by John Hagee
Lepidus returned with a splendid carriage, and Naomi smiled. She would arrive in style, as she had intended. She made sure Fulvia was carrying the small valise Naomi had personally packed and then settled into the carriage for the short trip to Rome. Inside the valise were two items, a wooden box and a leather pouch, which she had found locked inside the drawer of the table that had saved her life. The box held enough gold coins to meet their immediate expenses, and the pouch contained a document from her father’s bank at home. Naomi was not sure what the technical term for the document was, but she understood its purpose: to make available for his use in Rome a vast sum of money, guaranteed by funds available in his account in Ephesus. All she had to do was present the letter to his banker in Rome, and the money would be hers.
I’m a very rich woman, she thought as the wheels of the carriage sang over the pavement. Tomorrow will be the day I’ve lived for all my life.
26
NAOMI TRIED TO CONCEAL HER FRUSTRATION as she spoke to the portly, balding banker. “I don’t think you understand,” she told Cassius, willing herself not to laugh at his ridiculous lisp. She did not want to insult the man—not until she’d secured her father’s funds in her own name, that is.
Once again she went over the details, thinking that perhaps this time her words would penetrate his thick skull. “You acknowledged that you received the message saying my father had drowned at sea and that I would be handling his business affairs. And here is the letter from his bank in Ephesus authorizing you to release funds. I’m sure you’ve handled this kind of transaction for him before.”
“Yes, of course, and I’d gladly do it again—for him.”
“Then you’ll do it for me. I’m his legal representative now.” Naomi did not hesitate to make the claim, even though it might be a stretch. She was not familiar with the legalities of inheritance, but she knew she was her father’s rightful heir. The man was simply being stubborn because she was a woman, she decided. It wasn’t unusual for a woman to inherit a fortune, but it was out of the ordinary for her to attempt to exercise complete control over it. Some men couldn’t handle the concept of a competent woman, and this fool of a banker was evidently one of them.
“Actually, there’s some question about that,” Cassius said, whistling the words through his teeth.
Naomi bristled visibly. “What do you mean?”
The banker appraised her carefully before he spoke. “A few days after we received your message from the Mercury, we received a contradictory message from your father. You see, he’s not dead, therefore you cannot be his legal representative.”
“That’s impossible.” All the color drained from Naomi’s face. “I watched him drown.” She stifled a moment of panic at the thought that her father had not actually perished when he’d been hurled from the ship. It couldn’t be! Kaeso had said there was no way her father could have survived in the open sea; even if he hadn’t succumbed to the raging waves of the hurricane, they were too far from shore for him to swim to safety. After the storm had died down, Kaeso had tried to search for Abraham, but there had been no sign of him.
“Perhaps you’d like to see the message. It originated from the harbormaster’s office at Syracuse.” Cassius pushed a small square of parchment across the desk, and Naomi’s heart almost stopped as she read it.
Rescued at sea. Will arrive in Rome within the week.
Let no funds be transferred from my account for any reason.
The note, written and signed in her father’s bold, artistic handwriting, bore the harbormaster’s seal. Rescued at sea. She couldn’t believe it—wouldn’t believe it.
“It’s obviously a forgery,” Naomi said, her voice rising. “Some impostor wants to get his greedy hands on my father’s estate.” She was on the verge of tears, and she hoped the banker would think it was from grief, not the deep despair that threatened to overwhelm her. She had been terrified when her father was swept overboard, but afterward, she had not been devastated by the fact of his death. Rather, it had seemed fitting—a matter of justice. After all, he should have been the one lost at sea three years ago. She reasoned that Abraham had simply cheated destiny for a while before finally meeting his intended fate, and she refused to feel guilty for not mourning him.
“An impostor? That could be,” Cassius said. “But you understand that I can’t legally transfer any funds until we get this sorted out.” His tone was placating, but the puffy black eyes were cold. Naomi could not tell whether he was convinced the message was authentic, or whether he was simply holding on to her father’s assets with a banker’s tightfisted reflexes.
