The partisans had surrounded the Roman force at Beth-horon. That night General Gallus had called for four hundred volunteers to fight a rearguard action. Gallo had immediately stepped forward, but Gallus’ junior tribunes held the centurion’s military record, and they pointed out that Gallo had been demoted after Petus’ disastrous capitulation at Rhandeia in Armenia years before. The general had sent Gallo back to his tent. To the centurion, this lasting shame, of being overlooked, had been like a wound to the heart. It had not mattered to Centurion Gallo that the four hundred volunteers chosen by the general never survived. Those men bravely sacrificed their lives giving the rest of General Gallus’ army enough time to escape to Lydda. Gallo would have gladly died to win the glory of such a sacrifice, to have put the shine back on his tarnished reputation.
Lying in his bed now, Gallo was revisited by the humiliation of Bethhoron. For years he had suppressed the memories. Now, just miles from the scene of his shaming, it was all he could do to prevent himself from screaming with rage. Gallo made a pact with himself as he lay there in the dark. Never again would he allow a commander to humiliate him the way that General Petus had at Rhandeia, the way General Gallus had at Bethhoron. He did not care who his commander was. If Questor Varro were to put him in a position where humiliation threatened, Gallo would not stand for it. He would allow no one to put him through that again. Every man has his limit. Gallo had reached his.
As he lay there now, the ground beneath the centurion began to move. It was a sideways movement, as if some prankster was beneath his bed. Again the earth moved, more violently this time. In the corner, Gallo’s upright shield fell to the tent floor with a woody bang. From outside the tent, there came the sound of yelling voices.
“Earthquake!” someone bawled in terror as they ran past the centurion’s tent.
Gallo threw back his blanket and jumped to his feet. Parting the tent flap, he stepped outside. In the light of lamps in the streets he could see that the camp was in uproar. In Gallo’s experience there was no man braver that a Roman legionary, and none more superstitious. The legionary feared little that roamed the surface of the earth, but powers above and below it were a different matter. Again the ground moved beneath Gallo’s feet. From the corral came the neighing of frightened horses. Then, from somewhere behind the centurion, came the sound of something crashing to earth; one of the temporary wooden guard towers at the camp’s pretorian gate had come down.
A young legionary without a stitch of clothes on and wide-eyed with terror ran past the centurion. Gallo grabbed him by the hair and pulled him to a halt. “Where in the name of Hades do you think you are going, soldier, naked as the day you were born?”
“Earthquake, centurion!” the man bellowed. “Earthquake!”
“It will pass. Go back to your tent. Put on your tunic and your equipment. Then report with your squad to the tribunal. Now, soldier!”
The youth was suddenly more afraid of the officer than he was of anything else. Besides, the earth had ceased to move. “Yes, centurion.” He ran off.
Gallo strode toward the questor’s pretorium, close by. In front of the tribunes’ tents there was a dais formed from sections of turf laid one on top of the other. This was the camp tribunal, the focus, of morning parade. Gallo hoped that his men had enough presence of mind to remember their training, that in an emergency they should assemble in front of the tribunal. When he arrived at the earthen platform, he found Tribune Martius there ahead of him.
“Soldiers! There is no need to panic!” Martius calmly called. “This was merely an earth tremor. Fall in by squad. Soldiers, listen to me. Fall in!”
Men were milling in front of him, most in just their tunics, all highly agitated.
“The gods of the underworld are not happy with us!” one man called.
“Pluto is punishing us!” cried another.
“Why would Pluto be punishing you, soldier?” Martius responded.
“For going to Jerusalem, tribune,” came the reply.
“We are being warned not to go to Jerusalem,” said another.
“The place is stained with the blood of Roman soldiers,” someone else called.
“Might not the gods simply be reminding us of their power?” said Martius.
“How so, tribune?” a soldier came back.
