“All loved Lais.” My voice is as small as my breathing. There is more. I know he will tell me more. He gathers himself to do so and I cannot stop him, would not stop him. By the passing of Father, more than Father will pass.
“And I love you.”
“Of course. As a sister, just as I love you as brother.”
“I do not love you as a sister. If I could in all honor, I would do as your father wishes.”
“You would marry me?”
“Yes, Hypatia, I would marry you.”
I am thrown into tumult. Minkah and I might wed? It would keep me in the house of my birth. It would keep the house for Jone should she ever come home. And to hear that he loves me? I who have heard these words from so many, but who have never truly heard them at all, hear them now and thrill to them now. I would leap from my chair. I would cleave to it. I would turn to Minkah and give him my heart. I would turn away so he does not see how he touches me. And why am I torn between when I have won all? Hypatia, speak truth! Because I would lose my freedom.
This is more than freedom from the whims and needs and demands of a husband, more than his assuming control over my home and wealth—my freedom is that I am seen by the world to be free of a man, but even more, to be seen by women as free. I stand as a woman alone and by standing alone, stand all the taller. And what I can do, they can do.
I would say this, I would tell him I have loved him since the day we stood in the depths of the Serapeum daring fire for the books, I would explain all but the loss of status, but Minkah is already speaking. “I would have you as wife, but I cannot.”
“Cannot?”
“I am not who you think I am.”
Across the years, Isidore sounds in my ear. Who is this Minkah the Egyptian who lives in your house and eats your food and hears your teaching and goes you do not know where? Ask him who he is. As if the earth shook under me, I tremble. “Who do I think you are?”
“You believe I was born poor, and in this you are right. You believe me an Egyptian of the streets, and in this you are right. You believe me a craftsman, and in this you are right. You believe I love not the Christian come among us to destroy what causes them fear and discomfort, and again you are right.”
“Then who is it I do not know?”
“You believe I am still poor. You believe I am good and have done good. You believe I would never cause harm. In this you are wrong.”
“What do you mean, Minkah? What are you saying?”
“As Isidore was, I am Parabalanoi. I do the bidding of Bishop Theophilus. In your home, for so long as I have lived here, you have harbored a spy, one who has performed his shameful tasks faithfully even though he loves you.”
I stare at him. I stare at him. Immobilized with horror, yet how fast my thoughts—Theophilus must know of the library! But before I can react to this latest calamity, before I even know how to react, comes a great crash outside a door I had not thought to close. The statue of Thoth falls. Nildjat Miw jumps from her place on my table, not away, but towards the door. His knife drawn, Minkah is there a moment after Miw. What they have found is Jone, senseless on the tiles near the god of knowledge.
~
Jone, youngest daughter of Theon of Alexandria
Which touches me? I scramble to my feet on the instant. I push away the hand that holds mine. Minkah’s hand. I would spit on him. I would spit on them all, even the cat, Hypatia’s enormous cat, who curls and curls like a snake round my ankles, who leaps when she finds me, who forces her face into my face, talking and talking and saying such odd and terrifying things I long ago learned to shut my ears.
Minkah speaks. “Jone? Do you sicken?” Yes, I would say, you sicken me, you who I know now to be a deceiver. But I say nothing. I cannot even look at him,
Hypatia speaks, who is full of demons. “I will send for Olinda. Do you need Olinda?”
Minkah would marry Hypatia? I am ill enough to vomit.
My belly clenches as a fist, my head swims as if I were on the Irisi. I hate the Irisi. Under it sinks a deepness I swoon to imagine. When I would speak I manage only a dry hacking retch.
There is no female as my sister. There should be no female as my sister. Nor one as Lais. Demons took that one. First they laid their egg beneath the skin of her belly, then they took her mind, and finally they took her body. Sweet Mother of God, how came I to be born here? How came I to be sister to these? I raise my eyes to the eyes of Hypatia. False. False. False. If I could see through, what would I see? The deep under Irisi? I hold up my hand, palm facing them both. “Get away from me.”
