The Handmaid and the Carpenter (2 page)

CHAPTER TWO

Mary

OSEPH’S MOTHER, RACHEL, LIT THE TWO CANDLES
on the table, then passed her hands slowly over the flickering flames and back toward herself, welcoming in the Sabbath. Covering her eyes, she began reciting, “Barukh atah Adonai, Elohaynu, melekh ha-olam…”
Blessed are you, Lord, our God, King of the Universe…

Mary sat with her eyes fixed on her lap, trying to pay attention, but it was of no use. She was too excited: her heart thumped so hard she thought it might be audible, her mind was racing, and she kept feeling as though she might cry out. She drew in a breath and unclenched her fists that she might at least appear calm, sitting here at the table across from the young man to whom she was so strongly drawn.

She and her parents had all but run through the village’s narrow alleyways to the home of Rachel and Jacob, but still they had arrived late, thanks to a neighbor’s ailing donkey that her father had delayed their departure to attend to. Joachim had a gift for curing animals, and someone was forever coming to him—no matter the hour—with chickens, with sheep, with cows. Once, a little neighbor boy had brought over a sparrow with a broken wing. With meticulous care, Joachim had set the wing, using a twig and a thin strip of cloth. He had then told the child to leave the bird with him; he would watch over it that night. The bird had died, as expected, and at dawn Joachim had buried it. Then he had hidden in the bushes until he caught another sparrow, which he placed in a covered basket and presented to the boy. Joachim told him his bird was cured, and now he should set it free. The boy complied reluctantly; he watched with Joachim as the bird flew furiously away. But then the child began to weep and stomp his feet, saying, “I wanted it for myself!”

Joachim gently admonished the boy, asking, “Which is greater, your desire to have the bird captured, or the bird’s need for freedom? Belonging to everyone, as it now does, does it not also belong to you?”

Because Joachim had assisted the donkey in giving birth, the sun was soon to set when Mary and her parents arrived at Joseph’s. There had been no time to be shown graciously around his home. But no one could fail to notice that the downstairs of the house had not one room but two, and that it was equipped with many oil lamps; Joseph’s father had olive orchards. One could not help but see that Rachel wore a mantle dyed red with madder root, and that the linen of her tunic was whole and without the patches so familiar to Mary and her parents. Joseph had immediately risen higher in Mary’s esteem, not only for his family’s riches but for the kind way in which he welcomed both her and her parents. He had about him an air of easy confidence that Mary knew her parents admired; they had looked at each other in an approving way after he had spoken to them.

The table had been properly set with two loaves of challah covered with plain white cloths, and with earthenware cups. Rachel had politely accepted the wine Joachim had brought, made with grapes from his own vineyards, and then everyone had sat down immediately so that Rachel could light the candles at the proper time. Now she completed the blessing and uncovered her eyes to look at the candles and to smile at her guests. The light in the room was a pinkish orange from the sun hanging low in the sky, and there was in the air the rich scent of cumin and garlic, of lemon and coriander.

Mary stole another look at Joseph’s mother—interesting how in candlelight everyone looked beautiful, even Rachel, whose countenance was overly long and wide, more a man’s face than a woman’s. But Mary had seen already that Rachel’s heart was good and generous, her manner lively, her faith deep. And for all her plainness, she had produced a very handsome son. Joseph was too lean, perhaps, but he was wonderfully tall, with reddish-brown hair and copper-colored eyes fringed with dark lashes a woman would envy. His beard was already thick and even.

After the evening service the parents performed the blessing for the children, placing their hands on their offspring’s heads and exhorting Mary to be like Sarah, Rebecca, Rachel, and Leah; for Joseph to be like Ephraim and Menasseh. During the kiddush that followed, Mary felt a rush of longing, as she often did during this prayer, to go
home,
though not to the abode of Anne and Joachim. It was to another home, to a place she could not even imagine, much less describe. “Kiy vanu vacharta v’otanu qidashta mikol ha’ amiym,” she said softly, along with the others.
Indeed, you have chosen us and made us holy among all peoples.

Mary felt deep inside herself, felt it more and more, that
all
people were holy, that indeed all the earth, with its humans and its animals, with its rocks and rivers and trees, was holy; and that all the things upon the earth were given to one another in an act of such spectacular grace it was impossible to comprehend. Yet an attempt at such understanding should be what life was devoted to, should be what life was
for,
she believed: let there be a joyful fullness in taking, and also fullness in giving.

She did not speak of these things. She held them unto herself and pondered them. Yet now, looking across the table into the shining eyes of Joseph, she considered that there might be for her one true companion, someone who held in his heart what she guarded so carefully in her own.

When it was Joseph’s turn to wash his hands, he filled a cup with water and poured it over the top and bottom of his left hand first. He realized his error immediately and corrected it, pouring again quickly over his right hand and pointedly avoiding looking at Mary.
I am also nervous,
she wanted to tell him.
Do not despair.
And it was as though he heard her thoughts, for he looked up with relief and smiled at her. She smiled back, and again she saw her parents exchange glances.

