Free Kindle Nation Shorts -- August 8, 2011: An Excerpt from RIGHTFULLY MINE by Aggie Villaneuva

Join the final leg of the Israelites 40-year trek to the Land of Milk and Honey, freedom and their own nation in today's 6,500-word Free Kindle Nation Short.

With Moses in the lead, the entourage laid plans for allocating the land soon to be theirs.  For Rizpah and her sisters, with father at death's door, a horrible problem loomed.   

Land would only be granted to families headed by men, and her father stood little chance of surviving  long enough to ensure his children's future.

There had to be a solution, and Rizpah was determined to find it. 

Rightfully Mine: God's Equal Rights Amendment

by Aggie Villaneuva     

4.7 Stars   -  11 Reviews

Kindle Price: $3.97

Text-to-Speech and Lending: Enabled 

Here's the set-up:    

   

"Why should the name of my father be wiped from Israel like footprints in a sandstorm because he bore only daughters?"

The promised land-God's precious gift to the Israelites. Precious indeed, but for Rizpah and her sisters the promise seemed empty. Only a male could claim a family's inheritance of land, and since Rizpah and her sisters had no brothers or husband she only has one option: to petition Moses on behalf of her self and her sisters.

Despite the odds against her, Rizpah must fight for what is rightfully hers! 

An Excerpt 

from RIGHTFULLY MINE 

by Aggie Villaneuva

 Copyright © 2011 by Aggie Villaneuva and published here with her permission

It was inconceivable that after forty years of chastisement in the Zin desert and the recent military successes in the Transjordan hills, the wandering nation of Israel could succumb to the temptations offered by the Moabite and Midianite women, but the tomb-like encampment attested to the sin. As a result, hundreds and thousands of sprawling black tents suffocated their inhabitants with the lingering, putrid taste of the death within them.

          The vast camp of Israel lay crippled by plague. They huddled piteously beneath arcing acacia branches along the oasis-like steam of Abel Shittim, the only shelter available in the scorching summer sands of the Moab plains. Israel was halted only a few miles east of the Jordan they yearned to cross.

          In the southwest corner of camp, among the tribe of Manasseh, Rizpah, the second-born of Zelophehad, grabbed a leather pail from a peg on the center pole of her family's tent. Unnoticed, she hurried from her father's crowded sickroom and headed for the nearly dry stream. Rizpah's brow crinkled in apprehensive muse as she made her way through camp. She shuddered as she filled her leather pail with the cool waters of the creek.

          Rising from the task, a flutter of white garment caught her attention. One of her four sisters, Tirzah, stood beneath a nearby acacia tree, praying toward the tabernacle outside camp. Rizpah decided not to interrupt her. Perhaps the youngest of us is wisest.

          With a sigh, Rizpah turned her face back into the eastern breezes of sunset. The wind attempted to dispel the dank, rotting odor of the disease that had claimed over twenty thousand of Israel so far, but grief and dread registered the approach, clamping the encampment like a vise. From each row of tents, the dreadful sounds of mourning were squeezed out into the night wind, or worse, the dreaded hush of encroaching death emanated from where families watched their loved ones die.

          Lugging the water, Rizpah returned to where her family's tent squatted, enveloped in dreaded hush. The front and back tent flaps were stretched taut over wooden doorposts, desperately sucking in fresh air to alleviate the humidity caused by too many bodies, crushed inside the tent's confined receiving room.

          Rizpah stole into the tent, praying for anonymity among the throng of neighbors murmuring their concern for Zeplophehad to her sister, Hoglah, and her husband, Ludim. Zelophehad's nephews, whom he had treated like the sons he never had, milled about with awkward attempts to receive the guests. They and their wives were the only relatives present, as all Zelophehad's brothers (save two younger half brothers) had died during their desert wanderings. Blessing her cousins for their help with a silent benediction, Rizpah skirted the crowd.        

          She paused at Zelophehad's door to finger the goat hair partition, remembering. Last year she had mended the ragged edges of it for her father. In jest, Zelophehad had claimed he couldn't sleep for the lamplight that crept through the torn edges of his door from his giggling daughters' all-night festivities.

