  The Tetrarch, mouth open, his thick lips grease-smeared and wine-purpled, snored sonorously; his round, closely cropped head, cradled in his hand, swayed in precarious balance on the column of his forearm which was pressed into the heavy cushion. Herodias, reclining at his left, had changed position to rest her head on her right arm and thereby avoid somewhat breathing the heavily alcoholic exhalations of her spouse; she lay facing her daughter. Claudia, Herod’s guest of honor, was at his right, and next to her, as the ranking Roman soldier at Machaerus, Herod had placed the Centurion Cornelius. Other guests, in various stages of intoxication, sat or reclined on their elbows or had fallen inert on their couches to the right and left of the Tetrarch. The banquet had begun in the daylight of late afternoon, and by the time the sun had dropped behind the western headlands the Tetrarch and his guests had begun to be surfeited with the richly tempting food, the wine, and the wildly sensual dancing of Herod’s darkly handsome Arabian women, who, nude but for gossamer thin, gaily colored loincloths, writhed and twisted in the open square before the tables to the oriental, whining insistence of the strings and the maddeningly rhythmical beat of the drums. But now the dancers, their copper-hued perspiring bodies shining as though they had been rubbed with olive oil, had retired to a chamber adjoining the banquet room. From there they could come prancing out barefoot, with lewd twistings and contortings, at the first summons of the musicians. Until Antipas should arouse from his stupor, though, and call for them, they would be free to relax. Cornelius, who had been eying the Tetrarch, nodded in his “Yes. I’m gorged. And I’d like to have a breath of fresh air on the terrace. Perhaps Herodias would excuse us. I had no idea that Antipas....” But at that instant the Tetrarch’s head slipped from its cradling hand, and he fell face downward upon the cushion. The sudden drop awakened him, and he twisted his legs around heavily and sat up. The leader of the musicians, seeing him, signaled his men to begin playing and motioned to the dancers to return. “No! No!” shouted the Tetrarch. “We have had enough of their dancing! But now, my friends”—Antipas faced right and left to look along the couches, as his guests began to sit up—“I shall provide you with more novel entertainment.” He paused and reached for his wine goblet. “I ask your pardon for having gone to sleep, although I’m sure a number of you did likewise. During our stay at Machaerus I have been overindulging in food and wine and, for a man of my age, certainly, other more strenuous pleasures.” He ran his thick tongue over his greasy lips and smiled lewdly. “But now”—he signaled two of the guards standing at the doorway opening upon the terrace—“go into the dungeon and fetch to our birthday feast the Wilderness prophet.” Herodias whirled about to confront him, her countenance betraying both anger and amazement. “Why should the Tetrarch bring that depraved madman here to insult his guests, his wife, and himself? Has the Tetrarch permitted too much wine and too many women...?” “Patience, my dear! And be calm. I am not having him brought before us to insult us. On the contrary, he will ask our pardon for his intemperate words, and we shall release him.” “Release him! By all the gods, can the Tetrarch be speaking seriously? Does he for one moment contemplate giving this notorious insurrectionist his freedom to resume his agitating against us, against Rome...?” “But, my dear Tetrarchess, Rome, as represented by the Centurion Cornelius,” he interrupted, as he glanced toward the centurion “But are not you Tetrarch of Galilee and Peraea? Was it not your wife and you, not the centurion, whom this revolutionary castigated so bitterly? And has he not sought to inflame the people even against Rome?” Claudia had turned to confront Cornelius; she said nothing, but her eyes were sharply questioning. He bent forward and spoke quietly, so that none of the others would hear. “I did suggest that it would be a good idea—especially in so far as Sejanus is concerned—for him to free the man, since it would please the Jews and the man is plainly no insurrectionist against Rome. But I didn’t know he meant to have the fellow brought before us. The man should have been freed quietly, with no fanfare.” “Frankly, I think he would have done better,” Claudia whispered to Cornelius, “to have had the fellow beheaded, but quietly.” She leaned nearer the centurion. “Antipas craves attention; he tries to be dramatic. He’s always....” But suddenly she stopped, for the guards, flanking the manacled prisoner, were entering the great hall. They escorted John into the open square before the Tetrarch’s table. “Unbind him,” the Tetrarch commanded, “and step back from him.” In an instant the guards had removed the shackles about the prophet’s wrists and retreated to their former places at the doorway. Though not all the Tetrarch’s guests had completely sobered, every eye was on the Wilderness preacher. In the months he had been imprisoned in the Machaerus dungeon, John had lost the leathery deep burn of the desert, but otherwise he was little changed. He was tall and erect and perhaps even more gaunt than he had appeared to be the day Antipas had ordered his arrest; his coarse brown robe, belted with a woven rope at the waist, hung “You are the Prophet John of the Wilderness and the Jordan Valley?” Antipas asked, his tone and manner almost friendly. “Have I been so long in your dungeon, O Tetrarch, that you can’t be sure you know me?” The question and the tone in which it was framed were sarcastic, even patronizing, but the Tetrarch appeared to take no offense. “It was an idle query, and you have been a long time in prison. Perhaps your intemperate words to the Tetrarch and the Tetrarchess have been sufficiently punished.” Antipas smiled blandly and rubbed his fat hands together. “Our banqueting this day is an occasion of joy and merriment; it is our birthday and to mark it further the Tetrarch is happy to demonstrate before these our honored guests, including even the wife of the great Procurator Pontius Pilate”—he bowed