The Secret Magdalene Read online

  “For the Voice within you. The ancients called such a one as you Pure Mother Bee, as they called all the queens who ruled in the age of the matriarchs.” I would that I had not asked, for I clearly see that Salome hurts not also to be called Queen Bee. Seth speaks on, “I say the Sicarii are fools and I fear them, for by their bloodletting they would destroy us all, Jews as well as Nazorean. Because of this, we of the inner Nazorean keep to ourselves as much as possible. As for what those who have broken with us call themselves, most are now the Poor. Or they are the men of Issa, Issa-ene or Essene. They await the Anointed One.”

  “But the Nazorean do not await a warrior king?”

  “The true Nazoreans look for the coming perfection of man, a transformation of being the like of which has never been seen on this earth.”

  I am dazzled by the thought of such a messiah. A perfection of man? I am suddenly struck by what the Loud Voice said, I shall make myself known to thee through the one who appears as a Shepherd among Lambs, through the one who stands forth as a Lion. Has a voice in me prophesied the Messiah of the Nazorean? Frantic that somehow I have something to do with such things, I signal Salome, but she does not see me. “This Issa,” she says, “I would hear of him.”

  Seth answers her, “I will tell you what is said of Issa, to show what men make of a man who confounds them. There are those who claim Issa was born of a virgin called Mari, that he was not human but divine, that he performed miracles and raised the dead, that he was crucified, taken up into heaven, and that he will come again as the Messiah.”

  Salome shouts with laughter. “But as you are true Israelites and not pagans, surely you cannot believe this?”

  “Issa was a son of man. As we all are. Is this not miracle enough?” Seth then turns his attention to Addai, saying, “It is not long before we must leave this place.”

  Later this night, as we prepare our meager blankets for sleep, and close the dusty flap to our small tent, I whisper to Salome, “It is not long before we too must leave this place.”

  A large caravan is in from the north. It is said this caravan will be among us for three days and three nights, and then will continue on to Gaza, the gateway to Egypt. Gaza is a Greek city, which means that though it is full of Jews, it is also full of everyone else. It is a cosmopolis, a universal city. In it live poets and philosophers and satirists. This is all we need to hear. When the caravan leaves, Salome and I mean to go with it.

  On the second evening of the caravan’s arrival, a strange cold makes the air seem solid, as if we could step off the cliffs over the Sea of Salt and walk away on cold alone. In the third hour of the night, Salome and I sneak as close as we dare to the fire of the camel drivers and the muleteers. These are camped outside the west wall and the hubbub they make is more than the entire wilderness at its noisiest. We shelter behind the bulk of a sleeping camel, huddle against its flank for warmth. Yea Balaam, but camels stink! We peek over its skinny curve of a neck. There is more than one fire, for this is a large caravan. There must be five or six fires. There are women and children around one, what seem fairly wealthy merchants around another, simple travelers around a farther two, and off near the cliffs there are three tents that stand by themselves. There are camels with hoodahs on their backs, the largest of which is shrouded all in black. We should certainly spy on these first, all three tents look finer than any Father has, and as for hoodahs—Eloi! Eloi! Eloi! What do I see! The daggerman who stabbed the Temple priest is mere cubits from our camel!

  Like a great tree, he stands planted before the sparking campfire, the skin of his thick legs and his thick arms and his thick neck and his fat cheeks above his black beard as ruddy as a roasted calf in the fire glow. Before our eyes, he boasts of his killing. He describes the stabbing of Ben Azar to a circle of seated men, all leaning toward him. We hear the man’s name: Simon of Capharnaum. In a voice thick with the unpleasant accent of Galilee, Simon of Capharnaum shouts out that he has killed other priests in other towns. He proclaims that he has killed Roman soldiers. He has burned whole villages of those he thought loved Rome. He killed a man in Jericho because the man was a Jew and would not be cut. He swears he would kill any Jew who polluted the Law, any Roman who suppressed those who kept it. “I have a brother and a son and a dozen cousins who would do as I do!” So shouting, he pulls a man to his feet, a man who looks nothing like him and is a full head shorter. This man glances round as if someone would kill him, and is speechless at the prospect. “This is my brother Andrew, a man every bit as righteous as myself!” Simon shoves his brother back down again, and here he stops his shouting long enough to glare about him. There comes a dreadful moment when I think he can see us behind our camel. No one moves; no one dares say a word as he tells them that the Lord will bring about the Last Days and that is certain, but he will not bring it with plague or with flood, no! He will bring it through the righteous anger of his Sons of Light. He tells them that he, Simon of Capharnaum, does God’s work, and that he waits for a man, a very king! “And then! And then! ‘We will make the people drunk with the Lord’s fury!’”

