‘He trusted him not to.’
‘You’re right. He reckoned on his sense of honour: honour he displayed to the very end, when he promised me that he’d say nothing to his men. He’d carry out my order as if it had been issued in good faith.’
‘Did he mention me?’
‘You? No. The man was living his last moments; why would he waste them? But my concern isn’t Uriah; it's David. Because of you, he has behaved with cruelty, ingratitude and gross stupidity.’ He shakes his head in bewilderment and I’m convinced that he – a man as dry as the desert – is about to cry. ‘And there's worse. Because of you, I can never look at him in the same way again: the king I’ve served for more than thirty years, whose life I value more than my own, is tainted forever.’
He leaves me and I feel as crushed as if I had endured the full weight of the Law. I should have confessed what happened and accepted my punishment, thereby saving the lives of Uriah and his men. No stone could wound me more deeply than Joab's charges... I break off, appalled at my callousness. Here I am unscathed while Uriah lies in his tomb, covered in myrrh and honey, food for flies. He knew; Uriah knew! He went to his death willingly and wittingly. But why? Was it to free me or to indict me? Did he wish my unborn child to inherit his honour or my shame? Matred moans, and I turn to see her lips speckled with blood and foam. She smiles wanly – at least I think she does since, when she opens her mouth, I see that Joab has knocked out two of her front teeth.
Determined to observe the law of mourning if of nothing else, I attend the tabernacle first three days and then seven days after the obsequies, to be cleansed of the defilement of Uriah's corpse. But nothing can cleanse me of the defilement of my own skin. Meanwhile, Grandfather sets his mind to securing my future. Uriah's death may have removed the threat to my life, but what of my house? It is reserved for a captain of the guard, with no guarantee that the king will allow me to stay. When Grandfather tackles him, his response is to offer me a place in his harem.
‘What's worse is that he thinks he's being magnanimous,’ Grandfather says, unable to contain his outrage.
‘So what did you tell him?’
‘That no granddaughter of mine will be a concubine and, unless he consents to marry you, I shall trumpet his offence throughout the kingdom: not just what he did to you but what he did to Uriah.’
‘How did he react?’ I ask, astounded by such temerity.
‘Exactly as you’d expect. He blustered that he was the king, that he’d hang me and throw my corpse on to the city dunghill. But I stood my ground. I’m sixty-three years old; I owe the Lord a death. And the king backed down.’ I am dumbstruck. ‘He has issued a proclamation that he will honour the dead warrior, Uriah, by taking his widow as his wife.’
By rights we should wait ninety days until we marry. The reason, which would be comical if it weren’t so sad, is to ensure that any child I might bear him isn’t Uriah's. But, as he proved by remarrying Princess Michal while her second husband lived, he reads the Law from a tattered scroll. So I have scarcely taken off my mourning when I must put on my finest linen. It is the same robe that I wore to marry Uriah, to whom I remain wedded in my heart. Jonadab comes to fetch me, as sinisterly smug as ever. He peels off a bracelet, as he did once before, and hands it to me; I long to fling it back in his face or, better still, thrust it down his throat, but with a grateful smile, I slip it like a fetter on my wrist. He leads me through the main gate of the palace and, if he registers the contrast to our previous visit, he shows no sign. We enter the harem, where twenty or so women stand, sit and loll, in clusters and alone. I cannot work out which of them are wives, which concubines and which slaves: distinctions that, I suspect, are blurred at night. A heavily jewelled woman in a purple robe walks up to me. Her face is kindly but so blotched and wrinkled that I take her for the king's sister, since no man would want her in his bed. I discover my mistake when she introduces herself as Abigail, the king's first wife.
‘Forgive me, but I understood that was Princess Michal. Is she dead?’
‘She might as well be,’ a second woman interjects. She is younger than Abigail and plumply pretty, as though her features were fashioned in dough.
‘She offended the king. She lives in the harem but secluded,’ Abigail says.
‘Imprisoned?’ I ask.
