Rome. I think that idea has come down from the old Jewish prophets, who
foresaw a great political and military savior of their land. Several
times I’ve been in the crowds listening to him talking, and so far as I
could tell, he was only trying to explain to the people the nature of
this god whom he refers to as his father. He was attempting to interpret
this Yahweh to them sometimes even to the extent of utilizing some of
this father god’s power. That’s apparently what he did when he restored
Chuza’s son.”
“You mean he was clever enough to figure out when nature would do the
restoring. But we won’t go into that again.” Longinus twisted around in
the boat and stood up. “No, my friend, I insist that your reasoning is
not sound, that you have been overcome by this eastern mysticism which
seems to fill the very air out here.” He clapped his hand on Cornelius’
shoulder; his friend had risen with him. “Centurion, come with me to
Rome; I suspect that you need to be indoctrinated again in the ways of
modern thought.”
“I wish I could go with you.” Cornelius stepped from the boat and kicked
the sand from his sandals. “But sometimes I wonder just what sort of
thinking could properly be termed modern.”
They walked back to the inn to await the loading of the ship on which
Longinus would sail for the capital. No further mention was made of the
Roman gods, the Greek gods, Yahweh, or the Galilean carpenter. And early
in the forenoon the next day the vessel spread its sails for Rome. Two
hours later Cornelius and his men started on their return to Tiberias.
26
One of the household servants was waiting for Cornelius when he returned
to the garrison’s quarters at Tiberias.
“Centurion, Lucian is desperately ill,” he reported. “In the last few
days he has developed a palsy. Your wife bade me tell you that she fears
him near death. You must come back with me, sir; she’s greatly
frightened and in much distress about the boy.”
“But the physicians? Haven’t they been able to help him?”
The man shook his head. “She has had them all with him, sir, all she
could find in this region, and they have done what they could; but the
paralysis has spread, and his fever does not abate. All their efforts
have been useless. She prays that you hurry, sir.”
As fast as their horses could take them the two raced toward Capernaum.
When Cornelius entered the house, his wife rushed to him and fell into
his arms. “Oh, I thought you would never get here,” she cried. “Lucian
is near death, I know; I don’t see how he can live much longer. And the
physicians have despaired of saving him.”
“But there must be something we can do,” he said, as he turned toward
the sick boy’s chamber. “Are there no other physicians we could call?”
“None,” she said. “And the paralysis seems to be growing worse. He is
deathly ill, Cornelius. Oh, by all the gods, if there were
something....”
“‘By all the gods.’ The carpenter! Didn’t he restore Chuza’s son? And
though Lucian is a slave, isn’t he just as much a son to us? Wouldn’t
the carpenter just as willingly restore a slave boy, even of a Roman
soldier?” He had said the words aloud, but they had been addressed more
to himself than to his wife.
He turned smiling, to face her. “Do you remember how that young
carpenter of Nazareth healed the son of Herod’s chamberlain? Don’t you
think...?”
“But he’s a Jew, Cornelius, and we are Romans.”
“No matter.” He turned to the servant who had gone to Tiberias in search
of him. “Get me a fresh horse, and quickly!” he ordered. “I’m going out
to find that carpenter!”
A few minutes later he stopped to inquire of a shopkeeper if the man had
seen the young Nazarene rabbi. “Has he been around today?” Cornelius
asked. “Can you tell me how to find him?”
“He passed here this morning,” the shopkeeper answered, “with Simon and
the Zebedees and some of those others who are usually with him. They
went out the gate in the western wall, and judging by the poor trade
I’ve had all day, the whole city’s gone out after them. I hear the
carpenter’s been speaking to them from the side of that little mountain
over there.” With his head he motioned toward the west. “In all
likelihood you’ll find him there, soldier.” Suddenly his face fell; his
hands shook as he grasped his scraggly beard. “Now wait a minute,” he
sputtered, “this fellow, this Nazarene, he hasn’t run afoul of you
Romans, has he?”
“No. No, indeed. It’s on a personal mission that I seek him.” Cornelius
smiled reassuringly. “I’m his friend.”
The shopkeeper looked relieved. “Then if you station yourself at the
western gate, you’ll surely see him as he returns to the city. Or you
might ride out toward the mountain, soldier.”
Cornelius rode on through the gate. He was halfway to the little
eminence in the plain west of the city when he began to meet the throng
returning. Soon he spotted the rabbi walking in the company of the
Capernaum fishermen. Boldly he rode up to them and dismounted.
