“Do not concern yourselves with priests and men of riches,” Nadab shouted. “Do not concern yourselves with those who’ve run and hidden. They know everything that’s been written down but nothing about the Word of God. They work for the infidels.”
Two of the guards tried to seize Nadab from each side, but Nadab saw them both. He struck out at one of them with the sword, then turned quickly and raised the dagger at the other one.
“Don’t,” he said. “Keep back, don’t try your luck. If the Lord will stand by me, I’m here to tell everybody that the light hasn’t been extinguished, it’s still lit, the Lord is here with us. Listen to the prophet Jesus. Don’t listen to the ones with all the power. Don’t listen either to the young ones who thirst for justice, but who would lead us all into war. It’s Jesus, Jesus of Nazareth, you should follow, that’s who.”
And then he was cut off. Several of the guards went for him at the same time. But when one of them was in range of Nadab’s sword, Nadab hesitated. He didn’t stab him with the dagger. I heard Jehoram groan as Nadab lowered both his weapons and lifted up his face.
The guards were on top of him at once. One of them struck Nadab on the head with a club, and when he fell to the ground, they kicked him in the face and chest and arms and stomach. The crowd began to shout: “Hang him, hang him.” More guards arrived and told people to stay back. Jehoram was on his way up to where Nadab lay, bloody and curled up. I took hold of him, pulled him away, pushed him out and down the stairs.
“They’re going to kill him,” Jehoram said.
“Shut up,” I said. “Shut up, Jehoram, just go, don’t look back.” But Jehoram didn’t want to listen and tried to stop me. I got hold of one of his hands and pulled him close to me.
“Do you want to die?” I snarled at him. “There’s nothing we can do now. We’ve got to find Reuben.”
Jehoram nodded in agreement.
“Yes,” he said. “Yes, it’s true, there’s nothing we can do, nothing.”
He started to tear off the fabric he had wrapped around him. He scratched at his sores and spoke to himself, and I knew I had to get him out of there. I dragged him across the square toward the colonnades. There were some children gathered in the shadows. They looked like a gang, and I recognized the boy who’d barked at us.
Before I could say anything, Jehoram ran at the children, the loose fabric from his bandages flapping around him. It was a while since I’d last seen him like this. He was about to fall apart. Jehoram bellowed at the children, striking those who couldn’t get away, knocking them over, and grabbing the boy, lifting him up, and shaking him.
“Do I look like a dog?” Jehoram said.
Some of the children stood there, staring at him, while others screamed and fled. The boy hanging in the air punched and kicked. Jehoram just grinned and asked him again if he looked like a dog. I told him to stop.
“Stop,” I said. “Let go of that boy and pull yourself together.”
Jehoram looked at me. His eyes were red, and he was drooling. He let go of the boy, and the boy fell to the ground. The other children, those who were still there, stared at us. One of them, a tall lad, asked who we were to lay hands on one of his people.
“One of your people?” said Jehoram, starting to snigger.
I grabbed him. “Let it go, Jehoram, calm down.” Jehoram shook off my hand, spat, and snarled.
“You have no business here,” said the tall boy. “He’s possessed, isn’t he?”
“No,” I said. “He’s not possessed, he’s my brother. Keep your distance from him if you still want to see the light of day.”
Jehoram smiled at my threat and nodded. “Yeah, Jehoash, that’s right. Come on, tell them who I am.”
“Who are you?” I asked the tall one while I looked around. Nobody seemed to care about what was happening here. There were no guards or soldiers heading in our direction.
“I’m the new Saul, King of the Temple Dogs,” said the boy.
I nodded and tried to understand what he was talking about.
“So,” I said, “you and those kids, your gang, you have control of everything that goes on here, do you?”
Saul nodded.
“All right, Saul,” I said. “Listen here. I need some help. There’s money to be had if you help me.”
Saul stood there looking at me. He was quiet and the children around him were standing still.
