Having, with the help of his slaves and servants, consigned his family to a lower deck, he returned to the upper deck alone. He looked at the sea contentedly, and then at the sky, and he smiled. He spread his big brown legs and balanced himself with the slight swell of the ship, his thumbs hooked into his wide leather belt with its short sword. He removed his helmet and wiped his sweating face. His expression became genial as he glanced at Lucanus. It was evident that he wished company, and Lucanus rose and politely asked the soldier to join him in some wine. Ramus went below and brought up the wine and three goblets, and poured the red liquid. Lucanus waited for a look of surprise and affront to come over the Roman’s face at the easy presence of the dark man, and his amazement that his participation in the wine was tolerated by Lucanus. But the centurion accepted the wine from Ramus and gave him a kind smile, and then sat beside Lucanus, who had introduced himself while they had been awaiting Ramus’ services.
“I left Judea three weeks ago,” he said, “to gather up my family where my wife and my two daughters had been enjoying the dryness of the desert air. My family is not very well,” and he sighed, but immediately the look of peace returned to his face. “I have now been retired; I have a small estate near Naples, and there I intend to live out my life, with no regrets and no further ambitions.” His name was Antonius. He continued, “Once I believed that there could be no life for me except as a soldier and a guardian of Rome. Once I was the proudest of men, and, I am ashamed to confess it, the most impatient.”
Lucanus was interested. Pride and impatience were not regarded as reprehensible among Romans, but as part of the national character.
The centurion gave him a shy, hesitating glance, and Lucanus was very much intrigued. The glance had a boyishness in it, and a candor. Ramus, who was standing close by, moved closer.
“But all this must be of no interest to you, Lucanus,” said the soldier, in apology. “You must forgive the maunderings of an old man.” He sipped his wine and looked dreamily at the sea. “Yet I feel impelled to speak so to any who will listen.” He held the goblet to his lips and still gazed at the rising ocean, and a look of exaltation and wonderment shone in his fierce black eyes.
“It is indeed of much interest,” said Lucanus, and signaled to Ramus to pour more wine. Antonius thanked Ramus, and Lucanus was freshly astonished.
Antonius withdrew his gaze from the sea and stared into the goblet he held in his brawny hands. He said, “For a long time I lived in Capharnaum. It was there that I was stationed, until at my request I was recalled to Rome. You must understand, Lucanus, that the Jews are much like Romans. They have the same pride and are stiff-necked, and love their country; they are also shrewd, while they are also very religious. They market. And they pray. They are excellent dealers. And they give alms to the poor.”
“Yes,” said Lucanus, with a fond smile. “I understand. My adopted father was like that. He, too, often mentioned that the Romans and the Jews were much alike.”
Antonius nodded. He was very serious, like a youth. “The Jews detested me, as they detest all Romans — and do not brothers detest one another? — and yet over the years we became excellent friends. I learned, not only the vulgate, Aramaic, but the Hebrew of the wise men, and sometimes they would visit me, though not often, and talk to me of many things. I was instrumental, a few years ago, in the building of a synagogue, which, as those in Capharnaum are very poor, was badly needed. I am not a poor man; I poured out my own money for the synagogue. Yes, we were friends, loving one another, the Jews and I. My oldest daughter married a very learned young Jew, and she lives with him in Jerusalem, and they have three little children. They are beautiful,” he added, and his eyes misted.
Lucanus listened courteously, but he was becoming somewhat bored. The centurion had a most weighty air, and Lucanus remembered that old soldiers are frequently tiresome, and are given to rambling tales which they find, in retrospect, are very portentous.
“I have left my servant with my daughter and her family,” said Antonius, still gazing into his goblet. “I must tell you about that servant, for it is important. He was my childhood companion; he was a slave. We were like brothers. When I went into the army my father gave the slave to me, and I freed him, for I loved him dearly. His name is Creticus; he is fifty years old, two years older than I. He was never a slave to me, Lucanus,” and the centurion lifted his eyes as if to challenge the other.
“No men are truly slaves,” said Lucanus. The sun was swiftly setting; the sea had turned purple, and the sky was a conflagration.
Antonius fixed his eyes with penetration upon the Greek. “You will remember that the Greeks have a tradition. They pour a libation to the Unknown God before they drink, themselves.”
“Yes,” said Lucanus, and his heart squeezed, and he was filled with an amorphous yet impatient pain. “So my father did.”
Antonius held out his goblet to Ramus for more wine. But when it was poured for him he did not touch it to his lips. He looked before him into space, at the wild scarlet of the sky. “I have seen the Unknown God,” he said, in a very quiet tone.
Lucanus frowned. The man was becoming tedious. He knew these superstitious Romans, who pretended that they were realists. There was no shrine anywhere in the world, to any obscure or Eastern or Grecian or African god, that they did not visit, affecting to despise them. But they were always there, and they left money at the shrines, and draped themselves with amulets.