The men with Jesus formed a circle about him.
“I am unarmed, and I intend no one harm,” Cornelius said, holding out
his hands. “I am seeking the rabbi of Nazareth.”
Jesus stepped forward and held up his staff in salute. His brown eyes
were warmly bright. Cornelius, closer to him than he had ever been
before, saw sparkling in the beads of perspiration rolling down his
bronzed smooth forehead the long rays of the setting sun. He saw them,
too, in the beads clinging to the thick mat of reddish-brown hair on the
carpenter’s chest, for in the sultry stillness of the dying day, Jesus
had thrown open his robe half way to his rope-belted waist.
“What would you have of me, my brother?” he asked the centurion.
“Sir, I pray you to restore my little servant boy whom I greatly love; I
fear he is near death of a palsy. If, sir, you would but say the
word....” He paused, suddenly hesitant.
The rabbi reached out and with strong brown fingers grasped the
centurion’s arm. “I will go with you and restore the boy,” he said
gently. “Show me to your house.”
“But, sir, I am a Roman soldier”—a feeling of embarrassment, deep
humility, strange to the centurion, possessed him as he looked into the
face of the young rabbi—“and unworthy that you should enter my house.
But if you would only command that my little servant boy be healed,
while we stand here, sir, then I know that he would be restored to
health.” He smiled, weakly, he thought. “You see, sir, I understand
authority, for I am a centurion and when I give a command, it is
obeyed.”
For an instant the rabbi said nothing, but his warm eyes lighted with a
rapture plain to see. He turned to his friends. “Nowhere in Israel have
I seen such faith. I tell you that many will come from the east and the
west and with our fathers Abraham and Isaac and Jacob sit down in the
Kingdom of Heaven. But many of the chosen likewise will be cast out, and
there will be great wailing and mourning, for their faith shall not be
as the faith of this Roman.”
Then he turned again to confront the centurion, and Cornelius saw that
his face was radiant. “You may go on your way, my brother,” he said. “As
you have believed that it might be done, so has it been accomplished.
Return in peace to the little boy.”
“Oh, sir....” But the centurion’s eyes were blinded with tears, and he
bowed his head, and no words would come. Then he felt a warm hand on his
shoulder and strong fingers once more gently squeezing his arm, then the
fingers released it. When after a moment he looked up, Cornelius saw
that the Nazarene and his friends had resumed walking toward the city
gate. In that same instant Jesus turned and looked over his shoulder,
his face still alight with a glowing happiness, and raised his hand high
in a parting salute. Then he quickly turned eastward again, and the
little group disappeared around the bend.
Cornelius stood unmoving, his left hand still clutching the bridle rein,
and then he mounted and rode toward the western gate. A few paces ahead
he went around the bend and shortly passed the rabbi and his friends,
who had overtaken several men who evidently had been out with them at
the mountainside; Jesus smiled and once more lifted his hand in friendly
greeting.
The centurion, reaching the gate, rode through it and toward the center
of the city, where he turned left and followed a cavernous road to the
gate in the southern wall. He was in no hurry as his horse picked its
way along the cobblestones and out upon the coast road southward. His
fright, his sudden hysteria had gone; it had vanished completely as he
had looked into the eyes of the young rabbi. Cornelius knew that Lucian
would be well; not the shadow of a doubt darkened his thoughts.
When he reached home and turned into his courtyard, a servant came
running to take his horse. “Lucian, sir, is well again!” the man
declared, almost breathless with the excitement of being the first to
give his master the thrilling news.
“Yes, I know it.” Cornelius smiled.
“But, sir, it was only an hour ago that....”
“A man over at Capernaum told me then,” he said and strode toward the
house as the servant, mouth open, stared after him.
As he stepped inside from the courtyard, his wife, who had heard him
ride in from the roadway, rushed to him and flung her aims about his
waist. “Oh, Cornelius, Lucian has been restored! Not only has his fever
gone, but so has the paralysis. He can use his arms and hands, and he
can walk as though nothing had ever been wrong with his legs!”
She stood back from him, her eyes wet with the sudden surging of her
emotion. “Isn’t it wonderful, Cornelius! And it happened so quickly,
too; he was low, Cornelius, desperately sick, much sicker than when you
left, I’m sure, and the fever was consuming him. I had turned aside from
his bed a moment to wet a cloth to spread on his forehead; then, as I
wrung it out and turned back to him, suddenly he sat up. I caught him
under his arms and discovered that he was no longer feverish; in a
moment he was talking and using his hands, and then quickly he stood up
and walked toward the table where I had set the pitcher of cool water.
