A small black bird with yellow wings, usually met with along the brook
flitting from stone to stone, diverted his thoughts from Jerusalem and
set him wondering what instinct had brought the bird up from the brook
on to a dry hill-top. The bird must have sensed the coming rain, he
said, and he came up here to escape the torrent. On looking round the
sky for confirmation of the bird's instinct, he saw dark clouds
gathering everywhere and in a manner that to his shepherd's eye
betokened rain. The bird seems a little impatient with the clouds for
not breaking, he continued, and at that moment the bird turned sharply
from the rock on which he was about to alight, and Jesus, divining a
cause for the change of intention, sought behind the rock for it and
found it in a man lying there with foam upon his lips. He seemed to
Jesus like one returning to himself out of a great swoon, and helping
him to his feet Jesus seated him on a rock. In a little while, Paul
said, I shall be able to continue my journey. Thou'rt Jesus whom I left
speaking in the cenoby. Give me a little water to drink. I forgot to
fill the bottle before I left the brook, Jesus answered. There is a
little left, but not the fresh water that I would like to give thee,
Paul, but water from overnight. It matters not, Paul said, and having
drunk a little and bathed his temples, Paul asked Jesus to help him to
his feet, but after a few yards he tottered into Jesus' arms and had to
rest again, and while resting he said: I rushed out of the cenoby, for I
felt the swoon was nigh upon me. I am sorry to have interrupted thy
discourse, he added, but refrain from repeating any of it, for my brain
is too tired to listen to thee. Thou'lt understand the weakness of a
sick man and pardon me. Now I'm beginning to remember. I had a promise
from thee to lead me out of this desert. Yes, Paul, I promised to guide
thee to Cæsarea---- But I rushed away, Paul said, and thou hast followed
me, knowing well that I should not find my way alone to Cæsarea. I
should have missed it and perhaps fallen into the hands of the Jews or
fallen over the precipice and become food for vultures. Now my strength
is coming back to me, but without thee I shall not find my way out of
the desert. Fear nothing, Paul, I shall not leave thee till I have seen
thee safely on thy way to Cæsarea or within sight of that city. Thou
hast come to guide me? Paul asked, looking up. Yes, to guide thee, Paul,
to accompany thee to Cæsarea, if not all the way the greater part of it,
Jesus answered. Thou'lt sleep to-morrow at a village about two hours
from Cæsarea, and there we shall part. But be not afraid. I'll not leave
thee till thou'rt safe out of reach of the Jews. But I must be at
Cæsarea to-morrow, Paul said, or else my mission to Italy and Spain will
be delayed, perhaps forfeited. My mission to Spain, dost hear me? Do not
speak of thy mission now, Jesus answered, for he was afraid lest a
discussion might spring up between him and Paul, and he was glad when
Paul asked him how it was he had come upon him in this great wilderness.
He asked Jesus if he had traced his footsteps in the sand, or if an
angel had guided him. My eyes are not young enough to follow footsteps
in the sand, Jesus replied, and I saw no angel, but a bird turned aside
from the rock on which he was about to alight abruptly, and going to
seek the cause of it I found thee.... Now if thy strength be coming back
we will try to walk a little farther.
I'll lean on thee, and then, just as if Paul felt that Jesus might tell
him once again that he was Jesus of Nazareth whom Pilate had condemned
to the cross, he began to put questions: was Jesus sure that it was not
an angel disguised as a bird that had directed him? Jesus could only
answer that as far as he knew the bird was a bird and no more. But birds
and angels are alike contained within the will of God; whereupon Paul
invited Jesus to speak of the angels that doubtless alighted among the
rocks and conversed with the Essenes without fear of falling into sin,
there being no women in the cenoby. But in the churches and synagogues
it was different, and he had always taught that women must be careful to
cover their hair under veils lest angels might be tempted. For the
soiled angel, he explained, is unable to return to heaven, and therefore
passes into the bodies of men and women and becomes a demon, and when
the soiled angel can find neither men nor women to descend into they
abide in animals, and become arch demons.
Paul, who had seemed to Jesus to have recovered a great part of his
strength, spoke with great volubility and vehemence, saying that angels
were but the messengers of God, and to carry on the work of the world
God must have messengers, but angels had no power to carry messages from
man back to God. There was but one Mediator, and he was on the point of
saying that this Mediator was Jesus Christ our Lord, but he checked
himself, and said instead that the power to perform miracles was not
transmitted from God to man by means of angels. Angels, he continued,
were no more than God's messengers, and he related that when he had shed
a mist and darkness over the eyes of Elymas, the sooth-sayer in Cyprus,
he had received the power to do so direct from God; he affirmed too, and
in great earnestness, that it was not an angel but God himself that had
prompted him to tell the cripple at Iconium to stand upright on his
feet; he had been warned in a vision not to go into Bithynia; and at
Troas a man had appeared to him in the night and ordered him to come
over to Macedonia, which was his country; he did not know if the man was
a real man in the flesh or the spirit of a man who had lived in the
flesh: but he was not an angel. Of that Paul was sure and certain; then
he related how he had taken ship and sailed to Samothrace, and next day
to Neopolis, and the next day to Philippi, and how in the city of
Thyatira he had bidden a demon depart out of a certain damsel who
brought her master much gain by soothsaying. And for doing this he had
been cast into prison. He knew not of angels, and it was an earthquake
that caused the prison doors to open and not an angel. Peter had met
angels, but he, Paul, had never met one, he knew naught of angels,
except the terrible Kosmokratores, the rulers of this world, the
planetary spirits of the Chaldeans, and he feared angel worship, and had
spoken to the Colossians against it, saying: remember there is always
but one Mediator between God and man, Jesus Christ our Lord, who came to
deliver us from those usurping powers and their chief, the Prince of the
Powers of the Air. They it was, as he had told the Corinthians, that
crucified the Lord of glory. But perhaps even they may be saved, for
they knew not what they did.
