Family Reunion
by Albert Russo
Joseph gave the largest
plate to Benjamin, showing in this manner that he
considered the ladder the most worthy of
the brothers. After the banquet, he told them
that they could go back to Canaan with their
sacks full of grain and other goodies.
They had just left the city
when, to their surprise, a chariot overtook them
and the driver shouted “Stop! One of you
guys has stolen my master’s silver cup. You’ll
pay dearly for that.”
“ … wha … wha … wha,”
wailed the eldest of the brothers, “we’re
not thieves.”
“That’s what we’ll
see.” answered the driver, nastily.
He had them opened all the
sacks, until the silver cup was found in Benjamin’s
sack.
“This must be a
terrible mistake,” cried the baby brother,
“I’ve never seen that cup.”
“My master has ordered
me to bring back the culprit,” added the
driver with fire in his bulging eyes - they
seemed ready to pop out.
The brothers begged him to
allow them all to accompany Benjamin, in order
not to leave him alone, if he had to be punished.
Soon the ten of them stood
before the Egyptian guv’ner, who then said:
“I’ll be merciful, while the rest of
you can go back to your home country, I’ll
keep the thief as my private slave.”
The brothers started
hiccuping, stuttering and drooling all at once,
in an awful cacophony - that’s when you can’t
put words in their right order, like so: ‘we
… not … father … crazy … die
…’
But, if you remember, good
‘ole Joey had the gift of interpreting
dreams. Here too, he could make sense of the
gibberish he was hearing.
That is when, with tears in
his eyes, Joseph told his brothers who he was.
They were as flabbyghosted as they were
ashamed, remembering how, so many years ago, they
had left Joey in the wild to a certain death.
They all started to sob and to tremble. But
Joseph ordered them to come back to their senses
and to stop their shenanigans.
“Listen to me,”
he said in a gentler tone, “there is going
to be a famine, lasting five years. Go and fetch
our dear father. You shall all live here where
there is an abundance of food, and we will
finally be reunited as a family.”
When Jacob finally saw his
son, whom he believed to be dead, guv’nor
Joey cried so much that he felt like the little
boy he once was, crying, spluttering and
sniffling, with tears flowing from both his
nostrils and his tongue. He was so shook up that
he began to snort and to pee - he was wearing a
white linen robe without underwear, like all the
hifalutin Egyptian princes -, something too gross
for a personality of his rank. Thank Goddess he
was alone with his father and his brothers.
Pharaoh welcomed and
entertained them in his palace. He generously
gave Jacob and his sons the best pastureland of
Egypt, so that they could live off it comfortably
and prosper.
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