At last, Jacob moved to the head of the table for the ha-motzi
.
He pulled the cloth from the two challah loaves and lifted them high into the air while he recited the final blessing in his deep, slow voice: “Barukh atah Adonai, Elohaynu, melekh ha-olam, ha-motzi lechem min ha-aretz.”
Blessed are you, Lord, our God, King of the Universe, who brings forth bread from the earth.

Amein!
Mary said silently with him, then watched eagerly as he ripped off pieces of bread for each person and passed them down the table. Mary was suddenly starving, eager for everything before her.

THAT NIGHT, AS MARY
lay awake on her pallet, her mother came to sit cross-legged beside her. Anne smelled of the rosemary she used to scent the olive oil she rubbed into her heels each evening before bed. The lamp cast shadows on her face, deepening her wrinkles, but still she was beautiful. She stroked her daughter’s cheek, pushed a tangle of curls back from her forehead. “Are we at last to make a match, then?”

“At
last,
” Mary muttered. “I am only now turned thirteen!”

“Already thirteen, and never so much as gazed upon a man until now.”

Mary said nothing. From across the room came the deep and even sounds of her father breathing. At last, Mary smiled, and with this her mother smiled also, and then the two of them began quietly giggling. “Did you see her mantle?” Mary asked. “The red?”

Her mother shook her head in admiration. “It is said that she has blue, as well.”

“No one in all our village has the means for indigo dye!”

Her mother raised an eyebrow.

“No one,” Mary said firmly.

“Her vegetable stew was delicious,” Anne said. Coming from Mary’s mother, this was a rare compliment; usually Anne let people know that although a dish might taste good, it could not compare to her own version. “And she set a fine table.”

“Yes.”

Her mother reached behind herself to rub a place on her lower back. Then she said, “When you went out with him to the courtyard, of what did you speak?”

Mary blushed. “He told me he had a dream that we were married and had seven children.”

“Seven!” Mary’s mother cried, and her father turned in his sleep, muttering to himself. “Seven!” she said again, this time in a whisper. “And I suppose all of them were sons!”

“That I do not know,” Mary said. “But when I, too, expressed surprise over the number of children he so easily assigned me, he said, ‘I see, though, that you voiced no objection to the marriage.’ ”

“He is clever as well as handsome.”

Mary smiled, but then she grew serious. She sat up and took her mother’s hands into her own. “Tell me, please. How do you know?”

“Know what?”

“Know when it is time.”

“You know it is time when your parents make a match.”

Mary’s face fell, and Anne leaned in closer. “And you know when your heart beats fast, your breathing quickens, and your dreams are full of your betrothed.”

“He is not yet my betrothed!” Mary said quickly.

“Love grows slowly, but steadily,” Anne said. “You will come to see this, my daughter. For I believe we shall make a match.” She yawned. “And now I shall bid you good rest, and hope for the same myself. Tonight my bones ache.”

She kissed Mary’s forehead, and Mary lay down, then reached out again for her mother’s hand. “Mother?”

“Yes?”

She looked upon Anne’s face, beloved to her, deeply familiar. She was full of questions, full of doubt. But she drew in a breath and said only, “I wish you sound sleep.”

“You are frightened,” Anne said.

Mary nodded.

“Tell me why.”

Mary hesitated, then said, “It is…new. I am only excited, I think.”

“Perhaps you worry that he and his family are too far above us,” Anne said. “Ah, Mary. Are you such a poor offering? My only daughter, my beauty. I shall tell you something now. When you were conceived, an angel came to me and said—”

“I
know,
” Mary said. “I can tell the story to you!”

“Backward, no doubt,” Anne said. “As fine as your beauty is your mind. But what I want to tell you this night is something I have never told you before.”

Mary waited.

“I hesitated to reveal these things to you,” Anne said, “fearing it would make you swell with pride and be unto others as is dreadful Naomi.”

Mary smiled, thinking of her boastful friend who lived nearby and referred constantly to her skill at bread baking and weaving, to the sheen of her hair and her fine form. She reminded Mary of the crowing rooster that strutted back and forth across the courtyard, oblivious of the fact that he was his only admirer. Still, Mary loved her.

“Hear me now,” Anne said. “The angel said not only that I would conceive when I was barren, but that my offspring would be spoken of in the whole inhabited world.”

Mary breathed out in a rush. “Truly, Mother?”

“For what reason would I lie to one I so love?”

“But…how?”

Anne shrugged. “We wait always on God’s will. But also we must believe his messengers.”

Mary wanted to say something, but what? What would be right to say?
Yes, it is true that I have felt inside myself some call to greatness.
Would that not be even more boastful than Naomi?
Yes, and this is why I feel destined to a fate other than marriage and the life you have lived with Father.
Such words would deeply sadden her mother, and make her think that Mary dishonored her parents, which she did not. And Anne longed so for her daughter to marry—she had spoken of Mary’s wedding day since Mary was a little girl. Finally, Mary said simply, “I shall embrace my destiny.”