The Missing Madonna, Chapter 17, Part 2 "In the Slum"

Eventually the woman emerges from the tent opposite with the two infants trailing after her. She is older than me, though it is hard to tell by how much. At least she is smiling and her clothes, though old and ragged, look clean. She smiles at me, which is a relief, and says something, though once again I cannot understand. Joseph says something to her in Greek and she appears to say the same thing again.

“She says she is a Jewish woman, although she’s been here since her youth. She is speaking a form of Greek but with a very strong accent which I struggle to understand.”

“Ask her where we can get water.”

Joseph has a further conversation with the woman, with much head shaking and waving of arms to try to make themselves understood. I’m impatient to learn what information she is imparting, but I have to wait as she seems to have a lot to say. While they are talking the other child, a small girl perhaps a few months older than Joshua, comes over and looks shyly at me. I hold out my arms to her and at first she runs back to her mother and buries her face in her skirts. The woman says something to her and she sidles back to me and gives me a big smile and puts her fingers on my hair and pulls a few strands from beneath my shawl. Her mother scolds her sharply but I hold up my hand to indicate that I have no objection. After all this time, contact with another soul, especially a child, is welcome.

“She says that we’ll have to pay rent for this site. Every bit of land here is owned by scoundrels who exact money from us and if we fail to pay they send thugs in to move us and steal anything we own.”

“Where can we go, Joseph? Is there nowhere we can go without having to pay money?”

“She says that the only empty spaces are right at the end of the city wall where it curves away from the river – there is a gateway there that leads right to the city rubbish tip which no-one wants for fairly obvious reasons. Only the outcasts go there, people with leprosy or other infectious diseases.”

“Do we have to go there? Is there no-one who will help us?”

“She says it might be worth trying to negotiate a loan with the guy who comes to collect the ground rents, especially if I can demonstrate I can get employment at the jetty.”

“Has she said where we can get water?”

“Apparently there’s no well in this party of the city. Everyone gets water from the river and has to boil it to make sure it’s usable. She says we can use her stove until we can afford our own.”

“But how do we reach the river? There’s no way through the walls. Do we have to go right back to where the soldiers were, by the road we came down? That must be half an hour’s walk at least each way, more with a heavy jar of water and a young child.” Another thought. “And how do I fetch water? We have no jar.”

Joseph asks the woman my question and I listen to a stream of incomprehensible sounds.

“She’ll loan you her large jar but you’ll have to fetch water at a different time to her as she only has one large waterpot. And she can loan you some smaller vessels to store a bit of water. She says most of the women go to the gate by the rubbish tip because it’s not so far, although it means putting up with the foul odour. She also says that the water is cleaner there as it’s got no commercial activity nearby though some refuse and drains get to the river there. But if you walk a few leagues further south, you can avoid the worst of the pollution.”

“Thank her, Joseph.”

“She says her name is Naomi. Her husband works on the jetty and he’ll take me with him tomorrow morning. She has three other children. Boys of eight and ten are working with their father. Her daughter is seven and is scavenging on the tip. Sometimes the girl stays at home to look after her young sister and Naomi works the tip as she can find more of possible value there herself. She’s offered to take you there and show you what to look for.”

At that moment the older girl returns. She is wild-eyed and dishevelled and is carrying small sack which she plonks at the feet of her mother. She is just wearing a small discoloured tunic, bare feet, tangled hair of indiscriminate dirt colour.

“Anna,” the woman says, pointing to her daughter.

I look at the poor girl and am consumed with pity for her. What sort of life is this for a young child? How long have these people been living in this condition? Is there no way out for them? For us? I realise now that if we are here without means, what chance have we of getting away? I thought we were coming to safety. I thought it was to preserve Joshua for the role ordained for him – not to condemn him to a life scavenging on refuse tips like this poor girl. A Messiah from such a place? Our religious leaders will never tolerate or recognise a child with so much stigma attached. I wonder what led this unfortunate family to this life here. Now is not the time to probe though. If we become friends, I’ll learn in good time. Now I’m just grateful that at last we have found someone in this city who has not rejected us.

Anna comes up to Joshua and throws her skinny arms around him and lifts him into the air. I want to restrain her as she’s so dirty, I want her to clean up first, but Joshua whoops with joy and I’m forced to realise that I must adjust my thinking and just leave it to God. I can’t go round mollycoddling the boy any more – not that I’ve thought I was in the past, but I’d never envisaged this. I’ll just have to trust God. If it is truly his plan that Joshua is the saviour of our nation long promised to us, then he’ll find a way and Joshua will survive. Perhaps Joseph and I have already fulfilled our purpose and we are no longer in the plan. I banish this disturbing thought at once. Joshua needs our support now as never before. I feel so homesick at this moment. As I watch Anna playing with Joshua, I think of my sisters playing with Benjamin in far off Nazareth. They’ll be growing up now and I have no news of them. When will I see them again? Will we recreate the close relationships we had or will it all be so different? I’d envisaged Salome and Rebecca playing with Joshua as Anna is doing now. I must stop this maudlin reverie and concentrate on the practicalities. I must fetch some water as soon as possible.