I turn and I run from this house. Even for the Holy Bishop, I will never return, never.
That it is now Minkah’s, I care not. That Father is finally dead, I care not. That Minkah would marry Hypatia, I will learn to care not!
~
Hypatia of Alexandria
I turn my face from the tragedy that is Jone to the horror that is Minkah.
Our Egyptian is a spy. Father and father’s friends, even the Companions, what they have said and what they have done, this is known to the Patriarch Theophilus through the one I called brother, through the one I have loved though I knew it not. The library! Minkah knows every cave, every jar. Could this mean that Theophilus knows every cave, every jar…even that which contains the poems of Lais our “brother” claims to have loved?
“Minkah?” Even on my own ear, my voice falls as the linen pall over the face of my newly dead father. It seems as lifeless as the drone of the prayers of priests to aid in his journey with Anubis.
“Yes?” Minkah’s voice is every bit as dead as mine.
“Is the library still there?”
“It is as it was.”
“This you swear?”
He would move towards me, but as Jone, I hold up my hand, palm outward. “I have loved you, Minkah. I have placed my trust in you.”
“It was not misplaced.”
“You can say this, a spy for Theophilus?”
“I can say this.”
I cannot listen. I cannot move. I cannot understand even the need for nourishment. I am as destroyed as Jone.
He takes another step forward. “Hypatia!”
As he moves forward, I slide my chair back. “Leave me. I am homeless. I am without father or sister or brother. I am Hypatia and I do not know who I am.”
“You are not homeless and though I am not worthy to stay, I cannot leave. Not yet. You must hear me out.”
With all the pure black anger I have never allowed myself to feel or others to see, I turn on him. I, who have denied myself rage, am filled with rage. Lais, who most deserved Life, was murdered by life. Those without reason silence in loud righteousness those with exalted understanding. Jone was not loved as all deserve love and so cannot love. There is no cure for this. It is done. I was taken when I would not be taken, yet still soothed my abuser—a woman’s curse, for women, like children, forever accept blame. As for Father…the disgust he has caused me has weighted my belly with bile for years. And now this. This! To find my friend, my brother, my love, betrays me!
I stand so suddenly my chair is thrown back. I rush towards Minkah who does not step back. What I would scream, I would scream in his face. But just as I reach him, I pass him by, seeking to find the only place ever I found peace: the window ledge of Lais.
Nildjat Miw, anticipating, runs before me.
~
Minkah the Egyptian
Theon’s death has been my death. Followed by her cat, her strange unquiet cat, I watch Hypatia leave me. All around there is nothing but silence. In all its forms, death rules this house.
If I walked, I would stagger. If I sat, I would slump. If I remain as I am, standing in the door to Hypatia’s room, as made of stone as Thoth or his sister Seshat, I might never move. In all my life I have known what next to do. I do not know now. For years my confession has lived on my tongue. I saw it there as clearly as if I were to take up a pen and write, not a poem or a comment,
but a play. I would imagine that it played out one way. I would imagine it played out in another way. Or in yet a third way. At times, Hypatia would laugh at my exposure. At times, she would cry. Most often she would both cry and laugh. Each time I would stand before her: humble, repentant, but charged with love. I knew it would remain my love, not hers, but that was long ago accepted. The point would be my declaration. The point would be my honesty and her forgiveness. In the plays I wrote but did not truly write, no matter how each began, how each clashed and rang with heated words, with rended cloth, with arrows of accusation, in the end, we should understand each other.
I was right. We understand each other. I am to leave this house. And she has left me.
