Enchantress: A Novel of Rav Hisda's Daughter (25 page)

My throat constricted as he read it through, and then, eyes wide in amazement, read it through again. “Ha-Elohim,” he whispered. Then he shook his head and said “Ha-Elohim” again.

“What is it?” Father leaned forward to catch a glimpse.

“Here.” Rava thrust the message at him. “You read it.”

Father perused it only once before staring at Rava in awe. “Bar Shmuel has bequeathed you thirteen thousand
zuzim
from his property in Nehar Panya. You are summoned to the court there to acknowledge your inheritance and arrange to collect it.”

I promptly closed my jaw, which had dropped open. Rava had just inherited enough money to buy more than twenty large houses, from some man I’d never heard him even mention. “Who is this Bar Shmuel?” I asked him. “Did you know about this?”

Rava shook his head vigorously. “I am as astounded as you. I have no idea who Bar Shmuel is, other than someone with a lot of property in Nehar Panya.”

Father began to laugh. “To think that we were all so worried, and here it is good news.” He explained how the messenger had been delayed earlier by Seoram.

“Now I’ll be able to redeem my mortgages before the wedding,” Rava declared.

“Don’t be hasty,” Father warned. “Go to Nehar Panya and see what this is about.” He paused to stroke his beard. “I’m inclined to go with you, so we can verify this inheritance together and establish what it consists of.”

“I would appreciate the presence of your business acumen,” Rava said.

“There is no reason to pay the mortgages early,” I added. “The produce is yours anyway, and that way you can use Bar Shmuel’s money to invest in something new.”

Father addressed the messenger, who was waiting a discreet distance away. “Tomorrow is Sixth Day, so the court certainly can’t expect Rava until Second Day at the earliest. If you haven’t noticed, we are celebrating a wedding here. Why don’t you delay your return until after Shabbat?”

The man stood up and sniffed the air appreciatively. “The
beit din
has been waiting since Elul. I expect they can wait a few days longer.”

Father led him inside, and once they were out of sight, Rava hugged me tightly. “Thirteen thousand
zuzim
, I can’t believe it,” he kept muttering. “Now I can give all the charity I want.”

With Rava in such an ebullient mood, this seemed the time to question him about Zeira’s accusation. I cleared my throat, and Rava looked at me questioningly. “When I came to get Abaye, I couldn’t help but overhear Zeira saying something about you having hidden defects.”

Even in the dim light I could see Rava blushing furiously. He looked more embarrassed than when we’d met outside the
mikvah
.

“You said you’d never lie to me,” I reminded him.

He looked down at the ground. “It started years ago, when we were all studying with your father. Being unmarried adolescents, we often had to immerse in the morning before discussing Torah,” he began. “Of course we all saw each other naked and observed . . . the size . . . of each other’s . . . members.”

“You needn’t be embarrassed. Men’s members are no mystery to me.” I tried to reassure him. “I have seven older brothers, after all.” I wasn’t about to mention the time I inadvertently entered that Caesarea bathhouse with mixed bathing. I saw plenty of naked men that day.

He did not seem reassured. “I was, uh, considerably larger than the others, while Zeira was the smallest. So they teased me, he most of all. That was when they began to call me Rava, ‘the big one,’ in contrast to Zeira, ‘the little one’.”

“It must have been awful for you.” I couldn’t recall how I’d learned it, but I knew that the ideal male, in both Bavel and Eretz Israel, was one with a small penis. Indeed, the smaller the better.

“To hide myself, I would walk to and from the water bent over. Zeira always stood up straight, declaring he was proud of his circumcision—which implied I was not.” Rava winced at the memory. “Not that anyone could see his. I thought he looked like he had a bird’s nest with three eggs in it between his legs.”

I was so filled with relief that I had to giggle at his description. “Now you’re proud of the name Rava.”

“If they were going to call me Rava, I would become ‘the great one,’ as it referred to Torah learning,” he declared. “I’m sorry you had to learn about me this way.”

I put my hand on his arm. “You don’t have to worry about being too big for me. I’ve borne two children, and if there was room for them, there will be room for you.”

He put his hand on mine. “I was worried.”

We stood there in awkward silence until another subject came to me. “Homa told me you promised to find a way to free Abaye from Eli’s curse.”

He quickly corrected me. “I said I’d try.”

“Do you really think you can do it?”

“To enable Abaye and Bibi, and their progeny, to have a normal life span would give me much joy.” He paused with a sigh. “As it would to have the ability to lift such a powerful curse.” Now his eyes gleamed and his voice rose in excitement. “You must help me. You must learn everything you can about removing curses.”

“I will try.”

 • • • 

I was not surprised when neither Abaye nor Homa came downstairs for bread and porridge the next morning. I was surprised, however, when not long after I’d joined Rava and my parents, Em’s doorkeeper informed us there were visitors he thought we should see.

Rava rubbed his forehead, finished his cup of ispargus, and refilled it. “Do we know them?”

“I believe they consulted Mistress Hisdadukh several times last spring.”

“You may bring them here,” I said. “If they appear to be staying, set up tables for them.”

Moments later Rava was introducing Dakya and Gerbita to my parents, while my attention was focused on the chubby pink-cheeked infant in Chatoi’s arms.

Gerbita sat down next to me. “My new grandson just turned one month old. I know you’re only in town for Abaye’s wedding, but could you find time to inscribe an amulet for him?”

“I would have to do it this morning, as the afternoon and all of tomorrow are inauspicious,” I replied after some thought.

“You only need to write it,” Dakya urged me. “We can buy the case on our way home.”

“If you give me the boy’s name and let me hold him for a little while to get a sense of his spirit, I will write his amulet while you’re here.” Only after thirty days of life did a child receive his soul.

