The Shepherdess

by Jill Eileen Smith

  I poured the king another cup of the spiced wine, then sat on the edge of his couch and looked into his shining eyes.

  “Your son will soon be king,” I said softly, smiling at him.

  “My son Solomon,” he said, as though he needed to remind even me what he intended.

  “Yes. Solomon.” I patted his hand and tucked the blanket closer to his neck. I kissed his cheek then, something I had never done before. “This is a good day.”

  He nodded and sipped his wine, smiling. He looked long at me then, and I wondered what thoughts went through his mind.

  “Your son Solomon will make a good king, my lord. His name will be as great as yours.” I do not know why I said it, but I was certain it would be true in time.

  “He will build the temple to Yahweh. His name will far surpass mine.” He handed me the empty goblet. “I have lived to see a son sit on my throne.” He closed his eyes for a moment, and I thought he would sleep, but he surprised me by throwing off the covers and rising. He walked to the window and opened the shutters. I could see his thin shoulders shake with the sudden cold. I clutched a soft woolen blanket and carried it to him, draping his back.

  “You will be a great asset to Solomon one day, Abishag.” He pulled the blanket closed at the neck and nodded his thanks. “When I no longer have need of you.”

  I followed his gaze to look down on the outer courtyard, where crowds were gathering and the king’s own mule waited. Solomon emerged from the palace dressed in royal finery and climbed atop the mule. My heart picked up its pace at the sight of him. Nathan the prophet, Zadok the priest, Benaiah, and the Kerethites and Pelethites, mercenary soldiers loyal to King David, led the mule and Solomon toward the Gihon spring. I caught sight of Bathsheba and Solomon’s wife Naamah in the group of men and women closely following.

  “They will return soon, and Solomon will surely come to visit you, my lord. Perhaps you will feel well enough to greet him as he enters the throne room?” I touched the king’s arm. His frail strength seemed to suddenly need my support. I moved my hand beneath his elbow. His arm came around me, and I pressed close, hoping to instill in him greater warmth. The sun’s bright rays came through the open window then, kissing our faces. The king drew in a breath and slowly released it.

  “I have missed the sun on my cheeks.” His grip tightened ever so slightly as the crowd moved through the palace gates. He kissed the top of my head. “I would like to see him crowned,” he said.

  I nodded, truly hoping to help give him what he so desired. But his strength ebbed quickly as we stood there and the last of the crowd disappeared from sight. I closed the shutters and helped him back to his plush bed, tucking him in.

  Later, as the royal officials returned with Solomon and came to King David’s chambers, I realized that he had given up the thought of attempting to walk to the throne room. But as each man congratulated him on his son’s coronation and said, “May your God make Solomon’s name more famous than yours and his throne greater than yours,” King David sat straighter and then bowed in worship on his bed.

  Adonijah the son of Haggith came to Bathsheba the mother of Solomon. And she said, “Do you come peacefully?” He said, “Peacefully.” Then he said, “I have something to say to you.” She said, “Speak.” He said, “You know that the kingdom was mine, and that all Israel fully expected me to reign. However, the kingdom has turned about and become my brother’s, for it was his from the LORD. And now I have one request to make of you; do not refuse me.” She said to him, “Speak.” And he said, “Please ask King Solomon—he will not refuse you—to give me Abishag the Shunammite as my wife.” Bathsheba said, “Very well; I will speak for you to the king.”

  1 Kings 2:13–18

  6

  971 BC

  Life did not change as much as I expected it would once Solomon wore the crown as co-regent with his father David. Adonijah no longer visited the palace, and some said he had left Jerusalem entirely. We actually saw more of Solomon in the king’s chambers than in earlier days, for Solomon seemed eager to learn all he could from his father while the king still had breath. Arrangements were made for the whole assembly of Israel to gather, bringing gifts to help pay for the construction of the temple Solomon would one day build. All seemed well, and I fell into the dangerous position of thinking things would remain as they were.

