Second Touch (8 page)

inquired. Simon saw the high priest’s fingers twitch. Simon lifted his gloved hands in denial. “No, no. Yeshua merely went on to say, ‘Neither of them had the money to pay him back, so he canceled the debts of both.’ ” “Anarchist,” Caiaphas muttered. “Proceed.” Simon stared off toward the Temple, now rose hued from the twilight banners streaking the sky. “Looking right at me—he has a most direct gaze that cuts right through you—he asked me this question: ‘Now which of them will love him more?’ Naturally I said, ‘I suppose the one who had the bigger debt canceled.’ ” “Are you certain it ¬wasn’t the offer of a bribe?” Caiaphas said suspiciously. “It sounds like one.” “Listen,” Simon urged a trifle brusquely. “Yeshua said to me, ‘You have judged correctly.’ Said that to me, like patting a Torah schoolchild on the head for answering how many days there were of creation!” Simon’s indignation came roaring in full force as recollection overwhelmed him. “Yeshua raised his palm toward the woman in a gesture of blessing . . . blessing that creature! But it was still to me he spoke when he said, ‘Do you see this woman?’ As if I had been able to take my eyes off her since she first arrived! Then Yeshua criticized me—me, not her! He said, ‘I came into your house. You did not give me any water for my feet, but she wet my feet with her tears and wiped them with her hair. You did not give me a kiss of welcome, but this woman has not stopped kissing my feet. You did not put oil on my head, but she has poured perfume on my feet.’ ” Simon interrupted himself. “Well, of course I hadn’t offered to wash his feet. Part of his reputation is that he has no regard for proper washing. I wanted to see if he would ask for a basin, but he ¬didn’t do that. And of course I ¬didn’t put oil on his head. Why would I signal to my associates that I honored this charlatan, this demon?” Caiaphas waived dismissively. By the high priest’s expression Simon saw that self-justification was not of interest. “And then?” the high priest pressed. “Get to the point.” Simon, flushed with anger and smarting from the remembered rebuke, continued, “Yeshua said, ‘I tell you, her many sins have been forgiven—for she loved much. But he who has been forgiven little loves little.’ Then he took her hand. As if he hadn’t endured enough of her foul touch, he deliberately took her hand and said, ‘Your sins are forgiven.’ ” “He said that?” Caiaphas’ eyebrows slammed together like two rams butting heads. Simon nodded emphatically. “While I and my esteemed friends challenged this aloud. After all, who is this country preacher to proclaim when someone’s sins are forgiven? While we were still in shock, wondering if we hadn’t heard correctly, Yeshua spoke again. as if to deliberately remove any doubt. To the woman he said, loudly enough for the servants in the kitchen to hear, ‘Your faith has saved you; go in peace.’ ”

Simon’s scalp prickled with his rage, and he tugged furiously at his ear. “Challenged the quality of my hospitality, challenged the sincerity of my religion. Then praised this harlot, this whore. Held her up to me and my guests as a shining example of faith!” “You’ve not yet told me who she was,” Caiaphas inquired. “¬I’m sorry; I thought I mentioned it before,” Simon apologized. “It was Miryam of Magdala.” “Just as my other sources suggested,” Caiaphas noted. “But I thank you for this confirmation. Is it true that she’s since sold property to support Yeshua?” “Yes,” Simon confirmed. “And turned her home in Magdala into a refuge for beggar children and unwed mothers with their fatherless whelps. It encourages wickedness of the worst kind.” “And she has been seen traveling with Yeshua since then,” Caiaphas added. “Still we cannot arrest him for lechery. But claiming to forgive sin; that’s something else again. Is that all?” Simon agreed that it was. “You can imagine what a babbling uproar followed. In the confusion the woman disappeared. And through it all Yeshua remained uncannily serene, as if he’d said or done nothing wrong—nothing at all! This from the same devil who called my brother Pharisees ‘whitewashed tombs full of dead men’s bones’!”16 Calling for a servant, who approached with a lighted torch, Caiaphas abruptly ended the interview. He was apparently not interested in insults leveled against Pharisees. “Thank you for your time,” he commended Simon. “We wish for you to return to the Galil immediately. Follow Yeshua. Challenge his teaching whenever opportunity presents itself.” “At your service,” Simon acknowledged in a shaky voice, puffing as if he’d just completed a footrace. “For the high priest of Israel.” With a curt nod, Caiaphas acknowledged the deference. As he stalked away he called over his shoulder, “Help yourself to some of the early figs. The ones near the southern wall are quite nice.” Smoothing his beard with both hands, Simon sought to calm down. His pulse was racing and his head throbbed. Ignoring the empty basket extended by the servant, Simon stared over the wall, past Jerusalem’s city barricades, and down into the Valley of Hinnom beyond. It was there that ancient idol worshippers had burned infants alive in the fires of Molech. Now it was merely a garbage heap, a shallow depression where refuse was dumped and burned. Accepting the wicker container half full of ripe figs, Simon surveyed the high priest’s palace once more before departing. Caiaphas was right about his ability and ambition: He had risen very far above his origins indeed. On the way out of the high priest’s compound Simon passed another man arriving. They bowed curtly to each other. It was a few paces into the lane before Simon remembered the new arrival’s identity: Eglon, reportedly the hired assassin of Herod Antipas. Despite the tokens of friendship presented by Caiaphas, the skin on the

back of Simon’s neck prickled.