Joseph passes on my urgent need to this angel who has come to our rescue.

“She says you can go now. Anna will look after Joshua and her little girl, and she will accompany you to show you the best place to draw water and ensure you don’t get lost.”

I smile my thanks to her and she pours water from her biggest jar into some smaller containers. She hands me the earthenware pot and we make our way along the inside of the wall passing the bustle of activity as many women and children are now stirring from their afternoon rest or returning from the activities of searching for some little income to sustain their lives. She obviously knows most of them well and greets them and must be explaining who I am as she waves a hand in my direction as she speaks. We tramp on. I’m tired and feeling a bit sick. I have had virtually nothing to eat and have been out in the burning sun all day with little protection from the heat . But I can’t complain to this woman – she’s being so good to us. It was not necessary for her to accompany me but I’m relieved that she’s with me. I just worry that I might faint and become even more of a burden to her.

We continue in silence. She tried saying something to me at first, but soon was aware that I could not understand her. She just smiles at me from time to time and waves in the general direction we are going. I can see the corner of the city wall now and can make out the small gateway which apparently leads to the tip and waterfront. The smell is bad and getting worse and I try not to show how much it is upsetting me for Naomi – I must get used to her name – is showing no signs of distress but is marching on as if we have little time to spare. It occurs to me then that she will be returning here on her own account in an hour or so at the time most women go for water. I must not delay her further and I make a real effort to keep up with her although I’m finding every increasing step agony. We finally reach the gate at the edge of the city and the noise of the gulls over the huge rubbish tips is deafening. There are carts hauled by donkeys carrying piles of refuse making their way to the dump from other parts of the city; there must be at least three converging roadways from gateways further to the west.

There is just one soldier guarding the gate, who is looking fed up – I would think this might be a punishment posting in such a place. He ignores us and we now follow a rough track along the bank. The river is wide here and looks a dirty brown. I’m horrified at first that we will have to make do with such polluted water, but as the path nears the river I see that the discoloration is more from the mud and sand than anything else. I make as if to approach the water to draw, but Naomi holds me back and points further upstream. We cross a couple of drainage ditches with filthy muck oozing from the refuse tip and finally leave the dump behind and come to a place where the bank is shallow and the pathway has been hardened by the trampling of feet over many years.

Naomi indicates that I should draw water here and I lower the jar into the water facing the flow and lift it out when I think I have as much as I can carry. I hoist the full jar onto my shoulder – Naomi helps me adjust the load to give a better balance – and we start our weary way home. Every step is now torture for me. I must not give up. I grit my teeth and try not to let her see how hard this is for me. We get back to the city wall and I notice a second soldier has appeared. Presumably he was down by the water when we came through earlier. As we pass he looks the other way and spits at the ground. Is he expressing his disgust at us or is he just clearing his throat from the dust flying in the air?

I’m being pestered by insects now, but I need both hands to steady my load, so I have to put up with the bugs which are settling on my face and flitting round my eyes. I keep blinking and blowing. Naomi is saving her breath now and I feel faint. I indicate to her that I can’t go on – I need at least a short rest. She looks at me quizzically and I point to my belly. She looks puzzled at first, then her face lights up and she rocks a pretend baby in her arms. I nod and she immediately takes the heavy jar from me and lets me stop until I get my breath back. I don’t want to be so much in her debt, but physically I have no choice. I will have to toughen myself up if I am to survive here. I always thought I was a robust girl and I had what many would call a hard life back in the fields of Nazareth, but this is a whole lot different and I’m going to have to get used to it. Perhaps it will get better once I’m able to get something to eat.

When at last we are in sight of Naomi’s tent, the three children spot us and come running towards us. Anna arrives first and stops, gasping, then Naomi’s three year old who I find out later is called Rebecca like my sister. Finally Joshua toddles up and makes straight for me and flings himself into my arms. I cheer up at this demonstration of affection and Joseph comes to greet us too. We are no sooner back to the spot we have claimed when Naomi brings out a couple of smaller water pots and we fill those and a cooking pot with the water I have drawn. Naomi immediately picks up the empty vessel and sets off with a couple of neighbours back to the water collection point on the river. Perhaps I ought to offer to go with her, or even go in her place, but I’m exhausted and sink to the ground. I guess Joshua is now going to expect me to tell him a story as I often do at this hour, and I’m just thinking that I should stir myself when Anna returns and Joshua immediately trails after her. He’s found a friend.

