Enchantress: A Novel of Rav Hisda's Daughter (9 page)

“Getting to the docks is easy. All you have to do is go downhill and you’ll arrive there eventually,” he said as the doorkeeper shut the gate behind us. “Finding your way back is the difficulty.”

“Well, then, what do you suggest?” I asked.

“I think you should learn the shortest and easiest routes between the docks and Em’s house.”

I saw what he meant. “Of course the shortest and easiest routes are not the same.”

He didn’t quite smile, but he looked pleased that I’d understood him. “We’ll begin with the shorter routes and save the easier ones for later, when you’ve tired.”

The first one was so steep that despite my sturdy sandals I began slipping on the wet road. I tried to slow myself, but just as my feet were about to fly out from under me, Rava’s steadying hand was under my elbow.

My heart pounding, from nearly falling as well as from his touch, I let him lead me to level ground. “I’m sorry I wasn’t more careful,” I said between gasps. “Perhaps we should save the short route for after the streets have dried.”

He waved aside my apology but did not let go of my arm. “It was my fault. I should have realized how slippery this street would be.”

“Can you show me the way we got to Em’s the day I first arrived?” Considering the number of loaded carts I’d seen, it had to be one of the gentler slopes.

We soon arrived at a wide roadway crowded with empty carts parked for Shabbat. Now that our path was less steep, I expected Rava to release my arm. But he continued to guide me while he plunged into his recent court cases.

“I’d appreciate your thoughts on this one,” he began. “A man gave his wife a conditional
get
that said, ‘If I do not return within thirty days, let this
get
be valid.’ But when he arrived on the thirtieth day, the ferry had already departed, and he was stranded on the wrong side of the river.”

I wanted to be sure I understood. “So by the time the ferry came back and brought him to the other side, it was more than thirty days since he’d left.”

“Exactly,” Rava said. “The wife maintained that they were now divorced and demanded her
ketuba
payment. The man insisted that he had in fact returned, and even if not, his
get
should be void since he was unavoidably detained.”

I was already annoyed with this man and I didn’t even know him. “I think ‘return’ should mean actually at his home. Otherwise there would be continual debate over how far away he could be and still claim to have returned.” When Rava nodded, I asked, “How did you rule?”

“The court agreed with you that he had not yet returned. We also ruled that his delay was not unavoidable. He should have anticipated that the ferry might be on the wrong bank and made allowances.”

“So the divorce took effect, and his wife received her
ketuba
payment?” Evidently the woman disliked this husband who had missed the ferry—she could have done nothing and remained married, but when she saw a chance to escape him without forfeiting her
ketuba
, she took it.

“Indeed.” Rava then continued as if he were still proving his point. “But I argued further that unavoidable circumstances can never invalidate a conditional
get
. Otherwise a woman whose husband doesn’t return might worry that there were circumstances beyond his control, and she’d be afraid to remarry, thus making herself an
agunah
.”

Agunah
meant “chained” and referred to a woman whose husband had disappeared or died without witnesses. Since only a man could initiate divorce, she could not free herself from the marriage and thus remained chained to him. The purpose of a conditional
get
was to prevent such a tragedy.

I could see another problem. “A different woman could ignore that he might be constrained, and thus remarry. But when he returns to void the
get,
her children from her second husband would become
mamzerim
, unable to marry other Jews.”

“So you see how this might create difficulties,” Rava said.

“You were very bold to rule that way.” I was torn between unease and admiration. Constraint normally voided a contract, but Rava had overturned this to protect women.

He made no attempt at humility. “A Jew who marries does so subject to the Rabbis’ decrees. If we wish, we may abrogate his betrothal.”

We continued walking on the wet ground, and I admit deliberately stumbling a few times to keep Rava supporting me. “Rava, Em told me you lived with her as a child.”

“I did.” There was a hint of apprehension in his voice.

“Did she and her husband have a good marriage?” He looked at me suspiciously, so I added, “I would think a young widow without children would want to remarry. Yet Em didn’t.”

“Their marriage was difficult. The family was poor, at least at the beginning. And it’s not that Em was barren but that all their children died young.”

“How terrible for her.”

