Sarah Read online

  Behind the transparent drapes, the bedchamber was lit by the weak reddish-brown light from the naphtha fires that flickered on the terrace.

  She came completely to her senses.

  Pharaoh stirred beside her.

  He was no longer only Pharaoh. He was a naked man, with smooth cheeks and a soft body, sleeping in a huge, shadowy bed shaped like a boat. He had short, curly hair like a child’s. On his powerful shoulder, Sarai could see the mark that her teeth had left there in the night, during her transports of pleasure.

  She wanted to stroke the mark, to kiss it. She managed to restrain herself. Her eyes misted over.

  She looked down at her own belly, her thighs, her breasts. There were no marks on them. But deep inside, her body was still feverish with the pleasure that Pharaoh had given her. An absolute pleasure that had overwhelmed her, terrifying her at first and then fulfilling her.

  How could it be?

  She shivered as the memory of his caresses came back to her. She pushed the memory aside, but now the thought of Abram assailed her. She dismissed it violently. At that moment, she hated Abram. She never wanted to see him or hear his name again.

  Yes, if Pharaoh wanted her, felt as much pleasure with her as she felt with him, why shouldn’t she remain Abram’s sister for all time?

  She even hated Abram’s god!

  Her throat tightened with shame. She hid her face in her hands, and huddled with her thighs against her chest.

  But the tears did not rise to her throat, because just then Pharaoh’s hand came to rest in the hollow of her back, then moved up to the back of her neck. She shuddered, and fell back against him with a moan. She touched his smooth cheeks, already hungry for his mouth, for the suppleness of his long body against her hips.

  Hungry for Pharaoh’s desire that burned in the gold of his irises and feasted on her body until her pleasure drove her consciousness away.

  DAY had barely broken. Sarai was standing behind the transparent drapes. Through the loosely woven threads, she watched the shadows fade from the gardens and lakes.

  She did not want to be in bed anymore. Did not want to be near Pharaoh. Did not want Pharaoh’s desire.

  She was trying to think of nothing. To feel nothing.

  If only her flesh, still burning from his caresses, could become as cold as stone!

  She thought of the handmaid Hagar, of the scar on her back.

  If she ran away, would they shoot arrows at her?

  But where could she run to?

  Was there a single space in Egypt where you could escape Pharaoh’s eyes?

  She gave a little laugh, bitter as a mouthful of bile. “Pharaoh knows everything!” she murmured.

  PHARAOH woke suddenly, with a groan, and sat up, his mouth open.

  “Sarai!”

  He opened his arms in the great boat of his bed.

  “Sarai!” he called again, in a commanding voice.

  “Here I am.”

  He saw her standing by the drapes, naked and cold.

  “I’ve just had a bad dream!” he cried. “Your people’s famine was becoming my famine. Snakes and crocodiles were swarming in my lakes. My wives were rotting in my arms and a voice called out to me that you weren’t Abram’s sister, but his wife.”

  Sarai approached the bed and Pharaoh. She brushed his cheek, then pulled the big sheet off the bed and wrapped herself in it. “It’s true. I am Sarai, Abram’s wife.”

  “What have you done to me?” Pharaoh screamed.

  Sarai moved away from him, calm and relieved. Watching Pharaoh’s hands, to protect herself from his blows.

  “Why?” he screamed again. “Why lie to me like that?”

  “Because Abram was afraid you would kill him in order to make me your wife. And I, too, was afraid you would kill him.”

  Pharaoh gave a nasty laugh, like a spit. “Afraid?”

  “Yes, afraid of Pharaoh.”

  Pharaoh sneered. He touched the bite mark on his shoulder lightly, and stood up. He was about to approach her, but changed his mind, and shook his head. “So Abram’s God Most High isn’t mighty enough to protect you against fear?”

  Sarai lowered her eyes without a reply.

  “You were mistaken, you and your husband. Pharaoh isn’t going to feed you to the crocodiles. As my father wrote, ‘Do not be wicked. Feed the poor man, for a rich people does not rise in revolt. Become great and lasting through the love that you leave behind.’ Repeat those words to Abram.”

