The Secret Chord: A Novel (7 page)

I looked up. Her eyes met mine, steady now.

“Oh, yes. He stooped to that. Only once, when he was drunk. But the fact that it happened at all only confirmed my fears of what he might be capable of, and so I sealed my mouth and kept the secret. That is how the baby—my last child—was, in the eyes of his father, a
mamzer
.”

She seemed to gag on the word, and no wonder. That word, whose roots dig down into rot, corruption, defect, the unwelcome other, the despised alien.

“The child I called David—Beloved—was, as Yishai thought, an outcast from the congregation of Israel unto the tenth generation, according to the law of Moshe. Contrary to our law, and, I must say, contrary to his own nature, Yishai did not speak his mind on this to anyone. He should, of course, have gone to the gathering at the gate where he sat with his fellow elders, and disowned us both—me and the child I carried. I do not know if he held his peace out of some lingering regard for me, as the mother of his other sons, or to protect himself lest I, accused, accuse him in my turn. In any case, to the world, we appeared like many another family where regard has waned between a man and wife, and a father takes a set against a particular one of his children for reasons that are his own and of no public concern. I deluded myself that things would change. In the best of times, men have little regard for infants, no matter how comely. But when the child begins to walk and speak, to look like them in gesture or feature, ofttimes their hearts soften and their interest swells. I have seen this, with Yishai and many other men. And David was a beautiful child, of the sort that draws eyes. He was forward, too, in walking and in speaking, a lively child with a curious nature and a sweet temperament. But all these blessings just seemed to goad Yishai all the more. It did not help that David, of all my children, favored me, without any one feature of Yishai’s plain in his face. If the child ran to him, he would push him away or answer his gesture with a cuff of the hand. Soon enough, David learned better than to try for his father’s notice, and would keep out of Yishai’s way.”

I could not restrain myself. It seemed impossible to me that a mother would keep a secret that proved so costly to her son. So I put it to her directly: “Even after some years had passed, you did not feel you could tell Yishai that David was his son?”

She drew a trembling hand across her brow. “Oh, I did tell him, in the end. I had to. It became so painful, watching him torment that child. The maid was beyond his reach by then, married honorably to a young man in another village, and I—I did not care what became of me. Better I should bear his anger than my son bear it. But it did no good. He still hated David because he reminded him of that night of weakness, and because, once he knew the truth, he felt humiliated, made the fool.”

She sighed. Her frail body quivered. But then she drew a breath and went on.

“Not all was misery in our home. The older sons, Eliav, Avinadav, Shammah and the others, gave us joy and pride, growing into honorable manhood. The girls we had married in good season to suitable husbands. Eliav won early distinction as a soldier in Shaul’s army. Shaul’s general, Avner, saw his quality and promoted him to head a unit in the field. In time, he became one of Avner’s principal officers. I think that you are too young to remember those years, when Shaul himself was young, and had been drafted reluctantly to the kingship. You have known hard fighting in your time, I am sure of it. But most of what you have experienced of war was as a victor. That was not the way of it then.”

I did not interrupt her to assure her that I did know. I had made it my business to study those times, to learn every detail I could of Shmuel and his relationship with Shaul. I had seen Shaul once only—briefly, in the half-light of dawn. I was still a boy then, gripped by fear, in the fog between two moments of prophecy. That huge man, our king and our pursuer, asleep, his fate in David’s hands. But Shmuel I had never seen at all. He died when I was just beginning to realize that I shared his gift, or his burden. I would have given much to have sat with him and had his counsel. There are not many men who have stood as I do at a king’s side and said to him what must be said, whether the words be welcome or no. So I had done what I could to learn about Shmuel, questioning every man who had known him. Their memories were of the times when each tribe held on in its own scattered hamlet, constantly called to this skirmish or that one. We were hill shepherds from small settlements, always threatened by the Plishtim in their wealthy cities on the coast, where they worshipped their many gods, forged their iron, made their handsome pots of red and black, and wove rich cloths, the likes of which we, in our sheepskins and homespun, seldom saw. They were organized and united under their
serens
. But we did not fight as one people in those days, and so we were weak.

