“That always happens,” I said. “We don’t talk about it.”
“Wow,” said the new guy. “Can I tag along with you guys?”
“Sure,” I said.
And thus did we become four.
At the river, John preached to a small gathering as he lowered Joshua into the water. As soon as Joshua went under the water a rift opened across the desert sky, which was still pink with the dawn, and out of the rift came a bird that looked to be fashioned from pure light. And everyone on the riverbank said “ooh” and “ahh,” and a big voice boomed out of the heavens, saying, “This is my son, with whom I am well pleased.” And as quickly as it had come, the spirit was gone. But the gatherers at the riverbank stood with their mouths open in amazement, staring yet into the sky.
And John came to his senses then, and remembered what he was doing, and lifted Joshua out of the water. And Joshua wiped the water out of his eyes, looked at the crowd who stood stunned with mouths hanging open, and he said unto them: “What?”
“No, really, Josh, that’s what the voice said, ‘This is my son, with whom I am well pleased.’”
Joshua shook his head and chewed a breakfast locust. “I can’t believe he couldn’t wait until I came up. You’re sure it was my father?”
“Sounded like him.” The new guy looked at me and I shrugged. Actually it sounded like James Earl Jones, but I didn’t know that back then.
“That’s it,” said Joshua. “I’m going into the desert like Moses did, forty days and forty nights.” Joshua got up and started walking into the desert. “From here on out, I’m fasting until I hear something from my
father. That was my last locust.”
“I wish I could say that,” said the new guy.
As soon as Joshua was out of sight I ran to my pit and packed my satchel. I was a half day getting to Bethany, and another hour asking around before someone could direct me to the house of Jakan, prominent Pharisee and member of the Sanhedrin. The house was made of the golden-tinged limestone that marked all of Jerusalem, and there was a high wall around the courtyard. Jakan had done very well for himself, the prick. You could house a dozen families from Nazareth in a house this size. I paid two blind guys a shekel each to stand by the wall so I could climb on their shoulders.
“How much did he say this was?”
“He said it was a shekel.”
“Doesn’t feel like a shekel.”
“Would you guys quit feeling your shekels and stand still, I’m going to fall.”
I peeped over the top of the wall and there, sitting under the shade of an awning, working at a small loom, was Maggie. If she had changed, it was only that she’d become more radiant, more sensuous, more of a woman and less of a girl. I was stunned. I guess I expected some sort of disappointment, thinking that my time and my love might have shaped a memory that the woman could never live up to. Then I thought, perhaps the disappointment was yet to come. She was married to a rich man, a man who, when I knew him, had been a bully and a dolt. And what had always really made Maggie’s memory in my mind was her spirit, her courage, and her wit. I wondered if those things could have survived all these years with Jakan. I started to shake, bad balance or fear, I don’t know, but I put my hand on top of the wall to steady myself and cut myself on some broken pottery that had been set in mortar along the top.
“Ouch, dammit.”
“Biff?” Maggie said, as she looked me in the eye right before I tumbled off the shoulders of the blind guys.
I had just climbed to my feet when Maggie came around the corner and hit me, full-frontal womanhood, full speed, leading with lips. She kissed me so hard that I could taste blood from my cut lips and it was glorious. She
smelled the same—cinnamon and lemon and girl sweat—and felt better than memory could ever allow. When she finally relaxed her embrace and held me at arm’s length, there were tears in her eyes. And mine.
“He dead?” said one of the blind men.
“Don’t think so, I can hear him breathing.”
“Sure smells better than he did.”
“Biff, your face cleared up,” Maggie said.
“You recognized me, with the beard and everything.”
“I wasn’t sure at first,” she said, “so I was taking a risk jumping you like that, but in the midst of it all I recognized that.” She pointed to where my tunic had tented out in the front. And then she grabbed that betraying rascal, shirtfront and all, and led me down the wall toward the gate by it.
“Come on in. You can’t stay long, but we can catch up. Are you okay?” she said, looking over her shoulder, giving me a squeeze.
“Yeah, yeah, I’m just trying to think of a metaphor.”
“He got a woman from up there,” I heard one of the old blind guys say.
“Yeah, I heard her drop. Boost me up, I’ll feel around.”
In the courtyard, with Maggie, over wine, I said, “So you really didn’t recognize me?”
