Thirteen

'You have heard?' said Jesus, but not to the people around him, but to those inside her. "You are to leave her and remain apart from her until tomorrow after sunset, and then you may return only if she permits you. Go!"

She emitted a gurgling sound, akin to what is called the "death rattle," after which she took in a gasping breath and screamed so that the hills rang, as she fell once more to the ground and writhed and writhed like a snake whose head had been cut off, shrieking and wailing with different voices, all in the ultimate throes of agony. I must say that I quaked in terror. It was uncanny.

After an eternity of this, everything stopped. She lay exhausted on the road.

Evidently, the thought came to her that everyone was looking at her humiliation, because she glanced round and suddenly sprang to her feet, staring defiantly once again at Jesus. She tossed her head, and said, "You think you have done a good deed! You think you have saved me! You have destroyed me!"

"Perhaps so," he answered. "That will depend on you. You have a night and a day of peace to consider it."

"Consider what? Who am I? What have you left of me?"

"Whatever there was of you that they left behind. You will find that there is much. You will recognize yourself."

"I doubt it."

"If you refuse to do so, that is your choice, of course."

"So I am to consider my evil ways, and then return and beg your forgiveness, (she spat out the word) now that you have left me this torn piece of rag that I must now call myself."

"Understand this: If you wish to be forgiven, you will receive forgiveness--Do not speak; I am aware that you do not believe it possible. If you wish tomorrow evening to be forgiven, return to me."

"And then I am to learn the conditions you impose."

"The only condition is that you wish it. You must know one more thing. It will not be possible for you to kill yourself before tomorrow night."

"So you would remove from me the one blessing in this curse you have cursed me with!"

"For a time, yes. You are rash, Mary. If I did not, you would kill yourself without taking thought. And you will find that it is not now necessary."

Mary. Aha! I had always wondered if Mary of Magdala was the little girl who had ruined me! Those who dared talk about her (and what happened to a friend of theirs) mentioned that she used something like the technique she tried on me, turning the tables so that her victim seemed the guilty one. It took me months to get over that and see what she had actually done. It would be interesting to see how she came to live in Magdala of Galilee, of all places.

"Then you are master," she was saying, "and I am slave."

"Yes."

"Suppose I refuse to take thought. Suppose I simply wait until tomorrow night."

"I will not force you to do otherwise."

"Do you actually believe that you can control my thoughts? Not even they could!"

"It is of no consequence."

"No consequence! That you think you can control thoughts! That you can forgive sins! You claim that I was deceived by spirits within me, and you practiced magic on me to drive them out! My deception is nothing in comparison!"

"Drive her away, Master!" shouted Simon the Revolutionary. "She herself is ten times the demons you cast out of her!"

"I need no driving, kind sir," she said in a voice of withering scorn. "If the Master will dismiss me, I will leave of my own accord. May I depart, Master?"

"You may go."

"Thank you, gracious Master. Gracious, kind, generous Master! I leave you in the pleasant company of the rest of your slaves!"

As I watched her go, some of the desire I had had after that encounter revived in me. It began to say, "Well, why not, after the devils have left her? She is certainly beautiful, and you, you know, are extremely handsome."

And so we would make a lovely couple, I thought. Rubbish! I would have to be very, very careful around her, not to get caught in the net again! Perhaps she knew me not, perhaps I was simply one of hundreds, and perhaps she would lead me on and toss me aside as she had done then. I would kill her this time!

And it looked as if she would be welcomed into our group by Jesus--though not by anyone else in the group. They had had extreme difficulty tolerating Matthew, and now they were going to have to tolerate a sinner whose name was synonymous with the filthiest sin in the Decalogue. Reformed, of course, we would have to believe.

But reformed did not necessarily mean that she could not be deformed again, and some of the self-righteous followers of Jesus could very well be ripe for the deforming: Andrew, for instance. I had seen him look at her with desire even while the demons were within her. Not John. He was more likely to be seduced by a man, I think. True, he fought against the attraction, but it was there. Thomas might succumb, if he could forget his attraction to wine for a few moments.

