MOTHER
Every winter, just before spring arrives, the almond trees bloom. They are a promise from God, each of those white blossoms, that He is watching and His words will be fulfilled in their appointed time. Sometimes, this appointed time comes before we are ready. Sometimes, it seems to come too late. We cannot understand His timing, any more than we can understand our children, when the children we love break our hearts again and again.
This was not the season of blooms.
I waited by our grinding stone for Kaleb and Liam to bring me some grain from our storage jars in the corner. I could have done it myself, but boys need to be kept busy.
Manoah spoke. “I miss our son.”
I whipped my head around to peer at him. I thought he had been sleeping. He needed so much sleep these days.
I tried to make my voice gentle. “Kaleb and Liam are our sons now too.”
“Where is my son?” His voice faltered.
“I know where he is.” We turned to stare at Kaleb, who was standing still, listening to us.
He cleared his throat, addressing Manoah instead of me. “He has fallen in love with another Philistine woman. Her name is Delilah. He spends all his nights with her. He says she is soft and doesn’t have to work for her meals like the Hebrew girls.”
“Every woman works for her meals. Trust me,” I said, with narrowed eyes and a lowered voice. “You are too young to understand.”
“So you have seen him?” Manoah tried to sit up on his pallet.
“Liam and I saw him when we were helping the servants plant the wheat. He said he knows how Mother feels about Philistine women. He does not think he can come home now.”
Manoah’s face brightened as he rubbed his hands together.
“Give him a message for me, if you see him again. Tell him to come home. I want to see him.”
“And you?” Kaleb was waiting for me to say something, a sweet message of my own to bring my wandering boy back.
I came to him, embracing him warmly but whispering in his ear, so Manoah would not see.
“Remind him of what it will cost her. She’ll be dead before spring.”
DELILAH
The creek glittered in the noon sun. I watched as children ran through it, screaming with delight as the cool water ran past their ankles. I did not mind watching older children. I had never had one. I picked up my tunic, walking back toward my home now. It had been less than a day’s walk to Ashdod, but I could have gone faster if I had wanted to.
I hadn’t.
Lord Galenos had called me to his home. He sent word that he had something of importance to discuss with me. He had welcomed me from his perch in the center of the room.
“Lord Marcos preferred to sit on a bench, with the others,” I told him.
Galenos shrugged. “Did he? I always liked Marcos. He was a good man. But we have a matter of official business, Delilah. Sit down.”
My throat was swelling, closing. I clenched my jaws together, shaking my head, refusing his offer. I did not want to sit in this house. I wanted to run. How could he not understand? I had lived here once, one brief happy window into another way of life.
“The five lords are prepared to make you an offer.”
“For what?”
He smiled. “Don’t you want to profit from what is inevitable?”
“In my experience, Lord Galenos, the inevitable is death. And the dead do not profit.”
He stood, offering me his arm, as if we should walk like friends through my former home. I had no wish to see it, so I refused again, shaking my head. Color flushed to his cheeks.
“Each lord is prepared to pay you eleven hundred pieces of silver. That’s five thousand, five hundred pieces of silver, my dear. A man’s life is worth only twelve, maybe twenty if he has some special merit,” Lord Galenos said.
The money he spoke of, the sum, was immense. Silver was power. Much silver was much power. My father had worked a year for five pieces. With the sum Galenos offered, I wouldn’t just have freedom. I would have freedom and power. That might make life worth living, if only to see that others suffered as I had.
“What could I do to earn such a fee?”
“One small favor. We know of your affair with the Hebrew, Samson.”
I remained still. I would not have called it an affair, but there was no reason to share that secret.
“All you must do is ask Samson about the source of his great strength. Our magicians have been of no help, but after all, he is a Hebrew, and we do not understand his gods.”
“His god.”
“What?”
“His god. They only have one.” I suddenly did not like Galenos. I did not like him standing in Marcos’s house, or speaking to me as a friend, or offering me such sums.
“Strange people, aren’t they? Not at all like us.”
I pressed my lips together as my stomach rose. Perhaps it had happened—his strange god had been at work in my sorrow. All had led me to Samson, had it not? But for what purpose? To make me rich?
I bowed before Galenos and walked home, taking a slow pace, letting others pass me, unwilling to return home before nightfall.