  One late afternoon, after I had applied a poultice of pepper flakes and olive oil to the king’s back to coax greater warmth into him, a treatment I had learned from talking to some of the palace servants, I was pleased to see the king awaken from a nap with a smile on his lips.

  “Good afternoon to you, Abishag,” he said, his voice unwavering. I felt a measure of pride that my treatment might have been the cause.

  “Did you sleep well, my lord?” I helped him to stand, and we moved to a sitting area, where a tray of nutmeats and dates and fresh fruit awaited us. I poured the king a golden goblet of goat’s milk and sat beside him, grateful for the light in his eyes.

  “I feel refreshed, Abishag.” He sipped the milk but did not touch the food. Lately he had given up the wine in favor of fresh milk but took little else, even when the palace cooks coaxed him with their finest dishes.

  “Will you not try some of the grapes? They are fresh from the vines in the gardens.” I searched his lined face, longing to restore deeper color to his cheeks and perhaps add a bit of thickness to his bones. I am not sure when it happened, but I had grown to deeply love the king. Not in the way of wife to husband, but as daughter to father. He treated me with such unequaled kindness.

  He looked at me, his brows slowly knitting to a frown. “I am sorry, Abishag. I fear I have no hunger left, nor appetite to enjoy the tastes I once knew.” He smiled, but his eyes were distant, as though seeing into a place I could not go.

  I nodded, surprised at the emotion his admission revealed to my heart. I sensed his implication, and I did not like it.

  “My days left with you are few, my dear girl.” His words coaxed me to meet his gaze. He lifted his hand to mine and clasped cold fingers over my much warmer ones. “Soon it will be my time to go the way of all the earth.” He said the words with acceptance and gentleness, as if he knew how much I would miss him.

  “I’m not ready,” I said, my voice breaking on a sob I desperately tried to hold back.

  He squeezed my fingers. “No one is ever ready to let go of one they love.” Our gazes met, and I sensed he did love me. He cupped my cheek, brushed a stray tear with his thumb. “Adonai will give you strength when the time comes.”

  I swallowed and nodded. “I will miss you.” I knew I would miss him more than I had missed anyone since Ima. “Sheol has stolen too many of those I love.”

  He seemed to consider my words but said nothing for the space of many moments. “It is the way of all,” he said at last, and I wondered where his memories took him.

  He removed his hand from my grasp and sipped the milk once more, then set the goblet on a small table that still held a tray too full of food. He drew in a breath, which barely lifted his chest. A soft cough followed. I jumped up and stroked his back, but the cough did not linger. I settled him among the cushions in his sitting room, and Bathsheba visited for a short time. But he tired quickly after she left.

  “I want you to summon Solomon and a scribe,” the king said once I had pulled the covers over him again in his bed. His breathing had grown slightly labored, sending alarm through me. I relaxed only a little when I heard his soft snores.

  I tiptoed from his bedchamber and sent a guard to summon Solomon, then took a rare moment to sink onto the king’s plush couch, awaiting his son’s arrival. I did not have long to wait, as the door opened soon after and King Solomon swept past the guard, the scribe on his heels, closing the door behind him. Solomon approached me and angled his head toward his father’s chambers.

  “He sleeps?”

  I nodded. “’Tis very strange.”

  The scribe moved away from us and set
up his tools in a corner of the king’s chamber, while Solomon quirked a brow and came to sit across from me, completely at ease in his surroundings. “Explain ‘very strange’ to me. For I would think that everything about your home here seems strange to you.” His gentle smile warmed me. Solomon made me feel something far different than I had ever felt before.

  “This place is not so strange as it once was,” I said, offering him a smile of friendship. Could he see the longing in my gaze? I quickly lowered it lest I give my heart away before love beckoned it. I had no certainty that he would take me as a true wife once his father passed into Sheol.

  “What puzzles you then?” He clearly wanted my answer, as he wanted answers to all things he did not understand. Solomon was inquisitive above any man or woman I had ever known. I wondered often if his mind allowed him to rest at night.