          In truth, he had trouble sleeping since momma died birthing her fifth daughter, fourteen years past. Now his death was upon them, and the milestone would birth a life of uncertainty for Rizpah and her sister, trying to survive without a man in a nation caught firm in racking labor pains itself. Forty years of desert wandering for a people impregnated with long-awaited promises, forced a violent labor that only now was beginning.

          I mustn't be so morbid. Father will recover. Rizpah tried to relax her brow. At thirty-eight, her face bore few marks of aging, but her lightly tanned skin stretched tauter than usual over high cheeks and a square jaw, etching lines of strain around her thin mouth.

          Her hair, tinted rich as mahogany bronzed from the lamplight, swung back hurriedly from her face, as if to avoid the candid gaze of her light brown eyes. Intelligence shone in those eyes, and a glimmer of ardent affection. The discovery of those lights in her eyes added intrigue to the interest showed her by cousin, Hanniel, son of one of Father's deceased brothers and leader of their tribe of Manasseh. She hoped the interest would be subdued when he recognized that latent affection was not meant for him.

          "How does my brother-in-law fare?" a voice shrilled beside Rizpah, startling her.

          "Not well, I fear, Aunt Puah. He's sleeping now."

          "It's such a shame," clucked Puah, wife of Zelophehad's oldest half brother. "I was telling Enosh, when your father first took ill...'It's a shame,' I said to him, 'that we have none of those learned Egyptian doctors here in the desert.' "

          "We're doing all we can to make him comfortable," Rizpah mumbled, tugging at the door flap as if to enter Zelophehad's room.

          "I'm sure you are, my dear. I'm sure you are." Puah paused, but not long enough for Rizpah to escape.

          "I can just feel the arrogance of the Moabites and Midianites as they sneer down at us from the eastern heights." Puah squinted as if she were imagining the scene. "They shall forever be remembered as the country who could not match us in battle, but defeated and immobilized us by their friendship-the friendship of their beautiful women, that is. Because of Israel's immorality and idolatry we stand thus, mourning in the tents of our loved ones." Puah looked back at Rizpah and clucked. "It is a shame that your father's good name will be smeared by his falling in this plague."

          Rizpah glared at her aunt, dropping the partition to hiss, "Many men have fallen in this plague who are innocent of its cause, as they have also in the plagues of the other desert. How else could an entire generation die in only forty years? Or would you rather we tarry in the wilderness until they all die of old age? A few more seasons here and you, too, will go to a sandy grave, denied your inheritance."

          "I would think you could keep a more respectful tongue under the circumstances."

          "If I were a man rebuking you, you would heed my words."

          "When you are ready to bear the burdens assigned to men, I will give heed to you, but until the Lord Elohim changes the status of impertinent women, I am still your elder and worthy of that respect." Puah jutted her chin haughtily.

          She is right, Rizpah realized. Why do I think anyone should give heed to me? "Forgive me." Her shoulders drooped as she sighed. "I am weary. I only believe we shouldn't judge all the men who fall in the plague of Baal-Peor. That is the privilege of Ha-Elohim, the true God."

          "Then I would assume it is also the privilege of Elohim and not you, to judge my tongue." Puah had spoken sharply, but when she saw Rizpah's weary countenance and the dark circles under her eyes, her voice softened. She patted Rizpah's arm. "I meant no offense to Zelophehad. I came only to bring you and your sisters this bread." She held up a reed basket. "Let us keep peace at your father's deathbed."

          Words of thanks formed on Rizpah's lips as she reached for the basket, but Puah's last word struck out at her and her arms fell limp at her side. "My father is not dying."

          "But," the older woman sputtered, "You yourself said his generation must die before we can possess the land. Surely you realize it is time?"

          Why don't you count off the number of years for me, my aunt? The press from the crowd of neighbors, mingled with the summer heat, added steam to Rizpah's anger. Reason all you like. I will not let Father go! She swore, clenching her fists, but keeping her peace before Puah. Her aunt's hand fluttered on Rizpah's arm before she clucked again and strode away, shaking her head.

          This plague. Curse this plague. It gives Aunt Puah an excuse to wag her tongue and threatens to steal my father. But my sisters and I will restore him to health. Rizpah threw aside the door flap.