“Yes,” said Antonius, and his voice trembled, “I have seen the Unknown God. But now He is not unknown! My eyes have seen Him at a distance, and this was but a few months ago. You must believe me,” he said, imploringly, seeing Lucanus’ averted face.
“No doubt you believe it,” said Lucanus, returning his face to the centurion. His golden hair, now silvered at the temples, haloed his noble head, and the sunset lay in his icy blue eyes.
“I believe it!” cried the centurion, in a voice of powerful exultation. “You must listen; you must not doubt it! It is imperative that you believe, that all men believe!”
Lucanus murmured something in distaste. But the pain was growing in his heart, blossoming like a huge red flower, and he did not know why. He wished to excuse himself; never emotional, except in anger, he was embarrassed before impetuousness, before eager immaturity and insistence. He moved restlessly on his chair. But in decency he could not leave. He looked at Ramus, and the dark face, he saw, was alight as if with rapture. The Greek said, “Tell me about this — this man — ”
The centurion stretched out his hand and caught Lucanus’ arm; his eyes glowed like dark fire. “This I must say to all men, that I have seen God, and have been in His presence, though I dared not approach Him too near!”
“I understand,” said Lucanus, wearily. “I have been in the Court of the Gentiles myself, in the various synagogues. But I have not been admitted to the inner court, where the scrolls are, and the altars. Have your Jewish friends admitted you to that sanctum, though it is forbidden to the Gentiles?”
The hand that clutched his arm tightened strongly, and the centurion leaned closer to him, trembling. The crimson light shone in every crevice of his browned face, in his eye sockets, along the line of his eagle nose. “You must listen!” he cried. “No, I have not been admitted before the altar and before the scrolls. But I have seen God, and that only a few months ago.” He lifted his hand in the gesture of a solemn oath. “I swear to you that I have seen Him, with these eyes, and I have heard His voice.”
The man is mad, reflected Lucanus.
The centurion touched his eyes with his fingers. “With these eyes!” he exclaimed, and suddenly there was a tear on his cheek. Ramus stood at his shoulder, and the dark man’s breath came fast, and his own eyes glittered. “Lucanus,” said the centurion, in a voice of the deepest urgency, “you will remember that the Jews have taught for many centuries that a Messias would be born to them, a King. And so He has been born, and He is in the Land of Israel now. I knew of Him be
fore He came to Capharnaum. He is young in the flesh of man, yet perhaps not so young. There were many rumors. He has performed many miracles.”
Lucanus’ mouth compressed itself until all the color was gone. He was suddenly enlightened. He said, coldly, “I believe I understand. I have a friend, a woman, who has told me of these Jewish miracle-workers, these mystics. Long before the Greek physicians understood that often a sick mind will infect the body the Jews were aware of it. And so the miracle-workers, by freeing and healing the sick mind, can restore the health of the body. It is not new, Antonius. It is not even a miracle, though we do not, naturally, know what the mind is, nor can we explore its mysteries with a scalpel or a probe.”
He was, all at once, seized by a strange terror. He wanted to hear no more. But Antonius had clutched his arm again, and the soldier’s face was tremulous with some profound emotion.
“Lucanus, I know all about the traditions and the beliefs of the Jews. I have lived in Judea a long while, and my friends have confided in me. This Man is no mere miracle-worker. He is the Messias; He is God. Do you think I believe this alone? No, multitudes of the Jews believe it, since He first appeared among His people to exhort them.”
“The Jews are a very excitable people,” murmured Lucanus. He could hear the beating of his heart in his ears. Pictures, memories, tried to form before his eyes, and he closed his vision to them. He added, desperately, “When the mind is overcome by hysteria, the body becomes ill. All physicians understand that.”
The centurion smiled, and the smile was infinitely sweet. “He is not a physician. His followers call Him rabbi. That is to say, a teacher. I have known many of these rabbis, devout men, who with prayer can heal, and who spend their days teaching the people and comforting them.”
The swollen red sun dropped into the sea, and sailors appeared with lanterns and began to hang them about the deck. A cool wind arose, and the sails swelled out, and the ship raced over the purple sea.
“But this rabbi is not one of those who went before Him,” said Antonius, in a shaken voice. “He is the Unknown God of the Greeks, of the Egyptians before them, and of the Babylonians and Chaldeans before the Egyptians. He is the Messias. How do I know? When I heard of Him, through my friends who visited me from Jerusalem and Caesarea, I knew instantly who He was! You must believe me!”
“How did you know?” asked Lucanus, listlessly.
The centurion struck his breast with his clenched fist. “How does any man know the truth, except by knowing it? He knows through his heart.”
He dropped his fist to his knee and sighed. “I have told you of Creticus, my friend, my freedman. He fell ill, not of the mind, but of the body. I called in the best physicians for him; I spared no money, no effort. I sat by his bedside through many days, and he did not know me. He vomited blood; he excreted blood; blood embossed his skin. His eyes were suffused with it; his lips were crusted with it. And his flesh whitened day by day until he resembled a shade.”
