Two from Galilee (7 page)

"A man in my father's shop brought word that he's not only still torturing and murdering people around Jerusalem, he's put another of his own sons to death."

"Good riddance," Joachim said grimly. "They're all a nest of vipers. How can they help it—the issue of a man who's neither a Roman nor a true Jew? An Idumaean," he said with vast derision. "A circumcised Arab."

"Even so, there are some who claim he's done a good deal for us," Joseph found himself saying. "He's restored the Temple, and rebuilt our ruined cities. And he's kept the peace."

"Peace!" Joachim exploded. "You call this peace, this milking us dry to adorn those cities, build his heathen palaces and theatres and coliseums? This bloody tyranny?"

"At least it's not civil war," Joseph persisted, against his better judgment, while Mary despaired. "As it was when we first appealed to Pompey for help in settling our own terrible conflicts. That's the irony of it," Joseph said earnestly, "that our conquerors are here by invitation. Because we didn't have the wisdom or unity as a people to settle our own affairs. Maybe we deserve them."

Joachim stared at him, astounded, grudgingly impressed. It was indeed a smudge on the glorious history of Israel, that ancient feud between the Pharisees and the high priest Jannaeus, who in his own way was as much a monster as Herod. A man who had feasted with his concubines while eight hundred crucified prisoners were forced to witness the slaughter of their own families as they hung dying. And after his death, the mortal combat between his sons, tearing the country asunder. Little emphasis was put upon this sorry fact when teaching the young. If people knew about it they submerged it in the larger fact of their own cruel suffering under Rome.

Restraining his mild, irked approval, Joachim carved another choice slice of duck and put it on Joseph's plate. "Surely you aren't defending this rape of our country?"

"No," Joseph hastened to assure him, "only trying to get it in perspective. And this madman who's trying to represent both our people and the heavy fist of Rome. When will Rome itself realize that's exactly what he is? Insane. A man who'd murder his own wife, drown his own nephew, his children. . . ."

Joachim grunted. "Yes. As the joke goes—it's better to be Herod's pig than his son, for at least he makes the gesture of not eating pork!" He leaned forward, liking the youth who did not sit in mute agreement, however anxious he surely was to make a good impression. "And Rome. Do you think she'll ever spit out this vassal and send us a better successor?"

"He can't last long," said Joseph. "He's not only possessed, they say he's dying of some awful affliction. . . ."
Herod,
he thought wretchedly, perspiring. Why had he ever brought up the ugly subject? Instead of being tactful and diffident before an elder he'd blundered, tried to overcome his nervousness by saying far too much. At least he might have hit upon something more pleasant for this meal at Mary's table.

"But his successor," Joachim prodded. "Do you think Judah will ever enjoy better days under any Roman emperor?"

Joseph hesitated before the challenge. "There is only one real hope for the land of Judah," he said. "And that is the coming of our own ruler. Even he that has been promised us so long."

"And you believe in this Messiah? That he will come soon?"

"As a good Jew I believe in the prophets who have told us that one day he will come. But when?" Joseph made a helpless gesture. "We've endured so much for so many generations, and each time the people thought they could endure no more. Just as we feel we've reached the limit of our endurance now. Surely if the Lord truly intends to send us a deliverer the time is ripe, for our travail is as great or worse than at any time since our forefathers left Babylon."

"Maybe the Lord is testing our patience as the prophets also warned," Joachim said. "Making us wait until we are worthy of our own deliverance. Wait until we have come to understand more of the true nature of Jahveh before the Messiah comes."

"But how shall we know him when he does?" Now it was Joseph who demanded an answer. "How can we be sure? The false prophets, those who honestly think themselves the Saviour —we have seen what happens to them, and to the poor souls who in their desperation follow them."

Joachim nodded and wiped his fingers. "We'll know," he said. "The Lord will give us a sign."

It depressed Mary to hear them, and the dumb compassion rose in her once more. Surely it was hard enough to have to provide for a woman and her children, to know that upon your shoulders rested the responsibility for their food and shelter and their spiritual welfare, as well as the responsibility to keep them safe within the Law. But worse, it seemed to her, was this cross that each of them also began to shoulder as they approached adolescence—this awful concern for their whole people, Israel.

Boys who had been pleasant playmates became bowed with it; their eyes became enflamed when they spoke of it. It was almost an obsession. And it was true, all true, these things they said. Once when she was small her own village had been ravaged. Joachim had reached his family in time and carried them off into the hills, but she would never forget the blood in the streets when they returned, or the acrid odor of burning wood. Worse were the crucifixions. Zealots who dared to defy the power of Rome, false prophets such as Joseph had mentioned. Whether it was at that time or later Mary couldn't remember and didn't want to, but Hannah, in a fierce mixture of curiosity, drama, and protest, had taken her to one. A spectacle so horrifying that she had fled screaming through the crowds and dreamed of it ever since.

Sometimes she could still hear the man's sick yells, pleading with them to take him down, crying pitifully that he couldn't stand it; and most ghastly of all, the apologies to the Romans, to all Israel, for realizing too late that he must have been mistaken or God would not have let such a thing happen to him. Though she had muffled her ears with cushions and beat her head against the wall, she could hear him long after she reached home. And she sometimes heard him still.

Yet there was this about being a woman. A woman could speak of other things. Because, for all man's greater responsibility, his superior strength and knowledge, it was through a woman that the deliverer would come. From a virgin, the Scriptures said. A young woman. Mary shuddered softly, newly conscious of her ripened body and its sweet weight of love.

