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V. IN THE COURT OF THE KINGS
Josh returned with Mira to Date Home in the week before Sukkoth, the Feast of Tabernacles. Mary and Cleopas welcomed them both warmly. The boys, James and Jude, were happy to have Mira back to play with them and read to them and sing them songs and marvel over their every accomplishment. Josh's bound and broken right hand was judged unfit for working the harvest, so he set about building the frames for the tents where they would camp for the feast days. Josh argued that Eli--visiting for the feast days--was the carpenter of the family, but Mary was steadfast, and Mira did not take Josh's side, disapproving as she did of violence.
So Eli and Simeon spent their preparation for the feast days in the grove seeing to the olive harvest while Josh was reduced to tent building. He had missed the New Year's celebration, the Feast of Creation, and he never participated in The Day of Atonement, even though the sacrifice was performed on the west side of his own property.
Cleopas was very busy setting up the altar at the bottom of the grove for the red heifer, but he still found time to see to Josh's adoption of Mira. Cleopas was only too happy to have a hand in thwarting Jake.
And the matter kept him too busy to help Josh with the tent frames.
Josh finished the sides--without any help, if one did not count James' obsessive measurements. Cleopas--damn his hide--had given the boy a cubit measure, blessed by the High Priest, or so he said, and James had entered a phase where measuring the world was a most serious endeavor.
Josh's forearm was longer than the Temple cubit and the resulting discrepancy instigated several lengthy and unpleasant discussions between Josh and his son.
Josh was relieved when he could take long walks up the mount to gather the olive prunings for the roof. This gave him a chance to escape James' boyish authority and to disapprove of Eli's harvest management. Josh offered sage suggestions and Eli nodded seriously, but Josh suspected the young rabbi was just humoring him.
Josh chose to regard Eli's demeanor as respect, whatever motivated it.
He returned to the tiled court and the four wings of his house, filled up with children's voices and the tantalizing odors of Mary's fine cooking. Josh could not find any pleasure in all the irritating domesticity. He was glad to lay the final boughs over the tabernacle frames and return to his grove to set the new mill stone for the oil press.
Mira's jenny managed to kick them both, rabbi and mason, several times, before they accustomed her to the harness, and even then she was more prone to sit than walk, not that either Josh or Eli were walking well by the time they had finished arguing with the donkey about her place in the scheme of things.
Simeon just watched them silently through the whole skirmish, then brought out the old donkey and exchanged it for the new jenny. Mira's jenny followed him meekly back to the pen. Simeon scratched her soft ears and chided her gently for being so unladylike to his father and his Uncle Eli.Josh shrugged and hitched the old donkey up. Such is the magic of children, he thought. The nasty-tempered jenny had not so much as nipped at the boy, when she had all but trampled two grown men.
They put the first load of olives in the press. The old donkey dutifully began its steady tread, going nowhere, dragging the weight of the stone, making the precious oil, oblivious to anything but the arc of the rut its tiny hooves had carved over the long years.
Simeon scampered down the hill. Josh and Eli followed more slowly, rubbing their bruises and cursing Mira's jenny. They entered the courtyard to a rainbow of silk. Mira had hung the tents and the court was transformed into a make-believe nomads' camp. They ducked beneath the billowing veil of the entry and arranged themselves on deep cushions, like the desert kings of old. Eli sang them a very old song about the wind and the stars and Mary served them a dinner King David would have envied.
How odd they would celebrate their harvest, the very symbol of ownership, by reliving the days when they were landless nomads.
Eli and Simeon left after the meal, but Josh stayed behind playing at Cat's Cradle with Jude. James' cubit string was useful for something, at least. A pity Josh had knotted it so tight it would never be undone.
While Josh played with his youngest, he watched the two women, Mira and Mary, lounging before the pale blue drapery, speaking quietly to one another while Mary nursed the baby. The sun filtered down through the boughs, mottling them like the patina on fine bronze, setting them before his eyes in tempered shades of muted wonder. He might have lived his whole life for this single lovely moment: the melodious voices, the marbled forms, the splash of color in the folds behind them, the light touch of his son's slender fingers playing with James' twine.
"You've dropped the loop again, Father," Jude complained.
He apologized and began again, but the moment had passed, and the next time he erred in the game, Josh excused himself to be off about his business.
In midafternoon Cleopas joined them at the press. He sent Eli and Simeon down the hill on an errand and took Josh aside. "Brother," Cleopas began sternly.
"Yes?" Josh peered round his brother to check on the roll of the new stone. There was an uneven sound as it rounded the far side of the trough.
"Mira's adoption papers are finished, Josh." They rustled in Cleopas' hand, but he did not seem eager to release them.
Josh shook his head and walked past Cleopas to halt the donkey. He disengaged the harness and let the beaste graze while he saw to the stone. "Help me with this, will you?"
Cleopas' mouth dropped open and he tucked the papers back in his robe.
"Oh come on, Alf. I'll hold most of the weight. You just have to steady it."
Cleopas wiped his hands, though they were not yet dirty, and his face screwed up. "Couldn't you wait until Eli gets back."
"If this could wait, do you think I'd ask you?"Cleopas succumbed to the slur and helped Josh heave the enormous mill up out of the track and onto the ground. Josh wiped his hands on his robe and licked the oil approvingly. Cleopas cringed within his own skin as if he had just discovered himself a leper.
"You want to talk to me about something?" Josh dug around in his tools and retrieved an arm-long rasp with which he began smoothing the mill's edge.
"What?" Cleopas was trying vainly to find a clean enough spot on his person to wipe his hands. He lifted up the hem of his robe. "Yes. As a matter of fact, I do."
Josh ran his greasy palm over the rasping and shook his head again. He sighted the stone with one eye closed, put the rasp down, and picked up a tined chisel and a wooden mallet. "Go on, then," Josh urged as he lifted the hammer and pounded down. Chips went flying like arrows.
A sliver caught Cleopas in his uncovered leg. "Damnation, Josh! Leave off a moment!"
Josh attacked the stone with relentless accuracy, stopping only when the offending bulge had been obliterated. He picked up the rasp again and started smoothing. "Did you say something, Brother?"
"I swear you do that on purpose," Cleopas grumbled. "Well, I have news, dear brother of mine: I think that new daughter of yours is with child."
Josh squinted up at Cleopas. "You just figured that out, oh wise priest?"
"Well, actually, Mary--." Cleopas put his fists on his hips and leaned forward. "You knew!"
Josh stroked the stone and changed to a small rasp. "I know. What difference does it make?"
"I will not have a bastard in my house!"
"You mean besides yourself, Alf?" Josh knew how his brother loathed the less-hellenic version of his true name.
Cleopas raised his fist and Josh picked up a larger mallet as if his brother's head were the next stone in line for smoothing. "It is not your house," Josh said quietly.
Cleopas lowered his hand. Josh lowered his mallet.
