The Master's Quilt (23 page)

Joseph (Barnabas) glanced at Deucalion with
understanding and compassion. “When we met at the tomb, were you
not simply there to insure that Jesus’ body would remain
undisturbed? And three days later, didn’t you experience something
you did not understand?”

“But how—”

“
How
I know is not important. What
is
important is that you share that experience with us.”

“Now?”

Barnabas nodded.

Deucalion recounted what had happened at the
tomb, during the morning of the third day of his guard duty. When
he finished, Esther said, “To think that you were there when He
rose from the dead! How wonderful!” She stared at him, wondering
why he seemed so sullen. He should be excited—
the Lord had
spoken directly to him
.

“There’s something more you haven’t told us,
isn’t there?” said Barnabas.

Deucalion stood and walked over to the
window. He stared out into the blackness of the night. After
several minutes, he whispered, “It was
my
spear that pierced
the Nazarene’s side.”

“What did you say?” asked Esther, her stomach
suddenly tied in knots.

Deucalion turned, a defeated and broken look
on his face. “I was the one who made certain Jesus was dead,” he
said in a hollow voice.

“Yet the Lord spoke to you directly, and
comforted you, when He rose from the dead three days later,” said
Barnabas. “He
forgave
you.”

“I don’t deserve to be forgiven.”

“None of us deserves what the Lord freely
gives by grace. If we received what we deserved, we would all be in
Gehenna
.”

Deucalion remembered that Pilate had said
something about Gehenna a few weeks ago. “What is
Gehenna
?”
he asked.

“Physically, it’s the valley of Hinnom.”

“The narrow ravine southwest of the city?”
exclaimed Deucalion, remembering bits and pieces of his dream.

Barnabas nodded. “It separates Mount Zion
from the Hill of Evil Counsel and the plain of
Rephaim
.
Unfortunately, we Jews suffered under a number of our own
idolatrous kings before Caesar. From the time of Solomon, infants
were sacrificed to the fire-god Molech, until Josiah rendered the
ravine’s depths unclean by spreading human bones over it.
Afterwards it came to be known by its spiritual name; it is a place
of eternal torment.”

“I feel like I’m there now.”

“You can put an end to that feeling,
forever,” Esther said softly. The look on her face was obvious—she
would take his pain if she could.

“But I
killed
Him,” groaned Deucalion.
He didn’t know how much more pain he could take.

“No, brother, that’s a lie,” Barnabas said
forcefully. “He chose to give His life at the appointed time so
that we might never die.

“Never die?”

Esther smiled. “To be absent from the body is
to be present with the Lord—in Paradise.”

Deucalion’s eyes flickered between Esther and
Barnabas.
They didn’t hate him?
There was hope for
him.
“What must I do?” he asked humbly.

“Admit your sin, and ask Jesus into your
life,” answered Barnabas.

“Confess with your mouth that you believe
Jesus was the Son of God and that He died on the cross so that you
might live,” finished Esther.

Esther and Barnabas closed their eyes and
began to pray out loud. At first Deucalion understood what they
were saying; but after a few moments, the words rushing out of
their mouths sounded odd, incomprehensible. He had the strangest
feeling that they were speaking a very special language. It
occurred to him that they might be speaking the language of
God.

Overwhelmed by the idea, and overcome with
emotion, he bowed his knee, as he had seen soldiers do when
surrendering on the battlefield, closed his eyes and called upon
the Lord to forgive him.

The haze thickened, and the room filled
imperceptibly with the scent of frankincense.

For the first time in his life Deucalion
sensed that he was truly loved. He began to weep. Instead of
fighting the emotion, he gave himself over to it, without
reservation. It was as if he had suddenly been washed clean of
every foul thing he’d ever experienced.

He kept muttering, “Thank you, Lord. I praise
Your Holy Name. . .”

Barnabas was the first to open his eyes. He
watched Esther and Deucalion praying together for several minutes.
Just before they both opened their eyes, Esther kneeled down beside
Deucalion and grasped his hand in hers. Then they stood up
together, arm in arm.

