John

by Niall Williams

  Where four streets meet in a cross they stop; Lemuel indicates their various directions as he has been told. They are to one another more than company. They are part of one another's belonging and purpose and have not been separate. In the street-cross bright daylight beholds them, their wordless pause, their look from one to another, then embrace, then departure.

  Emissaries, urgent and grave, they go into the shadows.

  The day rises overhead. Man is announced in noise, from inside dwellings a discord of pots, jugs, clanging of metal, movement of wooden stools, tables, voices. Questions called, curses shouted. Into the streets come hastening traders, merchants minor, figures in varied dress, elbowing, inquisitive of all that might betoken business. Some with jewelled fingers, others in robes fringed with dust. They have their places to be; they know the best junctures, in what corners accumulate the most likely buyers. The city is theirs. A stranger is a purse yet unopened. The passageways are soon crowded. Ordinary clamour of humanity sounds, news of cousins, of sickness, of deals struck, fortune found. In the jostle of men, dogs moving. Men of generous proportion and slender spirit kick at them. With olive breath, spice breath, lemon fingers, honey-water wash, they exchange tales of outrageous boastfulness, how their acumen won riches, how the goddess shone down upon them, sent fools with deep pockets, how a mere two golden tokens in offering brought untold recompense. Ephesus is their city, a place blessed, where in return for sacrifice, the gods repay tenfold. In the traders there is this confidence, a practice of commerce they understand, that in the exchange between heavens and earth a tabulated costing exists. It is so: such an action brings such a response. For them, it is only to recognise the beneficence, to see what Artemis has sent them up the river or unloaded on the dock. So the early morning is beaten with haste and anticipation.

  The sun burns. It seems to near, to descend, and make rise from below scents warm. Flies find the day come and take to the air. All species of gnat, spider, biting insect, traverse shadow and light in first quest of flesh.

  Where Papias and Kester go some such hang in the air, a gauze drapery that falls across their faces. They are swiftly stung, the tiny black creatures virulent. Papias cries out, swats, slaps his forehead, his cheeks. He shuts his eyes where they swarm upon them. He fists into them; when at last the creatures are gone, he blinks into the light and realises that Kester is gone. The street pushes past him. He goes quickly back some way, then returns, hurries into another. He looks in doorways, scans the morning crowds. Panic races his heart, makes sing the bites in his cheeks, the wounded ear. Where is he? Where is he gone? Has he been taken? You were to watch over him; he was placed in your care. How can you have lost him? Accusation bubbles in his blood. His back itches wildly. He stands against a wall of rough stone. Beneath his robe the scabbed rash that runs from his left shoulder toward his spine is blossomed purple and craves his nails. Anything sharp will do. The ruined skin is inflamed and must be scratched to bleed. Papias could rub his back then against the wall. He could find relief so. But he doesn't. What pestilence is in him, what makes his skin rupture and blisters to weep, he fears, but he cannot drive it away. His itching is more furious than any; upon his skin, within his skin something crawls. But he will not scratch. Instead, he stands in near the wall, shaking. The craving worsens. Tightly he screws his hands to fists. He will outwait it; it will lessen. He shuts his eyes to make his mind see only the Lord. To see the face and the suffering. His lips move in prayer.

  Let it pass, let it pass. If it be thy will, O Lord.

  He prays not for healing, only a salve. The healing will come from the soul outwards and is not yet. He knows.

  Across his back crawls the creature of his own unworthiness. Strike at me, it seems to say. Strike, scratch, draw nails across me. It is a wild torment. Papias knows he cannot defeat it, that if it scratches it will worsen.

  Near the wall, he stands.

  Traffic of traders passes, but not Kester. The boy is gone.

  An old woman, kerchiefed, with hollow eyes and shadow moustache, watches. This man may be in the throes of bliss, may be an interlocutor, may against the wall be in receipt of an ecstasy divine. In Ephesus she has heard of such. The city draws them. The sacred and its mysteries are the local speciality. She gums sour spittle, watches. The man is white-faced, young, thin as all that have forgotten the body. Will he fall down in writhing as she has heard some do? Will he cry out in tongues? In Ephesus it would be no surprise. She has heard of such displays to bring followers. The outlandish, the extravagant, are the mark of theists now, such practice and manner as the Romans despise. The man barely moves. Sunlight comes down the wall to meet his head. His eyes are shut and his head tilted upward. Might it catch fire now? Might the gods let it burst in flame?