I did not want Samson to read my face. I did not know what it would reveal.
Children watched me from their windows, giggling as I walked by; terse whispers from mothers corrected them, dragging them down. Word was spreading. Samson, the enemy of the Philistines, had been tamed by a temple priestess. I don’t know what made me more of a curiosity to them—that I lived alone in freedom after service in the temple, or that I had won the heart of the strongest, strangest enemy our people had ever known.
Samson was waiting for me. He had retreated into the quiet of the home below. He had a side of lamb on the table for me, raw and wet. I flinched, my eyebrows rising in question.
“I was hungry,” he said.
“I don’t know how to cook.”
“You’re a woman.”
“Yes, I’ve heard that. But still, I don’t know how to cook. You’ll have to take it to the market. Someone there will cook it for you.”
“What other secrets are you hiding from me?” He was moving toward me, a smile on his lips. He did not know I had made my choice. Or perhaps he did; who can say how his god moved in this world?
I stepped back and raised a finger. “I am not the one with secrets.”
“What? If you heard about the brothels, that happened in the past.”
“You told me so much, didn’t you? But not the whole truth. That, I am sure, is reserved for the woman you love.”
“Stop.”
“It’s all right. I know you cannot love me. I am your sworn enemy.” I narrowed my eyes so, if his god was willing, he would not fall into my trap. I could be merciful, too. If anything he had told me was true, it was this: The Hebrews hated the Philistines. We were his enemies. He should not be here.
Not if he had told me the truth.
“What will you give me?” he asked. “If I tell you the whole truth, whatever you want to know?”
“What do you want?” The words hung in the air between us, like the first chill air of a building storm.
He pulled me into his arms, and I kissed him, hard, on the mouth, fighting him in my way, my back rigid as he removed my tunic, my neck stiff as he bent it back to press his mouth to mine again. He leaned back then, pressing his hands on either side of my face, forcing me to look up into his eyes. He did not blink. I saw myself in him, my hard face with smeared lips, my cold dead eyes. I didn’t want to be that woman. I didn’t want to choose that path.
I softened under his control, and we did not have need to roast that lamb until much later in the night.
I kicked him with one foot. The sun was already high, and he was sweating on my blankets.
“Tell me.”
He sat up, rubbing his eyes. “You woke me up for this?”
“I woke you up to see what kind of man you are on the morning after.”
He groaned but did not lie back down. He yawned and shook his head side to side, the heavy braids flinging with dull flapping sounds in all directions.
“Seven fresh bowstrings,” he said. “If you tie me with seven fresh bowstrings, I’m powerless. That’s the secret of my strength.”
I frowned. The answer had come too easily to him. I could not tell if he was lying or telling the truth.
“Our magicians don’t use bowstrings.”
“Your magicians are worthless.”
I went below and fetched a child, who was to fetch a lord, who was to fetch the seven fresh bowstrings. By the fourth hour after the morning meal, I had them. I laid them on the table below, where the bones of the lamb were piled in a gnawed heap. Samson came below to see who had knocked at my door. He saw the bowstrings on the table and smiled at me, the smile of an innocent. I smiled in return, a silent promise of treachery. Or truth. Maybe they were the same.
He lay down on my pallet, crossing his feet, watching me as he tucked his arms behind his head.
“What are you going to do with those?”
“Tie you up.”
“I’d like to see you try.”
“I’m going to find out if you are a liar.”
“You don’t need to know the secret of my strength. Unless there is something you are not telling me.”
“There’s not!” I shouted it, provoked. It was foolish of me.
Samson grinned. He had won the exchange. “Maybe you are the liar.”
I grabbed the bowstrings from the table. They stank of animal and felt like dried gristle in my hands.
I dumped them at his feet and knelt, struggling to slide a rope under his feet. He offered no assistance, but just lay there, still and amused. I tied his feet together and moved to his head, yanking each heavy arm free, laying it on his belly. I was sweating by now, and he seemed to find it all great entertainment. I hoped that the bowstrings would burn his bare flesh if I ripped them fast enough. Laying each wrist on top of the other, I pulled a bowstring around them, tying it down to the wrists in a knot, then tying a knot over my knot, yanking up as hard as I could to tighten it beyond endurance.
Still, he grinned.
