Now he came again, but not with his great household to share water for a season in the nearby hills. No, this time he came with only a small entourage, enough men to make robbers think twice before attacking them on the road, and, surprisingly enough, three women. The camels they had with them were not enough to be a serious trading caravan; the cattle were not enough to be a herd. They could only be gifts for Bethuel.

He might have come like this if he needed Bethuel’s help in war, but there was no rumor of war, and he would not have brought women. Ezbaal had come with marriage in mind.

The whispers flew through camp like swarms of summer flies, buzzing everywhere so there was no escape. “Bethuel can’t say no to him.” “Rebekah has to fall in love with him at once!” “They say he married years ago but she died in bearing her first child, who died as well, and the poor man has been grieving ever since.” “He’s so rich he doesn’t need to marry for a dowry, he can marry for beauty, he can marry for love.”

Gossip also centered around the women who came with Ezbaal. One of them, it was agreed, was almost certainly his mother, and as the afternoon wore on, the other two were rumored to include the mother of Ezbaal’s dead first wife, Ezbaal’s sisters, his aunts, his great-grandmother, or the high priestess of Asherah from any of several famous cities, who was coming along to test Rebekah’s purity and bless any marriage that might ensue. Of course the three women actually with Ezbaal could not be all these things; Rebekah could not think of why he would have brought them along at all.

Rebekah was not one to wait for rumors, however. Soon after Ezbaal’s party had been seen and a messenger sent, who ran back with word that Ezbaal begged hospitality and that his company included fourteen men and three women, Rebekah took Laban aside and asked him who the women were and why they had come.

“They’re here,” Laban said dryly, “to look behind the veil, you dolt.”

Ah. Of course. Father would not display her to Ezbaal like a cow, but a man like Ezbaal would not marry a mere rumor or mystery. Rebekah’s face would have to be seen by someone that he trusted. And if it was a woman—or three women—willing to view her face in privacy, she could have no possible reason for objecting.