  He fell silent. His face became impassive, already resuming Pharaoh’s mask of indifference. But he crossed the space separating them and took Sarai’s face in his hands.

  “As for you,” he breathed, his mouth against hers, “I shan’t flog you or stone you. I want your perfect body to stay in my mind. And you, too, will have to live with the pain of our memory.”

  Sarai’s Veil

  Her brow and chest covered with gold, Sarai was led back to the encampment, swaying in a wicker basket strapped to the back of an elephant. She was preceded by a column of soldiers, while a flock of more than a thousand small livestock, asses and mules, filled the road behind her.

  This was a queen returning from Pharaoh’s palace, a goddess of the Nile. But Abram greeted her without asking her any questions, almost without looking at her. Lot, on the other hand, rushed to meet her, and tried to support her foot as she dismounted from the elephant, but collapsed on the ground, drunk. While Sarai had been away, not a day had gone by that he had not emptied whole pitchers of Egyptian beer.

  He burst out laughing, and got unsteadily to his feet. His eyes were red, and he stank so much that Sarai refused to embrace him. Without so much as a word or a smile for all those who stood admiring the magnificence of her return, she disappeared into the tent that had been pitched for her. A few moments later, her handmaids came out to announce that she wanted to be alone and to rest after her long journey. Lot protested, saying that he wanted to join her. He was pushed away roughly.

  Even Abram did not try to enter his wife’s tent. In any case, he was too caught up in the celebrations. He was lifted to shoulder height and carried around the camp in triumph. Everyone shouted his name and the name of Yhwh. Hadn’t Pharaoh bent his knee before God Most High? He hadn’t killed Abram, hadn’t kept him captive. Instead, he was giving him enough to make his people rich again!

  They danced until late at night, to the sound of flutes. Flakes from the fires rose in the darkness, swirling like phosphorescent insects. Beer and wine flowed like water. Their joy and relief were so intense that Sarai was quite forgotten. Nobody expressed any surprise that she was not at Abram’s side until Lot’s cries distracted them from their merrymaking.

  He was on all fours outside Sarai’s tent. “Show yourself, show yourself!” he was yelling, in a voice drowning in beer and tears. “I haven’t seen you in such a long time. Show yourself, Sarai.”

  His tunic was torn and soiled, his face a battlefield. With insane eyes and lips white with saliva, he threw himself against the tent posts, as if to break them. He collapsed, gashing his chest on the wood as he did so. But even at the height of his frenzy, he took care not to tear the tent flap, which Sarai was steadfastly refusing to open.

  They got him to his feet, but he still had the strength to struggle.

  “Dance!” he shouted. “Dance like fools! Just don’t ask why my aunt Sarai has come back to us like a queen! Be cowards! Be like Abram, he doesn’t ask! His God Most High doesn’t ask, either! Only their nephew Lot asks! He doesn’t give a damn about Pharaoh’s asses and mules! But he wants to know! He asks: Why has Sarai come back to us like a queen?”

  He gave a malicious laugh, pointing at the faces around him, looking for Abram. Not finding him, he spat in disgust.

  “You don’t know, do you?” he bellowed, grabbing the man nearest to him. “You don’t know! Well, I’m going to tell you. What she never wanted to do with Lot, Abram’s sister did with Pharaoh. Pharaoh put his cock in her and Sarai gave
birth to all this gold, just for us!”

  The only way they could silence him was to knock him senseless. The celebration was over. Their hearts were heavy now, and as closed as Sarai’s tent.

  THE next day, another caravan led by Pharaoh’s great officer Tsout-Phenath, arrived at the encampment, bringing neither flocks nor grain, but three chests of gold and silver loaded on an elephant, from which a veiled woman descended.

  Ignoring Pharaoh’s soldiers who surrounded the camp with spears raised, Abram’s people gathered. Tsout-Phenath ordered the chests to be opened outside the great black-and-white tent. Everyone pressed forward to see. Unlike the previous day, there were no cries of joy, no hugs and kisses. Yet none of them had ever seen so much gold and silver in their lives.

  Tsout-Phenath approached Abram. “Pharaoh is giving you one moon,” he announced haughtily, “to prepare your flocks, strike camp, and leave his lands. If any of you try to come back, you will die. Pharaoh wishes you a good journey home, you and your wife. He hopes you will long remember him.”