I had one bowstring left, and I had seen how butchers tied their animals. I pulled the bowstring under his neck, tying it in a knot at his throat, then pulling the ends down and securing them at his wrists. I stood, bracing against him with one foot, and yanked, so that his head was forced down as I shortened the length between his neck and his wrists.
The great enemy of the Philistines was bound like an animal before me, and still he laughed, a high-pitched giggle, as if he was playing a game. I was not going to release him. If he had told me the truth, he was going to die in this position.
“Now, what do you say?” I poked him with one toe. “Were you lying? Or do you love me?”
He struggled to raise his head. “That’s not funny.”
I opened my door, looking out in the street. The boy who had fetched the bowstrings was standing not far from my door, eager for my sign. I nodded, and he whistled, calling his two friends out from their hiding places under a blanket in the corner of the room.
I turned back to Samson. “There are men here, Samson! The Philistines are upon you!”
He pushed against the bowstrings, one small pulse, and they fell from his ankles, wrists and neck. Standing without effort, his mouth was set in a hard line. The boys cowered when they saw his size in such close quarters. He did not even glance at them.
“I don’t care if you test my strength. But don’t test me. Don’t make me try to prove what I feel.”
“I don’t need to! I know what you feel for me.” I spat the words at his feet. He was a fool to think I would want him after he lied to me.
The boys crept like kittens toward the door, and ran.
“I don’t think you do. I don’t think any man has ever loved you like I do.”
I crossed the distance to him and raised one hand to slap him into silence, but he caught my hand and then caught me around the waist, lifting me off the ground so that my toes grazed the earth and nothing else.
But of what happened then, I will say nothing except this: I did not need to feel the ground anymore. I knew only Samson and thought nothing else of this earth.
MOTHER
Samson had returned. The men were shouting, and the children running about squealing, and the women talking behind their hands. Only Samson could inspire such simultaneous delight and scorn.
Samson had returned to us in the spring, just before Passover. He looked terrible, my beautiful son, with dark circles under his eyes, and fat covering his ribs where once only muscle had been. That woman had been cruel to him, I could tell, and what she was feeding him was an injustice. She had no idea how to care for a man.
He did not knock on our front door but opened it and strode in. I tried to conceal my hard breathing, so he would not know I had been at the window, watching.
He entered our home as if it were still his and, coming to me first, gave me a kiss on the cheek. I was sitting next to Manoah, who was eating at our table. Manoah tried to stand, and I saw his legs shaking. Samson rested a hand on his shoulder, pushing him gently to remain seated.
“When do we roast the lamb?” Samson smiled, as if today was a cheerful day.
I replied. “It is not a celebration. It is a memorial. That we were spared the wrath of God.”
Samson nodded, not listening. He sat beside Manoah to tell him news from the territories.
I stepped back, tears stinging, as I pressed my lips together, unwilling to display any emotion. He was home, my son. He was still a judge among our people and still chosen by God to deliver us. It was enough, for today, to dwell on these truths. Truths, and not circumstances, because the two did not match at all.
I was already losing Manoah, a little bit more every week. All my strength as a woman, as a mother, was gone. I could not bear another moment of loss.
I forced a smile and set two bowls on the table.
“I will fix you both some curds. And I will roast the lamb. It is good to have you home, Samson.”
DELILAH
The game continued. Samson did not find it fun. But I had caught a scent, like a lioness stranded and hungry. I couldn’t help what I wanted. If he didn’t understand that, his god would. Maybe his god even knew which I desired more: a life with Samson, or life through Samson’s death. A life of immense power. I had no thoughts for what I would do with it. Only the certainty that it might protect me from pain. Immense wealth, immense power, might be enough.
I wrinkled my nose, considering the choices. Samson had been talking. I blinked my eyes and tried to pay attention to him. He was leaning against my legs as I sat working my loom. I did not know what I was making.
“I can protect you without telling you my secret. I can overpower any enemy of yours.”
Songs of the harvest girls made me lift my head and pause to listen. The women had a hard life here. Maybe everywhere. I did not know. Their hands would be calloused and dry when I saw them in the market, and they would hold their backs in their soreness. And when they finally stopped the harvest, it was time to process all their bounty. Pickling, pressing, fermenting, spicing, stewing, roasting.
