Noa, who did not allow her fate to be ruled by omens, reminded Malah of her obligation.
CHAPTER 7
JUDGES OF TENS
DURING MALAH’S BRIDAL week, a boy ran to Zelophechad’s tent and waited to be acknowledged. Milcah, who was beating the weft on her loom, did not hear him. She jumped, startled, when he coughed and announced, full of self-importance, “The Judges of Tens will hear Zelophechad’s daughters.”
Caught off guard, Milcah stared at the dusty boy, then panicked and cried out for Noa.
“What is it?” Noa answered, fearful the Guardians of Truth had returned.
“They’re ready for you. The Judges of Tens.”
“They are? Well, then, come. We’ll not let them wait.”
“Me? What can I do?”
“Stand near me, to give me courage. Your presence will give my tongue strength.”
She bid the boy lead them to the bet din. He brought them to a clan circle not their own, where the three men of the Judges of Tens sat on a carpet before a large tent, sipping tea.
“Here are Zelophechad’s daughters,” the boy announced.
No others waited before the judges. Noa and Milcah were the only two present. The fleshy face of the middle judge was partially hidden by a full black beard. Bushy eyebrows peaked in the center, giving him a fierce look. His hand beckoned them closer. Milcah was rooted, so Noa stepped forward.
“Having no brothers, you want to inherit land promised to your father. So your uncle Boaz said. Have we understood you?”
“Yes,” she said, flustered, then remembered to add, “Sir.”
Noa felt awkward standing and looking down as they sat. She did not know what to do with her hands, so she clasped them in front of her. Behind her, Milcah had done the same.
“Your case is not without merit. It is just that there is no precedent for such a request. Sons inherit land. And this land is not in hand nor in sight.”
He was silent for a moment. Milcah heard the whirring of locusts in bushes beyond the circle of tents. Noa looked at the other two judges. One dug in his ear, then looked at what he had excavated. He did not bother to acknowledge their presence. The other seemed half asleep.
“As you know,” the middle judge continued, “the three of us must agree on a judgment. One of my colleagues,” his eyes slid toward the Excavator, “believes that when the law says sons, it means sons. You will have to get land through your husbands, I’m afraid.”
“But, your honor, we have not even had the chance to present our case. We have a worthy presentation. It is surely not an idle request, nor a greedy request. It is a just request.”
“Without a precedent, we are not qualified to make a judgment.”
“Why did the bet din call us to come? Why let us hope?” Noa could not temper her frustration.
“I am sorry, there is nothing more we can say or do,” he said with cold finality.
He then tipped his head to one judge, then the other. They all rose and the two silent judges departed. Noa stood respectfully as they left, biting back anger.
Judge Blackbeard turned so that Noa saw only his back. When the other two judges were out of earshot, he ordered, “Come inside.”
Noa did not know whether to follow him or not. She had almost forgotten Milcah, but now turned to her and gave her a questioning look.
Milcah had never seen Noa look uncertain. She found something of Noa’s spirit in herself and whispered, “I’m with you.”
Noa turned, and the two sisters followed the judge into the tent. Immediately they realized they were on the women’s side.
“For reasons of propriety,” the judge offered.
He waved them to pillows just inside the tent door. His wife and a daughter-in-law sat spinning, apart from one another in the dim tent. Neither gave more than a sidelong glance to the guests. The trapped midday heat was stifling.
The wife raised her head, directing her eyes to the water jug. The daughter-in-law scuttled over to the jug and brought small cups of water to Noa, Milcah, and the judge. Judge Blackbeard, barely noticing the silent interchange, directed his attention to Noa.
“Boaz, son of Hefer, is your uncle,” he said, opening the conversation.
“Yes,” Noa breathed.
“He is an upstanding man, of good judgment.”
Noa waited for the judge to continue.
“I have heard of you as well.”
Noa stiffened, fearing he would level the charge of “witch.”
“Unusual skills . . .”