"I will adopt the child when it is born, just as I have adopted Mira. You will see to that." Josh did not ask--any more than a king would ask anything of a lesser man.
Cleopas was reduced to whining in a most unbecoming and unpriestly fashion, in every way the little brother Josh had always tormented. "First, you bring me this brood of motherless chicks to raise, while you are off, free as a bird. Then you break my nose. Now you are trying to ruin my standing at Temple by bringing this harlot under my roof."
Josh stood up and laid his greasy hands on his brother's shoulders. "I will forget you have said this about Mira. And you will not remind me of it by saying anything like it in the future, or I will break something far more precious to you than your nose. Is that understood?"
"I am relieved she is with child, actually," Cleopas had returned to himself. There was a cheap innocence in his conciliatory tones.
Josh backed away from him and his eyes narrowed.
"Yes," Cleopas straightened his oil-soaked raiments. "I had feared that Jake disowned her for another reason entirely." He let the statement drift into a minor mode. "I thought he had finally discover--"
Josh's hand found his brother's mouth. "We were never to speak of that'." he hissed.
Cleopas pinched Josh's wrist between his thumb and index finger. He lifted it away from his face as if it were diseased. "I might be more prone to remember that oath if you would cease throttling me at the least provocation, bar Abbas." He put special emphasis on the surname.
"I surrender," Josh sighed.
Cleopas excused himself to go bathe. Josh expended the rest of his anger on the defenseless mill stone, speaking in the lowest Aramaic to the donkey whose long ragged ears had heard worse.
Josh rose before the sun and gathered his wits for another day in the bosom of his ever-extending family. The house was snoring softly. It would soon be roaring. The boys would be into it over some stupid thing, or baby Marta would be howling, or Mary and Mira would be chattering, or Cleopas pontificating, or...
It had been different with Lydia, or perhaps he had only been younger, but he did not remember all this noise, or the continual aggravations of family life. This time of the morning though, with the house still and the day new, he felt himself swell with his great affection for them. He harbored a warmth for them all which bordered on the ridiculous, the more ridiculous because he had neither skill nor wit to properly express his love. He was such a clumsy old donkey of a father, only good for leaving and sending back the money to hire someone else who knew the trade of tenderness and family.
Today, he would dismantle the tents. Mary had been after him all this past week to clear the court, but Mira and the boys had begged him to leave them up so they could play. When he was done with that he would set up a meeting with the Idumean' s architect and see about the finances for this newest family member and her child.
He'd have to start considering a new home. Something not too far away. Mary and Mira were becoming the best of friends, and Mira was still too young to be left alone with her first infant. Where was her young man, anyway? Mira had refused to say and Josh had not pressed her about it. Still, what man in his right mind could give up such a one as Mira? Well, Jake had, but Jake's mind was anything but right.
Eli had returned the title to the house where Anna had died. Anna haunted them all. So much lost. Well, if God were just, she was with Lydia and the two of them probably laughing themselves silly over the old man's clumsy struggling.
Perhaps, with a little renovating, that Bread Home house would do--but who would tend Mira when Josh left to work? Mira could probably back down a desert demon, or even a dragon, but she was used to servants and fine things. Being left alone in the meager dwelling at Bread Home would seem like a dire abandoning. If he only knew her young man was gone for good, he might arrange a marriage for her.
Well, somehow--
There was an urgent pounding at the door. Josh went to answer it.
"Is this the house of Cleopas, son of Elijoachim?" A dark-robed man stood in the doorway, an official from the Temple by the look of the brass plates gracing his chest. Two others, less-richly appointed stood in shadows behind him.
"Yes it is, Lord," Josh motioned they should enter. "I will fetch him."
"We have business with his brother, Josef," said the priest. "Is he here?"
"No," Josh rubbed his head stupidly, trying to look more like the servant for which he had been mistaken. "I can tell Lord Cleopas when he rises and he can send word. What is the nature of this business?"
"He is under arrest, by order of the Sanhedrin," answered the priest.
A very stupid priest, Josh thought, to speak so freely. "I will surely tell him, Lord," Josh bowed in a ducking movement, as if he were used to being beaten.
"And inform him, the woman, Mira, is also to be brought to trial this day."
"Yes, Lord," Josh shuffled to the door. "As soon as the master rises, Lord. I will tell him."
The three hesitated at the door and Josh held his breath. Then the priest made him repeat the entire message, and satisfied with Josh's recitation, they left.
Josh leaned against the closed and locked door for a long time, blessing God for His timely interventions and wondering what the hell was going on.
And what the hell he was going to do about it.
Josh stumbled out the opposite door into the court. The Court of The Kings, as James had named it. Both boys, James and Jude, had sneaked out of their room and bundled into one of the Tabernacles, despite the chill of the fall nights. Josh lifted the tent silk and gazed upon them, sleeping in each others arms, tousled and innocent, like errant angels. Bless these children, Father of Us All, he prayed silently.
Simeon, though a year younger than James, had put aside his childhood with Anna's death and become too old for midnight excursions. He was still in the room where all the boys had grown up, the room where Elijoachim had died, the second room Josh's father had built before he joined them both with hallways round the court, and then added the other wings where Cleopas and his mother had lived.
Josh opened Simeon's door a crack. Simeon thrashed in his sleep. Josh entered and straightened his covers and woke him enough that the dream disappeared.
"Wha--" mumbled Simeon.
"Shh," Josh held him in an unappreciated hug. "You will wake Eli."
Eli had stayed the night, choosing to sleep on Simeon's floor, though he could have had his own room in the large complex. Josh settled Simeon back to sleep and borrowed one of his blankets to cover Eli. Maybe Eli would be the man for Mira when his mourning was done, hard-working, well-educated in the law. Wait a moment! Josh had more need of a lawyer, than Mira had need of a husband--or Eli had need of sleep, for that matter.
"Eli," Josh jostled him awake.
Eli followed him out to the court. "What is it Josh?"
"Why does the Sanhedrin send a lesser priest dressed as a high lord to a man's house well before dawn and demand he hand over his brother for trial?"
Eli rubbed his eyes and pulled his beard. "It is a little early for riddles, Josh."
Josh repeated his question.
"Because the brother has committed, or is perceived to have committed a serious breach of law, or has been accused of this by a high-ranking member of the Sanhedrin, more likely the Sadducees. They have the wealth and the arrogance for such an action."
"And the time?"
"They wish to apprehend the suspected criminal before he has a chance to flee, I suppose." Eli yawned and lowered himself to the ground. "Do they come with Romans."
"Three of them, all temple men, come alone to this man's house."
"Then the brother must be accused of a moral breach."
"Why is that?" Josh sat down beside him.
A door adjacent to Simeon's opened the barest crack, but neither man noticed.
"If it were a matter of criminal law, High Priest Simon would have sent at least the Temple thugs or a few Roman soldiers. His father-in-law, Herod, would have been most happy to oblige. Did they take the man's brother?"
