Mary of Nazareth Page 7

  Miriam peered at the shore without seeing anything unusual. All at once, at the foot of the wall, a fire sprang up, so intensely that it could only have been started by a torch or an oil lamp. With each passing second, the flames grew. The fire was spreading. Cries rang out on the rampart walk, and the guards quickly left their posts.

  “This is it!” Barabbas roared in delight. “They did it!”

  “They” were a dozen members of his band. Their mission had been to light fires in the guards’ camp and grain stores close to the market adjoining to the fortress, on the opposite side from the field of crosses. The carts they had brought from Sepphoris had been left there during the day, laden with old wood and innocent-looking fodder. The false bottoms, emptied of weapons, had been filled with pots of bitumen and jars of terebinth oil, making the vehicles highly inflammable. Barabbas’s men had been ordered to set fire to them at a specific time and then escape from the town.

  Clearly, they had succeeded. As if to confirm this, a muted roar echoed across the lake, and the walls of the fortress were lit up by the flames. Some distance from the first fire, more flames suddenly shot up. This second fire would confuse the mercenaries and send the villagers running from their houses.

  Cries of joy rose from the boats. The flames, ever more intense, were reflected in the waters of the harbor. At last, trumpets sounded, calling the legionnaires and mercenaries to the rescue.

  Barabbas turned to the fisherman. “This is the moment!” he cried, trying hard to contain his excitement. “We must charge while they’re busy putting out the fires!”

  HIS plan worked perfectly.

  Thanks to the diversion caused by the fires, there would be fewer—if any—guards watching the field of crosses and the rampart walk.

  Silently, the boats drew alongside a gravel beach, and everyone came ashore. It was still pitch dark here, but in the distance the sky and the lake glowed red, and they could hear the yells of those fighting the fire.

  Barabbas and his companions ran forward like shadows in the shadows, their unsheathed knives in their hands, ready to deal with any guard who might still be in the vicinity before he could raise the alarm.

  A hand slipped into Miriam’s. It was Obadiah.

  “This way,” he said, drawing her on. “Your father’s up here, near the stockade.”

  But now Miriam, Obadiah, and his comrades hesitated, struck dumb with terror. Their eyes were accustomed enough to the darkness to make out the horror around them.

  The crosses rose like a forest in hell. Some had rotted and fallen, bringing the corpses down with them. Others were so close together that, in places, the crosspieces holding the prisoners’ arms overlapped.

  Some crosses were still bare. But, at their feet, skeletons hung grotesquely, long since devoid of anything that could be called human.

  Only then did Miriam become aware of the stench, and the bones and human carcasses that littered the ground beneath her feet.

  They were startled by little growls as wild cats scattered, and a rustling in the air as night birds, carrion eaters disturbed by their sudden presence, flew off with a menacing softness.

  For a moment, Miriam did not think she could go on. But Obadiah, still holding her hand, leaped forward. “Quick! We don’t have any time to waste!”

  They ran, which did them good. As promised, Obadiah made his way without hesitation between the crosses.

  “There!” he said, pointing.

  Miriam knew he was right. In spite of the darkness, she recognized Joachim.

  “Father!”

  Joachim did not reply.

  “He’s asleep,” Obadiah assured her. “A whole day up there must really knock you out!”

  As Miriam was still calling to her father, they heard cries and the noise of a fight from the direction of the stockade.

  “Damn it!” Obadiah cursed. “They did leave some guards here after all! Quick, you others, help me.”

  He dragged two of his comrades to the foot of the cross and jumped nimbly onto their shoulders.

  “Do the same with the other crosses close by,” he ordered the rest of his band. “Some of these people must still be alive.”

  Miriam saw him climb the cross with the agility of a monkey, his knife between his teeth. In the blink of an eye, he reached Joachim, and gently moved his head. “Wake up, Joachim. Your daughter has come to save you!”

  Joachim muttered something unintelligible.

  “Wake up, Joachim!” Obadiah said again, more insistently now. “This is no time to take a nap! I’m going to cut your bonds, and if you don’t help me, you’re going to fall and smash your face.”

