Mary of Nazareth Page 3

  He smiled at Miriam and gestured to her to walk beside him.

  HOULDA’S house was one of the first you came to as you entered Nazareth from the direction of Sepphoris. By the time Miriam and Joachim arrived, half the men in the village had gathered outside it.

  About twenty mercenaries in leather tunics stood a little way along the road, guarding the tax collectors’ horses and the mule-drawn carts. Joachim counted four carts. These vultures from the Sanhedrin were aiming high if they hoped to fill them.

  Another group of mercenaries, under a Roman officer, were lined up in front of old Houlda’s house, holding spears and swords, all with an air of indifference.

  Joachim and Miriam did not see the tax collectors immediately. They were inside the tiny house.

  Suddenly, they heard Houlda’s voice. A hoarse cry that split the air. There was a scramble in the doorway, and out they came.

  There were three of them. They had hard mouths and the kind of arrogant expression in their eyes that power confers on people. Their black tunics swept the ground. The linen veils covering their skull caps were black too, and concealed most of their faces apart from their dark beards.

  Joachim clenched his jaws until they hurt. Just seeing these people made him seethe with anger. With shame, too, and the desire to kill. May God forgive them all! They were vultures indeed, just like those that fed on the dead.

  Guessing his thoughts, Miriam took him by the wrist and squeezed it. All her tenderness was in that gesture, but she shared too much of the father’s pain to really calm him.

  Again, Houlda cried out. She begged, thrusting forward her hands with their gnarled fingers. Her bun came loose, and locks of white hair fell across her face. She tried to catch hold of the tunic of one of the tax collectors, stammering, “You can’t do it! You can’t!”

  The man broke free, and pushed her away with a grimace of disgust. The two others came to his aid. They seized old Houlda by the shoulders, making no allowances for her age and frailty.

  Neither Miriam nor Joachim had yet discovered why Houlda had cried out. Then one of the tax collectors moved forward and they saw, between the tails of his black tunic, that he was holding a candlestick against his chest.

  It was a bronze candlestick, older than Houlda herself, decorated with almond flowers. It had come down to her from her distant ancestors. A Hanukkah candlestick, so old that, according to her, it had belonged to the sons of Judas Maccabaeus, the first people to light candles in celebration of the miracle of eternal light. It was certainly the only thing of any value that she still possessed. Everyone in the village knew the sacrifices Houlda had had to make in order not to part with it. More than once, she had preferred to go without essentials rather than sell it for a few gold coins.

  At the sight of this candlestick in the tax collector’s possession, the villagers cried out in protest. In the households of Galilee and Israel, wasn’t the Hanukkah candlestick as sacred as the thought of Yahweh? How could servants of the Temple in Jerusalem dare to rob a house of its light?

  At the first cries from the crowd, the Roman officer yelled an order. The mercenaries brought their spears down and closed ranks.

  Houlda cried out again, but no one could understand what she was saying. One of the vultures turned, his fist raised. Without a moment’s hesitation, he hit the old woman in the face, projecting her frail body against the wall of the house. She bounced off it, as if she weighed no more than a feather, and collapsed in the dust.

  Cries of fury went up. The soldiers took a step back, but their spears and swords pricked the chests of those at the front of the crowd.

  Miriam had let go of her father’s arm. She called out Houlda’s name. The point of a spear flashed less than a finger’s distance from her throat. Joachim saw the frightened look in the eyes of the mercenary holding the spear.

  He could tell that this madman was about to strike Miriam. He knew that even though he had been urging himself to be wise and patient since the night before, he could no longer bear the humiliation these swine from the Sanhedrin were inflicting on old Houlda. Nor—may God Almighty forgive him—could he ever accept a barbarian in Herod’s pay killing his daughter. Anger was gaining the upper hand, and he knew he would give in to it, whatever it might cost him.

