The Blood of the Martyrs (34 page)

‘Thank you, sir,' said the slave, and hesitated.

‘What's your name? Ah yes, Manasses. One of these Christians eh?'

‘Yes, sir. I'm afraid you wouldn't find me much use, sir. They did something to my hand.' He held out his right hand, which was swollen and streaked with red, and had some long, festering grazes on it. ‘I can't move the fingers properly, sir, I think something's broken.'

‘Better get it seen to, hadn't you?'

‘One of the doctors put on some stuff, but it wasn't much good. It didn't seem worth bothering, sir. I'm sure to be sent to the Arena.'

‘Not so bad as that, surely, Manasses? Isn't Crispus getting you out?'

‘He did the first time, but they aren't letting our masters claim us now. I was the deacon of the Church, you see; I expect they must have got some information. There was someone who was a police agent, sir.'

Gallio grunted and looked at the hand again. ‘What did they do that for? Want you to give names?'

‘Yes, sir. And agree to all kinds of lies about us. Things they'd made up.'

‘Stuck it, did you? Why?'

‘I'm a Christian, sir. We've got to try and show we've got something new. It wouldn't be worth much if we couldn't bear a little pain for it. Jesus showed us the way. He took on our pain and our death. And dealt with them. By loving everyone: even the ones that hurt Him, sir; so I was bound to try and do that, too.'

Gallio regarded him thoughtfully. ‘I get the feeling,' he said, ‘that this Christianity of yours means one thing to one man and another to another. Am I right?'

‘I suppose we've all got a different idea of what's best sir, at least we see different sides of it, according to how we've lived. And the Kingdom is a mirror of that; it has all the many kinds of good in it.'

‘Handy. Well, Manasses, sorry about those fingers. Anything else wrong?'

Manasses smiled a little. ‘They kick us, you know, sir. A good many of our people can't lie down on their backs, not comfortable. And we go on passing blood for days after.'

‘Got any kind of fund? You have, good. Here's some money for it. Go on, take it man. Better you have it than Nero!'

‘But, sir, don't leave yourself short—you're not used to this sort of place.'

‘That's all right. I shall get some more. Hope that hand's going to heal, Manasses.'

Sophrosyne went into the usual coma and died that night. All corpses were removed in the morning. Lalage burnt various herbs which the doctors advised to prevent the disease spreading. The smoke made her cough, and by and by she went and sat out on the bench, beside Euphemia. She felt as though she were in the current of a very swift river, which was taking her past everything, the known landmarks of jobs and dancing practice and day to day living. In time she would come to the falls at the end and go over. In the meanwhile she and Euphemia sat in the early morning sunshine and mended their dresses as best they could and talked quietly about clothes and scents, and people they didn't know well, people that weren't part of all this. There was something very soothing about surface talk just now, and they both rather needed soothing after the things that had been done to them. Once Rhodon passed them and they gave one another the peace greeting; one thing about being here, you could say that openly now! Rhodon was worrying, of course, but not more than usual. He would have been more comfortable if he'd had anything to do with his hands. He'd never been so long without working at his trade except that time he was taken prisoner, before they got to Delos.

The two women sat there most of the morning; from time to time Euphemia was bothered in case, when the time came, she did not go with the Spirit; it would be so terrible to die like an animal at the end, not be a person and a witness! And not everyone died well. But there was one thing did please Euphemia, that was Megallis coming to see her. Brought some food with her. Ever so nice that was! Megallis hadn't talked much, seemed almost as if talking choked her; in fact, she'd cried a bit. She couldn't stay long, of course, but she'd promised to come back. After a
bit, Paul came and sat with them. It had been one of his bad nights, when he had not been certain of anything, when he had been forced to spend hours struggling with himself, praying aloud and walking up and down; the other prisoners had seen the light in his cell. Later on he would begin to work again, but now for a time he was exhausted and gentle to the women. They were laughing at him a little about the letter he had been dictating yesterday to young Timothy, about his difficult and excitable Church at Ephesus. ‘These women are plaguing the life out of the boy,' he said, ‘but he's the leader in that Church and the only one they'd all accept, and I've got to send him a letter that'll stop them running after him all the time with their fusses and points of procedure and who's to do what!'