"They did not recognize me," Josh answered.
Eli sat bolt upright. "Josh! The Sanhedrin came after you? When?"
"This very morning. Not very long ago. As I said, they did not recognize me. They thought I was a servant," Josh looked down to see he had yet to change the robe he'd worked in all week.
"I cannot imagine how they would make such an error," Eli laughed. "What is the charge?"
"I wish I knew," Josh grimaced.
"Did they say anything else?"
"That Mira was also to be brought to trial."
"Oh, Dear, Dear Lord," Eli exclaimed. "To trial? And Mira also? Wait a moment. Let me think."
Josh stretched his neck back and scratched under his beard. He reviewed all the routes out of Judea. He had been to Egypt once, never farther east than the Jordan valley. North of Galilee? That was a possibility. Damascus was friendly to refugees. But could Mira make such a trip in her condition? They would be traveling by night through the worst of Samaria, if they didn’t decide on the rough jungles of The Rift. Either way--
"Josh!" Eli tugged Josh's arm harder. "I have an answer for you. There may be some question as to Mira's pregnancy." Eli blushed. His rabbinical training was not much use for matters of discretion, not these matters anyway.
"Because she is not married?"
"That she conceived before your wedding was completed, yes. I have been trying to think why you are summoned. I can only surmise they mean to accuse you of adultery."
Josh stared stupidly.
"I know, you were betrothed, and in Judea, while not condoned, it is not forbidden for the betrothed to, to--"
"I understand," Josh thought Eli's sudden fluster almost charming. What a son he would have made, what a husband for poor Ann.
"But in Galilee, the law is more rigid. This is strictly forbidden and is punishable."
"How?"
"Because the law of the--"
"No, Eli, I mean: what punishment?"
Eli bowed his head. "Death by stoning for both the man and the woman."
Josh exhaled sharply. "You are joking? For a brief moment of innocent pleasure the law prescribes an agonized death?"
Eli stared at Josh. "Innocent? Do you not know the Law?"
"Of course I know the Law. Five laws for everything, even several for where to crap and three more for how to bury it, but what has that to do with this? God has obviously blessed this woman. No man can say otherwise."
Eli blinked and yawned. "How is that?"
"A man covers a woman, but it is God Himself gives her the child. If God does not bless the union then the woman is cursed with barrenness. Is it not then reasonable to assume any congress which is fruitful is blessed and sanctioned by the True Sire of every babe, God the Father?"
Eli digested this. "You would do well to remember such wise words when it is your turn to speak in the trial, Josh. A man might just as easily mistake you for a sage by your wit, as they would a servant, by your dress. Where did you learn such acuity of argument?"
"I've a friend--" Josh began, thinking of Gabe for the first time in half a year and wondering where his young blond friend had gone for so long. Now there would be the match for Mira.
Josh and Eli continued their conversation until the air chilled, heralding the dawn. Then each retired to their rooms; Eli, to establish a coherent defense for each of the possible charges, and Josh, to pack his things preparatory to escaping any and all charges.
When the Court of the Kings was empty, the door next to Simeon's closed quietly and a flickering light licked out over the pavement from a crack where the door did not quite meet the casement.
Cleopas stumbled into Josh's room. Josh, where is--? What the hell are you doing?"
Josh glanced up at his disheveled, sleep-rumpled sibling, and returned to the last of his packing. "I have left instructions about the boys and my authorization for distribution of the deeds. I have signed over the house and the grove and the garden to you. I will try to get word to you, when we--"
"What is going on?" Cleopas shrieked.
"I am leaving, Alf. I am taking Mira and--"
"You will have to find her first. I came to tell you, she has left the house. Perhaps this makes some sense to you." Cleopas jabbed a piece of paper into Josh's hand.
Josh read Mira's note. She'd heard him talking with Eli and gone off "to straighten things out."
Josh wadded the note in his fist. "Damn!"
"Where did she go?" Cleopas demanded.
"To the Temple I'm afraid. Where would the Sanhedrin be meeting this month, Cleopas?"
"Probably the Xystos." Cleopas squinted. "You have business with the Council?"
"No, AIf. But it seems they have business with me." Josh sat down on his bed and rubbed his mouth with his hand. He explained to Cleopas what had transpired that morning.
"You weren' t going to run away?" Cleopas' thin eyebrow crawled halfway up his forehead.
"Yes, I was. Forgive me, Alf, but I've no love for the Zadok Sons, nor any trust, either--yourself excepted, of course. These hands, Alf, they are rough and common hands, dirty hands, but they have always held my fate and that is their worth. God forbid I should let any soft priest's hands hold my life, no matter that they be washed in the rivers of heaven itself."
"But you let a woman, barely more than a girl, hold your life in her hands, Josh. Mira is not worth your life. If you remember that, you will be safe from any charge. You are not part of her sinfulness, part of her--"
Josh's common hands threw his brother, head-first, through the doorway. Then he bolted out of Date Home and round the mount, towards Surrender.
Mira had too great a start on him.
He returned to Date Home without her. She was already being held in one of the halls on the Xystos bridge at the western Temple wall.
Cleopas advised they should answer the summons. Eli reviewed his notes aloud while Josh washed and dressed in his best robes. Mary fixed them a hasty breakfast and Josh said goodbye to his sons. Simeon sulked when he learned he could not accompany them, Jude whined, and James held up an accusatory finger with the knotted cubit string looped over it.Their gathering anxiety stirred baby Marta to yowling and Jude had to whine louder.
Josh hugged his sons. While they did not appreciate it now, they might think back more lovingly, and less loudly, at some point in the future, some day--God forbid it would be soon--when he was not around to embrace them.
In this dismal frame of mind, Josh and his two escorts made their way to 'Salem. They were met beneath the triple arch of the Hulda Gate by a contingent of Temple ruffians and escorted up onto the Temple esplanade. They skirted the Outer Court westward and stepped under the Xystos Arch.
The arch entered a gigantic barrel vault which pierced the wall and the Xystos and led onto a wide stone bridge, with deep ambulatories either side. The bridge spanned the Valley of the Idols and connected Mount Sion to the Temple Mount along the guardwalk of the Idumean's Palace. It also provided shelter to the many vendors which served the Temple pilgrims: booths filled with doves for those of lesser means, silks and sundries for those whom wealth had blessed, long tables of treasurers, who exchanged proper coins for the idolatrous issue of the empire--for a price.
Half-way down the vault, Josh and his retinue turned north into a stairwell and proceeded down two flights into The Hall of Hewn Stone. They called it The Hall of the Hewn Stone because of the carved marble tiers leading down from the entry to the lower level of the enormous gallery. They called it The Hall of the Hewn Stone because they were loathe to refer to its original function, as a marble bath for the gymnasium, the Xystos, which had been constructed to offer the Sons of Israel all the advantages of Rome. The Sons of Israel were not amused. The mark of their Covenant with God was not for display, nor was nudity condoned in general, being all too often the condition of slaves in the warmer climes. The Xystos' being adjacent the sacred ground of the Temple was intolerable and the gymnasium had been abandoned.
