Book IV
The Book of Esther
Perek Deled

While performing his mime outside the palace gates, Mudcha heard about Haman's plan and immediately put on sack-cloth and ashes to make himself look more disheveled in the hopes of dredging up some sympathy business. He began to wail that he would not be able to get that truck-sized SUV he had always wanted. "Without an SUV, how will I let people know I'm a really tough guy," he wailed, the tears smudging his mime makeup.

Then he remembered: mines don't wail. So instead he mimed his sorrow for pennies.

When Ester heard that Mudcha was crying in the street, she immediately sent a servant to find out what was wrong. Mudcha beseeched Ester to approach the king and beg him to retract the ban on SUV sales to Jews. And, so long as she was beseeching anyway, to see what she could do about that genocide thing, too.

Ester hesitated at this request, knowing that the only thing that the king loved as much as drinking was a good genocide. The only way to get him to change his mind would be to sleep with the fat oaf, something she had not done since the first night that had been together. Rashi claims that it was yet another hidden miracle that Ester's refusing to sleep with her husband didn't tip him off that she was Jewish.

After some negotiating and quite a few rounds of back and forth, which, normally, is not something you do when the lives of a few million people are on the line, Ester magnanimously agreed to pick herself up and walk into the next room to see the king.

But she insisted that the lights be kept off.

To be continued...