  The woman watches. A cat comes to her feet. She loses the man a moment in the laboured passage of a laden cart. When she looks again, he is looking at her. He is righted. Has something happened? What is different? Has she missed the God moment? She kicks at the cat and to escape the man's eyes turns quickly inside.

  The fury gone, Papias breathes. But where is Kester? Why has he run off? Did he not understand that they welcomed him? Did he not feel Christian love? Papias can find no comfortable answer. He steps out of the sunlight and continues to the end of the street. A figure of youth and curious intensity, he crosses the city and comes to visit the house of Diotrophes.

  There are several buildings, all proportioned in style of wealth. The principal is a large dwelling with white portico, even placement of cypress trees on either side. The sun is hot; Papias will be glad of shade. At the entranceway he is readying what he will say when the door is opened. Before him is a man his own age with flaxen hair and eyes of palest blue.

  'I am Papias, disciple of John, come to greet Diotrophes in the name of our Lord Jesus the Christ.'

  The man says nothing. He looks at the stranger then turns and leads down a corridor to an anteroom. He raises a hand to indicate Papias should wait, and then is gone.

  Here is the beginning, Papias thinks. Here is the first true beginning, the commencement of the gathering of the community. Diotrophes will have followers, he will know of others who have kept the faith and bring them the good news of our coming. They will join with us. How many? Maybe as many as three score. Maybe a hundred. And with those whom the others go to tell, by nightfall we may be a community of . . .

  He has not time to calculate the number, for the attendant is returned and gestures him to follow. The room he enters is long and clouded with the burning of frankincense. In its centre standing is a large circle of silver, an empty O. At the top of the room is a raised dais upon which sits a chair of ornate carving. Here sits Diotrophes, a man of sixty years with grey beard and deep eyes pursed in wrinkles. He wears a robe of dark blue and a chain of gold.

  Papias goes forward and greets him.

  'I am Papias, disciple of John, who is come out of exile on the island of Patmos to bring the good news.'

  Diotrophes sits impassive.

  'John, son of Zebedee,' Papias says a little louder. The frankincense is stifling. 'John who was the beloved disciple of our Lord Jesus the Christ, who was from the beginning and at the end, who sat at the right hand of our Lord, who . . .' He has to pause for better breath. The air is so thick and sweet.

  'We are come to bring the good news. I am to tell you that we rejoice in that you have kept the true faith and the time is now upon us for the coming of the glory.' His lips are dry. Is he not being clear? Is he failing to show the miracle of what is happening? 'It is a great time,' he says. 'We are full of joy.'

  'What do you ask of me?'

  The voice is cold, drops the words from the raised seat like lesser coins.

  'I am sent with the good news,' Papias says falteringly. 'Though we are small in number now, we will soon . . .'

  'Again, what do you ask of me?'

  The frankincense stings in the nostrils.

  'We ask that you will rece
ive us. We seek dwelling that we may go about the city to gather to us the community of faith. You have many buildings.'

  'Wherefore should I receive you?'

  'Because we are come in the company of the Apostle to bring the good news.'

  'The apostle John?'

  'Yes, the Beloved.'

  'The one called the apostle John is dead.'

  'No.'

  'He is dead. Another pretends to be him; he you follow.'

  Papias blinks. The world shifts out of its focus. Do the walls slide slightly? Does the light buckle? 'It is not true!' he says loudly. 'He lives. It is he. I have lived by his side these years past on Patmos.'

  'John is dead. He was killed in Rome, stoned and crucified, years since. This man is another,' Diotrophes replies, his voice unchanged, his manner cool, as though he but tells the hour. 'I have it on good account. You are fools. It is widely reported. Your numbers have diminished as the truth has enfolded. This man tells outrageous falsehood and some believe him. It is the way o£ the world. Ignorance is everywhere.'