“Think about it. It was not so long ago that the Jews celebrated their Passover Festival at Jerusalem at this time of year, flocking to their Temple from around the world to pay homage to their lone god. Yet now, there is no Temple. Why? Because the soldiers of Rome razed it to the ground.”
“He’s right,” came a rank and file voice. “The legions destroyed Jerusalem.”
“Where do they celebrate their Passover now?” said another, with mirth in his voice, catching the sudden change of mood.
“In Hades!” someone said, bringing a chorus of laughter.
“The gods are not warning us away from Jerusalem, tribune?” called a doubter.
“The gods were only reminding you that the soldiers of Rome have destroyed the heathen Temple and changed the lives of the Jews forever,” Martius responded. “Believe me, you men can march into Jerusalem without fear, and proud to be legionaries of Rome, the finest soldiers that the world has ever seen! You are the rulers of the world!”
This brought a boisterous, resounding cheer from the soldiers.
“You heard the tribune,” said Gallo, now striding into their midst. “Fall in!
Without further comment the men began to file into their infantry squads and cavalry troops and form up in neat formation, as others hurried from throughout the camp to do the same. While Martius had been marshalling the men, Varro had emerged from his tent, and as his staff joined him he had listened with an approving smile to the way the tribune had handled the situation. Now Martius saw him, and yielded the tribunal.
As Varro went to step up, Callidus slid in beside him. “Could it be that it was Pluto you saw in your dream, my lord?” he asked. “In his chariot. To my mind there is a considerable possibility that you were being forewarned of tonight’s events.”
“Possibly so, Callidus,” Varro replied. In reality, the figure in his dream looked nothing like the image of Pluto with which all Romans were familiar, and the horses drawing the chariot in the dream had not been winged like Pluto’s steeds. Varro had by this time come to the conclusion that his dreams had a life of their own and did not warrant either explanation or divination. He climbed up onto the tribunal. “By the end of this watch I want full and accurate reports concerning the injuries and damage caused by the earth tremors,” he announced to the assembled troops. “Now that we are all awake, we shall remain on our feet and make all necessary repairs. I want to be able to march at dawn. If there is another tremor in the meantime, I expect you all to act like the soldiers you are. Centurion Gallo, you may dismiss the men.”
Varro stood looking at the crevice which cut across the road at an angle. To continue east, to reach Jerusalem, the column had to cross this divide.
With daylight, the column had begun to move again, none the worse for wear after the earth tremors. Two men had been injured when the guard tower came down. Until they recovered, they would ride in a cart. All other personnel were fit and well, including Miriam and Gemara—as Varro had been quick to ascertain during the night.
Now, just ten minutes march from the camp site, the column was stationary, as Varro and his officers and officials studied the gap which the tremors had opened up in their path, at a point where the road had been carved from the side of a slope, with an almost sheer drop, a hundred feet or more, to the valley below. Small crevices had also opened in the roadway, but the largest posed the problem. The fissure was five feet wide at its narrowest, ten at its broadest. A man and a galloping horse might hurdle the gap, but pack animals and baggage carts were a different matter.
“Bridge the gap,” Varro ordered.
Timber carried on the carts for temporary camp gates and towers was quickl
y recycled, and within an hour a narrow bridge spanned the gap in the road. The infantry crossed with ease. Some pack mules were nervous, and they unsettled their companions, so the mules were left to last, to be taken across singly. The carts were dragged over the bridge, unhitched from their mules and manhandled by teams of legionaries while Varro and his mounted companions watched from the western side of the gap.
As the first of the mules were being led across, blindfolded, there was a sudden cry of alarm from behind the questor. Varro turned, to see muleteers and slaves rushing to the edge of the road and looking over the precipice, down into the ravine below.
“The slave girl, and the child,” someone called. “They have gone over the side!”
With pounding heart, Varro rapidly dismounted and pushed through the throng at the edge of the road.