  Miriam could hear moans of pain from the nearest crosses, where the other boys were at work, and angry cries and the clatter of metal from the stockade, where the fight was still in progress.

  “My father must be wounded,” she said to Obadiah. “Cut his bonds and we’ll hold him!”

  “No point, he’s waking up at last!”

  “Miriam! Miriam, is it you I hear?” The voice was hoarse and weary.

  “Yes, father, it’s me…”

  “But how can it be? And who are you?”

  “Later, Joachim,” Obadiah muttered, busy cutting the thick ropes. “We have to get out of here as quickly as we can, or things will take a turn for the worse….”

  Indeed, as Miriam and Obadiah’s comrades helped Joachim down from the cross, Barabbas and his companions came running.

  “The bastards!” Barabbas growled.

  His tunic was ripped, and his eyes still shone from the fight. In his hand, he held not a knife, but a spatha, the much-feared long Roman sword.

  “There were still four of them there, in a tent. They won’t see Jerusalem again! They made us a present of their arms. But I think there was also a man at the gate of the fortress. We have to get out of here before they come back in force.”

  “Who are you?” Joachim muttered, in a daze.

  His legs could no longer carry him, and every time he tried to move his arms he groaned. He lay now in Miriam’s arms, and she was supporting his head.

  Barabbas gave him a big smile. “Barabbas, at your service. Your daughter came to me and asked me to rescue you from the clutches of Herod’s mercenaries. Mission accomplished.”

  “Not yet,” Obadiah said, jumping down. “I just saw a torch at the foot of the wall.”

  Barabbas ordered silence and listened. He could hear the voices of the mercenaries coming closer. “They won’t find it easy to spot us in the dark,” he whispered. “All the same, we have to get out of here as quickly as possible.”

  “My father can’t run,” Miriam breathed.

  “We’ll carry him.”

  “The boys have taken down another four,” Obadiah said. “We’ll have to carry them, too.”

  “In that case, what are you waiting for?” Barabbas growled, and loaded Joachim over his shoulder.

  THEY were in the boats, with the sails already unfurled, by the time it occurred to the mercenaries, alerted by the flapping of the sails and the creaking of the timbers, to run down to the shore.

  But it was too late. They shot a few arrows and javelins at random, which vanished into the darkness. On the other side of the fortress, the fire was raging more fiercely than ever and was threatening to engulf part of the town. The mercenaries would not want to spend too much time chasing these people who, as far as they were concerned, were simply body snatchers.

  The boats sped away into the night. As arranged, the fishermen burned two of them, the oldest and least maneuverable, and abandoned them to the mercy of the current, so as to make the Romans and mercenaries think they had been stolen.

  As the boat sailed back northward across the lake, Joachim, his fingers numbed by the bonds that had held his wrists, could not stop rubbing Miriam’s hands and stroking her face. Still confused, faint with hunger and thirst, his whole body aching, he stammered words of gratitude, mixed with prayers to Yahweh. Miriam told him
how she had refused to give him up for dead, despite the opposition of their neighbors in Nazareth, apart from Yossef, the carpenter, and his wife, Halva.

  “But I was the one who came up with the idea for how to save you, Joachim,” Obadiah cut in. “Barabbas couldn’t have managed it without me.”

  “In that case, I thank you, too, from the bottom of my heart. You’re very brave.”

  “There was nothing to it, really, and, anyway, I didn’t do it for free. Your daughter promised me something if I succeeded.”

  Joachim’s laughter echoed against Miriam’s breast. “Unless she’s promised to marry you, I’ll honor that promise.”

  Surprised, Obadiah fell silent for a moment. Again, Miriam felt her father’s laughter as she held him close to her. It was the best proof yet that she had well and truly saved him from the horror of the field of crosses.

  “Oh, it’s a lot less than that,” Obadiah said. “She promised me that you would tell me stories from the Book.”