“If we didn’t have to eat, life would be easier,” I said to Samson.
“Without food, there is no energy for love.”
“Again, life would be easier.”
He turned around to face me, ready for another argument.
“Don’t worry, Samson. I know what you want. That, at least, is no secret.”
He stood, not even looking at me now. He walked toward the door. I picked up an empty spindle and threw it at him, hitting him right in the back between his shoulder blades.
“You have made a fool of me! You lied to me!” I screamed.
He didn’t turn back. A red welt was already showing itself. “I’m trying to protect you, Delilah, from yourself.”
“Don’t come back!” I screamed again. He opened the door, and I saw neighbors outside, peering in with interest.
He paused, his back to me. “If anyone ties me securely with new ropes that have never been used, I’ll become as weak as any other man. Think about what you will do with this knowledge.”
He did not return that night. I sat alone on the roof, watching the fires in the village as families cooked their meat, mothers laughing as children chased each other under the stars. The harvest was almost over. Soon there would be a feast, and after that, for all of them, even the women after their work was done, a rest. A long, quiet rest. Like death. Or sleep without faces that disturbed the dreamer.
Samson returned the next morning, stinking of new wine but not women. That surprised me. He collapsed onto my pallet below and was soon snoring, his face to the wall. He did not take off his sandals.
He might have told me the truth. He might expect to be taken away, or murdered right there, and a man would want to die with dignity. A man of any culture would want to die with his sandals and tunic.
The ropes rested in a woven basket by the door. I had sent for them last night. I slid silently to them, lifting them up in the cool, soft air. They did not scratch like old ropes; they still smelled of the fields and were green as meadow snakes, coiling around my arms, fresh and alive.
This time was different. This time, Lord Galenos had sent his own guards to be hidden on my roof. Even Lord Galenos knew Samson would lie to me the first time, that he should not waste real men on my first attempt. I had not been sure. I still did not understand the ways of men and their secrets.
I tied him up. He was drunk and asleep, and that made my task harder, not easier.
When his feet were bound, I moved to his wrists, and when his wrists were bound, I leaned down and kissed him on the cheek.
He murmured my name.
I sat back on my haunches, looking at him.
Deliverance was always offered to the wrong people.
“Samson, the Philistines are upon you!”
At my cue, Lord Galenos’s men stormed down the ladder from the roof. I counted four of them before Samson burst up from behind me, shaking off the ropes. He ripped the sword from the first man and drove an elbow into his throat. The second man was already swinging his sword, and Samson brought the first man’s sword around, plunging it into the second man’s abdomen. Philistine swords were made for cutting on both sides; now I understood why they were esteemed.
What happened to the other two men I cannot say. I hid behind my tunic while men fell dead in my quiet, cool home. Blood pooled and ran toward me, circling me, my toes growing sticky and hot.
Samson said nothing. He dragged the bodies into the street and returned with straw, laying it across the red stains.
“I’m hungry.”
I stood there, unmoving. I was not even breathing.
I pointed to his face. A smear of blood, rested on his cheek, the same cheek I had kissed, the same cheek that had made me reconsider what I was doing.
He frowned, not understanding.
“You have … something … there.” I pointed again.
He smiled, happy to know the answer, and wiped his face with his tunic. It was stained red, too, but he did not seem to see it. He did not see blood. He did not see death. What he saw, when he moved against the Philistines, I did not know. It was a mystery—a holy mystery perhaps—known only to him and his god.
He extended a hand to me. “Let’s go to the market.”
MOTHER
Liam was screaming, tears popping from his eyes as he squinted and howled. Poor thing had cut himself while harvesting the grapes. I cradled him, though by now he was taller than me, and clucked my teeth while I waited for him to calm.
It was good to see him cry at last.
“I wish I had died instead of her.” His body convulsed as he said it. I rubbed his arms and back and said nothing. He was learning so young this lesson that I had only now begun to understand. We love, but we cannot save. God does as He wills, and sometimes, His will is unbearable.
Liam settled after a while, and when I felt his back straighten, his breathing slow, I released him, lest he be overwhelmed by embarrassment and turn cold to me again. Better to let go before they realize they need you.
Better to let go before they realize how very much you need them.
“When will Samson be back?” he asked, choosing to stand and stretch.