‘I’m so thirsty,’ he said, grinning at me, ‘and hungry, too.’”
“Yes, I knew about it. It happened about an hour ago. Where is Lucian
now?”
“He went out to the stables. He wanted to see his horse; he hadn’t....”
Abruptly she broke off and stared at her husband, incredulous.
“Cornelius, how did you know when it happened? Did one of the servants
tell...?”
“Yes, when I rode in a moment ago. But I knew when it happened.”
“But how, Cornelius?” Her amazement was evident.
“Have you forgotten that I went in search of the carpenter of Nazareth?
Well, an hour ago I came upon him beyond the western gate of Capernaum.
I implored him to heal Lucian, and he did. He told me so. And I knew he
had; I had not the slightest doubt. Nor am I in the least surprised to
find him well.” His serious expression relaxed into a warm smile. “Did
you feed the young imp?”
“Yes. And he was famished. Literally, Cornelius, the boy ate like a
horse.”
“Well, he hadn’t had anything in days; he was bound to be empty.”
“But, Cornelius, this carpenter from Nazareth....” She paused, her
forehead furrowed in perplexity.
“Yes,” he said, not waiting for her to finish her question, “and, by all
the gods, I’d like to see Longinus try to explain this one away!”
Rome
[Illustration: decorative glyph]
27
When the vessel eased in to dock just below the Sublicious Bridge,
almost at the spot from which the “Palmyra” had started its voyage,
Longinus went ashore. Quickly he engaged a loitering freed slave to help
with his luggage. He had brought little from Phoenicia, only his
clothing and a few small presents for his mother, principally some
choice pieces of glass, and the package he was delivering to Sejanus.
“I’ll carry this,” he said to the fellow; “it’s glass and fragile.” He
picked up the bundle, heavily wrapped. “And I’ll take this spare toga,
too. You can carry the remainder. I don’t want any sedan chair; I’d
rather walk. I want to get my land legs back.”
The toga had been wrapped about the money packet, which Longinus had
kept securely under his arm as he descended from the ship. But it was an
innocent looking bundle and only its weight would have excited a
bearer’s suspicion. Longinus had determined not to let it get out of his
possession until he had locked it in his father’s safe to await its
delivery to the Prefect.
They walked from the pier along the way that went eastward from the
bridge into the dense, traffic-jammed heart of the city. At the foot of
Palatine Hill they turned left and walked northward past the western
front of the Imperial Palace. Glancing over his shoulder as they reached
the northwest corner of the sprawling great structure, Longinus had a
glimpse of the wing that had been Claudia’s apartment; once again he
picked out the bedroom window through which that morning he had heard
the rising bugle at Castra Praetoria.
“I wonder....”
“Sir, did you say something?” His helper, trudging behind, paused.
“No.” Longinus turned to face him. “I was just thinking, talking to
myself.”
All the way from the dock area Longinus had been retracing the route he
had come with his century from Castra Praetoria the day they sailed for
Palestine. But a hundred paces farther on, instead of continuing past
the Forum of Augustus on their left, he turned abruptly westward. “I
want to walk through the Forum Romanum,” he explained. “It’s been a long
time since I’ve been there. I’ve lost touch with Rome. What’s been
happening lately?”
“Very little, sir, as far as I’ve seen.” The fellow shook his head
resignedly. “No triumphs, as I recall, no big ones anyway, and precious
few games.”
“Why haven’t there been more?”
“Oh, I don’t know, sir. They say the Emperor gets no enjoyment out of
such things, and he’s not here in Rome most of the time anyway, and I
hear it told that the Prefect doesn’t want to spend the money....”
“They do say that?”
“Now, sir, I have heard such talk. Understand, I don’t know anything
about it; I don’t know anything about them, the Emperor and the Prefect.
Not a thing. I don’t even know whether I’d recognize either one of them
if he came right up to us now.” The fellow’s fear that he had spoken too
boldly was obvious. “All I ever get done, sir, is work; I have to
struggle hard to make a living. Seems that it’s just like it’s always
been in Rome, the way I see it, which is that the rich get richer and
the poor get poorer.” He grinned good-naturedly. “I’m meaning no offense
to you, Centurion; likely you’re one of the rich ones.”