  Papias does not know what to say. The man sits before him, his hands upon his knees, his deep eyes slow and spiritless, as though he studies dull wares.

  'This John,' Diotrophes says. 'He speaks of Jesus the Galillean?'

  'Our Lord Jesus the Christ.'

  Diotrophes shakes his head slowly. 'The Christ?'

  'The Son of God.'

  The phrase makes the elder man respond; he blows a half sneer to the ceiling. 'I have not heard it said outright until now,' he says. 'I had heard it reported but not spoken in my own presence. Jesus the Galillean, the Son of God! I should drive you from my house for blasphemy. You are a fool who has been taken for a fool.' Diotrophes's face warms with anger. His eyes now dark, he points a finger at the other. 'I should spit upon you for speaking such, have you beaten by my servants.' He sighs, looks above him, his nostrils wide as he draws to him the frankincense. 'But Diotrophes must be great of spirit,' he says. 'And is great of spirit. Your hope lies only in your ignorance. That you may be instructed. You are ignorant. John son of Zebedee was a fisherman who followed Jesus a prophet. Nothing more. Jesus was a wise teacher. Nothing more. John claimed for him this. Nothing more. John was killed in Rome by Romans. The rest is lies.'

  'Jesus was the Son of God,' Papias says. His voice is quieter than he wants, as if he tells himself.

  'Again, the Son of God?' Diotrophes raises his voice. Spittle flecks whitely his beard.

  'It is what John believed,' the disciple says, then corrects himself, 'what John believes.'

  'There is no John, you fool. You know nothing of God. Do not you speak to me of God! Do not utter it! Do not defile my house with your blasphemy. What gives you right to say this man was the Son of God, or that one? Why not my servant Galen? Why not Absalom, why not Ezra, why not my fatted goat, why not my horse? Any one of them no further from the truth. God the One forgive you, for you are ignorant. You are not fit to say his name. Be gone. Go before Diotrophes is removed from Diotrophes and is ruled by anger. Go, tell this John he is false. Tell him to go back to his island. To die with the fools who follow him. Tell him Diotrophes knows God the One, the True. Tell him a new age is come, that his Gallilean Jesus is forgotten and his John with him. The holy are not ignorant fishermen now, not carpenter's sons, but wealthy and important people. Look at my house. Do you see my house? Is this the house of an ignorant follower of your Jesus? Is this not the house of one whom God loves? If God loves me not, why do I prosper? Diotrophes is preeminent in God's eye. You tell this. Go. Go tell him this. Be gone from my house.'

  Papias does not move. What is happening cannot be happening. It is a dream. It is the infection in his blood speaking. His mind is disordered. He stares up at the bearded man, whose head shakes in scorn. What is he to say? What reply can be make?

  Beside him appears the flaxen-haired servant. His audience is over. He is touched on the elbow to be led away. But Diotrophes cannot let go yet of the outrage, and before Papias has reached the doorway, he calls after him, 'Tell him he is discovered a liar and a blasphemer! Tell him if he comes to my door I will have him beaten away! Diotrophes will punish him for God. I will bring the wrath of God upon him. Tell him that!'

  Diotrophes puts hand in fist behind his back, walks from the dais and out into a side chamber.

  Papias's head spins. His cheeks are aflame. He is like a bird stunned from flight, falling. He cannot see what he passes.

  Then he is outside in the street once more, and past the cypress trees and the avenue.

  He cannot think what to think. Is he blind or seeing? There is such sudden dark. He leans to a wall to steady himself.

  He does not see Auster watching, nor Matthias pass on his way into the house.

  27

  In the evening they are gathered again. Lemuel has good report of Gaius, who received him well, as did Demetrios, Meletios. Josiah was ill, Eli tells.

  'What of Diotrophes?' asks Danil.

  Papias looks at the serene face next to him. He is the apostle John, Papias knows he is. But he cannot unhear what Diotrophes said, nor can he break to John the news of hatred.

  'Diotrophes, Papias?' Lemuel prompts. 'Did he receive you?'