Jesus was afraid that Paul's vehemence would carry him on into another
fit like the one that he had just come out of, and he was glad to meet a
shepherd, who passed his water-bottle to Paul. Fill thy bottle from
mine, the shepherd said to Jesus, and there is half-a-loaf of bread in
my wallet which I'd like thee to have to share with thy traveller in the
morning, else he will not be able to begin the journey again. Nay, do
not fear to take it, he said, my wife'll have prepared supper for me.
Jesus took the bread and bade his mate farewell. There is a cave, Paul,
Jesus said, in yonder valley which we can make safe against wolves and
panthers. Lean on my arm. Thy head is still a trouble; drink a little
more water. See, the shepherd has given me half-a-loaf, which we will
share in the morning. Come, the cave is not far: in yon valley. Paul
raised his eyes, and they reasoned with vague, pathetic appeal, for at
that moment Jesus was the stronger. Since it must be so, I'll try, he
said, and he tottered, leaning heavily on Jesus for what seemed to him a
long way and then stopped. I can go no farther; thou wouldst do well to
leave me to the hyenas. Go thy way. But Jesus continued to encourage
him, saying that the cave in which they were to rest was at the end of
the valley, and when Paul asked how many yards distant, he did not
answer the exact distance, but halved it, so that Paul might be
heartened and encouraged, and when the distance mentioned had been
traversed and the cave was still far away he bore with Paul's reproaches
and answered them with kindly voice: we shall soon be there, another few
steps will bring us into it, and it isn't a long valley; only a gutter,
Paul answered, the way the rains have worn through the centuries. A
strange desert, the strangest we have seen yet, and I have travelled a
thousand leagues but never seen one so melancholy. I like better the
great desert. I have lived all my life among these hills, Jesus replied,
and to my eyes they have lost their melancholy.
All thy life in these deserts, Paul replied eagerly, and his manner
softened and became almost winning. Thou'lt forgive, he said, any
abruptness there may have been in my speech, I am speaking differently
from my wont, but to-morrow I shall be in health and able to follow thee
and to listen with interest to thy tales of shepherding among these
hills of which thou must know a goodly number. My speech is improving,
isn't it? answer me. Jesus answered that he understood Paul very well;
and could tell him many stories of flocks, pillaging by robbers and
fights between brave Thracian dogs and wolves, and if such stories
interested Paul he could relate them. But here is our cave, he said,
pointing to a passage between the rocks. We must go down on our hands
and knees to enter it; and in answer to Paul, who was anxious to know
the depth of the cave, Jesus averred that he only knew the cave through
having once looked into it. The caves we know best are the vast caves
into which the shepherd can gather his flocks, trusting to his dogs to
scent the approach of a wild animal and to awaken him. Go first and I'll
follow thee, and Jesus crawled till the rocks opened above him and he
stood up in what Paul described as a bowel in the mountain; a long cave
it was, surely, twisting for miles through the darkness, and especially
evil-smelling, Paul said. Because of the bats, Jesus answered, and
looking up they saw the vermin hanging among the clefts, a sort of
hideous fruit, measuring three feet from wing to wing, Paul muttered,
and as large as rats. We shall see them drop from their roosts as the
sky darkens and flit away in search of food, Jesus said. Paul asked what
food they could find in the desert, and Jesus answered: we are not many
miles from Jericho and these winged rats travel a long way. In Brook
Kerith they are destructive among our figs; we take many in traps. Our
rule forbids us to take life, but we cannot lose all our figs. I've
often wondered why we hesitate to light bundles of damp straw in these
caves, for that is the way to reduce the multitudes, which are worse
than the locusts, for they are eaten; and Jesus told stories of the
locust-eating hermits he had known, omitting, however, all mention of
the Baptist, so afraid was he lest he might provoke Paul into
disputation. See, he said, that great fellow clinging to that ledge, he
is beginning to be conscious of the sun setting, and a moment after the
bat flopped away, passing close over their heads into the evening air,
followed soon after by dozens of male and female and many half-grown
bats that were a few months before on the dug, a stinking colony, that
the wayfarers were glad to be rid of. But they'll be in and out the
whole night, Jesus said, and I know of no other cave within reach where
we can sleep safely. Sometimes the wild cats come after them and then
there is much squealing. But think no more of them. I will roll up my
sheepskin for a pillow for thee, and sleep as well as thou mayest,
comrade, for to-morrow's march is a long one.