toward Claudia, who had been listening avidly—“and our honored Centurion Cornelius, his softness of heart toward his subjects. Today a group of the prophet’s followers”—now he bowed toward John—“has petitioned the Tetrarch to liberate him. These men assured us that you”—he spoke directly to the gaunt preacher—“have never had any thought of insurrection against the government of Rome or the Tetrarch but that you were concerned only with the promulgation of our true religion. I agreed I would grant their petition. Now as soon as you satisfy me that you will cause us no further trouble and express your regret for the intemperate and malicious words with which you castigated the Tetrarch and his beloved Tetrarchess, as soon as you assure us that you have repented of your evil words....” “Repented!” John’s eyes blazed. “I have nothing for which to repent to you, O Tetrarch! My repentance is to the God of Israel against whom I have sinned and continue to sin. But I have done you no evil. I call upon you to repent, O you of evil and lustful heart, you robber of your brother’s bed!” The prophet lifted himself upon his sandaled toes and pointed with lean forearm straight upward toward the ceiling dome. “Repent! Repent! Repent, for your days are numbered! The Messiah of God, Him of Whom I Suddenly the preacher paused, and his blazing eyes settled upon the Tetrarchess. He thrust out his arm and held it before the startled woman’s face. “And you, repent, you evil woman, you deserter of your lawful bed, return to your husband, forswear your adulterous cohabiting....” “Hold your tongue!” Herodias, eyes flashing her uncontrollable rage, her cheeks flaming, had sprung to her feet. She leaned across the food-covered, disordered table. “By all the gods, O Tetrarch”—she turned to grasp her husband’s shoulder as he sat upright on the couch—“I will hear no more of this evil madman’s prattle. Send him away—have him shot with arrows, or order him beheaded, or throw him again into the dungeon—by the great Jove, I don’t care what you do with him, but I will not remain here with him and be further insulted!” She shook his shoulder furiously. “Do you understand, Antipas? Do you understand, by the Great Mother Ceres?” The Tetrarch stumbled to his feet, swayed, but clutched the table edge to steady himself. “Take your seat, my dear,” he said evenly. “I understand very well what you say. And you speak the truth.” He turned from her to face the desert preacher. “I had meant to hand you your freedom, Wilderness prophet; I had meant to give you into the care of your friends who remained here tonight to take you back into Judaea. But your vicious tirade against us forces me to change my plans for you.” He beckoned to the two guards. “Manacle him, and return him to the dungeon,” he commanded. Quickly they fettered his wrists and, grasping him by the arms, led him toward the door through which moments ago they had brought him into the chamber. John walked silently, head erect The guards jerked their prisoner through the doorway, and the door closed heavily behind them. The banqueters, silenced by the bitter exchange between Herodias and the prophet, listened to the retreating footsteps of the three along the corridor. “The fellow’s a fool,” Claudia observed in a low aside to Cornelius, “but he does have courage.” “Yes, he must believe that he’s serving his Yahweh and Yahweh’s Messiah,” the centurion agreed; “that faith must be the source of his courage.” “Amazing. I cannot understand how these Jews can be so swayed by such silly superstition. I do wonder what Antipas will do with him; Herodias, if she could, would have his head off in a minute. And so would I, if he had talked to me as he did to her.” She tossed her head and smiled indifferently. “But why should I be concerned about this Jewish fanatic? I don’t care one green Campanian fig what happens to him.” As she reached for her wine goblet, which a servant had refilled, Antipas set his down and stood up. The servant hastened to fill the Tetrarch’s. Antipas licked his thick lips. “By the beard of the High Priest,” he said, “I really intended to liberate the prophet. His imprisonment is on his own head.” He clutched the table’s edge to steady himself again. Then he grasped his wine goblet and drained it in one gulp. The servant raced around the table to refill the empty glass. Antipas picked it up and twirled it slowly on its slender stem, “Drink, my friends! Let us dispel this sudden gloom. Isn’t this the Tetrarch’s birthday? Drink! Drink!” He downed the wine as his guests, lifting their goblets, drank to their host. Antipas clapped his hands. “And now, music and the dancing women!” The leader signaled to his men, and the musicians began their lively playing, as the Arabian dancers came scampering again into “Soon now he’ll be very drunk, and we can escape,” Cornelius whispered to Claudia. “He’s still afraid of the Wilderness preacher, and he will try to drown his fears in wine.” “But he just ordered the fellow back to the dungeon.” “He also fears Herodias. He’ll free John, though, as soon as he can do so without his wife’s knowing about it.” The tempo of the music was increasing, and the women, refreshed by the long intermission they had been having and the food and wine they had been served, were fast approaching a frenzy of abandon in their wild convolutions and sensual writhings. For a few moments the jaded Tetrarch, watching the brazenly lewd gyrations of the dancing women, appeared to be gaining renewed stimulation. But quickly his interest faded; he sat up on his couch and straightened himself. “Hold!” he commanded, waving his hand aloft. “Enough of this. We are surfeited on dark women.” The music stopped. “Let them go,” said Antipas, nodding toward the leader of the musicians. The man bowed to the Tetrarch and, turning, waved his dismissal to the dancers, who went tripping out. Once again the great triclinium was as still and the guests as suddenly silent as they had been at the dramatic entrance of the gaunt prophet. Now the Tetrarch, beaming, looked to his left beyond his Tetrarchess. “It is our wish that our beloved daughter Salome honor our birthday by dancing for the Tetrarch and his