I shrugged as if unconcerned. “I do not know.”
“He wants to marry her someday.”
I forgot that the boys were old enough to have heard of his first disastrous marriage. If he expected to see a reaction from me at this, I disappointed him.
“He might. We will wait and see.”
Liam inhaled to say something, but then twisted his mouth. I did not sound like the woman he knew.
“Can I ask you a question?”
I smiled at him, hoping he would sit next to me. He did not.
“The Philistines think Samson is a sort of god. Or that he uses magic to become strong.”
“You know this is not true.”
“I don’t.” Liam was earnest now, stepping closer. “I don’t know how he does it.”
I stood, dusting off my lap. Liam had carried in leaves and dirt from the harvest fields.
“Get back to work.”
“I just—”
“Out!”
He scooted out the door at once. I could not understand why everyone devoted themselves to understanding the secret of his strength. Why did it matter? Why did no one care what his strength was for, why it had been given to him? Why did no one seek that answer?
No one wanted to know. They preferred the excitement of miracles to the hard work of change, the hard work of breaking away from a culture that enslaved them all so comfortably.
They were the real mystery.
DELILAH
We walked through the dusty streets as the orange sun set in the west, beyond the scrabble of little stone homes that stood in the center of the village. The air was thick with smoke from burning wood and metal. The blacksmith’s home sat away from all others, and his orange fire rose high above him as he worked. Philistines should have had a god of cleanliness, for all their worship of it. Homes were allowed in the center of a village or city, but never industry. Industry stank; industry made raging fire and sparks and blood that ran in fast red rivers. Industry attracted flies, the lords said. It was not a clean way of life, no matter what the job.
But all the men walked about at night when their wives were done scolding, always finding their way to the blacksmith’s to watch him work. He made swords that were one piece, from handle to stem and blade—swords that cut in both directions—and he saved his copper for decoration. Other peoples still used copper for their blades, or bronze, and in battle it was said they often stopped to brace one foot against a bent sword and straighten it. More men died straightening their swords than swinging them.
Samson had no interest in our weapons and technology, how we planned for war and trained for it and, some would say, hoped for it. We had no worthy opponents near us. We had to travel to Egypt for a good fight, and we had made our peace with the Egyptians long ago.
Samson whistled a tune I did not know and ran a hand through my hair as we walked. He let the soft strands flow between his fingers, stretching his hand open wide to claim as much of me as he could.
His own hair was a mess. I kept my hands at my sides, with no interest in his lover’s game.
“What should we eat?” he asked.
I shrugged. Of course I would pay for it. I had money, and Samson had his strength.
“Figs.” I liked them. They did not weigh me down like meat, did not make me feel heavy and clumsy and slow. I could eat my weight in figs and still glide across a floor like a spirit. I liked feeling weightless, insubstantial, as if I weren’t here at all.
Samson grunted. He wanted meat.
“Figs and meat.”
He nodded, and I pulled my bag from my sash as we approached a little stall set up outside a home. We did have a market during the day, but at night, if one was lazy or delayed and had not gone to the market during those hours, one could knock on a door and buy what was needed. A merchant was always glad to see money, whether he was at home or the market.
We bought our dinner and walked to the stream to eat it. A large cypress grove grew along one side of the stream. On early mornings you could see a lion or deer emerging from the trees to drink. For us, tonight, it would provide cooling shade. I did not like to sweat as I ate.
Samson sweat like a beast all the time.
My stomach was sour. I didn’t want to eat, not really, and everything Samson did irritated me. Odd that a man so devoted to me could be such a source of frustration. If I had ever thought I loved him, even suspected I might, surely this aggravation was proof that I did not.
We sat, and he held out a fig to me. I brushed it away and turned to watch the sun’s last descent.
“Do I smell?”
“When do you not?”
“Why are you angry with me?”
He started eating. Whatever upset me was of no concern to him. He must have thought he could overpower anything, even my objections.
“I wish it would rain. I should make an offering to the gods. Maybe it will rain early this year,” I said.
“There is no ‘gods.’ There is only God.”
I exhaled in a loud rasp, my annoyance too big to hide. He didn’t even look up. I wanted to tear the pork rib from his hands and hit him with it. I had to stand up and walk away.
