two
Miriam picked up her midwife’s basket. “Be sure to let me know if your wife feels feverish or if she starts bleeding heavily.”
“Are you sure you won’t spend the night?” Simon the Dyer asked. “I heard Matins chime a while ago, and it is Wednesday.”
“Merci, but non.” She smiled at the new father. “I expect there are still people about, even at this late hour. And I expect that my husband is among them.”
Miriam remembered the warning against demons from Tractate Pesachim:One should not go out alone at night on Wednesday and the Sabbath because the demon Agrat bat Machlat goes abroad with eighteen myriads of destroying angels.
But the text continued with how the sage Abaye later encountered Agrat and, because of his Torah learning, was powerful enough to forbid the demon from passing through populated areas. Troyes, one of the biggest cities in France, should be safe.
If it had been winter, or the weather bad, she might have accepted Simon’s offer, since the dyer lived at the far western side of Troyes, near the Vienne Creek. But during the Hot Fair, Count Thibault made sure the city streets, especially those between the fairgrounds and the Jewish Quarter, were well lit and patrolled by his men. Merchants thus felt safe to conduct business late into the night, with the Jewish ones staying up to study as well.
“I’ll ask Cresslin to walk you home.” Simon gestured to one of the men praying with him for a safe delivery. “He lives the closest to the Old Synagogue.”
“Merci,” she said. “I’ll be back tomorrow afternoon.”
Once the courtyard gate closed behind them, Cresslin turned to Miriam. “So Simon finally has a son. Did he say anything about you performing the circumcision, or do you think he’ll want Avram to do it?”
Miriam sighed. She’d been a mohelet for almost four years, but Judah had been right when he said that she could wait twenty years and perform a thousand circumcisions, yet some men would still complain that brit milah was a man’s mitzvah. “Dyers like Simon must have good relations with all cloth merchants, especially foreign ones who are less accepting of me.”
“I suppose your doing a brit at the New Synagogue during fair season would upset the foreigners,” he said. “But they will have to accept a woman eventually; Avram won’t live forever.”
Before Miriam could reply, she was distracted by a disturbance ahead of them. “What’s that yelling?”
“Wait here. I’ll see what the trouble is.”
Cresslin bolted down the street while Miriam slowly followed. He had only been out of sight for a few moments when she saw him running back. Except that when he grew closer, she could see that it wasn’t Cresslin at all, but her husband, Judah.
He grabbed her hand. “We’ve got to get Eliezer home right away. I’ve already sent for the doctor.”
“Eliezer?” Miriam gasped. “Where is he? What happened?”
“They’ve probably gotten him to the fairgrounds by now. He arrived a little while ago, at the Croncels Gate, so ill that he could scarcely stay on his horse. When the guards realized who he was, they sent to the New Synagogue for help. I happened to be there, thank Heaven.”
Miriam had to run to keep up with Judah, but she wished they could have gone faster. “What’s wrong with him? Is he sick or is he injured?”
“I didn’t see any injuries, but that doesn’t mean he has none.” He pointed up the road. “There he is now.”
Miriam saw two men supporting another between them, slowly walking up rue de la Fanerie toward the old city. A fourth man carried a large saddlebag.
“The four of you can carry him,” Miriam shouted, tying up her skirt and grasping her basket tightly. “I’ll get Rachel.”
She ran past the convent of Notre Dame, crossed the bridge, and soon reached her family’s courtyard. Her heart beating wildly, she banged on her younger sister’s front door.
Where are the servants? Are they deaf?
By the time Rachel’s elderly maidservant called out, “Who’s there,” Salomon had rushed to the door to meet Miriam, plying her with questions. But Miriam raced desperately up the stairs, only to nearly crash into Rachel on the landing outside her bedroom.
Before Miriam could catch her breath, Rachel cried out, “Can’t anyone get some sleep around here? Why are you running around in the middle of the night on Wednesday? Have you been attacked by demons?”
“Quickly now, put on your cloak.” Miriam hurried into her sister’s room and retrieved the garment. “Eliezer is in Troyes, and he’s ill.”
Rachel stared at her for a moment, bleary-eyed. Then she grabbed her cloak in one hand and Miriam’s arm in the other. “Take me to him. Immediately.”