This can’t be happening, she thought, looking around the opulent office she had entered with such confidence, believing she would be a wealthy woman—in her own right, not in her father’s name—when she left. Naomi knew she was far from destitute. She had a roof over her head—a magnificent roof, actually; her father’s villa was small but lavish. And she had the wooden box with its stash of gold coins. But how long would that sustain a household? A few months, perhaps, if she were frugal. She did not want to count every coin and worry how she would live until her father’s estate was settled, however. She had come to Rome to find a prominent husband, and that would require the right wardrobe. It meant being seen in the right places by the right people, and that required money—and plenty of it.
Naomi squared her shoulders as Cassius rose and walked around the desk. She had survived the stigma of her fanatically religious family in Ephesus, and she had survived a monstrous hurricane at sea. She didn’t care if Cassius happened to be the most powerful official at the most prestigious bank in Rome, which he was—she’d be hanged before she would accept defeat from this overbearing lump of lard.
Cassius offered Naomi a pudgy arm, clearly indicating that their meeting was over. “Why don’t you come back in a few days,” he said, “after your father—or whoever sent this message—has had time to arrive in Rome and contact me.”
Almost trembling with fury, Naomi stood but refused Cassius’s arm. “Very well,” she said in her haughtiest tone, “but you can rest assured that when this matter is resolved, I will transfer every last denarius of my father’s assets to another bank.”
“I wouldn’t be too hasty to make any changes, if I were you.”
She noted with some satisfaction that the banker had blinked before he spoke; she had gotten his attention with her threat.
“I could be of great assistance to you,” Cassius continued. “I’ve handled your father’s account for many years, and a woman in your position—alone in this delightful, but dangerous, city—might need the advice of an astute businessman such as myself.”
She despised his patronizing tone, and she despised leaving his bank empty-handed. As she followed Cassius to the door, she resolved to find out who had sent that message. It had looked like her father’s large, dramatic scrawl, Naomi thought, but she had examined the note only briefly. Someone familiar with his handwriting could have cleverly forged it—her father’s string-bean assistant, for one. Quintus probably signed Abraham’s name to correspondence as a matter of routine. Her father ran one of the largest shipping operations in the Empire, so there would be samples of his handwriting scattered from Mauretania to Arabia. It could have been anyone, she told herself.
When Cassius opened the door to escort her out, Naomi spied his assistant cowering before a tall silver-haired man who was demanding to see the banker immediately.
“Senator,” Cassius called out in his ingratiating lisp. “I do apologize for keeping you waiting. Something unexpected came up.”
The tall man turned and started to respond. When he saw Naomi, he stared with obvious interest. “If this is the ‘something unexpected’ that detained you, it’s quite understandable,” he said smoothly.
Even without Cassius’s greeting, Naomi would have known the man was a senator: he wore the distinctive white toga with the broad purple stripe and the short boot stamped with the letter C, stand
ing for centum, a reference to the original one hundred senators of the former Republic.
“Introduce us, Cassius, so I can make the lady’s acquaintance.”
The compliment earned the senator a dazzling smile from Naomi.
Cassius complied with the request, introducing them and briefly explaining that Naomi had just arrived in Rome after nearly being shipwrecked. With the way Cassius lisped, Naomi couldn’t quite decipher the man’s name. All she knew was that she had been in Rome only a few hours and she had already met a senator. What incredible good fortune!
Her dark mood vanished instantly as she quickly and surreptitiously appraised her first prospect for a husband. His curly silver hair was neatly trimmed and styled, and the well-manicured hand was not encumbered with a wedding ring. While he was older than her father, the senator was fit and well preserved for his age. And she could tell by the appreciative look in his eye that his interest in her was definitely not of the fatherly sort. Not particularly handsome, his patrician appearance was nevertheless attractive to Naomi. She knew immediately that he was a man who was used to getting what he wanted, and she determined that she would be exactly what he wanted for the moment.