I eagerly reached out my arms. It had been a long time since I’d held such a young baby, yet I instinctively supported his head and cuddled him against my breasts. I looked up at Rava, who was watching us wistfully.

Even holding the boy a short time, I knew how much I wanted the angels to protect him. After all, if my love spell for his parents hadn’t been successful, Chatoi might have aborted him. So I handed him back and went upstairs to get my box of supplies. When I came down, there was a table waiting for me. I took out a jar of ink, a quill, and a small piece of parchment. Then I turned my heart toward Heaven and summoned all my
kavanah
.

Between glances at the child, I wrote: “This good amulet is from Savaot Adonai for Sholi bar Chatoi to save him from evil tormentors, from
mazikim
, from the Evil Eye, from
shaydim
, from impure spirits. If you will obey YHVH your God, doing what is right in His eyes, giving ear to His commandments, and keeping His laws, then I will not bring upon you any of the diseases that I brought upon the Egyptians, for I am YHVH your healer. In the name of the holy and mighty Anael, prince of archangels, may Sholi bar Chatoi be guarded by night and by day. Amen, amen. Selah.”

“That was a well-formed seven-month baby,” Rava said after the family departed.

Mother’s eyes opened wide. “That was a seven-month baby? Are you sure?”

He nodded confidently. “Dakya and Chatoi married in early Adar. Your daughter and I attended the wedding.”

I knew very well that Chatoi’s pregnancy had lasted the usual nine months, but I said nothing. The Rabbis taught that while the gestation period of most babies is nine months, some, such as the sons of our matriarch Leah, reach maturity in seven.

When I asked Em about this later, her eyes twinkled as she answered, “If it weren’t for the possibility of seven-month gestations, who knows how many couples might be accused of having cohabited prior to their wedding?”

 • • • 

I could still feel little Sholi in my arms as I watched Chama and Bibi review their Mishna lessons. My son would be eleven years old in a few months, and it was as difficult to imagine the man he would grow to be as it was to recall how he’d looked as a baby. After merely an hour of listening to them studying, I had no doubt that Father was right about Chama’s sharp mind. I found it endearing the way he played with his curls when he became absorbed in thought, but I was careful not to let him catch me observing him.

When Bibi needed to relieve himself, I took advantage of his temporary absence to ask Chama, “What do you think of Elisheva now that you’ve seen her?”

My son blushed, which I considered a good sign. “I guess she’s satisfactory,” he mumbled.

“Only satisfactory?”

“I mean, she seems nice enough now, but it’s hard to know what she’ll look like when she’s grown.”

I had to agree with that. “We’ll wait and see, then.”

FIFTEEN

M
y first free afternoon after returning to Sura, I asked my
charasheta
sister-in-law, Rahel, if she knew any incantations for lifting curses. I told her only that I’d been asked to help someone suffering under a powerful one.

To my surprise, she nodded. “I rarely use it, as most of my clients want protection from curses, not to have a curse removed,” she explained.

We went upstairs to her bedroom, where she unlocked a small chest and riffled through several sheaves of papyrus.

“Not having your memory, I write down all the spells I’ve learned.” She must have seen the hunger in my eyes because she chuckled and added, “You are welcome to copy any you want, assuming you have time left after your mathematics lessons.”

I smiled back. “I don’t need more mathematics lessons. Tachlifa gave me a counting box that makes the most complicated calculations easy.”

It was true. With the counting box, I was no longer intimidated by even the largest numbers in the household accounts. I could now focus on which produce was the most, or least, profitable and how our income and expenses varied throughout the year. Mariamme was so impressed by my sudden proficiency that she started using her counting box as well.

Rahel handed me a page. “This is the most powerful counterspell I know.”

I repeated the text until she was satisfied, and then I practiced the others. Obviously there were more
charasheta
doing dark magic than I’d thought, for why else would we need so many spells to counter them?

 • • • 

Father returned home a week later. “Bar Shmuel directed that Rava’s inheritance is to come from his
alalta
in Nehar Panya,” he told Mari and me.

We exchanged puzzled looks. “What does
alalta
mean?” I asked. The mysterious identity of Bar Shmuel and why he chose to benefit Rava could wait.

“The Nehar Panya court didn’t know what type of property it referred to, and I didn’t either. So Rava sent a message for Abaye to ask Rav Yosef.”

“What properties did Bar Shmuel have?” Mari asked.

“Most of his wealth was invested in houses and ships he rented out,” Father said. “He and Tachlifa’s father-in-law, Gidel, owned many ships in partnership, which is how he learned about Rava’s plight.”

“But why take pity on a stranger?” I asked.

Father shrugged. “Apparently he harbored a deep hatred for Choran’s father, fueled by years of fierce business rivalry. Also he had no family of his own.”

“So he left Rava these thousands of
zuzim
to thwart a competitor.” Mari shook his head in astonishment.

“And because he wanted to help free Rava from Choran’s grasp,” Father said. “I’m afraid their unhappy marriage was a great source of gossip in Nehar Panya.”

“Rava should dissociate himself from that town as much as possible,” I declared. “Instead of relying on income from rental houses or the produce of fields there, he should ask for a share of the shipping profits.”

 • • • 

A week before my wedding, Em, Homa, Abaye, and his daughters arrived from Pumbedita. I was glad they would be able to celebrate the entire eight days of Hanukah with us. It was consolation for the fact that I wouldn’t see Rava until our wedding day. Abaye’s family was still settling in when he approached me and Father, speaking in a voice that did not presage glad tidings.

“Rava will be along later in the week, with his teacher Rav Oshaiya, but Rav Yosef has refused to attend,” Abaye told us. “He complained that his blindness made the journey too difficult, but I know it’s because he and Rava have quarreled . . . over the definition of
alalta
property.”