“We do,” Mari said. “Anna, bring a small jar from the house.”

Anna hesitated. She did not want to leave her mother alone with the bad-smelling shepherd.

“Anna!” her mother urged.

Anna ran to the house. When she returned with the jar, her mother filled it with milk.

“Double blessings on your house,” the shepherd said.

“And on yours,” her mother replied.

Anna was relieved when the boy finally left. His smell had made her eyes sting.

With a noticeable wobble, Mari lifted the jar and headed back to the house. Anna tripped behind and was preparing to ask if she could have a sling like the one the shepherd boy carried when her mother yelped in pain. Mari staggered back and dropped the jar. A tongue of milk licked across the dirt. She groaned and clutched her belly as a flood of water splashed down between her legs.

“Anna,” Mari said, bracing herself in the doorway. “Get Zahra.” A dark stain bloomed across the front of her robe.

Anna tried to move, but her legs were frozen. She thought her mother was dying.

“Go!” her mother yelled, staggering through the puddle of milk and water.

Yoseph threw a cedar branch onto the fire. It spit sparks into the night. His father sat across the flames, reciting an endless prayer. Yoseph looked nervously toward his house and wrung his hands.

Mari’s cries split the air.

Anna tried to gauge her father’s concern by counting the lines denting his forehead. Her neighbor, Daniel, approached the fire with his father, Ishmael. They hardly reacted when Mari screamed again.

“The happy day has come,” Ishmael said.

“Yes, thanks to the Lord,” Yoseph replied. The men embraced.

Mari’s cries came again, quick and urgent. Anna could not understand what was happy about her mother’s agony.

Daniel turned to Anna and stuck out his tongue. She ignored him.

“Is Mother going to die?” she asked her father.

Yoseph held up a hand. “Hush,” he told her.

Frustrated, Anna gazed back into the fire. While they waited, a breeze lifted from the west, carrying the scent of the olive trees. As if riding the breeze, a group of three men walked out of the darkness. One of them led a camel. A light dressing of sand salted their coffee cheeks. They were, Anna knew, desert dwellers.

“Blessings on your house,” the man with the camel said to Yoseph. “May we sit by your fire?”

“Blessings to you. Please join us,” Yoseph answered. The men laid down their staffs and circled the flames. Yoseph’s father ignored them.

Mari screamed again. Anna flinched.

“Who is the fortunate man?” one of the dwellers asked.

“I am,” Yoseph said. He looked to Anna. “Pour these men some tea. No one will go thirsty at the birth of my first son.”

“Yes, Father.”

The man with the camel pointed to Anna. “Is that not your first son?” he asked, mistaking her for a boy.