‘I like that word, waxed,’ Emma said, ‘like the moon waxing. Abner knew he was losing, so he made overtures to David, suggesting that he and David get together, and he’d give David all of Israel.’
‘Not a bad deal,’ David Wheaton said.
But,’ Emma said, ‘David made a condition about making peace with Joab. He demanded the return of his first wife, Michal, Saul’s daughter, so they took her away from her husband, Phalti. He came along with her, weeping all the way.’
‘So somebody actually loved Michal,’ Sophie said.
Emma said, I feel sorry for Phalti. He and Michal were happy together. He loved her, and expected to spend the rest of his life with her, quietly, away from court politics. They were caught in the middle of a political ploy, and there wasn’t a thing they could do about it. They weren’t asked so much as a by your leave, and suddenly Abner and the king tore them apart.’
‘Did King David love Michal?’ Sophie asked.
Emma said, ‘It was David’s power play against Joab, rather than Michal.’
‘Right,’ Nik agreed. ‘But power came into it with Michal, too, didn’t it?’
‘I think power had a lot to do with it.’ Emma frowned. ‘I mean, look at our various politicians who get caught with their pants down. You said it yourself, Papa. You said it’s power, not sex.’
‘Really?’ Sophie asked. ‘Is it really nothing but power?’
‘Sometimes,’ Emma said. ‘Not always. It doesn’t have to be. Two people can love each other without one of them wanting to have power over the other.’
‘But David—King David—what do you think, Dave?’
David Wheaton laughed. ‘Do you think I’m a good one to ask, with my reputation and my wives? Six of one, half a dozen of the other. Meredith: power. For both of us. Abby: love. Myrlo: power. Marical: I loved Marical. Harriet: It was a mistake, a one-night stand. I wanted to be true to Marical. Harriet and I agreed that it would never happen again, but lo and behold, Jarvis. Elizabeth: your mother, Emma. We were in competition and that’s never good. Edith: power. Nothing but power. Sophie—’ He laughed tenderly. ‘Blessed Sophie.’ He put his arm around her and hugged her. ‘The power of love, maybe, and that’s something entirely different. But, back to David: it strikes me that when David called Michal back, he did it more for power than for love.’
‘It must have been strange for the women—the other wives,’ Emma speculated, ‘when Michal came back.’
‘A good scene.’ Nik picked up one of his soft black pencils and pulled his yellow pad toward him. ‘When Michal comes back it’ll be a great opportunity for the costume designer. Michal would dress in her most royal clothes, to show the other women that she’s the daughter of a king and the wife of a king. Brilliant colors, red, purple, green, embroidered in gold and silver.’
‘Maacah, who was Absalom and Tamar’s mother, was the daughter of a king, too,’ Emma reminded him. ‘She’d probably have put on her royal garments and maybe even a crown. The women would all have dressed their very best for Michal’s coming. Let me have the Bible, please, Nik. I think I remember a Psalm that—here it is.’ She read, ‘“Kings’ daughters were among thy honourable women: upon thy right hand did stand the queen in gold of Ophir. Hearken, O daughter, and consider, and incline thine ear; forget also thine own people, and thy father’s house.”’
‘Hey, I really like that,’ Nik said. ‘Perfect.’
‘The other wives must have been nervous about Michal’s coming.’
‘I never met Meredith,’ Sophie said; ‘But Marical is my friend.’
‘King David’s wives all lived together, Sophie,’ David Wheaton reminded her. ‘They already had their pecking order, and Michal’s coming would have shifted everything.’
‘Abigail?’ Emma asked.
Nik said, ‘I think Abigail would have been pretty secure in her position.’
Emma picked up the Bible and read on: ‘“So shall the king greatly desire thy beauty: for he is thy Lord; and worship thou him … The king’s daughter is all glorious within: her clothing is of wrought gold. She shall be brought unto the king in raiment of needlework: the virgins her companions that follow her shall be brought unto thee. With gladness and rejoicing shall they be brought: they shall enter into the king’s palace.”’ She looked up. ‘Abigail and Maacah might have felt secure, but it would really have been tough on the other wives.’
