Very slowly I tried to free my hand, but he wouldn't let me go. I moved slowly to his left and saw even more of the light spill down on his upturned face.
“The world swallowed you,” he said bitterly. “You left the Temple and the world simply swallowed you. That's what the world does. It swallows everything. One woman's angel is another man's scornful tale. Grass grows over the ruins of villages until one can find nothing of them and trees sprout from the very stones where great houses, houses like this one, once stood. All these books are falling to pieces, aren't they? Look, see the bits of parchment all over my robes. The world swallows the Word of God. You should have stayed and studied Torah! What would your grandfather Joachim say if he knew what you've become?”
He sat back. He let me go. His lips curved into a sneer. He looked up at me though his gray brows were drawn down into a frown. He motioned for me to go away from him.
I stood there.
“Why does the world swallow the Word of God?” I asked. He couldn't hear the heat in my voice. “Why?” I asked. “Are we not a holy people, are we not to be a bright and shining light to the nations? Are we not to bring salvation to the whole world?”
“That is what we are!” he said. “Our Temple is the greatest Temple in the Empire. Who doesn't know this?”
“Our Temple is one of a thousand temples, my lord,” I said.
Again came that flash, seemingly of memory, buried memory of some great agitated moment, but it was no memory. “A thousand temples throughout the world,” I said, “and every day sacrifice is offered to a thousand gods from one end of the Empire to the other.”
He glared at me.
I went on,
“All around us this happens, in the land of Israel this happens. It happens in Tyre, in Sidon, in Ashkelon; it happens in Caesarea Philippi; it happens in Tiberias. And in Antioch and in Corinth and in Rome and in the woods of the great north and in the wilds of Britannia.” I took a slow breath. “Are we the light of the nations, my lord?” I demanded.
“What is all that to us!” he countered.
“What is all that? Egypt, Italy, Greece, Germania, Asia, what is all that? It's the world, my lord. That's what it is to us, it's the world to whom we are to be the light, we, our people!”
He was outraged. “What are you saying?”
“It's where I live, my lord,” I said. “Not in the Temple, but in the world. And in the world, I learn what the world is and what the world will teach, and I am of the world. The world's made of wood and stone and iron, and I work in it. No, not in the Temple. In the world. And I study Torah; and I pray with the assembly; and on the feasts I go to Jerusalem to stand before the Lord—in the Temple—but this is in the world, all this. In the world. And when it is time for me to do what the Lord has sent me to do in this world, this world which belongs to Him, this world of wood and stone and iron and grass and air, He will reveal it to me. And what this carpenter shall yet build in this world on that day, the Lord knows, and the Lord shall reveal it.”
He was speechless.
I took a step back from him. I turned and stared ahead of me. I saw the dust moving in the rays of the noon sunshine. Sparkling in lattices above bookshelves and bookshelves. I thought I saw images in the dust, things moving with purpose, things airy and immense yet guided and patient in their movement.
It seemed the room was filled with others, the beating of their hearts, but they were invisible hearts or not even hearts. Not hearts like my heart or his heart, of flesh and blood.
Leaves rattled at the windows and a cold draft crept across the shining floor. I felt removed and at the same time there, under his roof, standing before him, with my back to him, and I was drifting, yet anchored, and content to be so.
The anger washed out of me.
I turned and looked at him.
He was calm and wondering. He sat collected amid his robes. He sat peering at me as if from a great and safe distance.
When he spoke, it was a murmur.
“All these years,” he said, “as I've watched you on the road to Jerusalem, I've wondered, ‘What does he think? What does he know?’ ”
“Do you have an answer?”
“I have hope,” he whispered.
I thought about this, and then slowly I nodded.
“I'll write the letter this afternoon,” he said. “I have a student here to take the dictation for me. The letter will reach my cousins in Sepphoris this evening. They are widows. They're kind. They'll welcome her.”
I bowed and placed my fingers together to show my thanks and my respect. I started to go.
“Come back in three days,” he said. “I'll have an answer from them or from someone else. I'll have it in hand. And I'll go with you to see Shemayah on this matter. And if you see the girl herself, you will tell her that all her family—we are all asking after her.”
“Thank you, my lord,” I said.
I walked fast on the road to Sepphoris.
I wanted to be with my brothers, I wanted to be at work. I wanted to be laying stones one after another, and pouring the grout and smoothing the boards and hammering the nails. I wanted anything but to be with a man with a clever tongue.
But what had he said that my own brothers hadn't said in their own way, or that Jason hadn't said? Oh, he'd been full of privilege and riches and the arrogant power that he held to help Avigail.
But they were asking me the same questions. They were all saying the same things.
I didn't want to go over it in my mind. I didn't want to go over the things he'd said or what I'd seen or felt. And most especially I didn't want to ponder what I'd said to him.
But as I reached the city with all its engulfing voices, its wondrous pounding and clattering and chatter, a thought came to me.
The thought was fresh and like the conversation I'd had.
I'd been looking all this while for signs that rain would come, hadn't I? I'd been looking at the sky, and at the distant trees, and feeling the wind, and the chill of the wind, and hoping to catch just a kiss of moisture on my face.