  I see men listening who have long argued that no man can act for God. I see the ear biter who has forever sworn that the Anointed One has already come and he is Zakkai the Hidden. I see the man with one ear who claims he is a certain Judah the Priest. I see men who love John the Baptizer. Any moment, one or all of these men will surely leap up and run to Jerusalem in a night so that they might smite a Roman.

  Now he is telling them what occurs up in Jerusalem, and as I listen my throat closes in fear. Simon and his brother are not only stabbing priests in the Temple, they are breaking into the houses of the rich. Simon swears that soon they will not just plunder the rich, they will kill them, and he laughs that the priests and the Sanhedrin and Rome stand helpless. I am frantic with concern for Father. Simon promises the robbing and the killing will go on until all righteous men will take heart, and arise. Then they will drive Rome and men like my father, children of the pit, from the land. The men who hear him snarl and shout out curses. Their hatred thickens the air until I cannot breathe.

  I reach into the mind of this Galilean daggerman. It is as hot as his breath and as red as his rage. But to steal a man’s life and call it good? Father taught us no such thing. Our reading of philosophy has taught us no such thing. My heart tells me no such thing. Are these men right and all others wrong? If they do God’s work, has God gone mad?

  I feel as if my illness is with me again, I feel as if I will once more sink into the heated dark where the shouts of this world become whispers.

  “Come away,” Salome hisses. “We will wait for the next caravan.”

  In that instant, a hand comes down on my shoulder, and I see an arm go round Salome’s slender neck. “What is this!” shouts the owner of the arm. The hand on my shoulder is a vise, its grip so strong I think my bone must break under it. We are shoved forward, out into the light of the campfire.

  And all we can see is Simon of Capharnaum.

  His hand is instantly under his mantle in threat. There must be a hundred fevered men here, and of these most are not his men, but men from the settlement. “And who are these among you?” he asks.

  There comes a great stirring among the men of the settlement. Most of them know us; all know Seth and Addai. I cannot follow so many minds at once—what are they thinking? Simon has asked the men holding us to bring us closer. “Mere boys, eh? You would hear the talk of men?”

  Salome does not dare to open her mouth. If this man were to find we are not boys, but girls, what should he do? What should all these men do? Simon turns his huge face to mine. I am close enough to smell his breath, made rotten by the stump of a broken eyetooth. I am so close he can poke me in the chest, saying, “Speak up, boy!” As he touches me, there comes over his face a puzzlement. His thoughts have not caught up with what the flesh of his finger is telling him, but they might.

  “Tell me your name so I should not forget it. And tell me the name of
this other, so that I might not forget his name.”

  Salome finds the strength and the wit to say, “His name is John of the family of Seth of Damascus. My name is Simon of the family of Seth of Damascus. He is my brother. Why do you question him?”

  I am amazed at how she sounds—like a proud youth caught in a prank.

  At the name of Seth of Damascus, the eyes of this Simon narrow. “Seth of Damascus,” he mutters more to himself than to us, “how comes young kin of a Maccabee to the wilderness?” And then, with a suddenness that catches me completely unprepared, he grabs my upper arm and shakes me, glaring about the campsite, picking out faces in the intently listening crowd. “Is there a Maccabee here? Is there another who is blood to such?”

  My thoughts scramble for grip. Seth is a Maccabee? Our Seth is come from the Great Family of Heroes who took back the Temple of Solomon and seized the throne of Israel for the first time since the days of David and Solomon! By all the stars, how wonderful! Is not Hanukkah observed to celebrate the rededication of the Temple by Judas Maccabeus? And yet how sad. For the Maccabee were later sought out and killed by Herod the Great. No wonder Seth is held in such high regard!

