by Angela Hunt
For an instant Sagira considered arguing that Ramla should stay, but perhaps it was time she learned to live with the man she had married. She needed a son, but would never have one if she made this man her enemy.
“Leave us, Ramla,” she said, hoping her voice was sufficiently regal to impress her husband.
Ramla gave Potiphar a killing look as she moved out of the room. As her footsteps faded, Sagira threw Potiphar her brightest smile, but apparently the old dogfish wasn’t hungry.
Potiphar lowered himself into a chair across from her. “I am glad to talk alone with you.” Obviously uncomfortable, he took a long, slow swallow, his Adam’s apple sliding up and down the wall of his throat as if it were made of words he could not bring forth.
Perhaps he needed help. “What would you like to tell me?” she asked, crossing her legs so her posture was less formal. “I am pleased to be your wife, Potiphar. I have heard many stories of your bravery.”
He shrugged at her words, then drew the back of his hand across his brow. “I am a man of war,” he finally said, resting his hands on his knees. “I do not know how to be a husband. Pharaoh’s favor was a complete surprise, and I must apologize that you were not better received.”
“I was well received by all but one.” Leaning forward, she looked up into his strained face. For the sake of the prophecy, she would win this man’s heart. “You, Potiphar, did not properly welcome your bride last night.”
A shudder shook him. He rose from his chair and turned to face the wall. “I will honor you as my wife,” he said, thrusting his hands behind his back. “But I have no desire to embrace you. You are a child, and yet a stranger to me.”
“Surely you want children. Every man wants children.” She stood and moved toward him until their shadows mingled on the wall. Even at this slight contact, Potiphar flinched.
“I never thought to have children. I am content to serve my king.”
She dropped her cool hand on his arm. “Every man needs an heir.” His muscles were firm under her palm, his waist trim, his legs sturdy beneath his linen kilt. Though three times her age, Potiphar was still a striking figure, a husband of whom she could be proud.
His skin seemed to contract beneath her touch, but he did not move away. “I thought I would leave my estate to Paneah,” he said, his throat working. “He has managed it so well—”
“You should not leave your estate to a slave when you could have a son of your own.” Carefully, tenderly, she lifted his hand and placed hers under it. His eyes widened at her boldness, then he tilted his head and examined her as he might have studied an intricate painting in the temple.
“You are…exceptional.”
“I am your wife, Potiphar, and I could love you if you’d let me,” she murmured, her voice a silken whisper in the quiet of the chamber.
She stepped closer and ran her free hand over the bronzed skin of his chest, feeling rippled scars beneath her fingers. Three, no, four rough welts lay under her hand; how many times had he been injured? She felt the whisper of his quickened breath on her cheek. Surely he would step into her arms—
She pressed her lips to his shoulder, awaiting his shuddering sigh of surrender, but Potiphar abruptly moved away. “I am sorry, my lady,” he said, his face and neck flooding crimson. “But duty calls me to the palace. If you need anything, call Paneah. I may be gone a few days.”
Before she could open her mouth to protest, Potiphar whirled and left her alone.
The next morning, Tuya tiptoed through the corridor outside the master’s chamber, hoping that Potiphar and Sagira had found happiness in each other’s arms. But a clattering crash from the chamber drew her upright, then she heard Sagira’s scream: “I don’t care what his duties are! He can’t leave me like this!”
Tuya peered around the corner. Ramla sat on the edge of Sagira’s bed, her arms folded and a dark look on her face. Both women frowned to see Tuya in the doorway, and the slave’s pulse quickened when she sensed the hostility in the room. These women, she told herself, had tried to send her away. Perhaps she should not have come into the house.
But she’d already been spotted. She stepped into the doorway and bowed her head. “Is there anything you need, Lady Sagira?”
“Have you forgotten how to make a proper bow before your mistress?” Ramla barked.
Tuya dropped to the floor and pressed her forehead to the cool tile. “Mistress,” she repeated, “is there anything you need?”
