The Silver Chalice (14 page)

“She is a cousin,” whispered Deborra, suppressing a smile with difficulty. “Her name is Hazzelelponi, but everyone calls her Old Gaggle. She is a great eater and will not pay much attention to anything else.”

It was a spacious room, with windows opening on the north and east, and with fans swinging back and forth noiselessly on the ceiling. A servant in spotless white stood ready to serve them.

“I have saved three quail from below.” Abraham, the servant, bent his head over the girl’s shoulder to whisper this information. “They are cooked in wine and
very
good, mistress. They were fattened on curds and young grasshoppers.”

Deborra, whose cheeks showed a slight tinge of excitement as though this were an event of some importance, nodded her head in approbation of the quail. Then she asked, “What fish have you for us?”

Abraham drew down the corners of his mouth in a disconsolate line. “None has been prepared,” he said. “Perhaps I could get you some of the mullet they are eating downstairs. Red mullet with a crayfish sauce. Most tasty, mistress.”

Deborra shook her head. “I would rather not depend entirely on crumbs from my father’s table. What has been prepared for us?”

It was soon apparent that a most excellent supper was in readiness. After the bones of the tender quail had been picked clean, a platter of kid’s meat was served on rice, with pearl barley sprinkled over it, a mound of capers in the center, and young blite chopped fine around the edge of the dish. This was followed by hard-boiled eggs with a sauce of cummin, cheese of goat’s milk with preserved quince, and a heaping dish of fresh peaches. Throughout the meal their cups were kept replenished with the delightful honey wine called
mulsum
.

The appetite of the third member of the trio at table has already been commented on, and it is hardly necessary to say that she did full justice to this delicious supper. Both Deborra and Basil had the hearty capacity of youth and did not lag behind her. It was a long time before
the last dish had been served and the towels and hot water provided. Hazzelelponi, who had become more silent as the meal progressed, showed no tendency to join them when they took their seats at a north window, where the last glint of the setting sun could be seen on the roof of the Temple. The sound of the
shofarim
, the horns with which the priests announced the coming of night, reached them with surprising clearness.

“I have heard it every night of my life, and yet it still excites me,” said Deborra, listening intently. “Do you know much of our customs?”

“Very little, I am sorry to say.”

“It is ram’s horns the priests use, but they are heated and straightened out to get more length and tone. I have never seen them. No one sees them. The priests keep them covered always, even when they come out to sound the passing of day. All the sacred objects in the Temple are kept covered. Did you know that the High Priest has bells on his robe so people will know when he approaches and will turn their heads away? It is all very mysterious.”

“I realize,” said Basil, “that there is one question no one asks.”

The girl’s face became grave at once. “I am not afraid to answer,” she said. “You mean, am I a Christian? Yes, yes! I was born in the faith. I was raised to believe in Jesus Christ. My mother, who died when I was quite small, taught me to say Jesus before any other words, even before
avva
or
imma
, and then she took me in to let my grandfather hear. He seemed very old even then. His beard was white and he had all those wrinkles of kindness about his eyes. The tears poured down his cheeks when he heard me say Jesus.

“He and my mother were very close,” she went on. “I can remember how concerned they were over the state of my father’s soul.” She sighed deeply. “I love my father, but I am sure now that he will never see the light. Religion to him is all a matter of form.” She glanced about her to make sure that none of the servants were in the room and that the third member of the party was not straining her ears to follow the conversation between them. “Father’s guests today are all from the Temple. The High Priest is there and many of the men closest to him. I think they are discussing what they will do now that Paul is on his way. Is it not strange that there should be such talk in the house of Joseph of Arimathea?”

She had been speaking with great earnestness, but now she paused. Leaning her chin on her cupped hands, she watched him with a sudden
smile. “We are being very serious, aren’t we? We always seem to be so serious. Do you know that I have never seen you smile?”

“Am I as glum as that?”

“No, not glum. I think I would call you grave. And it is not surprising after all you have been through.”

He studied her face. It was a very young face, with the unclouded eyes and the fresh color of her few years. She looked more appealing at the moment, and prettier, than he had realized before.

“You do not smile often yourself,” he said.

She nodded at once in agreement. “I guess I have always been a little solemn. You see, I was a very small girl when Grandfather decided to be less active in trade. Then my mother died, and he has depended on me ever since. I was never allowed to play with toy children,
^*
even when I was very small. I have never had any young friends. I don’t know a girl of my own age. Perhaps that is the reason.”

“We seem to be a pair of sobersides, don’t we?”

She had been so serious about her plight that, without any conscious effort, he found himself smiling at her. She returned it with immediate delight. “There!” she cried. “You have! You have actually smiled at me. For the first time. And it was a very nice smile. I liked it.”

She was realizing that perhaps she had liked it too well. Facing him at the window, she thought: “He has a very fine face. I think it is a beautiful face. It is so sensitive and full of imagination.”

“I think,” said Basil, “that we should make a compact, you and I. To do a lot more smiling. How often do you think? Once every half hour?”

“Perhaps that would be right for a start. If we should get to know each other better, we might begin to smile much oftener. We might even laugh.”

“Yes, we might even laugh.”

She nodded her head and smiled to such good effect that her whole face lighted up. “I am sure it is going to be very nice,” she said.

“What a pleasant little scene,” said a voice from the door.

It was Adam ben Asher, looking dusty and even a little weary, which was most unusual, for his powers of endurance seemed to have no bounds. He walked stiffly into the room, keeping his intense gray eyes fixed on them.