“Of course I recognized you. I’ve never done that before. I just hope no one saw me, they still stone women for that.”
“I know. Oh, Maggie, I have so much to tell you.”
She took my hand. “I know.” She looked into my eyes, past my eyes, her blue eyes looking for something beyond me.
“He’s fine,” I said, finally. “He’s gone into the desert to fast and wait for a message from the Lord.”
She smiled. There was a little of my blood in the corners of her mouth, or maybe that was wine. “He’s come home to take his place as the Messiah then?”
“Yes. But I don’t think the way people think.”
“People think that John might be the Messiah.”
“John is…He’s…”
“He’s really pissing Herod off,” Maggie offered.
“I know.”
“Are you and Josh going to stay with John?”
“I hope not. I want Joshua to leave. I just have to get him away from John long enough to see what’s going on. Maybe this fast…”
The iron lock on the gate to the courtyard rattled, then the whole gate shook. Maggie had locked it behind us after we’d entered. A man cursed. Evidently Jakan was having trouble with his key.
Maggie stood and pulled me to my feet. “Look, I’m going to a wedding in Cana next month with my sister Martha, the week after Tabernacles. Jakan can’t go, he’s got some meeting of the Sanhedrin or something. Come to Cana. Bring Joshua.”
“I’ll try.”
She ran to the closest wall and held her hand in a stirrup. “Over.”
“But, Maggie…”
“Don’t be a wuss. Step, hands—step, shoulders—and over. Be careful of the pottery on top.”
And I ran—did exactly as she’d said: one foot in the stirrup, one on her shoulder, and over the wall before Jakan could get in the gate.
“Got one!” said one of the old blind guys as I tumbled down on top of them.
“Hold her still while I stick it in.”
I was sitting on a boulder, waiting for Joshua when he came out of the desert. I held out my arms to hug him and he fell forward, letting me catch him. I lowered him to the rock where I had been sitting. He had been smart enough to coat all the exposed parts of his skin with mud, probably mixed from his own urine, to protect it from burning, but in a few spots on his forehead and hands the mud had crumbled away and the skin was gone, burned to raw flesh. His arms were as thin as a small girl’s, they swam in the wide sleeves of his tunic.
“You okay?”
He nodded. I handed him a water skin I had been keeping cool in the shade. He drank in little sips, pacing himself.
“Locust?” I said, holding up one of the crispy torments between my thumb and forefinger.
At the sight of it I thought Joshua would vomit the water he had just drunk. “Just kidding,” I said. I whipped open the mouth of my satchel,
revealing dates, fresh figs, olives, cheese, a half-dozen flat loaves of bread, and a full wineskin. I’d sent the new guy into Jericho the day before to bring back the food.
Josh looked at the food spilling out of the satchel and grinned, then covered his mouth with his hand. “Ow. Ouch. Ow.”
“What’s wrong?”
“Lips…chapped.”
“Myrrh,” I said, pulling a small jar of the ointment from the satchel and handing it to him.
An hour later the Son of God was refreshed and rejuvenated, and we sat sharing the last of the wine, the first that Joshua had had since we’d come home from India over a year ago.
“So, what did you see in the desert?”
“The Devil.”
“The Devil?”
“Yep. He tempted me. Power, wealth, sex, that sort of thing. I turned him down.”
“What did he look like?”
“He was tall.”
“Tall? The prince of darkness, the serpent of temptation, the source of all corruption and evil, and all you can say about him is he was tall?”
“Pretty tall.”
“Oh, good, I’ll be on the lookout then.”
Joshua said, pointing at the new guy. “He’s tall, too.” I realized then that the Messiah might be a little tipsy.
“Not the Devil, Josh.”
“Well, who is he then?”
“I’m Philip,” said the new guy. “I’m going with you to Cana tomorrow.”
Joshua wheeled around to me and almost fell off his rock. “We’re going to Cana tomorrow?”
“Yes, Maggie’s there, Josh. She’s dying.”
Philip, who was called the new guy, asked that we go to Cana by way of Bethany, as he had a friend there that he wanted to recruit to follow along with us. “I tried to get him to join with John the Baptist,” Philip said, “but he wouldn’t stand for the eating-locusts, living-in-pits thing. Anyway, he’s from Cana, I’m sure he’d love to have a visit home.”
