by Colm Toibin
So I did not ask for news of him but I often thought of him, especially as I prepared to come to Cana. I wondered if I should visit him or his sisters. As I set out, I did not know that he had already died.
When I arrived in Cana there was a strange emptiness in the streets. I heard afterwards that for two hours or more some days earlier the birds had withdrawn from the air as though it were night or there were some cataclysm in progress that meant danger to them and made them retreat into their nests. And there was a hushed holding-in of things, no wind, no rustling in the leaves of trees, no animal sounds. Cats moved out of sight, and shadows – even the very shadows – stayed as they were. Lazarus had died a week earlier, and then when he was four days in his grave my son and his followers reached Cana with their high-flown talk. And when my son told them to dig Lazarus up, remove him from his tomb, no one wanted to do this. In the days before he died Lazarus had become peaceful and beautiful. No one wanted to touch him now, disturb him in the ground, but so great was the frenzy at the arriving horde that his sisters had no choice. The crowd had arrived with news of a blind man who could see and of a gathering where there was no food and which had, as though by a miracle, been filled with plenty. The talk was of nothing except power and miracles. It was as if the crowd was roaming the countryside like a swarm of locusts in search of want and affliction.
But no one among them thought that anyone could raise the dead. It had occurred to no one. Most of them believed, or so I learned, that it should not even be attempted, that it would represent a mockery of the sky itself. They felt, as I felt, as I still feel, that no one should tamper with the fullness that is death. Death needs time and silence. The dead must be left alone with their new gift or their new freedom from affliction.
I know, because Marcus told me, that Mary and Martha, the two sisters of the dead boy, began to follow my son once they had heard the news of the lame walking and the blind seeing. And I understand that they would have done anything in those last silent days. They watched helplessly as their brother grew easily towards death in the same way as a source for a river, hidden under the earth, begins flowing and carries water across a plain to the sea. They would have done anything to divert the stream, make it meander on the plain and dry up under the weight of the sun. They would have done anything to keep their brother alive. They sent word to my son and they asked him to come but he did not. It was something I learned when I saw him myself, that, if the time was not right, he would not be disturbed by a merely human voice, or the pleadings of anyone he knew. Thus he paid no attention to what he heard from Martha and Mary and they stayed with their brother so they would be with him when he took his last breath, when he was fully part of the waves of the sea, an invisible aspect of their rhythm. And during those days then, as river water slowly took on the taste of salt and they buried him and he lay fresh in the earth, many people who had loved Lazarus and who had known his sisters came to the house to comfort them. There was talk and lamentation.
And then when they heard that the crowd had arrived, like a carnival with every malcontent and half-crazed soothsayer following in its wake, Martha went out into the streets to announce her brother’s death to my son. She confronted him and won silence from him and those around him and she cried out: ‘If you had been here he would not have died.’ And she was ready to go further, but stopped for a moment when she saw how sorry he was, when she saw how he knew, or seemed to know, that the suffering and death of Lazarus was a sadness almost too great for anyone to bear. And now it was a weight that could not be lifted.
Having let the silence linger for some moments, Martha spoke again as the crowd listened. She spoke very quietly, but what she said was heard. She was so desperate in her grief that her pleading sounded like a challenge.
‘I know,’ she said, ‘that even now that he is four days in the earth, you have the power to raise him.’
‘He will rise,’ my son replied, ‘as all mankind will rise, when time relents, when the sea itself becomes a glassy stillness.’
‘No,’ Martha said, ‘you have the power to do it now.’
And she told my son then what the others had told him, that he was not a mortal as we are mortal, but she believed that he was God’s son, that he had been sent to us in mortal guise, but he was not mortal and he had powers, that he was the one we had been waiting for, who would be king on earth and in the skies, and that she and her sister had been among those blessed enough to recognize him, as they recognized him now. For the sake of her brother, she told him in plain loud words, with her arms spread out wide, that he was the Son of God.
When Martha found Mary, who had returned to the grave to weep there, she too went to my son and told him that he had the power. As she wept, so did he, because he had known Lazarus all of his life and had loved him as all of us did, and he came with her to the grave, freshly covered with earth, and there was a murmuring from the crowd that had followed, people shouting that if he could heal the sick and make the crippled walk and the blind see, then he could raise the dead.
He stood there silently for a time and then in a voice like a whisper he ordered the grave to be dug up while Martha, screaming now, afraid that what she had asked for was being granted, cried that they had suffered enough and the body would be stinking and rotting after its time in the earth, but my son insisted and the crowd stood by as the grave was opened and the soft earth lifted from where it lay over Lazarus’s body. Once the body could be seen, most of the onlookers moved away in horror and fright, all except Martha and Mary and my son, who called out the words: ‘Lazarus, come forth.’ And gradually the crowd came close again to the grave, and this was the time when the birdsong ceased and the birds withdrew from the air. Martha believed too that time was then suspended, that in those two hours nothing grew, nothing was born or came into being, nothing died or withered in any way.
