The Book of Longings(33)

She released a high, chirruping laugh. “It would concern him only if he were caught. Though a Jew himself, he cares little for Jewish customs. It is Rome he lusts for.”

“And you? You have no fears for him?”

“Should a host of Zealots drag my husband through the streets for breaking this law, it would not arouse the slightest care in me as long as they left the mosaics undamaged. I, too, find them beautiful. I would miss them more than I would miss Antipas.”

Her eyes snapped brightly. I tried to read her face. Beneath her easy indifference and her lighthearted dismissal of her husband lay something blistering.

She said, “Even as the fever scourged the city and his subjects were dying, he commissioned a new mosaic. It will be even more flagrant than the rest of them. The artisan himself is afraid to create it.”

I could think of only one reason for such trepidation. “It will depict a human form?”

She smiled. “A face, yes. A woman’s face.”



* * *



? ? ?

WE DESCENDED THE STEPS onto the portico, then another set to the baths. A frail cloud of dampness floated up to us, the smell of wet stone and perfumed oils. “Have you taken the Roman baths before?” Phasaelis asked.

I shook my head.

“I take them weekly. It’s an elaborate and time-consuming ritual. They say the Romans indulge in them daily. If that’s the case, one wonders when they found time to conquer the earth.”

In the changing room, we stripped naked except for towels, and I followed Phasaelis to the tepidarium, where the air flickered with lamps in high niches. We dipped in a pool of tepid water, then lay on stone-top tables while two female attendants thrashed our arms and legs with olive branches and rubbed oil into our backs, kneading us like balls of dough. This odd ministration caused me to leave my body and sit on a little ledge just above my head, free of fret and fear.

In the next room, however, I came hurtling back into myself. The hot vapors of the caldarium were so profuse, I struggled to breathe. We had entered the torments of Gehenna. I sat on the hard, slick floor, gripping my towel and rocking to and fro to keep myself from fleeing. Phasaelis, meanwhile, walked placidly through the mist unclothed, her hair falling around her knees, her breasts full as muskmelons. My own body, though fifteen, was still thin and boyish, my breasts like two brown figs. My forehead throbbed and my belly pitched. I don’t know how long I waited through that small enduring, only that it made what came next a paradise.

The most spacious of the bathing rooms, the frigidarium had curved bright walls with wide arches and bays bordered with vine-painted columns. Entering, I threw off my towel and plunged into the cold pool, then reclined on the bench that wrapped about the walls, sipping water and eating pomegranate seeds.

“It’s here that Antipas intends to place his new mosaic,” Phasaelis said. She pointed to the tiles in the center of the room.

“Here? In the frigidarium?”

“It’s a room hidden from prying eyes, and it’s his favorite room in the palace. When he entertains Annius, the Roman prefect, they spend all of their time in here conducting business. Among other things.”

The suggestive tone of her last sentence was somehow lost on me. “I don’t see why he wishes to install a woman’s face here. Wouldn’t fishes be more fitting?”

She smiled. “Oh, Ana, you are still young and naive about the ways of men. They conduct their business here, it’s true, but they also give way to other . . . interests. Why do they wish a woman’s face here? Because they are men.”

I thought of Tabitha. I wasn’t as naive about men as Phasaelis thought.

A scraping sound came from the alcove behind us. The click of bracelets. Then a low, guttering laugh.

“So, you’ve been spying on us,” Phasaelis called out. She looked past me, over my shoulder, and I spun around, grabbing for my towel.

Herod Antipas stepped from behind the arch. He fastened his gaze on me, his eyes moving from my face to my bare shoulders, then along the edges of the towel that barely covered my thighs. I swallowed, trying to force down my fear and disgust.

Phasaelis made no attempt to cover herself. She addressed me. “He sometimes watches me bathe. I should’ve warned you.”

Lascivious old man. Had he observed me step naked and dripping from the pool?

Recognition flickered in his face. “You’re the daughter of Matthias, the one we betrothed to Nathaniel ben Hananiah. I didn’t recognize you without your clothes.”

He stepped toward me. “Look at this face,” he said to Phasaelis, as if I were a sculpted object to be examined and discussed.

“Leave her be,” she said.

“It’s perfect. Large, well-spaced eyes. The high plump cheeks. Look at her mouth—I’ve never seen a more beautiful one.” Coming closer, he slid his thumb along my lower lip.

I glared at him. May you become crippled, blind, deaf, mute, and impotent.

His finger wound to my cheek, down to my neck. If I fled, what then? Would he send his soldiers after me? Would he do worse than rub his thumb across my face? I sat unmoving. I would endure this, and then he would leave.

He said, “You will sit for my artisan so he can sketch your face.”

Draping herself, Phasaelis said, “You want her face for your mosaic?”

“Yes,” he said. “It’s young and pure—it suits me.”