RUNT

RUNT

By Andrew Paul Grell

Nobody knew what to do with me, except to keep me from getting underfoot. I was too young to shear, but I was pretty handy with a currycomb. Someone might hand me some canvas, a handful of grommets, and a hammer just to see if I could make or repair tents; a very useful skill for desert nomads. What I really wanted was to sail ships. Once on a journey from here to there I saw Lake Lashon and the boats on the calm surface, men pulling in nets of fish. I wanted to be the Captain, not the net people. Now everyone sees me as the baby who must be changed, screaming, crying, spitting up, a sixth child biting his mother’s nipples. So what I do is get underfoot without being seen and just watch. If my mother Leah is too busy to pay attention to me at bedtime, and there is a full moon, I lie on my belly and see who goes into which tent and who comes out and what sounds I hear. The sounds are the sounds of animals but everyone going in or coming out is a person, and I very rarely see an animal inside a tent. The typical stay of a visitor to a tent is the time it takes to walk from the spring to Grandma Rachel’s tree, a hundred cubits for each of my fingers and toes. I heard her tell my father that his camp needed at least one sacred tree, an oak. That’s one of the jobs people give me, tending to that tree which I keep hearing people say belongs in the Oak Grove and not in a camp. But everyone loves tur-tur doves stuffed with the nuts of that tree. I was the one who gathered them, counted them, and apportioned them between the four tents of the mothers, and made sure to give the same amount to the workers and their families. I didn’t know that not everyone was good at counting things, but I figured that out when Aba gave me another job, to count the sheep and the goats and mark how many of each were spotted, or smooth, or speckled. It was easier for me to count than it was to tell spotted from speckled. I felt happy to doing jobs for Aba and anyone else, especially if counting was part of it, but I still loved playing with the Sumerian toy. A long, woody reed was notched and then soaked from one Sabbath to the next. Then it was wrapped around a big pot until the next Sabbath. Finally, cured goat gut was cut into a long string and woven through the notches of the toy. You put it on firm, flat ground and hit it with a stick so it rolls. A good roll is three cubits for each finger of a hand. Sometimes I wondered what would happen if I put a stiff reed between two of the toys; they could roll without end and never fall down. But my toy days were numbered.

“Zeb! Zeb, come see.” It was my sister-mother Rachel. Her son, Joseph, was at the last remains of an Assyrian town, a wall about four cubits high and cubits the number of days between three Sabbaths long. Rachel walked Joseph to the wall. He took his little zayin out from under his tunic and let out a stream that hit the ancient bricks. The kid did it! He pissed against a wall! Everyone was yelling and screaming, just like they did for me, but more so, since Rachel had only the one child. When it was my turn to congratulate him, I grabbed him by the hair and knuckled the top of his head. Then I gave him the double Sumerian toy I finally learned how to make.

“Zebulon ben Yakov! Come to your Aba, boy. These are for you.” My father handed me a knife, a crook, and a rope.

 “You’re going to be a shepherd when the season comes. Even if you only herd sheep and goats for one day, you’ll be entitled to a full share when I go down to the pit.” Aba could be creepy.

 “You’re a smart one, I can see that. Don’t use your head to cheat your brothers. Use it for the most increase for everyone. I’m counting on you, so to speak. But never tell that to anyone.”

The goats pretty much took care of themselves. They could climb trees if they scented a fox or a big cat, or if they wanted the sweeter and wetter leaves high up. I never knew that. The sheep needed to be kept in line. It was hard to figure out, but eventually I noticed that there was one sheep all the others looked to. I had my grommet kit with me and I pierced the ear of the head sheep, Chavah, and tied a strip of red cloth through the grommet. Then I decided that every sheep should get a color. There were only seven colors, though, so most of them had braids of many colors. We never lost a sheep after that.  

At some point we picked up a camp follower, a young dog, still a baby. I took charge of it. I remember when Bilhah was having trouble nursing, she fed struggling little Naphtali goat’s milk from a wine skin. So I did the same for poor orphaned Caleb.  It turned out that Caleb not only loved me but loved everyone with my scent, including the sheep. For the rest of the season, we never had a sheep eaten. Except, you know, by one of us. That was Reuben the chazer. He was no stranger to any of the four tents, I observed. One day Aba will find him out, sure as a girl tiger has balls. Or by God when Reuben decided it was time for a sacrifice of thanksgiving for the successful run. Ahem. 

After tupping season, and that was when I put two fingers together with two other fingers and realized what the noise was that I had been hearing when there were visitors to tents, we headed back to where Aba’s camp. Judah intoned a little chant when the tops of the oasis palm trees could be seen when were still in open country. “How goodly are your tents, oh Yakov, and your dwelling places, oh Israel.” Actually, the tents were showing some strain, inside and outside both, but everyone liked Judah’s little song, especially Aba. I moved up a few steps on Yakov’s ladder when he saw Chavah leading sheep with their tags. He wasn’t thrilled with Caleb, but he let me keep him, especially since he saw every returning ewe was, as we say, enmountained. But it had to be outside the camp. I didn’t mind. My older brothers were off trading wool for whatever they could get, figs, olives, tools of bronze, even scrolls of writings. I could spend time alone teaching Caleb to do things.

And that was what started it; time alone could be dangerous.

“Hello, Zebulon. That was a fine set of improvements you made to the art of herding sheep and goats.” I hoped Caleb would remember that he would get a piece of ram’s horn to gnaw on if he did the trick. I whistled and twirled my finger in the air. Caleb circled the visitor and spiraled in, coming to rest facing the man. Caleb did great but the man didn’t get spooked.