But the basilica beneath the Royal Portico, the Hanuyot, on the southern wall of the Temple mount had become too small to accommodate the expanded numbers of the Council. The Xystos had been renamed and refitted as apartments for the Sadducees, the large bath being converted to one of the Council Halls. The wealthy Sadducees considered their comfort took precedent over the petty concerns about the building's former purpose. The Hanuyot basilica, while still in use for the smaller assemblies, now functioned as a Pharisaic school, under Rabbi Hillel's direction.
Josh felt his heart drop as they entered the bath. The din of the one-thousand learned voices would have been disturbing by itself, but the sheer number of men gathered in the marble hall was daunting. Josh, never at ease in crowds, had the sensation that all the air had exited the room as the high doors closed behind him and the Sadducee thugs pressed closer to guide him through the crowd.
Josh sat down on one of the lower steps at the far end of the former pool with Cleopas on his right and Eli on his left. The priests, Zadok Sons, took their places higher on the same side, while the Congregationalists, the Pharisees, took up all the stairs on the three remaining sides. On the marble floor of the old bath several gigantic tables were set with scrolls and surrounded by scribes sitting cross-legged on the floor, the empty benches awaiting the High Priest
Simon, the Idumean' s son-in-law, and his prefect, Annas.
Josh leaned towards Eli, "Tell me who is the boy with Rabbi Hillel." Josh referred to the lithe child who was seated so seriously beneath his wild brown curls, watching the elder leader of the Pharisees as if he were the Messiah. The boy was younger than James, about the age of the twin, little Jude.
"That is Hillel's grandson, Gamaliel," Eli answered. He continued to point out the major members of the Congregationalists who formed the clear majority of the Council.
Since the decisions of the Sanhedrin were by vote, Josh's fate--and Mira's, wherever she was--would rest with these men, most of them common laborers like himself, even the rabbis. Josh hoped sincerely that this would favor him.
Cleopas nudged Josh, "Here we go, brother." He indicated a group of men in deep indigo and scarlet robes gathering beneath a secondary archway in the side of the hall. Josh recognized the man who had come to Date Home with the summons earlier that morning.
"There is Mary's brother," Cleopas pointed out the prefect.
Josh suppressed a sudden urge to choke. The stupid priest was Cleopas' brother-in-law. Josh had not met him before. Josh was away on some job and missed his brother's wedding. Mary's family did not consider Date Home proper quarters for sojourns and Josh had never been invited with Cleopas and Mary to her family's grand house in the Upper City. While Josh had heard about this very important brother of Mary's, he did not know him on sight, until now.
The High Priest and his cohort entered the hall and the sudden silence was oppressive. They settled themselves on the benches behind the tables. Josh was sitting behind them and to the right. He could not see their faces. All he could see were their dark robes and unbending backs.
"Who is that priest on the end who seems to be talking to himself. But he is just moving his mouth. What ails him?" Josh whispered.
"That is Isacariah. He's been like that since one of the Cherubs in the Holy of Holies was stolen, in early spring. He went dashing out of the sanctuary screaming that he saw the Cheryb walking. He stopped screaming and he has not made a sound since. His wife, Elizabeth, is carrying their first child," Cleopas added, as if that explained everything about poor Zack's losing his mind.
Josh was trying to remember how Zack was related to them--was it second cousin on Cleopas' mother's side?--when the prefect stood to read the invocation of justice and reason. His voice was unbeautiful to Josh's way of thinking, too precise and self-important. The prefect glanced over at Josh as he finished and sat down choking as he recognized the accused.
Josh smiled graciously and wondered if this were to be his only compensation for the day.
Hillel rose from the far ledge of the pool. "who is this man, and what charges are brought concerning him?"
Josh stared at the old man's soft grey beard and prayed he should live so long as to have one of those stately silver drapes for his own chest. Josh watched Hillel nod to his grandson. "This is how it is done," Hillel's nod seemed to say, and the boy's bright eyes flashed adoringly.
No one answered Hillel's question. From an archway behind them a tall and sinister figure emerged. Josh heard the man approach, but the angle was too acute to see him clearly without turning round and Josh was determined not to fidget in this proud throng.
Josh could hear the man walk up behind him and then an all too familiar voice rang out in cultured, dispassionate cruelty, "We cannot be certain of this man’s true identity. We will address this as one of the charges. He is called 'Josh' by some. Neither is his birth certain, and these questions will also be taken in their turn. Of only one fact can we be truly certain and that is: this Josh has most vilely desecrated a daughter of Israel."
Jake was interrupted by a gentle swell of humiliating laughter spilling through the Pharisaic portion of the Council. That was almost worse than Jake's pronouncement: they thought him incapable of ravaging anyone's daughter.
It was no comfort that the old man, Hillel, came to his defense, as if in empathy, calling them back to the due respect for such serious charges.
Jake glided down the steps like a serpent, brushing Josh's right side. He strode around the High Priest's tables to the center of the marble pool as serenely victorious as if he were wading through still, sacred waters.
"I am Joachim, a true Son of Zadok, and well known to you as a just and honorable man."
The same gentle laughter washed the room again and the mood at the High Priest's desks went icy and indignant.
Hillel quieted them again, as if he were an overly indulgent father, with great pride in his sons' exuberance. "A just and honorable man would have stated the charges by now."
Jake reddened. "I will state them, one, and then another, as soon as this 'Josh' comes forward to answer them before you."
Josh was led alone to the center of the hall to stand before his accuser.
Jake strolled back and forth, not so much pacing as stalking his prey. "What is your name?"
"Joshua Ben'eli Joachim, sometimes called 'bar Abbas,' often called just 'Josh.' I am a stone-mason and builder, a tekton by trade." Josh addressed, not Jake, but Rabbi Hillel, whom he had met on several occasions during Anna's stay at the Annex where Hillel was Headmaster.
"Where were you born?" Jake asked.
"Arimathea."
"Do you have any papers to prove this?"
"I have the deed to my father's house there," Josh answered steadily. Jake had found out about the discrepancy of his birth. But nothing could be proven, Josh reminded himself, only rumor.
"Is your mother mentioned in the document?"
"No." Why would a woman's name be included on a deed if she were not the owner?
"Do you know your mother's name?" Jake halted directly in front of Josh, cutting off his line of sight to Hillel. "Do you know her name?"
Josh cleared his throat and stepped sideways to address the man who would see to his fate. "Rabbi Hillel, my father was devastated by my mother's death. He would break down utterly the few times he tried to speak about her with me. I respected his mourning, his profound love for the woman who was killed by my birth. I never pressed him to tell me more than he could, and her name was one of the things he could not say without the greatest agony of spirit. All the years I knew him, I never heard him speak her name once, and I never asked."
