Rebekah

by Jill Eileen Smith

  In the three months since they had settled in Beer-lahai-roi, she had rarely joined him in the fields. She’d been too busy with dying, spinning, and weaving the yarn from the wool he had shorn, supervising the servants, and showing specific women how to extract the dyes from the henna trees, pomegranate peels, nuts, and crocuses.

  He patted the ground beside him and reached to take the basket from her. She handed it to him and settled her skirts around her.

  “I planned to return home this evening,” he said, lifting the basket’s cloth cover and peering inside. “What did you bring me?”

  She laughed. “Your favorite seasoned bread and some thick chunks of the sheep cheese I’ve been hoarding. I made it the way your mother used to. And some date cakes of my own creation.”

  Eliezer’s wife Lila had gladly shared Sarah’s recipes with Rebekah when they had stopped by during the sheep shearing several weeks back, but she enjoyed trying her hand at new dishes when they had the spices or fruits on hand to do so.

  Isaac gave her a mischievous smile and lifted the contents from the basket. He bit off a hunk of the bread, then tore a piece from the other half and handed it to her. “I daresay my mother would be proud of your skills.” His look grew more serious then, as if the mention of his mother still carried the weight of sadness. “As am I.”

  She felt the heat of a blush fill her cheeks, suddenly shy at his compliment. “Thank you, my lord.” She looked at the bread he had handed to her and nibbled the end, then met his gaze.

  Silence settled between them, broken only by the sounds of the sheep rustling the grasses, bleating here and there, and the birds squawking in the air above.

  “Why do you prefer to spend so much time here, rather than let the servants stay with the sheep?” The question had burned within her during his absence.

  He glanced at her, then looked into the distance where the sheep grazed.

  “I am sorry, my lord. Perhaps I should not have spoken.”

  He looked at her and smiled. “Of course you should. I fear that sometimes I am not the husband to you that you need.” He glanced beyond her as if his admission were too painful to face. “I am used to often being alone.”

  She waited, knowing he wanted to say more, wishing he did not ponder every word he uttered. “What do you do when you are alone besides carve new instruments or study the plants in the desert?”

  A sigh escaped him. “I think about God.” He turned penetrating eyes on her. “I pray to understand Him through the things He has made. And I study the details of all that grows, and even the things that don’t.”

  Her heart stilled with his words, and she wondered that he should be so introspective. “Has God met you here?” She glanced around, imagining she could see Him hovering nearby.

  He shook his head. “Not in person. Though I have heard His voice.”

  Awe filled her and her eyes grew wide. “What does His voice sound like? And when did you hear it?” Why had he never told her this before?

  “It was a long time ago. When I was a young man.” He looked beyond her again, his dark eyes clouded as they often were when he shadowed his feelings.

  “Do not pull away from me, Isaac. Please.” She took his hand in hers. “Tell me.” She rubbed circles along his palm and felt his breath release.

  The silence grew so deep she searched to fill it, finding and discarding more thoughts than she could count, most of them not worthy of utterance. At last he intertwined their fingers and looked deeply into her eyes.

  “I intended to tell you the story when I could show you where it took place.”

  “But I long to know it now. Please do not continue to withhold it from me, my lord. I can tell that it troubles you, that you wake in the night with a start and your breath comes too fast.” She pulled his hand to her lips, kissing his fingers. “I would help you, but how can I do so if you will not confide in me? Should not a marriage be based on trust in one another?”

  He nodded his agreement. “Yes, of course. The story is so long ago. It should not matter to us now.”

  “But it does. It is why you spend so little time with your father, is it not?”

  He looked at her intently, and she feared he would not answer, but at last he gave a defeated sigh. He stood and pulled her up beside him, the food left beneath the tree. “Walk with me.”

  They moved together as one, his hand clasped tightly to hers. He said nothing as they passed several lambs that barely noticed their presence, until at last he came to one of the few rams among the flock. He stopped at its side, placed a hand on one of its horns. The ram stilled and lifted its head, and then as though recognizing Isaac’s touch, it turned and looked at him.