guests,” he declared in honeyed tones. “Will you not dance for us, my dear child?” Cornelius leaned forward to watch Herodias’ daughter. Salome seemed amazed at her stepfather’s request. “But, Sire,” she ventured to protest, as she turned on her couch to face the unctuously smiling Tetrarch, “doesn’t my dear father know that I am not a dancer? Surely he prefers the dancing of women trained in the art.” She shook her head firmly. “Sire, I would not wish to display before this company just how poorly....” “Oh come now, my child, your dancing will delight the Tetrarch and his guests. Do not let maidenly modesty deny us the pleasure of seeing you perform.” The Tetrarch’s eyes were beginning to flame. “We would delight in your dancing, my dear. After all that dark flesh, a flashing before us of firm, white, youthful....” “But Salome, the Tetrarch well knows, is not accustomed to dancing before companies such as this.” Herodias, her eyes challenging, caught her husband’s arm in protest. “And has not the Tetrarch seen enough already of both white and dark female flesh? Is he not surfeited with women? Why should he wish to see a child...?” “I wish to see her dance, my dear Tetrarchess. I have never seen her dance. And is this not my birthday? Shouldn’t one be indulged on his birthday?” He leaned past his wife to plead again with Salome. “Won’t you, my dear Salome, dance just this once, to please and flatter your doting father?” Claudia leaned close to Cornelius. “I don’t believe ‘doting’ is the word,” she whispered; “I’d say ‘drooling’ is more like it.” Antipas was still pleading with the girl. “If you will but dance this once for us, Salome, my child,” he said, his voice soft and sugared, his round face disarmingly friendly, “I will grant any request you make of me.” “If I could dance well, Sire, I would be happy to dance for the Tetrarch, but I am not skilled in that art, nor do I have the mature charms of the Arabian women nor the....” “But you have the tender charms, my dear Salome, the virginal charms of the bud about to open to full flowering. And I am satiated with these wide-open flowers ready to shatter.” He stood up and braced himself against the table, then turned toward her with renewed pleading. “Dance for us, my dear. Dance for us, and I will reward you what you will, I swear by the High Priest’s beard, even to the half of our tetrarchy!” “But, Sire, even were I able to please the Tetrarch with my poor efforts, I am not suitably dressed....” The girl paused, for her mother had leaned over to whisper in her ear. She listened, solemn-faced, and then, suddenly smiling, she turned back to address the Tetrarch. “Sire, if the Tetrarch would not unmercifully “I’ve never been more serious in my life, my dear child. I fully intend to keep my promise. Anything you want, a marble palace, a pleasure barge to rival Cleopatra’s, gold, precious gems, silks from the Orient, anything; it is yours but for you to name it ... after you have danced for the Tetrarch and his guests.” “Very well, Sire.” The girl stood up. “I shall do my best to please the Tetrarch and his guests on his birthday. But, first, I must change my costume.” Herodias arose unsteadily to stand beside her. “Mother will help me dress.” Claudia leaned to her right to whisper to Cornelius. The Tetrarch, absorbed in watching his wife and stepdaughter, would hardly have heard her had she spoken aloud. “It’s Herodias who’s told her to dance for him. She’s got some sort of scheme in mind, and I’m sure it hinges on that request. I wonder what it will be....” Cornelius nodded. “Something, I would say, that bodes the Tetrarch no good. I’ll be interested myself to see what Salome will ask.” A few minutes later Herodias reappeared in the doorway. She signaled to the leader of the musicians, and he went over to her; she talked with him a moment, and then, as he rejoined his group, she made her way around the couches to resume her place beside the Tetrarch. Immediately the leader raised his hand, and the musicians began to play. “By the great Jove!” Cornelius, who had turned momentarily to reply to something Claudia had said, glanced back toward the doorway through which the Tetrarchess had returned. At his murmured exclamation Claudia looked in the same direction. “By Bona Dea! what a transformation!” she exclaimed. Salome was standing just inside the doorway. When she had left the chamber a few minutes ago she had been wearing a shimmering white silken stola, held at the waist by a wide girdle of interlaced narrow strips of green and gold, and golden sandals. Her raven-black hair had been combed back from a part in the center But now the girl, immobile and statuesque, stood stripped of every garment she had worn in leaving the chamber. At first glance the centurion thought Salome had returned completely in the nude, save for the few thin veils she had draped about her shoulders. But looking more closely, he saw that her loins were bound, though scantily, with a carefully folded flesh-colored veil. To the casual observer and certainly to the aging Tetrarch, the girl appeared to be standing before them divested of all her clothing. The brightly colored veils even heightened the illusion. She was barefoot, and her hair, freed from the restricting net and unbound, fell past firm, outthrust breasts almost to her slim waist in a tumbling dark cascade of curls. Salome looked as though, finding herself unclad, she had pushed her black tresses suddenly through a small wispish rainbow that had settled about her white shoulders and slipped downward to her dimpled knees. “Her charms seem quite mature,” Cornelius whispered to Claudia, grinning. “And I suspect they’re no longer virginal,” she replied. “But, by the gods, she must be sixteen, and”—she leaned nearer and spoke into his ear—“whoever could imagine a Herodian virgin any older!” Claudia’s caution had not been necessary, for the Tetrarch’s dark eyes, smoldering as though at any moment they might burst into flame, were measuring and exploring and savoring the girl. Claudia, following Cornelius’ eyes, glanced toward the entranced ruler and then, turning back to the centurion, whispered again, “Soon he’ll be drooling. He’s mad, stark, raving