          The black goat-hair walls of Zelophehad's room offered little aid to the lamp's attempt to illuminate the cubicle. In rhythm with her sister Milcah's sobs, fingers of shadows streaked grotesque mirages of grief across the faces of those who lined the partitions.

          Zelophehad slept fitfully on his woven reed mat in the center of the room, his hair and beard drenched with the sweat of fever and the stifling, trapped heat. At his head lay Mahlah, the oldest of his five daughters, an invalid who was propped against the thick fleeces she used for support in her chair. She wrung cloudy, tepid water from a rag to mop Zelophehad's brow.

          Rizpah hurried to fill a bowl with fresh water and nearly tripped over Mahlah's lifeless legs. They lay at such an awkward angle, Rizpah was sure she must be in pain. Reaching down, she tucked her sister's legs into a more comfortable position and was rewarded with a grateful smile.

          Still, the motion threw her off balance and she stumbled backward over Joshua, who was sitting cross-legged beside Zelophehad's pallet. Joshua's friend, Caleb, reached out to steady her with a firm grasp. Her heart raced at the touch. Why do I always behave like a fool in Caleb's presence? She fumed, embarrassed at her bumbling; then she hung her had in shame. Here am I, thinking of my own desires when Father is so ill.

          "Are you well?" The voice of Moses startled her as he burst into the room with his usual vivacity. His sharp eyes squinted at her pale features and he repeated, "Daughter of Zelophehad, are you well?" Rizpah struggled to overcome the start Moses had given her. She wanted to say, "I am not the one in need of your concern," or anything that would channel the focus of everyone's attention away from her, but she could only stammer.

          "Noah." Zelophehad's breath expelled a raspy whisper.

          Thankful for the interruption, Rizpah bent to him and covered his hand with hers. She wondered that he called her Noah, her given name, and not the nickname he had pegged her with so long ago. He said the name Rizpah was more befitting one who could bake bread on the heat of her anger.

          "Noah," her father breathed slowly and with obvious difficulty. "Is everyone here?"

          "Everyone?"

          "Are my half brothers here?"

          "No, Father."

          "I thought not."

          "But my cousins are all here. The sons of your dead brothers are a great comfort to us."

          "Hanniel also?"

          Rizpah didn't answer-only patted her father's hand.

          Zelophehad's eyes fluttered. "Bring my daughters and my half brothers. I want all my family here-to bless them." His eyes succeeded in opening and as Rizpah looked into them, she admitted at last he was truly near death.

          Moses, Joshua and Caleb, Israel's ennobled leaders, rose tactfully to leave but Zelophehad reached a trembling arm toward them. "Please stay. I said I want all my family present." Moses' eyes softened and the three men turned back to face the old man's bed.

          "Bring your cousin Ludim, Hoglah's husband, and Tirzah's betrothed, cousin Reuben, also," Zelophehad whispered to Rizpah. His eyes were closed again, but she nodded and left.

          The group that quickly assembled around Zelophehad's pallet was solemn. Oppressed by the stagnant heat, they waited, increasingly aware of the smothering presence of the death angel.

          The old man's head was propped on folded blankets. Although even his snow-white hair and beard appeared ashen gray, he seemed to have gained some strength. His eyes were open and alert, ready to perform the final act of the head of a household-the prophetic blessing.

          "Moses-you are like a brother to me," Zelophehad wheezed. Moses came closer. "We are the last, aren't we, my friend?"

          "The last of our generation, yes." Moses nodded and started to speak again.

          "No," Zelophehad inhaled sharply. "Do not pity me. We both know the mercy of Elohim Hayyim, the living God, do we not? So we must accept also His judgments. He is the object of all our human striving and the end to all seeking. I look gladly to the end." He coughed weakly, but his voice gained volume. "What will you do when this plague is over?"

          Moses sighed and his white head shook from side to side. "Israel deserves to be left here at the mercy of the surrounding hostile lands. This new generation is no more faithful than ours."

          "Come, you old, wandering Aramean, we both know you won't abandon them. Elohim's mercy and wrath must be learned anew by each generation, and you will stay to teach this one."