“No,” Sagira snapped, her voice a sharp stiletto in the quiet. “Wait—I will need a maid. Send Paneah to me so I can describe the sort of maid I want.”
Tuya nodded and rose to leave.
“Has your mistress dismissed you?” The priestess’s iron voice drizzled disapproval.
Tuya dropped to the floor again.
“Now you may leave,” Sagira said, her tone flat. “But send Paneah at once. Do not keep me waiting.”
Chapter Fourteen
Potiphar stayed away for a full ten-day week, then sent a message instructing Paneah to prepare a comfortable, separate chamber for Sagira and her maid. The instruction was not unusual, for most noble ladies lived in separate quarters from their husbands, but without being told the entire household knew that Potiphar had been less than enchanted with his new bride.
In her new chambers, Sagira fumed with frustration and embarrassment.
Again and again, Potiphar came home and left again, treating Sagira with the polite interest he might have displayed toward an esteemed visitor. Often he brought her a trinket, a piece of jewelry, or the latest court gossip which he shared over a breakfast tray, but he never returned to the house until night had fallen and Sagira had retreated to her room. On rising, she often heard his easy laughter in the stockyard as he checked the horses with Paneah, and occasionally she heard him tease Tuya in an almost paternal manner. Yet for her, his wife, he had nothing but insignificant conversation and the most casual of greetings.
Sagira’s temper rose to a flash point each time she thought of her husband’s disinterest, then she remembered the prophecy. She had to win his affection. Her father had been a coolly indifferent figure in her life, and it galled her to think her husband might prove to be as distant. But one way or another, she would bear a son. She had not studied the love lyrics of the ancient poets for nothing.
“Rehearse for me the song I will sing to Potiphar,” Sagira called to Ramla one afternoon as the women sat by the reflecting pool in Potiphar’s garden. Two servants had loaded a stand at Sagira’s right with fruit, flowers and wine; a harpist and fan bearer stirred the warm air in an effort to make their mistress’s afternoon a little more pleasant. The sight of the lotus-filled pool stirred Sagira with memories of playful days gone by, and for a moment she wished that Tuya, not Ramla, sat with her at the water’s edge. But Tuya kept a careful distance from both Sagira and Ramla.
Ramla opened a papyrus scroll and ran her finger along the colorful images as she read:
,!My god, my brother, my husband—
How sweet it is to go down to the lotus pond and do as you desire—
To plunge into the waters, and bathe before you—
To let you see my beauty in my tunic of sheerest royal linen,
All wet and clinging and perfumed with balsam!
I see my husband coming—
My heart is in joy, and my arms are opened wide to embrace him;
And my heart rejoices within me without ceasing—
Come to me, O my lord!
When I embrace you and your arms enlace me,
Ah, then I am drunk without beer!
O would that I were the ring on your finger,
So you would cherish me as something that adds beauty to your life!
“Stop,” Sagira commanded, emotion clotting her voice. Her husband did not cherish her, for she did not possess beauty enough to add to his life. Why should he long for a wife when he could feast his eyes on Tuya, whose beauty put all others to shame? Even t
he handsome Paneah possessed more beauty than Sagira did. No amount of perfume, cosmetics or fine clothing could disguise the fact that she was the plainest thing in Potiphar’s household. No wonder he despised her.
“You are pitiful.” Ramla’s icy voice intruded on Sagira’s thoughts. “Sitting in a gilded chair while you feel sorry for yourself.”
Sagira turned away. “I do not need you to help me feel worse.”
“I won’t flatter you now,” Ramla said, rising. She moved toward Sagira like an approaching vulture. “Years ago, your childish ego could not bear the truth. Your mother and I assured you of your beauty, your intelligence, your wit. That time is finished, Sagira, and yet you still yearn for childish coddling.”
“I do not!” Sagira blazed up at the priestess. “I am a wife, mistress of this house—”
“You are nothing here. The slave Paneah runs this house, for Potiphar does not trust you. Tuya pleases your husband more than you do, for I have heard them laughing together in the courtyard, and Paneah has become the son of Potiphar’s heart. You are good for nothing, Sagira, and yet you sit here, loving your wounds. A born whiner, all you ask for is a little neglect—”
“You’re wrong! I am going to do something about Potiphar!”
