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Authors: Orson Scott Card
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known, she could hardly think of anything she wanted more.
PART III
FATHERLESS
CHILD
CHAPTER 5
Z ilpah’s mother had never actually
said
that Laban was the man who had sired her. When Zilpah was six, she asked outright where her father was. Mother hushed her immediately, with tight-lipped anger, and told her that there were some things she was too young to know.
Zilpah never asked again, but she knew her mother’s answer was absurd. All the other children knew who and where their fathers were, even the ones who were younger than her, even the ones whose fathers were dead. So is my father
worse
than dead? Was he a criminal? Why should I keep still about him?
Then she heard the word
bastard
—hurled by one shepherd at another, in a quarrel—and asked one of the other children what it meant. “It’s a man who doesn’t know who his father is.”
This set Zilpah to wondering: What about a girl whodidn’t know who her father was? Was she a bastard, too? And was it an awful thing to be? The shepherd who had said the word was full of hate when he said it, and the word made the other shepherd fly at him, flailing about with his crook. Am I a thing so awful, that a man would attack a bigger fellow for having said he was one?
So once again she braved her mother’s wrath, expecting to be rebuked even more sternly for asking, “Mama, can a girl be a bastard?”
Her mother was angry all right, but not at her. “Who called you such a thing? I’ll kill him.”
“Nobody,” said Zilpah, frightened.
“Then how did you ever hear that word?”
Zilpah told about the quarrel between grown men, and Mother relaxed. “Well, it has nothing to do with
you
.”
“But Amar said that—”
“Amar doesn’t know his leg from his neck, so he scratches his knee when his head itches.”
Miserably, Zilpah confessed her worry. “Other children younger than me know who their father is.”
“That’s because it’s all right for them to know. Their father is nobody important, and so they don’t have to keep the secret.”
Ah. So her father was someone so important that his identity could not be known. That was better than any answer Zilpah could have imagined.
Of course, the most important man that Zilpah knew anything about at that age was Laban, the lord of the camp, who ruled over everyone and dispensed justice, food, and labor assignments every day. So for several years she believed Laban was her father.
But as she grew older and learned more about the world, she began to realize that this was not very likely. While Laban did not marry again after his wife died, he could easily have taken a concubine, or several concubines. Even if he had wanted to keep his liaison with Mother secret while his wife was alive—some women were jealous about their husband taking concubines among the women in the camp—there was nothing to stop him from recognizing Mother as a concubine after he was a widower.
She even asked one of the old women called Hobbler why Laban didn’t take concubines the way other powerful men did, and Hobbler only laughed. “He’s not the kind of man who can’t live without a woman. His eye never wandered the whole time his wife was alive. She never had to shed a tear because he was sleeping in another woman’s tent.”
It dawned on Zilpah then that since there were no secrets in the camp—the old women knew even more stories than were true—it was almost impossible that Laban could have fathered her, not without some kind of rumor among the women.
So her important father must have been someone from outside the camp, and that made more sense anyway. Mother must have sneaked off to the city, or perhaps a visitor crept into her tent one night. Maybe he even forced himself on her, and she had to keep it secret to avoid a terrible war between great houses.
And then, by the time she was twelve, Zilpah came to the realization that her mother was probably lying. She had only been about fifteen
PART III
FATHERLESS
CHILD
CHAPTER 5
Z ilpah’s mother had never actually
said
that Laban was the man who had sired her. When Zilpah was six, she asked outright where her father was. Mother hushed her immediately, with tight-lipped anger, and told her that there were some things she was too young to know.
Zilpah never asked again, but she knew her mother’s answer was absurd. All the other children knew who and where their fathers were, even the ones who were younger than her, even the ones whose fathers were dead. So is my father
worse
than dead? Was he a criminal? Why should I keep still about him?
Then she heard the word
bastard
—hurled by one shepherd at another, in a quarrel—and asked one of the other children what it meant. “It’s a man who doesn’t know who his father is.”
This set Zilpah to wondering: What about a girl whodidn’t know who her father was? Was she a bastard, too? And was it an awful thing to be? The shepherd who had said the word was full of hate when he said it, and the word made the other shepherd fly at him, flailing about with his crook. Am I a thing so awful, that a man would attack a bigger fellow for having said he was one?
So once again she braved her mother’s wrath, expecting to be rebuked even more sternly for asking, “Mama, can a girl be a bastard?”
Her mother was angry all right, but not at her. “Who called you such a thing? I’ll kill him.”
“Nobody,” said Zilpah, frightened.
“Then how did you ever hear that word?”
Zilpah told about the quarrel between grown men, and Mother relaxed. “Well, it has nothing to do with
you
.”
“But Amar said that—”
“Amar doesn’t know his leg from his neck, so he scratches his knee when his head itches.”
Miserably, Zilpah confessed her worry. “Other children younger than me know who their father is.”
“That’s because it’s all right for them to know. Their father is nobody important, and so they don’t have to keep the secret.”
Ah. So her father was someone so important that his identity could not be known. That was better than any answer Zilpah could have imagined.
Of course, the most important man that Zilpah knew anything about at that age was Laban, the lord of the camp, who ruled over everyone and dispensed justice, food, and labor assignments every day. So for several years she believed Laban was her father.
But as she grew older and learned more about the world, she began to realize that this was not very likely. While Laban did not marry again after his wife died, he could easily have taken a concubine, or several concubines. Even if he had wanted to keep his liaison with Mother secret while his wife was alive—some women were jealous about their husband taking concubines among the women in the camp—there was nothing to stop him from recognizing Mother as a concubine after he was a widower.
She even asked one of the old women called Hobbler why Laban didn’t take concubines the way other powerful men did, and Hobbler only laughed. “He’s not the kind of man who can’t live without a woman. His eye never wandered the whole time his wife was alive. She never had to shed a tear because he was sleeping in another woman’s tent.”
It dawned on Zilpah then that since there were no secrets in the camp—the old women knew even more stories than were true—it was almost impossible that Laban could have fathered her, not without some kind of rumor among the women.
So her important father must have been someone from outside the camp, and that made more sense anyway. Mother must have sneaked off to the city, or perhaps a visitor crept into her tent one night. Maybe he even forced himself on her, and she had to keep it secret to avoid a terrible war between great houses.
And then, by the time she was twelve, Zilpah came to the realization that her mother was probably lying. She had only been about fifteen
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