Josh had the distinct impression that the three sides of the old pool formed a smile for him, despite the hard hearts of the priests at the fourth side.
"A touching story, but the truth is you do not know your mother's name." Jake had not actually called Josh a bastard, but he was edging ever closer to doing so. "Do you own a copy of your lineage?"
"I do not think so. Father's was lost and Temple copies are very expensive," Josh explained. The Pharisees groaned in agreement and the scribes, who made their livings selling such lineage copies, shifted on the floor.
"Can you tell me what this is?" Jake thrust a scroll in Josh's face nearly hitting him with it.
Josh took the scroll and unrolled it. "It is a family record."
"Yours?" Jake asked.
"Well," Josh tilted his head sideways as he counted. "No."
"Whose name is here at the end of the scroll?" Jake jabbed his finger into the paper.
Josh bit his lip. "Alphæus ben Elijoachim."
An airy exhalation sighed round the room.
"So except for your brother's name, this is your genealogy, yes?" Jake's hiss sprayed Josh.
"No." Josh glanced beyond the High Priest to see his brother cringing on the steps, whispering anxiously to Eli. Priest Cleopas had blundered most grievously. Josh remembered the time when Alf had sat him down and questioned him at length about all the family names Josh knew. Cleopas had bought a lineage, not just a copy.
Josh decided not to lie. He hoped Alf would not be in too much trouble because of this. "The lineage is mistaken. My father was never known as Heli. His father was called Matth, but I do not think his name was Matthat. Salathiel and his son Zorababel were forebears, but these must be a different pair with the same names."
"And why is that, Joshua?" Jake spoke the name as if it were synonymous with deceit.
"Too many generations," Josh answered. "My family has traditionally not taken wives until their third or fourth decades. This lineage has forty-two fathers from the time of King David. I do not think our family has more than thirty predecessors from that time to this."
"Then perhaps you can explain this?" Jake slapped a second scroll into Josh's palm.
"Father's copy!" Josh exclaimed. "Where did you get it?"
"And can you verify this document?"
"Oh, yes," Josh murmured, handling the second scroll as if he touched the face of his departed father. "I was only a boy when I saw it last, but, yes, here is the picture of the eagle and the long name at the top which I could never seem to read." He looked close. "Solomon! And Matth's name was Matthan, and here is Salathiel in the sixteenth generation. Yes, I am sure of it! And there are twenty-seven generations from King David to me. What was it Abba used to say? From Abraham to David, from David to your sons--"
Little Gamaliel leapt to his feet, "He is a thirteen!"
Jake snarled.
Hillel popped his grandson's back with an open palm and the boy sat down again. The prefect called for order and the rumbling susurration ceased.
Hillel rose and asked for the second scroll. "Joshua Ben'eli Joachim is correct, as is my impetuous descendent here. He is a thirteen, that is Abraham to David being fourteen generations, David to the Babylon Exile being fourteen generations, and from the Babylon Exile to Joshua being thirteen generations. You have the supreme distinction, Jake, of bringing a thirteenth sire to trial. God forbid I should not be impressed. I would not have thought it possible you could find a thirteen in this day and age, let alone bring him to justice. Are we then scheduled to have The Messiah Himself stand witness?"
The laughing wave swelled again as Hillel took his seat. The legend of the fourteen generations had long since dwindled as the last of the thirteens died. Josh was one of the few left because of his family's habit of marrying late. He might well be the last for all any of them knew. The son of a thirteen was supposed to be The Messiah.
"We have not established that either lineage is truth!" Jake roared above the noise. "How can you explain two genealogies, except that one is a forgery?"
Josh amended his earlier decision not to lie. He sighed loudly. "A simple laborer goes to a friend of his who knows a Temple Scribe. He does not have much information about his background, but he relates what he knows, and his friend tells the scribe who looks through the records--maybe not too carefully, who can say--and the scribe writes out a line for the friend of his friend. He thinks perhaps the laborer cannot read, and what does he know except he has an official-looking piece of paper--and for a bargain. The man sees the copy is incorrect, but he puts it away and pays anyway, reminding himself once again that the price of a thing is too often the worth."
The nods of the assembly told Josh he was believed. Cleopas' face relaxed as all the imagined retributions evaporated.
Gamaliel piped up, "Say the judgment, Grandpa!"
Grandpa's old hand found the boy's mouth and he shook his grey head sternly, but no one believed his wrathful aspect, not even Gamaliel. "I remind the Council, that my all-too-eager boy here is incorrect, in that he surmises the judgment is mine. It is yours. He is correct, however, to indicate a judgment should be made for each charge. This first charge is, if I understand its rather rambling presentation: Joshua is the son of Elijoachim and a thirteenth in the triad of the fourteen generations, said Joshua, a rightful heir to David and to Solomon, and a true Davidic Son of Israel. How do you say?"
They all, save the Sadducees, said Josh was guilty of the high honor.
"Do you wish us to consider a punishment for this heinous crime, Jake, or may we be on about our business?" Hillel's suggestion to call the trial was met with a shuffling sound as the Pharisees made ready to leave.
"There are other charges!" The prefect stood and commanded they be seated.
A corporate moan floated to the ceiling, but the men retook their seats upon the hard, and cold, marble steps.
Hillel sent Gamaliel to Josh to return his father's scroll. Josh tucked it in his sleeve.
"Grandpa says your Abba also named you Gift of God, Zebdi. That is what the Greek scratchings in the corner mean. He thought you might like to know that."
Josh leaned down and shook the boy's hand. "It is the same as I call my son, Joshua, though I had forgotten Abba called me it as well. Thank you, and tell Rabbi Hillel I am most grateful."
"Tell us about those of your fourteenth generation, then." Jake interrupted.
Josh drew back up. "My eldest, Joshua, called also Zebdi, is married to a Galilean, Salome bar Abia. They live in Branch with their first son, James, who is now nearly a year of age."
"And does your son have a trade?"
"Joshua does many things. He serves as scribe for those who cannot read or write. He makes farm tools, simple building--in the summer, he has worked at Genneser, tying nets--"
"And conspiring with his Sicarri friends?" Jake's accusation of zealotry brought the prefect to his feet and drove Cleopas' shoulders forward.
"Are you in league with the Northern Zealots?" the prefect demanded. The buzz of the hall built to a drone as the Pharisees argued among themselves concerning the merits of the radical sect.
"I am not," Josh answered. "Nor is my son."
"The Judgment!" Gamaliel cried out gleefully above the din.
Hillel shrugged his old shoulders and raised his palms in surrender. "Well?"
They judged Josh not guilty of being a Zealot.
Cleopas began to breathe normally again.
Josh was made to name all his other children and their various locations and occupations. Then he had to explain why they were living with Cleopas rather than himself and why he had allowed Simeon to go live with a bachelor.
