Queen of Sheba (14 page)

“She’s serious?”

“Of course. She hates Tipti because she’s seen that you love her. She claims Tipti’s cat was killed by the priest because of her charm and Tipti will be next.”

“I don’t understand. The priest of Yahweh, not Chemosh, killed the cat.”

“My dear,” Bathsheba said lifting her skirt slightly so she could step down into the outer courtyard, “the harem has become a place of struggle for power and authority. In foreign languages they scream at each other with terrible threats and their maids and eunuchs are always thinking of ways to best themselves. In my day the harem was not the pleasantest place, but it definitely wasn’t like this.”

After she had gone Solomon moved to his dais and sank down among the cushions. He ignored the message that friends and tribesmen were waiting to see him. He had matters to ponder, decisions to make. So, his little Tipti was a tool of the pharaoh. He couldn’t believe it had all been a game, a maneuver for power. She had loved him. Perhaps if there had been
no other wives, no Naamah to torment her it would have been different.

In his heart, he knew it wasn’t so. Her final loyalty would be to Egypt and to her brother. He’d been foolish to love her. To give her so much freedom. Now, if his mother was right, and she was always right, he was about to lose everything he had worked for since he had become king. Everything he prided himself on was about to be lost.

He drummed his fingers on the armrest. Pharaoh had heard of the golden vessels in the temple, the fine carvings in his palace, the horses and chariots he had ordered from Egypt that had been paid for in pure gold. He thought of how proud he had been of all his accomplishments. “Pride goes before destruction,” he said at last getting up from the dais and pacing back and forth across the length of the tent.

So it was not just Egypt but Edom and Haddad, Damascus with the bitter Rezon leading the charge, and, joining them, the queen of Sheba, like an angry wasp whose nest has been disturbed, was undoubtedly ready to sting. He had no forces strong enough to battle such a coalition. They would surround him, rob him of his dearest treasures, clean out the lovely temple and leave it desolate.

Worse than all of this he began to realize they would no doubt take him prisoner, put out his eyes, torture his sons, and rape his wives. For a moment he couldn’t resist a small thrill of pleasure at the thought of Naamah, the terror of his harem, his evil queen, being led off into captivity. She wouldn’t be raped, she was too cross and sharp-tongued, but she would be made to stand and fan some Egyptian dignitary, or perhaps, if she was really difficult, clean their chamber pots.

He crossed his arms and stood thinking. Usually his quick mind could imagine some defense, some counteraction, but if his mother was right, this could be the one maneuver he couldn’t surmount. In such a bind only the God of Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob cared what happened to him and the lovely temple. “Jerusalem is where I have put my name,” the Lord had said.

He remembered the dream he had had in the tabernacle at Gibeon before he became king. The commitment he had made to Yahweh and the promise Yahweh had made to him. He deliberately called to mind the promise all Israel had made at Sinai and the assurance that Yahweh would fight for them and protect them.

His hand closed around the snake bracelet Tipti had given him. “Thou shalt have no other gods before me” seemed to thunder through his mind. He looked down at the bracelet and for the first time saw that it was an ugly, evil thing. A talisman of the devotees of Isis, the Egyptian goddess of love.

He pulled it from his arm and flung it from him as he buried his head in his hands. “O God of Israel, unless your strong right arm defends us, we can lose everything,” he prayed.

In spite of his prayer and his good intentions, the bracelet had reminded him of Tipti. He picked up the scepter where it was lying under one of the pillows. He twirled it in his long jeweled fingers and thought of Tipti. In spite of everything, he still wanted her tonight. Wanted her desperately, and yet he knew she was a pagan, worshiping false gods and it seemed, was also a traitor, her love simply a ploy. He could not give her the satisfaction of making him seem a fool.

It had been his habit in the past to go to the balcony where he could look down on the courtyard of the harem below. The maidens newly chosen as wives or concubines could easily be seen as they sat clapping and taking turns dancing to the steady beat of drums and clanging of cymbals.

The courtyard was lighted with torches and the women looked beautiful and seductive. He could hardly imagine, looking on this charming scene, that there could be such strife as his mother had described. He looked from one to the other, trying to find someone that would make him forget Tipti for at least a night. They all looked rather dull and uninteresting until his eyes found a dark beauty that played the small finger drum with an extra vigor. Her bead was thrown back and she was singing the words with the same enthusiasm. “I want her,” he thought. “If anyone can make me forget Tipti and all my troubles for a few hours perhaps she can.”

“Simon,” he called, as he drew the curtains together, “I would see the maiden who is playing the finger drum and singing.” He handed the scepter to the young man and then walked back to where he could see the courtyard. In a few moments the music stopped and he could see one of the old women hobbling out into the middle of the dancers. They all stood still and expectant while she looked from one to the other and then slowly walked over to the girl who was still holding the drum and handed her the scepter.

He could see that the girl was excited. All the others rushed over to her and began talking and gesturing while she stood rather dazed, holding the golden scepter. One of the few eunuchs allowed in the harem brought a large scroll and some reeds, for it must be recorded in case a child should be born.