David laughed. ‘Maybe I was wise to marry at a time when polygamy is no longer permissible.’ Gently he tousled Sophie’s curly, taffy-colored hair.
‘You’re glad you married me, Davie?’ she asked.
‘Sophie, I adore you.’
‘That’s nice, but I think I’d rather be loved.’
‘I love you.’
‘And you want me?’
‘I want you.’
‘And I want you, too,’ Sophie said. ‘Lust and love don’t have to be two separate things. In my oven is a wonderful fresh peach pie, which I am just going to take out and bring in here. How about a slice, with cream?’
Nik smiled at Sophie. ‘You’re a marvel. We need a break.’
Sophie moved away from David and went into the kitchen.
Emma said, ‘Hey, Nik, aren’t you being much too hard on Michal?’
‘Are you sorry for her because she was passed around—’
‘Like a property,’ Emma said. ‘Yes.’
‘Em, sweet, women were property in those days. Not like today when women go to college. Women vote. Women handle their own money and have their own bank accounts. Did you know that not so long ago a man could marry a woman of property, divorce her, and keep all her property?’
‘What!’
‘Don’t you remember? Clemence Dane wrote that famous play about it, A Bill of Divorcement. It was a big hit, right after the First World War, I think. Women have come a long way in this century.’
‘Men, too?’ Emma asked.
‘Men, too. And hey, did you know that in the early years of this century an actor could not be buried in consecrated ground?’
Sophie pushed through the swinging door, bearing her fragrant pie. ‘Any ground Davie is buried in will automatically be consecrated.’
‘Don’t bury me yet, please.’
‘Not for hundreds and hundreds of years.’ Sophie passed them slices of pie, handed around a pitcher of cream.
‘So,’ David said, ‘David got Michal back, Abner gave him his kingdom—’
‘And everybody lived happily ever after?’ Sophie suggested.
Nik closed the Bible. No, Sophie. Joab killed Abner, because Abner had killed Joab’s brother, Asahel.’
David pulled Sophie onto his lap. ‘Revenge. It’s a dangerous, damaging emotion.’
‘After that’—Emma looked at her father, then picked up the Bible—‘Saul’s son Ishbosheth, the one Joab made king, was murdered in his sleep by two of his own men—’
‘Enough!’ Sophie pushed off David’s lap and slid to the floor. ‘I hate all this talk of killing and useless bloodshed. I hate war.’
‘So did David,’ Nik reassured her. ‘And in the end he made peace and became king of Israel and Judah, and united the kingdom.’
‘And how long did that last?’ Sophie demanded. ‘Enough. I have joined a class at a gym. I go and exercise. All this cooking and I am getting plump.’
Emma slowly turned the pages of the Bible. After David took Jerusalem, it was known as the city of David.’ Then she began to laugh, partly as a release, and she continued to laugh until Sophie asked, ‘What’s the joke?’
Emma gasped. ‘I don’t know why it strikes me as hilarious, but after King Hiram of Tyre sent David cedar logs and carpenters and stone masons to build him a palace in Jerusalem, David realized that God had indeed established him as king, and he took more concubines and wives and had more sons and daughters. The children born to him in Jerusalem were Shammuah, Shobab, Nathan, Solomon, Ibhar, Elishua, Nepheg, Japhia, Elishama, Eliada, and Eliphelet. An
d of the eleven of these, only Solomon really comes into the story.’ She burst again into laughter. ‘He leaves you in the pale, Papa.’
Bathsheba
And it came to pass, after the year was expired, at the time when kings go forth to battle, that David sent Joab, and his servants with him, and all Israel; and they destroyed the children of Ammon, and besieged Rabbah. But David tarried still at Jerusalem.
And it came to pass in an eveningtide, that David arose from off his bed, and walked upon the roof of the king’s house: and from the roof he saw a woman washing herself; and the woman was very beautiful to look upon.
And David sent and enquired after the woman. And one said, Is not this Bath-sheba, the daughter of Eliam, the wife of Uriah the Hittite?
And David sent messengers, and took her; and she came in unto him, and he lay with her …
And the woman conceived, and sent and told David, and said, I am with child.