“One might even think you a quiet little family group, the two of
you sitting there with your heads so close together, and Old Gaggle still under the influence of a big supper.” He had crossed the room and was standing above them. “You have been discussing, no doubt, the little piece of work this young genius is doing for the master.”

“No,” answered Deborra. “It has not been mentioned.”

“
Aiy!
Relaxing from his labors. I expected this. They are great relaxers, these Greeks; and always, it seems, in the company of beautiful women.”

“The bust is finished and ready for casting,” declared Basil angrily.

“Now
that
is excellent news.” Adam turned to look at Deborra. “Can you detach your mind sufficiently from what this undernourished Apollo has been saying to you to hear what I have been doing? I have been escorting someone of importance to Jerusalem.”

“I know,” said Deborra. “It is Paul.”

“Paul, and none else. The great teacher of the Gentiles. The ardent Jew who is striving so hard to wreck the Law of Moses. He was as fierce of eye and of temper as ever. But somewhat less talkative.

“I brought him from Caesarea. He had gone there to see Philip, and something had happened to take the edge of loquacity from his tongue.” Adam threw back his head and laughed. “I was even allowed to do some talking myself, which is a strange thing when Paul is around. Naturally he did not listen to anything I said.”

Although he had laughed as loudly as ever, it was clear that he did not feel any sense of amusement. His eyes kept jumping from one to the other, trying to find the key to the relationship that had developed between them. They were full of anger and disappointment. When they rested on Basil the depth of feeling in them became more intense and they seemed to say, “You have been up to tricks, my young pagan!”

“Did you bring him here?” asked Deborra.

Adam ben Asher snorted loudly. “I would as soon bring a pack of hungry lions into this house as Paul,” he declared. “It seems he had plans of his own. He disappeared almost as soon as we came through the gate. A humble-looking fellow fell into step beside the camel the great Paul was riding and they began to talk in whispers. Before I knew what had happened, he had slipped down from the back of the camel and had vanished without a word. All the rest of them disappeared at the same time. It’s well that they did. Within a few minutes they were swarming around us, the underlings from the Temple, and asking
questions about him. There was a great deal of curiosity as to the whereabouts of Master Paul. If he had stayed with me, they would have had him trussed and ready for a hearing before the governor.”

Adam seemed to become conscious for the first time then that the absence of Joseph called for comment. He asked anxiously, “Is my good Master Joseph seriously ill that he could not come to supper?”

“No,” answered Deborra. “He is not ill at all. He is in bed, but he enjoyed a good supper by himself.”

Adam gave his thigh a slap and burst into a loud roar of laughter. “That means we have company tonight from the Temple. I should know by this time that our good old man is always indisposed when the great ones come to sup with Aaron. They have not laid an eye on him in ten years.
Aiy
, he is still the wisest fox of them all.” A still louder laugh attested his pleasure in the successful maneuvering of his employer. “Then I may see him this evening? I have many bits of information for his ear.”

“He will want to see you, of course.”

The servant Abraham had returned and was collecting the dishes from the table. He was in a disturbed state of mind; his hands fumbled at their task and he even allowed a cup half full of wine to fall. Deborra gave him an anxious glance and saw that his face was white.

“Are you ill?” she asked.

The servant straightened up and began to collect the remains of the supper with more care. “No, mistress, I am not ill.” Then he replaced the jug of
mulsum
on the table and asked in an angry voice: “Is it right that a Samaritan should be admitted to this house? One of the cursed Cutheans? Is it right that the master’s son should tell me to place a chair for him at the table? One would think he was a great man and not mud under our feet!”

Adam walked over to the table. “A Samaritan? Abraham, who is it?”

Abraham answered in a reluctant voice, as though unwilling to reveal the full infamy of the situation. “Simon the Magician. He was not here for supper. He came later, and they said he was to be taken in to them. They are all down there now, talking and whispering with their heads close together.”

“And the High Priest himself is there?”

The servant nodded his head. “He is sitting there in his jeweled
ippudah
, the closest of all to this Cuthean.” His voice sank to a husky
note of fear. “All the fiends and the wicked spirits came into the house with him. I could feel them in the air.”

“I think I know what those old men of iron down there are plotting with Simon the Magician,” muttered Adam. “I hope Moses hears them. He will not approve!”

S
EATED
at one of his windows, Basil waited the next morning for the summons from Joseph of Arimathea. From here he could look across the bridge that spanned the Cheesemakers’ Valley and ran straight as an arrow flight to the Temple. The bridge was a magnificent structure, as great in its way as the Temple itself; a span of white stone nearly four hundred feet long and wide enough to allow the passage of five chariots driving abreast. He had crossed it many times in his morning rambles and was finding that he fell naturally into the custom of keeping his eyes on the grandeur of marble and gold massed above and allowing his feet to take care of themselves. One aspect had kept him in a somewhat unhappy frame of mind, however: the squalor of the valley two hundred feet below. There was no reason, he realized, for him to carry any such burden of worry: the people of Jerusalem, even the humble workers themselves who lived in that hot and malodorous depression, seemed to give no thought to the contrast between the magnificence of the heights and the poverty of the depths. Or did they reserve their discontent for the meetings in the cellars of Fish Street that Benjie the Asker frequented?

As he watched the bridge this morning, Basil became aware of three men in particular. They had, quite apparently, visited the Temple and were now crossing back to the city. They walked abreast, and the one in the center was shorter than his two companions, a slight figure with bowed legs showing beneath his knee-length tunic. He was monopolizing the conversation, for even at that distance Basil could see the emphatic nod of his head, the frequent lift of his hand for emphasis. His fellow walkers paced along beside him in absorbed silence, their attention given to every word he uttered.