No, her presence among us would be a testing, that was certain. Fortunately, I could steel myself against her. I would simply ignore her. It was well I knew who she was, and that I had such consummate self-control.

And, of course, the next night, as we were outside Simon the town Pharisee's house (he had invited Jesus to dine with him--and from what I knew of Simon, which was considerable, he would be planning to instruct Jesus, and would receive an earful in return) we wondered whether Mary would seek Jesus out in the very lion's den (though in all probability, Simon had sought her out, and more than once, or I was much mistaken). The encounter would be very interesting. He would not dare to denounce Mary or keep her out if the Master wished to see her; she knew and could say too much that he would not have known.

And there she came, running down the hill, as if she knew that Jesus was there! And she was admitted! The door closed behind her, and I tried to picture to myself the scene--but I confess I did not have the imagination.

In any case, she was within for an inordinate time, so Simon had not simply seen her and thrown her out, as I suspected he would not. She was receiving forgiveness from Jesus, though I was willing to wager all that I had that Simon was not also doing so, and was trying desperately to remain a mere bystander. The whole situation was delicious.

I heard Thomas say to Matthew, "--It will be interesting if she also chooses to join us; it was one thing to accept you, Matthew, and me, but this will strain our tolerance to the limit!"

Simon the Revolutionary heard him, and said, "Join us? That one? Can you imagine the reputation we will have: 'Not only does he consort with tax-collectors and sinners, he has a prostitute in his midst! And not only a prostitute, but Mary of Magdala!'"

Thomas turned round to face him and said, "Well, you had best prepare yourself. All the signs indicate that that is exactly what is going to happen."

"Nonsense!"

John, of course, was perfectly correct. He had to be so.

And we waited.

Eventually, the door slowly opened, and Mary emerged, looking bewildered and lost--and beautiful and, shall I say? seductive. Matthew looked at her with pity. He was evidently smitten with her already, though doubtless he had no idea of it. If she had ever been seductive, she certainly was now--especially now, since she presumably had repented of her evil ways.

As the door closed behind her someone said, "Behold! She has been driven from his sight! As I told you!" Another chimed in, "I knew that we should not have let her by!"

There was an ominous movement of the small group toward her, with cries to the effect, "Let us show her what one does to those who defile the Master's presence!" when the door opened again, and a slave put out his head saying, "The Master wishes this woman to have a safe escort to wherever she chooses to go." He looked at her in disgust for an instant, and disappeared inside.

"Safe escort!" "As if she were a princess!" "It cannot be!" "Look at her! We know who she is!" "She is the worst of her lot!" They came no closer, but neither did anyone step forward to help her through them. and they formed a wall in front of her. She glanced off to her right, thinking to get round them, and saw a small group of women, with faces, if anything, ten times more menacing. It is interesting how hatred can overcome all attraction anyone has, because Mary's attractiveness was unquestionably considerable, with that "I am lost! Who can help me?" look.

She bridled for a moment at the taunts, which kept coming from all sides, and was about make an insolent reply, but thought better of it. She bit her tongue and then after a long pause said, "You are right. I am a disgrace to womanhood. No one knows how much of one, except one man. And he forgave me. So please, let me pass; I must--" And she stopped, at a loss as to what she was to do. She stood there, closed her eyes, and teetered slightly.

A man came up to her and clapped a hand on her shoulder. "You see, madame, it is not quite so simple." She opened her eyes and looked into his huge brown face sneering not a palm-breadth in front of her. The hand transferred itself to her chin and forced her to look at him, and she recoiled at the stench of his breath. "You think you can go to him as to a magician and be forgiven for what you have done, and all is erased. You can now go back to leading men into--"

"Leave her alone!" cried John, coming up behind him and with surprising strength spinning him round. "The Master said 'Safe escort,' and safe escort she shall have! If he forgave her, who are you to persecute her?"

"Who am I?" he spat out. "I am one who knows right from wrong!"