          Moses looked at the tenderness in his old friend's eyes and smiled in agreement. "I will remind them of Yahweh's goodness to us." Moses used the name for God that Elohim Himself had spoken and none, but their leader, dared breathe. "I will make them ashamed for their rebellion and call them to repentance. Then they will be prepared to enter the Promised Land."

          The dying man's face was paler, but his voice was steady. "There is now not much distance between the desert and the sown. The people will be hard pressed to wait until Elohim sends them to battle for Canaan."

          "I will hold them in rein."

          "I know you will, my friend. May your strength be firm."

          "And yours." Moses' voice was husky.

          Zelophehad offered thanks for Moses' friendship as the men gripped arms.

          "Where is Joshua?"

          "I am here, sir." Joshua came to Zelophehad's side.

          "And Caleb?"

          "Here, sir."

          "Joshua and Caleb, I love you as if you were my own tribe. All of Israel knows how you two led us to victory over the Amorite king, Sihon, and Og, King of Bashan, in the hills east of the Jordan toward the sunrise."

          Zelophehad reached out and touched first Joshua and then Caleb's head. "May Ha-Elohim, the true God, always lead you in His victorious path." Joshua stepped back but Zelophehad took hold of Caleb's shoulder. "My friend," his voice was beseeching. "I am leaving my family without the protection of a man. They have no one on whom they can rely."

          Rizpah's uncle Salu shuffled his feet and she saw him exchange resentful glances with her uncle Enosh. Her father kept his gaze intent upon Caleb. "Though you are not of our tribe, be to my daughters as a father and an uncle and a brother, as long as they need you." The pronouncement became a plea. Rizpah flinched at the thought. Caleb had always been her lover in her dreams.

          Caleb placed his hand upon Zelophehad's thigh in the gesture of taking an oath. "I will do as you bid."

          "Enosh and Salu, sons of my father but not my mother, come forward."

          The men shuffled to their half brother's bed.

          "Had my mother lived, you and Salu would not have, but because you were born to Father's second wife, after my brothers and I were grown, you are allowed to possess the Promised Land." Zelophehad's eyes wandered. "This is the only reason I ever had to question the wisdom of Elohim."

          Rizpah's uncles reddened, their eyes bulging in anger. Zelophehad returned his gaze to them. "Enosh, if the wicked beckon you to ambush the innocent without cause, keep your feet from their path. Do not walk with them, Enosh.

          "Salu, my youngest brother, you are as a ravenous wolf, but you will find it useless to spread the net for the righteous. You will become caught in the snare yourself." Salu's face purpled with anger, accentuating the yellowish bags beneath his eyes. He nodded, the jerky movement slinging sweat from his scraggly beard.

          Zelophehad closed his eyes as if to blot out all thought of his brothers. "I would bless my daughters." His eyes opened and swept over the five of them. "How you all bear the mark of your mother's beauty, each with a different shade of her hair."

          Mahlah, still at her father's side, slipped her hand quietly into his. Her firm chin showed none of the slackness of indolence or indulgence, while lines of age that marked most forty-year-old women were only just forming around her brown, wide-set eyes. Her thin nose graced her countenance with a long, noble sweep, turning up at the end in pride, not impudence. Wisps of light brown hair swept in soft, natural waves around her face, highlighted by strands of a lighter almond-shell shade. Her eyes filled humbly with tears as she heard her father's blessings.

          "Mahlah, my eldest, you were born the year Israel's military might was crippled by fear and we were sentenced to a bitter forty-year march in the wilderness. Perhaps that was a curse for you but despite your lameness, you were our first blessing.

          "If your mother had possessed the strength of the healthy, your infirmity would not have distressed her so. Yet, even in your sickness, or perhaps because of it, you have strengthened us. Your weak frame possesses the powerful strength of love." Zelophehad's tone became intimate. "This is the strength of a mother of Israel. Though you will never know physical motherhood, all who know you shall inherit a portion of your love."

          Mahlah released her father's hands to wipe the silent wash of tears from her face.

          "Come, Hoglah, my daughter who is like unto a desert partridge."

          Everyone shot questioning glances at Rizpah, as if she could explain why Zelophehad had skipped her in the order of blessing.

