Abraham and Sarah (16 page)

The scribe smirked and then grinned as though enjoying a private joke. “I told them you wouldn’t last. A sassy one as ever I’ve seen.”

“It isn’t fair,” she wailed as she snatched up the permit and fled. She didn’t want to stay a minute longer lest he see the smile of triumph that crossed her face.

Just before sunset she rode out the traders’ gate. She easily passed the guards who were so busy hurrying the craftsmen and merchants out that they barely looked at her pass. As she rode down the crowded lane toward the dock on the Nile, she could feel the small sharp horns of the little goddess Hathor pressing into her side. She had tucked her at the last minute into her girdle as the only object she was going to take with her.

More than the scribe’s pass, she was depending on the goddess to help her escape. Miraculously the goddess seemed to be with her, and within a short time she had reached the Nile. She had nothing to pay the boatman but a ring given her by her father. Parting with it pained her deeply, but there was no other way. She watched with growing anxiety as the boatman turned the ring over and over, looking at her with hooded, suspicious eyes. He went below deck and she became nervous. She could hear sounds of heated discussion and feared the man had recognized the ring and was afraid to accept it.

Minutes later the boatman sent a messenger ashore and then came to where Hajar stood. “I have sent the ring to be checked. I can’t afford to get in trouble with Pharaoh,” he said.

Hajar ran her fingers back and forth between the small image’s horns, then took her out and held her in her hand. “I am depending on you, my beloved Hathor,” she whispered over and over. She felt sure that if the ring was recognized, she would not escape without the help of the goddess.

However, remembering all the stories her mother and grandmother had told her of the great power the goddess possessed, she had little doubt that
all would be well. Surely it would not be long until she would be headed for Upper Egypt and her family home.

Suddenly and without warning a black linen sack was thrown over her head, and strong hands grabbed her from behind, tying her so that she couldn’t move. There was the braying of a donkey nearby, then the rattle of cart wheels. Hajar knew what was going to happen. She had taken the chance, and it was just her vile luck to get caught. Undoubtedly she would be taken in the cart back to the palace and there would be made into a laughingstock, a warning to others who might want to run away.

There was no reason to doubt that she would be executed. She had heard of others who had been publicly executed for a much less serious crime. She thought of her father, the pharaoh. He would be angry that she had tried to run away, and if he heard of the ring being used for her passage, he would never forgive her. Her Radiance, Senebtisy, would probably hold a celebration.

There was no hope. No matter what she did the punishment would not be reversed. However, she was determined to maintain her dignity. She would not plead for mercy or weep. She would be proud and defiant, not showing her true feelings.

Flooded with a mixture of despair and frustration, she also knew a growing anger that she should have been so close to escape before she was caught. The anger centered on the goddess Hathor who had deserted her at the most crucial moment. She blamed the small goddess for everything.

“You’re brown and ugly and completely in my power,” she muttered. “There’s only a short time. If you don’t rescue me, I’ll know you’re useless.” For a moment she held the small clay figure in one hand and was about to press hard with her thumb so the head would snap off. Then she thought better of it and kept it in the palm of her hand. She would wait and see. The goddess might yet help her.

P
haraoh had indeed remembered the traders from Mesopotamia. In the days when he was a vizier, he had depended on such men to acquaint him with the outside world. Now he welcomed Abram and his entourage warmly, and he insisted on putting several of his finest villas at their disposal. Their extensive flocks and herds and the men who cared for them would be provided a place to camp in the delta.

He seemed eager to see Abram. While emissaries from other countries waited for days to get an audience, Abram was invited right away to a feast and then a private audience with Pharaoh Amenemhet in his receiving hall. Abram was allowed to bring some of his men with him, so Lot and Eliazer with a few other retainers made their way to a bathhouse recommended to them by one of the other merchants to prepare for the big event.

“Egyptians are known for cleanliness,” a merchant advised. “It would be offensive to Pharaoh to see visitors who had not spent the day at the baths.”

They found to their surprise that when they arrived for the feast, they were to wear Egyptian garments and wigs. Abram alone retained his own clothes. “I want to see my old friend as he looked when he used to visit in my vizier’s office,” Pharaoh said.

The visit went very well. Pharaoh asked Abram to sit with him on his carved ebony throne so he could more easily ask questions. He had heard of the Elamite invasion, so he asked astute questions about every aspect. He was obviously pleased with Abram’s answers. At times he leaned forward to catch every word, and at other times he fired questions so fast that Abram hardly had time to answer.

When he had exhausted the political news, he asked about the studies Abram had done. When he heard that he was experienced in stargazing and mathematics, he was delighted. He was even more curious when Abram told him of crushing the idols and turning from the old worship of Nanna and Ningal to worship Elohim, the Creator God.

“Now,” he said at last, “tell me some of the wisdom of your country.” He settled back among the cushions and looked at Abram with an expectant twinkle in his eye.

Abram thought a moment, then smiled. “This is one of the more common sayings, but I think it is not for kings: ‘Who possesses much silver may be happy; who possesses much barley may be glad; but he who has nothing at all may sleep.’”

“Ah, but it is for kings. What king would not give everything he possesses for some good sleep? Who can sleep and have such responsibilities as I have? I must see that the Nile rises, the sun shines, the plants grow, and the people are happy.”