Slowly, the figure dirtied with clay and covered in graveclothes wound around him began with great uncertainty to move in the place they had made for him. It was as though the earth beneath him was pushing him and then letting him be still in his great forgetfulness and nudging him again like some strange new creature jerking and wriggling towards life. He was bound with the sheets and his face was covered with a napkin and now he turned as a child in the freshness of the womb who turns knowing that his time there is up and he must wrestle his way into the world. ‘Loose him and let him go,’ my son said, and two men came, two neighbours, and they stood in the grave as those around watched in hushed amazement and fright as they lifted Lazarus and then unbound him. He stood up with merely a cloth around his waist.
He had been unchanged by death. Once his eyes opened, he stared at the sun with a deep unearthly puzzlement and then at the sky around the sun. He seemed not to see the crowd; some sounds came from him, not words exactly, something closer to whispered cries, or whimpers, and then the crowd stood back as Lazarus moved through them, past them, looking at no one, being led by his sisters back to their house, the world around remaining stilled and silent, and my son too, I am told, stilled and silent, as Lazarus began to weep.
At first they noticed just the tears, but then his crying came in howls as his two sisters led him gently towards the house, across the path, followed all the way by the silent crowd as the howling grew louder and more fierce. By the time they reached their door he could barely walk. They disappeared inside and closed the shutters from the burning sun and did not appear again that day, despite the waiting crowd who lingered hour after hour, even as night fell, and some indeed through the night itself and even as the morning came.
There was in those first days a strange atmosphere in Cana. I noticed the stalls and the stallholders had more things on display than ever before, not merely food and clothes, but also cooking utensils and locks for doors. And there were animals for sale – monkeys, birds, like jungle birds, gorgeous creatures coloured red and yellow and blue, of a brightness I had never seen before, causing a crowd to gather around the
m in wonder. And there was a levity about the stallholders and those who walked the streets, as though some burden had been lifted, and there was much calling and yelling and figures on street corners guffawing. Even in Jerusalem on market days, when I used to go to that place before I was married, there had always been a gravity, a sense of people doing business who meant business, or preparing themselves with due decorum for the Sabbath. But Cana was full of raised voices and raised dust, sly laughter, young men laughing without restraint, the air full of whistling and catcalls. As soon as my cousin Miriam and I removed ourselves indoors, she told me the story of what had happened to Lazarus, and how no one now would even pass the house near by, where he and his sisters lived, but would cross the street instead, and how she believed that he was in bed in a darkened room, that she had heard that he could barely swallow water and barely hold down soft bread which had been soaked in water. The hordes had moved on, she said, followed by an even larger caravan of hucksters, salesmen, water-carriers, fire-eaters and purveyors of cheap food. All were being watched with a ferocious zeal by the authorities, some of whom were in disguise, but others of whom were following openly and then quickly departing for Jerusalem to be the first to arrive with word of some new outrage, some new miracle, some new breach in the great order that was maintained to keep the Romans pleased.
Miriam had sent word to my son that I was in Cana and word had come back that he would be at the wedding and his place would be beside his mother. Then, I thought, we could speak. I remained calm. I dozed and then slept deeply after my journey. I listened to Miriam go over and over the story of Lazarus. I was ready to confront my son and ready also to keep him in one of the inner rooms of Miriam’s house until things grew calm, until some other novelty arrived on the scene, and we could slip quietly back to Nazareth. I noticed in the night before the wedding that the streets around Miriam’s house, normally so quiet once darkness fell, were filled with the sounds of feet and voices. All through the night I heard them, men moving fearlessly, laughing and talking, or calling to each other, or having mock fights or funny arguments and then running back and forth in the street.
Also, that night, before we went to bed, people came to the house, almost hysterical with news of the bride, the lavish gifts she had received, the clothes she would wear. There was much discussion of the bridegroom’s family and divisions within it over protocol and tradition. I did not speak, but I knew that I was noticed and felt that some people had come to the house to peer at me, or be in my presence. As soon as I could I left the room to help in the kitchen. When I returned with a tray to collect empty cups, I stood for a second in the doorway, in the shadows where no one noticed me, and I heard Miriam and one other woman recount once more to others the story of Lazarus.
It struck me on hearing something each of them said that neither of them had actually been there. Later, when I found Miriam alone, I asked her if she had personally been in the crowd that day and she smiled and said no, but she had heard all the details from several who had witnessed it all. On seeing my expression then, she turned to the window and closed the shutters and spoke quietly.
‘I know Lazarus died. Do not doubt that he died. And that he had been buried for four days. Do not doubt that. And he is alive now, he will be at the wedding tomorrow. And there is a new strangeness; no one, not one of us, knows what the next event will be. There is talk of a revolt against the Romans, or a revolt against the teachers. Some people say that the Romans wish to overthrow the teachers, and others that the teachers are behind it all, but it is also possible that there will be no revolt or indeed that there will be one against everything we have known before, including death itself.’
She repeated the words ‘including death itself’. The force of her words held me still.
