The Missing Madonna - Chapter 2 "Ruth's reveries"

There was still no sign of Mari’s family the next day. Nathan checked first thing this morning and said their house was still deserted. I went down later and there was quite a crowd. I heard raised voices and saw that a couple of men were complaining bitterly that implements they needed and that Joseph had promised today were not ready. One of them was really quite angry and I heard Rebecca tell him not to complain to her as she knew no more than they what had happened. The men pushed into Joseph’s house and began to root around the half finished pieces of furniture and farm equipment and both eventually emerged brandishing what looked like an oxen’s yoke and a rudimentary plough, but they were rough and some splinters of wood protruded. One of the men muttered that he’d have to finish it himself and if Joseph thought he was going to get paid for this, he’d better think again.

The men eventually made off, still grousing and the gaggle of women outside the house began to disperse. I looked at Rebecca and she shook her head.

“Still no sign of them. I’m baffled. It’s just not like Joseph to let his customers down, especially that Simon from the other side of Jacob’s Field. He’s had a long trek and he comes regularly. There’s no way Joseph would have forgotten he was coming this morning unless there’s been some emergency. Either Joshua was taken seriously ill and they’ve gone looking for a physician in Jerusalem or Mari’s had bad news from Galilee and they’ve gone to her home in a hurry. But I’d have thought they’d have at least told one of us.”

Rebecca was expressing what we all felt. Eventually everyone drifted away back to their own homes. I walked with Rebecca’s daughter, Miriam, to the well. She immediately picked Benjamin up and started bouncing and tickling him and he chortled with laughter. He loves Miriam who always makes a fuss of him. I carried her water pot while she carried him and she played in the dust with him while I drew water for both of us. There were a couple of other women there and there was only one topic of conversation. However, I didn’t learn any more. Just the same old guesses as to what must have happened.

So we went home and carried on as normal, although Mari and Joshua’s disappearance was never far from my mind. The silence from Joseph’s house seemed eerie, I was so used to hearing the noise echoing in the distance of hammering or sawing as I went about my chores. Although Ben had been happily occupied by Miriam, after his afternoon sleep his first words to me sounded like ‘Shusha’ and I guessed he was missing Joshua as most days the two toddlers were inseparable.

When Nathan came in from the fields I gathered he had come via Joseph’s house and he confirmed that there was still no news of the family; no-one had heard anything. I thought this was very strange. There was always someone who could be relied on to have heard whatever news or gossip was going the rounds. But this time, absolutely nothing. Some had tried to construct scenarios arising from the strangers that had been seen after nightfall at Joseph’s home a couple of days earlier, but they were pure guesses and acknowledged as such.

Benjamin seemed very fretful at bedtime. I worried that he might be sickening for something, he’s usually so jolly and we have a lot of fun as I give him his last feed and change his soiled clothes. I wondered if it was because he was missing his friend. Anyway, I eventually got him to sleep and had a few minutes with Nathan before we retired to bed too. I thought Nathan was too tired at first to make love, but he curled himself eventually around me and I abandoned myself to his embraces. It’s so lovely and I’m so lucky really to have such a gentle and amorous man for my husband. I know from the gossip at the well that not many women are so fortunate. I hear all their complaints then; some of them seem very resentful or bitter sometimes, I can’t imagine what it must be like to be married to someone who does not respect you and neglects or even abuses you physically which some women seem to be quite open about. I think I’d be too ashamed to admit such things if I were to suffer like that – heavens above, what am I even contemplating? I just can’t imagine Nathan ever treating me like that.