mad.” The music had been soft and slow, but now Salome, with a quick upward flexing of her fingers and a nod to signal the musicians, stepped forward a pace and with shoulders twisting and hips undulating came slithering into the opening between the tables. From high on a pilaster a shaded lamp cast a circle of bright “Magnificent! Wonderful!” he shouted, unabashed, as he sank again to his couch and reached for his goblet. “My child, you restore the sap of youth to my aging limbs!” At the edge of the circle and straight across it from the Tetrarch, Salome stopped, and as the drums ceased their throbbing and the strings subsided to a whisper, she turned deliberately to face the Tetrarch and his guests. “Bountiful Ceres!” Claudia kept her voice low. “Is she going to discard those veils?” But Salome, with her arms still pressed across her chest, continued to clutch the colored gauze protectively before her. The music began to increase in volume, and hardly discernible at first above the harmony of the strings and the flutes, the drums added their insistent throbbing. Now the girl in the square before the diners slowly withdrew her right arm, which had been crossed underneath the left one, and lifted it high; at the same time she pushed forward her left leg, so that the gossamer veils fell to either side to expose it from toes to hip, and leaned back; the leg, torso, and lifted arm to ringed forefinger made one continuous straight line of vibrant, glowing, suddenly stilled flesh, veiled but scantily by the diaphanous colored silks. Cornelius ventured a glance toward the Tetrarch. Antipas, upright on his couch, was leaning forward, mouth half open, dark eyes staring unblinking at his stepdaughter and grandniece. The centurion gently nudged Claudia. “Any moment now,” he whispered, “he’ll be lunging over the table again.” But his eyes darted quickly to the girl. Her head was back, in line with the rest of her body, and her sultry eyes looked upward to her extended forefinger. Now it began to move, almost imperceptibly, so that few of the Tetrarch’s guests were aware of the beginning of its motion. But Cornelius, intrigued, saw the finger’s movement widening and speeding; like a serpent it was coiling and uncoiling, twisting sideways, darting, writhing, all in perfect rhythm with the music. As he watched, the motion of the finger appeared to flow like liquid downward to involve the hand and then the forearm. Now along the graceful length of her slender bare arm the smooth, unknotting muscles, rippling and twisting, seemed to have transformed it into an oriental adder swaying and bobbing to the compelling strains of the charmer’s flute. “The child’s amazing, I must agree with the Tetrarch,” Cornelius said. “Do you suppose Herodias trained her?” He leaned forward to glance past Antipas to the intent Tetrarchess who seemed absorbed completely in her daughter’s performance. “What a symphony of motion and movement!” “And when that movement begins to gyrate in the region of the hips, Centurion, you’ll realize Salome’s no longer a child!” Nor was the flowing, rhythmical motion long in attaining that region. In synchronized rolling and lifting and falling, the right shoulder joined the twisting, gently writhing arm, and then the rounded stomach undulated, freed now of the teasing veils. As the tempo of the music speeded and the volume swelled and the throb of the drums grew deeper, the hips began their undulating motion. Grinding, thrusting, withdrawing, thrusting, they moved faster and faster in an abandon of voluptuous movement. Then the music slowed again and the frenzied gyrations with it, and quickly the movement ran downward from the stilled hips and disappeared in a restrained tapping of bare toes on the mosaic of the triclinium’s marble floor. The Tetrarch’s guests, inspired by his shouted acclamations, applauded wildly. And before they had settled to silence again, Salome dextrously transferred to her right hand the thin veils that throughout her dancing, even in the abandon of its most voluptuous last moments, she had held clutched snugly against her From where the diners sat across the bright circle from her, the girl appeared to be entirely nude, despite the thin bit of flesh-toned silk that bound her loins. Her curling long black hair hanging unrestrained down her back and across her shoulders added to the illusion. “But, my dear daughter, don’t you know that one never turns his back upon the Tetrarch?” Antipas shouted, as he leaned out across the table, his black eyes bulging as though they might leap from the sockets. The girl’s only response was to draw in her hands slightly and then thrust them outward again in the pantomime of unveiling herself anew as, in an ecstasy of voluptuous simulations, she rotated her slim hips to the mounting frenzy of the music. “Wonderful! Wonderful!” Antipas clapped his fat hands together. “Marvelous, my dear child! But must you continue to give your back to the Tetrarch? Will you continue thus to tease us?” Still Salome made no reply to her stepfather. But slowly, as Antipas clutched the table edge to pull to his feet, the girl, without breaking the rhythm of her seductive undulations, began slowly to turn herself about, her arms still outthrust from her sides. The Tetrarch, seeing it, let go his prop and sank heavily to the couch; once more his screamed approval signaled the guests to new applause, as every eye in eager anticipation followed the gracefully suggestive motions of their royal host’s stepdaughter. But hardly had the girl done a quarter turn toward the diners when suddenly she drew the gossamer scarves protectively to herself, and, whirling the remainder of the turn to face them, paused Claudia was close enough now to Salome to see that the girl’s half-closed eyes, peering through slits beneath the darkly shadowed lids, were glancing from the Tetrarch to her mother beside him. Salome, she was suddenly convinced, was performing for Antipas not out of her own volition but through Herodias’ devising. And what, Claudia wondered again, could the crafty Tetrarchess be planning to accomplish through this brazen flaunting of her daughter’s physical charms. But the Procurator’s