“I am leading up their mule, my lord,” a white-faced Syrian mule driver hurried to explain. “Before I can stop it, the stupid animal goes and put its foot in one of the holes in the road. It topples over. I hear its leg crack. It goes over the side, and it takes the two females with it. Just like that! There was nothing I could do to prevent it, my lord! It was not my fault. I swear to Baal…!”
Dreading what he would discover, Varro looked over the side of the precipice. Then he saw Miriam and Gemara. They had landed on a ledge some fifteen feet down the slope. The mule they had been sharing had not been so lucky. It had bounced from the ledge and fallen all the way to the bottom of the hundred foot drop. Its shattered body lay on the rocks below.
“Are you hurt?” Varro called down to the pair on the ledge. As he spoke, Martius appeared beside him.
Miriam had picked herself up and dusted down her simple white belted gown. Her headpiece and veil had gone the way of the mule. Her silky black hair cascading over her shoulders swayed as she shook her head in answer. Again Varro was taken by her beauty. Pulling Gemara to her, she looked dazedly up at the faces peering over the edge of the roadway at the pair.
“Any bones broken?” Martius called, echoing Varro’s concern.
Again Miriam shook her head.
“Neither of them appear to be injured,” said Varro, “just shaken.”
“Leave them there,” came a voice from behind Varro.
The questor recognized the voice, and swung to see Antiochus sitting on his horse among a group of riders behind the anxious crowd. “What did you say?” Varro called.
“Tell them to ask their God to save them,” said Antiochus.
This brought a cackle of laughter from Venerius, mounted close by.
“Get down!” Gallo ordered, striving to rein in his anger. “You too, Venerius! Get down, the pair of you. You can help retrieve the females.”
Venerius’ smile disappeared, and he quickly dismounted, but Antiochus did not move, just remained in his saddle, glaring at Varro. The questor glared back.
“I would not put my life in the hands of either Antiochus or Venerius,” Martius growled. “I will go down after the females.”
“Very well,” Varro conceded.
The tribune called for Centurion Gallo and gave orders for a length of strong rope to be brought from the baggage train. When the rope arrived, Martius tied it around the two front horns of the saddle on Gallo’s horse. He tied the other end around his waist. With Gallo in charge of the horse, the tribune went over the side of the precipice. As the centurion carefully eased the horse back a step at a time, reassuring it with pats and a soft voice, Martius was lowered to the ledge. There, he removed the rope from his waist and tied it around Gemara. Then, with Varro telling Gallo when to start easing his horse forward and when to stop, the child was hauled back up the road.
A cheer rose up from the soldiers and civilians lining the edge of the road. Varro realized that all other work had ceased while everyone watched the rescue operation, and he now ordered Crispus to supervise the resumption of movement across the bridge. Then he sent the rope back down to the ledge, where Martius and Miriam stood side by side. Miriam was brought up next, and finally Martius was hauled up. Varro then called on Diocles to examine the females for injuries. The doctor dismounted and briefly examined Miriam and Gemara, pronouncing them uninjured but for grazes and bruises, for which his assistants ran to fetch ointments on the questor’s instructions.
After ordering the non-combatants to take their turns crossing the bridge, Varro looked to the waiting horsemen. “I told you before, Antiochus,” he called. “Get down!”
Antiochus did not reply. He folded his arms. Tired of taking orders from Julius Varro, and having worked to establish cordial relations with the junior tribune Venerius, nephew of the all powerful Mucianus, as Callidus had warned his master, Antiochus had been preparing for this confrontation.
“Get down now!” Varro ordered. “Give up your horse to the women.”
“Have you taken leave of your senses?” Antiochus retorted. “Put them on another mule, or a spare cavalry horse. General Collega and Licinius Mucianus…”
“Neither General Collega nor Licinius Mucianus commands here,” Varro resolutely came back. “I do! Give up your horse, Antiochus.”
“You are talking about a slave. Have you forgotten that I am a magistrate?”
“Get down, magistrate, and give up your animal.”
