Sarai

by Jill Eileen Smith

  “What are you doing here, Hagar? My pallet needs airing and my pots need cleaning. Get to work.” She felt a twinge of triumph at the woman’s shocked expression, then turned to face Lila, dismissing Hagar without another look.

  “Yes, mistress.” The brittle tone in Hagar’s voice made Sarai whirl about and strike Hagar’s cheek.

  “You will address me with respect!” Her blood poured hot through her veins, and she could not slow her racing breath. How dare Hagar flaunt her sarcastic arrogance! Seething, Sarai took a step closer until Hagar cowered and slipped to her knees.

  “Forgive me, my lady.” Hagar lifted a hand over her head as though to ward off a blow.

  Sarai looked down at the woman, but even her subservient posture brought little satisfaction. “Get busy. And don’t let me catch you resting until every last chore is done.”

  “Yes, mistress.” Hagar scooted backward, then rushed off before Sarai could say another word.

  “She did not mean to offend you, Sarai.” Lila spoke softly at her side, and Sarai turned to face her again.

  “Will you side with her too? Is there no one here who understands my plight, who sees the way she disdains me, the way she plots to take what is mine?” She searched Lila’s expression, reading a mixture of concern and pity in her gaze. “I gave her my husband, and she would take all I have. Has she taken you as well, Lila?” She hated the sudden hurt in her tone, wishing she could mask the pain.

  Lila touched her arm and squeezed. “Never! You know you are like a mother to me, Sarai. Hagar could never take your place.”

  Sarai’s heart twisted yet again at the word mother, knowing it was a kindness she did not deserve and an honor she would never truly know. She swallowed, longing to pull Lila close. “Do you care for Hagar?” She couldn’t bear to know, and yet somehow she must.

  “Hagar is lonely. She does not know her place, and she misses the other maids from her homeland. I thought only to befriend her.” Lila turned at the sound of her daughter running toward her, calling her name. Jael bounded closer, and Lila scooped her into her arms.

  “She might have stayed in my good graces and kept her Egyptian friends close by if she had not despised me for something I can do nothing to change.” If only she could.

  “And yet do you not despise Hagar for something she cannot change as well?”

  Lila’s pointed question brought Sarai up short. She took a step back and crossed her arms. “I don’t know what you are talking about.” Though in truth, she did. Hagar could not change her status as slave or her pregnancy or anything about her life if Sarai did not allow it. Did she despise the woman for being a slave, or for wanting to rise above it now that it seemed within her rights to do so?

  “I only mean that Hagar wants to belong, Sarai. Perhaps she looked down on you in hopes that she would be accepted. Her ideas were misguided and misplaced, but perhaps they were not with ill intent.” Lila shifted her daughter to the other hip. “If you would excuse me, I must see to Jael’s needs. Come to my tent, and we can talk more if you like.”

  Sarai regarded her but a moment, feeling rebuffed and dismissed, emotions she neither expected nor embraced. Had the whole camp turned against her for her dealings with Hagar? The thought stung.

  “No. You go ahead. Your family needs you.” She turned and hurried across the compound toward her tent. She did not stop until she reached the opening, then realized too late that Hagar would be inside cleaning—the last person she cared to see. She would go to the weaver’s tent and work alone if she must, but the basket of new threads was inside her tent.

  Thinking only to grab it and hurry off, she steeled herself for another encounter with Hagar, however brief. She lifted the flap and ducked inside, but the rooms were deceptively quiet. “Hagar?” She tilted her head, but no one responded. Had the girl disobeyed a direct command?

  She searched each side of the partition, which divided the sleeping quarters from the living area, but there was no sign of Hagar. Sarai’s pallet remained as she had left it, and one whiff told her that the nighttime pots still needed emptying. Where was the woman?

  Anger surged within her again, mingled with the slightest twinge of fear. Would she have gone to Abram to report all that Sarai had said to her? But Abram would not care. He had given Hagar into Sarai’s keeping to do as she wished with her. Still, where else would she be?

