robe and tied it with a leather thong. I placed the bundle into Yaltha’s arms.
“Wait,” I said. “Take my incantation bowl, too. I fear they will find it here.” Leaving the red thread in place, I quickly redraped the bowl in flax and added it to the bundle.
Yaltha said, “I’ll hide it in my room, but it may not be safe there very long either.”
As I’d stuffed my writings into the goatskins, an idea had formed in my mind, one designed to gain me freedom from my room. I tried now to put it into words. “Tomorrow when my parents come, I will behave like a repentant daughter. I will confess I’ve been disobedient and stubborn. I will plead for forgiveness. I will be like one of those professional mourners who pretend grief and wail at the graves of strangers.”
She studied me a moment. “Take care you don’t weep too much. A river of tears will make them wary. A trickle will be believed.”
I opened the door to be sure Shipra was still asleep and watched Yaltha creep past her with my precious belongings. My aunt had made her freedom. I would make mine.
viii.
They came late in the morning. They came bearing smugness, stern faces, and a betrothal contract freshly inked. I met them with smudges of twilight beneath my eyes and acts of guile and obsequiousness. I kissed my father’s hand. I embraced my mother. I begged them to pardon my defiance, pleading shock and immaturity. I cast down my eyes, willing tears—please come—but I was dry as the desert. Only Satan knows how hard I tried to squeeze them out. I pictured every grief I could think of. Yaltha beaten, battered, and sent away. Nathaniel spreading my legs. A life without inks and pens. The scrolls in the chest becoming a conflagration in the courtyard. And nothing, not a drop. What a failure I should be as a professional mourner.
My father lifted the contract and read it to me.
I, Nathaniel ben Hananiah of Sepphoris, betroth Ana, daughter of Matthias ben Philip Levias of Alexandria, on the 3rd day of Tishri and cause us to enter an inchoate marriage according to Rabbinic law.
I shall pay to her father 2,000 denarii and 200 talents of split dates from the first fruits of my orchard. I pledge to feed, clothe, and shelter her along with her aunt. In exchange, her guardianship shall pass into my hand on the day she is transferred to my house, where she will perform all the duties of wifehood.
This contract cannot be broken except by death or by divorce for Ana’s blindness, lameness, afflictions of skin, infertility, lack of modesty, disobedience, or other repulsions or displeasures so deemed by myself.
She shall enter my house four months hence on the 3rd of Shebat.
He held the contract out before me so I could witness the words myself. They were followed by Nathaniel’s signature in large brutish letters, as if slashed onto the parchment. Then my father’s name in bold imperial slants. Last, Rabbi Shimon ben Yohai, my father’s instrument, his signature so small and cramped I could glimpse the shame of his collusion.
“We are waiting to hear you acknowledge your consent,” Mother said, cocking her eyebrow, the crook of a warning.
I lowered my eyes. Clasped my hands to my breast. A small tremble of my chin. There. I was the compliant and docile daughter. “I give it,” I said. Then, wondering if they might be inclined to change their minds about the contents of my writing chest, added, “With all my heart.”
They did not change their minds. Shipra arrived with one of the soldiers who’d escorted us to the market. Mother went to my writing chest and threw back the lid. Her head vacillated back and forth as she took in the contents. “For all the time you spent writing, I should think you would have more to show for it.”
I felt a twinge of trepidation on the back of my neck.
“You will not partake in any more of this nonsense,” Mother said. “You are betrothed now. We expect you to put all of this out of your mind.” She dropped the lid. A resounding thud.