Part 19

“I would say so, Mistress,” Tullia answered. “Every devout Jew tries to go up for the Passover Feast. And certainly the Galilean is a devout Jew. Even though the Temple priests are bent on destroying him, I’m sure he will wish to go there to worship.”

“If he does, maybe we’ll have an opportunity to hear him again ... and perhaps this time he will perform some feat of magic.”

“But, Mistress, those who hold him to be the Messiah insist that he does not work magic; they declare he does his miracles of healing by the will of God.”

She smiled. “Well, however he does them—and even from you, little one, I’ve heard reports that he does—is no concern of mine. But should he come up to the Temple and perform some such feat, either by his own cleverness or with the aid of your Yahweh, I would like to be there when he did it.”

“But, Mistress, you saw him that day they dragged the woman before him....”

“Yes, but his saving her from that mob was not magic, little one. That was only the working of a quick intelligence and a good heart. But they say he can make lame persons walk again and blind persons see. And Cornelius, you remember, declared he healed his little servant boy, though Longinus thinks it was only a coincidence that the boy’s fever broke just at the same time the Galilean supposedly was curing him. Cornelius even believes that the carpenter once actually restored to life the son of a widow; he told me they were bearing the young man to the tomb when the Galilean happened along and brought him back to life. Of course, the boy may have been in a trance; certainly no sensible person can believe that he was really dead and then came back to life when the Galilean said some mysterious words and made some queer motions over him.” She paused and looked Tullia in the eyes. “Or do you, little one?”

“But if he is actually the son of our God....”

“Oh, you gullible Jews, even you, Tullia.” Her countenance revealed an amused tolerance. “And Cornelius. A soldier of Rome. But how, by all the gods, Tullia, can any present-day person of education and culture embrace such blatant superstition to believe that a man could come to earth as a god, even if he could believe that there are gods in the first place?”

But Tullia skillfully evaded answering the question. “If you saw him restore to life a man who you knew was dead, what would you say about him then, Mistress?”

“When I see him do that, little one, I’ll tell you then.”

Nevertheless, Claudia had not dismissed the Galilean from her thoughts, for that night she dreamed about him. It was a confused and illogical arrangement of stories she had heard about Jesus, interwoven with the experience she and Tullia had had that day at the Temple during the final exercises of the Feast of Tabernacles. In the dream she and Longinus had strolled with Cornelius down from the Tower of Antonia into the Court of the Gentiles. Rounding a corner of the Soreg, the three had come upon a throng ringed about the Galilean. They had pushed forward to the inner circle, and there, they had discovered on the stones of the court at the carpenter’s feet a crushed and bloody woman.

“Rabbi,” a burly fellow beside the woman was saying, “this woman is dead. We caught her in the act of adultery, and in accordance with the law of our father Moses we stoned her to death. I ask you, Rabbi, did not we do well in thus upholding the ancient law of Israel?”

“It is the law that the woman and the man taken in adultery be stoned to death,” the Galilean replied, and then his eyes flamed and his voice took on a new intensity, “but you who stoned her, were you without sins?” Then he lowered his eyes to the stones beside the dead woman and began with his forefinger to trace symbols in the dust. After a moment he stood up and, bending down, caught the stiffened body underneath his arms and raised it, unbending, until it stood upright.

“Remember,” said Cornelius, “she is dead, completely dead; see her mangled face, her crushed skull. Watch the Galilean.”

Jesus was steadying the rigid corpse with one hand. Now he raised his other hand to a position above her head and began to intone words that to Claudia were strange and utterly incomprehensible.

“Watch now,” said Cornelius. “Keep your eyes on him. And, remember, the woman is dead; there is no life in her, none.”

Incredulous, their eyes straining, they saw the stiffened limbs beginning to relax and the head bend forward slightly; the crushed bones of the shattered face rounded outward, the torn and bruised flesh smoothed, the clotted blood melted away, and the desecrated ghastly countenance was restored to a calm beauty; the woman, looking now into the serene face of the Galilean, smiled.