Rava abruptly let go of my elbow. “Her husband was descended from Eli the Priest, who was cursed so none of his male progeny would live a normal life span,” he explained. “That’s why Abaye’s father died so young.”

I was horrified. I knew about Eli’s curse from the book of Samuel, but I’d assumed that Eli’s descendants had died out long ago. “Then Abaye is cursed as well.”

He nodded. “His uncle, however, managed to survive to age forty by studying Torah. So we are hopeful that Abaye may live as long, maybe longer.”

Marriage to a man under such a curse would have to be difficult. What could have induced Em to accept the match? Or Babata, for that matter? Maybe the Rabbis were right that women preferred any husband to no husband.

 • • • 

On Fourth Day, Rava again announced that he would be staying late with Rav Oshaiya. Still, I was surprised to come downstairs the next morning and see his table empty. This turned to alarm when Tobia reported that his master had not yet come home. Later, at synagogue, the congregation was buzzing with news that the satrap’s treasury had been robbed during the night. Rumors flew as to how much gold had been stolen, how the thieves had managed to break in, and whether any had been apprehended.

It was impossible to concentrate on my prayers without anxiety about Rava interrupting them. Em’s slaves had no good news when we returned. Abaye had gone to see Rav Oshaiya, who reported that Rava left shortly after midnight. What if he had encountered the thieves on his way home?

The next evening, as the kitchen slaves started clearing the meal that none of us had felt like eating, the courtyard gate swung open to admit Abaye and, disheveled and leaning heavily on Tobia’s arm, Rava. I jumped up and ran to greet them, stopping abruptly at Rava’s baleful glare.

Em came up behind me. “Rava, what in Heaven happened to you? Are you injured?”

Rava shook his head. “I was only just now released from prison.”

Abaye explained. “After the robbery, soldiers arrested everyone out on the streets. It took me half the day to find Rava among all the prisoners, and the rest to convince an officer that he was neither a thief nor had any information about them.” He exchanged a furtive glance with Rava.

“You’re hiding something,” Em accused them. “Don’t think I can’t tell. What really happened?”

Rava kept his gaze lowered as Abaye reluctantly began the tale. “Last week we heard that Bar Hedaya, the dream interpreter who charges a
zuz
per dream, was in town.”

“An entire
zuz
?” I was outraged. How could anyone justify such a price when a modest house cost two hundred
zuzim
and a mansion five hundred?

“To test his integrity, we told him the same dream,” Abaye said. “Then I paid him, and Rava did not.”

Em let out a groan. “What did you say you dreamed about?”

Abaye swallowed hard. “Verses from Devarim. First, ‘Your ox shall be slaughtered before you, but you shall not eat of it.’ Bar Hedaya told Rava that his business would fail and he would be too worried to eat, then told me that my business would prosper and I would be too excited to eat.”

“What next?” Em pressed him.

“Second, ‘Your sons and daughters will be delivered to a foreign people.’ Bar Hedaya told me I would have many children, and that I would want to arrange their marriages with my family, but my wife would insist that they marry into her family—a people foreign to me.” Abaye hesitated and then spoke rapidly. “He said Rava’s wife would die and her children would be raised by a stepmother.”

I couldn’t restrain myself and gasped audibly.

Abaye shot me a look of sympathy. “Then we gave Bar Hedaya the verse, ‘All the people shall see that Elohim’s name is proclaimed over you and they shall stand in awe.’ He said that I would become
rosh yeshiva
and everyone would revere me.” Abaye nudged Rava with his elbow. “You tell them what he said to you.”

Rava scowled at Abaye, who crossed his arms over his chest. After a long silence, Rava said, “He said the king’s treasury will be robbed and you shall be accused of theft, and everyone will hear of it and be astonished.”

Em’s eyes widened and she covered her open mouth with her hand, but I could not remain silent.

“How could that be?” I blurted out. “Those weren’t your real dreams—you made them up.”

“I went back to Bar Hedaya later and told him some true dreams.” Rava spoke slowly, as if each word caused him pain. “When I told him I dreamed the door of my house fell off, he said my wife would die. When I said I dreamed I saw two doves flying away, he said I would divorce two wives, and when I told him I’d dreamed of two turnips, he said I would be struck in the head twice.”

