Sarah: Women of Genesis: 1 (Women of Genesis (Forge)) (33 page)

“Hagar,” called Abram. “Come out of your mistress’s tent.” There was no anger in his voice, but no tenderness, either. And he spoke loudly enough that the heads of many nearby women turned to see what was happening.

“I’m coming, my love!” called Hagar from inside the tent.

My love. The words galled Sarai. But she felt Abram’s arm tighten around her. To reassure her, she hoped. Though it was just as possible that he was gripping her more tightly to keep her from leaping on Hagar and clawing at her.

The girl emerged from the tent, a blanket gathered around her. She was padding out with an air of deshabille, perhaps designed to be seductive—but the moment she saw that Abram stood with Sarai on one side and Eliezer on the other, she knew that this was not a tete-a-tete with the father of her baby.

“Hagar,” said Abram, “you will be sleeping in the guest tent from now on, and not in my wife’s tent.”

Hagar’s eyes went heavy-lidded, and she glanced briefly at Sarai. “As you command, Master.”

“This morning I heard with my own ears the insolent, dishonest way you spoke to Sarai. It will never happen again, Hagar.”

For only a heartbeat, Hagar seemed to be starting to act contrite. But apparently she changed her mind and decided on a different course of conduct, for all of a sudden she began to wail loudly as if she had just been beaten. “What have I done to you, Mistress, that you turn the face of your husband against me! Please don’t drive me away! Please don’t turn me out of the only home I know.”

Abram’s body stiffened with anger. “Stop that at once,” he said to Hagar.

“Don’t beat me!” Hagar wailed. “Please, I beg you, for the baby’s sake if not for mine! Don’t beat me!”

“You fool,” said Abram softly. “Don’t you know that now that I see the truth, it doesn’t matter whether you deceive the rest of the world? I know my wife has been honest with me and with you, and everything you’ve been saying and doing is a lie.”

But Hagar was apparently incapable of giving up the deception. She spoke directly to Sarai, pitching her voice loud enough that many others could hear her. “This is what you’ve been trying for ever since I got a baby from him when you couldn’t. You’ve set your face against me, to get rid of me
and
my baby. Well, it’s worked! I won’t let you beat me! I’ll die in the desert before I let you beat me!”

With that, Hagar cast away the blanket and, wearing only a thin, semi-transparent linen shift, she scampered away, running past the tents, out into the grass. Only once did she look behind to see if she was being pursued. Even though she must have seen that no one was chasing after her, she screamed anyway, and ran as if a lion had just leapt toward her.

“Shall I go fetch her, Master?” said Eliezer.

“No,” said Abram.

“You have to,” said Sarai. “What about the baby?”

“If the Lord means that baby to be the one through whom his promises to me will be fulfilled, then the Lord will protect her and lead her where he will. I did not send her away, or mistreat her in any way. Neither did you, Sarai, and neither did anyone else. Her leaving was part of her own lie. Apparently she still believes it.”

“What if she comes back?” asked Eliezer.

“Then welcome her kindly,” said Abram, “and escort her to the tent I assigned to her.” He turned to face Sarai, and stroked her hair possessively as he said to Eliezer, “This is my wife. This is her tent. Whoever shows disrespect to her is not mine, and has no claim on me. But whoever shows honor to my wife, then I will be his friend and protector.”

“Thank you,” murmured Sarai.

Then she sat down in the door of her tent. “Sit with me, husband,” she said. “In the door of my tent, please sit with me today.”

Abram sat down beside her, and for the rest of the day, whoever came to him saw how he included her in every discussion and every decision, and how he heard her advice with great respect and did whatever she suggested and granted her whatever she asked. By nightfall there was no doubt in the camp that whatever struggle had gone on between Hagar and Sarai, it was over now, and Sarai was more firmly than ever in the good graces of the master of the household.