wife had only a moment for conjecture; Salome suddenly ceased her rhythmical writhings and stepped forward to lean above the Tetrarch’s still burdened table. Teasingly, and before the musicians were aware of her changed routine, she fumbled with the veils still held pressed against her, and as Antipas, in a new frenzy of excitement, sought to rise from his couch, she thrust her hands apart and then, with a high squeal of laughter, crossed them again in front of her. In the brief moment that her youthful but fully matured bosom had been completely exposed to them, the Tetrarch had lunged out to clutch her, but he had shattered his wine goblet instead and the girl, screaming with laughter, had darted backward into the illuminated circle to evade him. As a servant came running up to mop the spilled wine and remove the broken glass, Antipas settled back on his couch. “Aha! The clever little vixen was too quick for me,” he said, turning to face his wife. “But I’ll....” He said no more. Herodias, Claudia saw, was unsmiling, grim. But evidently she hadn’t meant for Antipas to see her in such a mood, for quickly she affected a cloaking smile. “By the gods,” she said to her husband, “the child is clever, isn’t she?” Salome was now in the center of the bright light. The music had died away as the leader awaited his new instructions. The girl stood quietly facing the Tetrarch and his guests, the colored veils “Another!” shouted Antipas as she whirled past his couch but safely beyond his reach. “Another! Let another one fly!” She was wheeling before the diners at her mother’s left when she loosed a second veil; a man grabbed for it and thrust it beneath his pillow. When she had spun around to the other side of the circle she held out her arm and a yellow one sailed above the table. A man and a woman grabbed for the floating gossamer; he caught it but laughingly surrendered it to her. “More! More!” screamed the Tetrarch, and around the square of the tables others joined in chorus. And when the girl let two of the shimmering scarves sail away together, they screamed again. “More! More! Let them fly!” Salome, her head back, laughing, began now to tease the Tetrarch and his guests. Whirling around the rim of the patch of light, she would sweep one hand with its veils outward with a flourish and then, without releasing them, fold the arm back across the other one, which all the while she had kept pressed close to her pirouetting white body. “She’s an actress, the little coquette!” Cornelius observed. “She knows how to build up suspense. She understands how to please Antipas, too; she’s got a good sense of the dramatic.” “Yes, and in another moment or so, unless I’m entirely wrong about her, her dramatics will have Antipas—and maybe you, But her question remained unfinished, for the girl had pranced, still pirouetting, into the center of the bright spot. She paused in her turning and with both hands clutching the remaining veils modestly across her chest, signaled with a motion of her head to the leader of the musicians. Immediately the volume of the music began to increase and the tempo to speed, and Salome whirled faster and faster in time with the music’s crescendo. As she spun on the balls of her bare feet, the veils that had been hanging to her knees streamed out in a kaleidoscope of whirling color. The flutes more insistently joined their whining pleas to the deeper invitations of the harps and the dulcimers and the rhythmical throaty demands of the drums; the girl’s black hair, standing out from her head as she whirled, made a dark spinning disk above the circular rainbow of the scarves. Now Salome lifted one arm above her head, while she held the other protectively before her, so that the dark whirling of her hair had above it as well as beneath it a spinning rainbow of color. “I think I know what she’ll do next,” Claudia said, leaning to her right to speak to Cornelius above the steadily mounting volume and frenzy of the music. Antipas, too, must have anticipated it. “The other arm!” he shouted, as he leaned forward, his eyes blazing with lechery. “Raise the other arm, my dear child!” But Salome did not obey the Tetrarch. Instead, as she came pirouetting nearer him, she lowered the arm she had just raised, and the two whirling circles of color merged into one fast, revolving gossamer flame. Faster the girl spun, and faster, faster the musicians played, and higher swelled their instruments’ invitation to abandoned revelry. Antipas, who had sat back when the girl failed to heed his demand, reached for his goblet, gulped his wine, and was replacing Once more the Tetrarch overturned his goblet, and the wine spilled across the table. But when a servant came racing to his aid, Antipas waved him away. The Tetrarch’s amazed eyes had focused upon the dancing girl; he would permit nothing to obstruct, even for an instant, his view of her. The spinning Salome in the circle of light from the wall lamp was nude from the small gossamer triangle of her loins’ covering to the crown of her head, and in the rapidity of her turning she appeared to be entirely divested of clothing. Antipas caught at the edge of the table and pushed himself, swaying, to his feet. “Nearer, child, nearer!” he shrieked. “Come closer! Come closer to us! Come....” But his frenzied words were choked in a swirling cloud of silken transparencies, for his stepdaughter had let go all her veils and one had dipped full into the flushed, round face of the Tetrarch of Galilee and Peraea. As Antipas struggled to free himself of the clinging, vision-obscuring fluff of silk, the guests around the tables grabbed merrily for the descending veils. But by the time the Tetrarch had jerked the scarf away from his face, Salome had already disappeared; she had darted across the spotlighted mosaic floor into the enfolding privacy of the triclinium’s antechamber. Behind her, her audience thundered its applause. Moments later, before the birthday celebrants had settled completely from the excitement of her dramatic exit, Salome, dressed as she had been when she left to prepare for her dance, returned to the great chamber and took her place beside her mother. Claudia, watching discreetly, saw