“My lord,” Abram said in astonishment, “you are in charge of the Nile and the sun?”

“Of course. If I do not perform the rituals and sacrifices, nothing would happen. The earth would become bare and dark while the people would weep and make my life unbearable.”

“But, my lord, in Ur they believe the gods do these things.”

Pharaoh drew himself up and assumed an air of great austerity. “Here, I am the god. I must make everything happen at the right time and in the right way.”

Abram was surprised. He had forgotten much that he had known about the Egyptians. He determined to sit as often as possible with this intelligent ruler, so he could learn more about their ways and beliefs. For this reason, when Pharaoh stood and dismissed them, Abram asked that he might come again and talk with him further on these matters.

Pharaoh was pleased. “There are very few a god can talk with as a man. I would welcome your visits anytime.”

With that they passed from the pharaoh’s presence, bowing and kneeling at appropriate moments. When they were back out on the street, they asked one of the guards to take them to the villas Pharaoh had ordered prepared for their use.

The main villa was situated behind a high wall with grounds extending down to marble steps that disappeared into the Nile. Reeds and water lilies sheltered a quiet basin where many a princess had come to bathe or where the royal barges often docked. It was not far by barge to Pharaoh’s palace.

Surrounding the villa was an extensive formal garden with grapevines, fruit trees, and flowers climbing the wall or bordering walkways. In the center
was a lovely blue-tiled pond filled with fish and bordered with water lilies and spikes of papyrus. A few fat geese floated lazily on its dark surface.

Abram, Lot, Eliazer, and a few of their retainers were promptly invited to eat at the pharaoh’s table and in the evenings to his private diwan where he could more freely ask questions about the world they were familiar with. The welcoming ceremony prepared at the pharaoh’s command by the supreme vizier was surprisingly grand. In all, it was five days before Abram and his men were free to ride back to Tjel near the border for their wives, servants, and extensive belongings.

As Sarai and her women entered the gate of the villa and approached the house, the women hung back and let Sarai lead the way. She paused in the doorway and ran her hand over the surface of one of the columns, then leaned back to gaze at its height. She laughed with delight. “Look,” she said, “it’s a palm tree made of stone.”

She ventured cautiously in through the door. In the main reception hall she paused to view the curious, unfamiliar sight. The roof was supported by painted wooden columns that bore a slight resemblance to upright giant bundles of papyrus. The ceiling, on closer inspection, was a marvel of geometric designs that were lighted by grillwork windows.

“How lovely!” Sarai exclaimed as she stepped from the reception room into the main living area. Its ceiling was supported by columns that ended in rather stylized capitals carved like lotus buds. It was a shadowy, quiet room. Sarai’s eyes had to become adjusted to the cool darkness before she could clearly see that the walls and floor had been transformed into something resembling one of the delta’s rich marshes.

Clerestory windows set high in the walls produced the only light. Strong rays pooled on the painted floor and highlighted sections of the wall rendered with lotus blooms, poppies, and cornflowers. With more light the room would have been ablaze with color. In the afternoon heat, it gave off a relaxed atmosphere.

The rest of the house contained sleeping rooms, and the kitchens, storerooms, baking facilities, and granaries were clustered near the servants’ quarters. An outer stair led to the roof, and there the women found carpets of woven rushes spread under a luxurious grape arbor. Armrests, clay pots, a stack
of wooden bowls and stone platters hinted that was where they would eat and spend their evenings.

“How kind of Pharaoh!” Sarai exclaimed later in the day as she showed Abram the marvels of the villa. “It is nicer than our house in Ur.”

“You haven’t said a word about how it compares to your tent.”

Sarai cocked her head on one side and studied Abram. She knew what he wanted her to say, and she had no intention of encouraging him. “I hope we never have to go back to living in a tent,” she said. “This is the kind of blessing I’m sure your God had in mind from the beginning.”

She didn’t wait for an answer but hurried out to instruct her serving girls as to which chests were to hold her robes and where to put her perfumes and ointments.

Abram went to the parapet and looked down into the walled area and then out past it to the Nile with its reed boats and more formal falukas. Most of them were fitted with sails and headed south. He remembered hearing that the sails were used only going south against the current. Coming north, the current carried them along. How odd, he thought, that the wind should always come from the north and the current always flows north. It was evident that most things in Egypt were predictable.

There never seemed to be famine, earthquakes, storms, or barbaric invasions. From one day to the next, they could predict what was likely to happen. Even the rising of the Nile was always predictable. It came when the star Sothis was seen on the horizon just after sunrise. The only flood they knew was the Nile’s gentle overflowing that left behind the rich black soil, giving their land its namesake—Kemet, the black land.

A palm tree obstructed Abram’s view, and he moved so he could see the pyramids being built by Pharaoh where the green fields ended and where the desert, which they called the “red” land, began. These pyramids would not be as big or as complex as the pyramids farther down the Nile near Memphis, but to him, they were impressive. It seemed a custom unlike any other.

The dead were supposed to join the god, Re, in his sun boat, and yet there was an obsession to preserve the body. Stranger still, animals seemed to be gods, and birds like the hawk, Horns, were said to indwell the ruling pharaoh. To Abram, who had been schooled in the logic of Mesopotamia, this prevalence of conflicting beliefs and ideologies was baffling. Perhaps someone like Pharaoh Amenemhet could answer some of his questions.