At the end of the day, Abram came inside her tent with her. They prayed together, Abram first, then Sarai. Abram did not mention Hagar. Sarai did, though, begging the Lord to watch over her and keep her and the baby safe. “Bring her home to us, O Lord, so we can show her that we forgive her and love her and that she does not need to lie to anyone in order to have a sure place in this household.”

When the prayer was over, Abram said to her, “You are more virtuous than I am.”

“That is not true at all,” said Sarai.

“To pray so generously for Hagar, after what she tried to do to you?”

“Of course I can be forgiving,” said Sarai. “Because she failed.”

The next morning Hagar returned to camp and was ushered into the guest tent. Abram spoke with her for a little while. Sarai did not ask what was said, and Abram did not tell her. Every day, Sarai visited Hagar and told her the news of the camp. Hagar always seemed glad to see her, and chatted away as if nothing had ever been wrong between them.

Sarai did not believe in her for a moment. But there was peace in the camp, Abram’s baby was thriving in the womb, and for now, that was enough.

Part VII

Fire from Heaven

Chapter 19

The boy Ishmael was born in Hagar’s tent. All the camp rejoiced, and Sarai led the rejoicing. Hagar reared the boy, but Sarai also watched over him, and delighted in him. And the boy’s father saw that he was strong and clever, and when Abram taught him of God, the boy learned and obeyed. He took no pleasure in learning to read, so Abram waited, hoping that as he grew older he would grow curious about the ancient books. And the boy seemed to pray only when Abram bade him, but Sarai had seen that few boys were quick to pray, and reassured her husband.

Between Hagar and Sarai, there was a strange kind of peace, each giving place to the other. Sarai was careful never to intrude on the rearing of Ishmael, and not just because she wanted never to have to imagine another person thinking, Who are you to give advice about children? No, she recognized that even though Hagar’s pregnancy began as a gift to Abram from Sarai, it was still Hagar who lay with Abram, and Hagar who bore the boy, and Hagar whose eyes could be seen looking out of Ishmael’s face. The child was Sarai’s gift, but Hagar’s son. So Sarai never intruded.

Nor did Sarai ever treat Hagar as a servant, after that night Hagar spent alone in the desert. For she realized that even though Hagar had lied and betrayed her and tried to take her place, it was partly because slavery had taught her to lie and scrabble for advantage and feel loyalty to no one. Sarai had never questioned the practice of slavery, believing, as most people believed, that if God did not want people to be slaves, he would not allow them to be captured in battle. But, having known Hagar, having seen how slavery poisoned a girl who had such quickness and beauty, such a gift for laughter and such understanding of other people, Sarai saw all the servants of Abram’s house differently.

She had admired Abram from the beginning for the way he treated his servants with courtesy. Gradually she had realized that Abram really believed that his servants were also children of God, worthy of dignity, and so Sarai had followed her own natural inclination to be gentle and courteous even with the lowliest and least reliable of the servants. She did this believing that it was good to be kind to those who already bore the heavy punishment of God’s disfavor.

Hagar had taught her, however, that every slave longs for mastery and resents having to submit. All of Sarai’s kindness and gentleness was no replacement for freedom and respect. It was in the nature of their relationship that despite all the friendship that Sarai believed they shared, Sarai had never forgotten who was slave and who was master. Neither had Hagar. There was not and could never be friendship between them as long as Hagar was a slave.

That is why Sarai insisted to Abram that the tent where Hagar slept should no longer be called the guest tent, but should be called Hagar’s tent. “As if she were a wife?” asked Abram.

“Will her son inherit?”

“Sarai, I will not raise up Hagar as my wife. I lay with your handmaiden, under the law that made her a substitute for your body.”

“And if I free her?”

“It doesn’t matter. I won’t marry her,” said Abram. “I won’t lie with her again. You are my wife.”

“I will free her,” said Sarai, “and you will call that tent Hagar’s, not because she is your wife, but because she is the mother of your son, and your son will not be reared in a slave’s tent.”

“Are you commanding me?” said Abram.

“I’m predicting the wise course that you will choose because of your wisdom.”

