"You know that after you left for Egypt, you, Mary and Joseph and the little one, Herod was of restless and cruel mind."
"Yes," said Cleopas. "Out with it." He began to cough again.
"And you know that John was born to me and to Zechariah when both of us were in our extreme old age, as were Sarah and Abraham when Isaac was born." She stopped and looked to each and every one of us little ones who were in the inner circle and we nodded that we understood. "You know of Hannah's prayer for a child, do you not, children, when she stood before the Lord at Shiloh praying, and who was it that thought she was drunken, can you tell me, any of you?"
"Eli the priest," said Silas quickly. "And she told him that she was praying and why she was praying, and he prayed for her as well."
"Yes," said Elizabeth, "and so I too often prayed, but what you may not know, all you young ones, is that the birth of my child was foretold."
I had not known it. And I could see that the others had not known it. As for John, he sat quietly, watching his mother, but it seemed nothing was disturbing him and he was deep in his thoughts.
"Well, how that is explained to you, I leave it up to your fathers, because there are reasons not to speak of it, but I will say only that it was known that the child came to us late in life by the will of Heaven, and when he was born I consecrated him to the Lord. You will see that no razor has ever touched his head, and he takes nothing of the grape. He belongs to the Lord."
"The Lord of the Essenes?" asked Cleopas.
"Let her speak," said my mother. "Do you forget everything you know?"
He was quiet.
Elizabeth went on.
Again she looked at each and all. And no one spoke, all of us waiting to see what all this could mean.
"We are of the House of David," Elizabeth said. "And you know that Herod so hated all of us, and any of us with the faintest claim to royal blood, that he burned all the records in the Temple by which everyone suffered the loss of the archives in which the names of all their ancestors had been written for all time.
"And you know what happened before you went to Egypt, you know what sent my beloved cousin Mary and her newborn into Egypt with Joseph and with you, Cleopas. You know perfectly well."
I didn't dare to ask the question that was on my lips. I didn't know what had sent us into Egypt! But she went on.
"King Herod had his watchers everywhere," she said, her voice getting rougher and deeper.
"We know this," said my mother softly. She lifted her hand just a little, and her cousin Elizabeth took her hand and held it and they nodded at one another, their veils almost touching, as if telling each other without words a secret.
Then Elizabeth said,
"Now, Herod's men, his soldiers, rough as those thieves who just came into our village, into this very house thinking to rob us for their petty wars, soldiers like that came into the very Temple and sought out my Zechariah to ask him about the son born to him, the son of the House of David. They would see this son for themselves."
"We knew nothing of this," Joseph said in a whisper.
"I told you I would not write this in a letter," said Elizabeth. "I had to wait until you came. What was done could not be undone. Now they accosted him in the Temple, these soldiers, as he came out of the Sanctuary where he had fulfilled his duty as it was his time as a priest. And do you think he would tell them where to find his son? He had already hidden me away with the baby. We had gone into the caves near the Essenes and they had brought food to us. And he wouldn't tell these soldiers where we were.
"They pushed him and knocked him to his knees, and this right outside the Sanctuary, and the other priests could not stop them. And do you think they even tried? Do you think the scribes came to his defense? Do you think the chief priests came to protest?"
Now my cousin Elizabeth's eyes were fixed on me. Slowly she looked at Joseph and Mary, and then again at each and every one listening. "They beat Zechariah. They beat him because he would say nothing, and with one fine blow to his head, they killed him. Right before the Lord."
We waited in silence as she went on.
"Many saw what happened. But they didn't know the reason for it. Some of the priests knew. And they sent word to me. Our kinsmen were told, and they told other kinsmen and some came to the Essenes and told. And I was told."
All were dazed by this terrible news. My mother leaned forward and put her head on the shoulder of Elizabeth, and Elizabeth held her. But then Elizabeth drew herself up, and so did my mother, and Elizabeth spoke on.
"The kinsmen of Zechariah, all of them priests, saw to his burial with his ancestors," she said. "And do you think I have gone into the Temple since? Not till you came to Jerusalem. Not till the tyrant was dead, and gone to eternal fire. Not till the stories of Yeshua and John were forgotten, and what do we find when we go before the Lord?"
No one dared to answer her.
"He goes to the Essenes and soon. There he will be hidden. Now you take your leave of me and go on to Nazareth before more bandits come through here. I have nothing for them to take. I'm old and John is little, and they'll leave us in peace. But I won't see you again. No. And surely John is meant to hear the voice of the Lord. He is consecrated to the Lord, and the Essenes know that he is under the vow. And they will take care of him and he'll study until the time comes for him. Now you, you go."
Chapter 9
Herod's soldiers, the bandits, the man killed in the Temple, my cousin killed in the Temple, a priest killed searching for the whereabouts of a child, and my cousin was the child.
Yeshua and John. Why was he foretold, and why were we linked, and behind it all was the great question: What had happened in Bethlehem? What had happened, and was it the thing that had made my family go to Egypt where I'd lived all my life?
But I couldn't think now except in bursts of curiosity and fear. The fear became part of my thinking. The fear became part of the story. My cousin Zechariah, a priest with gray hairs, being kicked by the soldiers of Herod. And here we were in the village that was filled with the angry voices of those who'd been robbed by the bandits, and expected more of the same.
We found our beasts still tethered on the outskirts. An old woman without teeth stood there laughing.
"They tried to steal them!" she cried. "But the animals wouldn't move." She bowed her head and slapped her knees as she laughed. "They couldn't make them move." And an old man who was sitting in the dirt beside a small house was laughing too.