‘Take care, Paul,' said Lalage, ‘or you'll write once too often. I tell you how it'll be. You write a letter for some particular Church that's got it's own difficulties, but that letter's going to get kept just because it was you that wrote it, and some day someone's bound to find it and say you've left directions for how all Churches are to be, always, everywhere!'

‘Nonsense!' said Paul, ‘people aren't such fools as that. Besides, when the Kingdom comes and the Churches are everywhere, there will be no need for directions. We shall be freed from the natural man in us that makes us act foolishly and selfishly.'

‘And the natural woman,' said Lalage. ‘But suppose the Kingdom takes longer than we think coming—a hundred years, perhaps?'

‘It cannot take so long. When there is such a blazing light, people cannot shut their eyes for a hundred years.'

‘Perhaps I've seen more of the blind people than you have, Paul. The ones who have built up round themselves a kind of dark tower of possessions. Shutting out the sky.'

‘Words, words!' said Paul, ‘all you women get tangled up in talking and what you think you see!'

‘I've known you get into a tangle of words sometimes, Paul!' Lalage said.

Two new people had come into the yard; visitors. Respectable looking ones—Flavius Crispus and Beric. Crispus
retired with Gallio into his little prison room; it was really remarkably convenient and private. Gallio had found a decent, civil young Christian, who had been a slave in a good house, to be his servant. The room had been scrubbed and sprayed with his usual bath-scent; a shelf had been put up for his book-rolls. Really, the only inconvenience was the set of irons which he was wearing, and after all, a Stoic should be able to disregard such things. For some time the two old gentlemen discussed methods of getting rid of their Emperor, in the pleasant certainty that nobody was overhearing them. According to Balbus, the soothsayer in the Suburra, who always charged such fabulous prices, had given Nero another four years. But Piso would shorten that.

Crispus had told Beric to bring a jar of his special potted shrimps, a few of Eunice's best rolls, and some fresh cream cheese for Gallio. Beric had also brought over some other food, a couple of his own tunics and also three women's dresses; if the prisoners had a change of clothes they had at least a possibility of getting what they had on washed; that could be done with a little bribery. When he went to the bakery to get the rolls, Eunice had asked him if he would take the dresses to Euphemia, Lalage and Sophrosyne. ‘There's two of my own,' she said, folding them small, ‘they're about the last and a bit mended. And one I bought cheap.'

Beric gave her some money at once; it was always so difficult to remember that he was part of this world in which people had only one or two of the things he was used to having in dozens, as part of an ordinary, decent life. He had put all the stuff into one basket with the things for Gallio on the top. Crispus raised his eyebrows slightly but said nothing. He had told Beric that Lamprion was to carry the basket across to the prison for them, but Beric said Lamprion had got a splinter in his foot—could they take Sannio? Whoever carried the basket would be left outside to gossip with the prison guards, so it might as well be someone more or less—on their side. Sannio knew and would almost certainly say nothing, but if Lamprion knew—and you couldn't be sure that he didn't—he might say a lot.

The things for Gallio having been taken out, Beric went along with his basket to see if he could see Manasses; the prisoners could smell the food in the basket and several of them came up, begging for it. For a moment Beric seemed to see nothing but broken teeth, scars and squints, slave faces and hands, the sickening smell they were apparently unaware of themselves. They frightened him and he hastily handed out some bread and sausage, hoping they'd go away, but they didn't. Then, very deliberately, he thought, these are my brothers and sisters; if they are like this, then it is the thing—the rule—which has made them so. He tried to put all the kindness he knew into his voice, speaking to them in his rather pedantic Greek, but not to give himself away. Not yet. Then he saw Manasses and called him. He wished they could have spoken to one another without all the other prisoners crowding round; there might conceivably be police spies among them, and any of them might be babblers. ‘How's the hand?' he asked, ‘no better?'

‘It doesn't matter,' said Manasses, ‘I shan't be pouring any more wine.'

‘Manasses—are you sure?'

‘The Games start tomorrow, you know. They go on for a fortnight. The prison's going to be empty at the end.'

‘I
must
stop it.'