  Abram gave a thin smile. “Tell Pharaoh he can rest assured that Abram’s people will indeed remember him. We have long memories. May God Most High bless him for his kindness.” He kicked the lids of the chests shut. “Who is that veiled woman who has come with you?”

  Tsout-Phenath made a casual gesture. “The last fruit of Pharaoh’s kindness to your wife.”

  At that very moment, inside Sarai’s tent, the handmaid Hagar had removed her veil and was bowing respectfully.

  “Pharaoh took me away from my mistress. He has sent me here to serve you because he does not want anything in his palace that could remind him of you.”

  She looked up, her happy smile undaunted by the sight of Sarai’s bitter expression. She took Sarai’s hands and placed them on her brow then on her chest, in the Egyptian manner.

  “I know these words must be hard for you, for Pharaoh ordered me to say them as soon as I saw you. Well, I’ve said them, and now you can forget them. This is what my heart says: Be my mistress and you will make me the happiest of women. You will be the balm on my scar, and I will be faithful to you unto death.”

  Sarai pulled her to her gently. “Have no fear! I shan’t ask any such sacrifice of you. I’m very happy to have you as my handmaid, but I’m afraid you won’t be as well housed as you were with Pharaoh. I have no palaces to offer you, no pools, only tents and long days of walking.”

  “I’ll learn to prepare ass’s milk in gourds!” Hagar said, with a singsong laugh. “I may no longer have a palace around me, but that’s because you’ve opened the bars of my cage.”

  Sarai was about to order something to eat and drink when she heard cries from outside. Half lifting the tent flap, Sarai and Hagar saw a group of young people waving their arms. Lot’s head stood out above them. Abram, surrounded by the elders, came out of the tent with the black-and-white stripes.

  “Lot’s drunk, but his question’s a good one,” one of the young people cried. “Why is Pharaoh chasing us away and at the same time giving us so many riches?”

  Abram’s voice rang out above the cries, in a tone that silenced the crowd. “Because Yhwh came to him in a dream. A cruel dream in which He showed Pharaoh all the harm He could do to him and his people if he did not treat us well. Pharaoh was afraid of God Most High and obeyed Him. With these riches He has given us by the hand of Pharaoh, Yhwh is showing us that our trials are over. That is the truth, there is no other! Tomorrow, we shall strike camp and set off back to Canaan, the land He gave me.”

  Hagar put her arm tenderly around Sarai’s waist. “Your husband certainly knows how to talk,” she whispered. “I can see now why Pharaoh prefers to keep him at a distance.”

  WITH such a huge flock, and having to go all the way around the Shur Desert, they took more than a year to reach Canaan.

  It was a year during which Sarai only spoke to Abram when she could not avoid it, and no longer received him in her tent. And she never forgave Lot for what he had said when she had returned from Pharaoh’s palace. Abram’s nephew groveled at her feet, making open and humiliating displays of his repentance, blaming it all on how unhappy and how drunk he had been. Each time Sarai turned her back on him.

  Lot stopped his lamentations, and from then on stayed at the rear of the caravan, moving forward through the dust raised by the flocks, getting drunk when evening fell, and remaining incapacitated until dawn, and sometimes until day had fully risen. Occasionally, he had to be trussed up like a sack and carried on the back of a mule.

  Not once did Abram lecture him.

  For several moons, they all kept their heads down.

  From her wicker basket on the elephant’s back, Sarai looked down on them with eyes like stone. She never took off the gold jewelry Pharaoh had given her. In the sun, it shone so intensely on her brow, her neck, and her breasts that it would have burned the pupils of anyone who had looked up at her.

  It was only in the evening, when she came down from the huge beast, that some of the women would sneak a glance at her. They hoped to see sorrow or forgiveness on her face, but all they saw was indifference and beauty. That same miraculous beauty, without even the trace of a wrinkle. Neither the sea wind nor the blazing sun had caused it to fade in the slightest.

  One spring morning, however, as they were finally approaching Canaan, a murmur ran through the caravan, and heads turned toward the elephant. Up there, in her wicker gondola, Sarai had covered her head with a waist-length red veil, the mesh of it loose enough to allow her to see through it while keeping her face hidden from others.