It’s dark when Naomi’s man returns from his work at the riverside jetty. After he’s greeted his wife, Naomi brings him over to us and he takes Joseph aside and they spend a long time in conversation. He finally goes back to his family and Joseph tells me what he’s been saying.

“There’s a ship due in tomorrow to load grain for Rome. It’s a big load and they need extra hands, so Nathaniel – that’s Naomi’s husband’s name – thinks I have a good chance of getting a full day’s work. I’m to go with him before daybreak and he’ll put in a word for me and persuade the foreman to employ me without the usual bribe which they call a ‘guarantee’. I’ll get enough to buy some bread and dates for us and put a down- payment on this plot of land. He says there is a chance that the ship may be docked for a second day which would give me enough for a week’s rent on this space and get some cheap clothes for Joshua and me so we can change from our filthy things.”

A few minutes later Naomi comes over with a hunk of bread each and bowls of hot broth. I’m not sure what it’s made from and I don’t ask. I’m just so grateful for any food and this seems like luxury. Joseph thanks our benefactors profusely and I nod vigorously in agreement. I tear off a small piece of bread and dip it in the soup and give it to Joshua who devours it ravenously.

I think the offer of possible work is good news and we have gone some way to filling our bellies at last. How quickly we change our judgements of what is acceptable. We sleep in the open air that night and ignore the smells, the cold, the hunger. I cover Joshua with my skirt and I only wake up briefly once in the night and cover Joshua up again as best I can. Despite him feeling chilly to the touch, he sleeps right through the night for once. When I awake again, I find Joseph is leaning over me and bidding me farewell, promising to return that evening with food and enough money to pay a first instalment on our piece of squalid land.

“Make sure you are able to tell the rent collector that we will pay. Get Naomi to tell him for you.”

With that advice Joseph slips away into the darkness. I see another shadow which must be Nathaniel. Now that I’m properly awake I feel that familiar bout of morning sickness rising in my throat and I have to roll Joshua quickly from my skirt to stagger up and be sick away from our immediate space and that of others for we are very crowded. Eyes are watching me. No other family has bothered to engage with us although there is obvious curiosity. I’m clammy and flushed and soon I’m sick again. Joshua wakes up this time and starts crying because he is hungry. I have to make him wait a while until I feel a bit better and by the time he is fed the sun is up and I can already feel its warmth.

I see Naomi giving Anna a piece of bread to take with her and the little girl joins a couple of others about the same age who are despatched on an identical errand. Then Naomi invites me into her tent and offers me goat’s milk and some bread. I haven’t mentioned, have I, that there are many animals rooting about this untidy area of barren land, mainly goats, but a few chickens also and a couple of pigs although I’m not sure what nationalities here are allowed that meat in their diet. Naomi’s family have one goat which is tethered to the tent pole and from which the family gain milk and cheese. After we have eaten and Joshua and Rebecca join some other young children around the site, I indicate to Naomi that I’d like her to teach me some Greek words. If we are to stay here long, this is essential or I’ll have no company but Joshua and my husband and find difficulty in carrying out the most basic jobs of a wife.

I have learnt, I think, the local dialect for bread, grapes, figs, dates, water and wine, also the common words of greeting and farewell, when Naomi spots the thug the owner of the land employs to collect his rent. I get up to go back to my palm carpet, but Naomi restrains me and I gather she will talk to him on our behalf. We watch as the thickset man moves gradually towards us, stopping off at each tent to collect his due. Naomi shakes her head and opens her palm and puts her fingers in the sign of a cross. I’m puzzled at first then I think she’s trying to show a ‘plus’ sign indicating that he charges too much. Gradually he comes towards us and my heart is in my mouth. He stops where our dead palm leaves are on the ground and picks up one and snaps it in half, then he does the same to the other. He picks up one pot that I filled with water and pours it onto the ground, then he empties the other. Naomi stands up and shouts to him and they enter into conversation which gets more and more heated. They are clearly arguing and suddenly the man cuffs Naomi about the face and spits at her.

Then he advances on me and grabs me by the wrist and hauls me to my feet. He yells something to my face – the sense is obvious, he wants us out. It is clear that the offer of money tomorrow has not satisfied him. I panic and burst into tears but instead of softening him, this only enrages the man further and he hits me violently in the face and then punches me in the stomach. He screams at me again and Naomi once more tries to argue with the man only to be knocked to the floor.

“I’ll go, I’ll go,” I shout pointlessly to the air, for no-one understands me. I stumble out of the tent and look around for Joshua. I can’t see him anywhere. I struggle from the grip of this heartless brute but he crushes my arm and drags me onto the path beside the wall and gives me a kick pointing in the direction of the rubbish tip. He keeps repeating the word I heard him yell before – it must be something like ‘go’ or ‘be gone’.