“It’s a pleasure to meet you, Senator.” Her voice was silky, her gaze frankly admiring.
Cassius suddenly changed from a hard-nosed businessman into a congenial host. “Since Naomi is here alone, I’ve offered to look out for her while she’s in Rome.”
“I’m sure the lady will have no shortage of gentlemen wanting to look out for her,” the senator said, “myself included.” His eyes never left Naomi’s face, and she felt a ripple of excitement as he asked, “Would you do me the honor of dining with me this evening?”
After a slight pause to give the impression she needed time to consider the request, she said, “I’d be delighted.”
“I’ve been invited to the palace,” he added casually, “and Caesar’s banquet hall is definitely something you should see while you’re in Rome.”
“I’ve heard it’s splendid.” The palace! He spoke as if it were simply another tourist attraction. Her heart raced at the thought of actually dining in the very pinnacle of power. She wondered if the emperor himself would be there. Surely he would, if it was some kind of state event. Her thoughts immediately went to what she would wear, how she would arrange her hair . . . and then her face fell.
The senator noticed her distress and appeared concerned. “Is something wrong?”
“I’m afraid I have nothing suitable to wear. Most of my clothes were destroyed in the hurricane.” If it took every gold coin in her possession, she vowed silently, she would buy an expensive new tunic and stola the minute she left the bank. There was no way she would miss an opportunity to appear at the palace on the arm of a senator. But she’d had a sudden flash of inspiration and gambled that she could use the situation to her advantage.
“You see, I intended to buy a new wardrobe immediately,” she said with a scorching look at Cassius, “but I’ve just learned that all my funds are being held until a certain misunderstanding is cleared up.”
The banker looked decidedly uncomfortable as Naomi launched into a description of the meeting they’d just had in his office. “So buying a new wardrobe today is out of the question,” she concluded, “and I wouldn’t want to be an embarrassment to you at Caesar’s banquet, no matter how much I would enjoy your company.”
She lowered her lashes and cast a look she hoped would convey just how very much she wanted to attend and how much she needed his help to intervene with Cassius.
“Even if you wore the rags of a common laborer, a woman as uncommonly beautiful as you would never be an embarrassment.” Wilting the banker with a glance, the senator said, “There must be something you can do, Cassius. I’m sure this will all be straightened out in a few days. Why don’t you give the lady an advance against her father’s letter of credit?”
It was more of a demand than a question, and the banker knew it. He looked as if the senator were holding a sword at his throat. “I suppose the bank could advance a small amount,” he said slowly.
“A reasonable amount.” The senator named a figure in a voice that dared Cassius to challenge him. “And I’ll stand good for it, if need be.”
“Of course,” the banker said, his face brightening at the senator’s guarantee. “I’ll direct my assistant to take care of the transaction right away.”
“I suggest you handle it personally,” the senator replied dryly. He placed a possessive hand on Naomi’s arm. “In the meantime, my dear, let me take you to the best dressmaker in Rome. We haven’t much time to find an outfit that will cause you to turn the head of every official who dines at Caesar’s table. And I have no doubt you will.”
“Senator,” Cassius implored as they started to leave, “what about the financial matter you wanted to discuss with me?”
“Oh, that. It will keep until tomorrow,” the senator said with a smile in Naomi’s direction. “A personal matter requires my attention first.”
27
ABRAHAM LAY ON THE SHORE, his cheek pressed into the sand, a long strand of seaweed twisted around his almost bare body. He was parched, sunburned, and famished—but he was alive. There had been no whale, he thought, yet God had miraculously placed him on dry ground, just as He had Jonah.
He wasn’t sure how long he’d been in the water. About thirty hours, he guessed, exhaustion fogging his mind. Abraham closed his eyes and reexperienced the sensation of flying through the stateroom and shooting up the mammoth wave, then plunging into the depths of the sea. He’d held his breath until he thought his lungs would burst, then he finally broke through to the surface with a desperate gasp. He had the presence of mind to strip off his clothes immediately, so the weight of the water-soaked fabric wouldn’t drag him to the bottom of the ocean like an anchor.