  'No. No, he was elsewhere; his servant told he was away,' he lies. He looks at his hands, sees tiny specks of dead gnats. He has not told John yet that Kester is not returned.

  Their host, Martha, brings them wine and bread, her children about her. The disciples, unused to the presence of a woman and of children, sit quiet in humility. But John most easily demonstrates gratitude. He finds in Martha virtues forgotten. Or perhaps it is that in her he traces back to others of the women in his life. Perhaps in her modest manner, in her voice, in the soft sounds of her movements, he is carried back into the century past where was his mother, and Mary and the Magdalen and another Martha, and others, too, such women. Perhaps it is only now, after years on Patmos, that he recognises how greatly he has missed the virtue of woman. He is deeply moved, it is clear.

  So, too, by her children. In the day the disciples have been absent, he has become familiar to them, and sometime in their presence reaches his hand out into the air and one or another takes it briefly, and the Apostle's face breaks in smile.

  No other dwelling has yet been found. They must burden their host a little longer. Martha tells them they are welcome, though the space is small. At sunrise they pray together, the first frail day of their return over.

  The darkness is past. The light is again.

  We are in fellowship with you.

  We walk in the light now, and have no occasion for stumbling.

  In the morning John tells that he will go about in the city. The disciples, having witnessed the crush and noise of crowd, rough traffic of human commerce, are concerned for his safety.

  'He will be knocked aside,' Meletios says. 'The numbers are too great. You all saw how the streets are thronged. He should remain here. You must tell him, Papias.'

  'I?'

  'Yes, you can tell him it is unsafe.'

  'He is resolved. I have never known him to turn.'

  'Then we must bear him on a litter,' Danil says. 'Or a chair, that he be out of the crowd. Ephesus is not Patmos. And if a number rushed forwards to touch him, even that they might touch one who had touched the Christ, what then might befall? Calamity and grief.'

  'You should tell him, Papias, that if he must come, we will bear him above us.'

  The Apostle is seated outside the doorway, his face to the morning light. The habits of his life on the island remain with him. His robe has been washed by Martha and all but shines whitely.

  'Master?'

  'What troubles you, Papias?'

  'It is thought the city is too dangerous.'

  'I am come not to stay hidden. I go into Ephesus to begin to prepare the way.'

  'I have told that you would not remain here. Danil says that we bear you on a litter, or a chair shouldered between us.'

 
; John smiles. 'Go, tell that they must not fear. I will walk. And I will come to no harm.'

  Papias has known this would be the answer. He turns to bring the news inside when John says, 'Papias, the boy Kester did not return with you?'

  The disciple pauses on the precipice of truth. 'He went away from me in the street,' he says. 'I could not find him after. I thought he would be returned here. But he is not come back.'

  The old man nods slightly, says nothing.

  They leave the house soon after in small phalanx, Papias and the Apostle at the rear. The day is already hot, the merchants and traders already installed. They come the narrow streets slowly.

  Some standing in conversation, or idling in shadow, take notice of the thin figure robed in white, his long wisp hair, his blind eyes. What new sage is this? What soothsayer? Where will he set up? Perhaps he can read fortunes. Look, already he has followers.

  The disciples head toward the open square of the State Agora and the basilica. Short, tense, Danil squares his chest, leads at the front. Noise of voices, cries of exchange and barter, of prices, weights, matters mercantile, swells the streets. Goods of all kind are borne to and fro. In his blindness, what must the Apostle think? He is as one bearing a candle flame. What readiness he might have to meet the jostle of the traders is nothing to what he needs next when they are arrived at the square. For here, in clusters tight and disparate, are gathered preachers, mentors, masters and followers, domini of varied belief. Here the trade is creeds, and the stock measured in disciples. Men call out for custom, promise reward, promise the favour of God, promise a place at the right hand. Some, in extravagant dress with red sash, with purple stole, or covering of snakeskin, make high drama, dance steps, drumbeat. All is clamour. All seek the attention of each passerby, make urgent claim of knowledge. Here seem assembled all those who interlocute between man and God, who have been variously touched by light, by fire, by vision. As the disciples move among them, their sleeves are pulled by youths in day employ to bring listeners.