Maggie and I made a nest of the cushions under the wide arched window in the front, so we could hear the slightest noise coming from the street, but as night started to fall, the footsteps became fewer and farther between, the distant singing from the Temple faded, and we settled into each other’s arms, a single lump of low, agonizing grief. Sometime after dark we made love together for the first time since the night before Joshua and I left for the Orient. All those years had passed, and yet it seemed familiar. That first time, so long ago, making love was a desperate way to share the grief we felt because we were each about to lose someone we loved. This time we were losing the same person. This time, we slept afterward.

Joseph of Arimathea didn’t come home.

It was Simon and Andrew who stormed up the steps to wake us Thursday morning. I threw my tunic over Maggie and jumped to my feet in just a loincloth. As soon as I saw Simon I felt the heat rise in my face.

“You treacherous bastard!” I was too angry to hit him. I just stood there screaming at him. “You coward!”

“It wasn’t him,” screamed Andrew in my ear.

“It wasn’t me,” said Simon. “I tried to fight the guards when they came to get Joshua. Peter and I both did.”

“Judas was your friend. You and your Zealot bullshit!”

“He was your friend too.”

Andrew pushed me away. “Enough! It wasn’t Simon. I saw him face two guards with spears. Leave him be. We don’t have time for your tantrum, Biff. Joshua is being flogged at the high priest’s palace.”

“Where’s Joseph?” Maggie said. She’d dressed while I had been railing at Simon.

“He’s gone on to the praetorium that Pilate set up at the Antonia Palace by the Temple.”

“What the hell’s he doing there if Joshua is being beaten at the palace in this end of the city?”

“That’s where they’ll take Joshua next. He was convicted of blasphemy, Biff. They want a death sentence. Pontius Pilate is the ruling authority in Judea. Joseph knows him, he’s going to ask for Joshua’s release.”

“What do we do? What do we do?” I was starting to get hysterical. Since I could remember, my friendship with Joshua had been my anchor, my reason for being, my life; now it, he, was running toward destruction like a storm-driven ship to a reef, and I couldn’t think of a thing to do but panic. “What do we do? What do we do?” I panted, the breath refusing to fill my lungs. Maggie grabbed me by the shoulders and shook me.

“You have a plan, remember.” She tugged on the amulet around my neck.

“Right, right,” I said, taking a deep breath. “Right. The plan.” I grabbed my tunic and slipped it over my head. Maggie helped me wrap the sash.

“I’m sorry, Simon,” I said.

He forgave me with the wave of a hand. “What do we do?”

“If they’re taking Joshua to the praetorium, that’s where we go. If Pilate releases him then we’ll need to get him out of there. There’s no telling what Josh will do to get them to kill him.”

We were waiting along with a huge crowd outside the Antonia Palace when the Temple guards brought Joshua to the front gates. The high priest, Caiaphas, wearing his blue robes and with a jewel-encrusted chest piece, led the procession. His father, Annas, who had been the high priest previously, followed right behind. A column of guards surrounded Joshua in the middle of the procession. We could just see him amid the guards, and I could tell that someone had put a fresh tunic on him, but there were stripes of blood soaking through the back. He looked as if he was in a trance.

There was a great deal of posturing and shouting between the Temple guards, and from somewhere in the procession Jakan came forward and started arguing with the soldiers as well. It was obvious that the Romans were not going to let the Temple guards enter the praetorium, so the transfer of the prisoner was going to take place there at the gate or not at all. I was measuring whether I could sneak through the crowd, snap Jakan’s neck, and sneak back out without jeopardizing our plan when I felt a hand on my shoulder. I looked around to see Joseph of Arimathea.

“At least it wasn’t a Roman scourge they lashed him with. He took thirty-nine lashes, but it was just leather, not the lead-tipped whip that the Romans use. That would have killed him.”

“Where were you? What took so long?”

“The prosecution took forever. Jakan went on half the night, taking testimony from witnesses who had obviously never even heard of Joshua, let alone seen any crime.”

“What about the defense?” asked Maggie.

“Well, I put forth a defense of good deeds, but it was so overwhelmed by the accusations that it was lost in the noise. Joshua didn’t say a word in his own defense. They asked him if he was the Son of God and he said yes. That confirmed the blasphemy charge. It’s all they needed, really.”

“What happens now? Did you talk to Pilate?”

“I did.”

“And?”

Joseph rubbed the bridge of his nose as if fighting a headache. “He said he’d see what he could do.”

We watched as the Roman soldiers took Joshua inside and the priests followed. The Pharisees, commoners in the eyes of the Romans, were left outside. A legionnaire almost caught Jakan’s face in the gate when he slammed it.

I caught movement out of the corner of my eye, and I looked up to a high, wide balcony that was visible above the palace walls. It had obviously been designed by Herod the Great’s architects as a platform from which the king could address the masses in the Temple without compromising his safety. A tall Roman in a lush red robe was standing on the balcony looking down on the crowd, and not looking particularly happy with their presence.

“Is that Pilate?” I asked Joseph, pointing to the Roman.

Joseph nodded. “He’ll go downstairs to hold Joshua’s trial.”

But I wasn’t interested at that point in where Pilate was going. What interested me was the centurion who stood behind him wearing the full-crested helmet and breastplate of a legion commander.

Not a half hour later the gate was opened and a squad of Roman soldiers brought Joshua out of the palace in bonds. A lower-rank centurion pulled Joshua along by a rope around his wrists. The priests followed along behind and were mobbed with questions by the Pharisees who had been waiting outside.

“Go find out what’s going on,” I said to Joseph.

We waded into the middle of the procession that followed. Most were screaming at Joshua and trying to spit on him. I spotted a few people in the crowd that I knew to be Joshua’s followers, but they were going along silently, their eyes darting around as if any second they might be the next one arrested.

Simon, Andrew, and I followed behind at some distance, while Maggie fought the crowd to get close to Joshua. I saw her throw herself at her ex-husband, Jakan, who was trailing the priests, but she was stopped in mid-leap by Joseph of Arimathea, who caught her by the hair and pulled her back. Someone else was helping restrain her, but he wore a shawl over his head so I couldn’t tell who it was. Probably Peter.

Joseph dragged Maggie back to us and handed her over to me and Simon.

“She’ll get herself killed.”

Maggie looked up at me, a wildness in her eyes that I couldn’t read, either anger or madness. I wrapped my arms around her and held her so her arms were pinned to her sides as we walked along. The man with the hood walked along beside me, his hand on Maggie’s shoulder, steadying her. When he looked at me I could see it was Peter. The wiry fisherman seemed to have aged twenty years since I’d seen him Tuesday night.

“They’re taking him to Antipas,” Peter said. “As soon as Pilate heard Joshua was from Galilee he said it wasn’t his jurisdiction and sent him to Herod.”