  CHAPTER 4

  BARABBAS had planned their escape as carefully as the freeing of Joachim.

  The band scattered. Some, accompanying the other rescued prisoners, crossed the lake with the help of the fishermen. Most quickly set out along the paths leading to the thick forests of Mount Tabor. Obadiah’s young companions spread out through the villages along the shore before going back to Tarichea and Jotapata to resume their lives as vagabonds. Obadiah himself stayed with Barabbas, Miriam, and Joachim. All night, they sailed northward.

  Never letting go of the helm, and using his long experience of the lake to anticipate the currents and keep the sail swelling even when the wind subsided, the fisherman kept close to the dense shadow of the shore. By dawn, they had left the gardens of Capernaum behind them. Miriam discovered a landscape that was unknown to her, even though they were still in Galilee.

  It was a landscape of rolling hills covered in holm oaks, and narrow, tortuous valleys. In places, cliffs rose sheer from the waters of the lake. Between them were twisted inlets, to which clung ram-shackle houses with roofs made of branches. Most of the shoreline, though, was impassable forest, with no beaches or coves for a boat to moor. A few rare villages huddled on the banks of the rivers that descended from the hills. It was to one of these hamlets that the fisherman led their boat. Five or six leagues to the north, the mouth of the Jordan was haloed in mist.

  During the night, Barabbas had assured Miriam that there existed no better shelter. Herod’s mercenaries rarely came to this area, which was too poor even for the vultures of the Sanhedrin, and too difficult to reach. You could only get to it by boat, which deprived any ill-intentioned visitors of the element of surprise.

  It was easy to vanish into the forest, and the hills were full of hidden caves. Barabbas knew a fair number of them. More than once, he had found refuge here with his band. He had a sufficiently full purse for the fishermen to take them in without asking any questions. Miriam should not worry; they would be safe as long as it took for the Romans’ anger, and perhaps even Herod’s, to die down.

  In truth, the choice of their hiding place was of little concern to Miriam. What did fill her with anxiety, though, as soon as the light of day revealed them, were her father’s wounds.

  Having spoken just a few words to his daughter in the emotion of their flight from Tarichea, Joachim had dozed off without anyone on the boat noticing. All night, Miriam had listened to his hoarse, often irregular breathing, and had forced herself not to think how painful and abnormal it was. But in the watery dawn over the lake, as he still lay fast asleep under a sheepskin, the full horror of his appearance became clear.

  Joachim was unrecognizable. Not an inch of his face had been spared. His lips were swollen, and both cheekbones were open, as was the arch of one eyebrow. A blow with a spear or a sword had severed one ear and left a scar across his cheek and all the way down to his chin. Although Miriam kept dipping her veil in the water of the lake to wash the wound, it was constantly oozing blood.

  She lifted the sheepskin off her father’s chest. The tunic he was wearing when he had attacked the tax collectors was now no more than a scrap of cloth stained with dried blood. He was covered in purple bruises from his stomach to his throat. There were jagged cuts on his shoulders and back, also oozing blood. And, of course, the ropes with which he had been tied to the cross had cut through his wrists and ankles.

  It was obvious he had been beaten—so violently, in fact, that there might well be invisible wounds, even more serious than the visible ones, that could endanger his life.

  Miriam bit her lips to hold back the tears.

  As the boat slowly rolled from side to side, she sensed Barabbas, Obadiah, and the fisherman turning away their eyes, horrified by what they saw. Now that day had risen, it became difficult to say if Joachim was asleep or had fainted.

  “He’s strong,” Barabbas said at last. “He held out until he was on the cross, and he knows you’re by his side. He’ll live, for his daughter’s sake!”

  His voice was gentle, without any of his usual cocky humor, and lacked conviction.

  Aware of this, Obadiah nodded in approval. “That’s for sure! He knows we didn’t do all this just to watch him die.”

  They were surprised at this point to hear from the fisherman, who had barely opened his mouth since Tarichea.