Milcah grasped her sinking sister.
“Boaz praises your husbandry.”
As the sisters recovered, the judge said, “Young ladies, you have a difficult journey. I am not saying it is without merit. That you pursue your plea is a testament to your father.”
Noa lowered her eyes, accepting the compliment and allowing her father’s memory to fill her momentarily before she reset her attention toward the judge.
“As I said, your way is difficult. You saw the reaction of my colleagues.”
The judge raised his shoulders and his peaked eyebrows as if to say, “What can I tell you about those two?”
“Judge Ploni-Almoni, with his finger in his ear, does not see the value in women asking for anything except leavings from the dinner platter. That’s his prerogative. The other does not like to question the way things have always been. That’s his prerogative. Most people, including judges, hate change. There’s your problem.”
“Please, sir, tell us what to do.”
He leaned toward them and narrowed his eyes, so that his eyebrows were all they saw. “Sometimes the best path to justice is under the back of the tent.”
They looked toward the back of the judge’s tent and, in a corner, they saw another woman, shrunken into the oppressive dark. Noa did not know what to make of the judge’s words. His next words dragged her attention away from the dark form.
“You have come before the Judges of Tens and have not found satisfaction. With my approval, you may make your appeal before a higher court. The Judges of Fifties hear complex cases the fourth day of every new month. I advise that your uncle arranges for you to appear before a rotation of the Judges of Fifties known for being open-minded. He knows who they are. There is where your path lies, although I cannot offer much hope. And now,” the judge rose to usher them out, “I wish you good fortune.”
The sisters took their cue, rose, and backed out of the tent.
“We cannot thank you enough for your advice and your kindness,” Noa said, hoping not to trip on her robe.
“It is for your father, my old friend.”
“Yes, thank you,” Milcah mumbled.
After exiting, they turned and walked quickly out of the judge’s clan circle, then turned to each other. Noa grasped Milcah by the wrists. “He does not see hope, but I do. I have not even presented our full plea. Milcah, we have an opening.”
Milcah, delighted by the outcome and by the lucky chance to be included, smiled like a new moon.
UPON RETURNING FROM the judge’s tent, Noa went straight to Malah’s bridal booth to tell her the news. Malah, entertaining three young married women under the canopy that fronted the booth, looked up.
“Noa, where have you been? We expected you.”
“Wait until you hear.” Then Noa looked at the shiny young wives and tamped down her enthusiasm. “Oh, I had an errand. Important enough, but mostly I could not get away,” she said, just remembering Malah had invited her to join them.
“Well, sit. Enjoy some of these dainty cakes my friends have brought. I don’t know how Boaz and I will be able to finish all this food in the few days left to us.”
Malah smiled a knowing smile, and the three other women smiled the same smile back, all quite pleased with themselves. Noa wondered when they would leave so she could pour out her news.
She endured another round of food, husband talk, and strange flounces of heads and shoulders. She was bewildered by this cake-nibbling, gos
siping, tittering woman who had emerged from her sister.
“Is there a special society of married women?” Noa wondered. “Will I have to belong?”
Finally, the women left, and Malah turned to her sister. “You look bursting to tell me something,” she said brightly.
“Malah, the Judges of Tens turned us down, but the main judge took us aside and said our case had merit. He said it would only take Boaz’s say-so to put it before the right Judges of Fifties.” She spilled out the words in a single breath. “You must ask him.”
“Boaz?”
“Yes. Who else would I be talking about?”
“Well, this is not the best time. After all, Boaz and I are still in our week and I already asked him to speak of you to the Judges of Tens. I fulfilled that obligation.
“And then there will be the new tent to furnish and invitations to the women you saw here today, plus others, to secure my station in the community. I’m sure this can wait. After all, we barely know where we are going or when we will get there.”
“No, it cannot wait. If you will not, then I will speak with him.”
“Boaz is my husband. You will speak with him only if I say so.”