"And are those all of your children, Josh?" Jake's malevolence twisted his face.
"Yes."
Jake smiled tightly and walked over to the High Priest's table. The prefect handed over two sets of papers which Jake brought to Josh. "What are these?"
"Deeds to my properties and tithing records.""Do you see a discrepancy there?"
"Look," Josh lost his patience. "If you were angry at my breaking your jaw, you should just have faced me with it, man to man. This lengthy and vague set of charges is ridiculous."
The room's volume rose and the prefect and High Priest exchanged uncertain glances. Simon's nasal, imperious tones rang out, "Is this true, Joachim? There is a personal dispute between yourself and the accused?"
"That is irrelevant to the proceedings," Jake answered. "Continue," he said to Josh.
"The tithes have been paid on these," he handed one stack back to Jake. "And the tithes have been excused on these." He returned the rest.
"Why were you excused the rightful tithe, Josh?"
"Because the properties in question are loaned to others."
"Could you explain to us why these 'others' are all widows--or so they say--with young children, Joshua?" The feigned pleasant curiosity was unbearable.
"What are you implying?" Josh put his fists on his hips and furrowed his grey-spackled brows.
"I imply nothing. I call your brother, or rather your half-brother. He knows the name of his mother. Cleopas, come before this court."
Cleopas stood shaky and pale. He made his way down the stair, past the High Priest and into the central area of the old marble pool.
"You are a priest of this Temple?" Jake asked deferentially, but definitely, reminding Hillel and his ilk that Joshua, though a laborer, was no Pharisee.
"I am," Cleopas answered, then had to repeat it, because he could not be heard.
"As a priest, you would not lie to this assembly."
"I would not lie," Cleopas answered.
"I would ask you one question, priest," Jake began almost intimately. "Fourteen years ago your brother--your half-brother--was working at my home in Branch on a building project, at the same time that this very council--" Jake turned slowly and pinned Hillel in a wicked glare. "This esteemed council decided I was not a loyal Son of Israel because I had sired no children. I sent for my wife to come to Jerusalem, and, as there was no one to bring her, I entrusted her safe passage to your brother, Joshua."
Cleopas turned the color of the cold marble and he staggered.
Jake continued, well-aware of the torment he produced in the priest, "My wife was found to be with child shortly thereafter. What did Joshua say to you concerning this?"
Cleopas' eyes went white-ringed and dilated like a cornered animal. Josh gripped him hard by both his shoulders and held him on his feet. "Tell him the truth," Josh said quietly. "I will think no less of you for it, little brother."
Cleopas found his tongue and answered in a tremulous, broken fashion, "Josh said that they had camped one night, he and Hannah, in the Lubban Valley, above Gophna. The night was warm and they had talked together until the moon set." Cleopas gulped audibly. "And after the moon set, he said that he--" Cleopas cast helplessly about. His frightened gaze settled on Josh, beseeching him to get him out of this--as his older brother had done on so many occasions before.
Josh nodded and patted Cleopas' shoulder. "I told my brother I had lain with Jake's wife that night, the last night of our journey to Jerusalem."
The hall rumbled in furious discourse.
"My charge is adultery, then," Jake sneered. "And you have admitted it!"
Josh helped Cleopas to a seat with the Pharisees. He returned to Jake. "Well, now you have scared the wits out of my kin. What more do you want of me, Jake the Just?"
"You admit to adultery--"
"I do not admit to adultery," Josh shook his head. "I only admitted to telling my brother this was so. I lied to him."
Hillel suppressed his inclination to smirk and asked, "Why would you lie about such a thing, Joshua?"
Josh lifted his chin nobly. He would have to be very careful about this. Just enough truth not to endanger Cleopas. "It is difficult to explain--"
"I'll just bet it is," Jake snorted.
"My brother is ten years younger than I. I have always bettered him at everything. My father was more attentive to me than to him, and in every way he had no, no advantage over me. We tried to respect each other as brothers should, still this came between us: Alf always trying to prove he was more worthy, I always trying not to take offense. One day I thought I should make myself so small in his eyes that he would never feel less than me again. I had just returned with Hannah the month before, and there was a rumor round that Hannah was already pregnant and that Jake had hired someone to--excuse me, but laborers use rough words--they said someone had been paid to knock up Old Jake's jenny."
Despite Hillel's obvious disapproval, the marble hall rumbled and roared openly. Jake's intention to remind them of what he took as injustice had likewise reminded them, with Josh's help, how little they thought of Jake, then or now.
"And I thought to myself, I had had the opportunity and no pay to show for it." Josh's timing was impeccable. Just as the hall began to still, he stirred it up again.
The room rocked with wicked glee.
"And I also thought that would be the story to tell Alf. Something he could never verify. Something he would never tell another. It was the perfect solution."
Hillel stroked his beard and shook with silent laughter. "And did this work?"
"Well, we still fight, but when Cleopas has been pushed past what he can bear, he hints about Hannah, and I know I have gone too far and I surrender. It has worked rather well...until now." Josh congratulated himself for having said enough to explain without adding anything about Cleopas' brief infidelity to his wife, Mary. That was the reason he had confessed to a similar iniquity himself: to ease Alf’s dreadful guilt and self-loathing.
Jake shook with rage. "Well then, maybe you can explain this! And this!"
"That is the bill of divorcement for your daughter Mira and the papers of adoption, also for Mira," Josh was relieved. It was apparent Mira was not to be on trial, that she had only been called as witness should Jake run out of proof--which he seemed to be doing.
"You claim, in writing, to be Mira's true father," Jake's roar grew hoarse.
"Yes, that is the form of adoption, as I understand it."
"You told Cleopas you are Mira's father. You told the Temple priests you are Mira's father. Do you now deny it?"
"No, I do not deny it. I am Mira's father. She is one of my heirs now, but she was not my daughter a month ago. Until you threw her out of your house, she was your daughter, Jake." Despite his anger with the stubborn old man who'd caused so much trouble, Josh tried to say this gently.
"And do you intend to give her a house on loan as you have all your other charities?" Jake's accusation resonated in his throat.
Josh's mouth dropped open. Even in direct confrontation, he could not believe the cruelty of this man.
"I call the woman, Mira bar Joshua, to this Court."
Mira's entrance silenced the assembly in an abrupt and sizzling whisper. She was more than two months from delivering, by Josh's reckoning, but her tiny frame was already great with child, most obviously so.
Having grown used to her majesty, Josh was struck instead by the elegant, lush look of her, at once inviting and forbidding. She floated towards the center of Court. There was none of the waddle or encumbered bearing which might be expected of one so gravid.
Mira passed her father by as if he were not there. She walked to Josh's side and took his hand. For all her royal and composed demeanor, Josh felt her hand shaking in his.
"Ask your questions," she said clearly. Her voice did not share the trembling of her hands.
"You were betrothed to this man when you became pregnant," Jake indicated Josh.
