Secret Magdalene (28 page)

It is gone the sixth hour. Above us, the sky is as gray as ash and seems closer by the hour, for this is the season of the rain. All morning it has filled itself with water, and any moment now it will let its water go—how it rumbles from end to end with discontent.

So soon as we see Shechem’s well, Yeshu stops as we are become accustomed to stopping, puts back his head cloth so that his hair and his beard and his alikeness to Jude is easily seen, and when enough are gathered round us, more than a dozen this day, curious to hear him, as all are curious to hear a storyteller, he tells them one of his newest about a rich man and his two sons. One son was dutiful, but the other was a wastrel who willfully left his father’s care. Yet when the wastrel came home again, hoping for welcome, the father lavished as much wealth and as much love on the wastrel as on the dutiful. Jude and I have heard this now several times, and I marvel how each time Yeshu tells it, I find more in it to hear. Or, perhaps, Yeshu puts more in its telling. He does not tell the people who the rich man is, or who his faithful son might be, nor does he tell them the true name of the prodigal son. He hopes they will see what is meant for themselves. I see that the people hear what they will. Do they know the rich man is gnosis, which is the Kingdom of God? That the faithful son is he who is always with the Father in the Kingdom, and all that the Kingdom has is his? But the prodigal son is the man who has turned away his face; he who is “Dead” and does not “know” the Kingdom. By prodigal son Yeshu means every man and every woman we meet. By prodigal son, Yeshu means also himself as he was, before he awoke and turned his face once more to the Father and by so doing, came again to the Kingdom. Yeshu means, like the prodigal son, he was Dead and now he Lives, that he was lost but now he is found. He means that they too are prodigal sons, lost not in sin or unrighteousness as the Poor and the prophets would have it but in ignorance of who they are and where they are. By his story, Yeshu means that we can all go home where the Father awaits us.

I do not think they hear this. But how could they hear, when they do not know the Kingdom of God? Nor do they know what is meant by such a thing as “home.” Still, whether they hear or they do not hear, oftentimes there are those who linger for more. People gather and, having gathered, would engage this man who tells them stories, he who travels with a twin of himself, and with a female donkey who carries nothing. There is almost as much wonder that a beast does nothing but nibble at whatever she can reach, and bray when she feels called to, and roll in the dust whenever it suits her, as over my magic. Though, as the days have gone by, I become less and less a market magician and more and more a silent youth listening intently to every word anyone says, for as Yeshu talks more, I need do less.

This day in Shechem, of those at the well, one woman stands alone. There is something about her of Tata. Like Tata, there seems an understanding that leads to pity. There is also something about her of Theano, the Pythagorean Therapeutae. She is prideful, but it is not overweening. There seems also a certain scorn for those around her. The others shun her, turn away their faces so that she might not catch their eye, yet she is as a queen among them. Watching, I am somewhat ashamed I hide my sex, that I am not such a woman, that I must act as a man to be a woman such as this.

When Yeshu’s story ends, some leave, some do not, but the woman has come only for water. As others stay to question Yeshu and as an older man touches him for attention, she dips her cup in the basin. It is to this woman that Yeshu chooses to speak, softly saying, “Give me to drink.”

There is a moment of shock all around. The people are scandalized that this man, a Galilean by his accent, would speak to this woman. The woman is startled anyone speaks to her at all. Yet she is quick to recover. She looks at Yeshu, at Jude, at myself. She does not look at a single one of her fellow townspeople. She says, “How is it you ask drink of me, a woman of Samaria? For the Jews have no dealings with Samaritans.”

Yeshu smiles at her, and it is so loving I hurt for it being hers. “If you knew God’s gift, and who it is that says to you, ‘Give me to drink,’ you would have asked for, and I would have given you, living water.”

Because there is something in her proud eyes as she hears this, because there is a quickening of her breath and a tremor in her lips, I am compelled to reach into her. I find it is as easy as slipping under the skin of Eio, as easy as turning toward myself, as easy as—by the stars! What I find alarms me. She
hears
Yehoshua of the Nazorean! Her hearing quickens my own breath. Have we not come out from over the Sea of Stink to have people hear? Have I not promised Yeshu this should be my delight as it is his? Why then do I not open my heart to this one—a woman!—who is the first to hear? I know my answer before I have finished asking myself. I am jealous. There. I have said it. I will say it again. I am jealous.
Eloi, Eloi!
I shall put this away from me.

