“Oyl Oyl” he cried, and was ready with his goad; but the old donkey had got its second wind and the road was downhill now, there was hardly any need to prod.
It was all exactly right, that was the beauty of it; the thing that she had, through so many Springs, expected. Colours sang, music was sweetly scented, scent took on lovely shapes; there was snow, made of white roses, and the stars fell like rain, the moon tasted of honey and all the beanflowers were butterflies, and the hawthorn, from which she had always expected a revelation, was an awning, green and white against blue, over this wonderful place where beauty was one and indivisible. This was heaven and to see an angel did not astonish her at all….
IV
Rachel said, “Where have you been? We dawdled and waited; and Leah ran back to the spring, but you weren’t there. Are you all right? Have you had a fall?”
She could truthfully say, “Yes, I had a fall.” Some explanation, however makeshift and temporary, was needed.
“After you’d gone, somebody came along, taking the hill road, so I took it too, and I fell. But I’ve brought you your water.”
“I was waiting for it,” Rachel said. If she’d had more time, if she hadn’t been so scared that Ephraim might come in and scold because his dinner was belated, if. Joshua hadn’t been putting at her skirt, Rachel would have questioned her friend more closely. But she could guess. Mary had had another of those spells when her mind was elsewhere, not seen some unevenness in the road, and stumbled; she’d spilled the water and had to go back for more. Following this line of thought she said:
“How lucky the jars weren’t broken.” And that sounded heartless, so she added quickly, ‘and that you didn’t hurt yourself. But you have been crying.”
Suppose she said—Yes, from wonder and joy, and went on to explain; suppose she were Rachel, standing in the low doorway and Rachel were herself, telling such a marvelous tale. Would I, in her place, believe it? Will anyone believe me?
She held out her hands, grazed and dirtied.
Rachel said, with solemnity, “Mary, when you’re married you won’t cry over a grazed hand. Thank you for bringing the water, I must make Ephraim’s dinner now.”
Moving on towards her own home she thought—Whom can I tell, with the
slightest hope of being believed?One’s mother seemed the obvious person, until one was face-to-face again with that practical, bustling woman, waiting, at the moment, for fresh water and slightly irritated.
“What a time you’ve been! Every day it seems to take longer and longer. In my day we went straight there and back, with a good clout if we lingered. And what have you done to your hands?”
(I fell.”
“Carrying the great boy of Rachel’s!” Anne said.
“So that’s the end of that. You can just say that I forbid you to do it again. God gave children legs to walk with. Your dress is filthy too, dust and grass stains.” The blood she did not notice for Mary was careful to keep her arm close to her side. At the first opportunity she slipped away and changed her dress.
The day wore on; such a day as no woman had ever lived through. The sun and the warmth had induced a house-cleaning fever in Anne; every mat, every blanket must be taken out into the yard and beaten, every candlestick cleaned, the big chest rubbed with beeswax. And Mary was much less helpful than usual. In the end Anne said, half serious “and half sarcastic :
“You didn’t by any chance hit your head when you fell, did you? You’re acting as though you were half-witted. What ails you?”
Turn to her and tell her the plain truth and what would happen? She’d drop dead. She was pious in her way, and like all pious Jews knew the prophecies about the Messiah and his virgin birth; but she would never be able to believe that her own daughter, whom she was scolding for letting the beans boil dry, was that chosen one. So belief and disbelief would work in her as new wine often worked in old, hardened casks; they split; and Anne’s limited, orderly mind, asked to accept and contain this marvel, would split and she’d drop dead.
She realised, as this momentous day drew to its close, that the only person she could tell was Joseph. He must, in any case, be told because he was so nearly concerned. Would he believe her? She cherished one hope here; since he was so nearly concerned, since so much depended upon him, God would surely have prepared him already. God was omniscient, He would know that without Joseph’s help and support … Don’t think of that! God was just; Joseph, too, on the long walk back from the house outside Cana, or in his workshop, would have been visited and enlightened.
To be with someone who knew, who understood and believed, was such a wonderful prospect that she could hardly wait for the moment when, supper over, she could slip away and find him.
She knew, before a word was spoken, that that hope had been groundless.
He was in his workshop, making the most of the last of the daylight, setting his tools in order and brushing some shavings from the bench to the floor. When her shadow darkened the doorway he looked up, recognising her with an expression of pleasure, and then, seeing that she was alone, with surprise.
He lived by himself and properly brought-up girls like Mary, with mothers like Anne, did not come visiting, almost at dusk, men who lived alone, even if they were officially betrothed. Once or twice a week Anne, who believed that men left to themselves ate nothing but bread and cheese, would invite him to supper, and sometimes, afterwards, Joachim, Mary’s father, would go to make his hens secure from the foxes and Anne would absent herself for a little while, and they’d be left alone; but she’d never come to his house unaccompanied and his first thought was that something must be wrong. Carpenters were often called upon when accidents happened for people believed-not without some reason—that a man who could dovetail two pieces of wood together so smoothly that they seemed to have grown that way, could replace a sprained joint or set a broken bone.
If God had informed him, she thought, he would have come to welcome her, reached out his hands to hers and begun to speak of the wonder. As it was he said:
“Mary! Is anything wrong?““No,” she said.
“Nothing wrong.” Disappointment made her voice sound small and woeful. And it was impossible to avoid the thought that had she come to report some physical disaster—the roof of the house fallen in, Anne’s ankle sprained, Joachim’s leg broken—she could have counted upon him absolutely. Sympathetic, kind and sensible, in any ordinary situation he could be relied upon to do the right thing and do it well. But in this situation … The very sound of her voice dismayed her. She had come to share with him the most marvelous news that anyone, ever, anywhere, had had to impart. It should have been announced with joy and pride and the singing of trumpets.
She said, a trifle more firmly, “I came to see you, Joseph, because I have something to tell you, something for you alone.”
His heart gave a great downwards thud. He aligned the handle of a chisel and the handle of a saw with meticulous exactitude. He knew what she had come to say. She didn’t, after all, wish to marry him. All along he’d found it difficult to believe in his luck. She was so young, and so pretty, so well-brought-up. He’d been immensely, and pleasantly, surprised when her parents had seemed to encourage him; and when, after quite a time of trying to pluck up courage, he had made his formal request to Joachim and he had said, “You’d suit me; but we must find out how Mary feels,” he had suspected that Joachim was making an excuse, not liking to say “No.” outright.
The trouble was that he was too old for her; age mattered in a society where widows had a very poor time. Any careful father was bound to look ahead and choose for his daughter a man who wasn’t likely to die before he had reared a son capable of supporting his mother. Of course, with a rich man it was different; he could provide for a wife. Unless they died early, in childbed, women tended to outlive men and that fact must be taken into consideration when arranging marriages.
However, Mary, so pretty and graceful and gentle, Mary, who could have married anybody, had agreed to marry him, a carpenter in his late thirties, not a native of Nazareth, a man who had plied his trade in many far places—he’d even been in Egypt—before settling down. An enormous gratitude had blended with his love for her. Amazement too. And if she had come here this evening to say that she had changed her mind, thought better of it, he would not be truly surprised. Sad, disillusioned, but not surprised. He’d bear the blow as a man should, not whimpering; and for her wedding to some younger, luckier fellow, he’d make her a chest, carved all over with lilies, her favourite flowers.