The maidservant was still standing at the gate, waving the shoes Rachel had forgotten, as Troyes’ doctor, Moses haCohen, caught up with the two sisters and their father at the end of the street. A moment later, turning the corner, Rachel could make out the shadowy figures approaching in the distance and, ignoring whatever she might step in, bolted toward the man she loved.
The next afternoon, Rachel’s voice rose in dismay as she refilled her husband’s wine cup. “You’re actually planning to pay the ransom?” It was all she could do to keep from screaming. He’d barely made it home alive, and now he wanted to put himself in danger again?
Eliezer helped himself to another slice of lamb. “I vowed an oath that I would return with food and supplies worth twenty-five dinars.”
“Twenty-five dinars? I thought the standard ransom around the Great Sea was thirty.”
He squeezed her hand under the table. “Luckily Geoffrey doesn’t appear to know that.”
Rachel had waited impatiently while her husband slept through breakfast and morning services, and now their entire family crowded around the table to hear what had happened. Shemiah’s eyes opened wide at his father’s adventure with bandits in the Forest of Burgundy, but Rachel only felt grateful beyond measure that he’d managed to escape and come home to her.
“Surely an oath given under such duress can be annulled by the beit din.” She appealed to her father. “He would have been killed otherwise.”
“The only reason bandits and pirates don’t kill Jews as they do their other prisoners is because we pay ransom.” Eliezer took her hand. “We must pay it, Rachel. Otherwise we’ll be setting a terrible precedent. Besides, Geoffrey kept at least twenty-five dinars worth of jewels.”
“I don’t care about the money. You were captured in Burgundy, so Duke Odo must indemnify our losses.” She looked up at Eliezer, her eyes pleading. “Please don’t go back there.”
Salomon turned away from his daughter’s display of concern for her husband. One of the reasons the Troyes fairs were so popular, and thus so successful, was that if any merchants were attacked in another province on the way Count Thibault would prohibit anyone from there to trade at the fairs unless the sovereign made restitution.
“Eliezer isn’t expected to return until the end of the Hot Fair,” Salomon said. “Maybe Geoffrey’s gang has harassed enough merchants that by then Duke Odo will have sent some knights to drive them from his land.”
Eliezer shook his head. “Geoffrey has plenty of his own men, and if Odo were going to arrest them, he would have done so by now. Geoffrey isn’t a bad sort, actually, although I wouldn’t mind seeing some of his men swinging from the gallows.”
Salomon stroked his beard in thought. “Let me remind you of the discussion between Rabbi Meir and his learned wife Beruria in the first chapter of Tractate Berachot.”
Eliezer immediately began quoting it.
“Certain brigands in Rabbi Meir’s neighborhood used to trouble him so greatly that he prayed for them to die. Beruria, his wife, said to him: What is the reason for your prayer? He replied: Because it is written (in Psalms), ‘Let sinners cease (from the earth).’ ”
Rachel knew the text as well and chose this point to interrupt him. “Then Beruria said:Is ‘sinners’ written? Rather ‘sins’ is written. And
further, look at the end of the verse, ‘And they are wicked no more.’ Once their sins cease, they will no longer be wicked. So pray instead that they repent and be wicked no more. He prayed for them, and they repented.”
Eliezer frowned at his father-in-law. “You can’t mean that I should just pray for Geoffrey and his men to repent?”
“But it was your idea that the highwaymen should charge merchants for safe passage through the forest,” Judah said.
Miriam leaned forward eagerly. “Now you must find out how large a bribe Odo will need to leave Geoffrey’s men alone. Once you arrange it, they can become toll takers instead of bandits.”
“And you will have done a great service for all the merchants traveling to Troyes from the south,” Salomon said.
Eliezer paused. He’d been desperate when he made that suggestion. Now that he was home, did he really want the bandits rewarded instead of punished? But Beruria was right, and he sighed in resignation. “I expect Geoffrey can earn more money this way than as a thief.”
Rachel scowled. “What’s the difference? Most toll takers are no better than thieves anyway.”