‘Including death itself,’ she said again. ‘Lazarus may be merely the first. But he is alive now in his own house and I can swear to you that one week ago he was dead. This may be what we have waited for, and that is why the crowd has come here and there are men shouting in the night.’
In the kitchen the next morning news came that Martha, Mary and Lazarus were going to come to Miriam’s house first, and then accompany us to the feast. Lazarus was still weak, we were told, and his sisters had become aware of how afraid people were of him. ‘He lives with the secret that none of us knows,’ Miriam said. ‘His spirit had time to take root in the other world, and people are afraid of what he could say, the knowledge he could impart. His sisters do not want to go alone with him to the wedding.’
I dressed carefully. The day was hot and the interior of the house was kept dark. We moved slowly in the dense and humid air. Miriam and I found ourselves several times in the main room of the house alone together, uneasy with each other, but not stirring from our chairs and not speaking. We were both waiting for the visitors to come. A few times when we heard sounds we both looked at each other ominously, fearfully. Neither of us knew what would happen when Martha and Mary led their brother into this room. And, as time went by, our wondering became more tense. Finally, in the stillness and the heat and the silence, I fell asleep and when I woke Miriam was standing over me, whispering: ‘They are here. They have finally arrived.’
The sisters looked more beautiful than I had ever seen them. In their solemnity as they entered the closeness of the room and approached me, they were figures of substance, grandeur, immense dignity. It was as though they had been marked and separated from others by what they had been through, it came across in their poise, a depth in the expression on their faces when they smiled. As they both came towards me I realized that I was associated in their minds with what had occurred and that they wished to touch me, embrace me, thank me, as if I had something to do with the fact that their brother was alive.
Their brother stood in the doorway and then moved quietly into the room. When he sighed all of us moved towards him and it was then, just then, that the opportunity came and it was the only one I had, and I think it may have been the only opportunity anyone had, to ask him. It was the semi-darkness of the room, the stillness of the air and the fact that all of us, us four women, would know to keep silent about what we should not speak of. There were a few seconds in which any one of us could have asked him about the cave full of souls where he had been. Was it a place of massive, obliterating darkness, or was there light? Of wakefulness, or of dreams, or of deep sleep? Were there voices, or was there pure stillness, or some other sound like the dripping of water, or sighs, or echoes? Did he know anyone? Did he meet his mother, whom we all had loved? Did he remember us as he wandered in the place where he had been? Was there blood or pain? Was it a landscape of dull, washed colours, or a red vastness, with cliffs, or forests, or deserts, or encroaching mist? Was anyone afraid? Did he wish to return there?
Lazarus stood in the darkened room and sighed again and something was broken, the great chance had escaped us, maybe never to return. Miriam asked him if he wanted water and he nodded. His sisters led him to a chair and he sat alone, utterly isolated. He seemed to be reaching deep into himself for some soft energy which had been left to him and which kept him awake, his sisters said, both day and night.
He did not speak as we set out for the wedding. It was hard not to watch him as he was being helped along by his sisters, moving as though his spirit was still filled with the thunderous novelty of its own great death, like a pitcher of sweet water filled to the brim, heavy with itself. I was so involved in watching him and then trying to look away that I had put no thought into what was ahead until we came close to the house where the wedding feast was to take place and I saw a crowd who I knew had nothing to do with the wedding, not only hawkers and hucksters I had seen before, but young men in large groups, all of them arguing and shouting. Everybody stood back as we approached; a slow silence came over the crowd. I thought at first it was solely because Lazarus was among us, still being led by both of his sisters. But then I realized that the silence was also for me and I wished I had not come here
. I did not know how these people knew who I was. That they should stand back for me struck me as almost funny, something I might dream, but it was not funny, it was frightening when I saw the mixture of respect and fear in their eyes, so I looked down at the dust and made my way into the wedding feast with my friends as though I were nobody.
Immediately, I was separated from the others and taken to a table which ran along a covered shaded space, where I was placed beside Marcus who seemed to have been waiting there for me. He told me that he could not stay, that it would be dangerous now for anyone to be seen with us, and he pointed to a figure standing casually at the entrance, whom we must have passed on the way in, although I had not noticed him.
‘Watch him,’ Marcus said. ‘He is one of the two or three figures who move easily between the Jewish leaders and the Romans, that is what he is paid to do. He owns olive groves that run through a whole stretch of valley and he has many assistants and servants and a house of great luxury. He seldom has any reason to leave Jerusalem except when he visits his own land. He is a man without scruples. He comes from the most humble place and the most humble circumstances. He rose at first not because of his wit but because he can strangle a man without leaving a mark or making a sound. That is what he was used for, but now he has other uses. He will decide what must happen and he will be listened to. His judgment will be dispassionate, merciless. The fact that he is here at all means that all of you are lost unless you move with very great care. You must return home as soon as possible. Both you and your son. You and the one they are watching most must slip away from here even before the feast starts and if you can disguise him in some way all the better, but you must not speak to anyone or stop and he must not leave the house for months, maybe even years. It is the only chance that you have.’