          Perhaps this is to be my punishment. Rizpah berated herself soundly, recalling all the times her temper had flared and her stubbornness had caused conflict. Surely, I deserve a rebuke. I will never acquire the meek spirit of my sisters. But is that just cause to lose my place as second-born?

          The room was frozen by disgrace and uncertainty. Thirty-two-year-old Hoglah, the only married sister, stood beside her husband, her deep-set eyes searching his for direction in this awkward situation. Finding none, her broad nose quivered and she turned to Zelophehad. "Yes, Father?" Her wide mouth pursed with tension and absently she stuck a crop of straight, straw-colored hair into the tight knot from whence it had escaped.

          "Come to me," he said. Still Hoglah hesitated. Confused, she glanced at Rizpah, who shrugged her own bafflement, then sat before Zelophehad. He laid his hand lightly upon her shoulder.

          "The desert partridge rarely soars in the clear, bright sky. The heights seem to frighten it. If forced, it will take flight, only to drop into the next available cover. So you, Hoglah, have spurned dreams that soar beyond your reach, but do not spurn hope.

          "As the partridge darts from rock to rock, so you dash from each completed task to stolidly face the next. May your children also drink from your well of duty and dig cisterns of their own to preserve for their children and their children's children."

          Hoglah embraced her father and retreated to cousin Ludim's side. She pretended to shoo a gnat rather than admit wiping away a tear. Milcah, the fourth-born, did not await her father's call but sank to his pallet.

          Milcah's topaz-hued hair swirled about her face with the tentative probing of sunlight constrained by dabs of drifting clouds. It crowned her high, regal forehead, lending a misty softness to the sharp lines of her nose and chin so like father's. The creamy complexion of a youth of twenty winters smoothed her every feature and silhouetted dark, fawn-like eyes, set wide and hopeful, but now reddened with weeping. She waited for her father to begin.

          "You were born twelve years after Hoglah. Your mother and I were sure she could bear no more children. When you came, we drank greedily of the blessing. I suppose one could say we spoiled you, as much as is possible in the barren desert. There are not many opportunities to indulge a child here. Still, we took advantage of every chance to free you to enjoy childhood and you have grown to expect more from life than we dared."

          Zelophehad spread his fingers over the crown of her head. "Milcah, lovely queen who reigns over our hearts and the hearts of the young men of Israel, your beauty shines brightly; but there is no great strength in beauty. There will come a day when you will despise beauty, so be strong in faith."

          Realizing that he was finished, Milcah smoothed her hair, bestowed a smile of incomprehension on her father through a veil of fresh tears and retreated.

          "Where is my maiden of gladness?" There was urgency in Zelophehad's voice, as if time was running out. Tirzah approached his bed from the opposite side. Her petite form squatted easily beside him, in contrast to the statuesque frames of her older sisters. Zelophehad gazed fondly at his fourteen-year-old daughter.

          Even the greasy lamplight picked out the iridescent, silvery highlights in her dark honeycomb hair. It was straight like Hoglah's, but the effect was softer as it caressed her young face. Even in her grief, Tirzah's cheeks bubbled in a crinkly-eyes grin for her abba.

          "We knew when you were yet in your mother's womb, that you would be our last reward from God and we knew your mother would not survive. Our generation has lived in the shadow of death, always conscious that we would not share in the promised future of our seed. Tirzah, the oil of pleasantness to my old bones, though you are a maiden of only fourteen years, your youth is not a disgrace, as it is in many."

          Rizpah flinched at what she feared was an implication aimed at her.

          "Goodness is a crown to your head. You will be counted blessed among the daughters of the tribe of Manasseh and a treasure in the house of your betrothed. Because of you, Reuben's home will be a fortress of joy in the land the Lord has promised."

          Reuben reached down to his beloved Tirzah. She rose and clung, weeping, to the chest of her betrothed.

          Rizpah felt conspicuous. She stood clenching her long, slender fingers, all eyes on her. Her mature beauty was unscathed by the tension.

          "Noah!" Zelophehad's voice sliced the air like a dagger, calling out her given name. Rizpah stole a glance at Caleb, regretting he must witness her disgrace. He will never consider taking me for his wife now. She knelt beside her father with lowered head. Trembling, she awaited the dreaded rebuke.