And then the day came when the Plishtim routed us completely, penetrating deep into our territory, killing thousands and capturing the ark of the Name. They carried it away deep behind their lines to their chief city, Ashdod. The ark, the very soul of our people for five hundred years. Yah himself had instructed Moshe in its design, and the artist Bezalel had crafted it—the acacia wood lined and clad with purest gold; the hammered figures of the cherubim, cunningly wrought of one piece with the cover, their raised golden wings outspread, sheltering the tablets of the Word that lay within. It was our chief treasure: precious and beautiful, sacred and powerful. When our priests carried it onto the field of battle, the tips of the golden wings caught the very light of the sun, and sent up such a blaze as struck awe into our enemies and gave heart and strength to our own fighters. It worked for us then, as it does now, as a mighty weapon. We look at it, and remember who we are: the people of the One, the children of the great Breath of Life. We recall that the ground on which we fight has been promised to us, and always a new frenzy boils in our blood. The power of the idea swells like a great wave—you can feel it pulse within you, around you. The army becomes one with this idea, and then we break upon the enemy with mighty force.

But that one time, the force was not enough, and the very ark itself was lost. The woe of it sucked the heart out of us. When a messenger brought the news to our high priest and chieftain, Eli, he fell back in his chair and died on the spot. All glory seemed gone with the ark fallen to our enemies and housed, as we heard, in their heathen temple beside their idol, the grain god Dagon, as if it were just any other trophy of war.

That was when the talk began that we must have a king, as other nations had, to lead us in battle. It was talk born out of a heartsick desperation, the fruit of utter despair. Shmuel warned the people against it. He said that a king would be a yoke upon freedom and a charge upon our purses. He, of course, was famed for taking nothing from the people, not so much as a sandal strap or a sheepskin. But as he grew old, and his sons began to take over some of his tasks, they proved corrupt. And so the clamor for a king grew. Moshe’s law had allowed for the possibility of a king, and in the end, Shmuel gave way. He found Shaul, tall and handsome, and anointed him, just as the people demanded. Shaul, at first unwilling, accepted his destiny and grasped it with a hard hand. He united the people with threats, butchering oxen and sending the pieces to each of the tribes, saying that if they did not join him and fight, they would be butchered just so, in their turn.

Shmuel, perhaps still not reconciled with the very idea of kingship, drove Shaul hard. It seemed he could do nothing right; Shmuel held him to measure with a harsh rod, and neither Shaul’s worship nor his warfare met Shmuel’s mark. Even the victories against the Plishtim did not satisfy. Instead, Shmuel proclaimed that the Lord of Armies commanded total war be made on the Amalekites, in retribution for ancient grievances. Nothing was to be spared. So, Shaul made war, and routed them, and captured their king. But in the aftermath of battle, when the soldiers were used to take spoils, Shaul wavered. He feared rebellion from his troops if he denied the accustomed rewards after such hard combat. So he allowed them to keep the best of the flocks for themselves. When Shmuel arrived and heard sheep bleating in the pens, he castigated Shaul for disobeying. “As you have rejected the command of the Name, so he has rejected you as king,” he declared, and turned to leave. The king, pleading for forgiveness, reached out and grasped Shmuel’s robe. It tore in his hand. “So has the Name torn kingship from you,” said Shmuel. He withdrew to his own lands at Ramah, and never saw Shaul again as a living man. This estrangement sat heavily upon Shaul. Some say it drove him mad.

As Nizevet had lived through these times, and I had not, I let her tell all this in her own way, waiting patiently for the thread of her account to stitch up once again to her personal story. Which it did, at last, on a day sometime not so very long after that final estrangement, when Shmuel arrived unexpectedly in Beit Lehem, seeking out Yishai.

“I did not know how to feel that day,” she said. “I dreaded Yishai involving himself in intrigues against the king, especially with our elder sons serving at his side. Shmuel made pretense that he had come only to sacrifice, and had brought his servant leading a heifer for that purpose. Yishai and all the elders went up to the altar and did the rites in the presence of the townsfolk. Yishai had told me to make everything ready to receive Shmuel after the rites, and so I did. I had asked the servants to take out the mats from the upper chamber and give them a good beating. I was overseeing their replacement, and ordering in the braziers—it was winter, and very cold—when Yishai and Shmuel arrived. I saw the look on Yishai’s face and it surprised me. He was lit like a torch with pleasure and anticipation. I could not think what could come from Shmuel to affect him in such a way. Shmuel had nothing to give that Yishai could possibly want. The old judge was famous for the austerity of his ways, the simplicity of his household in Ramah. Nor was an evening with him an occasion for levity. He was a stern man who thought only of his duty. Yet here was Yishai, beaming like a man who has just been gifted a pair of oxen.