  The mercenary drew back his hand to strike. Joachim leaped forward and pushed aside the spear before it could reach Miriam’s chest. The flat part of the head hit the shoulder of a young man standing beside him, with enough force to throw him to the ground. Joachim tore the weapon from the mercenary’s hand and slammed his fist, as hard as the wood he worked on every day, into the man’s throat.

  Something broke in the mercenary’s neck, cutting off his breath. His eyes opened wide in astonishment.

  Joachim pushed him away, and out of the corner of his eye saw Miriam help the young man to his feet, surrounded by the villagers who, not realizing that one of their enemies had just died, were shouting curses at the mercenaries.

  He did not hesitate. Still holding the spear, he leaped toward the tax collectors. With the cries of the villagers in his ears, he aimed the spear at the stomach of the vulture holding the candlestick.

  “Give that back!” he yelled.

  Stunned, the other man did not move. It was possible he did not even understand what Joachim was saying. He moved back, white-faced, slavering with fear, still clutching the candlestick, and huddled against the other tax collectors behind him, as if to melt into their dark mass.

  Old Houlda still lay on the ground. She had stopped moving. A little blood ran down one of her temples, blackening her white locks. Above the angry yelling, Joachim heard Miriam cry, “Father, watch out!”

  The mercenaries who had been guarding the carts were running to the tax collector’s rescue, brandishing their swords. Joachim realized that he was committing a folly and that his punishment would be terrible.

  He thought of Yahweh. If God Almighty really was the God of Justice, as he had been taught, then he would forgive him.

  He thrust in the spear. He was surprised to feel it sink so easily into the tax collector’s shoulder. The man screamed in pain and at last let go of the candlestick. It dropped to the ground, tinkling slightly like a bell.

  Before the mercenaries could throw themselves on him, Joachim threw down the spear, picked up the candlestick, and knelt beside Houlda. He was relieved to see that she had only fainted. He slid his arm under her shoulders, placed the candlestick on her stomach, and closed her misshapen fingers over it.

  Only then did he become aware of the silence.

  The cries and yells had stopped. The only sound was the moaning of the wounded tax collector.

  He looked up. A dozen spears, and as many swords, were pointing directly at him. The indifference had gone from the mercenaries’ faces, replaced by arrogance and hatred.

  Ten paces along the road, the people of Nazareth, including Miriam, stood unable to move, held back by the mercenaries’ spears.

  The stunned silence lasted for another moment or two, and then there was pandemonium.

  Joachim was seized, thrown to the ground, and beaten. Miriam and the villagers tried to surge forward, but the mercenaries pushed them back, cutting a swathe through the arms, legs, shoulders of the boldest until the officer in command gave the order to retreat.

  Some of the mercenaries carried the wounded tax collector to his horse. Leather straps were tied around Joachim’s wrists and ankles, and he was thrown unceremoniously onto one of the carts, which was already turning to leave the village. The body of the soldier he had killed was dumped next to him. Amid much yelling and cracking of whips, the carts sped away.

  The horses and soldiers vanished into the darkness of the forest, and silence fell over Nazareth.

  Miriam shivered. The thought of her father tied up and at the mercy of the Temple’s soldiers brought a lump to her throat. Although the whole village was crowding around her, she was gripped by a boundless fear. She wondered what
she was going to tell her mother.

  “I SHOULD have gone with him,” Lysanias said, swaying on his stool. “I stayed in the workshop like a frightened hen. It shouldn’t have been Joachim defending Houlda. It should have been me.”

  The neighbors who had crowded into the room listened in silence to Lysanias’s moans. They had told him over and over that it was not his fault and that there was nothing he could have done. But Lysanias could not get the idea out of his head. Like Miriam, he could not bear the thought that Joachim was not here with him now, and would not be with him tonight, or tomorrow.

  As for Hannah, she sat there stiffly, in silence, nervously creasing the tails of her tunic.

  Miriam, dry-eyed, her heart pounding, was watching her out of the corner of her eye. Her mother’s mute, solitary sadness intimidated her. She did not dare make a gesture of tenderness toward her. Nor had the women neighbors taken Hannah in their arms. Joachim’s wife was not an easy woman to get close to.