“By all the great gods ...” But Longinus hushed precipitately, for Jesus was speaking to the woman, now fully alert. “No man condemns you, my sister, and neither do I,” Jesus said, as he pointed toward her executioners, now slinking away toward the Gate of Shushan. “Go, and sin no more.”

Longinus turned now to the Procurator’s wife, and on his face she saw an expression of utter amazement. “But, Claudia, the woman was dead! Her head was crushed; her face was a bloody pulp. And now, look! She is walking away, around the corner of the Soreg! The Galilean, Claudia, he must be a god! By all the gods, Claudia, this man must be a god! He must be....”

But Longinus’ voice was fading, and he was receding, slipping away, and so were Cornelius and the Galilean and the woman....

Claudia opened her eyes; her chamber was flooded with light. She closed them again, trying to recapture the scene in the great court of the Temple. But the dream had fled. “Bona Dea,” she said aloud. “It was so real. That woman. And the Galilean. And Cornelius and Longinus. So vivid. Maybe”—the notion suddenly occurred to her—“I’m dreaming now, maybe I’m dreaming that I was dreaming.”

She sat up, swung her feet around to the floor, stretched and yawned. Then quickly she arose and crossing to the window, looked down at the ships in the harbor. Bright sunlight flashed from the hulls and the billowing sails. On the docks slaves struggled with casks and crates as they loaded and unloaded vessels. The world she was seeing was real; she stood looking through her window upon things tangible and comprehensible. The dream, with all its implications of the inscrutable, was gone, vanished.

But she was not to forget it entirely. One day Tullia revealed that while at the market place she had encountered some travelers from Galilee who had gone up to Jerusalem and were returning by way of Caesarea. On their journey, they told her, they had come upon the Galilean and several of his band in a hamlet in the mountains of Ephraim. Jesus had returned to Galilee from the Feast of Tabernacles, but after several weeks he had gone back for the Feast of Dedication. From Jerusalem he had retired into Peraea.

As Tullia related the story she had been told, her eyes began to shine. “While he was on the other side of the Jordan,” she went on, “he received a message from Bethany....”

“Bethany?”

“It’s a small village a few miles—a mile or so—just west of Jerusalem, Mistress.”

“What was the message?”

“Jesus had three friends who lived there, a man and his two sisters. While he was over beyond the Jordan he had word that the man was near death. So he and his band returned to Bethany. When they got there, they found that his friend had been dead four days.”

“And the Galilean brought him back to life?”

“Yes, Mistress! That’s what the travelers said.”

Claudia laughed. “Cornelius should have been there. No doubt, though, he’s already heard about it. And, of course, he believes the story.”

“But you don’t, Mistress?”

Claudia wasn’t sure that the servant woman was teasing. “No, Tullia, I don’t,” she replied. “Very probably this story has been repeated many times and has been added to by each teller. No doubt it was like the one Cornelius was telling about the widow’s son, or even the incident in which his own little slave boy was supposed to have been cured by the Galilean. Obviously, the man at Bethany was not dead; no doubt they thought he was....”

“But, Mistress, they said he had been in the tomb four days.”

“They said it, yes. Perhaps he hadn’t been entombed that long; but if he had, what of it? He wouldn’t have suffocated; tombs aren’t sealed that securely. In all probability the man was in a trance when they put him away; no doubt the carpenter roused him from the trance into which he had fallen.”

“Mistress, you have little faith in the Galilean.” Tullia’s dark eyes were serious now. “You cannot see how he could be the Messiah of the Jews and armed with unearthly power, can you?”

“I don’t believe that any man can restore life to another man, if that’s what you mean, little one. I cannot believe that any human possesses supernatural power; in fact, as I have told you many times, I doubt the existence of supernatural beings, including your Yahweh.” She laughed again. “But you and Cornelius outnumber me. I should have Longinus here to support me.”

But when a few weeks later the Centurion Longinus did sail into the harbor at Caesarea, Claudia had no longer a thought for the Galilean mystic and his reported wonder-working.

The centurion journeyed on a coastal vessel bound from Seleucia to Alexandria. He had sailed from Rome as soon as weather conditions permitted; from Seleucia he had moved on to Antioch to report to the Legate Vitellius. Returning a few days later, he had boarded another vessel destined for the Palestinian ports and Alexandria.