II SAMUEL 11:1–5
At Port Clements Ben docked the Portia between a large white yacht and a small, functional fishing boat. Dogs ran up and down, barking in excitement. Sea gulls sat on pilings. Children chased the dogs. It was crowded and noisy after their nights of anchoring in solitary inlets.
Emma left the Portia and walked along the dock, lined on either side by boats of all kinds, until she found a pay phone. Five in the afternoon in Port Clements is eight in the evening in New York. Nik would probably not be home. She could leave a message with his answering service.
But he was there. “Nik.”
“Emma. What’s the matter?”
“Papa.”
“What—”
“I told you he had cancer—?”
“Yes.”
“Nik, he’s dying. I didn’t tell you how bad it was. I didn’t want to know how bad it was. He has only a few more weeks, Alice says. He wants to see you. Can you come?”
“Of course.”
“When can you leave?”
“Tomorrow. Tell me how to get to you.”
“I guess the quickest thing would be to fly to Vancouver, and then get a seaplane to Port Clements.”
“Okay,” Nik said. “Can I call you back?”
Emma looked at her watch. “I’m at a public phone booth on the dock. I could be back here in an hour and call you, if that would give you enough time.”
“Sure. I’ve just got to find out about flights. Talk to you in an hour.”
It was all very civilized. And Emma was shaking. Her right hand cradled her left, covering the finger where Nik’s rings had been. She had not told him about reading his David play, that, with her father, she had been reliving the past. No. She had wanted to cry out to him, “I’m terrified of airplanes! Be careful!” Flying was still not the way Emma automatically thought of travel.
Why hadn’t she urged him to take the train? Put off seeing him as long as possible. Alice had said a few weeks …
She raised her hands to her face, trying not to cry, then walked away from the phone booth.
When she returned to the Portia, Ben and Alice were peeling shrimp.
“Nik’s coming tomorrow. I’ve got to call him back in an hour to see if he was able to make plane reservations, so dinner may be a little late.”
“We’ll fix a shrimp curry,” Alice said. “Don’t worry about it. Go tell your father.”
Emma went to the pilothouse and found David and Abby playing double solitaire. There was no question that Abby was good for David.
When Emma told them, Abby said, “Then perhaps I’d better leave.”
“No,” David said, and reached across the small table for her hand.
“There’s an extra sleeping bag,” Emma said. “Nik can use that, and sleep up in the main cabin with Ben. The seat is more than long enough for two tall men.”
“Good,” David said. “That’s settled, then.”
“Darling.” Abby pressed his hand. “I’m going to have to leave in a few days. When Sophie comes, she’ll need the bed. And when everybody goes—and we all must go—then it will be your time with Alice. Your most special time.”
Emma left them and went to her bunk. Lay there on her back with her hands under her head, staring at the ceiling. Their love both warmed and pained her.
She looked at her watch. Fifty minutes before time to go back to the phone booth.
Nik’s pages were in the main cabin, and in the chart drawers. She did not need them. In a strange way Nik was more present with her in memory than he might be when he came and she was in his physical presence. They had both changed. Nik’s hair was shot with white, turning early, as dark hair often did.
The Nik of her thoughts had tousled black hair, and if it was longer than most men’s hair in the forties, she liked it that way, and seldom reminded him to go to the barber.
It had needed cutting the weekend she and Nik boarded the night train to Savannah after the show, and spent Sunday with Grandpa Bowman. They would get back on the sleeper that evening so that Emma would have time for a rest before the performance Monday evening.
They arrived in time to eat a large breakfast with Grandpa Bowman before church, and sat in the old, musty dining room, talking. Nik had brought his current scenes with him, and Grandpa Bowman read them eagerly, his big Bible beside him.
‘“The ark of God,”’ Grandpa Bowman read, ‘“whose name is called by the name of the Lord of hosts that dwelleth between the cherubims.”’
‘“The ark of God,”’ Emma repeated. ‘Bahama said it was a symbol. A metaphor for God.’
‘Yes,’ Grandpa Bowman agreed, ‘but portable shrines were common in those days.’
Nik shook his head, ‘Grandpa, sir, you know it was more than a portable shrine. It had intrinsic power. God’s power.’