  There was no point in crying for vengeance now. All they could do was nurse their pain and meditate on their own powerlessness.

  Closing her eyes, Miriam relived the drama. She saw her father’s body huddled, tied and thrown like a sack into the cart.

  She kept asking herself, “What’s going to happen to him now? What will they do to him?”

  Lysanias was in no way responsible for what had happened. She was the one Joachim had been defending. It was because of her that he was now in the cruel hands of the Temple’s tax collectors.

  “We’ll never see him again. He’s as good as dead.”

  Echoing in the silence, Hannah’s clear voice made them jump. No one protested. They were all thinking the same thing.

  Joachim had killed a soldier and wounded a tax collector. They knew what his punishment would be. The only reason the mercenaries had not killed or crucified him on the spot was because they were in a hurry to tend to the vulture from the Sanhedrin.

  They would want to make an example of him, which meant one thing: crucifixion. It was a foregone conclusion. He would hang on a cross until hunger, thirst, the cold, or the sun killed him. His death agony could last for days.

  Biting her lips to hold back the tears, Miriam said in a toneless voice, “At least we should find out where they’re taking him.”

  “Sepphoris,” a neighbor said. “It’s sure to be Sepphoris.”

  “No,” someone else said. “They don’t imprison people in Sepphoris anymore. They’re too afraid of Barabbas’s men. They’ve been chasing them all winter without catching them. It’s said Barabbas has already plundered the tax collectors’ carts twice. No, they’ll be taking Joachim to Tarichea. No one has ever escaped from there.”

  “They might also take him to Jerusalem,” a third man said. “Crucify him in front of the Temple as one more demonstration to the Judeans that we Galileans are all barbarians!”

  “The best way to find out is to follow them,” Lysanias said, rising from his stool. “I’ll go.”

  Objections were raised. He was too old and tired to run after mercenaries! Lysanias insisted, assuring them that they wouldn’t be suspicious of an old man, and that he was still nimble enough to get back quickly to Nazareth.

  “And what then?” Hannah asked, in a restrained voice. “When you discover where my husband is, what will you do then? Go and see him on his cross? I certainly wouldn’t. Why should I go and see Joachim being eaten by birds when he should be here taking care of us?”

  A few voices were raised in protest, but only halfheartedly, since no one knew what was the best thing to do anymore.

  “If I don’t go, someone else will have to,” Lysanias muttered. “We must find out where they’re taking him.”

  After some discussion, two young shepherds were chosen. They left immediately, avoiding the Sepphoris road and cutting through the forest.

  THE day brought no comfort. On the contrary, it divided Nazareth like a broken vase.

  All day, the synagogue was full of men and women, praying endlessly, talking, and above all listening to the rabbi’s exhortations.

  God had decided on Joachim’s fate, he asserted. It was wrong to kill a man, even if that man was one of Herod’s mercenaries. We had to accept our path, for only the Almighty knew and could lead us to the coming of the Messiah.

  They should not be too indulgent toward Joachim. Apart from putting his own life in danger, his actions had condemned the whole village in the eyes of Romans and the Sanhedrin. There would be many who would demand punishment. And the one thought of Herod’s mercenaries, pagans fearing neither God nor man, would be of revenge.

  There would be dark days ahead, the rabbi warned them. The wisest course was to accept Joachim’s punishment, as well as praying long and hard for the Lord to forgive him.

  These words of the rabbi’s merely increased the villagers’ confusion. Some found them full of good sense. Others recalled that the day before the coming of the tax collectors, they had been prepared to rebel. Joachim had simply taken them at their word. Now they no longer knew if they should follow his example and take action. Most were disoriented by what they had heard in the synagogue. How were they to distinguish good from evil?

  Lysanias lost his temper and declared out loud that when you got down to it, he was glad he was a Samaritan rather than a Galilean.

  “You’re fine specimens,” he cried to those supporting the rabbi. “You can’t even sympathize with a man who defended an old woman against the tax collectors.”