‘Secluded,’ she says firmly, before introducing the plump woman as Ahinoam, mother of the king's eldest son, whom I have seen strutting through the city as if waiting for the day when he can rename it The City of Amnon. She then presents me to a group of women sitting around an ornamental pond, all of whom are wives. Several others, from whom if I am to preserve my status I must keep my distance, are concubines. But I am most intrigued to meet two of the king's daughters. His eldest, Tamar, who is about my age, hurries over to greet me and asks whether I will be her friend with the candour of someone whose trust has never been betrayed. She leads me to her younger sister, Nechama, who sits strumming a lyre, a skill she informs me that she learnt from their father. They are unhappy because their mother, Maacah, is in disgrace and, like Princess Michal, confined to her chamber.
‘What for?’ I ask.
‘Nothing,’ Tamar says. ‘At least nothing she's done. Her father, our grandfather, the king of Geshur, tore up his treaty with Father and sent troops to assist the Ammonites in Rabbah. It's so unfair. It's not her fault yet she's the one being punished.’
The wives all know my story but no one condemns me. ‘It will be our first child since Eliphelet four years ago. It's good to know he can still function,’ Ahinoam says, with welcome if shocking irreverence.
‘It's like drawing water from a dried-up well,’ Huldath, Eliphelet's mother, interjects, showing that the irreverence is shared.
‘That's enough now,’ Abigail says, although her smile gives her away.
‘I think you’re all horrid,’ Tamar says, putting her fingers in her ears. ‘I shan’t listen.’
‘Very wise, my dear,’ Abigail replies.
‘She doesn’t get that from her mother,’ Ahinoam says.
‘Honestly, what will Bathsheba think of us?’ asks another woman whose name I fail to catch.
‘I love you all already,’ I reply, although the truth is that I love being part of them; I doubt I shall love any one of them for herself, except Tamar.
A bondwoman – I have far too many names in my head to trouble with hers – takes me to my chamber, which is small but cooler than my chamber at home... what used to be home. I rest until Jonadab arrives to escort me to the main courtyard, where I watch the king and my grandfather sign the marriage contract. The king barely acknowledges me, except to glance with relief at my flat belly, which makes me wonder how closely he followed the births of his many children. His four eldest sons attend him, led by Prince Amnon, who studies me with all the interest that his father lacked. I force myself to return his smile. Not even the greatest king lives forever and my child's fate may hang on his successor's goodwill. The ceremony over, the women bring me to the feast. Much of the talk, far freer than I would have expected, concerns the king's capriciousness. I’m unsure whether they’re trying to caution me or to intimidate me, but either way it's too late. Although I have assigned our first encounter to another Bathsheba, a Bathsheba who lies buried with Uriah, I cannot ignore his veiled threat that the palace is accustomed to screams. I can fight him and end up in seclusion like Princess Michal, or I can submit to him and live in comfort like ancient Abigail and plump Ahinoam.
Silence descends as the king leaves the courtyard. I feel a stab of revulsion at seeing him accompanied neither by Joab nor by one of his sons but by Jonadab. After several minutes and further ribald remarks, my grandfather collects me and conducts me to the private chamber where the king waits with Jonadab. There is no pomegranate on the threshold, but then I suppose I am already too fruitful. Grandfather and Jonadab return downstairs, the one with an encouraging smile and the other with his customary leer, and the king leads me inside
. I am grateful that my violation took place on the roof, so that there's nothing here to remind me of it – apart, that is, from the man himself. I wonder how much of what he did he recalls or whether it has merged with the memory of other similar assaults, albeit ones with fewer consequences. After offering me a cup of wine and telling me to lay my robe on the chest, he undresses as guilelessly as a child.
My courage falters when he turns to face me, naked but for his loincloth and, in the lamplight, I scrutinize him as I failed to do before: the hard, heavy stomach; the pouches of fat on his chest like a budding girl; the patches of hair on his mottled skin like a hastily scythed field. I take off my clothes and fold them more carefully than usual, before following him to the bed.
‘I’m very tired,’ he says, and I recall Ahinoam and Huldath's comments on his waning powers.
‘Then you must rest, my lord.’
‘It's my duty to pleasure you.’
‘And you have, my lord. What greater pleasure can any woman ask than to bear the king's son?’ I screw up my eyes to obscure the image of Uriah but, when I open them, it is still there.