  She moved out of the tent into the compound again and headed for Hagar’s tent. When she found that place empty as well, her fear kicked up a notch. She had to be around somewhere. But the girl would regret the work it would take to find her. When Sarai got hold of her this time, she had better have a good excuse, or Sarai would have little mercy.

  31

  Abram strode into camp wearier than he had been in months. In moments when he allowed himself to ponder the cause, he could trace his lack of energy to the day Sarai had visited him in the fields and blamed him for her own problems with Hagar. There was no pleasing the woman, and the thought drained him. With Hagar he had begun to feel young again, and when his seed had quickened within her, even he had noticed the new spring in his step.

  But now he put greater force on the walking stick and took slower steps over the rocky, uneven ground. Age had caught up with him, and despite the coming child, he was feeling it deep in his bones. Would he live long enough to see the child raised to manhood? He shook the useless thoughts aside. There was no sense guessing the future. Adonai alone knew what was to come.

  The sounds of women and children greeted him as he drew closer to the campfire, and he smiled at the sight of Eliezer scooping his little ones into his waiting arms. A twinge of wistfulness filled him, accompanied by a small spot of joy in knowing that in a few months, he too would hold a babe on his knee.

  He turned from the sight a moment later and headed for his tent. There was still time to rest before the evening meal, and his persistent fatigue needed respite. A short rest before he was forced to watch the growing animosity between Sarai and Hagar. A sigh escaped him, but as he approached his tent, he tensed at the sight of Sarai standing beneath the awning, waiting for him. Now what?

  He drew in a breath, silently praying for strength. She came to meet him before he reached the tent’s door.

  “She is gone, my lord. The Egyptian is gone.” One look at Sarai’s frantic gaze told him this was no ruse.

  “She has a name, Sarai. ‘Hagar.’ And what do you mean she is gone?” He leaned heavier on the staff with one hand and used the other to rub the growing ache at the back of his neck.

  “I mean, I looked for her—the whole camp has been looking for hours. I sent servants to search the fields, thinking perhaps she had come to you to complain, but there has been no sign of her. Did she come to you? Have you sent her away somewhere?”

  As her words sank deep, alarm rushed through him, his exhaustion gone. He shook his head. “I have not seen her since this morning’s meal.” He looked beyond her, then briefly took in the camp, making a quick attempt at his own lame search. “Where could she be?” He looked back at Sarai. “Has some harm come to her? So help me, woman, if you have done something to make her run away . . .” He stopped himself at the look of shame flickering in her eyes.

  She averted her gaze and took a quick step back.

  “What have you done?” Anger surged through him. He knew her well enough to know she was hiding her guilt. “The woman is carrying our child, Sarai. If you don’t know where she is . . . at least tell me why. What happened?” He tried in vain to gentle his tone, knowing she always responded better when he soothed her like he did his smallest lambs. But a part of him simply did not care anymore. The life of his son—surely it was a son—could be in danger if Hagar had run off and fallen among thieves. The thought brought a sharp, knife-like pain to his gut.

  “I . . .” Her tone faltered, and for a moment he feared she would weep, but in the next breath she lifted her gaze to meet his, crossing both arms across her chest. “I yelled at her
. . . and I struck her cheek.” Her own cheeks flushed crimson at the admission. “I only did so because she disrespected my orders. If she had given a proper servant’s attitude, none of this would have happened.”

  “So the blame rests solely with Hagar?” He took a step closer. He had never hit a woman in his life, but for a brief blinding moment he was tempted to do so now. “You gave the girl into my arms and then have mistreated her since she gave us the very thing we craved. And now, because of your actions, you admit that we have lost her.” He turned, pounding the earth with the staff, then looked back at his wife, the woman he had loved since his youth. “Go to your tent, Sarai, and pray to Adonai that we find her. You had better hope no ill has come to my son.”

