Exodus - Leon Uris [340]
“I would appreciate that very much,” Kitty said.
Not long after Ari had left Sarah came in and announced that the Seder table was ready for everyone’s inspection. This was her moment of triumph after a month of labor. She opened the door to the dining room and the guests self-consciously tiptoed in with a chorus of “ohs” and “ahs.” It was a table indeed fit for a Feast of Liberation.
All the silver and dishes glistened. They were used only once a year, on this holiday. The silver candlesticks shone in the center of the table. Next to the candlesticks sat a huge ornate sterling-silver goblet which was called “Elijah’s cup.” It was set there and filled with wine to welcome the prophet. When he came to drink from the cup he came as the forerunner of the Messiah.
Special wine and silver goblets were at each place, to be filled four times during the Seder for the four promises of God: to bring forth, deliver, redeem, and take the Children of Israel. The wine symbolizing joy would also be sipped during the recounting of the Ten Plagues against Pharaoh, and when the Song of Miriam, of the closing of the Red Sea on Pharaoh’s army, was sung.
At the head seat there was a pillow, so that the teller of the story of the Exodus might relax. In ancient times only free men relaxed, while slaves were made to sit rigid.
And in the center near the candlesticks sat the gold Seder dish holding the symbolic foods. There was matzos, the unleavened bread to remind them that the Children of Israel had to leave Egypt so quickly their bread was unleavened. There was an egg to symbolize the freewill offering, and water cress for the coming of spring, and the shank of lamb bone to recall the offerings to God in the Great Temple. There was a mixture of nuts and diced apples and maror, bitter herbs. The first symbolized the mortar the Egyptians forced them to mix for brick building, and the herbs recalled the bitterness of bondage.
Sarah shooed them all out and they returned to the living room. As they entered, it was Jordana who saw Ari first. He leaned in the doorframe, pale and with a dazed expression in his eyes. Now they all stared at him. He tried to speak but couldn’t, and as a moment passed they all knew at once.
“Karen! Where is she!” Kitty demanded.
Ari’s jaws trembled and he lowered his head.
“Where is she!”
“Karen is dead. She was murdered last night by a gang of fedayeen from Gaza.” Kitty let out an anguished shriek and slumped to the floor.
Kitty blinked her eyes open. Bruce and Jordana knelt near her. The remembrance hit her and her eyes bulged and she turned and sobbed, “My baby ... my baby ...”
She sat up slowly. Jordana and Sutherland were in a stupor of shock. They looked haggard and numb with grief.
“Karen is dead ... Karen is dead ...”
“If I could only have died for her,” Jordana cried.
Kitty struggled to her feet.
“Lie down, dear ... please, lie down,” Sutherland said.
“No,” Kitty said, “no ...” She fought clear of Sutherland. “I must see Dov. I must go to him.”
She staggered out and found Dov sitting in the corner of another room, hollow-eyed and his face contorted with pain. She rushed to him and took him in her arms.
“Dov ... my poor Dov,” Kitty cried.
Dov buried his head in her bosom and sobbed heartbrokenly. Kitty rocked him and they cried together, until darkness fell upon the Ben Canaan cottage and no one had any tears left.
“I’ll stay with you, Dov ... I’ll take care of you,” Kitty said. “We will get through this, Dov.”
The young man stood up shakily. “I will be all right, Kitty,” he said. “I’m going on. I’ll make her proud of me.”
“I beg you, Dov. Don’t go back to the way you were because of this.”
“No,” he said. “I thought about it. I cannot hate them, because Karen could not hate them. She could not hate a living thing. We ... she said we can never win by hating them ...”
Sarah Ben Canaan stood at the door. “I know we are all broken,” she said pitifully,