“Now that we’ve agreed.” Eliezer locked eyes with Rachel. “You see why I must keep my oath.”
Her gazed shifted between Shemiah and baby Rivka, whose lives would be jeopardized if he broke his oath. She nodded slowly. “This must all be in place before the Hot Fair closes. The sooner we get your jewels back, the sooner I can sell them.” She continued planning, speaking to no one in particular. “We’ll sell the alum and arrange for the ransom with some men-at-arms to guard it. Then we’ll take it to Geoffrey.”
“Not you,” Eliezer said. “It’s too dangerous for a woman.”
Rachel smiled sweetly, but there was steel in her eyes. “I’m not letting you out of my sight, not after all the nights I spent worrying about you instead of sleeping.”
Salomon stood up and put a hand on each of their shoulders. “Hire some extra men, and Rachel can go with you as far as that inn at the forest’s edge. You shouldn’t need more than a day to pay your ransom and explain the duke’s terms to Geoffrey.”
“And if you haven’t returned to the inn by souper.” Rachel shook her knife at him, her eyes smoldering. “I’ll hire an army to bring you back.”
Eliezer nodded and returned her passionate gaze. Through all his travels he missed Rachel and their marriage bed almost painfully, and he knew she’d be sharing it far more willingly if they were in agreement.
Besides, the thought of going back into that forest alone terrified him.
Eliezer sold his alum quickly and had less trouble than he’d anticipated making a deal with Duke Odo’s chamberlain. Meanwhile Rachel arranged sufficient credit to pay for twenty-five dinars worth of provisions and men to accompany them. Eliezer protested again when he saw her packing swaddling for little Rivka, but Rachel insisted the baby was coming—their daughter wasn’t weaned yet.
Under other circumstances, their short trip to the travelers’ inn would have been a pleasant diversion. But it seemed that far too soon the moment Rachel had been dreading arrived. While the cocks were still crowing, she watched helplessly from the gate as Eliezer, his guards, and their carts disappeared into the dangerous dark forest. Long afterward, she stood there, staring at the empty road in the growing light.
“Mistress, please . . . you must come inside. Breakfast is almost over,” the serving maid announced, jostling Rachel from her vigil.
“Of course. Merci,” she murmured, reluctantly following the girl inside.
With little Rivka sleeping peacefully through her morning nap, Rachel brought out her father’s Talmud commentary to study while she waited. But try as she might, her mind wouldn’t focus on the text. What is Eliezer doing? Has he met Geoffrey yet? How soon will he be back? She tried to feel confident that Geoffrey would be grateful for their help, tried to ignore the terrible fear that once he had his supplies, he’d kill Eliezer without a second thought.
She paced the inn’s main room, taking in the well-worn tables and benches, the long counter littered with pitchers and mugs, the twin cabinets filled with more cracked and chipped dishes than whole ones, and the large stone hearth that was mostly coals on this warm summer morning.
Everything looked exactly the same as the last time she’d been here two years ago. And exactly the same as the first time she’d stayed here, four years before that.
She sighed. It was now six years since Eliezer’s father and brother died outside Prague, six years since she and Eliezer brought the two men’s effects back to Arles. Until then she’d never realized there was such a large world outside Troyes. Of course she knew that merchants came to the fairs from many faraway places, and she, like other Jews, prayed daily for the rebuilding of Jerusalem. But to travel so far herself—who would have imagined such a thing?
To distract herself from Eliezer’s fate, Rachel let her thoughts roam back to those innocent days during their second year of marriage. The inn’s salon was warm and, half-dozing, Rachel settled into her memories. Back then she’d been more excited than nervous when they’d left at the Hot Fair’s close, baby Shemiah on her hip, one cart loaded with woolen cloth and the other with casks of Papa’s wine.
It had been difficult saying adieu to Papa; his eyes looked so sad and his face was creased with worry. But she’d fought back tears and hugged him tight. Eliezer was her husband; to be separated from him for months would have been agony.
Riding through the forest on her hired palfrey had been pleasant, and the gentle movement kept little Shemiah content in her lap. Sleeping in the forest was both exciting and scary, and when they reached the Saône River, where their things were loaded onto barges, the water appeared too gentle to be dangerous. Still, she gave a prayer of thanks that Joheved had taught her how to swim.
