Vivius allowed the information to settle before saying, ‘Which makes my question even more poignant. Why did you come to help us?’
Simon gave a snore of contempt. ‘I’ve asked myself that same question a million times, Roman. I’ve no idea. Perhaps it was ’cos Joseph of Arimathea was convinced you would get justice for Zachary, and all Jews like him who was crucified without a trial. He was the one what asked me to follow you, see what you was up to.’ Simon dropped his head and concentrated on the steady rhythm of his boots. When he spoke again the anger had gone out of his voice. ‘I should have stopped Zachary from joining the Zealots, and from getting involved with that thug Barabbas, but if Joseph’s right and you succeed, I can at least get justice for him.’
A Roman Decurion galloped by on his way to Emmaus, a messenger judging from his speed. Vivius watched the dust rise from his horses hooves and when he was well past asked, ‘You’re with the Zealots?’
Simon shook his head. ‘Used to be.’
‘Why did you leave?’
‘I joined Jesus of Nazareth.’
‘I thought they were a peaceful sect?’
‘They are. We follow his teachings.’
‘Which are?’
Simon pursed his lips. ‘He says we’re supposed to forgive. But forgiving’s not easy when you’ve watched your family being massacred. Cruelty breeds hatred, Roman. And the hatred I have for your race is…’ He left the sentence unfinished. ‘But…’ Simon furrowed his brow as if trying to find the right words. ‘Speaking bluntly…’
Vivius wondered when he had ever done any other.
‘I found it…odd…when you said you wanted justice, for Zachary. I asked myself, why and couldn’t come up with an answer. Then I saw the risks what you took to get the Greek bookkeeper and his ledgers out of Jerusalem. That was when it dawned on me that, perhaps, you want what I want. To put wrongs right.’ He glanced at him sideways. ‘Am I right?’
‘Yes, you are.’
‘Knew I was.’ Simon rubbed his scruffy beard fiercely. ‘It chokes me to say it but…’ He cleared his throat. ‘The teaching what Jesus gave us is right. There comes a point in every man’s life, whether Roman, Jew, Greek or…whatever, when you decide you’ve got to stop burning up with hatred every time you relive the past. You’ve got to stop carrying bitterness around with you.’
Vivius found his own childhood injustices blowing in like a cold north wind. He cleared his throat.
A team of covered wagons approached, swaying over the road and forcing him and Simon to either side of it.
‘What will you do with the information you have, Roman?’ Simon asked when they were walking alongside each other again. Vivius noticed he had tried to inject a lightness in his question giving Vivius the impression he had even embarrassed himself by his speech.
‘Give it to the Emperor Tiberius.’
‘The emperor?’ Simon appeared impressed. ‘Will he do something about it?
‘You have my word on it; that is, if you’ll take the word of this Roman. I’ll be presenting Zachary’s case in a Roman court.’ Vivius chose his words carefully before adding, ‘And I’m sorry he wasn’t. Zealots may be the enemy of Rome but even enemies are entitled to a fair hearing, regardless if the sentence is crucifixion.’ He cleared his throat. ‘That, er…that massacre; it was against Roman policy, you know. It should never have happened.’ He cleared his throat again. ‘And as a Roman, I’m…I’m ashamed that it did.’
The small Roman garrison in Emmaus came into sight.
‘Thank you for saying that, Roman,’ the Jew said gruffly.
‘The name’s Vivius. Vivius Marcianus.’
They continued their walk in silence.
CHAPTER SIXTEEN
(Jerusalem)
Pilate waited until his wife had flung her cloak across the back of a chair, herself across the couch and bellowed, ‘Rico! Breakfast!’ before speaking.
‘Well?’ he demanded. ‘What did the senator say?’
She drew the back of her hand across her forehead as though she had a headache. ‘Nothing.’
‘Nothing? What do you mean, nothing’ he snapped. ‘You’ve been away for over an hour. He must have said something.’
‘He didn’t. When I entered his quarters they were packing, but there were parchments on the table.’
Pilate twirled his ring around his stubby finger. ‘Did you get a look at them?’