Lucanus started. The white sickness! The murderous, incurable, and dreadful sickness for which there was no cure, the sickness which had killed Rubria and had, in her dying, killed his spirit! He stared at the centurion and moistened his mouth, and it was cold and stiff.
“They told me Creticus must die,” said the centurion, “that there was no remedy for his malady. At any hour, or day, or week, he must die.”
“There is no cure,” said Lucanus, in a dull tone.
The centurion nodded, and his eyes brightened as if filled with tears in the light of the swinging lanterns. “But,” he said, softly, “Creticus was cured, and instantly.”
“Impossible!” cried Lucanus.
“Impossible for man, Lucanus, but not impossible for God. Creticus was cured from one instant to the next, and rose from his bed, his cheeks flushing with life and health, and he embraced me, and said to me, ‘He touched my hand in my dream, and He told me to rise and leave my bed!’ ”
“Who did?” demanded Lucanus. “What is this you are telling me?”
“I have been telling you. It was the Unknown God. Forgive me, I am only a rough soldier; I have no eloquence; I tell my story poorly. I have said that my Jewish friends brought rumors to me of the Messias, and one day He came to Capharnaum. My servants ran in to tell me that a strange Jewish rabbi had come to our city, and that it was said that He was the Messias. Three of my friends, Jewish elders, were sitting with me, to console me, for Creticus was dying; he was drawing one slow harsh breath after another, and there was a rattling in his throat, and his eyes were turned up and glazed. The cold shivering of death was upon him; he groaned deep in his body. The physician had just left, shaking his head.”
The memory of those hours made the centurion’s voice quiver. He put his hands over his face. “And I asked my friends, the Jewish elders, to go to Him and beg Him to cure my servant, my beloved Creticus. They went to Him, where He was preaching to the people, and they told Him that I was worthy that my servant be cured, and implored Him to come to my house. The elders told Him that I had built the synagogue for them, and that I was their friend. And so, surrounded by His followers and some of the people, and accompanied by the elders, He approached my house.”
The lanterns swung in the cool dusk, and a moon flowed over the high sails like a flood of silvery water. Lucanus forgot Ramus; he forgot everything but this incredible tale.
“I heard them all coming,” said the centurion, and now his voice was husky and slow. “I knew God was coming to my house, and I knew I was not worthy that He approach my threshold. I ran from the bedchamber; I ran from the house. The sun was high and hot, and there I saw Him! With these eyes I saw Him!
“Lucanus, you must believe me. The dust was bright yellow over the people and over Him who was in the midst of them, and He stood tall among them, a young man with a beautiful face, and the yellow dust was illuminated about Him. I saw His eyes, like the sky, and I saw His smile, and I knew again that He was God.
“My legs shook under me; it seemed to me that the earth and the heavens were incandescent around and about Him. And I thrust out my arms, to prevent Him from coming nearer, for I was not worthy. I bent my head, for it was a sacrilege to stare at Him. And I said, ‘Lord, I am a man of authority, a Roman, having soldiers under me, and if I say to one, “Go,” he goes, and if I say to another, “Come,” he comes. All that I command is done when I command it. Therefore, Lord, say but the word, and my servant shall be healed’.”
Lucanus trembled; he clenched his hands together. The evening wind was like ice against his cheek. But he said in himself, No, no! It is impossible!
“And then,” the centurion continued, almost in a whisper, “I heard Him speak, and His voice seemed to come from the sky and the earth at one and the same time, and He said to the people around him, ‘I have not found such great faith, no, not in Israel!’ And, Lucanus, when I opened my eyes He was gone, and the people with Him, and only my friends were there, and we went into the house, and found my servant cured.”
Above the sound of the night wind and the thunder of the sails Lucanus heard the faintest of cries, like an echo. He started and looked about him in bemusement, and he saw that Ramus was no longer with him. He got to his feet, then had to clutch his chair, for his knees were weak. He stared down at the centurion speechlessly.
“You must believe it,” repeated the centurion. “You look at me, and you know I do not lie. You know I do not lie! He healed my servant and He transformed my soul!” Lucanus turned on his heel and went away.
Chapter Thirty-Seven
Lucanus and Ramus ate their ascetic meal together in their cabin. The Greek was more than usually silent. He could eat little. Ramus sat near him, and Lucanus saw that the dark man’s face glowed radiantly, and that his thoughts engrossed him. Lucanus spoke with slow carefulness. “Ramus, you must remember that no physician knows all that is to be known; man is very mysterious; philosophers and physicians and priests have attempted vainly to explore his mystery. Mag
ic and necromancy and sorcery are perhaps not what they seem to be; it is possible they operate on natural laws as yet unknown to the majority of us. Once my teacher, Keptah, told me that it was written in the Babylonian holy books that men someday would move across the oceans without the aid of sails; that someday they would fly like birds across the continents. And that someday, in their incontinence, they would destroy the earth on which we live. All the philosophers have known of these prophecies, but they have feared to tell the populace; you will remember Socrates, who was forced to die for his thoughts and ideas.