baby is at the door

Fear not, he will live to bring you honor

Fear not, the hands of the midwife are clever

Fear not, the earth is beneath you

Fear not, we have water and salt

Fear not, little mother

Fear not, mother of us all”

Inna loved that song, especially when the women of the house could add harmonies and make the magic even greater. She was delighted to have learned something so powerful so late in her life. “Even the oldest of us,” she said, shaking a bony finger at me, “even we crones can pick up new tricks here and there.”

Our beloved friend was aging, and the time came when Inna was too stiff to walk out in the night or to manage steep paths, so Rachel took me with her and I began to learn with my hands as well as with my eyes.

Once when we were called to help a young mother deliver her second son—an easy birth from a sweet woman who smiled even as she labored—my aunt let me place the bricks and tie the cord. On the way home Rachel patted my shoulder and told me I would be a good midwife. When she added that my voice suited the song of the fearless mother, I was never so proud.

S
OMETIMES WE WERE called to assist a laboring mother who lived within sight of the city. Those trips were my special delight. The walls of Shechem awed me more than the misty mountains that inspired sacrifices from Jacob and Zilpah. The minds that had conceived such a great project made me feel wise, and the force of the sinews that had built the fortress made me feel strong. Whenever I caught sight of the walls, I could not look away.

I longed to go inside, to see the temple square and the narrow streets and crowded houses. I knew a little about the shape of the place from Joseph, who had been to Shechem with our brothers. Joseph said that the palace where Hamor the king lived in splendor with his Egyptian wife and fifteen concubines contained more rooms than I had brothers. Joseph said that Hamor had more servants than we had sheep. Not that a dusty shepherd like my brother could even hope for a peek inside such a grand house. Still, I liked his tall stories. Even lies about the place thrilled me, and I fancied that I could smell the perfume of courtesans on my brother’s tunic when he returned from the market.

My mother decided she wanted to see the place for herself. Leah was certain that she could drive a better bargain for our wool than Reuben, who was too generous to be trusted with such transactions. I nearly kissed her hands when she said I would go to help her. Reuben settled us into a good spot just outside the gate, but he stood at a distance from us when our mother began calling out to every passing stranger and haggled like a camel trader with those who approached.

There was little for me to do but watch, which I did happily. That day at the eastern gate was a marvel. I saw my first jugglers. I ate my first pomegranate. I saw black faces and brown faces, goats with impossibly curly coats, women covered in black robes and slave girls who wore nothing at all. It was like being on the highway again, but without sore feet. I saw a dwarf hobbling alongside a donkey as white as the moon, and watched a caftaned high priest buy olives. Then I saw Tabea.

Or at least I thought I saw her. A girl of her height and coloring walked toward our display. She was dressed in the white robes of the temple, head shaven, both ears pierced. I stood and called out to her, but she turned on her heels and rushed away. Without thinking and before my mother could stop me, I ran after her, as though I were a child and not a young woman. “Tabea!” I called out. “Cousin!” But she did not hear me, or if she did, she did not stop, and the white robes disappeared through a doorway.

Reuben caught up with me. “What were you doing?” he asked.

“I thought it was Tabea,” I said, near tears. “But I was mistaken.”

“Tabea?” he asked.

“A cousin from Esau. You do not know her,” I said. “I’m sorry I made you chase me. Is Mother angry?”

He laughed at the foolishness of my question, and I laughed too. She was furious, and I had to sit facing the wall the rest of the afternoon. But by then, my light heart had gone out of me, and I was content just listening to the sounds of the marketplace, nursing memories of my lost friend.

After our return from that trip, a messenger arrived from the city. She wore a linen robe and beautiful sandals and would speak only to Rachel. “One of the women in the king’s household is about to deliver,” she said to my aunt. “Hamor’s queen calls for the midwives from Jacob’s house to attend her.”

Leah was not pleased when I began to prepare my kit for the journey. She went to Rachel and asked, “Why not take Inna to the queen with you? Why do you insist on taking Dinah away from me, just when there are olives to harvest?”