  “Your father,” I whispered, tossing a glance over my shoulder toward David’s chambers. “He told me he will not be with us much longer.” I glanced beyond him, aware of the moisture in my eyes. “And after Bathsheba’s visit, his breathing became slightly labored.”

  Solomon ran a hand along his neatly trimmed beard, the fading sunlight coming in along the slatted window catching the stones in his father’s signet ring, illuminating the carved lion’s head. He turned it around his finger, studying it. After a lengthy silence he looked at me. “It has been over two years, nearly three since he was afflicted,” he said softly. “The time is coming for great loss.” He clasped his hands in front of him. “And much change.”

  I was not ready for what Solomon implied.

  “Surely there is still time.” I said it to make it so. I said it not because I feared becoming Solomon’s wife or concubine but because I feared losing David. My friend.

  “Perhaps.” But his voice lacked conviction.

  A stirring from the bedchamber roused us both from our stupor of sadness. Solomon rose first, and I quickly followed. He allowed me to see to the king’s needs before entering the room. When I had him propped on several pillows, Solomon came to kneel at his father’s side.

  “Solomon. My son.”

  “I am here, Father.” Solomon kissed the king’s hand, something he rarely did, then secured it between his own.

  David drew in a breath and released it, slowly meeting Solomon’s gaze. The look of love that passed between them sent an aching longing to my middle. But I pushed the longing away and moved to the foot of the bed.

  “My son,” David said again, holding fast to Solomon’s dark gaze. “I am about to go the way of all the earth.”

  My throat grew thick with unshed tears. No, please. The kingdom needs you. I need you. I stuck a fist to my mouth to stifle the unwanted cries.

  “So be strong,” the king said, his eyes alight with force, though his body obviously lacked the strength to rise, “act like a man, and observe what the Lord your God requires. Walk in obedience to him, and keep his decrees and commands, his laws and regulations, as written in the Law of Moses. Do this so that you may prosper in all you do and wherever you go and that the Lord may keep his promise to me: ‘If your descendants watch how they live, and if they walk faithfully before me with all their heart and soul, you will never fail to have a successor on the throne of Israel.’”

  Solomon bowed his head in an act of acknowledgment. The Solomon I knew, what little I did know of him, would do all in his power to follow exactly what his father had requested. I had no doubt he would always honor Adonai and that Adonai would surely bless him. But as I watched the exchange between father and son, feeling terribly like an intruder, I could not stop the silent tears wetting my cheeks. I made no move to swipe them away.

  “Now you yourself know what Joab son of Zeruiah did to me,” King David continued, drawing my attention to him once more, “what he did to the two commanders of Israel’s armies, Abner son of Ner and Amasa son of Jether. He killed them, shedding their blood in peacetime as if in battle, and with that blood he stained the belt around his waist and the sandals on his feet. Deal with him according to your wisdom, but do not let his gray head go down to the grave in peace.”

  The words troubled me, not for the judgment they would exact but for the fear Joab instilled in me. He had taken Adonijah’s side. He could still be a formidable foe to Solomon.

  “But show kindness to the sons of Barzillai of Gilead,” the king continued, “and let them be among those who eat at your table. They stood by me when I fled from your brother Absalom.”

  Solomon’s face softened at this, and I saw the light of reflection in his gaze. I was too young to remember much of Absalom’s treachery, but Solomon had lived through it. No doubt he knew this man of whom his father spoke.

  “And remember, you have with you Shimei son of Gera, the Benjamite from Bahurim, who called down bitter curses on me the day I went to Mahanaim.” David’s tone hardened ever so slightly at the mention of this man’s name. I searched my mind for what the court gossips had said of him but came up empty. A Benjamite, however, was likely related to King Saul, Michal’s father—David’s enemy. Was Shimei as mean as Batya had been to me? “When he came down to meet me at the Jordan, I swore to him by the Lord: ‘I will not put you to death by the sword.’ But now, do not consider him innocent. You are a man of wisdom; you will know what to do to him. Bring his gray head down to the grave in blood.”