I loved Lais. I love her still. But that love was as Persian opion. Lais was made of the stuff of dreams. Hypatia is life. Neither dream nor life are mine. I am Minkah and though I would not, I must be as I was made to be: the stuff of nightmares. There are these few things I can do. I will have Olinda sent for so Hypatia might have medicines if they are needed. I snatch up her father’s will where it has lain throughout. I will burn the thing as it is now. Those who were witness to it know me well. They will soon know the last wishes of Theon for I will tell them what it is they have signed. None would desire, any more than I, to see Hypatia disinherited. None would desire Jone to be slighted. All will keep their silence. I shall write another will. This they will hear before signing. Hypatia will keep her house.
I will also do these things. I will retrieve the map that is now hers. And then I will write the play I never wrote. In a letter to Hypatia, I will explain all, hide nothing. It will be left along with the map on her table of green stone, and then I will remove my person from the house of the woman I love.
What I shall do next is not for me to know. I am empty of life. I am empty.
~
Jone, youngest daughter of Theon of Alexandria
I am no one but Jone and all that I love loves me not. Even a dog longs for love.
I run from my sister’s house and into the great park which lies on the far side of the wide Street of Gardens.
Loving Mother of our Savior, hear thou thy servant’s cry. Star of the deep and Portal of the sky! Mother of Him who was from nothing made.
Over and over as a wheel rolls under a wagon, I pray: Sinking I strive and call to thee for aid. Sinking I strive and call to thee for aid. Sinking I strive and call to thee for aid!…until, lo! thanks to the Lord, I am blessed with the answer I seek and it stops me as I run. “And you must daily seek the companionship of the saints, so that you may find support in their words.”
I have reached the small amphitheater within the park. Someone lectures this day. Few listen. I hear nothing but a jumble of words. I see nothing but a small dark man with a large white beard throwing out his arms as people nod or doze or eat what they have brought with them. Oh, that so few listened to Hypatia, that they not overflow her lecture hall. Why do they listen? What do they hear? Do they not sense the demon that sits on her tongue? I turn on my heel and run back towards the street seeking the companionship of saints.
Those I pass stare at me. Before God, I bear myself modestly and I am used to being stared at. My habit is not light nor is it linen; it is woolen, hot and dark under the Alexandrian sun. I cover my head. I lower my eyes. The mark of my faith and my chastity remains uncommon among those come from all over the world, each clad in the dress of their origin, speaking tongues I do not understand, thinking thoughts that blind them to the true God. But those like me grow. Where once the widows and virgins of Christ had only one house, now there are two and talk of a third House of Women in the city of Canopus. We shall be seen one day, and we shall be heard and we shall save all though they know not they are lost, nor would they welcome the saving. God asks—and who denies God?
A hand reaches out, filthy, diseased, to grasp at my skirts, but I pull away.
And if they refuse to be saved? Why, then, they shall be cast down forever. Though it seems harsh, it is not…for no soul is sent to Satan before the offer of salvation. The choice is not ours, but theirs. Praise God.
Some step aside for me. Some block my way. One laughs aloud. I do not mind. Those who do not follow Jesus will find Jesus does not follow them. This thought eases my way through the sweating stinking shouting crowd on the Street of Gardens.
I hurry to Bishop Theophilus. I mean to tell him about Minkah. I will say what I was all along expected to say, but did not.
Alma Redemptoris Mater, hear thou thy servant’s cry. Come to my aid, come! What I will do is more shaming than standing outside my sister’s door, more shaming than hearing the Egyptian I have loved declare he would marry Hypatia, more shaming than having heard Father named me not in his will. I would stop. I would turn away. I would walk back to the house of the women I live with. But I do not. Instead I do not walk, but pick up my heavy skirts and run, directly past the ships that daily fill the canal, through the gateway of the courtyard of Bishop Theophilus without thought for the bald monk who guards the first door or for the monk who guards the second. This monk’s left eye is much larger than his right eye; both widen as I pass. The monks know me. They are used to my coming and my going. None stop my progress.
Our bishop is not in his great offices. He is not in his fine garden. He is not in the huge house at all. I run here and there. I cause a small commotion as I search for him, calling out. But no matter where I go, he is not there, and in the end I am saved—by the sweet grace of the Mother of God, I am saved. I, who could not stop myself, have been stopped by a Mother’s love.