"I was."
"Upon discovering you were pregnant, he put you away from him." Jake towered over her and Josh slipped her behind him.
"I divorced her before I knew she was with child. You can read the dates on the bill. Do not threaten my family," Josh growled.
"You could have discovered the fact in many ways, including the obvious--" Jake's accusation drifted off. "Mira, tell the Court who is the father of this child'."
Mira stepped out from behind Josh. "No man is the father of my son."
The assembly, Sadducee and Pharisee, did not like her answer.
"You were alone with Joshua at Date Home when the bride price was paid," Jake accused. "You were alone with Joshua at Branch. Joshua divorced you before he could have known your perfidy, unless he were the cause. He admits he committed adultery with your mother--admitted it twice, though he now recants. He adopted you to circumvent the law of the Temple. He--"
"Josh is not the father of this child," Mira interrupted. "It is a shame what he says about the other is not true," she whispered to Josh, just loudly enough that the Jake heard her also, beneath the roaring objections of the Court.
Hillel rose. "Cease!" the elder rabbi shouted with all the authority and volume of a much younger man. Gamaliel giggled with delight.
Hillel told Jake and Josh and Mira to be seated. When they did so, he attempted to bring some sense out of Jake's chaotic and complex accusations. "There are so many conflicting charges and testimonies, I am at a loss which to consider first. I defer to the young rabbi who came with the accused. Rabbi Eleazar, stand before us now and present the charges made."
Eli came forward, drew a deep breath, and began, "Mira is accused of adultery during the time of her betrothal, but before the completion of marriage."
Hillel nodded approvingly. "And the pertinent Law?"
"The accusation is two-fold: first, that the offense took place in Joachim's house at Branch. In this case: 'they shall bring out the damsel to the door of her father's house and the men of her city shall stone her with stones that she die: because she hath wrought folly on Israel to play the whore in her father's house.
"Or, alternatively, the rule of country and of town may apply: 'if a virgin betrothed is taken by a man in the city; Then ye shall bring them both out unto the gate of the city and ye shall stone them.'
"'But if a man find a betrothed damsel in the field and the man force her; then the man only that lay with her shall die, for the maiden cried out but there was none to be her savior.
Hillel frowned. "Which is the country and which the town?"
Eli inhaled, "Any case in which there was no one near enough to save the woman would be considered--"
Mira stood. "I did not cry out. I was not taken against my will."
"Well, then," Eli swallowed. "If a man be found lying with a woman married to an husband then they shall both of them die."
"And why is that?"
Eli hesitated. He knew the answer, but Master Hillel needed him to be stupid so the Council could be manipulated. "Because the woman betrays her husband," he answered incorrectly, but conveniently.Hillel's nostrils flared and he chewed the side of his mouth. "And if the woman is betrothed, but not yet married?"
"The same," Eli answered. "The betrothed is as a betrayed husband."
"And if the man who lies with the damsel is her betrothed?" Hillel asked the entire room. "Can a husband betray himself with his own wife?"
This was a point of great argument in the Sanhedrin: whether conjugal rights before marriage, but after betrothal were proper. Hillel had always argued that a woman accused of infidelity during the period of betrothal was thereby assumed to owe or at least allow those same favors to her betrothed, else how could betrayal of those favors be charged? And if the involved party were the woman's betrothed, then no betrayal was committed.
The northern country held with the old way of chastity prior to marriage, but in Judea, Hillel's argument held sway.
Eli mis-stepped, "If the offense were committed in Galilee, then Galilean interpretation of the Law should prevail, if in Judea, then Judean."
The young rabbi had brought up a point Hillel would have been happier to avoid. "Are we in Galilee?" Hillel asked.
No one answered the question which was no question. Eli wished he could cut out his tongue for his unthinking display of esoteric legality.
"When we hold court in Galilee, then we shall do so under northern Law, Eli. Not before. Which leaves us with your summary of the charges against Mira."
Eli folded his hands and squared his shoulders, blessing Master Hillel for saving him. From now on, he would follow Hillel's lead and stop trying to show off his knowledge. He repeated the first charge, "Mira is charged with adultery."
"And the child?" Hillel prompted.
Eli thought a moment. "The child is not charged, but as bastard, it will be punished. 'No mauzer will enter the Assembly of God even to the tenth generation."'
"And if the mother is killed?"
"Then the child will die. Innocent blood will be shed--"
Hillel did not let Eli finish, "Yes," he agreed vehemently. "And even the kittim do not do such a thing. Even the Romans do not kill the unborn babe."
This was so. Even a condemned slave, be she pregnant, was allowed to deliver before sentence was executed. The Assembly agreed Mira's case was an exception under Oral Law.
Hillel folded his arms and nodded at Eli to continue.
"Then there are the divers charges concerning Josh," Eli sighed. "Jake implies a history of bastardy, though it is judged as unproved, except this last concerning the widows Gamaliel's eyes batted shut and Hillel elbowed him.
"Judgment!" The boy woke with a start.
"Against the charge of adultery with the various widows Joshua has seen fit to house and support?" Hillel droned the question.
They found him not guilty.
Eli struggled. "We are left with the more complicated charges as follows: that Josh committed adultery with Mira's mother, Hannah, that Josh is the father of Mira, the sire of Mira, that Josh committed adultery with Mira, and that the babe she carries is her brother and her son and her bastard...Oh," Eli shook his head clear. "And that Josh betrothed his own bastard daughter and then divorced her after he got her with child, after which he compounded all that had gone before by proclaiming officially before the Temple that Mira was his true daughter. Joachim did not present the fact that Josh intends likewise to adopt Mira's child after it is born."
"It is an incoherent argument, Eli," Hillel commented. "But it is probably the best that can be done with these impossible charges. What is your thinking on the matter?"
Eli looked over at Josh and at Mira. He prayed silently for guidance. "It is my thinking that Josh is not Mira's father. It is my thinking that Josh is a kinder and more giving man than any I have known and that his kindnesses to those in need have been twisted by this cruel man to seem instead the foulest deeds." Eli stood before Jake. "This man cannot conceive of such kindness, so he suspects all men harbor the same cruel motives that he himself broods.
"I think that Mira is with child," Eli smiled. "However this has come to pass, God has blessed her with a son or a daughter, whose father waits only for his birth to claim him a true Son of Israel. A fourteenth son of the third triad, perhaps the last. A most auspicious child, this babe. No husband comes forward to denounce Mira, nor are there any witnesses of her adultery. No one accuses her except the father who begot her and then abandoned her.
"I choose to think that Josh is the true father of this babe, conceived during his betrothal to Mira, and not unlawful in this Court." Eli finished and waited.
"And the matter of Mira's divorce and adoption?" Hillel asked the final questions.
"I withdraw my signature from the bill of divorcement," Eli answered. "And since that nullifies the divorce, then the adoption is irrelevant. No man may adopt his own wife."