Rava fell silent and held his head in his hands, so Abaye continued: “When we were in the study hall that afternoon, two blind men were fighting. Rava went to separate them, and they hit him twice—”

“Enough!” Em shouted. Her eyes narrowed as she looked from Abaye to Rava and back again. “I cannot believe two grown men, Torah scholars no less, could be so stupid. And so reckless.”

I watched in dread as she began pacing the room. “Perhaps they could . . . No, that won’t help. Maybe I could . . . No, that would only make matters worse. Think, Em, think,” she muttered to herself. “What’s done is done, but there must be a remedy.”

Finally she stopped in front of Rava. “This is what you must do. Remember your dreams for the next few nights; then find Bar Hedaya and pay him to interpret them.” She shook her finger at him. “You understand, no more foolishness.”

A chagrined expression on his face, Rava nodded.

Yet the following week he was forced to admit that although he had looked for Bar Hedaya throughout Pumbedita, the dream interpreter was nowhere to be found. I thought that might end the matter, but Em was adamant. Even if it took years, Rava must find Bar Hedaya and then pay to have his dreams interpreted. Only then would he receive a new, good prediction.

 • • • 

Rava returned from his next Shabbat in Machoza so distraught that looking at him made my heart as heavy as a boulder. When Abaye asked about his father’s health, Rava’s eyes filled with tears and his chin quivered, so he could only shake his head. I watched helplessly as Abaye threw his arm around Rava’s shoulders to comfort him. To make matters worse, Rava had asked about Bar Hedaya up and down the Euphrates, and in Machoza as well, but nobody knew where to find him.

I couldn’t get Bar Hedaya’s dream interpretations out of my head. The grape harvest had been excellent and the price of wine at new heights, so Abaye’s vineyards had indeed prospered while Rava’s, now mortgaged, had brought him no income at all. And when Rava was forced to divorce Choran at year’s end, the prediction of his divorcing two wives would become true.

Bar Hedaya had also forecast, twice, that Rava’s wife would die, once adding that her children would have a stepmother. But Choran had no children, so did this terrible prophecy refer to me? It was not a thought I wanted to dwell on, but I couldn’t rid myself of it.

Later that week, feeling the need to occupy myself with some exacting activity, I secluded myself in Em’s workshop and opened containers at random to see if I remembered the names and purposes of their contents. Those that were nearly empty I moved to the edge of the shelf, so Em could check them later. I was so engrossed with this task that I didn’t hear the men until they were just outside the window.

“Rava, I want to speak with you.” Abaye’s voice was insistent. “In private.”

Rava muttered something I couldn’t understand, and then the workshop door swung open. I ought to have made my presence known, but there was no time to consider my options. Immediately I hid behind a row of shelves in the back.

“I love you as well as any brother,” Abaye said, “so it pains me to see you in such distress.”

“There is nothing you or anyone can do,” Rava said sadly. “My father has only a short time left in this world, and according to Bar Hedaya I will see my wife die as well.”

“Why are you upset about Choran dying when you have wanted to be free of her for years?” Abaye sounded perplexed. “In addition to inheriting her property, you would save having to pay her
ketuba
. Your financial problems would be solved.”

For a moment Rava’s anger flared. “Just because I no longer want to be married to her doesn’t mean I wish her dead!”

“I’m sorry, I didn’t mean to imply . . .” Abaye trailed off in embarrassment.

Rava’s voice softened, so I had to strain to hear him. “When Rami bar Chama died, many rabbis held me responsible. I am sure everyone in Rav Hisda’s family knows I gave the Evil Eye to the
kashafa
in Sepphoris and that she died as a result—which means other rabbis probably know too.”

“You think they’d say you caused Choran’s death?”

“I know they would.”

No wonder Rava was upset. Two deaths might be a coincidence, but a third one that benefited him so directly would mark him as a murderer.

“Then you must divorce her immediately.” Abaye was almost shouting.

“Choran has done nothing unseemly that I should divorce her,” Rava said. “I follow Beit Shammai’s teaching that a man may not divorce his wife unless he finds adultery in her.”