          "Noah, your mother named you for the rest and comfort you would bring her in caring for her invalid first-born, and indeed, you were her salvation. Yet I must confess you have not given your poor old father much rest. I have wearied myself seeking the wisdom to guide you rightly."

          His voice was tender, but Rizpah's head hung further. She grasped his outstretched arm and sobbed, "I have failed you, Father."

          Zelophehad took her hands. "No, my daughter," he sighed. "I fear I have failed you. My heart has rejoiced in you, but I have not the wisdom necessary to give you what you will need. Do you know why I did not bless you in the usual order of oldest to youngest?"

          Everyone seemed to lean forward. Rizpah raised her head slightly as she shook it, but she still could not bear to look at him.

          "You thought you were removed from your place as second-born, didn't you?" Zelophehad asked. "Oh no, my precious Rizpah." He reverted to his fond nickname for her. "You have always been quick-tempered, but that is not cause to disown you. I also know your faithful spirit. You have an under-girding of wisdom that bends your will."

          Does he mock me? Rizpah wondered and her head drooped once more, for she felt the most foolish of Israel's daughters.

          "How can I make you understand your blessing?" Zelophehad paused. "As a people, Elohim chose us for His possession and He made a covenant with Abraham. When I speak of these things, you think of the circumcision, but our covenant is not just of flesh. Circumcision was only the first step of becoming God's possession.

          "Our desert wandering was another step. There will be many more steps in this journey to become His possession. Some of them have been hard to bear-many that come will be harder still. This people have been chosen to show right to a world of wrong. Our covenant is with the God of love and mercy, but most of all, the God of justice."

          Zelophehad looked intently at her. "I have blessed you in this unusual manner, for you are unusual among women. You will stand for justice and justice will circumcise you."

          Rizpah shuddered. Was this a blessing or a riddle?

          "Do you understand now the frustration of an old man?

You have need of much wisdom and I will no longer be here to guide you. Do you know how a father needs to feel he has prepared his children?" Impassioned, Zelophehad shook her shoulder. His eyes slid to where Caleb stood behind Rizpah and they shone with the glimmer of an idea.

          "I never understood your choice not to marry your cousin Hanniel. He is the leader of our tribe of Manasseh and eldest son of my eldest brother. For twenty years he has sought you for his wife."

          Rizpah stared, perplexed at the abrupt change of ideas. She thought this issued had been settled long ago. Father became more puzzling by the minute.

          "You didn't know that he proposed yet again when he knew I was taken by plague. Are you certain you could find no happiness with him?"

          Rizpah looked bewildered but offered no answer. Zelophehad went on.

          "I have never believed your claim of allegiance to the care of Mahlah as an excuse not to marry Hanniel. It was not until I discovered that your love for Caleb forced your choice that I understood..."

          Rizpah heard no more. Her burnt amber eyes flashed an opalescent inferno. How can Father say these things before everyone, especially Caleb? How does he know? Not even Mahlah knows. What must Caleb think of me now? She could feel his questioning gaze burn her back.

          In mortification, she prayed that the earth would open up and swallow her as it had Korah and his followers. Would that she had rebelled with them, so she would have already been swallowed-anything rather than face Caleb. Her hands opened and closed in painful fists, unconsciously. Her features contorted from the pressure of the questions she wanted to scream. Why, Father? Why are you doing this to me? I must suffer this mysterious blessing-now why must you add this agony also to your death? Why?

          "I know you are distraught that I have uncovered your secret before all." Her father's steady voice broke through her thoughts. "It is my gesture of fatherhood, Rizpah. Perhaps by this I can prepare you to bear the covenant.

          "Let this, then, begin your journey. You think you will not survive, but your journey only begins this night. Stand firm and do not run. Do not turn to the side. If you endure to the end, you will inherit the justice of the covenant."

          Zelophehad slumped, breathless. "Leave me now." He raised his hand in an attempt to wave them all away but could not complete the gesture. "It is done..."

Chapter 2

   

Rizpah stumbled out of the tent into the night, not caring where she would go, only gathering the skirt of her tunic to make haste.