“Uriel was right—I have found my answer,” he
said, eyeing them appreciatively.

“What answer?” asked Esther.

“Now that neither of you can return to
Jerusalem, what will the two of you do?”

“My face is well known in Judea and Syria,”
replied Deucalion, realizing he had not really given the problem
much thought. “Pilate will send word to the garrisons throughout
Judea to be on the lookout for me. It will be difficult to hide
from the probing eyes of Rome. Alive, I’m a dangerous liability—not
only to the Procurator, but to the Empire as well. Truth revealed
is more frightening to the elite of Rome than an army of men
knocking at their doors.”

“And more difficult for the Sanhedrin to deal
with than a backslidden Jew,” added Esther.

“Don’t be so quick to mock the elders,
Esther,” scolded Barnabas. “We serve the same God—it’s just that
they don’t believe that He has already fulfilled His promise to
send the Messiah.”

“Moses believed and confronted Pharaoh. Lot
believed and was saved from the destruction of Sodom and Gomorrah.
Joshua believed and the walls of Jericho fell. Why won’t my father
and the others believe?”

“Because they are men whose vision of God is
molded from their fear of living lives without worth or purpose,”
suggested Deucalion. “Your priests serve God to the degree it
pleases their sense of ritual. For them, tradition has replaced
faith. Men like Caiaphas and Doras have become hardened to the
truth. Their unwillingness to change unmasks their unbelief.”

“I don’t understand.”

“Without tradition and ritual they slowly
starve, like a man without food. At first, the body survives by
getting nourishment from the excess it has stored; once those
reserves are depleted, the body begins to feed upon itself. The
less important organs are sacrificed first, in an attempt to
protect the more vital ones. If no new nourishment is forthcoming,
the flesh dies. It is no less with the spirit.”

There were stunned looks on both Barnabas and
Esther’s faces.

“The Jews are not alone in their
narrow-mindedness,” he continued, excited by the sudden
realizations flooding his mind. “The night I first saw you,
Esther—at your father’s house—I was ambushed as I returned to the
garrison by four men dressed as centurions. I never got a good look
at any of them, and even though each spoke to me, at the time I
didn’t recognize any of their voices. One voice did seem familiar,
however, and I learned later who it was. But I was not sure until
this moment that I had recognized yet another voice.”

“Why would centurions attack you?” asked
Barnabas.

“I’ve asked myself that same question a
hundred times.”

“Well?” prodded Esther.

“It was Annas who led the other three.”

“Annas!” exclaimed Barnabas. “Are you
certain?”

Deucalion nodded.

“And the other voice you recognized?”

“My second-in-command, Malkus.”

“This is incredible! A former High Priest and
a Roman Praetorian working together. But why?”

“Since the crucifixion certain members of the
Sanhedrin have been conspiring with high-ranking members of the
Legion to keep the truth about the resurrection of Jesus from the
populace. They are afraid of what might happen if they admit that
Jesus was who He claimed to be. They are afraid they will lose
their power.”

“We cannot just sit by and watch them
slaughter innocent people in order to protect their authority,”
said Esther he voice full of anger at such self-serving brutality.
“I may have a solution,” said Barnabas as he picked up the bundle
of leather parchments entrusted to him by Uriel and set them on the
table.

“I
followed the three
of them for over an hour,” said Malkus, delivering his report to
Pilate. The sun had only been up for half an hour—unlike the
Procurator, who had never really slept—and it was already over
ninety degrees.

“Well?” prodded Pilate, sweating
profusely.

“They stopped and went inside a house just
off the road to Bethany, about eight furlongs from the city. A
short time later they were joined by another man.”

“You’re absolutely certain it was Deucalion
with the two women?”

Malkus nodded.

“By the gods. . .” muttered Pilate. “Why does
he tempt me so?”

“Your orders, Procurator?”

Pilate hesitated, then said, “I’m promoting
you to Commander of the Garrison, and I’m ordering Deucalion killed
on sight. You are to find him and deal with him immediately. He has
betrayed not only me, but Rome as well.”

“What about the Syrian governor?”

“Vitellius has already notified me that he
has washed his hands of this rogue Praetorian.”