  He stalked off then, too angry to look back or to soften the words that had caused the stricken look to come over Sarai’s beautiful face. She would survive his wrath. Hagar, on the other hand, might not survive whatever fate she had chosen. Had she run away from his protection?

  A bitter laugh escaped him. He had done nothing to protect her.

  He walked on until he reached Eliezer’s tent. “Eliezer!”

  Eliezer lifted the flap and hurried to his side. “Yes, my lord? What’s wrong?”

  “Hagar is missing.”

  Eliezer nodded. “Lila told me. The camp has been in upheaval all afternoon looking for her. They have questioned the Egyptian servants thoroughly, along with the other servants, but there is no sign of her.”

  “There is only one place she would choose to return.”

  “Egypt.”

  Abram lifted a hand to his neck again, the ache becoming a relentless throb. “Send ten men toward Shur, along the road to Egypt. But to be safe, send ten others north toward Damascus. Leave no stone unturned.”

  Eliezer touched Abram’s shoulder. “We’ll find her. Don’t fear.” He hurried off to do Abram’s bidding while Abram went to the place of the altar to pray.

  The sun beat down on Hagar, and her feet tingled with the scorch of the hot desert sand. Sweat rolled down her back, and her tongue tasted thick, her thirst unquenched. The days since she had left Abram’s camp stretched behind her, nearing a week. How far had she come? How much longer until she reached one of the branches of the Nile? Longing for her homeland spurred her feet to continue. But the ache in her belly and her growing thirst made her stumble. If she didn’t eat soon, she would die in this forsaken land.

  She pressed a hand to her middle and forced herself upright, cupping her other hand to shade her eyes from the glare of the midday sun. Up ahead, the outline of trees beckoned. Could she have come upon water at last? Tears filmed her vision even as hope surged within her. She quickened her pace, barely mindful of the stinging sand creeping in between her toes. Palm branches swayed high in the trees as though bending to greet her approach. A spring’s bubbling waters drew her attention, and she moved toward it.

  At last, at the water’s edge, she sank to her knees and scooped water into her mouth. Over and over again her hands poured the cool liquid onto her parched tongue. Her thirst finally quenched, she filled the empty skin she had snatched before she left Abram’s camp, then crawled toward the shade of the cluster of date palms. After she rested, she would find a way up the tree to pluck the ripe dates from the sagging clusters.

  Her eyes closed of their own accord. She was so tired. But the ache in her stomach would not be ignored. She opened her eyes and glanced at the fruit high above her head. She had little strength left to climb the trunk. Despair threatened. Would she die here so close to food? Why had she not thought to take a satchel of dates and nuts with her along with the skin of water? But she knew why. There had been no time and little thought to her running. Sarai would have stopped her if she’d known of her plans. Sarai would beat her if she ever found her now.

  The woman had no right to treat her that way! She had done everything Sarai had ever asked of her, even when she did not have to in Pharaoh’s palace. If only she had stayed with her family that day. If only she had never met Abram and Sarai.

  Bitterness nearly suffocated her as the spring danced nearby over rocks on its way toward the sea. What was this place? She glanced up again at the bulging trees. Surely someone would come to harvest them soon. Could she wait that long for food if she offered to help? Would her help be accepted?

  “Hagar, servant of Sarai.”

  A deep voice startled her, and she jumped up. Backing up a pace, she lost her balance, then quickly righted herself. She cinched her robe close, entwining her arms over her chest.

  “Who’s there?” Trembling shook her, but she forced her feet to hold steady, looking about to find the source of the voice. She spotted a tall, handsome man who stepped closer, a cluster of dates resting in his palm. He extended it toward her. She eyed him warily, transfixed by the light in his dark eyes. “Who are you?”

  He placed the dates in her hand, giving her no choice but to accept them. “Hagar, servant of Sarai,” he said again, “where have you come from, and where are you going?”

  You know me? The trembling increased, her senses suddenly sharper, her heart racing with each breath.

  “I’m running away from my mistress, Sarai.” There was no reason to lie to the man, though she realized the stark truth of the fact that she could not have lied if she’d tried. The words would not form in her mind or on her tongue.