‘A glimpse, that’s all.’ She ran her fingers through her mass of tangled curls. ‘Rico! Curse the man. Where’s my breakfast?’
Pilate smirked down at his wife. ‘Huh! Well you’ve certainly come back in a bad mood. Reject you, did he? And there’s no point bellowing for Rico. I’ve sent him after your senator. You’ll have to get one of the other servants, and personally I wouldn’t bother. It’ll soon be lunchtime.’
Claudia sat up abruptly. ‘What do you mean, you’ve sent him after my senator.’
‘Exactly what I said. Vivius Marcianus is likely to be in possession of information that could have me—and I hasten to add, you—recalled back to Rome.’
He found a certain satisfaction in watching the colour drain from her face.
‘Those parchments,’
‘Yes, those parchments, Claudia.’
The rap on the door was sharp and Pilate barely had time to shout ‘Come!’ before Rico had entered.
‘Well?’
Rico bowed. ‘The Decurion and physician left in a trap and the senator rode an army mount. They didn’t appear to have the bookkeeper with them, but the gates were busy. He could have sneaked on to the trap without me seeing.’
Claudia stood up. Her face was still pale. ‘What are you going to do?’
‘Don’t worry. It’s the ledgers and the bookkeeper I’m after, Claudia, not your senator. At least I know where they’re headed.’
‘Where?’
‘Caesarea.’
Claudia’s eyes flickered nervously and there was a moment of hesitation before she said, ‘I thought they would have been sailing from Joppa.’
‘Joppa?’ Pilate narrowed his eyes suspiciously. ‘What makes you say that?’
She tossed her head at his insinuation that she was trying to protect her senator and her expression was scornful when she said, ‘Didn’t it occur to you that he would say he was sailing from Caesarea just to get you off his trail?’
Pilate twiddled his ring around his finger, stared uncertainly at his wife then glared at his slave. ‘Take those men you hired the other day and go after him. Hire more men if you have to. I don’t want any mistakes this time. You’re to head for Joppa.’
* * *
Leaving his newly acquired escort in the centre of Emmaus, Vivius marched into the Roman garrison, confident that as a senator from Rome he would receive privileged treatment. Minutes later he marched out again disgusted to find he didn’t. He had found the garrison overcrowded, noisy, and its overworked staff unimpressed at having a visiting senator demanding sleeping quarters for four when they were already full to capacity.
‘Then you’ll have to find us somewhere else and quickly, Senator.’ Lucanus demanded. ‘Dorio needs rest and treatment—now.’
The physician’s nagging did nothing to improve Vivius’s frustration. Storming across the road, he headed for the nearest inn. From the outside it looked clean enough so he ordered a meal and beds for the night. But once inside they found the meal tasteless, the mattresses coarse and lumpy and Vivius scratched all night with bedbugs. To add to his discomfort a stiff breeze blew through the town and whistled through the rafters making his room draughty and cold. He awoke the following morning stiff, tired, itching from head to toe and discovered his companions had fared no better. His only consolation was to discover Nathan and the big-shouldered, beefy Zealot had been sleeping downstairs guarding them all night.
Vivius examined his map over breakfast. His next stop was Lydda, twenty-five miles from Jerusalem. He felt slightly more confident they would h
ave a comfortable night in the garrison at Lydda. He had pleasant memories of staying there many years ago. He was less confident the Zealots would provide protection that far from Jerusalem. But after securing the three extra horses from the garrison, Vivius was surprised to find they had planned to accompany them, but at a distance, on this next leg of their journey.
It was still grey and overcast when they left Emmaus but the highway ahead was flat, smooth and well maintained by Romans for the constant stream of legions, travellers and commerce. The only downside to their journey was that every few miles Lucanus insisted they stop and let Dorio rest. Vivius curbed his frustration, knowing that on his own he would be travelling at twice the pace. On more than one occasion, he was tempted to scare them into flight by suggesting the longer they took, the more chance Pilate’s thugs had of catching up with them but he decided to keep those fears to himself.