On coming ashore at Caesarea the centurion went first to the garrison headquarters and reported to Sergius Paulus. That duty completed, he visited the Procurator’s Palace, ostensibly to pay his respects to Pontius Pilate. The Procurator, polite but coldly formal, talked with him for only a moment before excusing himself and leaving the palace. Longinus, remarking about it to Claudia, wondered if the Procurator was finally becoming jealous.

“No, he isn’t jealous, by all the gods, and that makes me furious with him!” Claudia had answered. “But he may suspect that you’ve been spying on him and that Vitellius called you to Antioch to report on his administration of affairs in Judaea and then sent you to Rome to relay information and suggestions to Sejanus.”

“He would be entirely right, too, in thinking so. And you can add old Herod Antipas to my watched list.” He thought, with sudden amusement, of the third name on the list given him by Sejanus when first the Prefect sent him out to Palestine, but he did not comment. “And what I told the Prefect about both of them, for the Legate Vitellius and from my own observations, didn’t make them any more secure in their positions, by the gods!”

Quickly he related his experiences in Rome; he had met several times with Sejanus, once to discuss ways of increasing the output of the glassworks in Phoenicia. On another occasion the two had gone out to Capri for an audience with Tiberius. “The Emperor asked about his beloved stepdaughter,” he said, “but I professed to have little information about you. Sejanus also quizzed me—I’m sure he still suspects us—but he, too, learned nothing.”

“But what is going to happen, Longinus—about us, I mean—and when? Is there any likelihood still of Pilate’s being recalled ... soon?”

“Yes, I’d say there was. I know Sejanus is losing patience with Pilate; he seems to hear everything that happens out here, and Pilate’s inability to rule Judaea without continually provoking turmoil and protesting by the Jews angers the Prefect. The only thing that’s kept Pilate as Procurator this long, I suspect, is the fact that Sejanus apparently doesn’t suspect that Pilate is dipping too heavily into the taxes, if he is ... and I can’t say yet that he is. That was one question he kept coming back to in talking with me, if there was any evidence that the Procurator was not sending to Rome all the revenues he was supposed to.”

“Did the Prefect indicate that he might call Pilate to Rome for questioning?”

“I couldn’t say that he did. But if the Procurator should be ordered to the capital to justify his administration of Judaea, he won’t be returned, you can be sure. The same thing is true of Herod Antipas. I believe the Procurator and the Tetrarch stand in precarious positions; the next few months could determine the fate of both.”

Longinus left the palace soon after Pilate had departed; he and Claudia, they agreed, would meet again when the opportunity was afforded. But that opportunity did not come quickly; he did not return to the palace until the Procurator summoned him there to discuss plans for the forthcoming journey to Jerusalem.

A week later the Procurator and his party, with Longinus commanding one of the escorting centuries, set out for Israel’s capital and the great Feast of the Passover.

Jerusalem

39

The caravan from Galilee had halted on the plain before Jericho for rest and the midday meal, and now the Tetrarch’s party and the escorting soldiers of Cornelius’ century were preparing to resume their journey. Two days and a half of steady traveling southward had brought them from Tiberias through the rapidly greening gorge of the Jordan, and soon they would face the most grueling and dangerous part of the journey, the steep and boulder-locked climb to Jerusalem.

Centurion Cornelius, who had been making a quick inspection of the assembled legionaries, approached Herod Antipas and saluted. “Sire, I need now to determine your wishes”—he bowed to Herodias—“and the wishes of the Tetrarchess, for the remainder of our journey up to Jerusalem. If you wish to rest awhile, we could make camp here and leave early in the morning for Jerusalem. Or we could move on now and camp for the night where the Jericho road begins its ascent to Jerusalem. But if you prefer, we can set out now and not stop until we reach the capital, though it will probably be well past nightfall before we enter the city.”

“Are you fearful of traveling the Jericho road after the sun has set, Centurion?” Antipas inquired. “Do you think that perhaps robbers or zealot bands might sweep down on us from the rocks?”

“I have no fear, Sire; certainly none, if they knew our strength, would attempt it. And before we enter that region, I’ll rearrange our order of march to strengthen our guard against a surprise attack.”