"You call yourself his student--"

"I call myself the student of no man who allows whores to go unpunished!" He swung his free hand and landed a resounding slap on John's cheek. The crowd erupted in noises on both sides, while John fell back a step in surprise and pain, holding his face, while the man said, "You call yourself his student, now, do you not? Very well, then turn me the other cheek!"

"I turn you my fist, you lobster! You pig's dropping!--" And suddenly, he checked himself, his face flaming, and stood up to the brownbeard, presenting his cheek. He said in a quiet voice, but full of suppressed passion, "Very well. But if you touch her, it will be a different story."

"It will, will it?" said the man, slapping him once again, now with the back of his hand. "You thought I would not do it, did you not? Now we will see what--"

"That will be enough!" said Andrew, in almost a conversational tone, one which took for granted that it would be obeyed. He towered over the man. "You, sir, whoever you are, if you do not choose to follow a man who would forgive whores, then I suggest you leave this group; our Master would not be to your liking. John, you are too hot-headed."

"What was I to do? Stand there? No one else made a move!"

"We were here," said Andrew calmly, as her attacker backed away as inconspicuously as he could. "Some of us do not move as quickly as you, but we would have managed to see that no harm was done, without the necessity of making a fuss."

"And who put you over us, if I may ask?" said John, his face still red, both from the slaps and anger now at Andrew. He stood there with his head tilted back, talking as if to his chest, he was so close. "I did not hear the Master call you Andrew Rock."

At this Andrew's face turned scarlet with chagrin, and I saw that John had gone too far--as did he, immediately. His face turned even redder than it had been from the slaps. How could he undo the damage he had done to his good friend? Would they ever be friends again?

He braced himself for another blow, from Andrew this time; but Andrew quickly controlled himself and spoke with measured cadences. "If you wish the opinion of Simon Rock, you have only to go in and ask him," he said. "Now let us all stop being silly. We give a fine example of what his students are if we continue thus." That left an opening for an apology from John, I thought; but he had to be very diplomatic.

Mary was standing there, evidently pondering what had happened, and Andrew said, "I think that there will be no more trouble; I am sure that no one will bother you now, madame." His tone was almost, but not quite, respectful. "You may go."

And, indeed, the next morning, I saw John and Andrew together, with Andrew's great arm on John's shoulder. He said something to him, and it seemed they were reconciled. A masterpiece of diplomacy on John's part.

I heard John say, "You are a great man, Andrew."

"Nonsense! If you knew!"

What he "did not know" was Andrew's jealousy at Simon's taking a higher place in the group than he, when he had the qualifications and Simon did not. It was obvious in everything he did around Simon. True, he fought against it, as John fought against attraction to men, but it was there and evident to anyone who had eyes.

At this point, Jesus, followed by Mary Magdalene, came to the group. He motioned to her, and she went toward them, somewhat irresolute; Matthew, interestingly, beckoned to her, and shyly and gratefully, she took a seat beside him. Matthew had clearly fallen deeply into the pit, and did not have the least notion that he was there. It was a blessing for him that she was not the tiger at the bottom any longer.

"I told you that there was something I wished to say," he began. "There was a man who had two sons--" and he launched into a long allegory the burden of which was that Mary had abandoned a life of virtue and then repented, and since "the father" of the two sons welcomed him when he came back repentant, the rest of us, "the elder brother" should do the same.

It was interesting. Quite a few took it simply as a story at first, and only gradually made the connection with Mary; and when they did, they were of a mind with the elder brother, who thought the spendthrift had no right to be in the family, let alone have a fattened calf slaughtered in celebration.

In any case, Jesus then beckoned Mary to him once again, and said, "We will be leaving here soon; it would be good if you would wash quickly. But remember, I would speak privately with you for a few moments afterwards, if you could arrange it."

And as we headed down the road which would pass Magdala, continuing by the huge lake to Capernaum on the northeast shore, Jesus told us to walk on ahead, and he would come up with us later.

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