the Tetrarchess lightly squeeze the girl’s hand and bend over to whisper into her ear. Antipas sat up and beaming turned to face his stepdaughter. “My child, you have pleased the Tetrarch immensely,” he said, as he rubbed his plump hands together. “I had no idea that you could dance with such grace and charm. Your dancing has far “Even, Sire, to the half of your tetrarchy?” Antipas blinked, hesitated a moment, and then his round face brightened. “Yes, if you ask it, even to the half of the tetrarchy, though I should think a marble palace or a yacht....” “Have no fear, Sire,” Salome interrupted. “I wish not the half of your tetrarchy or any part of it. Nor do I need or desire a marble palace or a pleasure boat, or a trip at this time to Rome.” “Ah, but I know what will please you,” Antipas spoke up. “A new wardrobe, full of beautiful garments fashioned of the finest silks brought from the Orient or woven on the looms in Phoenicia....” “No, not gowns or shoes or houses or yachts or journeys to Rome or gold and silver....” “But come, my dear child, you must be repaid for the pleasure you have given us. I beg of you, name your any desire....” “And the Tetrarch will grant it?” Salome stood up, facing the ruler of Galilee and Peraea, just beyond her mother. “You swear it, Sire?” “By the beard of the High Priest, I swear it, Salome. I shall grant whatever you ask of me, even to the half of the tetrarchy.” “Then, Sire,” she said, smiling demurely, “my request is simple and will rob the Tetrarch’s treasury of not one denarius. It is my wish”—she paused and looked the happily smiling Antipas full in his round face—“that the Tetrarch present to me on a silver Claudia and Cornelius had been leaning out over their plates, avidly following the conversation of the girl and her stepfather. “By all the gods!” Claudia whispered, without taking her eyes from the still calmly smiling Salome. “Now I understand. Herodias, by the Bountiful Mother....” But she said no more, for Antipas was pulling to his feet. “Surely, child, I have not heard you correctly. Surely you would not wish to have the head of a man....” “But you did hear correctly, Sire. And you have sworn to grant me my wish. I ask only for the head of the Prophet John.” The Tetrarch, braced against the table’s edge, looked to his right and then left along the tables. The eyes of his guests were fastened on their plates; not one face was raised to help him. Antipas stood, drained of all levity; the impact of the girl’s inhuman request, so simply and heartlessly presented, had sobered him. He turned again to Salome and tried to affect a smile. “Were you a man, a soldier, perhaps, seeking revenge upon an enemy ... but for a beautiful young woman of such charm and culture, who has danced for us so delightfully”—he shook his head sadly—“such an utterly strange request for a beautiful woman.” He seemed to be thinking aloud, talking more to himself than to the girl. “To want the head of a prophet of Israel, a man held in such esteem by so many of our Jewish subjects, a prophet who may indeed have been sent of Israel’s God....” He broke off, shaking his head as if in deep perplexity. Claudia, watching Salome now, saw Herodias reach out and gently grasp her daughter’s arm. The girl, still standing, smiled cynically and tossed her head. “Nevertheless, Sire, that is my request. If, however, the Tetrarch wishes to dishonor his oath before this company and refuse me....” The Tetrarch banged his fist on the table top. “The Tetrarch never dishonors an oath!” he shouted. “He withdraws no promises he makes.” He turned to face the two guardsmen at the door, the soldiers who had brought the Wilderness prophet into the banquet room and had escorted him back to the dungeon. “Guardsmen, The men glanced at one another, then faced the Tetrarch. “We understand, Sire,” one said. “Then go.” Quickly the two strode out of the chamber; their footsteps echoed as they marched down the hall. Antipas slumped on his couch, then lowered his head between his hands. Salome took her seat. She smiled as she and her mother whispered. The guests kept their places and were silent; the servants, moving about to replenish the wine goblets, walked noiselessly. “The Tetrarch is making a monstrous mistake,” Cornelius said. “Because he’s giving in to Herodias?” Claudia inquired. “Because he’s ordering the prophet’s death.” “Then you”—a faint smile crossed her face—“are afraid of the Jews’ one god?” “I could be,” he answered unhesitatingly. “But that’s not my reason. I’m sure it’s....” He stopped. A servant had approached the Tetrarch’s couch. “The Centurion Longinus?” The Tetrarch raised his bulky frame to a sitting position. “Indeed, bring him to us.” At the sound of the Tetrarch’s words, Claudia looked up; her eyes followed the retreating servant. Antipas turned to her. “The Centurion Longinus has just arrived at Machaerus,” he said; “I’ve sent for him. Shall we make a place for him between you and Centurion Cornelius perhaps, my dear?” He grinned. “He must be famished from the long journey to this forsaken outpost.” A moment later the servant escorted the centurion to the Tetrarch’s couch. Antipas greeted him cordially, presented him to the diners, and ordered the servants to set him a place at the table. When after a minute he was settled beside her, Claudia found his hand on the couch and squeezed it hard. “It’s so wonderful to have you here,” she said. “I can hardly wait to hear the news from Rome.” “I can hardly wait to be with you ... alone,” he said. “It’s “But what on earth are you doing at Machaerus, Longinus? Where have you been before this?” “Tiberias,” he answered, “I came there after landing at Caesarea. I had orders from Sejanus to convey to the Tetrarch. When I reached Tiberias and found that he and his guests had departed for Machaerus, I set out to follow. It was urgent that I see the Tetrarch as quickly as possible; I didn’t dare await his return to his palace.” Antipas had overheard. “We are happy that you came, Centurion, but what mission could you have that would be so urgent?” He smiled, and his manner was most agreeable. “A new style of glassware, perhaps, that you wish to sell to the Tetrarch?” “No, Sire, nothing