‘You think that it will be a son?’
‘I know it.’ I place his right hand on my belly and trace the baby's shape. Then I slip off my under-tunic and draw the hand towards my loins. I sense his resistance. ‘My lord must think of nothing but himself. His servant is here to fulfil his every desire.’ Matred has taught me the practices that she and her fellow priestesses employed to exact the tribute that their gods required: practices that disgust me but which, she insisted, worked on even the most modest of men. And as my belly attests, the king is far from that. This may be my one chance to secure his favour and my child's future. I shudder as I comprehend how much is at stake.
‘You’re trembling.’
‘With longing, my lord.’
I slip down the bed and stroke his member, while letting my hair ripple across his thighs. I roll the member between my breasts and feel the strength seep into it. I take it in my mouth like an impure sea creature. Banishing the fear that such practices might be unique to the Edomites, I slowly slide my finger inside him. I wait for him to spring up and even strike me but, to my relief, he pushes down, wriggling and gasping with delight. When he spills his seed, I follow Matred's advice and swallow it, in tribute not to her gods but to his potency.
For several minutes, he lies in a stupor. His eyes water, although I’m not sure if it is a sign of gratitude or age. ‘Who taught you those tricks?’ he asks.
‘Uriah,’ I say. He blanches and then smiles.
‘I haven’t known such bliss since I was a youth with... in King Saul's palace.’ His hatred for her is so intense that he won’t even speak the princess's name.
He takes a ring from his finger and places it on mine before sending me back to the harem with Jonadab, whose brow is beaded with sweat. He summons me night after night and, with hardened deceit, I thank him for the honour. My dread that he might consider my conduct depraved or resent my taking the lead proves to be groundless. As he puts himself in my hands, I understand that his private chamber is the one place where he doesn’t have to be the king. From time to time he displays – or affects – concern about me and I assure him that his pleasure is all that I crave. I squeeze, caress and excite him; then, when he's ready to spill his seed, I draw him inside me to fortify our unborn child.
The more I bolster my position with the king, the more I breed resentment in the other wives. Even Abigail, who adopts a pose of wry amusement towards intimacies that she has long abandoned (or that have abandoned her), looks jealously at the jewels the king lavishes on me. Eglah, the mother of thirteen-year-old Ithream and the gentlest of my rivals, tells me that the women are all amazed since, as soon as their bellies swelled, the king shunned them. So, even though I am nearing the end of my term, with the baby pinching my breath, pressing on my loins and weighing me down as if he were made not of flesh and blood but of stone, I answer the king's summons with a smile.
I enjoy a week's repose when he journeys to Rabbah, where Joab has broken through the Ammonite defences. Rather than take the city himself, he delays the final assault, leaving the king to claim the victory. The day after his return, the king sends for me but, instead of his usual display of affection, he greets me coldly. I drop to my knees. He beckons me to rise but so peremptorily that, braving his anger, I crawl towards him, rubbing my hands and face on his thighs, which smell of his mule.
‘No,’ he says, recoiling and leaving me sprawled on the floor. ‘You don’t understand; Nathan has spoken.’ I feel a tremor of apprehension as he cites the one man in the kingdom with the power to chide him: Nathan, the wandering prophet whom my grandfather brought to the palace; Nathan, to whom the Lord speaks in dreams and visions, filling the king, to whom the Lord speaks only through the sacred stones, with both envy and awe.
‘What did he say?’ I ask, as I haul myself up.
‘You are the poor man's lamb.’
‘I’m confused.’
‘And I’m the rich man who stole you.’
I beg him to explain, which he does with none of his usual precision. I gradually piece together the tale that Nathan has told him of a rich man with a flock of sheep and a poor man with a single lamb. A visitor arrives at the rich man's house and, instead of slaughtering one of his own sheep to feed him, he steals the poor man's lamb. The king was outraged and declared that the rich man should die – not that he should replace the stolen lamb with two or even three or four more, which would have recompensed the victim, but die. Whereupon, Nathan spelt out that he was the rich man and Uriah the poor man. He had no need to identify the lamb.