“What?”
“You heard me.”
Noa rose in fury and stubbed her toe on a rock. She refused to cry out and give Malah the satisfaction of hearing her pain. She set her jaw and headed home.
Their small spats of the past had never left her so rigid with anger, and Malah had never flung words with such high-handedness.
When Noa told her mother what had happened, Ada said, “When I first married your father, I was so foolishly in love with the idea of marriage and my new position. Oh, I thought I was so important. Now, if only I had a few hours with him . . .”
THE NEXT DAY the camp was astir with the news that Moses had finally descended the mountain, his face glowing with an unearthly light. Some muttered that he had the white disease that causes fingers to fall off. Others said he was imbued with the sign of God. This light so disturbed the people that Moses covered his face with a veil, and Tirzah declared that Moses was now a bride.
Moses brought down the laws and told the laws to the people. But the telling was long and people drifted away. Milcah, who saw no vision when the mountain had roared, listened well and vowed she would follow the new laws that numbered in the hundreds: fair weights and measures; judging rich and poor equally; leaving the corners of the harvest for the poor.
“Very sensible,” said their mother.
“What harvest?”
“We’ll have a harvest when we reach our land, Tirzah.”
With the laws, Moses also brought a plan for a grand Tent of Meeting that would house the tablets of the law. Bezalel, the master craftsman, would build the new Tent of Meeting and the objects within it.
Noa said to Milcah, “People need something grand to see.”
Remembering the Golden Calf and echoing something her father said, Noa continued, “We learn from God, and God learns from us.”
Milcah’s eyes widened, and she looked around, afraid someone had heard what sounded to her like blasphemy.
Bezalel chose Oholiav, he of the blessed hand, to help direct the work. Oholiav, examining the products of the best weavers, chose Milcah as one of the dozen or so who would fashion the hangings for the Tent of Meeting. Her sisters saw that Milcah glowed in the great artist’s light.
“You will be at the very center. Think of the things you will hear. You must tell us everything,” Noa insisted, wondering if the new laws said anything about brotherless sisters.
THE DAY MILCAH was chosen as one of the weavers was the last day of Malah’s bridal week. She was in her father’s tent, packing her bedding and household goods to transfer to her new tent, but as the day progressed she saw no new tent being raised. Boaz was sitting as judge in another part of Manasseh’s camp, so she could not question him.
“Where is my tent?” she hissed to the wind.
As the day progressed, Noa sensed unpleasantness ahead. She nudged her mother, who had just awakened from a nap.
“Mother, remember you wanted to visit the wife of Hanniel? Come, let us find out what it was she had to tell you.”
Before her sleep-dazed mother could protest, Noa hoisted her, hooked her arm around her mother’s spongy waist, and prodded her out the door.
That left Malah alone in the tent. Suspecting no new tent would appear, she dragged bedding outside and, as she beat the bedding, she honed her fury to a knifepoint.
Hearing dull, fabric thuds as he approached Zelophechad’s tent, Boaz hesitated. He had not forgotten Malah’s tent any more than she had. He exhaled slowly, then stepped within her view.
“Malah . . .”
That was all he managed before a storm of words struck him.
“You promised . . . you lied. You shameless liar.”
Malah flung a blanket at him.
Boaz dodged, then rushed her, grabbed her arms, and held them at her sides.
“Wait. Just wait,” he demanded, but Malah kept spewing verbal venom.
“What was I thinking?” Boaz shouted back, his breath hot on her face. “You behave like a child. Everything is you, you, you.”
Malah, having run out of words and startled by Boaz’s, stopped, then gathered herself and began again, but more quietly. “You promised a tent and there is no tent. Do you want to humiliate me?”
“Malah, please understand. I will provide you with a home, one that will please you. But we will leave this place shortly, traveling to who knows where. It will be hard to protect two separate households . . .”
“So. I will have to live with . . . the Witch?”
