The dawn visitor in Bethlehem

Morning was breaking in Bethlehem. The star had just disappeared, the last pilgrim had left the stable. The Virgin had tucked in the Child in the straw and he was finally falling asleep. But does one sleep on Christmas night? The door opened, thrust open, it was said, by a breath more than by a hand, and a woman appeared on the threshold, covered with rags, so old and so wrinkled that in her earth-colored face her mouth seemed to be just another wrinkle.

When she saw her, Mary was frightened, as if the woman was a bad fairy barging in. Fortunately, Jesus was asleep! The donkey and the ox chewed their straw peacefully and watched the stranger enter without surprise, as if they had known her all their life. The Virgin did not take her eyes off her. Each step she took seemed like an eternity. The old woman continued to walk forward, and now she was at the edge of the manger. Thank God, Jesus was still sleeping. But does one sleep on Christmas night?

Suddenly he opened his eyes, and his mother was astonished to see that the eyes of the woman and those of her child looked exactly the same and shone with the same hope. The old woman then leaned over the straw, while her hand went to seek in the jumble of her rags something she seemed to take centuries to find. Mary was still looking at her worriedly. The beasts looked at her too, but still without curiosity, as if they knew in advance what would happen. Finally, at the end of a very long time, the old woman drew an object hidden in her hand from her clothes, and she handed it to the child. After all the treasures of the Magi and the offerings of the shepherds, what was this present? From where she was, Mary could not tell. She could only see the old woman’s back bent by age, bending even deeper as it leaned over the cradle. The donkey and the ox could see her but they still did not seem to wonder, as if they knew what was going to happen. This lasted a long time.

Then the old woman straightened up, as if delivered from the heavy weight that was pulling her to the ground. Her shoulders were no longer vaulted, her head almost touched the thatched ceiling, her face looked miraculously younger. When she moved away from the manger to go back to the door and disappeared in the night from which she had come, Mary finally saw the mysterious present. Eve—since that is who she was—had just given the child a small apple, the apple of the first sin (and of so many others that followed). The little red apple shone in the hands of the newborn like the globe of the new world that had just been born with him.

Jérôme and Jean Tharaud

From Tales of the Virgin (Les Contes de la Vierge), Plon publisher, 1940