As Vivius had predicted, when they reached the garrison at Lydda he was treated with more respect and provided with a decent meal and a comfortable bed. That was when Nathan and the beefy, big-shouldered Zealot left them. There was no formal departure, simply a nod from Nathan as he and the beefy Zealot left them outside the garrison.
The following day Vivius and his companions left for Joppa.
That was when it rained.
It rained solidly all the way to Joppa. And then the stiff breeze which had blown into Emmaus, turned into a squall, whipping through their sodden clothes, and to Vivius’s dismay delaying their progress even further.
By the time they trailed into the ancient port of Joppa it was dark. They were drenched and cold and Vivius was concerned that Dorio had been shivering uncontrollably for the last hour and even struggling to stay astride his mount. It didn’t take a physician to see he needed food and he needed rest, and although he never uttered a word of complaint, Lucanus was well able to do that for him.
As they rode towards the harbour Vivius noticed there were three vessels secured to the pier.
‘Which one of these is bound for Rome?’ he called to a drenched harbour master.
‘All of them,’ the man called back. ‘But there’ll be nothing sailing in these waters till the wind changes.’
Vivius had already guessed that much. All we have to do now is wait out the storm, he thought, and pray to the gods that Pilate’s men don’t catch up with them. He swivelled around on his mount to inspect their surroundings. With the exception of a welcoming lantern outside a tired old inn, the driving rain made it difficult to see what other accommodation Joppa had to offer. However, one glance at Dorio was enough to convince him the Decurion had gone as far as he could go. The tired old inn would have to do.
Their rooms he viewed with a curled lip; tolerable was all that could be said about them. And tolerable they remained for three whole days and nights while the gale battered at the doors and windows, and high seas rocked the vessels against the pier with a persistent thudding that kept them awake all night. They stayed indoors, for their own safety as much as for the atrocious weather. The only positive side to this enforced rest was it gave Dorio valuable recovery time.
On the morning of the fourth day, Vivius woke to a blissful silence. The wind had dropped, the rain had stopped beating against their inn and when he went downstairs for breakfast he was relieved to be told they could board the first vessel bound for Rome, a cargo vessel.
As they climbed aboard with their luggage, Vivius examined their fellow passengers carefully. A Syrian judging from his tongue, a dozen or more merchants, a family with six children, a Roman centurion on crutches and a handful of unarmed travellers. Vivius decided he was satisfied, partially. All he had to get through now was the sea journey. He grimaced at the thought of days at sea. This voyage in particular he expected to be particularly arduous with the swell left on the seas by the recent storms.
He was right. The first setback occurred when their captain spotted a pirate vessel not far from the island of Crete. The cries of alarm from passengers and crew alike were sufficient to drag him up from his seasick bed in the hold to investigate. He watched the vessel approach with a set jaw. The centurion on crutches joined him at the rail.
‘It’s all very well for Roman propaganda to claim they’ve made the seas safer,’ the centurion complained. ‘But it’s a bit disconcerting watching a pirate vessel heading straight for you and knowing there’s very little you can do in the way of combat.’
Vivius glanced at his companion and realised that, discounting his seasickness, he was about the only passenger on board in a physically good enough condition to make a stand. But then he clutched the rail with both hands as their vessel heaved alarmingly as it changed direction. Vivius blew softly through his pursed lips, relieved their captain was playing it safe and had decided to scuttle to the nearest port. Unfortunately, the sudden change of direction knocked his stomach off balance and he was forced to retch over the side—and he keep on retching until they reached the port.
The second setback occurred when a heavy fog settled on the port forcing them to stay in harbour for the next two days. Vivius booked himself and his travelling companions into an overcrowded inn that smelt of fish and stale wine, and where the average guests were of such dubious character that Vivius slept with his sword by his side.
He noticed that the only advantage to these two days in port was to the captain who took the opportunity of loading his already overloaded vessel with extra cargo. Good news for him financially but not for his passengers, Vivius brooded. As he had predicted, when the fog lifted and they set sail again, the swell in the sea had their vessel rolling perilously low in the water with the extra cargo. On this final leg of their journey Vivius was so sick that he lost track of the days and resigned himself to curling up in his dark corner of the hold to wallow in his misery.
