Eleven

Nathanael shook his head, wonderingly. "There is so much we assume that we have no right to assume. I must learn to see things from others' point of view. I have not insulted you, have I, without realizing it?"

Thomas, who was burying the fire and the remains of the breakfast, looked up. Nathanael was watching him closely, studying what one did to clean up after a meal. "No never," he answered, "that I recall. You were always gentlemanly with me. I never felt uncomfortable with you, even when you gave me a gentle reproach at my buying so much wine."

"I knew it was doing damage to you, and that toward the end, the damage was becoming serious. But I was too--but I could not bring myself to create a fuss. I apologize. I should have done something to stop you while it was still possible."

"I doubt if you could. God grant that I not go back to it! But--" He paused and looked around him with wonder--"I actually have lived a whole day without drinking anything but water!"

Nathanael smiled. "I expect you will be counting the days for quite a while."

"May they mount up to the hundreds! But when I think thus, I quake! I know I cannot do it."

"Well, trust the Master, and just do it today." If I myself could only learn to trust him!

"And today. And today."

"There is a psalm that says, 'Today is the day that you should hear his voice,' and I think that means every day when it is 'today.'" He thought, Can I hear his voice today?

"I--I am inclined to think that I must just concentrate on the morning. The day seems frighteningly long."

"Fear not. We will be here." Nathanael laughed inwardly at his telling someone else not to fear. Well, he hoped that Thomas might be there for him when he needed someone. Or Ezra.

Perhaps. He had a suspicion that Ezra was soon not going to have much to do with him.

"Actually," Thomas said, "today is not what concerns me, as much as tomorrow. Should I take the wine so as not to insult the bride and groom? I cannot drink it."

Nathanael pondered a bit. "If I were you, I would stay apart from the people, if you can, and only take the wine if you must."

"That was what I had planned. But--" He bowed and shook his head.

"Fear not. The Master will be there. He thinks you will be able to manage, I am sure, and if he thinks so, then you will be able to manage." If he is what I think he is. Fortunately, for me the wedding should pose no real problem.

By this time Ezra had joined them, with an armful of clothes. "I brought a few other things, so that Andrew could choose," he said.

"But we had best be going." said Nathanael. "Even if it is downhill all the way, it is a long walk."

Nathanael noticed that Thomas was walking rather painfully, which was not surprising, considering the damage that he had done to himself in the past weeks, and that he had only two real meals since them. It was by no means yet the Thomas that had gone by day after day and thrown out the net so skillfully.

There was no conversation. Nathanael was not used to walking briskly, and was breathing rather heavily; he saw that Thomas, in his difficulty, was aware of it with some satisfaction. Ezra, of course, had the bundle of clothes that weighed him down, so their progress was considerably slower than it might have been.

But finally, they reached level ground, and there was the group, on the lake shore as on the previous day. Ezra went up to Andrew and showed him the clothes, and Andrew tried on the cloak, which was the most important of the garments, and, to his joy, it almost fit him. "I had no idea you were that big, Ezra," he said.

"Actually, we selected this one because it is a little large for me; I used to use it when I had some task that would require moving around a great deal. But if you do not try fishing in it, it seems as if it will serve very nicely."

"And you have a tunic also. That is well. My tunic looks rather--forlorn--inside it."

"I expect you will be able to get into that also, though you might have a bit more trouble moving once you put it on. But it is only for the wedding and the reception, where you have nothing to do, except congratulate the bride and groom and drink wine."

At this, Andrew cast a glance in Thomas's direction, which Thomas pretended not to notice.

Someone--Nathanael thought it was young John--asked Jesus when they would begin the announcement of this "reign of God," and what it was and how they would go about it.

Jesus answered that it would not happen until after they had attended the Passover the next week, and that he had in mind some events that would prepare for it. "I plan to give a speech somewhere around here stating what the new reign of God is going to be like--probably up the mountain over there, where there is that plateau halfway up where people could gather and hear well. But we will see how things develop. I expect it would be unwise to begin in Judea."

