21

Rahab startled out of a sound sleep. Steady pounding of the earth’s surface and the jangling of warriors’ armor fairly shook the walls of the city. Had they entered the gates?

She sat up. She must get to her family. Convince them to come now!

Tangled covers seemed to fight her efforts. Her heart thumped hard as she opened the shutter and peered from her window to the sea of men below.

First priests carrying a golden box, then men dressed as military leaders, then soldiers tromped in straight lines around the circle of the town, saying not a word. Just as her townsmen had done during the Festival of Keret several months earlier.

Israelites. Were their actions mocking Jericho’s feast honoring the moon god?

A wave of fear and excitement moved through her. Israel’s God had mocked the gods of Egypt. Surely He was powerful enough to do the same to the moon god of Canaan. The god the people of Jericho also worshiped.

She glanced at the scarlet cord, relieved to see it still held secure. A breath she’d held too long escaped as she stepped back and closed the shutter up tight. She must make her father see that there could be no more waiting.

Although Adara had tried to convince the family to move to Rahab’s home, they had refused. And once news of Dabir’s apparent suicide spread, the town had lost all hope. Even Prince Nahid refused to visit her. No men ventured from their homes to hers. Except for the cook and Tendaji and a stray cat that had found its way to her courtyard, she lived alone. She looked down as the cat, back arched, rubbed against her bare leg. She bent to pick him up. The poor thing had been scrawny, nearly starved when she found him. And the cook had protested feeding the animal. Cats, especially black and brown like this one, she’d said, were evil tools of the gods. Only the Egyptians held them in high regard.

“You’re not a tool of evil, little one.” She kissed the cat’s brown nose and stroked the dark stripes down his back. “No more than I am.” Her words trailed off. What was true of her could not be true of such a small, charming creature.

He rewarded her with a kiss against her check, and she felt an uncommon motherly bond to the animal, as though he understood her and needed her, like she’d needed the babe she’d lost.

“Do you need me?” she whispered against his cheek. His loud purr was her reward. But a moment later he buried his head against her arm, as though she could protect him from the strange silence . . . the sounds of steady, heavy marching, but missing a battle cry.

“Are you afraid?”

His purr ceased, and she realized that even this animal was not safe from Israel’s invasion if he did not stay within her walls. Soon there would be a breach, and since she did not know when, she must convince her family to come to her for safety today.

“Perhaps you could convince them.” She spoke to the cat but knew she was really speaking to herself, bolstering her courage. “I will leave you with Tendaji, for I do not trust that the cook won’t put you in a soup and feed it to me. Perhaps when I return you will have many arms to hold you.”

She set the cat on the end of her bed, patted its head, then hurried to dress in her plainest garments and old, dull robe. She must not be recognized as she took the streets to her father’s house. But she must hurry and bring her family back with her before it was too late.

The sun was halfway between dawn and the day’s midpoint when Rahab knelt before her father, arms outstretched, pleading with him to listen to her. “Father, please, come stay with me. We are surely safer together than separate.”

Her brothers laughed outright at her words, causing a sinking feeling to settle within her. “Why should an entire household move to stay with you, when you are one woman alone?” Tzadok said, his expression carrying its familiar frown. “I have no intention of living in the home of a prostitute.”

Silence followed his caustic remark until an argument broke out between her brothers and sisters. Her mother came to stand behind her father, placing a hand on his shoulder as though to infuse him with her strength. Rahab noted the deep lines along her father’s weathered brow, her pulse suddenly quickening at the realization that he was indeed not as strong as he had been the day she married Gamal.

“What possible reason can you give us for coming to stay with you?” her brother Jaul asked, breaking her train of thought. “Are you privy to something the rest of us do not know?”

She rose slowly and let her gaze sweep the room, resting on each of her brothers. “Men tell me many things they would normally keep to themselves.” She swallowed the impossibility of keeping the truth from them yet trying to convince them to see things her way. She had to convince them without revealing Salmon’s secret.

Help me, God of Israel. If only Salmon had not insisted they stay within her walls.

She straightened. “Did you not think it strange the way they marched in silence in one complete circle around the city? Just like we do during Keret’s festival? If my guess is right, they will do the same again tomorrow. Perhaps they will take until the seventh day to attack, as our festival lasts a week, but we cannot be sure. What if they challenge us on the third day to surprise us?” She watched their skeptical faces, their doubt evident. And why should they listen to her, a prostitute?

She reined in the desperate need to beg and plead with them, instead kneeling again at her father’s side. “I cannot force you, Father. But I have plenty of room, and my home stands along the wall. If they invade the city, we could escape from the window in the wall.” Though she knew they ought to see through such impossibility, she could think of nothing else to say to convince them.

Her father’s gaze shifted to hers, softening. He cupped her cheek with a veined hand. “My dear Rahab.” His expression filled with sorrow, as though his thoughts carried him to another time and place.

“Father,” Rahab said again, her tone more urgent this time. “Just because the Israelites have stopped marching for today does not mean they will not return tomorrow. They will return. They are going to take this city.”

She stood and turned in a circle to include her brothers in her plea. “You can think what you want of me, but you have heard what their God did to stop up the Jordan River in the midst of flood stage. You have heard of the miracles He performed in Egypt and seen how the men of the city won’t even leave their homes for fear. Well, they are right to fear a God so powerful. I fear Him.”

