all they do.”
I opened my eyes, and here I was again, in Martha’s courtyard, the heat of the afternoon just beginning to turn, the dusty olive leaves making their dry sound in the breeze. Then I heard the humming sound, bees in apple blossoms on the Shining Isle of Tir na mBan, or the wild roses of Temple Magdalen.
It was only Ma carrying a tray of food, a little haphazardly, scattering figs and olives as she listed across the courtyard.
“I sail in three days, Maeve,” said Joseph softly. “Send me word, if you change your mind.”
And though Joseph stayed to eat with us all, as the rules of hospitality demanded, I knew in my heart—in his heart—he was already gone.
CHAPTER FIVE
TWO OR THREE TOGETHER
SOMETIMES I STILL WONDER if I was temporarily insane. Here is Joseph of Arimathea about to set off for Glastonbury, and I refuse to go with him? And what is so wrong with a second marriage to a doting older man who asks nothing more than to love and protect my child and me? A doting older man named Joseph, no less. Just like Miriam’s husband. If it was good enough for the mother of god, for god’s sake, why didn’t I jump at the chance? Who do I think I am? (I’m not going to answer that).
The day after Joseph sailed, the khamsin kicked up, a hot desert wind that parches the earth, the skin, the soul, and covers the sky with the kind of clouds that never rain, just block the light and dull the senses. Martha and the rest of us worked inside, out of the wind, pressing figs into cakes that could be preserved and stored. A simple enough task, pleasant and repetitive, but today I could not settle into a mindless rhythm.
I’ve got to get out of here; the thought was clear and urgent as an alarm bell. And I looked at my life, suddenly aghast that I had not only refused Joseph’s help but made no plan at all for the coming birth of my child. I’d been docile as a cow, sitting here all summer, content to chew my cud. Now the lethargy of early pregnancy was gone; the child was quickening. Time was racing. What was I going to do? Hang around and let James determine my fate? And if I didn’t, who would help me escape? Escape might seem a strong word to use, considering that I was among friends, or anyway friends of Jesus, who would take care of me for his sake. Lazarus had made that very clear.
Lazarus. The thought of him was like a drink of cool water. I needed to go to Lazarus. Simple. I was under his roof, under his protection. He would shelter me for as long I needed, but he would not be offended if I asked him to help me arrange safe passage home to Temple Magdalen. At least I didn’t think he would. There was certainly no one else I could approach about hightailing it with the unborn scion of David back to a heathen whorehouse. Because that’s where I knew I wanted to go. That was my place now, not Glastonbury, not Mona, not even Tir na mBan. Temple Magdalen, where my beloved had finally returned to me—or more precisely was returned to me, more dead than alive, by a good and desperate Samaritan.
I slipped away from the kitchen to the vineyards where I suspected I might find Lazarus clucking over the vines, trying to protect them from the hot dry wind, for the harvest would begin soon. Mature vines offer shade and, as many lovers have discovered, camouflage. As I searched the vineyard, there was a lull in the wind, and I could hear Lazarus speaking to someone—unusual enough in itself, as he was a man who avoided conversation, if possible. I drew nearer and recognized Mary B, speaking in a low intense tone, accompanied by terse gestures. She must have come from Jerusalem that morning and gone straight to find her brother, for she had not stopped by the house. They were so intent on each other, they did not notice my approach. All right, I’ll admit it, as soon as I could hear their words, I did step behind a fig tree and listen.
“Do not ask it of me,” said Lazarus in a tone more anguished than angry.
“It is not I who ask it. It is he.”
I felt that prickle of alarm that was becoming more and more familiar to me at the sound of that pronoun spoken in a certain tone. Or perhaps I should say invoked.
“But how do you know, Mary?”
“How can you not know is more the question. Lazarus, you of all people should know who he is. He called you back from death!”
If I’d had any doubt (and I didn’t) which “he” she meant I knew now for sure. It was Lazarus who took me by surprise.
“Actually, he didn’t.”
Mary was silenced for a moment.
“Lazarus, what can you mean? We were all there when he called you from the tomb and you came forth.”
“I wasn’t dead,” he said in a low voice, as if it were a shameful secret.
“You were. I was there. Martha and I anointed you and swaddled you for the grave with our own hands.”
“Do you remember what Mary of Magdala did then?”
I couldn’t see Mary B’s face but I could feel her frowning.
“I was beside myself with grief; I wasn’t paying attention to her. I don’t think she was with us when we, well, prepared your body,” Mary paused, perhaps suddenly struck by the strangeness of reminiscing about a burial with someone who had been the corpse. “No, she wasn’t with us. Martha told her to go away. She was angry with her. I can’t remember exactly why, but then Martha has never liked her.”
“I can remember.”
“You—”
“I keep telling you, I wasn’t dead. She tried to tell you, too, but you and Martha wouldn’t listen. Finally, I told her not to bother.”
“You…were talking to her.”
“She was with me at the river. The whole time.”
“What river?” said Mary; I could hear her increasing confusion and distress.
“You know, the river,” Lazarus repeated helplessly. “There’s a shoal in the river where you have to wait, until Moses calls you.”
“A place between life and death? There is no mention of such a place in the Torah,” Mary’s mind clicked into action. “It sounds pagan, perhaps Egyptian.”
“Moses was there,” Lazarus reminded her.
And Isis had been there, too; I had seen her. Mary B wasn’t so far off. All rivers belong to Isis, but Moses had been quite at home. Well, why wouldn’t he. He’d spent his earliest infancy floating on the Nile.
“And you say Mary of Magdala was there with you? How can that be?”
Lazarus shrugged and then threw up his hands. “I don’t know, Mary. Maybe it is a mistake to talk about these things. But I will tell you one thing more. I didn’t want to come back. I came back for him, because he wept, because he was my friend, and he needed me. And now he’s gone.”
And Lazarus began to weep, and Mary reached for him, and tried to comfort him.
“But he’s not,” she said. “He’s still with us, whenever two or more are gathered together in his name. That’s what he said that last night. Remember? We have to love each other now as he loved us.”
I