“She is no witch. She is my wife, just as you are. Perhaps I love you more, but people cannot be thrown away.”
“Perhaps you love me more?” Malah blistered. “So you do still love her?”
“Once, perhaps,” he said, stumbling over the word again, hoping to mollify her, “but I have my obligations. Please, Malah. You two will have to make your compromises with each other eventually. Why not start now?”
Furious, Malah realized she had no recourse, but resolved to get something for herself. She remembered her father’s promised land, and Noa’s demand.
“Perhaps I will trust you again if you help us secure a place with the Judges of Fifties.”
WHEN NOA AND her mother returned home, they noticed Malah’s things had been removed. Ada was thankful that Zelophechad could not have focused on more than one wife. The ways between a husband and one wife were difficult enough.
“Yet,” she said, “Malah will manage.”
CHAPTER 8
THE SHEEP SHEARERS
TWO SHEARERS STOOD in the center of Boaz’s clan circle, calling out, “Sheep sheared. Newest tools. Nothing like it.” Next to each stood a nervous ewe pulling at its rope.
The taller of the two was in his early twenties, a narrow man with a mass of copper-colored hair and a redhead’s complexion. The sun had melded his freckles so his arms and legs were a brown mosaic.
The other shearer was about the same age, with a moon face. Although his face was soft and round, his manner was rough.
They quickly drew a circle of people. When the crowd ringed them, the redheaded man pulled a strange tool from the belt of his tunic and held it aloft: two bronze blades joined at the top by a flexible metal band. He scissored the blades together for the crowd to see.
“These from the Kenites, known to all as master metalworkers. With these we will shear your sheep,” he asserted, his hair glowing like embers in the late afternoon.
“Why choose the old way? Combs that only pluck out tufts of wool. These,” he waved the shears, “can cut a whole coat as one. Takes less time. Good for me.” He thumped his chest for emphasis. “And gives more wool at better value. Good for you.” He stretched the shears toward the crowd.
“Watch,” he insisted as the two men each grasped the head of a ewe. Each made long
strokes up one side of his sheep, then sheared the other side. The ewes, their bellies bulging slightly with the hint of lambs, jumped aside when released and shook themselves, surprised at their own lightness as the two shearers held up whole pelts.
“Here. This is what we can do. From sunup to sundown, more than fifty sheep each.”
“How much?” one man called out.
“One pelt for every ten.”
“Too much.”
“Not if you get half-again as much wool, which you can trade at greater value.”
“One pelt for every fifteen,” called another.
The round-faced shearer laughed and, with his staff, tickled the two sheared ewes in a dance around his legs.
“One for twelve. First-time price for you,” the ember-haired shearer pointed around the circle, “and you and you and you.”
Many, including Noa, decided to try the shearers with their new shears.
The next day, shepherds stood or squatted near their flocks, waiting their turn. The ripe smell of sheep and the sweat of the shearers competed with the baa-ing of edgy animals and a low undertone of conversation. A pair of girls threw a camel-hide ball back and forth. Two old men, sitting on a pile of fleece, waiting for the shearers to finish the rest, reminisced about their days in Egypt.
Tirzah sat on Malah’s bride-price donkey, leaning her head against its neck as she watched, mesmerized by the zzzt-zzzt-zzzt of the shearers’ blades.
Hoglah had taken the goats up the slopes to graze. Before she left, she checked how many flocks came ahead of theirs, then estimated when to return. “I will return in plenty of time.”
Tirzah had eyes only for the shearers’ blades.
“Tirzah . . . are you listening?”
“Yes. I’m listening. I’m listening,” she answered as Hoglah turned to leave, shaking her head.
Soon after, Adam ran over and pulled himself onto the donkey, right behind Tirzah.
“Look what I’ve got,” he said, reaching his arm around her and opening his fist to display a handful of round gray stones. “Let’s play.”
Tirzah twisted to face him. “I am busy,” she said, turning back to the shearers.
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