And he would heal all these bloody wounds, the prophets taught. Every injustice would be avenged. The Romans would retreat in disgrace. The kingdom, so wide in the days of Solomon, would expand again. He would reign in majesty and infinite wisdom, and all the world would recognize that the despised but proud and mighty Jews were right, theirs was the true religion. Soon, soon! "Oh, Lord, how soon?" the mobs kept crying—along with the priests in the Temple, and the rabbis in the synagogue. The cry was a ceaseless supplication. And God in his mystery gave no response. But Mary knew. All women knew—and this too was what gave them a certain serenity, detachment and power over the more impassioned men. They knew that it would not be long.

The men stood up, brushing away the crumbs. It was time for the women to clear away the cups and bowls and bring the children and sit down. Mary kept her eyes averted as Joseph moved past to follow her father to the roof, for the night was unseasonably warm. They would continue their discussion under the stars. But she could feel his presence strongly, and she knew without even lifting her gaze that his whole being yearned toward hers.

Later, stepping into the yard to empty the dishwater, she could hear the voices continuing overhead. "The Sanhedrin has no power. . . ." "The effrontery, to put a golden eagle on the very Temple to mock us, and putting the torch to the people who tried to remove it. . . ." An affectionate exasperation shook her. Oh speak of something else! Speak of youth and love and marriage, speak of me. . . . The towel still lay cradled between her breasts. She could feel it like a caress as she bent to toss the water over the last red coals of the spit. They hissed and sputtered and sent a plume of white smoke coiling toward the roof.

For a moment she stood watching it, aware of him who might notice and look down upon her, small and desirable in the firelight as she performed her task of drying out the vessel. Slowly, in a sweet lassitude of love, she moved back into the house that was still redolent with the scent of food and the flickering oil lamps. She wished that Joseph knew that the towel nestled against her heart, that she would sleep with it beneath her cheek this night.

Sleep was a long time claiming her, however. At first she was too excited by the evening, whose wretchedness in the beginning seemed to enhance its gradually mounting harmony. She lay reenacting it, from the first shattering news, "He's here!" on through his every gesture, every word. Joseph's charm with the children, the gentleness of his manners at table (surely not lost on Hannah). The very assertiveness she had deplored seemed to have won Joachim's respect. And the way he'd responded to her mother when the women drew shawls about their shoulders and joined the men on the roof.

Warmed by food and wine and the certainty that only by her appearance had the evening been saved, Hannah had unbent. She had in fact become expansive, telling impish tales of her childhood that made Joseph's laugh ring out. He had matched them with stories of his own. "I remember the inn," he said. "Though I was only about three years old when my parents moved from Bethlehem."

"That's right, you were born there," Hannah exclaimed. "I'd forgotten. The City of David," she added—and this too seemed to confirm some subtle new bond between them, reminding her as it did that they were all of David's stock.

Everyone was smiling by the time farewells were being said. Hope flared as high in Mary as the torch which Joachim insisted on handing to Joseph to light his way down the dark winding streets. How foolish her earlier apprehensions, she thought. And how infinitely fortunate that first incredible impulse to seek out Joseph this morning, despite the shameless way she had hurled herself at him.

But even as Mary lay marveling, the muffled voices came to her from beyond the curtains. She lay stiff, scarcely daring to breathe. Her limbs, aglow a moment before, began to chill. Her parents were quarreling. In whispers that blurred their words, yet only made more appalling the impact of those she heard.

"No, no, he's not right for her, no matter how pleasant he is. That bright nature—it's like his father's. Light without substance, that may brighten a window but never cook a meal."

"You misjudge him, Hannah. He has a very serious side as well. Didn't you hear our discussion of Israel? He is deeply concerned."

"Ha, all men are concerned. It's the fashion to be concerned, small good that it does any of us. Let men concern themselves with their wives and children and how to provide for them. Especially if they come seeking our daughters in marriage."

"Our fate as providers depends upon the fate of Israel. When taxes take the very bread from the mouths of our families."

"Don't think to divert me from Joseph. Like father like son. He comes from a poor household."

"It's a happy household, Hannah. I was there today and felt their joy in one another. Even the children—"

"Did you also feel their ribs?"

"The ribs of Jacob's children are no thinner than those of mine. And there is other food, Hannah. The spirit too needs food, the food of love."

"Love!" Her voice broke rawly. Accused, "You speak as if there is small love in the house I have made for you."

"No, no. How you twist things. I am only trying to show you that Joseph's background is not so impoverished as you think. Love compensates for many things. And while it's customary and right that parents arrange such matters, how much better for everyone when two people love and want each other from the very beginning."

"Unlike us?" Hannah challenged. "You didn't love me. I was a poor bargain picked by your mother for heaven knows what reason, and a sorry disappointment in your bed."

"Must we rake up old miseries?" Joachim begged. "I loved you almost at once."

"No. No, you only pitied me."

"Yes, that too, but pity is close to love, Hannah, and in protecting you, taking care of you, you know how much I came to love you."

"There was another whom you loved before me. Your sisters told me. A woman named Abigail. Would it have been better had you married her instead?"

"You'll never know how thankful I am that I didn't."

"Then so it is with Mary. One day she'll thank us."

"Not if we give her to someone she hates and fears. Joseph loves her deeply, Hannah, and she's beside herself with love for him. He'll make her happy. She knows him so well, she'd never be afraid of him as you were afraid of me." Joachim's rough hand stroked the thin gray hair. He attempted to draw her spindly body closer, but she twisted away. "That was the hard part, Hannah, that you were so terrified of my love, when I only wanted to be united with you and to give you joy as well.  Think, Hannah, think how much sooner we might have found happiness had it been with us as it is with them, had you loved me from the very start."

"How do you know?" Hannah demanded. "Joseph, yes—the way he's hung about her has sickened me for years. But Mary," she protested, "she's young, she's given little thought to marrying. And if she has, certainly she'd prefer to do better than this."

"You're wrong. She loves him so much she will have no other man."