After we had lain quietly for a while Nathan turned and I realised he was quickly asleep. I listened to his regular breathing for sometime and I suppose I must have drifted off to sleep soon as well, but it didn’t seem many minutes before I woke with a start and heard Ben crying. I was alarmed for it is several weeks now since he started sleeping right through the night and my first thought was that he must be ill. I picked him up and he didn’t seem particularly hot. In fact his eyes opened wide and he grinned at me as I lifted him from his cradle – I was at once relieved that nothing seemed to be wrong and annoyed at the little devil that he seemed to be enjoying waking me up. I thought that perhaps he might be soothed if he took a little milk so I put him to my breast and settled myself as comfortably as I could. After he’d taken his fill – not very much in truth – I rocked him and waited for those eyes to close. They stared at me for a time, then began to blink, but every time I made to put him down the movement stirred him and his eyes opened once more.

I found my mind wandering as I rocked him. I kept looking over to the huddled form of my husband, still rising and falling gently as he breathed in such a restful rhythm and I wished Ben at this moment would take a hint from his dad. It seems strange now that we are so settled that just three years ago it was so difficult for us to come together. I used to see him quite often accompanying his father who was a scribe in the synagogue when the white robed man would stop at my father’s market stall to buy vegetables to take home for his evening meal. In fact I’d noticed him when I must have been barely ten years old and admired the young man who was already showing signs of imminent adulthood and whom I knew had celebrated his ‘bar mitzva’ the previous year. I know I used to look forward to the time of day when his father would come by on his way home from the synagogue and I’d be disappointed if Nathan did not accompany him. I used to be shy at first and I’d blush and go hot all over if I thought he was looking at me, then I’d feel silly, because I thought that he’d never be able to take me seriously.

He used to tease me a lot and I liked that because it meant that he’d noticed me. I used to play up to him, to goad him, and he’d chase me around the stall and try to grab me while his father and mine haggled over the price of my father’s vegetables or occasionally over a chicken we’d slaughtered. Then one day, Nathan had sat down and talked to me, just like a friend, and I’d felt so grown up and when they’d both gone I started to dream that one day he’d marry me. Little did I think it would really happen.

I don’t know how long it was before Nathan’s father noticed that his son spent time talking seriously to me and even began to seek me out at other times and stop to chat. My father warned me one day – I must have been coming up to my twelfth birthday by then – that I must not set too great a store by my obvious friendship with Nathan. I mustn’t begin to get any ideas… But it was already too late as far as I was concerned. I used to long for the times I saw Nathan returning home from his lessons at the synagogue and I began to think he really liked me too, not just as a childhood friend, but something more special. I could see his eyes light up, he started to show off to me and made it obvious that he wanted me to see just how grown up he was and ready to get married and start a home of his own. Then one day he beckoned me to leave my father’s side and whispered that his mother and father had told him that he mustn’t be seen alone with me any more, that it was unseemly and he should keep himself for a girl they would choose to be his wife….

“Oh, shush, my darling Benjamin, do go to sleep. Shut those gorgeous eyes and let me dream on about your great big handsome dad. Shush, my love, go to sleep, let those eyes close, shush….”

Then that thrilling moment when he said he loved me and wanted me to be his wife and made me promise to keep it a secret. ‘Why can’t we tell everyone?’, I said, and he told me that his parents disapproved because I was only the daughter of a tradesman and his father was from a family of scribes and that he couldn’t ever marry me. So he used to come and whisper where we could meet without his family knowing. I don’t know how he managed to keep our assignations secret – he’s always told me that his father never found out until I was of age and he’d asked my father formally if he could marry me. My mother found out long before where I was going and she used to admonish me and say that no good would come of it, I’d be disappointed in the end. She used to warn me that I must be careful and not let him take advantage of my youth and innocence. He would leave me and if he’d taken my virginity they’d not be able to find me a proper husband. I knew she was wrong about that, Nathan never pressed me, he never tried to even kiss me, let alone anything more, but he held my hand and I so wanted him to take me in his arms and, silly me, I think I’d have let him do anything, I was so infatuated.

“Oh, Benjamin, do go to sleep. I’m tired, I can’t keep my eyes open, why don’t you let your eyes shut, then we could both go back to bed. Come on, let me rock you, that’s it, quiet, now, shush, my darling, shush…

I think he’s gone, at last.