“What’ll happen to the man they caught in the Temple just now?” I asked.
“There’ll be a crucifixion,” Saul said.
I asked him when and where. Saul moved and pointed at some of the other children, who came over and whispered to him.
“It’s happening now, right away,” he said. “They’re taking him to Golgotha.”
“Can you show us the way?” I asked.
Saul said we’d have to pay, and once we’d paid, he’d let two of the children take us there. I took out some coins. Jehoram said it would be cheaper just to make them do it.
The two children walked down from the Temple Mount and into the city. We followed them through the crowds, through the streets and around corners.
I didn’t think we’d be able to stop it. I wasn’t planning to step forward and declare that Nadab was insane, or that there was a raging fever inside him. I just wanted to see what they’d do with him. And if he’d stay alive until nightfall.
After walking a short way, the two children stopped, pointed ahead, and started running back. We stared at where they’d pointed and saw a procession heading out through an opening in the city walls. The soldiers went out in front, and in between them was Nadab. He was carrying a wooden cross. People were shouting, and some young men threw stones and spat at Nadab. The soldiers didn’t seem to care as they dragged Nadab and pushed him forward.
We followed behind, right at the back of the procession, out of the city and up toward a hill. There were a number of crosses still bearing the remains of the dead. I felt empty as my legs climbed up, my hands cold. The soldiers chased away the children and told people to stay back. They held Nadab down while they nailed him to the cross. He screamed and wailed, and they had trouble keeping him still. One of the soldiers, the one holding his feet, yelled to the others, and another one went up with a staff and hit Nadab on the head to keep him still.
They finished their task, and Nadab was raised up. His clothes were torn off, his whole body broken. I’d never seen any of my men in this way before. If one of us was injured, we tended to him. If one of us was killed, we put him where wild animals couldn’t reach. I’d taken Nadab in, and he’d seemed ready for this life. But seeing him like this …
“We shouldn’t have come here,” I said.
Jehoram didn’t move. He stood there, facing Nadab.
“We’ve got to find Reuben,” I said. “We’ve got to get out of here.”
Jehoram said something, but I wasn’t listening.
“Come on,” I said. “We’ve finished here.”
“No,” said Jehoram. “He’s not dead yet.”
I turned to my brother. Blood ran from some of the sores on his forehead.
“Jehoram, we’ve got to go.”
“No,” said Jehoram. “Listen, he’s still alive.”
I turned to where Nadab was hanging. He was making a sound, a weak, whining lament.
We met up with Reuben when it had grown dark. The stars were hidden behind black clouds. A chill wind was blowing in, and Jehoram had undressed. He’d begun to scratch and claw at all his sores. He shouted to Reuben and told him to hurry up. Reuben asked what was wrong, staring at Jehoram, who was sitting there, almost naked, and bleeding.
“Why weren’t you with Nadab?” Jehoram asked him.
“Nadab?” said Reuben. “It’s not my damn job to look after him.”
“Nadab’s been caught,” I said.
“Caught?” said Reuben. “What do you mean caught?”
“I thought he was with you,” I said.
“He wa
nted to be on his own,” said Reuben. “Was I supposed to follow him around the whole damn city?”
I called over to Jehoram and told him to get dressed. “Follow me,” I said, leading them through the streets to a row of stables at the back of a worn-down house. There was a boy guarding the stables, so I gave him a coin and asked him to leave us alone.
“Just don’t disturb the animals,” he said. I nodded and told him not to worry about us.
“Nobody will look for us here,” I said to the others.
“We haven’t got time for this,” Jehoram said. “We’ve got to go and take him down now, straightaway.”
My hands were cold. I held them up to my mouth to warm them. Reuben asked what had happened. I told them to sit down, and in the dim light of a torch burning outside, I explained what had been done, and what we were going to do.
Over the following years, when Jehoram forgot himself and started talking about that day and that night, I would close my eyes, and it was still difficult to remember everything the way it had happened.