He sat cross-legged on the floor while the older women looked over his shoulder and the young girls giggled and talked among themselves. Solomon was momentarily amused as a small child reached for the reed pen and the eunuch spilled ink on the precious parchment. For a moment there were wild flailing of arms, accusations, and recriminations as the mother snatched up her child and the eunuch began to write again.

For all of his original interest in the girl, the evening didn’t turn out well. The girl had been shy and frightened. She looked at him with the same awe and reverence with which one would look at the holy ark. He could not get her to talk. She watched him closely and began to make him nervous. Finally, in spite of the fact that he knew there would be talk and the girl would be disgraced, he called the evening to an end. She had done nothing but make him all the more depressed over his mother’s bad news and more lonesome for Tipti.

He ordered that she be rewarded and was pleasant up until the moment the curtains closed behind her, and then he sank down on the dais and breathed a sigh of relief. He wondered if he was losing his charm. Was he getting too old for love? Had he become so formal and austere or so morose that he would only frighten women from now on?

He briefly wondered why he had always needed women so very much. It wasn’t that he was abnormally preoccupied with sex. It was more that he found it difficult to have friends, really close friends; most of them were too much in awe of him. They acted stilted and formal around him. Most people had even grown careful in the way they worded things or what they would discuss around him.

With women everything was different. Pleasantries were exchanged. Hands reached out to hands and lips to lips. For a short time he would feel a sense of belonging, a wholeness. He would feel accepted, part of the normal world, not set aside and only envied or admired.

Now after this miserable experience, he felt only depression. Ashes were in his mouth and tears of frustration in his eyes. The whole world had turned to dust and he ruled a kingdom that could vanish with the new moon, a kingdom in which even the best of friends could turn out to be enemies.

He had pulled out the parchment he had been writing on and was reading it over when he heard the guard outside his door clear his throat. Then there was the sound of footsteps and voices. “I have permission to see the king. It’s urgent!”

Solomon threw down the parchment and rose. He recognized Badget’s voice and he knew he would see him. Badget with one of his stories could make him forget all the unpleasantness of the day. “Come in, come in,” he said as a guard appeared with Badget close behind him.

B
adget had passed tribesmen and counselors in the lower courtyard who were all still hoping for a moment with the king. At the entrance to the roof pavilion, he encountered more guards and scribes, also a harpist with his harp under one arm and a trumpeter who stood ready should the king choose to leave and return to his own quarters.

As he followed the page into the dimly lit pavilion, he was surprised to find the king virtually alone except for his pet monkey. Upon seeing Badget the monkey jumped and went scrambling up the chain that held an incense burner. He sat perched on the rim and kept moving the chain so the burner swung back and forth.

Though Badget was amused, he didn’t forget to prostrate himself before the king and rose only at his command. Solomon was sitting cross-legged on a low throne that rose from a dais covered with lion skins.

“My lord,” Badget said as he accepted a tasseled cushion brought by one of the servants, “I bring important news.” He looked around the room as though trying to determine whether there was enough privacy.

“News? Is it good news or bad news? I’ve had enough bad news for one night.” The king looked uninterested, actually bored.

Badget pushed back his headpiece a bit nervously and then smiled. “Why, I would say it was good news. In fact the very best of news for a hospitable man like yourself.”

“Then perhaps we are to have a visitor.”

“Yes, yes. But such a visitor you can’t imagine.”

At this Solomon became interested. He leaned forward and his eyes studied Badget with an intensity that was very flattering to one such as the trader. “This visitor, I take it, is from some country where you’ve been trading.”

“Yes, my lord. A country to the far south filled with gold and beautiful women.” Badget’s eyes expressed more than his words.

Solomon laughed despite his lingering tendency to be morose. “Gold and beautiful women. You must be speaking of paradise.”

“No, my lord, it is a real country and you know it well, the land of Sheba. You are to have a royal visitor.”

Solomon was immediately interested. Since receiving word that Sheba’s queen was joining with the pharaoh to come against him, he had thought of little else.

“A royal visitor coming here?” He intended to be cautious and only draw Badget out without giving him any indication of his own knowledge of the situation.

“The queen herself is coming. See.” He pulled out a tasseled golden case from a huge pocket in his dusty cloak. “She has sent this message with me. I was instructed to deliver it in person.”

Solomon reached for the case, but his face was a mixture of curiosity and caution. “Then you saw the queen and talked with her.”

“Yes,” Badget said drawing himself up and nodding enthusiastically in the manner that had given him the name Hopoe. “She asked me many questions about you and our country. Then she told me she was coming to see for herself if all I had told her was true. She is probably already well on her way.”

“Already left? What did you tell her?”

“Of your wisdom and wealth. Your palace of marble and gold and the temple with its carved doors and hidden ark with the golden cherubim guarding it …”

Solomon fingered his scepter nervously. He didn’t like it. Badget of course had done it all innocently, but telling of all his wealth would only make someone like this queen greedy to get her hands on it. “She’s leading an army?” he asked.

For the first time Badget looked startled. “No, my lord. She’s only coming to see you, to talk and ask questions. That’s what she said. Of course, I had to leave before she finished making her plans but …”