Damascus Page 9

  The Lord provides. Near the gushing stream, full from the rains that have battered our mountain overnight, mushrooms have bloomed under a moss-covered rock. They are liver-brown, their curved heads spotted with white flecks as if marked by the hard rain. I know them to be safe to eat. They will be a feast. Thank you, Lord.

  That’s when I hear footsteps. I look around in panic, grab my knife. The steps are human, not animal.

  A scrawny, terrified girl emerges from the glade of cypress trees. She has a bundle in her arms. My fear vanishes. Another infant to be abandoned.

  On seeing me the girl stops. I crouch there, blade in hand. Neither of us speaks.

  Tentatively, timidly, she approaches.

  I hear the growl. It comes from me. I am now a creature of this forest. I have become what they claim me to be. A witch. A hag. An animal.

  Then she astonishes me.

  She kneels before me as if I were a noblewoman. ‘Lady,’ she says in a trembling stutter, ‘is your god the one they call Jesus the Saviour?’

  ‘Get up, girl. Get off your knees.’

  My instruction scares her; she turns to flee.

  I had not intended to frighten her. I make my voice gentle. ‘What is it you want? Are you abandoning your child?’

  She shakes her head. ‘Does—does …’ And then she speaks in a rush, though her voice is still soft. ‘Does your god raise the dead?’

  I make no answer. She dares come closer until we are an arm’s length from one another. She unwraps the bundle.

  The child is dead. Its tiny limbs are bloated. Already the stench of rot is upon it. The dull blankness of its soulless eyes. A tiny bump dangling from its grey corpse. A boy. A son.

  She offers him to me. ‘Please. Raise him.’

  I don’t understand. I wonder if she wants me to burn the body, to take it away from her. But the feverish demand of her eyes gives me pause.

  My voice is hushed. ‘What is it you want?’

  ‘Raise him from the dead. Ask your god to make my child live again.’

  I know if I move closer I will scare her. I want to hold this girl. To make her understand that I know her grief.

  All I can do is shake my head.

  With extreme care, she places the infant on the ground and then falls again to her knees. She coils her arms around my feet.

  ‘Lady,’ she is moaning, ‘I’m sorry, but I am poor. I can’t give you anything but my pledge that if you raise my child I will follow your god. They say he’s a god for the poor. They say he hates the rich and that he cares about those of us most wretched.’

  Her tears fall on my feet.

  ‘That’s a god I can worship,’ she continues. ‘That’s a god for me. This is the first son born living to me, my lady, all the others were born dead. My husband will beat me—he’ll throw me out.’

  Her voice rises to a scream. ‘I need a son! Bring him back, make my son live again.’

  I crouch, I pull her arms away from around my feet.

  ‘Sister,’ I say, ‘I cannot.’

  Still on her knees, she stiffens. ‘What does your god want of me?’

  To cherish your neighbour with a love equal to that you feel for your mother, your husband, your child. To abandon all possessions. To turn your cheek and offer love to cruelty.

  I do not say any of this. I remember how absurd these commandments sounded when I first heard them.

  She picks up the child, lays him at my feet.

  It is the way she looks up at me, the trust I see in her eyes, that reminds me of Salvation. And though I know it is futile, I pick up the body and cradle it in my arms. The stench of death. I swallow, refuse the bile, I look down at the child.

  She is expecting spells cast from a trance. Rituals and narcotics and invocations. All I have are words.

  ‘My redeemer, my master, my lord, my son, my brother, my hope, my Jesus, you who are always with the last, you who will make them first, raise this child.’

  The dead infant in my arms. The soft wind rising, the branches cracking and swaying. The rushing stream. All of this, and the cold child in my arms.

  She looks at me expectantly. ‘Is he coming back to life?’

  I pass him back to her. ‘I’m sorry. Your son is dead. May the Lord have mercy on his soul.’

  The sighing wind, the coursing of the water. And her weeping, tears without end. And then the rage, also without end.

  ‘Witch. Dog. Hag.’

  This time there is no timidity. This time there is only hatred.