When Reuben lay dying, and Jehoram and I sat there with him, he carried on about Anna from Sychar. He’d promised to take care of her, and everything he’d done had been to save Anna. Jehoram and I took turns sitting there and listening to him, neither of us trying to understand what he was talking about. But then, after a while, Reuben wanted to talk about Nadab.
“I’ll meet Nadab now,” he said. “He died fighting for something he believed in, there’s honor in that. I’ve been proud of him ever since that day, and I’m going to tell him. He’s waiting for me; I’ve been waiting for him.”
Jehoram tried to get him to drink some more water, but Reuben didn’t want any. He just lay there, on the ground, with his hands by his sides. He lay there, talking and talking, about what Nadab did that time in Jerusalem and how it was right, about how Nadab truly was a child of God. Jehoram became impatient and excused himself while he went to find some more wood for the fire. I stayed sitting there with Reuben. He asked for Anna, and I told him that she wasn’t there.
“Maybe she’s waiting for me too,” said Reuben. “I’ll have several people to meet. I’ve got so many to meet. Nadab and Anna.”
I got up and could hear Jehoram walking about out in the night air.
“Jehoash,” said Reuben. His voice was so weak.
“Yes?” I said, still facing the sound of Jehoram.
“Jehoash,” said Reuben again. I turned to him and knelt down.
“What?” I asked.
“I shouldn’t have done it,” he said. “Should I?”
“No,” I said. “Maybe not.”
“I shouldn’t have done what the old man told me,” he said.
I had no idea what he was talking about.
“What was it he said? I’m blind, and yet I see many things, something like that. I can picture him now. He had pale, gray eyes, he talked about light and shadow, he touched me.”
I told him to hush now, to relax, but he wasn’t listening to me anymore.
“You’re going to bury me,” he went on. “You must bury me here. Don’t leave me lying here so the old man can find me, bury me. Don’t let him find me.”
I nodded and told him we would.
The next morning he was dead, and Jehoram and I dragged him over to a small cave that Jehoram had found. We had to break his bones to fit him in, and we covered the opening with rocks and with sticks. There was glaring sunlight, and a chafing wind.
“When it’s my turn, just leave me,” I said. Jehoram nodded. I didn’t know then that Jehoram would also die by my side, while I would be dragged away, alive and tied up. A new and final chapter would begin. I didn’t know then, I couldn’t see it.
Neither did we know what was coming as we sat there, in the stable, that evening in Jerusalem. The city lay in darkness, while Nadab was hanging there alone, nailed fast.
“They did it so quickly,” Jehoram said. “They just took him and nailed him up there sooner than you can count to three.”
“He was still alive when we left,” I said.
“I’ve never heard him like that,” Jehoram said. “He was screaming.”
“Do they know about us?” Reuben asked.
“We’ve got nothing to do with it,” I said. “He was talking about Jesus.”
“I told you,” said Reuben. “He’s not one of us.”
“Shut your mouth,” Jehoram said. “Don’t talk about him like that. Why are we sitting here talking anyway? He’s still alive.”
“I warned you,” said Reuben. “I didn’t like his talk.”
“He was still alive when we left,” Jehoram said.
“We can’t leave him hanging there like that,” I said. “I won’t let one of us be strung up like that. If it were you, Reuben, I’d take you down. If it were Jehoram, I’d do the same. Nadab’s one of us. If he’s going to die, he should die with us, not in front of those people who want us to serve them.”
Reuben fell silent. He glanced down at his hands; he turned them and stroked them across his beard.
“If they get hold of us, we’ll be strung up there with him,” he said. “He’s no more now. Nobody can stand being nailed up like that.”
“That may be so,” I said, “but Nadab’s one of ours, he’s tough.”
“What do you want us to do?” Reuben asked. “Take him down? Are you going to climb up there and bring him down?”