  “I owe my life to God, and to such a ram who took my place.” He faced her, releasing the ram’s horn. “Years ago, before my father married Keturah, back when my mother and father were happy together, when our home was filled with joy and laughter, God spoke to my father. At least that is how he tells it. I do not know. But I do not doubt him because God spoke to him again later. That is when I heard His voice.”

  Rebekah’s breath caught. He gripped her hand, and they walked farther among the flock, Isaac touching a ewe here and a newborn lamb there.

  “God told my father to take me up to a mountain, three days’ journey from where we lived, and to offer his son, his only son whom he loved, as a sacrifice there on the mountain.”

  “The only son whom he loved? You?” Her heart kicked over at the hurt that flickered in her husband’s dark gaze.

  He nodded. “So he took me, along with Haviv and Nadab, three days’ journey to Moriah. When we neared the place God had told him about, my father left the servants and took only me farther up the mountain.” He paused, ran a hand over his beard, and she knew the memory still pained him. He blew out a breath. “I carried the wood and my father carried the torch, but there was no ram to offer as the sacrifice. So I asked my father, ‘Where is the lamb for the sacrifice?’ and he said, ‘God Himself will provide a lamb.’ I did not understand until he had built the altar and then came toward me with the rope he had strapped to his belt.”

  Rebekah’s pulse thumped harder, and she could not keep the horror from her expression. “What did you do?”

  Surely he’d fought back. Told his father no. Run away. But as she searched his gaze, she knew he had done none of these.

  “I knew in that instant that my father intended to bind me like an animal and place me on the stones and wood. I would die on that mount without ever seeing my mother again, without ever loving a woman or fathering a son. Either my promised birth had been a cruel joke, or God would bring me to life again. But I knew without question that my father intended to kill me. I could have stopped him, for I was stronger than he. But I did not have the will to do so. He would prevail because I would let him.”

  “But . . . why? Why not run away at least?”

  Her own father’s face flashed in her mind’s eye, and she could not fathom him ever doing such a thing to her. She would have fallen at his feet and wept, begging him for mercy. Did Isaac plead for such a thing? She had heard the tales of child sacrifice on the altars of foreign gods and could never understand how a god could request such a thing. And how on earth could a father ever justify killing his child?

  “Because I knew that God had commanded it. My father’s heart was breaking with every step we took up that mountain. He was determined to obey what he did not understand, but he did not like it. His hands shook as he bound me. I could have overcome him with little effort.”

  But he had not made that effort. Rebekah tried to wrap her mind around the thought, but the horror of it still overpowered any rational conclusion. “What happened?”

  “He tightened the rope around my hands and feet.” His cheeks darkened as if the memory still shamed him. “And he lifted me onto the wood. The branches poked through the fabric of my tunic, stinging like nettles . . .” He choked and looked away. “I wanted to beg him for mercy,
but my throat closed tight against the need to weep. I closed my eyes for the briefest moment, and when I opened them again, my father stood over me, weeping, his knife raised above me. ‘Forgive me, my son,’ he said, and then he readied the knife at my throat, raised it again, and quickly lowered his arm.

  “I waited for the pain I knew would come, knowing my father would make the cut swift and deep so I would not suffer. But a loud boom startled him, and he dropped the knife in the dust beside the altar.”

  Rebekah released a breath she had been holding, though her heart continued to pound.

  Isaac squeezed her hand. “That’s when I heard His voice. He called to my father, saying, ‘Abraham, Abraham!’ My father called back, ‘Here I am.’ And the voice said, ‘Do not lay your hand on the boy or do anything to him, for now I know that you fear God, seeing you have not withheld your son, your only son, from Me.’ That’s when we found the ram in a thicket. My father sacrificed the ram in my place.”