  A great fuss comes among the men of the settlement as someone pushes forward from the back. I pray it is Seth, and breathe again as they make room for his coming because it is Seth. Right behind him walks Addai. And though my joy at their arrival is immense, I find that I am still privy to the thoughts of Simon. This Galilean is a jumble of contradictions. He is both brave as a bull, yet craven as a stoat. He believes himself a man of vision, yet longs to see. He would follow the first man who promised him what his heart desires, but he could not name his heart’s true desire. He is full of hatred, yet yearns to know love. I pity him. I am afraid of him because he would crush my pity if he knew it. To him, Addai as a Samaritan is not worth a single thought, but he knows Seth. He fears him. He wonders: Could this man lead to the coming king? Could he be that king? Should he align himself with a Maccabee? Or shun him?

  I have never touched a mind so calculated and so conflicted.

  “I am kin, Simon Peter of Galilee,” says Seth. “Is there reason you find fault with John and with Simon? If so, I shall answer for them.”

  With a gesture, Seth requires Simon to loose his grip and I find I am as well released from Simon’s thoughts. The relief could not be more profound. As Addai gathers us up, pushes us away, my last glimpse of Seth is as he speaks to a man who has stood beyond the light of the fire, one who comes forward, and places his hand on Seth’s shoulder while all others give them room. Eloi, but I have seen him before! I have seen also the one who shadows him, as alike to his brother as one grain of millet is to another. The brothers have hair and beard of Thracian red, and I saw them last standing near to Simon of Capharnaum as he stabbed the Temple priest not once, but thrice. As I am pulled away, I hear Seth name them in greeting: Yehoshua and Jude.

  When we are once more near our own tent and he is sure we are not followed nor overheard, Addai rounds on us. His voice is low but his passion high. “What you do and who you are affects more than your own skins!” Salome hangs her head. By this, I know she knows his anger is just. I too hang my head. “If you are found to be females, what would happen to Seth who has spoken for you?”

  “It would not go well,” I say to him.

  “Not well! It would go badly, very badly.”

  He closes our tent flap, commands that we remain inside, that he will be back, and until he is, we are to speak to no one. All we are to do is to wait.

  And then he is gone, and Salome and I are left gaping. Salome says “Why do Addai and Seth do this? Who are we to them that we endanger them so?”

  My very thought. Indeed, why should they?

  THE FOURTH SCROLL

  Daughters of the Nazorean

  Though the camp and the caravan settle in all around us, though fires burn low and it is sure by now that everyone sleeps, Salome and I are frantically whispering. By Isis, where shall we be tomorrow? Still here, waiting for another caravan? Should we choose other than Egypt? We cannot go back to Jerusalem for Father would not take us back into his house. Perhaps north to the true Damascus? Or better yet, Tarsus! I long to see Tarsus, the city of Posidonius, the great astronomer, who devised a machine to show the workings of the sun and the planets and even the stars. Were Tarsus ever mentioned in front of Nicodemus, he would sputter. “Mysteries and abominations!”

  Oh yes, I should love to go to Tarsus.

  I am suggesting leaving it in the hands of a god or a goddess when Addai suddenly pokes his head into our tent, completely unexpected. “Hush and rise up. I have someone I wish you to meet.”

  I shut my mouth in the middle of a hissed word. “Who?” asks Salome.

  “A great teacher,” he replies, already walking away.

  A teacher? Immediately we throw warm mantles over our youth’s tunics and hurry after Addai. We reach the same gate in the wall we reached the first day ever we saw this place, and enter it. Once again we are in the courtyard of the small sundial. Near the tower he stops us. “Sicarii,” he whispers, pointing up as we press ourselves to the stones. I look up. Above us, a watchman by night passes along the edge of the top of the tower. But this is not Sicarii; this is merely a zealous man. Suddenly, I am chilled by understanding—all of them are Sicarii. They are all terrorists and killers! This is why there is no easy entrance to the tower, why there are no houses or bedchambers here. This is why our camp sits high on a cliff set back from the Sea of Salt. How foolish I have been, not to have realized this sooner. These are the very men Rome would seek out and destroy. Eloi! Eloi! We are in a seething nest of them.