“Prove it.”
Ramla tossed the challenge casually, then sank gracefully back into her chair. Sagira looked away and bit her thumbnail. How could she do anything with a man as strong-willed as the captain of Pharaoh’s guards? Ramla was right, Potiphar didn’t trust her to even dispose of a troublesome slave. But if he saw her administrative and social talents on a small scale, perhaps he’d appreciate her. Then he’d spend time with her, just as he visited with Paneah whenever he came home.
She sat up and clapped her hands, then smiled when her handmaid came running. “Send the household scribe to me at once, and have a messenger ready to take a message to Potiphar at the palace,” she said, tossing her head so the weight of her wig fell back over her shoulders. “And send Paneah to me. Tell him to drop everything he is doing, for Potiphar is going to host a party.”
Ramla laughed when the girl had gone. “Do you truly think a party is going to win your husband’s heart?”
“It’s something I do well,” Sagira answered, bounding out of her chair with the first burst of energy she’d felt in weeks.
She wasn’t sure how Paneah managed to convince him, but Potiphar agreed to host a party, the first he had ever given. All of the greatest nobles in Thebes received invitations to the villa, and not one of them declined the opportunity to visit Potiphar’s fabled estate.
The celebration fell on a quiet day after an entire week of wind, and Sagira rejoiced to see the house look its best. Fresh flowers adorned each room, the braziers burned with incense, the perfumed cones of fat sat in orderly rows on a tray by the front porch. After making certain the house stood ready to receive its guests, she retreated to her chamber to make herself as beautiful as possible.
She had ordered new jewelry, for Potiphar’s treasure chests contained nothing worth wearing, so now the finest creations the jewelers of Thebes could provide adorned her neck, wrists, fingers and ears. Cunningly wrought in gold, silver and electrum, the ornaments dazzled her handmaid and even impressed Ramla as Sagira pirouetted in her dressing room.
“Be still and let us adorn your face as well,” Ramla said, pressing Sagira onto a stool before her dressing stand. The maid stood ready with kohl and ground red ochre to color Sagira’s lips.
Ramla studied Sagira’s face for a moment, then motioned for the maid to begin. “You will be so beguiling that Potiphar will forget his insane notions of not needing a wife.”
“He thinks me a child,” Sagira said, pouting so the maid could freely apply the lip color. “Tonight he will see a grown woman in his house.”
“He will see only you.” Ramla picked up the perfumed cone that would adorn the top of Sagira’s wig. She sniffed at the cone and nodded in approval. “With perfumed and oiled skin, you will win him,” she said, smiling. “Tonight you will have all the weapons of a woman at your disposal.”
Sagira studied her sparkling reflection in her bronze mirror, then closed her eyes. The image that had looked back at her was mature, sophisticated and as magnificently adorned as Pharaoh’s queen. Surely Potiphar would be impressed. If he was not, by night’s end, at least he would be drunk.
She nodded at the priestess. “Tonight, the old warrior will surrender to me.”
Yosef crinkled his nose as he and Tuya stood apart from the merrymakers in a doorway off the central reception room. Before them, in various stages of revelry, the most illustrious nobles of Pharaoh’s court were eating, drinking and singing. The guests had been drinking since their arrival at noon, and the sickly sweet odors of beer and perfume mingled in the hall. To counter the sour odors of sweat and beer, Tuya had placed garlands and fragrant flowers throughout the house, and to Yosef had fallen the task of securing enough jars and cups, bowls and vases of gold, silver and alabaster to lend an air of opulent gaiety.
“Potiphar’s house was lovely,” Tuya whispered, leaning toward Yosef’s ear. “Tonight I find it gaudy. I prefer the ordinary arrangement of things.”