to sell you ... now, at any rate. It’s a more important mission. I’m coming to you from the Prefect Sejanus who is sending you instructions in the name of the Emperor, for whom he is acting in this case and after conferring with Tiberius at Capri. I assure you it is important and urgent, and I desire an audience with you at the first moment you may be available, Sire, in order to transmit to you the instructions from Rome.” “Indeed, Centurion”—the Tetrarch’s flippant manner had disappeared; his countenance, at the centurion’s mention of Sejanus and the Emperor, was suddenly grave—“if it is that urgent, we can leave the dining chamber at once. But that would cause a lot of talk, I suppose. Must you confer with me in secret, Centurion? These are all dear friends, my wife, the Procurator’s wife, Centurion Cornelius. Is it necessary that the information you bring me from Rome be kept from them?” “Indeed, no, Sire. In fact, they would know soon anyway, as quickly as you acted. And the Prefect desires that you act immediately.” He paused. Antipas nodded. “In fact, Sire, it is fortunate that you are here at Machaerus; your orders can be put into effect within minutes after they have been issued. The Prefect’s instructions to you have to do with that strange fellow we encountered along the Jordan as we were going to Tiberias, the “John the Baptizer!” The Tetrarch’s face had paled. Herodias, who had been listening, leaned forward; her countenance was a mask. “But what of John,” the Tetrarch began, “what...?” He paused, licked his dry lips, and swallowed. “Sire, it’s nothing to be unduly concerned about,” Longinus replied. “It’s only a policy matter. You know that Sejanus and Tiberius are always stressing the importance of keeping the Jews happy, at least to the extent that they won’t attempt to revolt. And since John is so popular among them, the Prefect believes that your release of the prophet will be pleasing to the Jews and will, to that extent, strengthen Rome’s rule ... and the Tetrarch’s. There’s no point in needlessly offending them, you see. That’s why he sent me to you with the suggestion, Sire, that you release John at once. He has prepared notices, to be signed by you, for posting in Tiberias, Jerusalem, Caesarea....” The Tetrarch said nothing but buried his face in his hands. Herodias, erect and unmoving, stared straight ahead. “But, Sire....” Longinus said no more, for Claudia had suddenly grasped his arm. He turned and stared toward the doorway through which, a moment before the centurion’s arrival, the two palace guardsmen had disappeared. Now the two were returning. They advanced straight toward the Tetrarch. One man was carrying, chest high and at arms’ length, a large silver tray of the type used by servants at Machaerus for serving food. On the tray was a rounded, gory mass. “But that can’t be for me, surely,” Longinus whispered to her. “It looks like raw meat, bloody.... Great Jove!” The man bearing the tray had come close enough for them to see his ghastly offering. “By all the great and little gods!” He twisted to face the girl, his expression suddenly aghast. His voice, when at last he spoke, was hoarse and unbelieving. “The Wilderness prophet?” She nodded. “Yes, the Tetrarch had him beheaded ... just a moment ago, perhaps even after you arrived here.” She turned her head to look away from the guardsman’s horrifying burden. But Longinus saw. The prophet’s head, with blood dripping from the stump of the severed neck, lay on one ear in the tangled, gore-smeared mat of his long, black hair. His beard, too, was blood-streaked, and his face and forehead were smeared; blood had run down into the corners of his eyes. Wide-open and set in staring rigidity, the eyes seemed to be trying to communicate with him. “Sire,” the guardsmen said, as he reached the table and held out the profaned tray, “the Tetrarch’s orders have been carried out. The head of the desert preacher....” “No! No!” screamed Antipas, as he held up his right hand before his eyes and pointed with the other toward his wife and her daughter. “Not here! It’s ... it’s theirs! Put it there!” The guardsman set the tray down in front of Salome, who glanced at it idly and then lowered her head. Herodias stared unabashed at the pitiful profanation before them, and then after a moment she, too, looked away. Now the Tetrarch lowered his shielding hand and calmly turned to his left to face Herodias and his stepdaughter. His demeanor, Longinus saw, was suddenly changed. When he spoke his voice was calm, modulated. “The Tetrarch of Galilee and Peraea does not dishonor a promise made,” he said. “My daughter, you have the reward you sought. Now what will you do with it?” The girl turned to stare an instant at her questioner. Then she glanced again toward the head on the tray. Shock, nausea, sudden fear, horror curdled her countenance, and she threw up a protecting hand to shut out the fearful sight. “Give it to Mother!” she cried out, her voice shrill, and tense. Jumping to her feet, she fled from the great chamber. “Take it away!” Herodias screamed to a servant at her elbow. “Dispose of it ... quickly!” Without a word to her husband, she reached for her wine goblet and drank; then she drew up her feet, smoothed the skirt of her glistening stola, and settled herself comfortably on her elbow. Equally calm, Antipas leaned over to speak to Longinus. “I regret, Centurion, that you didn’t reach Machaerus a few minutes earlier. But....” He gestured with resignation, then sat back on his couch. He was reaching for his wine glass when a palace “Sire, a delegation has just arrived; the men declare they were sent by King Aretas. They maintain their mission is most urgent and they petition—indeed, Sire, they demand—that the Tetrarch give them audience this evening.” “From King Aretas?” A heavy scowl darkened the Tetrarch’s full, round face. “Most urgent, they say?” He was thoughtfully silent a moment. Then he turned, glaring, to the obeisant servant. “Then bring them to us.” “But, Sire”—the bowing man was rubbing his hands together nervously, palpably fearful—“they suggested that perhaps the Tetrarch would wish to receive them privately in his council