My aunt shrugged. “You know that Inna cannot walk as far as the city any longer. If you wish me to take a slave, I will. But the queen expects two of us, and she will not be so disposed to buy your woolens if I walk into the palace without skilled assistance.”

Leah glared at her sister’s smooth words, and I dropped my eyes to the ground so that my mother could not see how much I longed to go. I held my breath as my mother decided. “Pah,” she said, throwing up her hands and walking away. I clapped my hands over my mouth to keep from crowing, and Rachel grinned at me like a child who had outfoxed her elders.

We finished our preparations and dressed in festival robes, but Rachel stopped me before we walked out, and braided my hair into smooth ropes. “Egyptian-style,” she whispered. Bilhah and Zilpah waved us off, but Leah was nowhere to be seen as we headed into the valley with the messenger.

Walking through the gates of the city that first time, I was sorely disappointed. The streets were smaller and dustier than I had imagined. The smell was an awful mixture of rotten fruit and human waste. We moved too quickly to see inside the dark hovels, but I could hear and smell that the goats lived with their owners, and I finally understood my father’s disdain for city dwelling.

Once we crossed the threshold of the palace, we entered a different world. The walls were thick enough to block out the sounds and smells of the street, and the courtyard in which we stood was spacious and bright.

A naked slave approached and motioned for us to follow her through one of the doorways into the women’s quarters, and then into the room where the mother-to-be panted on the floor. She was about my age and by the look of her, early in her labor. Rachel touched her belly and examined the womb and rolled her eyes at me. We had been summoned for the most straightforward of births. Not that either of us minded; a trip to the palace was an adventure for which we were grateful.

Soon after we met the mother, Hamor’s queen walked into the room, curious to see the hill-bred midwives. The queen, who was called Re-nefer, wore a gossamer linen sheath covered by a tunic of turquoise beads—the most elegant clothing I had ever seen. Even so, my aunt was not outshone by the lady. Old as Rachel was, lined by sun and work, crouched on the floor with her hand between the legs of a woman in travail—even so, my aunt glowed her golden light. Her hair was still lustrous and her black eyes sparkled. The women looked each other over with approval and nodded their greeting.

Re-nefer raised her gown above her knees and squatted on the other side of Ashnan, for that was the name of the young mother who huffed and moaned more in fear than pain. The two older women began to talk about oils that might ease the baby’s head, and I was impressed both at how much the noblewoman knew of birthing and at Rachel’s ease in conversing with a queen.

Ashnan, it turned out, was the daughter of the queen’s nursemaid. The woman on the bricks had been a playmate of her own son’s infancy and his milk-sister—just like Joseph and me. The nursemaid had died when the children were still babies, and Re-nefer had been tender toward the girl ever since and was even more so now that she was pregnant by Hamor. Ashnan was his newest concubine.

All this we learned from Re-nefer, who stayed beside Ashnan from noon until nearly sunset. The mother was strong and all the signs were good, but the birth went slowly. Strong pangs were followed by long pauses, and when Ashnan fell asleep late in the afternoon, exhausted by her labors, Re-nefer took Rachel to her own chamber for refreshment and I was left to watch the mother.

I was nearly asleep myself when I heard a man’s voice in the antechamber. I should have sent word through the slave girl, but I didn’t think of it. I was bored and stiff from sitting so many hours, so I rose and went myself.

His name was Shalem. He was a firstborn son, the handsomest and quickest of the king’s children, well liked by the people of Shechem. He was golden and beautiful as a sunset.

I dropped my eyes to the ground to keep from staring—as though he were a two-headed goat or something else that defied the order of things. And yet, he did defy nature. He was perfect.

To avoid looking up into his face, I noticed that his fingernails were clean and that his hands were smooth. His arms were not black from the sun like my brothers’, though neither were they sickly. He wore only a skirt, and his chest was naked, hairless, well muscled.