‘And David, now that he was safe, and his kingdom established, wanted it back?’
‘Yes. He wanted it back. He was the anointed of God, and it was only proper that the ark be returned to Jerusalem. But in a way it’s peripheral to my play. In fact, I think it’s another play, just about the ark. It’s that important. It can’t be just a secondary scene.’
‘Your instinct is right.’ Grandpa Bowman pulled out his pocket watch, then heaved himself out of his chair. ‘You’ll have to put in Michal’s reaction to David’s dancing around the ark, won’t you? Now, children. I have to leave for church. If you want to wait for me, it’s cooler out on the porch.’
‘Nonsense, Grandpa, sir,’ Nik said. ‘We’re coming with you.’
‘… when at last David brought the ark into Jerusalem, into his city, the city of David, he danced before the Lord, honoring the Lord with his joy. He wore only a linen ephod as he danced, but he was not thinking of revealing his nakedness as he leaped before the Lord, he was fully rejoicing in his Creator.’ Grandpa’s voice rang with triumph. Then it was lowered.
‘And Michal, Sauls daughter, looked from her window and saw her husband dancing and she—oh, poor king’s daughter, poorer king’s wife—did not understand that where true joy is, there God is, and she despised David in her heart.
‘David did not see Michal and her mean-mindedness and he offered burnt offerings and peace offerings before the Lord, and he blessed the people, and gave to everyone bread and meat and wine. Then he returned to bless his household, and Michal, Saul’s daughter, came out to meet him, and poured her scorn on him: “How glorious was the king of Israel to day, who uncovered himself to day in the eyes of the handmaids of his servants.”
‘And David told Michal that his dancing was to honor the Lord. “I will play before the Lord,” he told Michal, “and the handmaids of whom you have spoken will honor me.”
‘Joyless Michal did not understand that joy honors the Lord. And she was barren for it.’
After church Emma and Nik cleaned up the breakfast dishes, then joined Grandpa Bowman on the porch. A mockingbird was singing in the chinaberry tree. It was still winter in New York, but there was the freshness of spring in Georgia, with new leav
es pushing off the old.
‘Grandpa,’ Emma asked, ‘did you imply that after that scene where Michal scorned David, they never made love again?’
‘That would be my reading of it,’ Nik said. ‘It wasn’t a good marriage, David and Michal’s. He was much happier with Abigail.’
‘And then all those other wives,’ Emma said. ‘When does Bathsheba come in?’
‘Soon. First I’ve got to get in some information about Nathan the prophet, who appears out of the blue, like so many characters in this story.’
Grandpa Bowman huffed slightly. ‘The Biblical narrator leaves out all nonessentials. Nathan comes when he’s needed.’
‘He isn’t a copy of Samuel. He’s much too cerebral. He isn’t one of those whirling-dervish-type prophets. But he was like Samuel in that he changed his mind, and attributed the change to God. When David had the ark safely in the city, he wanted to build a temple for it. He said it wasn’t suitable for him to live in a palace and for the ark of God to be in a tent. At first Nathan said that was a great idea, but then God spoke to Nathan and said no.’
‘Slow to understand, as always,’ Grandpa Bowman said. ‘God told Nathan to tell David that God wanted to have a people, a nation, for his own, and that God has never lived in a house, but has always traveled with his people. The entire universe is the home of the Lord. We need church buildings for our sakes, not God’s.’
Nik, as usual, had his Bible with him. ‘Nathan told David that God promised him that his dynasty would never end.’
‘A rash promise,’ Grandpa Bowman said. ‘But, then, God has never been known for playing it safe.’
Nik made a face. ‘That rash promise was one of the many reasons my father was an atheist. My mother said God kept his promise in Jesus. My father said Jesus didn’t have any children, so what was she talking about? It was one of their battlegrounds.’
‘God always keeps promises,’ Grandpa Bowman said, ‘but often in ways that are unexpected and surprising.’
It was a good visit. Emma was grateful that Nik had had a chance to see her grandfather in his own setting. After the play that evening they went to the Riverside Drive apartment to tell David and Sophie all about it.
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