The Sinners and the Sea

by Rebecca Kanner

  Though I cannot find them, I have found what I think are human droppings on the floor. I leave meat out; I know that if the manlike beasts come upon this food while wandering outside their cage, they will not eat it. I place animal skins full of water around the ark. When I find these skins empty, I thank the God of Adam. My sons are still alive. Or at least two of them are.

  • • •

  One day I come upon Noah kneeling on his sleeping blanket. His eyes are closed, but his lips are not moving. He is not praying. He is yearning.

  I kneel beside him. He does not acknowledge me right away, but then, after a few breaths, he says, “I miss them.” I do not ask of whom he speaks. He is speaking of the sinners.

  I cover his shaking hand with my shaking hand. “I know.”

  Later, I lie awake on my own sleeping blanket, listening to an owl hooting, a large cat roaring, and the steady chorus of insects rubbing their wings together. I think not only of Shem, Japheth, and all of the sinners but also of Herai, and I begin to cry. I get up.

  I walk to the ramp, hiding the light from my lamp behind my tunic. Light is something Noah can still see. In my other hand is my knife. I descend slowly, grateful for Noah’s snoring, the sounds of the animals, and the pelting of the rain against the deck, which drown out the squeaking of the ramp beneath me. Or perhaps I no longer have enough flesh to make the ramp creak.

  Herai is sleeping on the floor by the cage of the rough-skinned beasts with the horns upon their noses. I crouch beside her and put the knife behind me, where it will not scare her. Quietly, I say her name. She opens her eyes, then immediately shuts them and turns her head away. I brush her hair back from her face to look at her. “Herai.”

  She squints up at me as if staring into the sun. Her pupil takes up half of the eye she is able to keep open. I set the lamp behind me next to my knife and ask if she is well.

  She smiles. “Mwahfah,” she says, and points to herself. She takes my hand and places it on her belly, which is no bigger than it has ever been. Yet I do feel warmth beneath my palm.

  “Yes,” I say, “a healthy child grows here.”

  I am startled by the loud, strange sound of her laugh. I had not expected to hear it. I quickly place a finger on her lips to quiet her. She brings my hand back to her belly. I have never seen her so happy. She is not sad that she has been banished to the bowels of the ark, or that she may have lost any chance of ever being with Ham.

  She hits her chest. “Mwahfah!” she says again.

  I am surprised to feel myself smile too. My face has not moved other than to speak or strain against my many aches in a long time. We clasp hands. She laughs again, and this time I join her. Our laughter grows wilder, until soon it takes hold of our bodies. We are elated. We wave our arms. I lose my balance, but she has hold of my hands and keeps me from falling. The male rough-skinned beast snorts, which causes us to laugh even harder.

  I point to my chest. “Grandmother,” I say. Then I think of Javan and wish I had not said it.

  But Herai smiles. She points at me and says, “Grawdmwahfah!”

  Her happiness has almost made me forget the true purpose of my visit. I reach for the knife and hold it up for her to see. It is hard for me to believe that I am arming a girl against one of my own sons. If it were Ham who wished her ill, I would not risk any harm that might come to him from the knife. But it is not Ham.

  “I hope you will not need this,” I say.

  She pushes it away and pulls her tunic up. There, sheathed in a belt he must have given her, is Ham’s dagger. I am glad to see my favorite son has not deserted her, despite the pain she and Shem have surely caused him. I pray that if Herai is ever in danger, she will be able to reach the dagger quickly enough to defend herself.

  I squeeze her hand and say good night. It does not matter that it might be noon. For us it is always night. Unlike all the others, though, this night is a good one.

  As I return to my blanket, Noah is still snoring. I cannot help but be grateful for the loss of his sight and hearing. These losses have brought me a small measure of freedom.

  When I wake Noah is squatting beside me. “The middle boy must return to the deck to guard the ark,” he says. “Do not leave any more food for him.”

  “I do not . . .” I trail off before the lie fully leaves my tongue.

  “What reason does he have to rejoin us if he already has meat in his belly?”

  “I am afraid he would rather starve.”