“I decided the only way to get to the root of it was to be in that room, so in the guise of doing our judge a particular honor I took the tray from the servant and said that I would carry in the meat myself. Yishai gave me a look when I entered the chamber—I did not usually show myself there when guests were present—but he was too preoccupied to spare me more than a second’s thought. When I had handed around the dishes I took up a place in the corner, half hidden by a pillar.

“I saw Shmuel’s head turn sharply as our eldest son, Eliav, entered the room. Shmuel rose and took several steps toward Eliav, who uttered the proper salutations. The old man’s face was creased with lines of concentration as he studied my son. I could see him noting with approval the young man’s height and soldierly bearing, his handsome face, his clear, direct address. I admit it, I was proud as I observed this. Eliav had grown into a fine young man, sober, dutiful, the kind other men readily follow. Shmuel gazed at him a long time, then closed his eyes and raised his hands to heaven. A sour expression passed across his face. He opened his eyes, shook his head and turned back to Yishai. ‘This is not the one.’ Eliav looked startled at this curt response to his courtly greeting. He turned to his father, the confusion clear in his face. Yishai, in turn, looked at Shmuel in bafflement. Shmuel shrugged. ‘Not as man sees does Yah see. Yah sees beyond what is visible. He sees into the heart.’

“Yishai laid a consoling hand on Eliav’s shoulder and said softly, ‘Send Avinadav in to us.’ Avinadav was just a little more than a year younger than Eliav, and had lived in his shadow, imitating him in all ways. He, too, was an upright young man, and handsome. But Shmuel waved him off. ‘Yah has not chosen this one either.’ So it went on with all our sons, until even young Natanel, not much more than a boy, had been called for and dismissed in turn.

“‘Are these all the sons you have?’ Shmuel demanded. ‘Is there no other?’ Yishai looked down, not meeting Shmuel’s gaze. I saw him about to shake his head—for him, after all, there was no other son he fully counted as his own. But he must have sensed my eyes boring into him, or else I made an involuntary movement of which I was not even aware, for he looked over then to where I was. I had risen to my knees in a kind of supplication. He met my gaze and I saw him flinch. I did not know what Shmuel wanted with one of our sons, but clearly it was something important, something Yishai very much desired. And if he deemed it—whatever honor or position it might be—good for Eliav or any of the others, then my David must also have his chance. ‘There is one other,’ Yishai muttered. ‘But he is a boy, merely. He is away, tending the sheep.’

“‘Then fetch him. For we will not quit this place until he comes.’ I slipped out then and went downstairs to the beasts’ stalls. I did not know who Yishai would send to summon David but I wanted to be sure whoever it was went well mounted. I told the boy to saddle the mule, not to make do with a donkey. Finally, Raddai appeared, wearing a heavy cloak and a sullen expression, affronted that he had been chosen to fetch his despised younger sibling, and would have to abide a cold night with the flock in his stead.

“The hour was late when I heard the mule returning. I had sent the servants to their beds, content to sit a lonely vigil. When I heard the clop of hooves on the still air, I kindled an oil lamp and went out. David looked, as I expected, unkempt and filthy. His hair was a tangle, with bits of twig and lichen knotted into it, his skin ingrained with dirt, and to complete the picture of neglect and wildness, he had draped himself in the skin of the lion he had slain, which he had somehow roughly cured and fashioned into an outlandish kind of cloak. I had water ready, and fresh clothes of Natanel’s laid out, but Shmuel appeared at the head of the outdoor staircase, and called out to bring the boy straight up to him. Yishai had fallen asleep, sprawled out upon the cushions. Shmuel had not even dozed. He was alert and agitated. He waited by the door, the lamp held high in his hand. As David climbed up the stairs toward him, that hard old face softened. His eyes filled. ‘Bring the oil,’ he said softly. Yishai was roused now, on his feet, his mouth open, eyes wide. Shmuel’s servant rifled through his pack and pulled out a twisted ram’s horn stoppered with wax. He approached Shmuel, knelt, unstopped the horn and held it up to him. Shmuel took the vessel and raised it above David’s head. A thin spiral of golden, viscous liquid dribbled down upon David’s dusty hair. David showed no surprise or confusion. His face, tilted upward to Shmuel, was calm and grave, his eyes wide. It was as if he could see right through the walls, into the future that awaited him. ‘Behold!’ said Shmuel. ‘The anointed of the Name.’ Then he knelt. I followed. Out of the corner of my eye, I saw Yishai, going down on his knees before the son he had spurned.