I stagger blindly down the path, still in his vice-like grip, scanning the area for any sign of my son. After he’s propelled me a good distance from Naomi’s tent, he lets go of my arm and again points me in the direction of the gate to the rubbish dump. I hesitate, still looking for Joshua. I try to tell him but I can find no words or actions to make him understand. I slink away, ready to return as soon as his back is turned. He is now progressing towards the roadway into the city proper and when he is far enough away, I begin to creep back. I can see Naomi looking for the children and eventually she finds them in the tent of another family playing with their toddlers. By the time I’ve got back to Naomi’s tent she has Joshua in her arms. She looks at me in distress. She shakes her head. I thought that once the man had gone that we’d be able to return to our space as long as we moved before he came again, or at least we had money to pay him. Naomi is trying to convey something to me by sign language and in the end I grasp that he’ll send another thug to beat us up unless we go immediately. She signals ‘back’ and then throws mock punches and puts her hands round her throat. I get the message.

Naomi goes back into her tent and comes out with a crust of bread and goes over to pick up one of the pots that the collector has emptied. She fills it from her own water jar and gives it to me and embraces me. Then she points to the path leading to the tip, makes the sign of a gate with her hands and pushes her fingers through it. I grasp that the only place we’re allowed is actually outside the city walls where we saw the outcasts and the diseased. I can’t think of anything else to do and I fetch Joshua and bid him trot alongside me. He is not worried. It is all a big adventure for him. I look at his grubby little toes and notice bloodstains where he has gashed them on a stone or bit of rubbish. He hasn’t noticed.

He looks up at me and grins. I try to look cheerful to avoid alarming him, but inside I’m confused and upset. I’m sure Naomi will tell Joseph what’s happened when he returns with her husband tonight and he’ll manage to find me even in the dark, but I’m scared for us all. I fear most of all catching one of the many fatal diseases that must abound in neighbourhoods like this, but there is little I can do to protect us. My trudge compares with Joshua’s hop, skip and jump and he wanders around investigating other tents and squats and their children, covering twice as much ground as I do. The smell makes me feel sick, but Joshua seems impervious to it. We’re getting closer to the edge of the city and the gateway to the path by the river and the rubbish tip. The soldiers on duty there are busy chatting to each other and ignore us – at least that’s a relief. Joshua is fascinated by the gulls and large crows that are circling over the refuse making a terrific din, and attempts to chase a couple of the raven birds that are tussling over some disgusting morsel at the edge of the path. I warn him away - I don’t trust these birds with such a small child. They look vicious to me.

There is a small town perched precariously along the bank, inhabited by those considered by the citizens of this city to be the dregs of society – those who because of disease or lack of money are cast out to fend for themselves. There are men, women and children here for these men can find no employment. There are old gnarled near corpses, men with hideous physical deformities, men and women whose loss of mental faculties makes them perform obscene gyrations as we pass by. Joshua thinks they are funny. He does not yet realise the pathetic nature of the figures prancing at the water’s edge, some naked or in tattered rags. We had a few such creatures in Nazareth and Bethlehem, but someone always looked out for them and gave them alms and food. We did not let them starve. Here no-one seems to care. There is an old woman here whose face and fingers have been eaten by the dread leprosy and a young boy already showing the white skin blotches that denote he too is a victim. I forget my own misery when I see these sights. They are much more unfortunate than me. They have no hope, no future. Surely we are not condemned to live like that. Joseph will earn some money then we can escape, but I shall not forget this ever. And although he cannot appreciate it now, I won’t let Joshua forget it either.

We keep walking. We must have meandered for nearly half an hour beside the river before the wretched hovels and makeshift dwellings start having gaps between them. The rubbish tip too has dwindled until it only consists of a few remnants blowing in the wind. There are stray dogs prowling amongst the remnants of the rubbish but no-one chases them away. I watch them carefully to see that they don’t come near Joshua. Luckily he seems to be wary of them - I was worried that he might chase after them and get bitten. We now have a full view of the river and the path on the other side where we were passing only yesterday morning – it seems like an age already. The path wanders a short distance from the bank now taking a short cut where the river curves in a wide arc. The community of the sick and destitute has finally come to an end.

I move across onto the barren land on the river side of the path and sit down. I put the bread and pot of water beside me. It is all I have in the world apart from the clothes on my back. We are at the end of the dispossessed, the lowest of the low. We can go no lower. Perhaps we have to learn this before we can become honoured. I must learn to hang on to God’s promise. I look at the few strands of brownish grass struggling to survive in this wilderness and remember the times I used to sit under the fig tree blowing seeds from the grasses planting anew. Joshua is fascinated by the river now – I’ll have to watch him carefully here or he’ll be in the water and quickly out of his depth. We must just wait until Joseph finds us. I watch the red ball of the sun sink over the rubbish tip and think how beautiful it is, shimmering orange and purple even on that revolting mound. The birds wheel dark against the rainbow coloured sky. I must wait and count my blessings.