He didn’t like it, but he agreed because she was, in fact, right. Whether Abram told Hagar that it was Sarai’s idea or not didn’t matter. Neither of them ever mentioned it. But in the camp each woman had her sphere. No one came to Hagar to settle any business of the camp—Sarai was the judge who ruled under Abram. But Hagar was the mother of Ishmael, and all the fussing and flattery that came to the baby and, as he grew, to the boy, was done under Hagar’s watchful eyes. All delighted in the boy, but only Hagar and Abram had the right to be proud of him, for he was theirs.

Of course this did nothing to ease Sarai’s grief that her age of bearing had passed without her womb ever quickening with the life of a child. But at least she was eased of the burden of guilt for never having borne a son to Abram. He had his son as a gift from Sarai, and so she might still have the pity of others, but not their resentment or scorn. And when she felt envy for Hagar stir within her, she channeled it into the envy she felt for every mother, instead of allowing it to fester as resentment that Sarai’s husband had known Hagar’s body in order to make the boy Ishmael.

And so, because Sarai willed it, there was peace in the camp.

Only one question remained in Sarai’s heart concerning Hagar. That night when Hagar fled from the camp and spent the night in the desert, something had happened that sent the girl home transformed. It was more than just having spent a night alone, because Hagar did not seem to have been broken by the experience. She was not docile—far from it. She took command of her tent and later took command of the raising of Ishmael, without the slightest sign of deference to Sarai. She did not leave Sarai in peace out of fear. It was something else. A transformation that had happened that night.

Sarai asked Abram once, and Abram said, “It’s not for me to tell what she saw and heard that night.” With that he dropped the matter and made it clear he was never going to say more than that.

But what he had said was perhaps more than he realized. What Hagar saw and heard? Not for him to tell? Well, he wouldn’t have said that if Hagar saw a scorpion or a serpent or a bramble bush or sand or rock—the ordinary things one sees in the desert. He would only have said such a thing if what she saw and heard was miraculous. A sign from God.

That explained everything, of course. Especially it explained why Hagar no longer prayed only when the whole camp prayed. Now she prayed on her own, without prompting, and sometimes even when she thought no one could see. Sarai could only conclude that Hagar prayed because she believed in God. And, to Sarai, this meant that now, despite what had happened between them, Hagar could be trusted. She was no longer lawless, seizing advantage wherever she could. She knew that God lived, that Abram was not just pretending to know God the way that Sehtepibre had faked the signs of divine favor. That’s what had humbled her and given her courage, both at once.

God can make of anyone what he wishes, thought Sarai.

She even said this to Abram once, but Abram disagreed. “God can make of anyone exactly what they are willing to become, and nothing better, just as the Enemy can make of us only as wicked a creature as we are willing to become.”

“Then Hagar has a good heart,” said Sarai, “because look what she has allowed God to make of her.”

Abram smiled at that, and embraced her. But said nothing. And sometimes Sarai wondered what he meant by that silence.

No matter. There was peace in the camp.

For thirteen years, peace. Sarai thought she could see the end of her life. She would watch as Ishmael grew to manhood. She would continue helping in the camp as long as she had strength. She would live in the light of Abram’s love, as part of him, and with him as part of her. If God willed, she would die before Abram, and she would consider herself the most fortunate of women.

Every now and then she wondered what would happen if Abram died first. Especially if he died before Ishmael came of age. The boy did not know Sarai very well. He knew only his mother. Sarai would be at Hagar’s mercy then. If Hagar was truly converted to God and his law, then Sarai would be allowed to spend the rest of her life in Qira’s household; if Qira died first, then surely Lot would take her in. But one thing was certain—if Abram died, Sarai would have no future here. The servants might wish to serve her well, but they would belong to Ishmael, and Ishmael would obey Hagar. Sarai could not believe that Hagar had changed so deeply that she would keep Sarai here to grow old. And even if she did, it would be a useless life for her. Lonely without her husband, her days meaningless, she would pray for death.