“I am Zebulon Ben-Yakov of the Eberite people.” I put another mat on the sand and fetched water and honeyed locusts. I bowed low. “Please, rest after your journey, sit, eat, drink.”

“Oh, no, young man, I couldn’t accept anything you might need soon.”

“Honored guest, I offer the hospitality of the Eberites and the camp of Yakov.”

It looked like we were going to do the full refusing-three-times. After the second refusal, I answered that my father would slap me on the back of my head if I didn’t give you to eat and drink. No one was looking so we cut it off there and had some locusts and wine.

The man had a family resemblance. Maybe he was from Uncle Laban’s camp, one over from ours. Maybe he was a spy for Laban, come to see how Aba always got the lambs to be speckled if Laban said before the tupping that his pay would be the speckled lambs, or smooth if his pay was the smooth lambs. Of course, I knew the secret. My father couldn’t resist sharing it with someone who could count and puzzle things out. Aba had a book with every sheep in it; there lines going from sheep to lamb for every sheep we ever had. Aba would select rams and ewes to breed by their grandparents. Another thing Aba told me never to tell.

“Honored guest, how should I call you, how are you named, so that I may say to my family the name of the guest who honors us with his visit.”

“You may call me Yetzer. But which Yetzer, I will never say. You should watch out for me, pay attention to the meanings of the things I say, for your own good. I let you bring food and drink for me after only two refusals. I was a bad influence on you.”

“Will you grace us by meeting my family in the common tent?”

“No, Zebulon, my business is with you alone. I come with a warning for you. Now that Joseph your brother is old enough to work, to do the work you were given, you will no longer be the darling of the camp. Joseph will replace you. You are a thinker and a doer, he is a dreamer. What is better for your family, a dreamer or someone thinks of new things to do. Your first tupping, did any other season bring so many healthy lambs born? Look and see in your father’s book.”

“G’var Yetzer, how came you to know of our season and of our book?” Caleb took his actions, it seemed, by what was going on in my head as it was revealed in my face. He trotted between me and Yetzer and stared him down. A growl the loudness of parchment falling on moss escaped my dog’s throat.

“Outside of the camps and oases, the wilderness is mine. I know everything about it.” Caleb let out one loud bark but responded to my hand signal for silent running.

“Joseph, Buchar. What to do about him is up to you.” Caleb escorted the messenger to the place between the camp and the wilderness, then came back to me for a belly rub and a game of throw the stick.

My mistake was that I didn’t tell Aba and Imah about the guest. They should know who visits. But it was a visitor for me bearing a message for me. I thought no more about it until three sets of longest days and longest nights plus new moons the number of fingers on one hand. We were back in the wilderness, all the brothers except Joseph. I told Reuben I had seen date palms to the north, not in any other tribes Oasis.

“Go on, kid. Get lost. Bring us some dates, or is it that you’re meeting a girl from the Syrian camp?” My eldest brother gave me a good knuckling, yanked my hair, and got me moving with his sandal on my backside.

As I headed east toward what I hoped really were date palms, my wilderness training showed up ad I took a good look south and a better look north. I wasn’t sure what I was seeing to the south, from the direction of the goodly tents of Yakov. I recognized the barley-colored hair first but I must have been seeing his clothing through a mirage. His cloak looked like it was made of the colored sheep tags. It looked that way because it was. Someone must have made him that cloak and thought it was a good idea. I decided not to hail him. Maybe Asher or Dan had forgotten something, or maybe someone’s Imah died. No. Joseph was the son of Rachel, Aba’s greatest love and desire, now ready for responsibility. Aba sent him to check up on us. Reuben was not going to like that at all. Maybe Yetzer’s message applied to all of us. The gander north was more promising. It was my cousins—I could see the Standard of Ishmael. Walking behind them, in chains, were four poor wretches. Could the grandchildren of Abraham, Father of Nations, progenitor of souls to come more than the stars in the sky or sand in the deserts, sink to chaining people? If Aba were here I know he would have ridden the camels over them and unchained the wretches, found them something to do in the camp. But they may have their use. I hooked around, shook dates the number of the fingers of two hands of men from the tree, and went to visit my relatives. I gave them a gift of my dates, kept low swinging back around to get more dates for my own brothers, and made it back to flock without being seen. Sure enough, Joseph showed up in that funny coat, confusing the sheep. The goats didn’t care.

“Aba has sent me to check on the flocks. How are the flocks?”

“The flocks do well, pissant. Are you here to work? This is a place for men who work,” Reuben told him.

“My work is to make sure the flocks are well.” He started counting; he had some difficulty telling sheep from goats, and perhaps I hadn’t noticed when he pissed against the wall, but he was counting line he had two thumbs.

“And I should tell you about a dream I had, so you can be prepared. I dreamed you stood around me in a circle and bowed down to me. I don’t know what the dream means.”

“It means you’re a circle-jerker, pissant. Get out of here, tell Aba that everything is in order.”

My little brother couldn’t stop laying it on, dream after dream. Finally Reuben and Asher grabbed him and threw him in a pit. I gave Caleb the signal; he headed out towards he Ishmaelites and let out a howl. 

“Reuben. Why kill our brother, it would bring dishonor on our house. Look, our cousins come, it looks like they are now buying and selling people. Why not sell Joseph?”

“I guess this is why Aba says you are smart, snot-nose.”

He gave me two shekels from the price cousin purchased cousin; he told me two more shekels will get me a Holy Whore for a night from the Molochites. I didn’t know who to ask what that was. We didn’t lose any sheep this trip, but we did misplace one.