Читать книгу The Rabbi’s Daughter - Alan Sorem - Страница 6

The old woman’s gnarled fingers grasped at the weeds along the edge of her vegetable garden. She muttered to herself, as she always did, “Time for younger fingers to do this work.”

But she never asked for help. Weeding beneath a warm springtime sun was one of the few pleasures she had after the chill of winter.

She glanced toward the foot of the long garden. Yes, she could almost make out the form of old Lazarus sitting in the worn wooden chair that once had been her husband’s. Lazarus had sat there often before he went to Cyprus to escape rumored plots on his life. When the guardians rode up from the city to tell him he must go, he had laughed, a great hearty roar. But he had heeded their warnings in the end. He was proof, after all, of a second life that could not be denied.

“Mary, Mary,” he gently chided now in her remembrance of his ways. “If it is more burden than pleasure, my nephew from down the hill can help. Or one of the young maidens from The Community in Ephesus.”

He paused for a moment and then chuckled. “You would be doing the young maiden a favor. She would have such a tale to tell.” He paused and peered about to see if other ears were listening. “Helping the Rabbi’s Daughter.”

She sighed. Still, after all the years, the code name used for her that began the day she was hurried away by John, one of her son’s disciples, from the tragic carnival atmosphere on the hill. The terrible day of suffering and death with words of mockery flung about along with the cries of the hucksters and the vendors. The final sight as she looked back to her dying son was of the six men on horseback surveying the crowd, their calculating eyes watching for signs of resistance to the cruel execution. And one of the horsemen, the Chief Priest’s man, kept his eyes always on her.

“Don’t look back,” John had murmured as he pulled her forward. “Don’t look back.”

She shook her head to rid herself of the awful memory and concentrated on the next weed in the garden.

The vegetables were sustenance for her and her daughter through the autumn, and the garden flowers, placed in a large vase from Nazareth in her simple bedroom, brought memories of her early days. The garden in Cana, lovingly tended by her mother and herself. The garden where her life had changed abruptly.

“Mary,” called the Lazarus of her memory, his form growing dimmer as the sun rose. “You have a doleful countenance today.”

Yes, she did. Yesterday the message had come from the head of The Community in Ephesus that she was to have a visit today with two travelers returning from the North on their way to Antioch. They were on a special mission from Simon Peter that involved her son. What could it be? Simon Peter had been crucified in Rome a year ago. On the tenth anniversary of Nero’s accession to Emperor.