“Then I suggest that we continue on to Jerusalem today,” Herodias spoke up. “We can rest better tomorrow in the palace than we can here in camp, even though”—she turned malevolent eyes on the Tetrarch, and her tone was bitterly sarcastic—“we shall be lodging in the old Hasmonean Palace in order that our Palace of the Herods may be occupied by the Procurator and his wife.”

“Yes, the Tetrarchess is right, Centurion,” Antipas agreed complaisantly. “Let’s push on to Jerusalem today.” He ignored his wife’s caustic remark. “We’ll have tonight and all tomorrow to rest before the start of the Passover celebration.”

Beyond Jericho, where the Peraean road joined the road up from Galilee and one that came down along the western side of the Jordan from the region of Ephraim, the way began to fill with pilgrims going up to Israel’s capital for the annual great spring festival of the Passover. As the caravan neared the point where the road began its steep climb, Cornelius called a halt. While the Tetrarch and Herodias were having a brief respite from their saddles, he called in his legionaries and changed the pattern of their advance. Down through the Jordan valley they had been moving in column along the roadway with guards ahead of and behind the Tetrarch’s party and only now and then a few soldiers on the flanks.

But now Cornelius gave orders to Decius to divide the century into three groups, the largest of which would continue along the Jericho road, while the other two would move forward with the Tetrarch’s group, one on its right flank, the other on the left, and each several hundred yards from the road.

“I’m not expecting any trouble,” he explained, “but if there are any Zealots lying in wait for us, in all probability they’ll be up there in that defile where the road cuts through the rocks. You men out on the flanks will be able to beat them off; if they’re crouched beside the road, we’ll trap them between your columns and us.”

When the division of the century had been completed, the centurion had a final warning. “Stay abreast of us, and keep in contact. And now, let’s get moving. Men, keep your eyes open. These Zealots are bent on killing every Roman in Palestine. They’re clever, and they know every foot of ground in this region.”

The steep rise of the narrow Jericho road and the push of pilgrims trudging ahead slowed the progress of the caravan, and it was nearing sunset when once more Cornelius halted the column. “It’s been a hard climb, and the animals are laboring,” he explained to the Tetrarch. “A short rest will refresh us for the last few miles into Jerusalem. Soon we’ll be past the boulders and can move faster. And with danger of assault by robbers ended, we can pull in our flanking files. So we should be approaching Jerusalem by nightfall.”

But the centurion had spoken too quickly. They went hardly a mile farther and were moving slowly through the last narrow defile in the ascending road before it veered sharply around screening boulders to come on a level plateau extending to the vicinity of Bethany; the caravan was strung out in a long column and the advance guard had disappeared around the turn in the gorge-like roadway. In the instant that Herod and the Tetrarchess, with Cornelius and several of the escorting legionaries just ahead of or behind them, had advanced into the narrowest portion of the rock-walled canyon, they heard a sudden commotion above them. Looking up, they saw on each side of the pass, glaring down upon them and with spears poised, a group of grizzled, fierce-eyed insurgents.

“Halt, Roman dogs!” shouted a hulking, reddish-bearded fellow, as he drew back his spear menacingly. “Get down from your beast before I nail you to his belly like a thief to his cross! And you”—with his free hand he gestured toward the Tetrarch—“you traitor to Israel, you fawning puppet of evil Rome, stay where you are! You, too”—his angry black eyes were studying Herodias—“you adulterous sharer of your uncle’s bed, don’t you move!”

“Who are you? What do you want?” Cornelius demanded loudly, in the hope that his soldiers in the flanking columns would hear.

“You needn’t be screaming, soldier,” the burly fellow said calmly. “There’s nobody to help you. We have you surrounded. See?” He pointed to his men in the rocks on the other side of the road. “One wrong move and we’ll stick your carcasses full of spears. And you needn’t be hoping for help from those up ahead”—he motioned—“or down there.” He threw back his bearish great head and roared his laughter. “We have them cornered, too.” Then suddenly he was scowling again. “You dogs of Rome! Throw down your weapons! Quickly, before we forget ourselves and let our spears fly!”