“I understand, and I suspect it’s a sound observation, that the rich do
get richer and the poor get poorer, I mean. But it’s not true of Rome
alone; it’s that way everywhere, isn’t it, throughout the world?”
“I couldn’t say as to that, sir. Rome’s pretty much my world.”
Rome was his world, too, Longinus told himself a moment later as the two
were propelled suddenly from the shaded cavern of the cobblestoned
narrow street into the widened stir and commotion of a veritable forest
of marbled columns and statuary.
The centurion’s heart lifted as he strode once more into the Forum
Romanum, that busy, marble-crowded flat between the Tiber’s westward
bend and the mansion-crowned hills. He took a deep breath, and his chest
swelled.
_... This is the veritable beating, pulsing heart of Rome, and Rome is
the world. Here is reality. Here are solidity, strength, planning made
real, dreams hewn in enduring stone. Here are wealth, accomplishment,
power, might. Not twenty paces across there is the Millenarium Aureum,
the resplendent bronze column set up to mark the center of the Roman
world, the point from which miles are counted along the highways and
their joining sea lanes stretching to the ends of the known earth to
bind Rome into one colossal, unconquerable, enduring Empire!..._
They paused to catch their breath. Longinus set down the glass, but he
continued to clutch the toga-wrapped packet under his arm. In another
moment they would push once more into the jostling, shoving multitude
milling through the Forum’s crossways. Suddenly the centurion remembered
Cornelius and their discussion that afternoon as the two men had sat in
the wrecked rowboat near the glassworks. He smiled grimly.
_... But this is Rome. This is reality. This is accomplishment,
creation. I can reach out and run my hand over the stone and feel these
marbled creations of men; a thousand years from now, were I to live so
long, I could rub my hands across their imperishable cold faces. These
are tangible things, and Rome is tangible, her power, her strength, her
wealth, her dominance over the world. Cornelius may prate of his old
tutor’s preachments about the imperishability of the intangibles and the
reality of things unseen. But these statues, these temples, this
Millenarium Aureum, are tangible. Rome is carved statuary and fluted
marble magnificence; Rome is spacious mansions and marching great armies
flaunting their ensigns. Rome is poverty, too, and injustice and
ugliness at times and in places, but Rome is no pale intangibles, no
vaporous conjurations of an eastern philosopher. Rome is not even her
gods. This is Rome, this marbled splendor of the Forum; Rome is here and
now and touchable and real, and Rome, by all the gods or no gods, will
endure._
_... Rome is something else. Rome is strength and power and substance,
but Rome is also grace and beauty. Examine these graceful columns, these
elegant pediments. Rome is feminine, a beautiful woman. Rome, by the
great Jove, is Claudia. Indeed! What is more Rome than Claudia; what is
more Claudia than Rome? Rome is beauty and pleasure, tangible, real, to
be experienced, enjoyed._
_... And Rome will endure. That carpenter of Galilee, wandering up and
down the seacoast with his little band of poor working people, talking
of intangibles to illiterate fisherfolk and the dwellers in Jerusalem’s
festering Ophel, that fellow to overcome Rome! Even under the silvery
softness of a full moon beside the sea in Galilee, it was a preposterous
notion. But here in the middle of the Forum, with confirmation of Rome’s
might everywhere around...._
“By all the gods, Cornelius. Can’t you see?”
The man carrying Longinus’ belongings whirled suddenly around. “I beg
your pardon, sir,” he asked, “did you command anything of me?”
Longinus laughed. “No,” he answered. “I was just thinking aloud again. I
must be growing old.” He reached down and picked up the glassware
package. “But let’s be moving on. I’m anxious to get to my father’s
house.” He pointed the directions. “Out that way and on through the
Forum of Augustus to Via Longa. The house is on Quirinal Hill.”
28
Longinus placed the package on the desk in front of the Prefect. “Sir,
I’m delivering this to you just as I received it at the glassworks,” he
said. “I have not seen the contents; I don’t know what’s inside. The
package when it was handed to me was sealed as you see it now; the seals
have not been broken.”
“Thank you, Centurion, for bringing it; it has been quite a
responsibility, I know.” The Prefect’s darting eyes, Longinus saw, had
examined the package already. The centurion, appraising Sejanus in the
short moment he had been in the ornate chamber, had observed no change
in the Prefect’s appearance. Judging by the man’s looks and demeanor, it
might well have been only yesterday that they had last met. The small,
cold eyes were just as carefully calculating as they had been the day
the Prefect had given Longinus his orders and sent him and Cornelius
eastward aboard the “Palmyra.” Now the eyes were disarmingly friendly.