"It only remains that you affirm this version, Joshua." Hillel addressed Josh.
"I do affirm it," Josh took Mira's hand.
And there it might have ended, but Mira shook her head. "This is a lie."
Josh's eyes closed and a pained distortion marked his weathered features.
Eli bowed his head and Hillel grunted.
Jake stood up. "She is trying to protect him." His anger had clearly robbed him of all charity, a~ reason.
The Hall of Hewn Stone grumbled and bellowed.
"Mira," Hillel called her name softly. She was his very best student. "You know very well you have only to agree with Eli's premise and we can all retire to our various duties and you can return to Josh's house."
"I know, Master Hillel," she replied.
"Well then, Mira, why do you persist in your opposition?"
"Because it is the truth, Master," Mira said bravely. "You always taught me that without truth all else is meaningless."
And so he had. Hillel asked a last time, "Say you are innocent, Mira, and we will believe. Is not faith also truth?"
Mira stood and turned slowly, meeting their eyes directly. "False belief is worse than none at ail."
Hillel's eyes filled. He had taught her too well to save her own life. "There is a question raised of conflicting testimony. How is it to be decided?"
The High Priest rose like a treacherous storm. "The Law says such matters are decided by God and not Man."
Eli gasped. He was not alone. Mira's fate had been delivered out of their hands into the bejeweled talons of the Sadducee priests and the inflexible Written Law.
The prefect read from the ornate Torah scroll, "And the priest shall take holy water in an earthen vessel; and of the dust of the floor of the tabernacle the priest shall take, and put it into the water: And the priest shall set the woman before the Lord and uncover the woman's head, and the priest shall have in his hand the water that is bitter water and causeth the curse.
"And the priest shall charge her by an oath, and say unto the woman, If no man have lain with thee be thou free from this bitter water that causeth the curse." The prefect lost his place in the reading and hesitated.
Mira sighed. "If thou be defiled and some man have lain with thee, then the priest shall charge the woman with an oath of cursing, The Lord make thee a curse and an oath among thy people, when the Lord doth make thy thigh to rot and thy belly to swell. And the priest shall write these curses in a book and he shall blot them out with the bitter water, and he shall then cause the woman to drink the bitter water."
The entire table gaped at her perfect and courageous recitation of her sentence.
Little Gamaliel clapped in appreciation. Hillel took his grandson's hands in his own and held them up to his cheek. "Shh," he said, as much to himself and his sad old heart, as to the boy.
Josh stood with Mira, "There is no charge upon my wife that is not laid directly upon my own head. If you charge her with adultery then also do you charge me with the same."
Cleopas grabbed for Josh's robe, "Don't do this! You cannot help her by dying also!"
But Josh would not be dissuaded. Some insanity had gripped him during Mira's recitation, and he was determined not to abandon her, as all the rest had, simply because she refused to lie.Jake, conversely, sat emotionless, a rigor which might have been a smile twisting his thin mouth.
Even Master Hillel could not make Josh reconsider. "We have a man who confesses to adultery," he said finally. "What is the punishment?"
The murmur formed a single word: stoning.
Gamaliel leaped to his feet before his grandpa could catch him. "No, no, no," he squealed. "If the punishment for 'dultry is bitter waters for one, then it cannot be more for the same crime.
"Gamaliel may not understand the particulars of this charge," Hillel motioned his grandson back to his seat. "And his a fortiori is perhaps not what it might be, but his argument has merit. If we allow Mira the grace of God's Judgment, then we must allow Joshua the same grace, for the same transgression."
The majority of the hall agreed, but some of the assembly dissented, most notably, the Sadducees. "There is no provision for so sentencing a man," was the gist of their argument.
"Nevertheless," was the gist of Hillel's.
And that was how Josh found himself in the midst of the Sanhedrin standing before the Holy of Holies in the bright sun of his last day on Earth. His earlier determination had deserted him and he could not think now why he had cast his life away so carelessly, abandoning his family for no reasonable cause.
He was more ashamed than afraid, more concerned for Mira than for himself. Josh wished they had not made Cleopas do this, though. The prefect had decided Cleopas could best prove his own innocence of this whole affair by presiding over the ceremony.
Cleopas was clearly miserable, despite Josh's assurances that no blame would be laid at his feet, just so long as he took care of the children--and Mira, should she survive. Josh did not doubt that the baby would die. The poison was made for the purpose of causing miscarriage.
Cleopas finished the mixing of the water and blotted the poisoned ink, wringing it into the bowl. Josh felt his jaw go rigid as his brother reached for Mira's veil. Cleopas was so nervous and undone, he could not get it off. Mira patted his hand calmly away. She removed her own veil, folding it neatly and setting it on the altar beside the bowl. The Sanhedrin, and not Mira, was embarrassed by display of the loose ebon fall of her hair, her true veil. She said the words of the curse, lifted the bowl, and drank.
Then Mira set the empty bowl down and her part was finished.
Josh watched them lead her away towards the northern wall. They could not take the chance Mira would lose the babe before the Holy and defile the entire Temple. She would be staying at the Annex until whatever happened, happened.
Josh waited for his brother to mix the waters again and when the bowl was set upon the altar the ritual came to an abrupt halt.
There was no curse for a man to say. Josh could hardly dare God to cause him to abort as a sign of his iniquity. The entire Sanhedrin was at a loss as to what was proper. Hillel shrugged, but he did not remove his palm which was resting over Gamaliel's eager mouth.
Josh was suddenly inspired, "Mira said without truth there was no meaning. May God strike me dead--in whichever hideous fashion--if this is not the truth." As long as he lived--Josh prayed it would be long--so long as he survived, his word would be truth, not as prophesy, but as revelation. Josh was not the sort to be giddy, but he felt the sudden rush of power as if it were consummation.
"This is the truth," he began again, each of his words carrying the force of creation. "That I am innocent of any transgression. That Mira, though with child, is not known by any man. That the son--" Mira had called the babe such for so long, why not make It truth? "That the son she bears is my own true son, sent to me from God the Father of Us All."
Josh lifted the bowl, but he did not drink. He waited for the scribes to catch up with him. One more truth. "That Joachim is the cruelest man in all of Israel, an embarrassment to God Himself. His only saving grace being that, in a dismal spasm of marital duty, he sired a daughter whose presence in the world is a constant, sweet reminding of all that we once were and might be again."
He drank the water quickly. Bitter was hardly a fair description. "Rancid" was the word came to mind. The mere taste of it made him nauseous, but sheer stubbornness kept him from spewing. There followed a long walk--more a humiliating processional--out of the city and south, beyond Bread Home to a cave in the hills above the Shepherd's Field, near the tomb of Rachel.
Josh sat alone in the dark cave and waited to be sick.
So much for the short-lived thrill of creation. So much for truth.
Now was the time for somber reality and the ultimate purpose of all life.
Now was the time for death.