Yosef nodded in wordless agreement as he surveyed the scene. Though he had long ceased to be surprised by the ostentatious Egyptians, his senses were overwhelmed by the abundance of fleshly pleasures in the room. An orchestra of thinly clad maidens played double-reed pipes, lutes, lyres and harps, while a dancing girl clad only in a bronze belt beat out rhythms on a rectangular tambourine as she whirled in front of the drunken guests.
The mood of the gathering had been formal and decorous when Potiphar and Sagira first greeted their guests, but the party had gathered momentum as the wine and beer flowed. Now it surged with raucous life in the tinkly rhythms of the slave girls. Those who chose to dance had progressed from slow, dignified posturings to wild gyrations. One dancer, a dark slave brought by one of the nobles, culminated her dance in a series of leaps, somersaults, back flips and hand springs. The delighted partygoers applauded with heavy hands and loud cries for more.
An army of serving maids circulated among Potiphar’s guests, plying the drunken nobles with food of every description. Servants wended their way through the crowd, refilling silver cups with pitchers of flavored beer and wine, while other slaves supplied disheveled guests with fresh floral garlands or paused to tidy up kilts that had slipped out of their proper positions.
Yosef thought he could almost measure the disintegration of the party by the speed with which the cones of perfumed fat had begun to drip down the persons of the formerly dignified guests. Only two participants at the party had kept their composure—neither Sagira nor Ramla had partaken of more than one cup of wine. Ramla sat apart from the company, her dark eyes surveying the group as if she measured and weighed their hearts, and Sagira contented herself with wandering through the crowd and overseeing the needs of her guests. But as the sun set and darkness came on, Sagira surprised the entire gathering by standing on a stool and clapping for attention.
“Hear me, oh guests of Potiphar, the appointed guard of Pharaoh!” she called, her voice ringing over the gathering. A silence, thick as wool, wrapped itself around the revelers. Secure in the limelight, Sagira lifted her hands and turned toward her husband, who leaned heavily on the arm of his chair.
“My husband!” she cried, clapping her hands over her head. “I have composed a poem for you!”
“Let’s hear it!” came the cry.
“A poem for Potiphar!” another voice called.
“Tell us!”
“Speak!”
Swaying like a palm tree in the desert, Sagira let the long cloak she had worn all night fall from her shoulders. She stood before the crowd in a sheer golden sheath as transparent as a clear sky. Yosef felt a blush burn his cheek. Embarrassed, he averted his eyes from Sagira’s slender figure and studied his master.
“Hurriedly scampers my heart,” Sag
ira recited, swaying in the pulsing rhythm of the room,
,!When I recall my love of you—
It does not allow me to go about like other mortals—
It seems to have been uprooted from its place.
It doesn’t even let me put on my tunic or even take my fan—
I am not able to paint my eyes or anoint myself with perfume.
‘Don’t linger thus! Get back to yourself!’ I say when I think of you.
‘Don’t cause me silly pain, O my heart!’
Just sit cool and he’ll come to you, and everyone will see!
Let not people say of me, ‘There’s a girl fallen hopelessly in love!’
Stand firm when you think of him, O my heart! Don’t bound about so!
Wild applause met the finish of her poem, and Sagira stepped down from the stool and prostrated herself at Potiphar’s feet, her hands on his ankles. Yosef could not hear if she said anything to the master, but amid the wild hooting Potiphar stood, lifted Sagira to her feet and covered her lips with his in a rough kiss that set the crowd to cheering. Sagira blushed and pulled away, suddenly modest and coy, and in response the master swept his bride into his arms as the guests raised their cups and cheered his prowess. In the rhythm of the drunken throng’s escalating roar, Potiphar winked and lurched from the dais where he had been sitting while Sagira tightened her arms about his neck. While the others laughed and lifted their cups, the party’s unsteady host and hostess departed the hall for the privacy of the master’s chamber.
Yosef and Tuya exchanged glances. It had taken a party and two hin of wine to accomplish it, but Sagira had finally won her husband.
Sagira
And Yosef was a goodly person, and well favoured. And it came to pass after these things, that his master’s wife cast her eyes upon Yosef; and she said, Lie with me.
Genesis 39:6b–7
Chapter Fifteen