What joy! I am saved from myself.
Finding I achieved some part of the house I have never before seen, I hold my side from the stitch. Praise Mary. Praise Jesus. Praise Theophilus for not being discovered at home. For now, when I speak of Minkah, and I will speak of Minkah, it will not be to complain of my own hurt, my own sorrow, my own shame, but because in so doing I shall save him. Praise God.
“Misella landica, nay? You here again?”
Yet another monk who guards yet another door makes a noise down his long hooked nose. I do not understand his noise. I do not understand Latin. But I understand who it is who has spoken. I turn slowly towards Cyril of Alexandria, my eyes lowered, my hands folded, slowing my breath, slowing the beat of my heart, reining in my wild and shameful needs.
“Yes, sir, I am here.”
The Bishop has not given Cyril the position left vacant by Isidore, turned traitor with the monks of the Nitria, those who love Origen. I do not love Origen. Origen once wrote much as my sister speaks now. Instead a man named Timothy is Archdeacon. I imagine Cyril, who is only a lector, a mere reader and not even a priest, knows why. Surely his own uncle will offer him some greater post…although the only greater post I can think of is the throne of Saint Mark upon which Theophilus already sits.
Aside from the snorting monk, only Cyril and I occupy the place I have come to. He grows no better looking as the years pass, though he seems to grow shorter and stouter, but I begin to understand that the outside of a man is not the inside of a man. I learn this lesson as I have learned all my lessons, with great and lasting pain. Cyril walks round and round me, rather as Hypatia walks round a horse before buying, or Lais once turned a scroll before reading. So young and so wise. So imperious. I am silent before his inspection. “How opportune you should come here today.” I force myself not to turn with him, but to stand quietly awaiting an explanation. “My uncle visits a certain Augustine of Hippo. Your sister knows this man. They exchange letters.”
“Yes,” I say, eager to show off my knowledge, “I have copied as many of them as I could, brought them to…”
I am waved into silence.
“And I am left to govern his daily affairs, a task I find myself well suited for.” He is behind me now. I cannot see him and when I cannot see him there seems a different quality to his voice. It is harsher. Or louder. There is certainly a hitch in it. It seems the kind of voice h
alf-remedied of defect. I know this, having been forced to attend more than I could stand of Hypatia’s classes in oratory. “He has taken with him the best of his servants until his return late in the autumn leaving me with the dregs…” From where I stand I see that the monk whose nose curves towards his mouth does not move so much as a hair. “…which I would rectify. And you, little mule, would, I believe, serve me well. I confess I had not thought of you at all. But now that I do, the choice is perfect.”
How grateful I am he stops going round and round. His circling has unsettled my stomach. But how should I serve him? I have so much to do. I pray. I weave. I visit the poor offering salvation. I weave and I pray and I seek out the unwanted children, all girls, so we might raise them up in God. I weave. Actually, most of my time is spent in weaving. Our priests need robes. Our altars need clothes.
“You will now gather what little you own and move into my house. In the morning you begin as my handmaid.”
“Me, sir? I have…few skills.”
“You are the sister of Hypatia. That is skill enough.”
My thoughts turn to chalk on my skin. I will miss the small cell I have come to love. I will not miss weaving. What a terrible changeable disagreeable day.
What is a handmaid? Why do I ask? I do not speak Latin but I know what opus mulierum means—woman’s work.
BOOK FOUR
“I am the Invisible One within the All…I am immeasurable, ineffable, yet whenever I wish, I shall reveal myself of my own accord. I am the head of the All, I exist before the All, and I am the All, Since I exist in everyone. I am a Voice speaking softly. I exist from the first. I dwell within the Silence…And it is the hidden voice that dwells within me, within the incomprehensible, immeasurable Thought, within the immeasurable Silence.”—Trimorphic Protennoia, The Three Forms of the First Thought