As we came into the square of Bethany, Philip called out to a blond kid who was sitting under a fig tree. He was the same yellow-haired kid that Joshua and I had seen when we first passed through Bethany over a year ago.
“Hey, Nathaniel,” Philip called. “Come join me and my friends on the way to Cana. They’re from Nazareth. Joshua here might be the Messiah.”
“Might be?” I said.
Nathaniel walked out into the street to look at us, shading his eyes against the sun. He couldn’t have been more than sixteen or seventeen. He barely had the fuzz of a beard on his chin. “Can anything good come out of Nazareth?” he said.
“Joshua, Biff, Bartholomew,” Philip said, “this is my friend Nathaniel.”
“I know you,” Joshua said. “I saw you when we last passed through here.”
Then, inexplicably, Nathaniel fell to his knees in front of Joshua’s camel and said, “You are truly the Messiah and the Son of God.”
Joshua looked at me, then at Philip, then at the kid, prostrating himself on camel’s feet. “Because I’ve seen you before you
believe that I’m the Messiah, even though a minute ago nothing good could come out of Nazareth?”
“Sure, why not?” said Nathaniel.
And Josh looked at me again, as if I could explain it. Meanwhile Bartholomew, who was on foot along with his pack of doggie followers (whom he had disturbingly begun to refer to as his “disciples”), went over to Nathaniel and helped the boy to his feet. “Stand up, if you’re coming with us.”
Nathaniel prostrated himself before Bartholomew now. “You are truly the Messiah and the Son of God.”
“No, I’m not,” Bart said, lifting the kid to his feet. “He is.” Bart pointed to Joshua. Nathaniel looked to me, for some reason, for confirmation.
“You are truly a babe in the woods,” I said to Nathaniel. “You don’t gamble, do you?”
“Biff!” Joshua said. He shook his head and I shrugged. To Nathaniel he said, “You’re welcome to join us. We share the camels, our food, and what little money we have.” Here Joshua nodded toward Philip, who had been nominated to carry the communal purse because he was good at math.
“Thanks,” said Nathaniel, and he fell in behind us.
And thus we became five.
“Josh,” I said in a harsh whisper, “that kid is as dumb as a stick.”
“He’s not dumb, Biff, he just has a talent for belief.”
“Fine,” I said, turning to Philip. “Don’t let the kid anywhere near the money.”
As we headed out of the square toward the Mount of Olives, Abel and Crustus, the two old blind guys who’d helped me over Maggie’s wall, called out from the gutter. (I’d learned their names after correcting their little gender mistake.)
“Oh son of David, have mercy on us!”
Joshua pulled up on the reins of his camel. “What makes you call me that?”
“You
are
Joshua of Nazareth, the young preacher who was studying under John?”
“Yes, I am Joshua.”
“We heard the Lord say that you were his son with whom he was well pleased.”
“You heard that?”
“Yes. About five or six weeks ago. Right out of the sky.”
“Dammit, did everyone hear but me?”
“Have mercy on us, Joshua,” said one blind guy.
“Yeah, mercy,” said the other.
Then Joshua climbed down from his camel, laid his hands upon the old men’s eyes, and said, “You have faith in the Lord, and you have heard, as evidently everyone in Judea has, that I am his son with whom he is well pleased.” Then he pulled his hands from their faces and the old men looked around.
“Tell me what you see,” Joshua said.
The old guys sort of looked around, saying nothing.
“So, tell me what you see.”
The blind men looked at each other.
“Something wrong?” Joshua asked. “You can see, can’t you?”
“Well, yeah,” said Abel, “but I thought there’d be more color.”
“Yeah,” said Crustus, “it’s kind of dull.”
I stepped up. “You’re on the edge of the Judean desert, one of the most lifeless, desolate, hostile places on earth, what did you expect?”
“I don’t know.” Crustus shrugged. “More.”
“Yeah, more,” said Abel. “What color is that?”
“That’s brown.”
“How about that one?”
“That would be brown as well.”
“That color over there? Right there?”
“Brown.”
“You’re sure that’s not mauve.”
“Nope, brown.”
“And—”
“Brown,” I said.
The two former blind guys shrugged and walked off mumbling to each other.
“Excellent healing,” said Nathaniel.
“I for one have never seen a better healing,” said Philip, “but then, I’m new.”
Joshua rode off shaking his head.