chamber....” “No! Who are they to tell the Tetrarch where he must receive them! Bring them to us, at once!” “Yes, Sire. Yes, immediately.” The timorous fellow was backing away, bowing, as he rubbed his knuckles in his palm. “Did you hear what the servant said?” Claudia whispered to Longinus, as the Tetrarch twisted his heavy hulk the other way to watch the retreating fellow. “I wonder....” “Yes, so do I. And I’m sure Herodias does, too.” He turned to speak to Cornelius on his right. “You heard the servant?” Cornelius nodded. “Sounds like more trouble for the Tetrarch, doesn’t it?” “I wouldn’t be surprised,” Cornelius agreed. “This seems to be a bad night for the old fellow, a tough night, indeed.” The representatives of the Arabian king were formally polite, rigidly reserved. “It is no pleasant mission on which we have been sent here, O Tetrarch Herod,” the spokesman of the visiting Arabians announced, once they had been presented to Antipas, “and we regret that we must speak as we have been ordered to speak, Sire, and particularly that ears other than the Tetrarch’s will hear the message we have been commanded to bring you from His Majesty, King Aretas. But the Tetrarch has so ordered it, and we must obey.” He paused, and from the fold of his robe pulled forth a rolled document. “Go on, speak,” Antipas told him. “The Tetrarch wishes on his birthday”—he affected a grim smile—“that nothing be withheld from his beloved wife and his guests. The Tetrarch is prepared to hear the King’s message.” The man nodded, and unrolled the document. “Sire, I have here the King’s message to the Tetrarch of Galilee and Peraea. But would not the Tetrarch prefer to have it read to him privately and then later, if the Tetrarch might still wish it, have it read to this assembled group?” “Read it, now. Go on with it. Let us all hear the King’s message.” “Very well, Sire.” He bowed and then, shifting his position so that the light from the wall lamps fell more directly on the parchment, held it out from him and began to read. But when the stiffly formal greeting was concluded, he raised his eyes questioningly. “Continue,” said the Tetrarch. The man nodded, and once more his eyes returned to the out-held document. “‘King Aretas declares that the Tetrarch Herod Antipas in sending his faithful wife, the King’s beloved daughter, a bill of divorcement, after having deprived her of the honors and privileges of the Tetrarchess of Galilee and Peraea, which honors and privileges without right he conferred upon her successor, has grievously injured and insulted the King’s daughter, his royal house, and the person of the King himself.’” Claudia gently squeezed Longinus’ hand beside hers on the couch, but she dared venture no whisper. Slyly, though, they both glanced toward Herodias who sat eying the Arabian, a malevolent, frozen smile on her plainly flushed face. The reader looked up again, but only for an instant, and then resumed his reading of the Arabian ruler’s grievances. “‘Now, therefore’”—he cleared his throat—“‘King Aretas demands that the Tetrarch Herod Antipas seek to make what amends he can by providing certain reparations to King Aretas, the terms of which shall be agreed upon in conference of the Tetrarch and his ministers with the King’s ministers who bear this message. But King Aretas further demands that before such negotiations are entered into, the Tetrarch Herod Antipas must put away or reduce to second “‘He demands!’ Everything is ‘He demands’!” Herodias had sprung to her feet, her eyes blazing, her shaking finger extended across the table toward the suddenly interrupted Arabian. Now she turned fiercely upon the Tetrarch. “Didn’t you hear him, O Tetrarch? ‘He demands!’ That old goat of Arabia demands of you, Herod, Tetrarch of Galilee and Peraea. He writes you an evil, insulting message abusing you and your wife, and you sit here calmly listening while that man reads it before these your guests and me your Tetrarchess....” “But, my beloved Herodias”—Antipas clutched the table’s edge as he straggled to get to his feet—“these men are only the messengers of King Aretas. What you hear are not this man’s words, they are the King’s.” “Of course I know that, Antipas; I am not entirely a fool. I know they are the King’s words, but don’t they say that Aretas has empowered these men to represent him in your negotiations over me? Over me, do you hear? Negotiations designed to force me from the palace in Tiberias, to return her....” Gently Antipas caught his wife’s arm and tried to calm her, to get her to take her seat. “Of course not, my dear, of course you’ll not be sent away, you’ll never be supplanted....” She jerked her arm free, turned upon him, eyes blazing now in utter fury. “Then send them back to her doting old father! Send them packing, Antipas!” She shook her finger under his nose. “Or else, by all the great and little gods, I myself will go away!” Antipas faced the still shocked Arabian. “Perhaps you had best excuse yourself,” he said evenly. “Tomorrow, in the calm of our council chamber, we shall be able....” “No!” shouted Herodias. “Let them leave tonight, immediately. I can abide their insulting presence here no longer!” The Tetrarch, ignoring his wife’s outburst, beckoned to a servant hovering nearby. “Escort these men into a suitable chamber, and see that they are adequately provided for with our best food and wine,” he commanded, “and after they have dined, show them to The servant stepped forward and bowed to the visitors. They in turn, without any further word from their spokesman, bowed to the Tetrarch and turned with the escorting servant to withdraw from the triclinium. Herodias, seated now and apparently calm, twisted around to watch them depart. But when at the doorway Aretas’ spokesman glanced over his shoulder toward the Tetrarch, she suddenly grabbed the goblet beside her plate. “Go!” she screamed. “Go! Go!” With all her strength she hurled the goblet toward the man; it shattered on the wall near the door. As a servant came running to pick up the broken bits of glass, she sank to the couch, pulled up her sandaled feet, and, sobbing wildly, buried her face in the pillow. |
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