My immediate reaction is that he merits the rebuke, not just for his treatment of Uriah but for his obtuseness. Only a man so blind to his own faults could have failed to grasp Nathan's meaning. Prophets don’t concern themselves with livestock for no reason.
‘We shall atone, my lord,’ I say, fondling his hand. ‘We shall sacrifice a hundred sheep to the Lord. We shall dedicate our son to his service: a son who will be the strength and shield of his father.’ I bite back in his old age. I place his hand on my belly, but he snatches it away as if from a corpse.
‘The child will die. Nathan told me.’
‘No! That's a lie! Feel it! How can he know?’
‘He speaks with the voice of the Lord. Your belly is the cradle of death.’ As if to refute the charge, the child kicks me.
‘But he's blameless.’
‘He won’t survive a week from birth. He will be taken as my sin offering.’
Every muscle in my body stiffens with loathing for him, which is all that keeps me from collapse. The child for whom I have fattened and sickened and sprouted hair on my belly will die. The child for whom I have lain awake all night with no solace but thoughts of his future will die. The child who has revived my love for a world that I’d wished to see engulfed by a second Flood will die. I have been violated twice over, first by the king and now by the child who is the living – the dying – embodiment of his guilt. But I shall say nothing. I shall make myself the embodiment of my revenge.
‘My lord mustn’t brood. If I had a hundred sons, I would gladly surrender them all to reconcile you to the Lord.’ So monstrous is his vanity that he believes me.
From that moment on, I resolve to feel nothing. I allow myself to be mauled by the other women, their faces flushed with excitement as my imminent confinement brings back memories of their own. But to me, their interest means nothing more than if they were fingering the weave of my robe. To me, the child has no more substance than a shadow on the water, its kicks those of a soldier whose legs have been cut off at the knees. It has been given out that the child was conceived on our wedding night and even my fellow wives, who know the truth, connive in the deception. When my pains start, they express alarm at their coming so soon before my time. They crowd into my chamber and gather around the birthing stool: Eglah and Matred clutching me under the ar
ms; Huldath pressing damp cloths to my face; Ahinoam rubbing my neck and shoulders. The pains tear through me like bolts of lightning. Eglah insists that I’ll forget them as soon as I hold my baby in my arms, but I shout her down. I intend to remember every last one, to offset the pain of my loss.
He is born, and my resolution flounders. Matred cleans him, rubbing his body with salt and wine and wiping his eyes with olive oil, before giving him back to me. I sniff his warm, fresh scent and stroke his whorl of soft red hair (just like his father's, according to Ahinoam, who knew him when he was young). He is so perfect – so complete – that I cherish the hope that the Lord has relented. But it swiftly wanes. When I cradle him in my arms, he makes no sound; when I press him to my breast, he has no suck. His indifference, not just to me but to life itself, is chilling. Huldath, still nursing Eliphelet, offers to feed him. ‘He may sense your anxiety,’ she says softly. After a moment's hesitation, I hand him over, but he remains inert. While the women fuss and fret around us, I plead with the Lord. He once spared the entire wicked nation at Moses's entreaty; surely he can do as much for an innocent child?
Jonadab, displaying more delicacy during the child's birth than during his conception, waits outside to take him to the great chamber where, according to custom, the king will present him to the elders. Abigail, however, declares that, first, he should see him alone and has us taken to his private chamber. Even when the chair jolts against the steps and I cannot keep from crying out, the baby stays silent. The king greets us and guides us to his bed, before kneeling beside it. I ask if he wants to hold his son, but he declines. I expect him to leave as soon as we’re settled, but he doesn’t stir, first for one day, then two, and then three, refusing both succour and sustenance. Ahinoam who maintains a constant vigil, whispers that he has shown no such solicitude for any of his other sons, not even Amnon, when he fell down the ramparts and lay insensible for two days. At different times and with differing emphasis, Grandfather, Abiathar and Joab plead with him to sit and sleep and eat and, at the very least, to drink a cup of water, but he rebuffs them all. Is his display of devotion designed to stir the Lord's compassion or to regain his favour? Are his tears for his dying child or for himself?
The Anointed Page 23