When we came into Cana we were broke and hungry and more than ready for a feast, at least most of us were. Joshua didn’t know about the feast. The wedding was being held in the courtyard of a very large house. We could hear the drums and singers and smell spiced meat cooking as we approached the gates. It was a large wedding and a couple of kids were waiting outside to tend to our camels. They were curly haired, wiry little guys about ten years old; they reminded me of evil versions of Josh and me at that age.
“Sounds like a wedding going on,” Joshua said.
“Park your camel, sir?” said the camel-parking kid.
“It is a wedding,” said Bart. “I thought we were here to help Maggie.”
“Park your camel, sir?” said the other kid, pulling on the reins of my camel.
Joshua looked at me. “Where is Maggie? You said she was sick?”
“She’s in the wedding,” I said, pulling the reins back from the kid.
“You said she was dying.”
“Well, we all are, aren’t we? I mean, if you think about it.” I grinned.
“You can’t park that camel here, sir.”
“Look, kid, I don’t have any money to tip you. Go away.” I hate handing my camel over to the camel-parking kids. It unnerves me. I’m always sure that I’m never going to see it again, or it’s going to come back with a tooth missing or an eye poked out.
“So Maggie isn’t really dying?”
“Hey, guys,” Maggie said, stepping out of the gate.
“Maggie,” Joshua said, throwing his arms up in surprise. Problem was, he was so intent on looking at her that he forgot to grab on again, and off the camel he went. He hit the ground facedown with a thump and a wheeze. I jumped down from my camel, Bart’s dogs barked, Maggie ran to Josh, rolled him over, and cradled his head in her lap while he tried to get his breath back. Philip and Nathaniel waved to people from the wedding who were peeping through the gate to see what all the commotion was about. Before I had a chance to turn, the two kids had leapt up onto our camels and were galloping around the corner off to Nod, or South Dakota, or some other place I didn’t know the location of.
“Maggie,” Joshua said. “You’re not sick.”
“That depends,” she said, “if there’s any chance of a laying on of hands.”
Joshua smiled and blushed. “I missed you.”
“Me too,” Maggie said. She kissed Joshua on the lips and held him there until I started to squirm and the other disciples started to clear their throats and bark “get a room” under their breaths.
Maggie stood up and helped Joshua to his feet. “Come on in, guys,” she said. “No dogs,” she said to Bart, and the hulking Cynic shrugged and sat down in the street amid his canine disciples.
I was craning my neck to see if I could see where our camels had been taken. “They’re going to run those camels into the ground, and I know they won’t feed or water them.”
“Who?” asked Maggie.
“Those camel-parking boys.”
“Biff, this is my youngest brother’s wedding. He couldn’t even afford wine. He didn’t hire any camel-parking boys.”
Bartholomew stood and rallied his troops. “I’ll find them.” He lumbered off.
Inside we feasted on beef and mutton, all manner of fruits and vegetables, bean and nut pastes, cheese and first-pressed olive oil with bread. There was singing and dancing and if it hadn’t been for a few old guys in the corner looking very cranky, you’d never have known that there wasn’t any wine at the party. When our people danced, they danced in large groups, lines and circles, not couples. There were men’s dances and women’s dances and very few dances where both could participate, which is why people were staring at Joshua and Maggie as they danced. They were definitely dancing together.
I retreated to a corner where I saw Maggie’s sister Martha watching as she nibbled at some bread with goat cheese. She was twenty-five, a shorter, sturdier version of Maggie, with the same auburn hair and blue eyes, but with less tendency to laugh. Her husband had divorced her for “grievous skankage” and now she lived with her older brother Simon in Bethany. I’d gotten to know her when we were little and she took messages to Maggie for me. She offered me a bite of her bread and cheese and I took it.
“She’s going to get herself stoned,” Martha said in a slightly bitter, moderately jealous, younger sister tone. “Jakan is a member of the Sanhedrin.”
“Is he still a bully?”
“Worse, now he’s a bully with power. He’d have her stoned, just to prove that he could do it.”
“For dancing? Not even the Pharisees—”
“If anyone saw her kiss Joshua, then…”
“So how are you?” I said, changing the subject.
“I’m living with my brother Simon now.”
“I heard.”
“He’s a leper.”
“Look, there’s Joshua’s mother. I have to go say hello.”
“There’s no wine at this wedding,” Mary said.