But maybe I was seeing signs of something else altogether different. Something was indeed coming. It had to be. Here, all around me, were the signals of its approach. It was a building, a pressure, a series of signals of something inevitable—something like the rain for which we'd all prayed, yet something vastly beyond the rain—and something that would take the decades of my life, yes, the years reckoned in feasts and new moons, and even the hours and the minutes—even every single second I'd ever lived—and make use of it.
12
THE FOLLOWING MORNING, Old Bruria and Aunt Esther tried to get word to Avigail, but could get no answer.
By the time we came back from the city that evening, Silent Hannah had come in. She sat now broken and small and shivering beside Joseph who kept his hand on her bowed head. She looked like a tiny woman under her woolen veils.
“What's the matter with her?” James asked.
My mother said, “She says Avigail is dying.”
“Give me some water to wash my hands,” I said. “I need the ink and parchment.”
I sat down and put a board over my knees for a desk. And I grasped the pen, amazed at how difficult it was. It had been a long time since I'd written anything, and the calluses on my fingers were thick and my hand felt rough and even unsteady. Unsteady.
Ah, what a discovery that was.
I dipped the pen and scratched out the words, simply and fast, and in the smallest possible letters. “You eat and drink now because I say you must. You get up and you take all the water that you can now because I say you must. You eat what you can. I do all that I can do on your behalf, and you do this now for me and for those who love you. Letters have been sent from those who love you to those who love you. You will soon be away from here. Say nothing to your father. Do as I tell you.”
I went to Silent Hannah and gave her the parchment. I gestured as I spoke. “From me to Avigail. From me. You give it to
her.”
She shook her head. She was terrified.
I made the ominous gesture for a scowling Shemayah. I gestured to my eyes. I said: “He can't read it. See? Look at how small are the letters! You give it to Avigail!”
She got up and ran out quickly.
Hours passed. Silent Hannah didn't come back.
But shouts from the street roused all of us from our semi-sleep. We rushed out to discover that the signal fires had just reported the news: peace in Caesarea.
And Pontius Pilate had sent word to Jerusalem to remove the offensive ensigns from the Holy City.
Soon the street was lighted up as it had been on the night the men rode out. People were drinking, dancing, and locking arms. But no one knew the particulars as yet, and no one expected to know. The fires gave the word that the men were returning to their homes all over the country.
There was no sign of life in the house of Shemayah, not even the glimmer of a lamp beneath the door or in the chink of a window.
My aunts used this festive occasion to hammer on the door.
It did no good.
“I pray Silent Hannah's asleep next to her,” said my mother.
The Rabbi called us all to the synagogue to give thanks for the peace.
But no one really rested easy until the next afternoon, by which time Jason and several of the men, hiring mounts for the whole way, had reached Nazareth.
We threw down our bundles, fed the animals, and made for the synagogue to pray and to hear the story of what had happened.
As before, the crowd was much too big for the building. People were lighting torches and lanterns in the street. The sky was quickly darkening.
I caught a glimpse of Jason, who was bursting with excitement and gesturing wildly to his uncle. But all begged him to stop and wait and tell the tale to the whole village.
Finally benches were dragged out of the synagogue and up the slope, and soon some fifteen hundred or so men and women were massed in the open area, torch begetting torch, as Jason made his way up to the place of honor, along with his companions.
I couldn't see Silent Hannah anywhere. Of course Shemayah was not there, and certainly there was no sign of Avigail. But then, again, it was difficult to tell.
People were embracing and clapping their hands, kissing one another, dancing. The children were in a paroxysm of delight. And James was crying. My brothers had brought Joseph and Alphaeus along slowly. Some of the other elders were also late in coming.
Jason waited. He stood on the bench, embracing his companion, and only then as the torches drew in, clearly illuminating them both, did I realize that the companion was Hananel's grandson, Reuben.
My mother recognized him at the same moment, and the word spread in a whisper through all of us, as we stood crowded together.
I hadn't told them any of what Hananel had said to me. I had not even asked the Rabbi why he hadn't warned me that Hananel's grandson had once come to court Avigail.
But all knew how the grandfather had grieved for two years for this lost son who had gone abroad, and soon the name “Reuben bar Daniel bar Hananel” was being whispered everywhere.
He was elegant, this one, and beautifully dressed in linen robes just as was Jason, with the same barbered beard and anointed hair, though both were thoroughly soiled from the long hard ride, and neither seemed to care about this.
Finally the whole town shouted for the men to tell the story.
“Six days,” declared Jason, holding up his fingers so that we might count. “Six days we stood before the palace of the Governor and demanded that he remove his brazen and blasphemous images from our Holy City.”
Shouts of wonder and approval rose in a soft roar.
“ ‘Oh, but this would give injury to our great Tiberius,’ the man told us,” Jason cried. “And we to him, ‘He's always respected our laws in the past.’ And understand that for every day we remained firm, more and more men and women came to join us. Understand that Caesarea was overflowing! In and out of the palace of the Governor went the men who presented our petitions, and no sooner were they dismissed than they returned and presented them again, until at last the man had had his fill of it.