  “Be afraid for yourself, wife. Creaking is one of the sounds that have gotten louder to my ears instead of softer. In less than these forty days that we have been on board the ark, the ramp has gone silent beneath you.”

  “I am not hungry.” This is true. Though I am starving, I’m not hungry. The jagged pitching of the ark tosses my stomach even more violently than it tosses the rest of me.

  Noah frowns. “From now on, you will eat all of the meat I give you instead of hiding it in the sleeves of your tunic.”

  I must admit that I am moved. With this demand, he has said what he otherwise would not be able to: I love you.

  The power of meat does not stop there. Though we have an ark full of it, Japheth is afraid of God and will not kill a single animal. Only a few meals after I stop leaving meat for him, he emerges from wherever it is he was hiding and comes—palms up—to Noah.

  “You have returned,” I cry, as if he has been on a long journey. He has sealed the skin where not long ago there was an ear. I position myself on the unwounded side of his head and embrace him. I wonder if our wounds look alike. The scar where my head knocked against the hull during the drowning of the nephil cannot be easy to gaze upon, but at least I kept my ear. Still, I imagine that we look like members of the same clan. Will this somehow serve as a bond between us?

  He does not put his arms around me, but he does not push me away. He says nothing more of my mark or demonry.

  Though it has been too long for me to be able to smell his wound, I do. It is more nauseating and sweet than leather being tanned over a flame. I console myself that the agony he felt as he burned his own flesh likely was not as great as when Shem cut off his ear. Japheth surely prefers to be the one wielding the weapon, even when the person he wields it against is himself.

  “Father,” he says, “please, I am hungry.”

  I hurry to get a bowl. Though it has not yet been forty days since we have been on the ark, our stores have dwindled, and Noah has begun meting out our food. He does not greet our son with happiness, but he places at least two rations inside Japheth’s bowl. “You will never again call your mother a demon,” he says.

  Japheth flinches at the memory. “I never will, Father. Please forgive me.” This is as close as he will come to saying he is sorry, and I am not the one he says it to. Still, I am glad to hear his words.

  As Japheth eats, the scar tissue tugs at the edge of his face. The flesh beyond his cheek is hard to look at, and the expressions that contort his face take what is left of his handsomeness. He hardly chews the lentils and meat before gulping them down. Twice he chokes and spits into his hand. Then he hurls the food as far back into his throat as he can. When he swallows, his eyes bulge as if the meat were a knife.

  I wonder how I could let this happen to my son. And yet I think that if he tries to hurt Herai, I will let even worse harm come to him.

  CHAPTER 41

  A DECEPTION

  Noah is the only one who knows how to tie and untie the mysterious knots our stores are sealed with. If the God of Adam really has deserted us, He did not miss the opportunity to show us that our lives are in Noah’s ancient hands first.

  But God did not give Noah the power to provide Shem with what he most wants. Even after Shem emerges and eats the double portion of meat Noah gives him, he is hungry. He needs to be held. He puts his head against what little is left of my breasts. Though Japheth eats with his head bowed, out of the corners of his eyes, he looks at Shem and me with disgust.

  Ona
eats apart from us, but we know Noah gives her large portions. Whenever Noah returns from her chamber, there is still meat in the bowl. Noah divides it among us. Zilpha’s only task aboard the ark is to bring whatever remains to Herai. Noah and Japheth always eat all of their meat and lentils, leaving nothing. Shem rarely leaves anything either.

  One day when Zilpha has almost finished her ration, I say her name and stare sharply at the last few lentils in her bowl. She is small and rarely exerts herself. Surely she can spare something for a girl she calls “my sister.”

  The faint smile comes over her face. It hardly moves her mouth, but it turns the corners of her eyes up a hair’s width. “I must keep up my strength so I can help my second cousins onto the ark,” she says, and tips the bowl so the last lentils fall into her mouth.

  She pours Ham’s leftovers onto mine to bring to Herai. Noah has given us each a piece of dried fruit. Zilpha takes the halves of the dates that Ham and I have saved for Herai.