The woman with the cup looks upon Yeshu, “Sir, you have nothing to draw with and the well is deep. Where shall you get this living water? Are you greater than our father Jacob who gave us this well? Are you more than the John who baptizes and who is called the Messiah?”

It seems almost without thought that Yeshu has an answer. He says, “Whoever drinks from this well will surely thirst again. Does it not seem there is no end to hunger and thirst and the desires of the heart, no end to the sorrows of woman and man?”

“Yes,” replies this Samaritan, “and a prudent man would say that what seems to be so,
is
so.”

Yeshu laughs. “Woman, that is well said! But as I am what I am, I say to you, whoever drinks of the water I can give will never thirst, for I offer living water from the well of everlasting life.”

I shift uneasily, as do the people hearing these words. Yeshu has said nothing like this before. Before, he has only told a story, answered a few questions, has been careful in what he might say and how he might say it. But here in the city of Addai, something about this woman has made him say more.

The woman of Samaria dips her cup in the water and hands the cup to the storyteller. Yeshu takes it from her and from it deeply drinks, and as he does, she says, “Sir, give me this water so that I would not thirst.” Then, lifting her fine dark eyes to those around who listen with open mouths, and looking at them one after the other, she says, “And so I need not come here again to draw water.”

Yeshu looks at none but the woman. “Go,” he says. “Call your husband, and return here.”

All around I feel the movement of people drawing nearer. They would not leave this well for their very lives. I know why I am interested, but what so interests them? As firmly as she has said all else, the woman answers, “I have no husband.”

Behind me, comes a clucking of tongues, a sly snickering. There begins a faint hissing. But Yeshu smiles a smile of warmest love. “Again, how well you answer. You who have had five husbands.”

Five husbands! This woman has had five husbands? I have never heard a woman have so many, nor any who would wish to. Though I do remember Herodotus writing that in Libya it was once the woman with the most lovers who was honored, but he also wrote that a mare once gave birth to a rabbit, and I have assumed that in some things Herodotus was perhaps a bit credulous. But no wonder the people remain to hear. Salome would laugh with delight to know this woman lived. I struggle mightily with myself not to hate her.

“And the man you live with now is not your husband.”

Comes such a murmuring of the people around us. Tongues that clucked now wag, and by this, and by the look on the woman’s face, I understand that what Yeshu has said is true. And that this is why the woman is shunned. The woman’s eyes have grown round and rounder. “Sir!” she says, “Even as you are a Galilean, yet you are a prophet.”

Yet again, Yeshu laughs. He is delighted with this woman. “Even were I what you say I am, I tell you an hour comes; I say to you that the hour is already here, when no mountain is needed to know the Father. Nor any temple be it Jewish or Samaritan, or yet Nazorean.” Yeshu turns to the others now, all of whom listen closely, though who knows what they hear? “You worship you know not what, and you abase yourself yet you know not why, but I would give you what is in me to give. I would give you what is in you to
know.
Not only do you seek the Father, but the Father seeks you, and yet you are not apart.”

At this, the woman regards Yeshu as she might regard a new husband. She has heard him; I
know
she has heard him. Now I think she hears more. “I know the Messiah is coming. Have we all not heard that John the Baptizer is he? I know when this Messiah comes he will tell us all things.”

Yeshu touches her brow as he once touched mine. “I am one who can tell you things of the All.”

I begin to think Yeshu’s way of saying a thing numinous. By the hour, his words move closer to the poetry of Julia of Alexandria. Just to hear Yeshu’s words from Yeshu’s mouth is worth every step I take, no matter where it leads.

But now, from out a narrow side street, one of three leading into and out of this place of the well, comes a group of men, and such a sorry group of men as I have ever seen. Even at a distance their sorrow is plain on their persons, as plain as the dust of the road on their clothes. And as these draw near us, there sounds a shout from out among them, then another. “Yehoshua! Jude!”

On the instant, Jude is off, moving quickly, and I am confused as I watch him do this. Yeshu too has turned away from the woman at the well, and he too moves toward these men. Eio brays in alarm as they leave her, and the people gape in surprise. The brothers have broken into a run, and now, finally, I too see whom they run toward. It is Simeon, the son of Cleopas. It is Joses, the youngest brother with his poor scarred face. It is Jacob bar Judas and it is Simon bar Judas, who are the Sons of Thunder. Behind these, I see the fearsome brothers from Capharnaum. And behind these, there are more.