“My purpose in having it so well sealed was not because I didn’t trust
you, Longinus, but because I wished the manager at the glassworks to
know that no one but himself could be blamed in the event that the
contents were subsequently found short. I knew that he would therefore
make sure that the packet left Phoenicia intact.” The blinking, small
eyes narrowed. “So actually, you see, it was a protection for you.” With
a flourish of the hand he motioned to the chair in front of the massive
desk. “Sit down, Centurion.”
“Thank you, sir.” Longinus took the seat and faced the Prefect.
Sejanus leaned forward and crossed his hands on the desk. “In all
likelihood, Centurion, you’ve been wondering why I summoned you to
Rome.”
“I have wondered, sir.”
“Yes, I’m sure you have. And I’m sure you’ve also guessed that I
dispatched my message to you before receiving your report.”
“I had presumed so, sir.”
“And right you were. Had I received the report but a few days earlier I
would not have summoned you here. But once I’d received your
communication, I had no way of countermanding my order to you so that
you would get it before sailing for Rome.” He sat back in his chair and
folded his arms across his chest; his entire attitude radiated good
humor. “But I’m glad it happened as it did, Longinus. I’d rather like to
hear in person from you concerning the situation in Palestine. It was a
good report, Centurion, and comprehensive, so far as such written
reports go. But I had the feeling in reading it that you might have had
further information to give had you been able to talk with me directly.
Perhaps discretion had cramped your writing hand.” Now his smile was
disarming. “But here, with no ears to hear us but our own, we can talk
with complete freedom. I, too, can say things that I would not dare
write.”
The Prefect unfolded his arms and, leaning forward, drummed his fingers
on the desk. He studied the centurion briefly through narrowed eyes,
then sat back again.
“How did you leave the Procurator, Longinus?”
“He was quite well, sir, when I left him at Caesarea. But your message
overtook me at Tiberias, and I had then been away from Caesarea for some
time. I went on to the glassworks and sailed from Tyre, as you
suggested.”
“Then you have seen Herod Antipas quite recently?”
“Yes, sir. I saw the Tetrarch and Herodias and told them good-by just
before leaving Tiberias. I had escorted them to Galilee from their
landing at Caesarea.”
“And how did the daughter of King Aretas accept Herod’s new wife?”
“She didn’t, sir. She has left him and returned to her father. She....”
“By winged Mercury!” Sejanus lunged forward and slammed his fist against
the desk. “Gone, you say? Fled to Aretas? By great Jupiter! But this you
did not report, Longinus!”
“Sir, Herod didn’t know she was gone until we arrived at his capital. I
was preparing to dispatch a report to you when I received your summons,
and then I decided I would bring the report in person, instead.” He
ventured a wan smile, and the Prefect himself relaxed.
“I understand; you did right, Centurion.” Then his countenance darkened,
and his narrow forehead wrinkled. “This is a matter of considerable
moment; I shall come back to it presently.” He shook his head. “Yes, it
could have dire repercussions. But for the moment, let us speak of more
pleasant things.” His small weasel-like face lighted with a thin but
suggestive smile. “Longinus, when did you last see Claudia? How is the
Procurator’s wife?”
“I saw her in Tiberias the day before I left there for Phoenicia, sir.
Herodias and Herod Antipas had invited her to accompany them to Tiberias
for a visit.”
“And Pilate didn’t object to her going up into Galilee with them ... and
you?” He licked his lips and drew them in thin lines across his teeth.
“If he did, sir, he did not indicate anything of the sort to me.”
“I’m sure the Procurator would do nothing that he thought might
displease the Emperor’s stepdaughter. But what he thinks, however, is a
different matter, isn’t it?”
“I’m sure it is, sir.” Longinus expected momentarily that the Prefect
would begin plying him with intimately personal questions concerning his
relations with the Procurator’s wife, and he wondered desperately how he
should answer. But, happily, Sejanus turned away from the Procurator’s
affairs to return to a discussion of the Tetrarch’s.
“You were saying a moment ago, Longinus”—the familiar scowl had returned
to the Prefect’s face—“that Herod’s wife has gone back to old Aretas.
Have you had any reports concerning his feelings toward Herod for the
way his daughter has been treated?”
“He was greatly angered, according to reports coming back to Galilee,
sir.”
Sejanus shook his head slowly. “No doubt.” He reflected a moment. “Has
there been any talk of possible reprisal?”