  “Leave them,” Noah says.

  “Herai needs fruit,” I say.

  Zilpha seizes the opportunity to disobey Noah. She hurries off to bring the lentils and dates to Herai. To ease the injury to Noah’s pride, I pretend he has given her his permission. “Thank you, good husband.”

  Shem does not like to hear the women’s names. He slinks away, no doubt thinking of how cruel and unfair the world has been to him. Neither Ona nor Herai will let him come near. Herai guards the little life in her belly with both hands, and I am certain she would not hesitate to use Ham’s dagger if she felt that her child were in danger.

  “I have not decided whether the adulteress can stay,” Noah says, gazing steadily ahead at the inner wall of the ark. He does not look at us, and I am afraid he means what he says. “It is probably a waste to feed her.”

  “You will repopulate the world with one child?” Ham asks. “Who will the child mate with? Himself?”

  Zilpha returns from bringing food to Herai. “I have felt Ona’s belly,” she says. “Three children live there.”

  Hush, child!

  “If Ona does not come into better spirits,” Zilpha continues, “all three will be born into eternal sadness. Perhaps they will even die. We should have told Ona that it is Japheth’s seed in Herai’s belly.”

  Noah’s eyebrows smack together in the center of his forehead. He lifts his staff and bangs it hard against the floor. Zilpha is cruel to use the word “should” when speaking to Noah. “The adulteress cannot stay on board the ark,” he says.

  If Herai dies, I will blame Zilpha as much as Noah.

  Zilpha’s face, as usual, is still. Is she pleased that Noah wants to cast Herai overboard? Perhaps she wants all of her husband’s attentions.

  Ham is the only one I can trust. Ham and myself. “I do not want to do it, husband,” I say, “but I will. We must do whatever is necessary to bring God’s favor upon us once again.”

  Noah narrows his eyes at me so that they are slits too small to see into. But he does not want to admit that I might question his decision or disobey him. Especially not in front of Zilpha. “Very well,” he says.

  • • •

  I wait until the storm grows wild, until cages fly across the floor and sharp blades of rain divide the darkness into tiny pieces. Flashing lightning, booming thunder. Herai is wrapped in her sleeping blanket, securely tucked in with the manlike beasts. I have taken her tunic. It lies on the ground beside me as I straddle one of the seven ewes. I hold the meat knife out to Ham. Though we have no light, I am certain he knows it is there between us. But he does not take it. “There is no other way,” I say.

  The ewe fusses beneath me and begins to cry.

  “Quickly, son. It is cruel to hesitate.”

  I feel the tip of the blade slide away, through my fingers, as he takes it from me. A mother does not need light to know when her son is quivering. I hope my son’s hand will be firm enough for the task.

  I squeeze the ewe between my legs and force her jaw open. “Steady,” I tell Ham.

  He grasps the ewe’s tongue with one hand, and with the other, he slices it from her throat. I hear the cleanness of the cut. If Japheth were with us, he would be envious of Ham’s skill.

  The ewe thrashes beneath me. I press her jaw together to minimize the blood we will have to clean up. “I will keep hold of her. Do away with her tongue,” I tell him.

  Ham’s footsteps move off toward the lion cage. There is scuffling that ends as quickly as it began, then the wet, satisfied sound of chewing.

  I wrap Herai’s tunic around the ewe, and Ham and I carry the struggling animal up to the second level. We do not take the ramp all the way to the deck until lightning has flashed and then left the world dark once again. We need as much time in the dark as possible. When Ham trips over his feet, I summon all of my strength to push him onward.

  “Who goes there?” Japheth demands. I see the light of his lantern flickering through the rain. Ham rushes the animal to the side of the ark and throws her into the waves crashing below.

  “It is done,” I tell Japheth with what is left of my breath. “The ark is rid of evil.”

  Japheth’s lantern moves toward us. “The lightning will show me if you have truly expelled the adulteress.”

  “Get Noah,” I tell Ham.

  Japheth and I lean against the wall of the deck. I say, “Hopefully, God will leave some righteous girl alive so that she may bear you sons.”