Is Dositheus among them? Is John? Is Salome!

I too break into a run.

The house of Thecla, the woman at the well, and the house of the man who is not her husband, is small and it is humble, and I would take comfort here if I could, but I cannot. My mind will go on and on, speaking not in Aramaic or in Greek, but in Egyptian, and I wish that it would stop no matter what the tongue. I would that I had no thoughts at all for I am numb as stone, as cold as the rain. But this I wish above all: that I did not know that John is taken. Zadok the Righteous One, who walked with Judas of Galilee and who was not taken then, is taken now.

But Simeon has told us of it, and there is no untelling.

John and his followers were sleeping when the soldiers of Herod Antipas appeared, for they had come for John in the darkest part of the night. And there followed such a terrible confusion, such a loudness of lamentation, that none can tell what truly happened, save only to themselves. The tents were torn open. The animals slaughtered or scattered. Dositheus is missing. Helena of Tyre is missing. As is Jair, the second son of Jacob bar Judas. As is Joanna, the wife of Chuza. Even Jacob the Just is lost. I am stunned. Even Old Camel Knees? None can say where these are now. There is no one who knows if they remain well. Or if they do not remain well.

We all of us sit in the house of the woman at the well, huddled here and huddled there, each a miserable lump of sodden clothing, and we listen to the din of the rain on Thecla’s flat roof. The woman moves among us offering food and wine that Menahem eats from the greed of youth and Yeshu eats out of compassion, for no one else takes Thecla’s food. I cannot eat, nor can I drink. I do not know where Thecla’s man is, and I do not care. I do nothing but watch the rain. Moments ago the sky opened as a great mouth would open, and it rains now as if all the rain at once would fall. Water rushes off the limestone of the walls outside Thecla’s door and over the stones of the street before her stoop, forming quick and sudden rills that could grow into rushing rivers that might wash away the whole of Shechem. I too would wash away in the rain.

All this is as the bitterest bile. All this is felt with the deepest sorrow. The heart of the father Jacob bleeds as he sits by the hearth, bent over and rocking, back and forth, his face in his hands. Anyone could know his thoughts. Where is his son? Is Jair locked away with John in the Fortress of Machaerus, a place of hopeless horror in Herod’s Peraea, which is the Land of Moab? Is he dead?

I know his grief as I know my own. I am broken with it. Simon Magus is also taken. Simeon tells us he watched, helpless to do other, being held down on all sides by Herod’s men, as young Simon would shield John with his own body. By this, the soldiers who bound John the Baptizer were forced to bind also Simon Magus. Simeon says that John offered no resistance, nor did Simon, but that all this changed when one among the men of Herod struck John. It was then that the youth Simon had turned and fought for John of the River as the wildest Sicarii, until both were chained into a high-wheeled, high-sided, ironbound wagon brought along in the dead of night for just this purpose.

I do not weep and I do not gnash my teeth. I do not rock where I sit in Thecla’s doorway. As I did on the shores of the Sea of Salt where no thing can live—except me, except me—I long again for death. I long again for anything that will take me away from where I am now, even if it would place me in the darkest cell, just such a one that must now enclose Salome. By this thought, I have thoroughly surprised myself. Salome must be in a cell! We could go to her as we did to Addai! Surely if Yeshu could rescue Addai from the Fortress of Antonia, he could rescue John, and, of course, Salome, from the Fortress of Machaerus?

I raise my head. I look for Yeshu. He is seated by his brothers Jude and Joses. Just as he did on the salted shore of the Sea of Salt, he clasps his knees. In this same moment, he looks for me. His eyes are not shattered. Not once since he saw the Father, has the pain revisited him. Has he heard my brilliant thought? I would rise. I would go and ask to speak to him. But in the very next moment Simon Peter of Capharnaum shouts out, and by his very first word, all is swept away in what it is he demands of us. “How was it known where John slept?” He leaps to his feet. He shakes his fist at the rain. “How was it known which tent of all tents, when all tents were the same! How was it known which bed of the hundreds of beds? I would know these things!”