Now and then my eyes rolled up. I saw the golden linen of the tent snapping in the wind. On went the washing.
"Some soup, my lord," said the woman beside me. "Only a little for you have been starving."
I drank.
"No more. You sleep."
And beneath the tent I did.
The desert cooled, but I never lacked for robes or blankets. Soup again, take this, and then sleep. Soup, just a taste. And then their voices far off collected in gentle agitation.
Morning came.
I watched it with one eye from this silken pillow. I saw it rise and push the darkness up and up until the darkness was gone and the whole world was light, and the shade of the tent was cool and sheltering.
Ravid stood before me.
"My lord, my sister has asked to come to you. We ask that you come home with us, that you allow us to care for you until you're well, that you stay with us under our roof in Magdala."
I sat up. I was clothed in linen robes, robes trimmed in embroidered leaf and flower. I wore a soft bleached mantle with a thick border.
I smiled.
"My lord, what can we do for you? You have given back to us our beloved sister."
I put out my arms to Ravid.
He knelt down and held me fast. "My lord," he said. "She remembers now. She knows her sons are dead, that her husband is dead. She has wept for them and she'll weep again, but she's our sister."
He renewed his invitation. Micha had come and he too pressed me.
"You're weak, my lord, you're weak though the demons obey you," said the older brother. "You need meat and drink and rest. You've done this wondrous thing. Let us restore you."
This one, Micha, got down on his knees. He held a pair of new sandals in his hands, sandals studded with brilliant buckles. And he did now what I'm sure he'd never done in all his life as a man. He buckled these sandals to my feet.
The women stood apart. In their midst stood Mary.
She came forward step by step, as if ready at any moment for me to forbid it. She stopped a few feet from me. The rising sun was behind her. She was clean and wrapped in fresh linen robes, her hair bound beneath her veil, her face still for all its scratches and fading bruises.
"And the Lord has blessed me, and forgiven me, and brought me back from the powers of darkness," she said.
"Amen," I said.
"What shall I do to repay you?"
"Go on to the Temple," I said. "That was the direction of your journey. You'll see me again. You'll know when I need your assistance. But for now, I must be on my way. I must return to the river."
She didn't know what this meant, but the two brothers did. They helped me to my feet.
"Mary," I said to her again, and I reached for her hand. "Look. The world is new. You see?"
Faint smile.
"I see it, Rabbi," she said.
"Embrace your brothers," I said. "And when you see the beautiful gardens of Jericho, stand there and look at the gardens around you."
"Amen, Rabbi," she said.
The servants brought me the tightly wrapped bundle of my ruined clothes, my broken sandals. They broke me a walking stick.
"Where do you go?" asked Ravid.
"To see my kinsman John bar Zechariah at the river . . . northward. I have to find him."
"Be quick and be careful, my lord," said Ravid. "He's made the King very angry. They say his days won't be very many."
I nodded. I embraced one after the other of those present, the brothers, the women, the slaves who'd bathed me. I raised my hand in farewell to the wary bearers who stood in the shade of the palms.
There were offers of gold, offers of food, offers of wine for the road. I took nothing, except a final, delicious drink of water.
I looked down at my new tunic and my splendid robe. I looked at the finely crafted sandals. I smiled. "Such soft clothing," I whispered. "I've never seen myself dressed in this manner."
Dry hiss of the desert wind.
"It's nothing, my lord, it's the least, the very least," said Ravid, and the others joined their declarations with his and he repeated them.
"You've been too kind to me," I said. "You've dressed me as I should be dressed, because I'm on my way to a wedding."
"My lord, eat slowly and very little each time," said the woman who'd fed me. "You are gaunt and feverish."
I kissed her fingers and nodded.
I started northward.
Chapter Twenty-Four
AS BEFORE, the air of jubilation gripped those at the river, encompassing the pilgrims who came and went. The crowds were even larger than before, and the number of soldiers had greatly increased, with bands of Romans standing here and there, and many of the King's soldiers watching warily, though no one seemed to take notice of them.
The Jordan was flowing swiftly here and full. We were just south of the sea.
My cousin John sat on a rock beside the stream, and watched his disciples as they baptized the kneeling men and women.
Suddenly John looked up, as if pulled out of his thoughts by some sudden realization.
He looked across the river at me as I came walking along slowly, slipping through the porous crowd, my eyes fixed on him.
He stood and pointed his finger.
"The Lamb of God!" he cried. "The Lamb of God who takes away the sins of the world."
It was a trumpet blast turning every head.
My younger cousin John bar Zebedee gave over the conch from his hands into John's hands.
I held the eyes of John bar Zechariah for a moment. I glanced slowly, deliberately, at the masses of soldiers to my left and then at those to my right. John lifted his chin. He gave a small nod. I returned the nod.
A shiver passed over me. A darkness rose as if the distant mountains had climbed Heavenward and blotted out the sun. The gleaming river was gone. The radiant face of John was gone. My heart was cold and small. But then it grew warmer and I felt it beating. The sun struck the water again and set it afire. John bar Zebedee and another disciple were coming towards me.
The crowd thundered with its usual eager and happy voices.
"Where are you lodging, Rabbi?" asked John bar Zebedee. "I'm your kinsman."
"I know who you are," I said. "Come and see. I go to Capernaum. I go to lodge with the toll collector."
I kept walking. My young cousin deluged me with questions. "My lord, what is it you want us to do? My lord, we are your servants. Tell us, Lord, what do you want of us."
I answered all this with a soft laugh. We had hours before we would reach Capernaum.
Now my sister Little Salome lived in Capernaum. She was a widow with a little son, and lived with her husband's family, who were kin to us and to Zebedee. And I wanted to go to her.