  He does not reply. Or maybe the rain cloaks his voice. But then he asks, “And what if He does not?”

  Now it is my turn to be silent. If he is feeling remorse, I do not want to lessen it.

  “Then I will take Ona for a wife,” he says.

  “You cannot take your brother’s wife unless he . . .”

  Lightning cuts open the veil of black over the sea. In the frothing water below, Herai’s tunic with a body thrashing wildly inside it is visible for less than a breath. Long enough for Japheth to see it.

  “Now the ark is almost rid of evil,” he says.

  It pains me to think of what an attractive child he was, strong, with big yellow-flecked eyes. Somehow he never noticed neighbors staring at him. He only noticed them adoring Shem. “Do you want your father to cast you out as Adam did Cain? God has commanded that your father and his three sons journey to the new world. He will not take only two.”

  When he does not respond, I am overtaken by two urges. I want to smack him, and I want to cradle him to me and ask forgiveness for whatever I have done to make him so hateful. I reach for him.

  He knocks my hand away. “Keep your embraces. You have given your other sons all but the smallest crumb of your affection. That is fine, I will take what affection I want myself. I will have Ona.”

  “And will you provide for Shem’s children when they are born?”

  Again he does not answer. We are silent while we wait for Ham to return with Noah. When they approach, Japheth announces, “The adulteress is gone,” as proudly as if it is he who has gotten rid of her. “One more sinner has been fed to the sea.”

  “Now God will bless us once again,” Noah says. He sounds more hopeful than certain.

  CHAPTER 42

  DAY 41

  Usually, we squat and listen to the rain pounding the deck while we eat. But today there is a new sound coming from above.

  “Do you hear that?” Ham asks.

  “What?”

  “Nothing.”

  “Boy,” Noah says, “keep quiet if you have nothing to say.”

  “I hear nothing from above. The rain has stopped.”

  Shem opens the hatch. First water, then gray light, spills down upon us. Though it hurts my eyes to look at it, I cannot look away; I am afraid it will disappear if I do. I reach my hand into the daylight and try to grab it in my fist.

  “Come on,” Shem says, hesitating. For half a breath no one moves, and then Japheth hastens up the ramp to the deck. We follow, stumbling blindly into the light and then to the edge of the deck. W
e look at the sea, the one God has emptied of everything except us.

  But the sea isn’t empty at all. Rafts of half-dead bodies, with tiny morsels of life left inside them, float below.

  How have they outlived the Nephilim? They could drink rainwater, but what did they eat?

  “Hello,” Shem calls to a woman who has lost most of her hair. She lies on a raft holding a blue, motionless baby to where her tunic has fallen away from her breast. “Come closer.”

  “Please, you must take my child.”

  It is not the child Shem wants, and the woman has no paddle or rudder with which to come closer. Our rope would reach only half the distance between us, and only with a strong wind behind it. And now there is no wind. When Shem leaves to look for more women on the other side of the ark, the woman begins to scream.

  My eyes are adjusting to the gray pallor of the new world, and I notice that the birds have lost their color. As if they were bleached by the dullness of the light.

  Noah is looking into the sea at the sinners. “They are not gone. They are not gone.” He snorts, happy that he is a preacher again. “Behold, children of the God of Adam!” he cries, throwing open his arms. “It is not too late for you. Proclaim your love for the Lord.”

  Japheth turns his angry gaze from the sea to Noah. His face is so flushed, it looks swollen. “The sinners have not been destroyed.”

  Without taking his eyes off the sea, Noah replies, “God pauses between the rains and the worst of the flooding—the true flood. He gives the sinners one last chance.”

  This chance looks quite small, unless we are going to throw down the rope.

  Noah raises his voice so it rings out over the waters: “Repent!”

  “Old man,” Japheth addresses his father, “I must kill these abominations myself, since your God has forgotten them, along with us.”

  Noah cheerfully thwacks his staff against the deck near Japheth’s feet. “God has not forgotten us.” He raises his staff heavenward. “The rain stopped, as He promised it would.”