Pilate grimaced, remembering that he had
spoken the same words when the Nazarene was brought before him.
“The Governor also made it unmistakably clear that he will
similarly wash his hands of me if I fail.” He glared at his new
Commander. “Need I say more?”

“No,” replied Malkus grimly. “I will not fail
you.”

“Good,” Pilate said, forcing a note of
finality into his voice that was not in his heart.

Malkus was nothing like Deucalion. The
Procurator also had the distressing feeling that Malkus harbored a
“lone wolf” mentality—an attitude that could prove dangerous. Even
though this was Judea, and even though Sejanus had been dead and
buried two years, the Senate had a very long arm.

Rome still suffered under the judicial
turbulence of “treason trials.” A scroll would arrive from Capri,
where Tiberius lived in self-imposed exile, with charges of
complicity in the Sejanian conspiracy, usually on the basis of slim
evidence. If the Senate found the man guilty, he was executed, or
allowed to commit suicide. There were many among the most prominent
of Rome’s pyramidal hierarchy who lived in daily dread of being
cited for
maiestas
—treason against state and Emperor.

It was not just that Pilate’s record in Judea
that left much to be desired in the eyes of his superiors; No, what
he worried about was that it had been Sejanus himself who had
appointed him Procurator of Judea.

Pilate eyed Malkus appraisingly. He needed to
know what motivated this man. “Tell me what you think,” he
commanded.

Malkus spoke hesitantly at first, until he
realized that the Procurator was no longer frowning. Then he grew
bold. “Many of us in the Legion, particularly those of us who were
with Deucalion on guard duty at the tomb of the Nazarene, have felt
for some time that his behavior was suspect.”

Pilate grimaced, in spite of his order to
kill Deucalion. Ironically, he was unsure whether he was angrier at
Deucalion for failing him, or at himself for cultivating such a
deep friendship.

“As you are well aware, Procurator,”
continued Malkus, “Deucalion was the only one of us who refused to
accept the Tribunal’s finding that the Nazarene’s body had been
stolen. It’s clear that the theft was orchestrated by the
Nazarene’s followers in order to arouse the populace into
rebellion—by claiming that their “king” had risen from the dead.
Deucalion was adamant that he would not participate in any attempt
to give discredit to that idea.” Malkus paused, and then added, “I
believe that Deucalion was convinced that the Jew had indeed risen
from the dead.”

Pilate’s eyes went vacant as color drained
from his face. But he said nothing.

“Ironically, it was a Jew who provided us
with a solution,” offered Malkus.

“A Jew?” interrupted Pilate in a hollow
voice. His head jerked spasmodically, as if it were a ball hanging
on the end of a piece of twine being swatted by a playful cat.

“But. . .but I thought you knew. It’s not
possible you
didn’t
,” stammered Malkus.

“Tell me
everything
,” demanded the
Procurator.

“About a month after the Tribunal handed down
its findings—early in June, I think—a heavy-set man approached me
in the market. It was crowded and I didn’t notice him until he was
standing right beside me. Actually, I smelled him before I saw
him.”

“What?”

“He was heavily scented, almost to the point
of making me gag; like he just stepped out of the baths.”

“Go on.”

“He called me by name and that surprised me
more than his sneaking up on me, because I had no idea who he was.
When I asked how he knew me, he told me it didn’t matter. What was
important, he said, was that there were certain matters that
remained unresolved in the case of Jesus of Nazareth. I told him
the case was closed. That’s when he told me that he knew about
Deucalion’s refusal to cooperate with the Tribunal. He also knew
about Deucalion’s refusal to accept the money the rest of us had
taken.”

“He knew Deucalion’s name?”

“Yes.”

“Did he tell you
how
he knew so
much?”

“No. I pressed him, but he refused to
answer.”

The frown on Pilate’s face deepened.

“When I threatened to take him to the
garrison and question him further, with the help of some
centurions, he just laughed. That’s when he told me that he had a
solution—one he said, that even the Syrian governor would be most
pleased with. One that had been approved by the highest authority.
I thought he was referring to you.”