He finished eating, humming to himself as he did, content with ribs and figs and dirty fingers. I did not even want to think what his beard would smell like tonight when he tried to kiss me.
And he would. That was why I was inconsolable tonight. I realized this only when I had walked a good distance away, when I stood still and listened to the night encroaching, sneaking up on us, loud and dark. Insects began to shriek and in the trees, a flutter of wings. The heavy, fast panting of a big cat warned me to be careful, not to get too far from Samson.
I needed him.
No. I wanted him. That was worse.
And I was a liar, a filthy, cruel liar who would ruin everything for a chance at relief. I didn’t want justice or revenge. I wanted relief. I would hurt anyone I had to, even myself. I did not know why that sum had changed my heart about money. Maybe I had never had a chance to have so much. But theories about wealth fell apart when wealth became real.
But it was not too late. Nothing had been done, not really. I could pretend it had been a lover’s game. Samson was fond of those. He would not know how wretched I could be, how I had tried to use him. We could still go on.
His hands on my shoulders made me jump. The cat ran through the forest, alarmed by the sight of Samson, I am sure.
“Will you talk?” he asked.
I turned to look at him.
“The bowstrings, and the new ropes? It was a silly game for me to play,” I said.
He shrugged me off with a laugh. “Doesn’t matter. I didn’t tell you the truth anyway.”
My stomach tightened. Everything tightened and hardened and flushed red with anger. Whatever his powers were, he had the power to make me furious without trying.
“You lied to me? There really is a secret?”
“If you knew the truth, people might try to hurt you. I have enemies. You saw that for yourself.”
“I would never reveal your secret!”
“Of course you would.”
My mouth opened for a scream of fury before he finished his thought. “Under torture, anyone will reveal a secret. And then, once they killed me, what would they do to you?”
I couldn’t even hear what he was saying. I made fists from my hands and trembled, holding them up at my chest, so furious I could not even decide where to hit him first. He had lied to me. He had kept a secret from me. I hated secrets.
“Why are you so angry?”
I swear on the feet of the gods, he was trying not to laugh.
“Delilah, I was only protecting you.”
“You lied to me! You betrayed me!” I grabbed my head with both hands just trying to clear the rage from my vision. I did not know where we were or how to get home. I just wanted to hurt him.
So he kissed me. He grabbed me around the small of my back, his arms drawing me in, pressing down against my arms so that I was trapped. He kissed me, and I bit him. His eyes lit with anger and surprise, and I tried to step back, thinking I had won my release, but he drew me in tighter.
And what can I say? He was a very strong man. He got what he wanted, until I wanted it too.
“I love you,” he whispered in my ear. No man had ever said that to me. I wasn’t sure what I should feel.
When he had finished, I made my voice small and sweet as I rested my head on his chest, moving his beard aside and breathing through my mouth so I would not smell it.
“Please.”
He wanted sleep. He was a man of big appetites. He wanted to sleep, and I saw how that could be a useful appetite. All his appetites could be useful. He had no restraint, no discipline. He lived like a very bad donkey, his reins loose and untended. All he needed was someone to take the reins, and his strength could be used at last.
So I made my small, sweet voice in his ear, stalling his hunger for sleep, and he told me. He told me because he wanted sleep, more than he wanted to protect me, more than he loved me.
That is how I made my last choice. I knew his real secret long before he knew mine.
He did not love me, not really. No man ever would again.
After the first sleep, when others stirred at midnight and put out lamps and checked on the animals, we went home. Samson slept on the pallet below, simply because that was where I led him. He made no resistance, offered no criticism that the roof was surely cooler. He just wanted to sleep.
I let him.
I let him sleep while I carried the loom over to his sleeping form and rested it on my lap, settling down on my rear end near his head. One by one I lifted his fat rough braids and wove them into my loom.
His brown hair wove into my red pattern.
Slowly, I tightened the loom with its pin. His braids were secure but did not pull on his scalp. It was lovely work, my finest yet, and Samson would bring me more income than any fleece I had ever dreamed to make.
I arched my back, sore from bending over my work. Without disturbing him, I set the loom beside him. Gliding across the floor one last time with him sleeping in my bed, I opened my door to the night and did what I had to do.