He was looking at me, too, and I shuddered at the stains on my apron. Even my festival tunic seemed shabby and drab compared to the gleaming homespun of the simple garment he wore at home. My hair was awry and uncovered. My feet were dirty. I began to hear the sound of breathing, without knowing if it was my own or his.

Finally, I could not help myself and lifted my eyes to his. He stood taller than me by a handbreadth. His hair was black and shining, his teeth straight and white. His eyes were golden or green or brown. In truth, I did not look there long enough to discern their color because I had never been greeted with such a look. His mouth smiled politely, but his eyes sought the answer to a question I did not fully understand.

My ears rang. I wanted to run, and yet I did not wish to end this strange agony of confusion and need that came upon me. I said nothing.

He was disconcerted, too. He coughed into his fist, glanced toward the doorway where Ashnan lay, and stared at me. Finally, he stuttered a question about his milk-sister. I must have said something, though I have no memory of my words. All I remember is the ache in the moment when we met in that bare little hallway.

It amazes me to think of all that happened in the space of a silent breath or two. All the while I scolded myself, thinking, Foolish! Childish! Foolish! Mother will laugh when I tell her.

But I knew I would not be telling this to my mother. And that thought made me blush. Not the warmth of my feeling for this Shalem, whose name I had not even learned, whose presence made me dumb and weak. What caused my cheeks to color was the understanding that I would not speak of the fullness and fire in my heart to Leah.

He saw me color and his smile widened. My awkwardness vanished and I smiled back. And it was as though the bride-price had been paid and the dowry agreed to. It was as though we were alone in our bridal tent. The question had been answered.

It sounds comical to me now, and if a child of mine confessed such things to me, I would laugh out loud or scold her. But on that day I was a girl who was ready for a man.

As we grinned at each other, I remembered the sounds from Judah’s tent and I understood my own fevered nights. Shalem, who was a few years older than I, recognized his own longing and yet he felt more than the simple stirring of desire, or that is what he said after we had redeemed our promise and lay in each other’s arms. He said he was smitten and shy in the antechamber of the women’s quarters. He said he had been enchanted, struck dumb, and thrilled. Like me.

I do not think we spoke another word before Rachel and the queen swept into the room and pulled me back into the birth chamber. I did not have time to think of Shalem then, for Ashnan’s water broke and she delivered a big healthy boy who barely ripped her flesh.

“You will heal in a week,” Rachel told the girl, who sobbed with relief that it was done.

We slept in the palace that night, though I hardly closed my eyes with excitement. Leaving the next morning was like dying. I thought I might never see him again. I thought perhaps it had been a mistake on my part—the fantasy of a raw country girl in the presence of a prince. But my heart rebelled at the idea and I twisted my neck looking back as we departed, thinking he might come to claim me. But Shalem did not appear, and I bit my lips to keep from weeping as we climbed the hills back to my father’s tents.

Nobody knew! I thought they would all see it in me. I thought that Rachel would guess at my secret and pry the story from me as we walked home. But my aunt wanted only to talk about Re-nefer, who had praised her skills and given her a necklace of onyx beads.

When we returned to camp, my mother hugged me without sensing the new heat in my body and sent me to the olive grove, where the harvest was busy. Zilpah was there overseeing the press and barely answered my greeting. Even Bilhah of the discerning heart was preoccupied with a batch of oil jars that had cracked, and she saw nothing.

Their inattention was a revelation to me. Before my trip to Shechem, I had supposed that my mothers could see my thoughts and look directly into my heart. But now I discovered that I was separate, opaque, and drawn into an orbit of which they had no knowledge.

I delighted in the discovery of my solitude and protected it, keeping myself busy at the far end of the orchard and even sleeping in the makeshift tent near the edge of the harvest with my brothers’ wives. I was happy to be alone, thinking only of my beloved, numbering his qualities, imagining his virtues. I stared at my hands and wondered what it would be like to touch his gleaming shoulders, his beautiful arms. In rriy dreams I saw sunlight sparkling on water and I awoke smiling.