“Do as he says, men,” Cornelius commanded, dropping his sword. “But what do you want?” he asked the highwaymen’s leader again. He had decided that the safest course would be to pretend that he knew nothing of the rebel group, that ruthless party of guerrilla-fighting revolutionaries known as Zealots who had sworn not to rest until every imperialist Roman had been vanquished from their nation’s soil. “We have brought little money,” he said casually. “We aren’t Jews, you know; we aren’t going up to Jerusalem to purchase animals for the Passover sacrifices.”

The centurion’s thrust at the Israelites seemed to incense the fellow. “No, you mongrel of a Roman,” he roared, “nor would your sacrifice be acceptable to Israel’s God were you of a mind to offer it! Now get down, all you Romans! We’re taking your horses. But you and your woman, Herod, stay where you are. We’re taking you with us for ransom, and if the money isn’t quickly forthcoming to redeem you”—he tugged at his flaring dirt-caked beard and once again laughed uproariously—“we’ll skin you and one dark night pin your worthless hides to the door of old Herod’s Palace.” But quickly his demeanor changed again. He turned to glare at his comrades. “Get down there and pick up their weapons,” he commanded, “and mount the horses. We’ve got to be getting back into the hills. And you, Bildad and Achbor, I’ll hold you accountable for the Tetrarch. Dysmas and Cush, you take charge of the woman.” His sneering countenance softened into an evil grinning. “And see that no harm comes to her. I may wish myself to examine her seductive charms.”

Antipas sat staring stonily ahead, his countenance a frozen mask of fear. But anger added a flush to the cheeks of the frightened Tetrarchess. She did not venture, however, to challenge the man’s insulting remark.

The revolutionaries scampered like sure-footed mountain goats down from the rocks and quickly assembled the swords that Cornelius’ soldiers had thrown to the ground. The leader, who had stayed in his position atop an overjutting boulder, watched eagle-eyed along with several of his band who had continued to stand guard. “Issachar, you and Nadab see to the weapons those frightened dogs have thrown down,” he called. “See that not one remains to them when we’re gone. Now, Achbor and you, Bildad, get started with the Tetrarch, and let the woman follow. Men, mount the horses”—he paused an instant to watch one of his men who was having trouble getting into the saddle—“all you who know how to ride a horse ... and Coz, you don’t, I see.”

“But you can’t get away into the rocks with these horses. You have our swords; why don’t you leave us the horses...?”

“And let you fly into Jerusalem and have old Pilate’s soldiers combing through the hills for us? Oh, no, Roman dog, we aren’t fools. You’ll stand in your tracks until we’re gone, or we’ll come charging back and slit your throats and leave you here for the vultures to clean your bones.” He suddenly whirled about, for from behind him came the sound of men running through the rocks back from the road.

“Romans! Romans!” Cornelius heard someone shouting in Aramaic. “Fly! Roman soldiers!” In the next instant a bearded, coarse fellow burst into view above the deep-cut trail. “We can’t stand against them, Bar Abbas; there are too many of them!” he shouted. “We’d better get across the road and into those rocks!” He looked down and spied his companions and their captured party. “The Romans!” he yelled. “Fly men! There are too many for us to fight them!”

“Fly!” yelled the gang’s leader. “Go out through that ravine!” He pointed. “Get yourselves lost in the rocks, and hurry!” He turned to the man who had just rushed up to him. “How many did there appear to be, Hamor?”

“Many. I could not count them. We speared several before they discovered us....”

“Fools! If you’d held your peace and stayed under cover, they wouldn’t have known you were there. Now you’ve caused us to be flushed out. By the beard of the High Priest, Hamor, haven’t I warned you...?”

“But we thought there were only a handful....”

“Through that way!” Bar Abbas turned his back toward the road and was signaling the revolutionaries racing toward him. Cornelius, who since his first sight of the burly fellow had suspected he was the notorious Zealot marauder, couldn’t see the fleeing Israelites, but he could hear their sandals slapping against the loose stones. And close behind them—he was able distinctly to distinguish the sound of their heavy boots crunching the gravel and scattering the pebbles—came the pursuing legionaries of his flanking file on the west.