This caused some discussion, since Judea seemed to some the logical place to begin, while others thought that it would be better to have the movement established before confronting the Judeans, who might not like the idea of their authority being, if not trampled on, diminished. Jesus held himself aloof from actually joining in the conversation, but seemed to be listening intently, gauging the readiness of his followers to accept his lead.

Judas Iscariot figured heavily in this discussion, since, as a priest himself, he had a fairly good finger on the pulse of the establishment in Judea. His opinion seemed to coincide with that of Jesus, since he said that if one were to try to make the Judean priesthood change their way of thinking, one would have to do it gradually and very diplomatically, somehow convincing them that they were the authors of the change, rather than that a Galilean upstart was telling them that he was right and they were wrong.

"What is wrong with being a Galilean?" asked John, and some others murmured agreement.

"Nothing at all. You are as good Judeans in the generic sense as the people living in Judea. But you know that they do not think so. The idea of a prophet coming from Galilee is laughable to them."

"Well, they will have to become used to it!"

"Granted. But since they think that they are the only true Judeans, it will take considerable diplomacy to make them give up the idea."

"Either that," broke in Simon the Revolutionary, "or a movement so strong that they will have no power against it, especially if here in Galilee we show how we can shake off the Roman chains." Nathanael thought that Simon had no idea of what the real situation was. If Jesus planned to take over the world, then there would be a way to do it without bloodshed. How absurd! To take over the world from the Romans!

Several of the rest also opined that that would be a miracle beyond anything they had so far seen, to which Simon responded, "Exactly. But who can say if it will not happen?" Jesus looked a bit bemused.

It looked as if it was going to be an exciting future, if not positively a dangerous one. Nathanael became less and less convinced that he could go through with it.

And so the day passed, without anyone's actually becoming enraged at anyone else, though there were a few instances in which James and especially his young brother John made some remarks that could be construed as intemperate. But their flushed faces quickly cooled down, especially when others agreed with their main point, and only added caveats and qualifications.

The trouble was that no one really knew what Jesus was up to; they only had, each of them, some experience of his remarkable powers, basically over people's minds, it seemed, but what this Reign of God would mean was a complete mystery.

As it again drew toward evening without their being aware of it because they were so engrossed in their discussions, John looked up at the sky and invited Thomas and Nathanael and Ezra to stay at his house there in Capernaum, so that they would not be climbing the hill in the night, and all could go up to Cana on the morrow together. Nathanael thought a bit, and said that it probably made sense, and agreed. There was only one room for the three of them, John said, but it was large enough so that they could share it without much discomfort. "We can put some straw on the floor to make temporary beds, and it should be comfortable enough."

The others agreed, and they went off after John and James.

It turned out that Simon and Andrew had the house next door (where Jesus and his mother were staying): the one Nathanael took Thomas to, though, John said, walking by Thomas's side, they had only recently come here, in order to team up with Zebedee and his family; "They are originally from Bethsaida, and it was becoming a nuisance to come here from there or for us to go there from here, so they moved. Jesus himself, you know, is not from here, but from Nazareth, up not far from Cana."

During the night, Nathanael thought he heard Thomas calling Jesus in an anguished whisper. A temptation to drink from the wineskin he had? Should he go over and reassure him? He decided he would wait and see if he seemed to be starting to drink, and sighed with pity and relief when Thomas, crying softly for a time, went back to sleep.

As they walked up the hill to Cana, Nathanael noticed that Thomas went over to Jesus and talked with him privately, probably about what happened the previous night. As he left the conversation, he had a look of relieved worry, stroking the place where he hid--if one could call it "hiding," it was so obvious--his wineskin. Jesus had evidently told him that he did not have to get rid of it, at least for the moment, and most assuredly had told him not to worry, especially at what would happen at the wedding.