He realised they had reached calmer waters when he woke to discover their vessel had stopped rolling. Rising groggily to his feet he cautiously made his way up on deck only to find the glare of the early morning sun so intense he was forced to stand with his hand over his eyes until he had accustomed himself to its brilliance. Then holding on to ropes, rails or cargo he attempted to walk in a straight line across the wet deck to join his companions. Fortunately, they refrained from commenting on either his prolonged bout of seasickness or his unkempt appearance.
Leaning heavily on the rail he closed his eyes and breathed in the early morning air like a baby taking its first breath after nine months in the womb. The gentle breeze ruffled his hair. The sun warmed his back and there was a smell of salt, fresh air and fruit from the captain’s cargo. Squinting through one eye, he saw the longed-for sight of land on either side of them. Their vessel was sailing smoothly towards the port of Ostia at the mouth of the river Tiber; and theirs wasn’t the only boat. As they made their way up river, Vivius noticed that vessels that had been delayed by the Mediterranean storms were either searching for docking bays or, having found one, were unloading wheat, olive oil and wine from Rome’s many colonies.
Vivius’s heart lifted. Rome!
* * *
(Jerusalem)
Pilate was sitting at his desk, his head in his hands as Rico delivered his report.
‘Gone, you say?’
‘Yes, excellency,’ Rico kept his eyes fixed to his feet. ‘I waited four whole days and when the weather did clear and the boats did set sail, he wasn’t on any of them.’ The black eyes flickered nervously towards his master. ‘I made enquiries and the senator never arrived in Caesarea. Perhaps…perhaps the Lady Claudia was right. Perhaps he did sail from Joppa after all.’
Pilate sniffed; his upper lip curled.
‘The…the bookkeeper, excellency? Do you want me to search Jerusalem?’
‘Get out, Rico!’
Being familiar with his master’s foul moods, Rico moved smartly out of the room closing the door softly behind him.
Pilate rubbed the heels of his hands into the sockets of his eyes so hard it brought white dots floati
ng in front of them. After a while he stopped rubbing and dragged himself over to the table of wine. The heavy rhythmic stomp of the legionaries’ boots from the courtyard echoed through the open window pounding through his head. Claudia’s tuneless hum drifted irritatingly through from the bedroom, along with an over-powerful aroma of roses. Nothing had gone right on this trip, he brooded snatching up the wine jug. Nothing! Not since… His jug hovered over his goblet…Not since the arrival of the senator. He filled the goblet to the top pondering on Claudia’s obvious attachment to the man, then he gulped a few mouthfuls down as if he was drinking water. The wine was strong and had a bite to it. He licked his lips and then slammed the wine jug down. Damn the woman! He’d been convinced she’d been misleading him when she’d suggested the senator would sail from Joppa. That’s why he’d sent Rico off to Caesarea. Pilate sniffed; his upper lip staying in a curled position. The whole thing was a shambles. Well, she’d only herself to blame if he ended up back in Rome without a position. But if the senator had made it back to Rome…then the problem was now in Sejanus’s hands. After all, he had more to lose than him or Claudia.
CHAPTER SEVENTEEN
(The Port of Ostia – approximately 15 miles from Rome)
Vivius rested his arm on the rail of the boat as it meandered up the sun-bathed River Tiber in search of a docking bay. With the other he scratched at the dark grey stubble on his chin. He yawned, exhausted from lack of sleep and days of seasickness. His thoughts kept straying towards Aurelia and it was taking a conscious effort of will for him to put her to one side. His first priority was getting Nikolaos and the ledgers to safety, he decided firmly. Only under the emperor’s protection would they all be safe.
The emperor! Vivius transferred the scratching of his chin to rubbing at the streak of vomit down his clothes. He grimaced, and wondered how in the name of all the gods he was supposed to present himself to the emperor looking like this. He was unshaven, unwashed and presumably smelled foul as he was wearing the same clothes he’d been vomiting in for days—and due to the storms he was late. The emperor would have expected him back before now.
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