  The next day, and the day after that, she wore the same veil. And all the days that followed. From then on, Sarai never appeared outside her tent without her red veil.

  Some believed that her face had changed during the night. That it had grown ugly. Perhaps she had caught leprosy in Pharaoh’s palace and did not want anyone to know. Abram acted as if nothing strange had happened, never questioning Sarai, never asking her the reason for this concealment.

  Little by little, the whispers and the absurd rumors stopped. Soon, everyone understood, without any words being spoken: Sarai did not want her anger or her beauty to be a burden on anyone anymore. She was weary of reminding them, through her appearance, of the source of their newfound wealth. But there was still one person against whom her wrath did not diminish, the only person who could have lifted her veil and begged her forgiveness, but did not do it: her husband Abram.

  There was great relief. They all grew accustomed to Sarai’s red veil. They were glad no longer to have to confront her perfect and unalterable beauty. Her handmaid Hagar’s beauty, in comparison, was infinitely more changeable and infinitely less threatening. Laughter returned to the camp. Joy was overflowing, the joy of soon being back in the land of Canaan.

  THEY approached Salem on a day of squally rain. The fields and hills were becoming green again. The roads were muddy, and their huge flock raised no dust.

  Melchizedek rushed to meet them, amid trumpets and drums and his people’s joyful welcome. Everyone was astonished to see these people who had left gnawed by famine now looking so rich, well-fed, and ruddy-cheeked. They surrounded the elephants, and laughed at their trunks and their outsize ears.

  But Melchizedek was surprised and saddened to be greeted by Sarai with a veil covering her face. He was about to ask a question, but his eyes met Abram’s, and he fell silent, blinked, and opened wide his arms. The two men embraced, while joyous chants thanked God Most High for his kindness. Before they had even separated, a boy was tugging at them.

  “Eliezer!” Abram cried.

  Eliezer of Damascus had grown as tall as Abram. He had shoulder-length curly hair, and the down of his first beard was on his chin. He embraced his adoptive father with all the effusiveness of a true son. Everyone saw Abram’s eyes mist over.

  That night, for the first time since they had left Canaan and set off for Egypt, Abram’s laughter rang out over the music of the celebration.
It was loud enough to be heard by Hagar, who was in the tent helping Sarai prepare for bed. She asked her mistress the name of the handsome boy who was making Abram so happy.

  Sarai waited while Hagar removed her tunic and began to massage her back with a soft ointment. “His name is Eliezer of Damascus,” she at last replied with weary indifference. “Abram chose him to be the son I can’t give him. He’s pleasant enough; quite a charmer, in fact. But don’t trust him. He’s like a fruit that looks nice and juicy when you see it on a hot day and your throat is parched. As soon as you bite into it, you realize it’s poison.”

  “Why do you say that?”

  “Perhaps I’m jealous. That was what my dear Sililli thought. Or perhaps I can tell good from evil whatever mask they put on to conceal their true natures.”

  Their return was celebrated for seven days. Every morning, Abram and Melchizedek would join the elders in the big black-and-white tent. Abram told them about the country of the Nile and the questions Pharaoh had asked him about God Most High. In his turn, Melchizedek recounted how the rain had returned to Canaan as suddenly as it had disappeared. Rain such as they had never seen. It had come in summer, but not as a storm; it had been abundant, but not too heavy; it had watered the thirsty earth, but not drenched it. It had filled the wells and the springs all winter long, so that when spring had come, it had been as green as in the old days.

  “In autumn,” Melchizedek said to Abram, with a calm smile, “when I saw the turn this rain was taking, I knew God Most High was taking care of you. I said, ‘Abram and his people are well. They will soon be back. Yhwh is preparing Canaan for them as a bride is prepared for her wedding night.’”

  In the middle of one of these joyous conversations, Lot suddenly appeared. “I want to speak to Abram!” he declared, roughly.

  They all feared another drunken rage. But although his face was red, his eyes bulging and his clothes disheveled, he was not drunk.

  Abram invited him to sit down. “Speak, I’m listening.”