          Plunging through the rows of tents heading west toward the camp's edge on the Jordan's side, she dodged skillfully the many obstacles impeding her way. On the right loomed tent poles obscured by darkness-on the left, buckets of diseased excrement awaiting disposal. Directly in her path a widow lamented her loss, a circle of moonlight bathing her rocking, solitary form. Rizpah swerved, ducked and hurdled, picking up speed until she achieved a fast trot, to emerge at last at the vast camp's edge.

          Gulping the cool night air, she attempted to calm herself. Her fists clenched her skirt convulsively. Facing the Jordan, her rigid back aligned against the graveyard camp that continued, unsated, to consume its dead, marking the hours till it could vomit up the body of her father also. She wished she could eliminate her problem with Caleb as easily as vomiting. She held her cramping midsection as if the humiliating bile would burst forth at any time.

          Rizpah was aware of his presence even before she heard the scrape of thong against pebble. What is he doing here? The din of surging blood roared in her ears; yet she could hear the sound of Caleb's slow, even breathing behind her.

          "The night is pleasant in Shittim under the starlit skies of the Moab plains," he said softly.

          "Plains?" Rizpah scoffed. "A plain has meadows of waving wild grasses, with lilies of the fields scattered about." She seared the shadowed western horizon with her stare.

          Such a plain could not be further from this barren desert east of the Jordan rift valley. The Jordan here was known as the Ghor and it was but a trench incised in the distance. The moon was full and the bright stars illuminated the inauspicious landscape-a perfect accommodation for the plague of Baal-Peor.        

          Along the Ghor to the north, Rizpah traced the distant blur of dense, jungle-like vegetation that ended too abruptly on the river. There steep, bare cliffs marked the foreboding entrance to the Salt Seas region in the south. Behind them in the east soared the mocking Moab Mountains and across the Ghor before her, the Promised Land of Canaan beckoned. The possession of a peaceful land flowing with milk and honey seemed a millennium away from tonight.

          "This plain doesn't have that," Caleb said.

          "What?"

          "This plain is not a meadow ripe with grass and bloom. It is a barren pit. But it is a plain."

          "Would that be some of the wisdom you are so acclaimed for?" Immediately Rizpah bit her lip in remorse. "I am sorry. There is no reason to lash you with my tongue. I cannot fault you because my father-"

          "I am sorry for making light of the situation," Caleb interrupted. "I only hoped to put you at ease."

          Rizpah's back stiffened toward him. "Thank you, my lord. I would beg your leave now."

          She moved aside to return to the tent, but her father's blessings loomed before her like a barricade. Your journey begins this night. Stand firm and do not run. Do not turn to the side.

          She halted-her back still to Caleb. She was running. She had run here and now she was running back to camp. Where would she go next? Father is right. Turning aside will solve nothing. But how can I face Caleb? He knows. He knows I love him. Rizpah nearly moaned aloud, but she knew she must face him. Even if he thinks me as brazen as the Midianite women.

          With willful determination, she turned to Caleb and her breath caught at the sight of him so close to her. The moonlight turned the gray at his temples silver and she could see his steady pulse beating silently. His striped summer tunic was sleeveless, revealing tanned, muscular biceps and sunburned forearms, and the neckline plunged deeply enough to allow dark, curly hairs to climb out. His broad chest heaved with each patient breath.

          Rizpah had to tilt her head back to a dizzying degree to look him in the eye. For the first time their eyes met and her head spun with exhilaration, even under the degrading circumstances. She could not tear her gaze from him. He shifted uncomfortably on athletic legs that attested to the restrained strength of tightly wound coils.

          The man could not have seen seventy-nine years, Rizpah thought in amazement. "Why did you-" Her voice cracked and she tried again. "Why did you come out here?"

          "I wanted to let you know I didn't take seriously the words your father spoke. He is sick unto death. A man can say many things on his deathbed."

          There it was-her way out. She could laugh about it with Caleb. They would forget the whole episode and maybe someday he would learn to love her. Do not turn to the side. Stand firm and do not run. She sighed.

          "It would be so easy to let you believe that, Caleb, but it would haunt me. My father spoke the truth." Rizpah finished quickly and looked down. She could smell his sweat. Now that she was so close, would she lose him?