“If their God is so powerful that He could destroy Egypt and stop up the Jordan, what good does it do to band together?” her father said. “We are all doomed.”

“Then let us be doomed together,” she said, longing to reinstill hope in her father’s hopeless eyes. “But I do not think we are doomed,” she added, leaning forward to kiss his cheek. “I believe in their God, Father. If He is as great as the tales tell, then come with me and let us encourage each other while we wait.”

She watched her father’s changing expressions, his indecision palpable. At last he stood. “We will come with you.” To the household he said, “Gather your things, only what you can carry, and let us go and lodge with Rahab.”

The following morning Rahab awoke to the same marching beat, only this time, Adara clung to her in the bed they shared, as though they were both young girls.

“Why do they not shout like normal warriors?” Adara poked her head from beneath thick linen sheets. “Are they truly acting out the part of our festival?”

Rahab patted her sister’s arm, reminded of her innocence. “I can only assume what they are up to, my sweet. But I do believe they will break through these walls. It is only a matter of time.”

“You do not know that for sure.” Adara rose up on one elbow. “Do you?”

Rahab noted Adara’s raised brow and slowly nodded.

“The spies promised you, didn’t they?” Adara’s dark eyes grew round. “Why didn’t you tell us?” she whispered, glancing toward the closed door.

“You speculate too much, my sister. Even if they had given it, since when have you known me to trust any man’s word?” Only when a handsome stranger is able to take my breath with a look.

But no, she was not so fickle as that. She had heard the stories of their God, seen the fear in the eyes of the men of the city. She rolled on her side to face her sister.

“You used to trust men.” Adara met her gaze, searching.

“I trust Israel’s God, not their men.”

“But if the Israelites did not promise you, how do you know their God will accept you . . . or us? Why would He save a prostitute?”

The words, though said in innocence, stung.

“He has no reason to,” she whispered, pulling Adara into her arms lest she see her doubt, her fear. “But I believe He can. If He is merciful.”

Adara pulled slowly away, jumped from the bed, and walked toward the shuttered window. “I have never heard of a god who is merciful without a calculated reason.” She touched the shutter and glanced at Rahab. “One peek?”

Rahab chuckled, then came to stand at Adara’s side. “Suddenly you are brave?”

Adara shrugged. “I’ve never seen an Israelite,” she whispered. “Are they very different than we are?”

Salmon’s handsome bearded face filled Rahab’s mind, the memory as sharp as it had been every day since she had helped both men escape. “Not very different.” Somehow she could not bring herself to describe them to her virgin sister.

Adara looked at her and began to unlatch the shutter. “Just a quick glance?”

Rahab nodded. But before she could pull the shutter open, her mother burst into the room. “What are you doing? Do you want them to see you? Close that at once.”

Rahab stepped back from the window, and Adara hurried to her mother’s side. “It’s not Rahab’s fault, Mama. I asked to look.”

Her mother’s scowl brought heat to Rahab’s cheeks. A moment later her father’s large frame filled the archway. “Their priests carry a gold box on long poles ahead of the company. And men march before it with the horns of rams, yet they do not blow the trumpets. This is not like our festival. What foolishness is this?”

Rahab felt his gaze bore into hers, as though she should somehow know the secrets of Israel’s plans. “I do not know, Father.”

He shook his head in disgust and strode from the room. Her mother followed, taking Adara with her. Rahab hurried after them, fearing they would leave and go home after only one night. But relief filled her as she saw them go to the cooking room and accept food from the cook. The cat licked scraps from a bowl in the adjacent courtyard near where Cala stood. Her sister met Rahab’s gaze with a guilty one of her own.

“He was hungry, and I felt sorry for him.”

Rahab smiled. “I intended to feed him. But how did he get out of my room?” She’d been sleeping with the animal for days but, in the hustle of settling her family, had forgotten him.

“He was scratching at the door, and I was awake with Raji, so I let him out. Where did you find him? Tzadok thinks cats are cursed.”

Rahab scowled. Tzadok had an opinion about everything, but she did not say so. “He showed up in our courtyard one day. I have yet to name him.”

Cala nodded. “I like him. He’s so scrawny, though. Do you think he’ll live?”

Rahab picked the cat up after he’d finished eating and stopped to lick his paws. “He’s a fighter. If he doesn’t get crushed in the battle, we must keep him inside with us.” She looked at her sister. “Will you help me?”

“If I think of it. With the men underfoot and Raji nursing at odd hours, I don’t know. Better ask Adara to help you.” Cala turned at the sound of her young son crying. “I should go.”

Rahab stroked the cat’s back and held him close, wishing it were her baby she held and not just a homeless animal. She nodded at Cala, who walked toward one of Rahab’s bedrooms. But a moment later she turned back.

“Thank you for doing this for us,” she said. She placed a hand on Rahab’s shoulder. “I know Father and Tzadok and our brothers blame you, but I know it was not your fault—all that happened to you. To us. Thank you for suggesting this final time together.” She put a fist to her mouth to stifle a sob. “At least if we die, we die together.” She hurried off to care for her child, while Rahab sank onto one of the plush chairs in her courtyard, still holding the cat.

The marching had ceased for the second day, but the thought was not comforting.