‘You can't, Beric. Nobody can. It's out of our hands. We've just become part of something happening. Because of a new leaven that's got into the old world, but hasn't finished working on it yet. We're like in between past and future, Beric, we're making what's going to be, just the way Jesus made what was going to be.' He spoke in a whisper; neither of them wanted the others to realise that they were anything but master and servant. A kind master surely; those existed, even in Rome. But nothing beyond.

‘You sound almost as if you were happy,' Beric said.

‘I almost am, Beric. If only I knew what was going to happen afterwards. But perhaps I shall know somehow, or perhaps it won't seem to matter then. I'll have got so mixed that I'm part of it for always, or else, once I'm free of my body I'll be outside that sort of wondering. Even being in prison where you can't alter anything or hope anything for
yourself is in a kind of way freeing.' He hesitated. ‘Does that sound all silly, Beric?'

‘No, Manasses. It's wise. It makes me think of all the wise men I ever read about. But when I read about Socrates in prison I'd never been inside a prison myself, so I didn't know if it was true. Manasses, Phineas was arrested yesterday.'

Manasses said nothing for a minute, then, ‘He's got those two little children. It must be wonderful to be a father. What will Sapphira do?'

‘I shall have to try and see her. Look, here are some things for you and Rhodon. Eunice gave me some for the women.'

‘There's Lalage, over there in the corner. Thank you for the things, Beric. Now, you shouldn't talk to me any longer. There's a lot I'd like to say.'

‘I know, Manasses,' Beric said. They couldn't even give one another the peace greeting; it might have been reported. Beric went over to the bench where Lalage was sitting, feeling a bit shy, followed again by a trail of prisoners. He remembered the last time he had seen Lalage, when she had turned him out, and the time before, in the hall of the house after the arrest.

Lalage apparently remembered that too, for she jumped up, saying, ‘My lover!' And then she begged the other prisoners to leave them a little. This was quite successful, though rather embarrassing for Beric. ‘That'll clear you,' she whispered, ‘and I'll make up a story. Anyone who visits here may get his name taken.'

Beric took out the dresses. ‘They're from Eunice for you and Euphemia and Sophrosyne.'

Lalage fingered the dresses. ‘Sophrosyne won't need anything ever any more. Yes, she's dead. She wasn't very strong, you see. But someone will wear the dress. I'll be glad of one myself. You'd better have a bath when you get home, Beric; this place is crawling.'

‘What did they do to you, Lalage?' he asked.

‘Nothing much—this time. It wasn't very nice, all the same. Well, all we've got to do now is to keep faith for a few days and then we shall have done what we're here for.'

‘Unless something happens. If Tigellinus were to die.'

‘It's silly making up stories. God doesn't do little things like that, not to cut across a big thing like our all dying. Besides, the ordinary people wouldn't like being done out of their fun now, whatever the ones on top thought! We aren't hoping about our own little lives any longer, Beric. We've got a bigger hope.'

‘Isn't there anything I could do for you, Lalage?'

‘Yes. You could kiss me. It'll help to clear you and—I'd like it. Take care of my right shoulder, though—it's bruised.' He put his arms round her, taking care of the hurt shoulder—had they beaten her like the slaves were beaten … or what?—and kissed her as well as he could. Without her make-up you could see the lines round her eyes and mouth, but she had been very pretty once, and she was still good-looking. She did not cower away, like Persis had, but kissed him back. Then she laughed a little. ‘That was nice,' she said. ‘I'm not likely to be kissed again before—it all happens. And everything helps. Everything that's a sign of what we want to be towards one-another. Oh Beric, I would like to have been going to live, all the same.'

He kept one arm round her; she blinked and wiped her eyes with the back of her hand. ‘I didn't hurt you did I, Lalage?' he asked, worried.

‘No, Beric. Only it was so nice to be kissed. Silly sort of a deacon I am! There, that's all right. Look Beric, there's just a chance they mayn't get all of us. Depends on what names they've got and whether they're going to take all the slaves. If they've too much respect for property to do that, well, we win. Beat them on their own ground too! So they just mayn't pick on all the slaves. If that's so, Beric, do what you can. Phaon's the one that's got the Spirit, I think. If you can look after him a bit—stop him being broken?'