Antiochus continued to ignore his order.
“I will not tell you again!” Varro barked.
“I will write in the most censorious terms to General Collega, to Licinius…”
“Get down!” boomed a deep, dark voice, the voice of Columbus, Antiochus’ massive Numidian guardian. His role had been to be unobtrusive but alert, and now, sitting on a large horse behind the Jewish magistrate, he edged closer. “You heard the questor. Get down now, or I will knock you down!”
Antiochus looked at the former gladiator, and realized that he meant every word. Fuming, the Jew slowly swung one leg over the horn of his saddle, then slipped to the ground. Columbus also dismounted, and took the reins of Antiochus’ steed.
Varro turned to Miriam. “The horse is yours,” he said.
“I don’t want his horse,” she replied.
Varro did not care what she wanted. “Columbus, put her up, and the child.”
Columbus wrapped one gigantic arm around the girl. As he lifted her off her feet, Pedius the lictor, who had been caring for Gemara since her rescue, stepped up and helped the Numidian place Miriam in the saddle. Between them, the pair then lifted up little Gemara and set her on the back of the horse behind Miriam.
“Now what am I supposed to ride?” Antiochus whined.
“For your insubordination, you should walk.”
“Walk! Me?”
“Callidus, bring a mule for the Jewish magistrate.” The questor strode to his horse, and the waiting Hostilis boosted him up into the saddle. “Now, all of you,” Varro called, “attend to the business at hand. Too much time has already been wasted.”
XVI
THE TESTIMONY OF THE SCRIBE OF EMMAUS
Emmaus Roman Province or Judea. April, A.D. 71
The flaccid Greek, an apprehensive, balding man, entered the tent and stood at the open end of the table in front of the questor and three of his officers. Aged in his sixties, he was pudgy and pale. There was a prominent and disfiguring brown mole the size of a sesterce coin on his right cheek. The Varro expedition had camped an Emmaus, which Titus had established as a colony for soldiers of the 15th Apollinaris Legion, veterans of the Jewish Revolt who had gone into retirement following the siege of Jerusalem.
“You are not a former soldier,” Varro said, looking the man up and down. The questor had stood before an assembly of 15th Legion veterans that morning and called on any man who had information about the death of Jesus of Nazareth forty-one years before to seek him out. This pasty-faced specimen did not have the look of a former legionary.
“No, my lord,” said the man apologetically. “My name is Aristarchus. I am a freedman. By profession, a scribe.” The Greek spoke rapidly
, in short, nervous bursts. As he did, his eyes roved over the lounging officers, and then moved to the two secretaries waiting at a table with moist wax and glittering stylus at the ready.
“You are a resident of Emmaus, Aristarchus?” Varro asked.
“I am, my lord, having only recently settled here. I serve the veterans. I write their wills and their letters, and certify their bills of sale. Previously, I was at Caesarea.”
“You have information for me?”
“I do, my lord. I heard that you sought information. In relation to a Jew. A Jesus of Nazareth. About his execution, during the tenure of Pontius Pilatus.”
“You are looking for a reward, fellow?” Marcus Martius asked suspiciously.
Aristarchus shrugged. “A hardworking tradesman would never say no to a little coin in hand, my lord. However, if the questor were to make it known, among the veterans of the 15th, that Aristarchus the scribe had been of service to him…The questor’s endorsement would be of inestimable value.”
“You shall have your endorsement, and cash in hand besides, if your information proves of value,” Varro assured him. He sounded impatient; the questor could not imagine what information a Greek scribe might have that would be helpful to his investigation. “What is your connection with Jesus of Nazareth, if any?”
“Forty-one years ago, I was a slave. In the service of Pontius Pilatus when he was Prefect of Judea.” The questor and his associates were suddenly all ears. “At the time of the execution of this Jesus of Nazareth, I was with Prefect Pilatus at Jerusalem.”
The Inquest Page 21