5 “When your mama has her baby, who do you think will die?” It was a question in the minds of many more than these three small boys who trailed after Lily and Cantor. Little Baruch was troubled by the thought that the birth of a new baby in his family could cause the death of someone living in the Valley. He frowned. “Who says anybody’s going to die?” A childish treble piped, “It’s the way it always is with us lepers. When a new prisoner ¬comes Inside from Outside, one of us Inside dies to make room. That’s all. So who will die, do you think?” “My baby brother won’t be a prisoner like us when he’s born. Not a leper. Not sick. He ¬comes from heaven, not from Outside. So. Not an outcast. Not a prisoner. Nobody has to die to make room for him.” Something to hope for, Lily thought. She glanced at Cantor. Did he hear the grim discussion? Deborah’s baby would not be a prisoner in the Valley of Mak’ob. Not outcast from the world. He would be new. Perfect. “There’s more than usual in there. Lying in the dying cave,” chirped the second boy. “Charities bring food to us. Dump it at the top of the Valley ¬every new moon. Like feeding caged animals. But there’s ¬only one road out of here for us. We’re prisoners until we die. And when a new one arrives? Somebody always dies.” This seemed to be more than coincidence. The population of Mak’ob’s captives never varied. It was a stark fact. Even so, those lepers who existed inside Mak’ob were better off than those who attempted to remain free. Outside there were many stricken ones who chose not to endure imprisonment and exile in the Valley. No matter that they might have food and some shelter here; the terror of the place kept many from entering freely. In hopes of perhaps catching a glimpse of loved ones, these Outside lepers haunted graveyards. They roamed the countryside after dark in search of food. They were the stuff of a child’s nightmares: wormy, rotting flesh that could not speak except to wail for mercy. But there was no mercy for a leper on the Outside, Lily knew. Lily no longer thought of herself as a prisoner, an outcast. Yes, her left hand had been robbed of fingers. Her ears had bloomed like cauliflower. The latter deformity was concealed beneath hair and head scarf. In the world Outside, perhaps few would notice unless they came in close contact with her for a time. Her face was still her face. Though suntanned and six years older, Lily often thought if Mama had ¬ever come to visit her . . . if . . . ¬ever . . . Mama would have found that Lily was still mostly herself. After years of exile Lily was not eaten away by the disease that devoured some

quickly and others, bite by bite, over many years. She had come to love those who lived on and on, half eaten. Surrounded by the thousand-foot-high cliffs that rose from the Valley of Mak’ob, she was at home among the chadel, the “Rejected Ones.” Outside they were known as chedel, the “living dead.” Strange how fear, loathing, and a vowel or two could make such a difference in the definition of a person’s worth, Lily thought. Inside they were Lily’s People. Beloved. Men. Women. Lots of children here. The God of them was the God of Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob. Inside there was a rabbi, and a Torah school held ¬every other morning in the grove of date palms. Lily had a family of her own now. Inside. Jekuthiel, who had gone away but would come back. His wife, Deborah, was pregnant. Their son, Baruch, seven years old, did not remember Outside. And best of all, though no one Outside would think it possible, Lily was in love and loved in return by Cantor. Cantor had spent the fifty days between ¬Pass¬over and Pentecost building a hut for the two of them. It was a modest shelter, with ¬only room enough for sleeping out of the weather. Lily looked at it across the gulch and felt as if God was watching over her after all. Shavuot was over. The season of weddings had begun. Lily and Cantor would be married by the rabbi as soon as Deborah’s baby arrived. Like Lily, the evidence of Cantor’s condition was not far advanced. His right foot was crippled. No matter. With the help of a stick he hopped and skipped over the rough Valley floor as quickly as any man with two good feet. Cantor had a tiny lesion on the lobe of his right ear, and the beginnings of invasion on his forehead. But this went unnoticed beneath locks of red hair that tumbled down over his brow. Cantor was twenty-three. He had first come to the Valley when he was nine. He had lived in Mak’ob as long as anyone ¬ever lived in Mak’ob. This was his home. He knew ¬every one of his fellow sufferers by name. He sang kaddish over each new grave. Cantor often told Lily that if he was ¬ever given a chance to leave, to go Outside again, he would not go. Everything he needed or wanted was here, he told her. Especially now that she had consented to marry him. Today, followed by a flock of children, Lily and Cantor set out to train the Hawk. ¬I’m praying again, Awesome One. I know you hear me as I thank you for him. The sun on his copper hair. The Hawk riding proudly on his shoulder. Baruch and the others skipping all around him! Thank you for the suffering that brought me here to Mak’ob! To him. Cantor’s hawk never had a name after he came to be an accepted resident of the Valley. Though this seemed like an oversight, it was, within Mak’ob, an honor. He was simply the Hawk, as if there was no other hawk in all the wide world. Names were important Inside Mak’ob, but not in the same way they were