Over and over, the vicious waves flipped his large frame into the air the way a child tossed a rag doll. It was early afternoon, but the hurricane had turned the skies as dark as ink. All Abraham could see was water, dark green walls of water that churned and rolled and threatened to suck him under with every turbulent wave.
After a while his eyes had burned from the brine and his arms and legs had felt like lead. His head hurt from the deafening roar of the storm, and fighting to keep above the surface of the water became a battle Abraham could not win; the strength and fury of the hurricane were too powerful for a mere mortal to overcome.
Finally, he was sucked under water for so long that the urge to breathe became too great to resist. He knew he was about to lose consciousness if he didn’t breathe, but he also knew that if he did breathe he would inhale water—not air—into his lungs, and then it would be over. But he could not hold out against the sea any longer.
His eyes had been open as he was pulled under by the wave, but Abraham could see nothing in the roiling water. Now, he closed his eyes and contemplated how the first gulp of seawater would feel in his lungs. Would he enter a dreamlike state between death and life? He thought of Elizabeth. Would she be waiting for him on the other side? Would God welcome him, a repentant traitor, into heaven?
Sinking in a watery grave, about to succumb to the desperate need to breathe, he suddenly felt a solid substance jammed against his body. It was a dream . . . or was it? He was dying . . . or was he?
Abraham did not consciously wrap his arms around the submerged object, but when it rose to the surface with the next wave, it dragged him up with it. As his screaming lungs finally found the air they craved, he comprehended that the object he was clutching was indeed real. It was huge, it was solid, and it was floating.
And so was he.
Abraham clung to his inanimate rescuer. The object he’d encountered underwater and ridden to the surface was wooden, about twelve feet long, and so broad he couldn’t completely get his arms around it. As his mind began to clear, Abraham realized he was holding on to a remnant of the main mast of the Mercury. The storm had snapped the ma
ssive oak timber like kindling and sent it hurtling into the sea after him. An object that size could easily have killed him; instead it had saved him, and the only conclusion he could reach was that God wanted him alive.
With a great effort, Abraham hauled himself on top of the wooden beam and stretched out along its length. Utter exhaustion claimed him then, and he lapsed into the bliss of unconsciousness. When he woke, the fierce winds had died and the water was as smooth as silk.
Cautiously, Abraham raised himself to a sitting position and straddled the mast. He wondered if the Mercury had ridden out the storm, or if the hole punched into the stern had capsized her. He looked around him, searching the water for any signs of wreckage. As far as he could tell, there was none. There was something else he looked for but couldn’t see: land. Even before the storm blew in, Kaeso had been uncertain of their position because of continued rain and poor visibility for several days. Now, Abraham realized, he could easily be a hundred miles or more from land, but he had no way of knowing.
As darkness fell, he stretched out again, lying on his stomach. Stripped down to his undergarment, he shivered in the cold night air. He shivered, and he prayed. Lord, if You spared me from the hurricane, surely it was not so I could die of exposure on the open sea.
When morning arrived, there was still no sign of land. Abraham was a strong swimmer, and if he had seen land, he would have plowed his way through the water toward it. Instead, he lay on top of the mast and paddled, trying to set a course for the northeast; Rome lay somewhere in that direction.
By midday, Abraham was still chilled to the bone, yet the sun had started to burn his salt-soaked skin. His mouth was as dry as a boll of cotton, and his lips were cracked and sore. He longed for just a sip of water but knew that drinking the seawater would be deadly: the salt would further dehydrate him.
By midafternoon, figuring that another night in the water would kill him, Abraham began to despair of life. He’d already been in the water for more than twenty-four hours, and now, with no land in sight, and no sign of another ship, surviving seemed impossible. Abraham held out little hope for a passing ship; no one else would have been so foolhardy, or so desperate, to be on the ocean in the middle of November. He should never have tried to make the trip.