          There was silence, then Caleb cleared his throat. There was more silence. Rizpah thought she would faint.

          "But, I am an old man of seventy-nine," he finally managed.

          Rizpah lifted her eyes to stare at him. "And I am a shy young maiden at thirty-eight."

          Caleb conceded her point with a nod. At least he is no idle flatterer, Rizpah thought, a little disappointed that he had not assured her of her youthful appearance. There seemed to be nothing more to say. They stood close together for an awkward eternity, not looking at one another.

          "I don't know what to...this has never...I am just an old widower."

          Rizpah nodded. "And your daughter has decided not to wed until after the land is possessed, so that she should not become a war widow at eighteen years. There is nothing I don't know about you."

          Caleb's eyes darted to her in surprise. She took a deep breath. "I suppose I should tell you everything. This night seems determined to strip me, to lay me bare to the world." Rizpah looked up into the blackness as if she hated it. "I suppose I have nothing but to submit. You will think me unforgivably brazen, but you may as well know all."

          Caleb kept his gaze upon the distant Ghor. Neither dared move. The wind whistled around them, as if laughing at their feeble attempts to carry on this macabre conversation.

          "I hated your wife!" Rizpah's voice split the stillness. She glanced at Caleb, but his only reaction was to blink. How can I be saying these things to him? She wanted desperately to know what was going on behind those huge, thickly lashed eyes.

          "Oh, it wasn't real hatred. It was childish jealousy. She had you and I wanted you. My father thought it was just the usual hero worship afforded you by the children of Israel," Rizpah snorted, "but it was more."

          She resigned herself to letting the words spill out unchecked. "I remember you invited my family to sup with you and your wife. I was at the marrying age. In fact, I had just convinced Father to turn down cousin Hanniel's first proposal.

          "It happened after the meal, when my mother and your wife-I could never bring myself to call her by name-were clearing away the bowls. You reached out and touched her hand. You complimented her, saying 'We have eaten of only water and manna for these many years, but you somehow manage to make it delectable.' The spark that passed between your eyes was the same tenderness my parents shared, but far from touching me it tore me asunder. I swore never to be near you again if your wife was present."

          There was no bitterness in Rizpah's voice, only a toneless resignation to at last let the truth be known. Releasing the hidden emotions of a lifetime was almost pleasurable. But will he return my love? Her temples pulsated in suspense.

          "I am sorry I abided by that adolescent oath." She clasped her hands together and nearly brushed the front of Caleb's tunic with them. "She must have been a remarkable woman."

          Caleb nodded stiffly.

          Dear God of Israel, what must he think of me? Have I waited all these years only to chase him away with my babbling?

          Caleb cleared his throat. "Is it true what Zelophehad said? Is this why you have turned down all Hanniel's proposals?"

          This was the hardest to admit. She nodded her head slowly. Oh, why did I not keep silent? She heard Caleb let his breath out, as if he had been holding it in anticipation of her answer.

          Rizpah waited. It was all up to Caleb now. She had emptied herself before him. She felt as if she were writhing before him, frighteningly vulnerable to his tread. Caleb shuffled his feet and cleared his throat again. She wanted to slap him on the back to clear what seemed to block his voice.

          "I am grateful for your honesty." His voice betrayed no emotion.

          "It would not be fair to withhold this information from you after my father's speech tonight." Her tone came out too clipped in the effort not to sound pleading. Caleb finally looked at her again.

          Rizpah met his gaze. They stood motionless, facing each other. Throw your arms around me, she wanted to scream at him. Tell me you have admired me from afar and this is an answer to your prayers. Say you want to marry me at dawn. Say you despise me for the things I've said. Rebuke me for my immodesty. Anything. Just give me some response!

          "I beg forgiveness for this intrusion." Rizpah's uncle Salu tried to soften his words in reverence but his voice only took a sinister quality. Your father, my brother, has just been gathered to his people."

          A thud echoed in the wailing night wind as Rizpah sank to weep among the thorns and rocks.

... continued ...

Want to continue reading? Click on the title below to download the entire novel for just $3.97!

Rightfully Mine: God's Equal Rights Amendment 

  

by Aggie Villaneuva

List Price: $3.97

Buy Now