The soldier who had searched him had either missed, or not been interested in the manumission paper which he carried inside his robe. But tomorrow it would be taken out and studied and its falsity would be detected. Tonight’s search had been perfunctory—they had missed Caspar’s knife. Balthazar knew, from his experience in Metellus’ household, how meticulous the Romans were about property and ownership; if they had the slightest suspicion about his forged paper they would get in touch with the Lady and she would claim him, and punish him so severely that he would die.
He looked back, calmly over the event that had brought him to this situation, and finally he thought—I deluded myself. Once and once only did I truly see the future, and that was in Cleo’s black ball, after she had conjured up the vision. She was a real seer, what she
saw was the truth; she saw the Greekdying, and I, for a moment, shared her vision. What I saw afterwards was what I wished to see; a waking dream, of no more substance than the dreams of sleep. I wished myself free, finely clad, in the company of free men. So I saw what I wished, and it meant nothing… .
Wait a bit, he said to himself; and he remembered that Metellus had always said that every bit of evidence must be weighed. And against this theory of self-delusion, he must, in fairness, set the fact that he had found Melchior and Caspar, he had found the very clothes in which he had seen himself; in Jerusalem he had recognised the gateway…. But all to what end? The star had been the link between him and Melchior, and now, outside in the night it was dying, while in one little brick cell Melchior fretted over his wasted errand, and in another Balthazar saw his vision as nonsense and faced the possibility of death. And he thought, it might be that it was death that I came out to seek. I thought it was the death of the world, but it might be only my own. I thought I saw an end to slavery, and death would end my bondage. When I die, under the lash, a whole world will die with me; my world; my youth; my mutilation, my ability as an accountant, my gift of tongues, everything that-made me me, and not the other fellow, all my thoughts, my hopes and disappointments. The death of a man is the death of a world. And in death my dream will be fulfilled, for death does put a slave on the level with a soldier, making all men equal, death does stop the mouth of hunger, and puts an end to heartbreak and homesickness.
Thinking these and a multitude of other tumbling thoughts Balthazar was quiet and gave no trouble.
With Melchior it was otherwise. He sat down thankfully, and he was glad to find himself alone in a quiet place, conducive to thought. He cast back, in his mind, to the moment when, at the top of his tower, he had seen this journey as something that must be undertaken, and for the life of him he could not see that he had at any point made a miscalculation of such immensity that it resulted in his being incarcerated here while the star moved on, came to its appointed end and the whole thing was made nonsense. In very circumstance he had been sensible, reasonable, and meticulous. In turning off the road perhaps a little impatient, but surely impatience then had been justified.
He sat very still, but his heart beat so fast and so hard that he could only breathe in little shallow gasps and his whole body quivered. There must be some way out. There always had been, hitherto. He thought of how he had arrived in Jexal, penniless on a spent camel—and there had been Caspar. Then, when he arrived in a country where nobody understood him and Gas-par’s money was dwindling at an alarming rate, there’d been Balthazar. True, outside the walls of Jerusalem he’d wished he’d never seen either of them, but even that waste of time had been justified. Now this!
Inside his distressed old body the trained, obedient mind worked on. He thought of his own attempted protests in the faces of the grinning soldiers, the hard-eyed officer; of Balthazar’s pleading voice and subservient manner. Something had been missing, one decisive, propulsive word. A catalyst. There must be one. There must be something—and it must be a word, since there was nothing to be done. A word known to him, and recognisable to these barbarian men. Of course; he had it. Herod!
He took off his shoe, stood up and went to the door and rapped smartly on it, just below the grating so that the sound would carry. He had a little trouble with his breathing, but he mastered it, drawing a deep breath, counting while he held it, ten the first time, then twenty. And when he felt sure of producing a firm clear sound he said:
“Herod.”
Then he rapped again, breathed, repeated the word. The name sounded and died along the whitewashed passage much as the name of Mariamne sounded and died through the halls and corridors of Herod’s palace. Even in this extremity Melchior realised the absurdity of calling the name as though he expected Herod himself to answer; so he began to make sentences.
“Herod will be very angry,” he said in his abominable Greek.
“I was with Herod this afternoon. Herod is expecting a reportfrom me. I am on an errand from Herod. Herod is waiting for me. Herod, the king in Jerusalem. I was in Jerusalem with Herod this afternoon.”
He rapped with his shoe, waited, repeated his simple uninformative sentences, resolutely keeping his voice steady; it would never do to sound hysterical.
“Herod will be angry. I was with Herod this afternoon….” The soldier on duty at the end of the passage said to another, “The old one is carrying on now. Listen! All gibberish, but it sounds to me as though every now and then he says “Herod”. What do you think ?”
“I am on an errand for Herod. Herod is waiting my report.. ..” Melchior chanted.
“Right enough. It’s Herod he’s talking about.”
“I reckoned they looked a funny lot the minute I clapped eyes on them,” the one on guard said.
“And Herod’s pretty touchy. Think he ought to be told?” He nodded his head in the direction of the place where Caepio might be expected to be at this hour.
“If I was you, I would.”
Caepio came out and listened, and for a moment there was no sound, Melchior was drawing breath. Then he rapped and resumed his chant. Caepio recognised the one important word and it occurred to him that if the King of Judea was in any way, however remotely, concerned with these mysterious men the responsibility for retaining them had better be shuffled, as soon as possible, on to Vatinius. So he turned, and went quickly, though still heavy-footed,; towards the little room which Vatinius regarded as his own, his home.
THIRTEEN
A ROMAN BARRACKS Half-mile Earlier that day, just as the daylight was fading, a very elegant litter, borne between two mules, had come to a standstill before the small barracks from which Eunice and Ephorus drew so much of their custom. The litter’s occupant was obviously a well-to-do man who travelled in style; there were three pack mules and four slaves in his train. The mules were all plump and sleek-coated, the slaves, young, plump and well dressed; and when from inside the litter a hand moved and pushed back the bronze-coloured velvet curtains, it was seen to be a plump hand with a large ruby ring upon the forefinger.
“Ask,” said a voice, well used to issuing orders, ‘for the centurion, Vatinius; and say that Quintilius is here.”
Vatinius was inspecting stores. The last day of December had seen a fresh century of soldiers come marching down from Jerusalem to occupy the barracks for three months, and the stores had, as usual at the change-over, been delivered. As usual they had been stored, all in confusion, and Vatinius had waited, tactfully, until Caepio, the centurion who had come with his men, had had time to settle in and get things into order. Like many before him, he had done nothing, so then Vatinius had said, “This is a filthy mess and muddle; you can’t tell wine from vinegar, honey from oil. Set a couple of men to put it straight.” Caepio had heard something of Vatinius’ fussy ways—and his other peculiarities—before he came to Bethlehem; he had given the order, muttering to himself that he was a soldier, not a housewife. Now Vatinius was viewing, with only mild approval, the job the two men had made of the store-room. The point was, he said to himself, that in an orderly store-room a depredation was so much more quickly detected.