The house was on the other side of town from Nathanael's; it was a large house, quite adequate for a wedding feast, and no doubt able to accommodate the dozen or so extra people that Jesus was bringing. Nathanael knew the family vaguely, but the fact was that his father and mother did practically no visiting or receiving guests, because of his mother's condition. On the few occasions when they could not avoid attending a celebration such as a wedding, Nathanael's mother would have too much to drink, and though she did not become boisterous (she tended to grow maudlin), it became noticeable after a while that she was growing drunk, and his father always spirited them all away before things got out of hand. Everyone knew what the situation was, and no one ever alluded to it. The hosts always thanked them for coming and let them go quietly without a fuss, as relieved to have them go as they were relieved to be out of there.

The host here and his wife (relatives, of course, of the bride and groom, whom Nathanael also knew in passing) greeted Nathanael, raising an eyebrow that his parents were not with him, and when he explained that he had come with the group around Jesus, one could see the sigh of relief. If they could have known that in that little group there was a drunk quite worthy of Nathanael's mother! But, of course, Nathanael was certain that nothing would happen, because Jesus was there.

Jesus's mother also was obviously keeping an eye on things, since she was the one who had suddenly foisted this large addition to the festivities, and about halfway through, Nathanael saw her go over to Jesus and make a quiet remark to him. He also saw Ezra move behind them, within earshot to hear what was going on.

Jesus answered with a look of concern, and glanced around the room, stroking his beard. He seemed to come to some sort of decision, and called the wine servers over and spoke briefly to them. With an expression of surprise, one or two of them went out and came back with pitchers of water from the stream nearby, and began filling up the stone water jars the people had been using for washing purposes. When they finished, Jesus told them to draw it out and take it to the one in charge of the festivities, who tasted it, then tasted it again in disbelief, and then called the groom over, with whom he had a whispered conference. The groom looked completely confounded, but evidently told him to go ahead, and so the wine servers filled cups with the water and began handing it out to the guests.

Nathanael took one, and it was wine. In fact, it was superb wine. Nathanael never drank anything but the best, but this was beyond anything that his father had ever bought. And it definitely had come from the water-jar; he had seen the whole operation; and the water-jars could not have had wine poured into them; it was too strong, too pure. Besides, where would they have got wine, and why would they have put it into those pitchers? It would have been in wineskins, because it clearly was aged to perfection. No, the water in those jars had somehow become wine. Jesus's mother had doubtless told him that they were running out of wine, and the only remedy he could think of was to create more out of water! Amazing! Astounding! Not possible, in fact.

And with no fuss or fanfare! The servers had apparently been told not to mention the source, to avoid embarrassing the bride and groom, who were talking to each other, each drinking the new wine, with the groom telling his new wife quietly that he had no idea where it had come from, but that there was somehow plenty of it.

Then Nathanael noticed that Thomas held a cup, and not only held it, but, after looking a question at Jesus, actually began to drink from it. Nathanael came up behind him, and said, "Do you think that wise, Thomas, so soon?"

"Taste it." said Thomas, handing him the cup.

"Oh," said Nathanael, who blushed and left. It was water.

He noticed with amusement that Ezra was right behind him. He did not say anything, but it was obvious that he felt the same as Nathanael, and Thomas gave him a taste of the water also. He promptly faded into the background. Nathanael noticed that nobody seemed to pay any attention to him, which he found astonishing because his appearance was so striking, with his gleaming white cloak and his black skin. But he speculated that, precisely because of his unusual appearance, people did not know what to make of him, and so tended to pretend that he was not there, so they would not have to interact with him. They also may have heard that he had been a slave, and of course slaves were simply part of the furniture.

The other interesting thing was that Jesus's mother also had an eye on Thomas, once she saw him with the cup. She took him aside--and Nathanael saw Ezra go quietly after them--and they went out and sat for a considerable while on a bench with an arbor over it, talking earnestly about something. Nathanael wondered what it was. She seemed to have something she wanted Thomas to know, but it was clearly private, and so Nathanael mingled with the others, merely noticing that Ezra was on the other side of the vine that covered the area, eavesdropping. Nathanael felt like going over and admonishing him, but he was no longer his slave, and might resent being told what to do, so he did nothing.

He always did nothing.