important Outside. Many residents kept their Outside identity. Deborah was still Deborah. But to be known by your skill or particular talent or some aspect of your personality? Perhaps even some long portion of Scripture learned by heart? Inside Mak’ob, virtues and talents became identity. The carpenter of Mak’ob was the Carpenter. He did not have much wood to practice his craft, but he had brought his tools Inside with him, and on occasion he assisted in construction of a shelter or a well-made crutch. The shoemaker was the Shoemaker. He had no feet, but for those with goatskin leather and a few toes remaining, he could craft a miracle of style and comfort. There was no glove maker in residence, but the Shoemaker also filled that role as needed. The Cheesemaker and the Goatherd were closest of friends. They discussed at length the virtues of grazing in the upper pasture or lower pasture in relation to the taste of cheese. The result of their long conferences was goat cheese. Two afflicted sisters, who had made a living in the Outside world dyeing clothes, were now known as the Cabbage Sisters. They were extraordinarily skillful in the gardens. Cabbages flourished when they waded among them, watering, plucking, fussing, discussing this and that. There were five vintners Inside. Old. New. No Nose. Drunk. Crusher. They worked together in vines and vat to create about one hundred gallons of wine each season. Not much when spread around over six hundred inmates, but greatly appreciated and of high alcohol content for medicinal purposes. The midwife was the Midwife. Rabbi Ahava, whose name meant “love” in Hebrew and whose real identity was long forgotten, declared this was proper. What was best about a person should be what he was known by. Lily was perfectly named. Little Baruch, as his name conveyed, was full of praise. Cantor, because he had a strong, pleasant tenor and led the psalms from the heart, was the Cantor. And so on. And so the hawk was the Hawk. Cantor’s eyes were hawklike in their intensity. He studied things, reasoned out the ways of cloud and wind till he could give warning to those living near the creek bed that a flash flood was coming. He studied the bark of the apple trees, letting Pruner and Grafter know if there was a need to lime wash the trunks. Most of all, Cantor loved to study the ways of the animals in the Valley. He knew where conies lived among the rocks and could tell from an empty circle of crushed grass where a deer had hidden with her fawn. Cantor spied on the places where birds nested in the craggy gorge, a good source of eggs and meat for the hard times. Cantor had prepared a home for the Hawk long before he had ascended the narrow ledge. In the nest he placed a net of woven palm fronds, then waited two days and nights. Cantor wanted a hawk, but he wanted one parent-reared

to the point of independence. He also timed the capture so as to snare ¬only one, lest a brace of hawks injure each other struggling to escape. Afterward Cantor tamed the Hawk with love, patience, and dead mice. It was a partnership, he said. The Hawk hunted for Cantor and returned when called because Cantor fed him regularly. The Hawk found the teamwork more than satisfactory. He was never tame, Cantor said, nor obedient like a slave, ¬only agreeable. Lily loved the Hawk. Brown and black lines. Mottled ¬underneath. Little spots on feathers. Patterns of light and dark shimmering on his wings when he soared. A sharp orange beak that cracked open the skulls of mice like nuts when the children of Mak’ob caught them for his training sessions. And when he sat on Cantor’s glove? Golden eyes, piercing, staring over Cantor’s shoulder, as if he was studying something important. The Isaiah scroll maybe? To Lily the Hawk’s eyes and Cantor’s eyes shared a quickness of perception she found nowhere else. Oh! The Hawk was an intelligent, faithful bird! Lily loved the Hawk because Cantor did and she loved Cantor. Man and raptor were inseparable, it seemed, and when the Hawk soared, circling on rising currents of air, Lily sensed Cantor’s soul soaring upward as well. Cantor exercised him ¬every day. With Baruch and many other children as onlookers, Cantor put the Hawk through his paces, and Lily helped with the training. Sometimes Lily looked at Cantor’s broad shoulders and the unhurried movements of his skillful hands. She thought how it would be to be a family of three: Cantor, the Hawk, and herself. Keeping the jesses wound loosely from thumb to between third and fourth fingers, Cantor nodded to Baruch, who was posted across the clearing about twenty-five yards away. Proud that Lily had shared this responsibility with him, Baruch urged the others to get back, make room, then set the swing lure in motion. A leather pouch the size of a pigeon and stuffed with feathers was overlaid with pigeon wings. In place of the decoy’s head was the eyelet through which a stout cord was knotted. When Baruch paid out the line and swung the lure around his head, it fluttered and rustled like a bird in flight. The Hawk, knowing what was coming, plucked the talons of his left foot against Cantor’s glove. He never actually tried to pull free from the restraints when Cantor held him; he merely signaled his readiness to participate. When Cantor judged the lure to be rotating properly, not too slowly and not too fast, he cast the Hawk. As he did so he shouted, “Ho!” even though this time the Hawk needed no help identifying his goal. Pinions beating powerfully, the Hawk gained altitude, then abruptly folded his wings and dove at the lure. At the last second he flared, so as not to overshoot his target, and seized the lure in midair. The surrounding circle of children applauded. Immediately Baruch let the slack of the line slide through his fingers, and