  ‘Witch. Dog. Hag.’ She spits on the ground. ‘Mother of an abomination.’ She takes a breath, laughs bitterly. ‘You know what I hear about your god? That he was born to a whore, that his father was a drunk, a coward, the lowest of Roman soldiers. That’s what they say about your god.’

  She spits once again. ‘And he was hung on the cross.’ Her tears have ceased. ‘Your god was hung on a fucking cross. That isn’t a god. That’s just some poor cunt of a slave.’

  The hand not holding the infant is a fist that is pounding at me, her nails are clawing at my face. I do not resist. I do not try to escape her fury. I offer her my cheek. She gouges at it. She punches me, she spits at me, she curses at me till her fury is gone. Then she is empty. She drops and lies whimpering on the ground, curled around the bundle of her child.

  I take my blade and start stabbing at the hard ground, preparing for the burial of the child. She is huddled, shivering, watching me. I dig and I dig till it seems I have gone all the way to Hades. I will not place this babe on a fire. I will not turn it to ash. This child, this mother, they are the last who will be first. I will not burn this child. I take him from her and lay him in the grave.

  The mother does not move. It is only when I begin to pray that she struggles to her feet.

  ‘Not in the name of that god of yours,’ she snarls. ‘Never in his name. I won’t let you bury him in that god’s name.’

  I am without tongue. I dare not move.

  She looks down at her child in the freshly dug hole. She spits one final time, she spits on her son. ‘You have brought me shame. May only evil meet you in the afterlife.’

  She turns and runs back down the mountain. I cover the body of the child, push in the earth and press it over him. I kneel and say, ‘May the Lord have mercy on your soul.’

  I clean my hands in the thundering stream, I take my horde of wild mushrooms in one hand, and under the other arm I take my wood.

  I return to my Salvation.

  There had been a time of plenty and then came a time of want. At first there were the great floods, when the heavens were torn and the rain poured unceasingly onto the earth. And then I learned what it was to go hungry in a city. At first the prices in the markets doubled. Then they tripled. In the end all that remained were scant provisions. Rotting vegetables, maggot-infested meat. Guards were stationed at every market square to beat back desperate thieves.

  Our stores of food were gone within a season. We released one labourer and then another. We sold Fortitude. She was far from young and the price we received for her was paltry. We got a better price for Salonikos but he was still sold at a loss. We were reduced to Psyche and Rectitude and one skinny youth, Atticus. Theodorus could not bear to part with him. He was a hard worker, and devoted as a hound to his master. That was all that remained of our household.

  We all returned to work, scouring and drying the hides, sewing the canvases together. It was our labour that made the tents. Philos was no longer tutored. He was apprenticed to the craft of his father and grandfather. His muscles thickened, his body became leaner and stronger. Every day his speech grew coarser and he had no time for games with his little brother, no patience for conversation and gossip. He was becoming a man.

  The floods had swept away the most ramshackle buildings and made homeless half our city. When the deluge ended and the skies cleared, the temples were full of people rejoicing. But the respite was fleeting, for then came the plague. They dug pits outsi
de the city walls and filled them with the bodies of the dead, covering them with lime. The stench of death permeated everything.

  We lost Psyche. We came close to losing our Leonidas. I sat beside his bed, I put heated cloths on his chest, I gave him purgatives, I washed him twice a day. My husband prayed to his gods and I prayed to my Lord. I slipped into his bed and took my son in my arms, whispering to him, ‘Leon, my dearest son, please know that our son, our brother, our Jesus is always with us, always beside us. He will not let you die. If you pledge your honour to his Father, He will not only heal you in this life but He will welcome you into eternity.’ In the delirium of his fever I had no idea how much he understood, or even if he had truly heard me. But one morning I awoke beside him, and when I opened my eyes he was looking back at me. My heart refused to beat. I thought I was looking into the eyes of my dead child. Then I saw his chest rise, so very gently, and I knew that he had been saved.

  ‘Mama,’ he whimpered, ‘I am so hungry.’