  Isaac had circled them back to the tree where the basket of food still lay. A trail of ants had found a piece of the cheese he had dropped, and Rebekah would have snatched it up and brushed it off if not for the pressure of Isaac’s hand in hers.

  He turned her to face him. “So now you know.”

  “Thank you for telling me.” She touched his cheek. “Not every man would submit to such a thing. Not every man would be a willing partner to what God intended.”

  “My mother did not see it that way.” The shadow passed before his eyes once more. “Things were never the same after that. She could never forgive my father for putting my life in such danger.”

  “I might feel the same if it were my son,” she said, suddenly wondering if God would require any other sacrifices of Isaac for their own future children. When they had children . . . Why had she not already conceived? She squelched the worry as he bent to kiss her.

  “Then you can understand the struggles my family has faced since that day. It is why my father took Keturah, why my mother, though she loved him fiercely, could not forgive him.”

  She nodded. “Have you forgiven him yourself?” She sensed the truth but wanted to hear it from him.

  He looked beyond her, and she feared she had lost him to his thoughts. At last he leaned down and scooped up the basket, brushed the ants from its side, and placed it in her arms. “I would like to think so, beloved. It is one of the many things I ponder when I am alone, when I am seeking God’s face.”

  She reached up to kiss him again. “I shall pray that you find the answers you seek.”

  They walked in silence until the camp was within sight, then Isaac bid her home and returned to gather the sheep.

  The morning before the Sabbath many weeks later, Rebekah awoke with the familiar monthly pains, sequestered in her own tent where she would wait out the week of uncleanness. A week she had seen every month since her marriage and now feared would spread on into a future of uncertainty. Surely she was being foolish to fear so soon. But she could not help herself.

  She forced herself to stand, though she wanted nothing more than to stay abed and moan in self-pity. Isaac would not come to her until her time had passed, and she would eat alone with the women of the camp. She would work as she always did, but she would not have the privilege of his touch, and she desperately needed him now.

  The rustle of the tent’s fabric door brought her out of her melancholy, and she walked to the basket where her garments lay folded into neat piles. Deborah poked her head around the corner from the sitting area into her sleeping quarters.

  “You are up. Good. Let me help you with that.” Deborah chose a fresh tunic and robe, then proceeded to help Rebekah dress.

  Silence stretched between them, but Rebekah did not care to fill it.

  “You are quiet today.”

  “There is nothing to say.” Rebekah blinked against the sudden sting of tears, surprised at how bitter she sounded.

  “Obviously there is or you would be able to say it.”

  “Am I so quick with my tongue that my silence means I finally have something worthy to say?” She looked at her nurse and did not like the sardonic smile touching her lips.

  “My dear Rebekah, you are very seldom at a loss for words.” She tied the belt at Rebekah’s waist and bid her sit while she pulled the ivory comb from the basket of hair ornaments. “What troubles you?”

  Rebekah winced as Deborah worked to pull through her tangled mass of dark hair. “How long did it take . . . how long were you married before you carried Selima?” She needed reassurance that there was nothing at all to fear.

  Deborah twirled a strand of Rebekah’s hair into a loose knot and pinned it atop her head. “Every woman is different, dear one. You have barely been married six months. You must put a child out of your head. Then it will come when you least expect it.”

  “Isaac’s mother did not see it that way. She waited twenty-five years to bear him.” She tilted her head to meet Deborah’s kind gaze, her heart stirred with affection for her. “I will die if I must wait that long, Ima.” She rarely used the motherly term for her servant, but Deborah had always been like a mother to her. Somehow the word slipped out unintended.

  Deborah’s smile held compassion, and she touched Rebekah’s cheek. “Isaac is the son of the promise, is he not?”

  Deborah waited and Rebekah reluctantly nodded.

  “Did not Adonai promise Abraham many descendants through Isaac?”

  Rebekah conceded the argument with another nod.

  “Then what do you fear?”