  And, sure now that there was nothing to stop him, he went to live with old Houlda, who was confined to her bed with a pain in her hip.

  Miriam kept silent. She had to admit that there was a degree of truth in what the rabbi said. But she could not accept it. Not only did it justify whatever Herod’s mercenaries did to her father, but it also implied that the Almighty no longer showed justice toward the just. How could that be?

  THE shepherds returned before sunset, out of breath. The column had only stopped in Sepphoris long enough to tend the tax collector’s wound.

  “Did you see my father?” Miriam asked.

  “We couldn’t. We had to keep out of sight. Those mercenaries were evil. What’s certain is that he stayed in the cart. The sun was beating down, so he must have been very thirsty. The people of Sepphoris couldn’t approach him, either. There was no way to pass him a gourd.”

  Hannah moaned and whispered Joachim’s name several times. The others bowed their heads.

  “After that, they put the wounded tax collector in another cart and left the town. In the direction of Cana, according to the shepherds.”

  “They’re going to Tarichea!” one of the neighbors exclaimed. “If they’d been going to Jerusalem, they would have taken the Tabor road.”

  Everyone knew that.

  A heavy silence settled over them.

  They all recalled Hannah’s words. Yes, what good did it do them to know that Joachim was on his way to the fortress of Tarichea?

  “At least,” a woman neighbor sighed, as if in response to everyone’s anxieties, “that means they won’t crucify him straightaway.”

  “Tomorrow or the day after tomorrow, what difference does it make?” Lysanias muttered. “Joachim will have longer to suffer, that’s all.”

  They could all picture the fortress. A stone monster dating back to the blessed days of David, which Herod had enlarged and strengthened, ostensibly to defend the people of Israel against the Nabateans, their enemies from the eastern desert.

  In fact, its real purpose for some time now had been as a prison for hundreds of innocent people, rich and poor, learned and illiterate alike. Anyone who displeased the king. A rumor, a malevolent piece of gossip, a personal vendetta—anything could lead to a man being thrown in there. Most never came out again, or else ended up on the forest of crosses that surrounded it.

  A visit to Tarichea was a grim experience, despite the great beauty of the shores of the Lake of Gennesaret. No one could escape t
he sight of the crucified. Some said that at night their moans echoed across the waters like screams from the depths of hell. It was enough to make your hair stand on end. Even the fishermen did not dare go near, despite the fact that the waters closest to the fortress were especially rich in fish.

  They were all struck dumb with terror, but Miriam said in a clear, unwavering voice, “I’m going to Tarichea. I won’t let my father rot in that fortress.”

  Everyone looked up. The deep silence of a moment earlier was replaced by a cacophony of protests.

  Miriam was raving. She mustn’t let herself be carried away by her grief. How could she get her father out of the fortress of Tarichea? Had she forgotten that she was only a girl? Barely fifteen, still so young she had not yet been married off. It was true that she looked older, and her father had the unfortunate habit of considering her a woman of reason and wisdom, but she was only a girl, not a miracle worker.

  “I’m not planning to go to Tarichea alone,” she said, when calm had returned. “I’m going to ask Barabbas for help.”

  “Barabbas the thief?”

  Again, there was a chorus of protests.

  This time, Halva, the young wife of Yossef, a carpenter friend of Joachim’s, looked at Miriam and shouted over the din, “In Sepphoris, they say he doesn’t steal for himself but only to give to those in need. They say he does more good than bad, and that the people he robs have deserved it.”

  Two men interrupted her. How could she say such things? A thief was a thief.

  “The fact is, these wicked thieves draw Herod’s mercenaries to our village like flies to a wound!”

  Miriam shrugged. “Just as you claim the mercenaries will attack Nazareth in revenge for what my father did!” she said, harshly. “What matters is that however hard they pursue Barabbas, they never catch him. If anyone can save my father, he can.”

  Lysanias shook his head. “Why would he do it? We have no gold to pay him!”