  I clambered out of bed, I rushed to our hearth where Rectitude was already kneading the yeast for the bread. ‘Hurry, hurry,’ I ordered. ‘Your young lord is hungry!’

  The slave searched our paltry larder and quickly prepared a gruel of soaked barley and buttermilk. I fed my child. He gorged the soup like a beast of the forests, his hunger insatiable. When the bowl was emptied, Leon fell back into his bed, exhausted.

  ‘Mother,’ he said, ‘Jesus the Saviour made me well, didn’t he?’

  ‘Yes, my child.’

  He fell to sleep in my arms.

  It was a time of want but I felt only bliss. I was bringing my child to the Lord. And in my belly, another child of the Lord was growing. As soon as I was sure that Leon had conquered the disease, I returned to my work. I was in a fever myself, impatient with the slowness of time, longing for the day of rest. When that blessed day arrived I awoke before dawn, wrenching Rectitude from her bed and demanding that she follow me. The silly child wanted to make prayers to her useless gods. I was on fire with impatience as she kneeled before the altar and bleated her incantations over the sacred flame.

  We rushed through the town as first light glimmered. The streets were already full of the din of slaves and labourers at work, rebuilding dwellings destroyed in the floods. We ran until we reached the top of the hill. Only then did we draw breath.

  Clemency welcomed us to the hut, drawing the screen and standing back so I might enter. We fell into each other’s embrace as I joyously proclaimed, ‘Sister, my son lives!’

  She covered me with kisses. ‘He is returning, sister.’

  ‘Truly,’ I answered, ‘he is returning.’

  And then I added breathlessly, ‘My son is coming to the Lord.’

  She whooped in jubilation, clapping with her hands held high. We were both cheering and crying. Perseverance came to see the reason for so much racket. I repeated my news and soon we were locked in one embrace, one celebration. Out of the corner of my eye I saw my slave. Her eyes were lowered but her pursed lips and stiff back conveyed her disapproval and revulsion.

  Finally, we released each other. Perseverance playfully grabbed my hands. ‘Can you bring him to the next thanksgiving? Can we welcome him into our way at the next Sabbath?’ His smile was radiant.

  I kissed his cheeks. ‘I promise you, brother, he will be here for our next feast of love.’

  I was bringing a son to the just god and I would be avenging the daughter that the unjust gods stole from me. My God was stronger. My God was Lord.

  I could sense trouble as soon as we got home. As we passed the kilns, Atticus was there on the path, a load of heavy timber across his narrow shoulders. He bowed to me, careful not to upturn his load, and then he beckoned Rectitude. They moved away, whispering. I ignored them and immediately went to see my son. His bed was empty. I heard voices from our chamber. I could smell the cloying odour of myrrh. I drew aside the curtain.

  Leon was kneeling with his father, their palms upturned. They were wreathed in smoke from the incense. I heard the drone of their prayers to that impacable deity, to that wooden fraud sitting on the altar.

  Leon turned on hearing me but his father sternly commanded him to continue his prayers. The boy did as as he was ordered. Once they were finished, Leon jumped to his feet and rushed to me.

  ‘Go, son,’ ordered his father. ‘Leave us.’

  Leon bowed and ran out of the room, calling out for the slaves. As if he had never been ill, as if he had never felt the tender caress of our Saviour who had spared him from death.

  My husband was silent. I did as I had to, I waited for him to speak.

  ‘Lydia,’ he said finally, ‘I will not let you make my son a Jew.’

  I had to assure him, had to make peace.

  ‘He was saved by my God, husband. I prayed day and night for the Lord of the Jews to save him and it was done.’ I placed my hand over my heart. ‘I made a vow to that God, husband.’

  ‘I will not have my son castrated.’

  At first I was stunned by the madness of his words. Why would he dare think I would make a eunuch of my child? And then I understood.

  I went to him then. He was still at the altar. Averting my gaze from the hideous god, I kneeled before my husband, taking his face in my hands. How rough the skin, how he had aged.

  ‘No, my husband, this is mistaken. My god does not demand such a barbarity.’