  Rebekah looked away. “I don’t know. I just thought it would happen by now. And with Isaac . . .” Tears grew thick in her throat. “He can be so hard to talk to sometimes. If I had a child . . .” She let the words go unsaid.

  “You think a child would replace the love you desire from your husband?” Deborah’s gaze held no reproach.

  “I do not know. Perhaps.” She shook her head. “But I know Isaac loves me . . . it is just that I want to please him. He will make a good father. I know it.”

  Deborah smiled and took the pot of kohl from the cosmetic basket. She picked up a long, thin tool to apply it to Rebekah’s eyes. “And in God’s good time, he will be the father you so desire. Be patient and trust Him.”

  Rebekah lifted her head, allowing Deborah to dab the paint to the edges of her eyelids, just enough to enhance her appearance and make her dark eyes appear larger, brighter. “I am trying.” And failing miserably. “But you never answered my question.” She crossed her arms and met Deborah’s gaze.

  “What question was that, mistress?” Deborah shrugged as though she could not remember, though Rebekah knew for sure that she did.

  She squelched her irritation. “How long did it take you?”

  Deborah was silent for so long that Rebekah turned to face her, reading uncertainty and perhaps fear in her gaze.

  “I did not wait long.” She looked away, and Rebekah knew the answer was not complete. She touched Deborah’s arm.

  “Tell me what it is that you keep from me.” She tried for a commanding tone, but the words came out more as a request.

  “Some things are not meant to be shared.” Deborah turned from Rebekah and hurried to the tent’s door. “I must see what Selima is up to. Forgive me.”

  Rebekah stared after her, determined to discover what Deborah kept so secret.

  18

  Deborah managed to avoid another confrontation with Rebekah the rest of the day, though she knew her mistress would not allow her to keep silent for long. The time had come to speak the truth, or at least what she would tell of it. She could not tell all. What mother would admit to such a thing when it could shame her only daughter?

  She stiffened her back even as she stirred the stew for the evening meal, listening to the voices of women fussing at children and men laughing where they sat in groups around the fire.

  Please, Adonai, let Rebekah’s tongue be quieted and her questions kept to herself.

&
nbsp; She might be a servant, but she did not need to reveal everything just because her mistress wanted to know. Nuriah had not told Rebekah. Why should Deborah demean herself so?

  She turned at the sound of rushing feet, startled by Selima as she came up beside her, breathing as though she had run halfway across the camp. She set the water jar in the dirt beside the fire and bent over, hands pressed to her knees to draw in air. “There you are, Ima.”

  Deborah set the stirring stick aside and cupped her daughter’s shoulders. “Slow down, my daughter. Sit and drink.” She dipped a clay cup into the water and handed it to Selima. “Now tell your mother before you upset the whole camp.”

  Selima straightened and glanced quickly over her shoulder. “Haviv is back, and he and Nadab . . .” She paused, placed a hand over her heart. “They are fighting over me!” She sighed as though this was the best thing in the world, but Deborah’s heart sank with the news.

  “Fighting over you? Surely you are mistaken, my daughter.”

  They had clearly waited too long to give Selima in marriage, and now her imagination was running away with her.

  “I am telling you the truth, Ima! I heard them.”

  “And just how did you overhear such a conversation? They did not throw fists at each other in front of you, did they?” She touched her chin and studied her daughter.

  In her conversations with Lila, she knew the brothers did have their differences, but everyone knew it was Haviv whose heart was bound to Selima’s. Nadab could not possibly want her too, unless he should do so to spite his brother.

  “I was hidden by the tree line, and they could not see me from their place at the crest of the hill. I went to draw water at the wadi when I heard them.”

  “What did they say?” Deborah took the cup from Selima and refilled it. “Drink.”

  Selima obeyed, and the two walked to a corner of the cooking tent where the women were few.

  “Nadab had just returned the day before Haviv did.”

  “Yes, yes, Rebekah told me that Isaac had sent them to check on different flocks and herds. In opposite directions.”