“I know. Strange, isn’t it?”
James stood by scowling as I hugged his mother.
“Joshua is here too?”
“Yes.”
“Oh good, I was afraid that you two might have been arrested along with John.”
“Pardon me?” I stepped back and looked to James for explanation. He seemed the more appropriate bearer of bad news.
“You hadn’t heard? Herod has thrown John in prison for inciting people to revolt. That’s the excuse anyway. It’s Herod’s wife who wanted John silenced. She was tired of having John’s followers refer to her as ‘the slut.’”
I patted Mary’s shoulder as I stepped away. “I’ll tell Joshua that you’re here.”
I found Joshua sitting in a far corner of the courtyard playing with some children. One little girl had brought her pet rabbit to the wedding and Joshua was holding it in his lap, petting its ears.
“Biff, come feel how soft this bunny is.”
“Joshua, John has been arrested.”
Josh slowly handed the bunny back to the little girl and stood. “When?”
“I’m not sure. Shortly after we left, I guess.”
“I shouldn’t have left him. I didn’t even tell him we were leaving.”
“It was bound to happen, Joshua. I told him to lay off Herod, but he wouldn’t listen. You couldn’t have done anything.”
“I’m the Son of God, I could have done something.”
“Yeah, you could have gone to prison with him. Your mother is here. Go talk to her. She’s the one that told me.”
As Joshua embraced Mary, she said, “You’ve got to do something about this wine situation. Where’s the wine?”
James tapped Joshua on the shoulder. “Didn’t bring any wine with you from the lush vineyards of Jericho?” (I didn’t like hearing sarcasm being used by James against Joshua. I had always thought of my invention as being used for good, or at least against people I didn’t like.)
Joshua gently pushed his mother away. “You shall have wine,” he said, then he went off to the side of the house where drinking water was stored in large stone jars. In a few minutes he returned with a pitcher of wine and cups for all of us. A shout went through the party and suddenly everything seemed to step up a level. Pitchers and cups were filled and drained and filled again, and those who had been near the wine jars started declaring a miracle had been performed, that Joshua of Nazareth had turned water into wine. I looked for him, but he was nowhere to be found. Having been free of sin all of his life, Joshua wasn’t very good at dealing with guilt, so he had gone off by himself to try to numb the guilt he felt over John’s arrest.
After a few hours of subterfuge and guile, I was able to get Maggie to sneak out the back gate with me.
“Maggie, come with us. You talked to Joshua. You saw the wine. He’s the one.”
“I’ve always known he was the one, but I can’t come with you. I’m married.”
“I thought you were going to be a fisherman.”
“And I thought you were going to be a village idiot.”
“I’m still looking for a village. Look, get Jakan to divorce you.”
“Anything he can divorce me for he can also kill me for. I’ve seen him pass judgment on people, Biff. I’ve seen him lead the mobs to the stonings. I’m afraid of him.”
“I learned to make poisons in the East.” I raised my eyebrows and grinned. “Huh?”
“I’m not going to poison my husband.”
I sighed, an exasperated sigh that I’d learned from my mother. “Then
leave him and come away with us, far from Jerusalem where he can’t reach you. He’ll have to divorce you to save face.”
“Why should I leave, Biff? So I can follow around a man who doesn’t want me and wouldn’t take me if he did?”
I didn’t know what to say, I felt like knives were twisting in fresh wounds in my chest. I looked at my sandals and pretended to have something caught in my throat.
Maggie stepped up, put her arms around me, and laid her head against my chest. “I’m sorry,” she said.
“I know.”
“I missed both of you, but I missed just
you
too.”
“I know.”
“I’m not going to sleep with you.”
“I know.”
“Then please stop rubbing that against me.”
“Sure,” I said.
Just then Joshua stumbled through the gate and crashed into us. We were able to catch ourselves and him before anyone fell. The Messiah was holding the little girl’s pet bunny, hugging it to his cheek with the big back feet swinging free. He was gloriously drunk. “Know what?” Josh said. “I love bunnies. They toil not, neither do they bark. Henceforth and from now on, I decree that whenever something bad happens to me, there shall be bunnies around. So it shall be written. Go ahead Biff, write it down.” He waved to me under the bunny, then turned and started back through the gate. “Where’s the friggin’ wine? I got a dry bunny over here!”