Her anxiety began when they arrived in Lyon, where the mighty Rhône River joined the Saône. Here the current was much swifter, faster than a man could run. But Eliezer assured her that the river was only treacherous in the spring. She squeezed his hand and kept her fears to herself; after his father’s drowning, Eliezer might be more frightened than she was.
Indeed, after only a few days on the Rhône, the river’s constant pull was rather soothing. The ever-changing scenery fascinated her—vast forests interrupted by vineyards, fields of grain, fruiting orchards, and small villages. Eliezer preferred to study Talmud, and their son’s lengthy naps provided plenty of time for her to join him. Rachel was almost disappointed when, two weeks later, they disembarked in her husband’s hometown.
If Eliezer was shocked at his mother’s appearance, he said nothing to Rachel. Of course Flamenca was in mourning, having lost both a son and husband, but Rachel scarcely recognized the plump and rosy-cheeked matron who’d attended their wedding the previous year. Flamenca was a shattered old woman: her hair grey, her face wrinkled, her thin hands lined with veins. The woman who had danced so joyously now walked haltingly.
As soon as Eliezer’s mother saw him, she burst into tears, and he began to cry as well when they embraced. Little Shemiah elicited more weeping, and Rachel gulped in alarm as she considered that Eliezer might now be the head of his family, responsible for supporting all of them. But her anxiety eased when Eliezer’s sisters arrived. Eleanor, the eldest, was obviously the one in charge.
“We have ten days until Rosh Hashanah,” Eleanor declared. “That gives us time to decide what merchandise my husband will take to Sepharad and what you will take to Maghreb.”
Eliezer gasped. “I’m going to Maghreb?”
Her husband Netanel nodded. “And if the proper ships land in Arles this week, we should be prepared to leave as soon as a good wind permits.” He turned to Eliezer and explained, “No ships sail in the winter; it’s too stormy and the sailors can’t see enough stars through the clouds to navigate.”
Standing next to her husband, Rachel tried to stifle her surprise. Not only would they be spending Yom Kippur at sea, but a jour
ney to Maghreb and back would prevent them from returning to Troyes for the Cold Fair. She felt her excitement and anticipation growing. Ships didn’t sail all winter, so they wouldn’t be home until after Passover.
Eleanor eyed her brother sternly. “Netanel has spent several years establishing his business contacts in Sepharad. Papa’s associates were in Tunis, and he had just started to turn that territory over to Asher when . . .” Her chin began to quiver and she could no longer speak.
“I understand.” Rachel stood up tall. “Our family mustn’t lose such valuable connections. Eliezer and I will travel to Tunis and assure your father’s clients that nothing has changed.”
“You’re taking the baby?” Flamenca asked. “But I was expecting you to stay with us.”
“Wherever I need to travel, Rachel and Shemiah come with me,” Eliezer replied. Now his voice was firm.
Rachel sighed with relief. It wasn’t just a matter of preventing their separation. Eliezer had almost no commercial experience, while she had been partners with Miriam’s mother-in-law in a jewelry business for years. Without Rachel’s expertise, Eliezer would be at the mercy of the sophisticated Maghreb merchants.
She and Eliezer continued to present a united front to his family until Shabbat. They were sitting at Flamenca’s dining table, where Rachel was enjoying the food, so different from the fare she knew. The olive trees that flourished in the Provence countryside yielded massive quantities of olive oil, and the fried fish included ocean varieties she had never sampled before. Citrus trees also thrived there, and several dishes were infused with the sweet pulp of oranges or the tart bite of lemons. There were delicious vegetable sauces, rich with olive oil and eggplant. And some wonderful desserts. Rachel couldn’t help but wish Papa were there: he loved sweets almost as much as she did.
She was wavering between another piece of lemon cake and an almond pastry when Eleanor announced to Netanel, “Rachel taught us the most beautiful blessing for lighting the Sabbath lamp. It’s just like the one for Hanukkah, except you say ‘ner shel Shabbat’ instead of ‘ner shel Hanukkah.’ ”
Rashi's Daughters, Book III: Rachel Page 3