  “Go back to your mistress and submit to her.”

  I can’t! She staggered, nearly losing her footing again. She fingered the dates in her hand but was no longer hungry. Silent protests sprang within her, but she could not voice them. Nor could she glance at the man who seemed much more than a man, or meet his steady, penetrating gaze.

  “I will so increase your descendants that they will be too numerous to count.”

  Her breath caught, and despite her fear, despite all she had been taught, she boldly looked his way. Suddenly her fear dissolved in the kindness of his smile. Relief spilled over her like showers after a drought, filling her with hope. “My descendants?”

  His smiled broadened, its warmth soothing. “You are now with child, and you will have a son. You shall name him Ishmael, for Adonai has heard of your misery.”

  Tears filled her eyes at his words. Adonai cared about a slave? He saw her? He knew?

  The man’s expression changed, compassion in his eyes along with something she could not define. “He will be a wild donkey of a man; his hand will be against everyone and everyone’s hand against him, and he will live in hostility toward all his brothers.”

  The words only skirted the surface of her mind. All his brothers? Which meant either she or Abram would have more sons. Or did he mean brothers in a more general family sense? As it stood, there were no others that could even be named relatives. Abram’s brothers lived far from Canaan.

  Canaan. Not Egypt. Where Sarai still lived to torment her. Go back to your mistress and submit to her . . . You will have a son . . . You shall name him Ishmael.

  Ishmael. God will hear. And God had heard, had seen her misery.

  She lifted her head and looked again at the man who was not really a man. “You are the God who sees me. I have now seen the One who sees me.”

  His piercing look told her she had surmised the truth, and the realization sent her to her knees. She planted her face in the dust at his feet, her heart humbled yet filled with overwhelming joy. Though her father, the pharaoh of Egypt, had never noticed her, and her own mother had barely acknowledged her existence, and Abram, the only man she might call husband, had also turned his face from her, there was One who had not only heard but seen.

  He had not only seen, but He knew her misery and had promised to bless her and the child in her womb. As though the thought of Him awakened both the child and her hunger, she felt her stomach rumble and kick all at once. She lifted her head, about to ask the man if He wished to share the dates He had offered to her, but He was gone.

  Thank you, El Roi, O God who sees me. For though He had g
one from her, she knew He watched her still.

  Sarai stood near the edge of the camp between the road leading south toward Egypt and the path heading west where Abram had gone to pray each morning in the ten days since Hagar had disappeared. Worry gnawed her middle, the image of Abram’s wrath playing over and over again in her mind. He’d been angry at her before, but never like this, and never before involving another woman to rival her affections in his heart. The breeze teased the hair away from her face, its cloying warmth oppressive. Would the men find Hagar alive?

  A chill worked through her despite the heat, and she toyed with indecision. Abram had sent her to her tent. Lila, in her kindness, had told her that first night that Abram had gone in the direction of the altar and that Eliezer had sent men to look for Hagar. Shame heated her face. The news should have come from her husband, but he clearly had nothing more to say to her until news of Hagar could be found.

  She tugged the corners of her robe more tightly against her body and turned back toward the camp. The stones crunched beneath her leather sandals, and children’s laughter grated on her already heightened nerves. She glanced at a group of boys taunting a younger son of one of Abram’s servants. She quickened her pace, marching closer.

  “What do you think you’re doing?” Her voice came out harsh, as she intended, snagging the boys’ attention.

  They jerked their heads toward her, looking chagrined.

  “Go on, off with the lot of you. Go back to your mothers and obey, or I’ll see to it you are put to work cleaning the waste pots!” They scampered away from her, even the boy who had been taunted, leaving Sarai alone again despite the hum of voices nearby.

  The thought depressed her. What kind of a mother would she have been? One who protected her child against boys who would hurt him? Absolutely! One who would make sure such children were kept far from her son. She would have done all in her power to keep him safe.