When I returned, I had three Philistine guards with me. They waited outside the door. No matter what I said, they would not enter, not until they were sure he was weak.
“Samson, the Philistines are upon you!”
Samson awoke from his sleep and jumped up, his braids ripping the fabric from the loom, a sharp crack echoing from the stone walls as the loom exploded.
The guards ran away, their swords slapping against their sides as they ran.
Samson was busy picking the splinters of wood from his hair.
I crossed the floor, not bothering to be silent, and struck him on the chest. “How can you say, ‘I love you,’ when you won’t confide in me? This is the third time you have made a fool of me and haven’t told me the secret of your great strength.”
“Delilah—”
“Get out!”
“No.”
“This is my home!”
“Not anymore.”
He sat down on my pallet and tucked his arms behind his stinking foolish head. “When you calm down, you can come back. I won’t even punish you. Unless you ask me to.” He wriggled his eyebrows at me, which made his beard wriggle, which let a few fat splinters fall free into his lap.
I stomped out the door and slammed it, making as much noise as possible.
“No razor has ever been used on my head, because I have been a Nazarite dedicated to God from my mother’s womb. If my head were shaved, my strength would leave me, and I would become as weak as any other man.”
That was his secret. And I did not win it by seduction, by promise or threats, but by persistence. When Samson let me return in the morning, I was neither shocked by the experience nor shaken. Worse had been done to me.
What Samson wanted from me, I thought, was a rare kindness. He wanted someone who knew his destiny and did not judge him by it. I did not care about him, and he mistook that for the acceptance he craved. But what if I did accept him without judgment? What if I pretended to love, and because I loved, wanted to know everything?
I returned in the morning with a plan. I would love him. I would love him, and because I loved, I would nag. I would ask, and inquire, and prod, and hope. I would love him as no other woman had, until he was ready to die from so much devotion.
He lasted less than a week.
Even neighbors noticed the change in me, and old women gave me such frowns. Sleeping with an enemy is one thing, but loving him? That was poor character, especially for a Philistine.
So when I called for the lords and their men this time, they all came, silver in hand. I bid them wait outside until the first sleep had begun. My little friend, my boy who ran and fetched these men for me on the other occasions, stood alone at the door, a knife in his hand.
I spoke kindly to Samson that night, running my hands along his hair, stroking his cheek, letting my fingers graze his skin with tender attention. He rested his head in my lap as we sat on my pallet together and spoke of the future.
“How many children do you want?” he murmured, sleep coming to him already.
The question was a cold one. But he could not have known.
“None. I had one, once.”
“What?” he murmured, the end of the word falling off like the speech of a drunk.
He was asleep.
What happened next has been repeated in the streets many times. Often I was asked to tell it myself. I never did, not once. The lords did not pay me to tell it. My work was done.
I felt nothing, not for days. When the feelings came, they were so frightening, so unlike what I had thought possible, that even now, this story is like sand in my mouth.
I put him to sleep in my lap and whistled low for the boy. He cut off the braids, one by one. They fell like severed ropes at my side in a tangled pile.
Samson changed. We both did, actually, but I would not know that for days.
He seemed smaller, softer.
Then I called to him, “Samson, the Philistines are upon you!”
He awoke and stumbled as he stood, like a newborn doe.
Then the Philistine guards seized him, and with those fine smelted daggers they gouged out his eyes right there, in my home, as I watched. He looked right at me as they did it. I was the last thing he saw on this earth.
I could not turn away, as if some unseen hand grabbed the back of my neck, forcing me to watch.
With that, he screamed like an animal, like a small, wounded animal. And they dragged him outside, through the streets, where people threw stones at him and emptied pots on him until the lords begged them to stop, if only for the guards.
They took him down to Gaza. It was a journey of a week’s time, and I have heard tell how they stopped in every village so the people could see their enemy shamed and bleeding and blind. How he survived the walk, I do not know. Perhaps some strength remained, strength I knew nothing of, the strength of a very mortal man who knows a very real god.
I was free at last to live long and in luxury. I could buy anything my heart desired, but no one had told me this: My heart still desired nothing. Money left me cold, colder than the dead.
I could not forget how his hand reached for me, after he was blinded and struck with many blows, how he reached for me still, even knowing I had betrayed him.
He had still been calling my name as they dragged him away.