  He grasped my hands, hurting me with his force. His eyes were wary and suspicious. ‘We all know that the Jews demand this violence. I will not have my son’s manhood disfigured.’

  ‘We don’t do that! My teacher, Paul, was definite. We don’t do it.’

  The mention of my teacher conjured a vision. He was before me, the crooked one-eyed smile, his reedy voice saying, ‘Our Saviour said that a woman must become as a man to enter the kingdom.’

  I knew what to say. ‘Husband, my god is a god of justice and a god of love. He is not a barbarous god. I give you my word: our son will not be harmed.’

  I was on all fours, I was kissing his feet. ‘I promise you this. Not one hair of his will be touched. Our mysteries are not violent.’

  My husband was a good man, a kind man. ‘If you promise this, then you can honour your vow to your god.’

  I bowed, rocking back and forth at his feet. ‘Thank you, husband, thank you.’

  ‘Stand.’ His voice was still unyielding.

  I rose, not daring to look at him.

  ‘Leon can worship your god but he cannot abandon his worship of our gods. Do you agree?’

  ‘Yes, husband.’

  ‘And you will not take him with you on the Sabbath and you will not initiate him into your cult.’

  I was silent. Broken.

  ‘Lydia, your girls have told me what goes on there. That slaves mingle with freemen, that women and men pray together, that beggars and orphans stand side by side with merchants and with traders.’

  His voice was hoarse from disgust at such shamelessness, such madness.

  ‘I have been too lenient with you, wife, too soft. You can worship your god but you are never to join with others from this accursed cult again. I forbid it. You can pray to your god as we pray to ours. In your home. Only in our home.’

  It was as if the walls had collapsed and the roof fallen upon me. I stumbled, I fell. The earth opened up and darkness, death, the shades of Hades fell upon me. The cruel gods had conquered. Jesus was not beside me, I could not feel him there.

  I knew that I was in my husband’s arms, knew that he was carrying me to bed, calling to the slaves to come immediately. I was lost to love. I was lost to my Lord. All I could think of was death. And that I wanted them all gone. Husband, sons, slaves, the world. I wanted it all gone. The cruel gods had been triumphant.

  The agonies began. Calliope and Rectitude had hold of me, the midwife was before me, squatting and intoning the prayers to her goddess. I crouched, I pushed, I held my screams. I was no longer a young girl; I knew what to expect and
what to do. The sun had just lowered and night was beckoning when the infant came. It emerged covered by a caul, and even in the torment of labour the sight choked my heart. Had I given birth to both child and tomb? But then the slick membrane ruptured and I heard my child’s cry. I held my breath and awaited the midwife’s pronunciation. Nothing came. All I could hear was the infant’s crying. I heard Rectitude gasp.

  Only then did the midwife speak. ‘She’s an affront to men and to gods.’

  In my stupor, all I could see was the blood. And then my hand flew to my chest, as if I had been returned to the old world and must bang my breastbone to ask mercy from the gods. The tiny creature only had one arm. I dropped back into the bed.

  The midwife had her hand over the atrocity’s face, her fingers like talons.

  ‘I will destroy it now.’

  But the infant was wailing. She was searching for me.

  And it was then that I knew my Saviour had not abandoned me. His arms were around me, offering me strength. I heard him whisper to me: ‘My father is the only god who will love this child.’

  I lifted my head. Thunder cracked as I did it—was I the only one to hear it? I was reeling from my efforts to rise from the bed. I could not fail.

  ‘Let me keep her for one night.’

  Rectitude threw a frightened glance to her mistress.

  ‘Mother.’ I forced the words through cracked and burning lips. ‘My dearest mother, let me keep her this one night.’

  Calliope had borne children, she had raised sons. She understood what I was asking but she was unmoved. ‘It will do no good to keep this thing alive, daughter, she is an outrage. A creature reviled by the Mother and by all our gods.’

  I sensed the rebuke in her tone. That it was my god who had brought this pollution upon our house. This was the Mother’s revenge.