  He paused a moment, leaned back, and closed his eyes. I thought perhaps his words were spent and he would sleep once more, but he rallied when Solomon stood as if to leave.

  “There is more I would say to you, my son.”

  Solomon sat on the edge of the king’s bed, again taking his hand. “I am here, Father. Speak whatever is on your mind.”

  “These are the last words you are to record for me. These are my final words.”

  A lump formed in the pit of my stomach, and fresh tears stung my eyes. He could not possibly be so near death as to give his final words this soon. He had seemed so well, so strong, this very morning! Did he know something in his spirit I could not see? I leaned against the bedpost and listened, my breath coming shallow for the fear that seemed ready to steal it from me.

  The king glanced at the scribe. “Are you ready to record these words?”

  “Yes, my lord,” the man replied. He lifted his reed pen as if to show the king he was indeed taking down every word.

  David seemed satisfied and looked to Solomon once more. “The inspired utterance of David son of Jesse, the utterance of the man exalted by the Most High, the man anointed by the God of Jacob, the hero of Israel’s songs.”

  I knew this to be the introduction to tell future generations who had authored these words.

  “The Spirit of the Lord spoke through me; his word was on my tongue.” Pure silence followed, as if even the birds outside the window stopped to listen. “The God of Israel spoke, the Rock of Israel said to me: ‘When one rules over people in righteousness, when he rules in the fear of God, he is like the light of morning at sunrise on a cloudless morning, like the brightness after rain that brings grass from the earth.’ If my house were not right with God,” he said, his words dropping in pitch, “surely he would not have made with me an everlasting covenant, arranged and secured in every part; surely he would not bring to fruition my salvation and grant me my every desire.” A sigh lifted his chest, and for the first time I heard the labor with which he spoke. He closed his eyes, and I waited. Was this the end of his utterance?

  Solomon glanced from his father to me but looked back as his father spoke.

  “But evil men are all to be cast aside like thorns, which are not gathered with the hand. Whoever touches thorns uses a tool of iron or the shaft of a spear; they are burned up where they lie.”

  He stopped as abruptly as the last sentence had begun, drew in a long slow breath, and sighed. Solomon nodded to the scribe, who quietly picked up his tools and left the room. I struggled to make sense of all King David had said, but apparently Solomon understood. I had gotten caug
ht up in the king’s description—light of morning at sunrise on a cloudless morning, like the brightness after rain that brings grass from the earth—easily recalling such days in my youth when I frolicked among the vineyards or with the goats. My soul missed those times, and when I heard his last comments they did not make sense to me.

  But just as suddenly as the king had urged us to listen to him speak, his words seemed used and drained like water released from the mikvah. He closed his eyes and sank deeper into the pillows, his breath coming shallower, labored, his hand still held in Solomon’s. I moved slowly closer.

  “Would you like me to do anything for you, my lord?” I whispered in Solomon’s ear.

  He glanced my way. “Call for my mother,” he said, and I knew in that moment that Solomon understood what King David had been trying to tell me only moments ago. He was truly about to go the way of all the earth, and Solomon wanted to share the moment with his mother, King David’s beloved.

  I hurried from his side to Bathsheba’s apartments, tears blinding me every step of the way.

  7

  Word spread quickly through the palace and the city of Jerusalem. By the next afternoon the mourners stood behind King David’s bier, ready for the trek through the streets to the grand building Solomon had erected for his father’s burial. Bathsheba stood directly behind the bier with Solomon to her right. I followed Bathsheba, and Solomon’s wife Naamah came some distance behind me.

  Loud cries erupted in the streets, weeping and gnashing of teeth, as we slowly wound our way through a crowd of onlookers. Tears blurred my vision, and my headscarf blocked the view of the weeping women along the path. What would become of me now? King David had become my life, his daily care my only routine. In my mind’s eye I still heard the remnants of the songs he had taught me.

  The Lord is my shepherd, I shall not be in want . . . Even though I walk through the valley of the shadow of death, I will fear no evil . . .