“Yes,” I said. “We’re taking him down, and we’ll leave into the night when it’s all over, toward Jaffa. We’re going to get Nadab, we’ll fix him up. If it doesn’t work, then we’ll bury him. None of us should hang like that.”
Reuben was about to say something, but I cut him off: “I know you’re surprised, Reuben. I don’t know how to say this, but Nadab’s given us something. Since he’s been one of us, it’s as if something new has opened up. I’ve been fighting against it, I’ve been holding on to what we are. But when I saw them taking him, when I saw them putting him up there …”
“It’s all right, Jehoash,” said Reuben. “I’m joining you. You would’ve done the same for me.”
“We took him in,” I said. “We stick together. What we do, he does. What he does, we do.”
“Yes,” said Reuben, “but they’re going to come looking for us.”
“They’ll go hunting for insurgents,” I said. “They’ll search the city, the mountains, they won’t find us.”
Reuben nodded. I saw that he was ready. If not for the sake of Nadab, then he was ready to do what we were made for.
The guards were positioned by the city walls. They stood facing away from us, staring into the darkness where Nadab was hanging. I could hear dogs and soft, hoarse cries. One of the guards sneered and yelled out into the night.
“Whose cries are those?” Jehoram said. “Is it Nadab?”
“The animals feed on the ones who stop moving,” said Reuben. “Were there any others hanging there?”
“The others were dead,” Jehoram said.
“How are we going to do this?” Reuben wondered.
I nodded at the guards.
“There are only two of them,” I said. “We’ll go through from the other side of the wall. They won’t see us. If they hear anything and come to see, we’ll kill them. Nobody will look for us, nobody knows who we are, and we’ll be on our way to Jaffa before daylight anyway.”
“They’re soldiers,” said Reuben.
“Good,” I said. “Maybe they’re not so soft.”
We walked through the darkness, disguising ourselves in the night. A faint, dancing light came from the torches on the city walls and where the soldiers were standing, but otherwise nothing. Jehoram later told me how he’d held on to my right hand and let himself be pulled along. He said I had such powers that night, as if something were guiding me, and he could taste, more than smell, the saltiness and stickiness in the air. Reuben walked behind us.
“Jehoram,” I said, stopping dead. In front of us, a body was ha
nging from a cross. We fell silent. I touched the foot of what was hanging there, but it didn’t say anything. An animal, maybe several, growled around us. I lashed around with a stick and hit something that whimpered and moved away. We walked on, and I heard a soft whispering.
“Nadab?” I said, but the whispering stopped. Then I heard Reuben.
“He’s here,” said Reuben. “It’ll take several of us to get him down.”
“Where?” I asked.
Reuben came over to us; he took hold of me and led me with him.
“Here,” he said.
The cross was made of rough wood. I lifted my hand and touched Nadab’s feet. I could hear him speaking softly. There was an awful stench, and his feet were covered in something sticky. Reuben stood close to me.
“We can’t get him down,” he said. “It’s impossible.” We heard the animals, some barking, some snarling. The guards moved. They stood in the torchlight, staring out into the night.
I pulled Jehoram close, put my arms around Reuben and him, and whispered to them: “Lift me up.”
I climbed up, with their help, and took hold of the cross. Nadab was still mumbling. I put my hand on him and asked if he could hear me.
“Jehoash,” he said. Or did he say something else? I don’t know.
I raised myself up until I had my ear to his mouth.
“Nadab,” I said. “We’re going to get you down.”
“No,” he whispered. “I’m here.”
“Nadab,” I whispered back. “Can you hear me? It’s me, Jehoash.”
“The little light,” he mumbled.
“What?” I whispered.
“The little light,” he mumbled. “It flashed. I saw the light, high up there, it was searching for me.”
“Nadab,” I whispered. “Nadab, it’s Jehoash.”
“Jehoash,” he murmured. “She told me about him, Jehoash, it’s cold. She told me everything, the little light, it flashed down at me.”
“Nadab,” I whispered. “We’ve got to get you down.”
Children of God Page 8