  “The boy’s right,” he said, addressing Miriam. “Even with all his pain, your father won’t want to abandon you. A man with a daughter like you doesn’t let himself die. God’s paradise can’t compare.” He paused to pull on a rope, making the sail taut again, then said angrily, “I hope the rabbis and prophets are right and the Messiah comes one day, so that we can have done once and for all with this worthless life.”

  Instinctively, Barabbas was about to respond with mockery. How long were the people of Israel going to believe in this nonsense that the rabbis were constantly drumming into them? How long would these poor people, who were being bled dry by Herod, wait for a Messiah to come and deliver them, instead of delivering themselves?

  But the fisherman’s tone, Miriam’s expression, and Joachim’s unconsciousness made him refrain; this was not the time to argue. It was just as well, as the fisherman was to surprise him again a little while later.

  They had just pulled the boat onto shore at last. The villagers, curious to see the newcomers, had gathered to greet them. Discovering Joachim’s condition, they helped to carry him and laid him on a thin straw mat. As the procession moved toward the houses, Barabbas held out the purse he had promised the fisherman, but the man pushed away his hand.

  “No, there’s no need.”

  “Please, take it. Without you, none of this would have been possible. You’re going back to Tarichea. You may have problems there. What if they try to burn your boats, to force your comrades to say what they know about us?”

  The fisherman shook his head. “You don’t know us, son. We knew what you were going to do. I’m taking a roundabout route back to Tarichea. My comrades will do the same. By the time we get to Tarichea, our boats will be full to bursting. The best catch we’ve ever had. When we find out the market has been burned to the ground, obviously we’ll be really angry, and we’ll decide to give them our fish for free. All the housewives in the town will be overjoyed. It’ll cause quite a stir.”

  Barabbas burst out laughing. But he still insisted. “Take it anyway. You deserve it.”

  “Leave it, I said. I don’t want your money. I’m a Jew from Galilee. Why should I need money to save another Jew from Galilee from the cross? Only Herod’s mercenaries get paid to do what they do. Don’t be upset. We all know now that Barabbas is not a thief, but an honest Galilean.”

  ALTHOUGH Barabbas had warned him not to say anything, Obadiah was too excited to stop himself, and as soon as he could, he told everyone about the hell from which Joachim had been rescued.

  This was a village outside the mercenaries’ reach, and it was the first time the villagers had seen a man who had es
caped from the cross. All the women in the village united to save him. They vied with each other in showing off their knowledge, unearthing the secrets of herbs, powders, potions, and soups that could reduce the bruising, close both the visible and invisible wounds, and at last give Joachim back his strength.

  Miriam assisted them. Within a few days, she had learned to distinguish plants to which she had never previously paid any attention. She was shown how to grind them into powder, which they would mix with goat’s fat, fine earth, seaweed, or fish bile, depending on whether they were being turned into pastes, plasters, or oils for massage. The massage was administered by big, strapping women long since accustomed to treating naked men.

  A cheerful young girl made infusions and nourishing herbal teas. In his unconscious struggle against pain, Joachim kept his jaws clenched so tight, it was a wonder his teeth did not break. The young girl helped Miriam to part them with the aid of a small wooden funnel. Only then was it possible to feed the wounded man, one spoonful at a time. It was a slow, difficult, depressing task. But Miriam’s young companion managed to lighten it and turn it into a very special moment, in which the daughter was able to treat the father with maternal gentleness.

  Miriam watched over Joachim all night, every night. Barabbas and Obadiah tried to dissuade her, but in vain. All they could do was take turns in keeping her company, sitting beside her in the dim light of an oil lamp.

  At last, one afternoon, it became clear that Obadiah and the fisherman had been right. A few hours before nightfall, Joachim opened his eyes. He had chosen his daughter over God’s paradise.

  HE did not seem surprised to see Miriam’s face above him. He gave a slight, very pale smile. Awkwardly, he lifted his hands, the wrists still covered in plasters and bandages, and tried to touch her. Laughing and weeping at the same time, Miriam bent toward him, kissed his face, and offered her cheeks to his caress.