  When the daggerman moves away from the lip of the tower roof, Addai edges along the tower wall, around the jutting of a small storage room, then slips through a door in a farther wall, and we slip through too. We find ourselves in a perfectly square room that is mostly a set of steep stone steps leading up to the tower roof. Here, it is darker than the moonless night. Following Addai, we move quickly through this square room of steps and into a long rectangle of a room that lies on the opposite side of our entrance. Addai holds his finger to his flat nose and stands waiting. It is not long before we know why. Seth comes in out of the dark of the evening. He does not look at us. But I look at Salome, and she agrees. He is still very angry. A moment later, Tata steps into the room. Tata? What great goings-on are these? Tata glances our way but makes no other sign that singles us out. I fully expect Ananias to enter as well, but he does not; instead comes a woman whose head is covered. The woman lights a small earthenware oil lamp, cupping her hand round the flame, and by this, I see that her skin is as black as pitch. I poke Salome, but Salome is glaring at Tata, offended that Tata betrays us by keeping a secret. But what is the secret?

  The woman as black as the night guides us to a door. Behind it there are only steps hewn into solid rock. The steps lead down into rooms below, storage rooms lined with bins full of foodstuffs, things that are better preserved by the chill and the dark. By the flickering light of one small lamp, no one of us speaks, no one moves. Are we hiding? Salome and I glance at each other; she makes one of our signs: if so, from whom?

  The woman of the south walks forward, toward long-necked jars of oil and baskets of last summer’s grain. She and Seth together move a certain heavy pot and then the larger one behind it. Behind this is a wall of stone, rougher and older than all other walls. Seth moves this stone and she that stone, and then, to my utter amazement, a door opens through which he and Tata and the woman I hear them call Helena promptly disappear.

  “Go,” we hear Addai say. “It will take you where only the Few may go.”

  I duck my head and wriggle through the hole in the wall, Salome right behind me, to find that we go not to another room, but into a tunnel, a bore going down through the stone in which there are very narrow and very steep steps. I keep hold of Salome until we reach a bottom, far underground. It is cool down here and so
unds echo. Addai shoos us along another tunnel after Seth and Tata and Helena whose light is far ahead.

  We follow them, passing other chambers to our left and to our right, until we come on one that is perfectly round. Instantly my heart races with joy. I care nothing that there are stone benches here, or that lamps are placed high in the round walls, or that there is a round bath in the middle of the round room. What matters are the books halfway from floor to ceiling. Books! Here is where Seth finds books! And here I notice the ceiling. A vaulted dome, round as the heavens and full of painted stars. There is the moon and there is the sun, both shining in the sign of Pisces, the Fish. And in the middle, a sign. It seems also a fish, but a fish made of two circles. What does it mean?

  In this vaulted chamber wait two others. One has the face of an actor—there is certainly an actor’s conceit written on it. But the other stands as tall as a ladder and as thin as a rung and I know him immediately. He was the ancient who pushed himself forward in the house of Heli of the Way when the Loud Voice spoke. Salome kicks my ankle. By this, I know she knows him too. We both think, Surely this cannot be the great teacher?

  The old man folds himself onto one of two stone benches at the edge of the pool; the others sit here or there. There seems no ordering of class or worthiness. There is only the feeling that since the old man has seated himself, so too shall the others.

  But not us.

  Addai signals that Salome is to remain on her feet, that she is to continue silent. This too I must do. Then he himself takes a seat near to Tata so that my friend and I now stand alone. I am jumping with nerves. Where is the great teacher, the sage, the tzadik? Will he appear from one of the tunnels? In my mind’s eye, I conjure up someone greater than the magician Hanina ben Dosa or the sorceress Megas. Will he strike us dumb? Or will he answer our questions? Will he tell us whose books these are? Beside me, I feel Salome tremble.