“And all the while soldiers had come pouring in, soldiers taking up their stands at every gate, at every door, and all along the walls that bounded the pavement before the judgment seat.”
The crowd gave a loud roar before he could go on, but he gestured for quiet, and continued.
“At last, sitting there before the great mass of us he declared that the images would not be removed. And giving the signal brought his soldiers to full arms against us! Swords were drawn. Daggers lifted. We saw ourselves on every side surrounded by his men, and we saw our deaths right in front of us—.”
He stopped. And as the crowd murmured and shouted and finally roared, he gestured for quiet again and came to the finish.
“Did we not remember the advice our elders had given us?” Jason asked. “Did we need to be told that we are a people of peace? Did we need to be cautioned that Roman soldiers would soon hold our breath in their hands, no matter how many of us had banded together?”
The shouts came from all around.
“On the ground, we threw ourselves,” Jason cried. “On the very ground, and we bowed our heads, and we bared our necks to those swords—all of us. Hundreds of us did this, I tell you. Thousands of us. We bared our necks, all of us, to a man, fearlessly and silently, and those who were left to speak told the Governor what he already knew, that we should surely die—all of us, to a man, as we knelt there!—before we would see our laws overturned, our customs abolished.”
Jason folded his arms and looked from right to left as the cries rang out and slowly rolled into one great song of jubilation. Nodding and smiling, he waved to the little boys who clamored at the foot of the bench. And Reuben stood beside him, as filled with pure happiness as he was.
My uncle Cleopas was crying; so was James. So were all the men.
“And what did the great Roman Governor do in the face of this spectacle?” cried Jason. “At the undeniable sight of so many ready to give their lives for the protection of our most sacred laws, the man rose to his feet and ordered his soldiers to put away the weapons they held at our throats, the blades flashing in the sun everywhere before him. ‘They shall not die!’ he declared. ‘Not for piety! I will not shed their blood, not one drop! Give the signal. The soldiers are to remove our ensigns from within the walls of their sacred city!’ ”
Cries of thanksgiving filled the air. Prayers and acclamation. People went down on their knees in the grass. The noise was so great that nothing further could have possibly been heard from Jason or Reuben or anyone for that matter.
Fists were in the air, people were dancing again, and the women were sobbing now, as if only now could they sink down onto the grass and let their full fear flow from their hearts and into the arms of one another.
The Rabbi who stood near the summit beside Jason bowed his head and began the prayers, but we couldn't hear him. People began to sing psalms of thanksgiving. Bits of melody and prayer floated and mingled all around us.
Little Mary sobbed against the breast of my uncle Cleopas, her father-in-law, and James held his wife, kissing her forehead silently as the tears came down his face. I hugged Little Isaac to me and Yaqim and all of Avigail's children, who were with us now, even as I knew it meant that Silent Hannah and Avigail had not come to this crowd, no, not even for this.
We were all kissing one another. Wineskins were passed. People had broken into long discourses on how this had seemed or that had been, and Jason and Reuben struggled through the press, besieged for the greater details, though both men now appeared completely spent and ready to collapse if given the opportunity.
Joseph clasped my hand and James' hand. Our brothers and their wives made a circle, and the little children stood in our midst. My mother had her arms around my shoulders and her head against my back.
“ ??
?Sacrifice and offerings You do not desire, O Lord,’ ” said Joseph, “ ‘but ears open to obedience You've given us. Burnt offerings You did not demand. So I said, “Here I am; Your commands for me are written in the scroll. To do Your will is my life; my Lord, Your law is in my heart. I announced Your deeds to a great assembly. . . .” ’ ”
It took us a long time to make our way home.
The street was choked with revelers, and it was plain as well that other men were arriving, others who'd hired mounts for the hard ride, and we could hear the sharp unmistakable cries of those who were being reunited.
Suddenly Jason, bright faced and smelling of wine, caught up with us, his hand over James' shoulder.
“Your boys are well, they're well indeed and stood straight and strong with us, both of them, Menachim and Shabi, and I tell you all of the men of your house stood firm. Silas, and Levi, of course, I expected it, who didn't, but little Shabi I tell you, and Young Cleopas, and every man—.” And on he went, kissing James and then my uncles, and kissing the hands that Joseph lifted in blessing.
We'd reached the gate to the courtyard when Reuben of Cana caught up with us, and he tried to take his leave of Jason now, but Jason protested. They passed the wineskin between them and offered it to us. I waved it away.
“Why are you not happy!” Jason demanded of me.
“We are happy, all of us are happy,” I said. “Reuben, it's been many years. Come inside, refresh yourself.”
“No, he's coming home with me,” said Jason. “My uncle wouldn't hear of it if he didn't lodge with us. Reuben, what's the matter with you, you can't ride out for Cana now.”
“But I must do that, Jason, and you know I must,” Reuben said. He looked to us as he took his leave, nodding to us. “My grandfather hasn't seen me in two years,” he said. Joseph answered Reuben's nod with his own. All the older men nodded.