The Testament of Mary Read Online Free PDF

towards life. He was bound with the sheets and his face was covered with a napkin and now he turned as a child in the freshness of the womb who turns knowing that his time there is up and he must wrestle his way into the world. ‘Loose him and let him go,’ my son said, and two men came, two neighbours, and they stood in the grave as those around watched in hushed amazement and fright as they lifted Lazarus and then unbound him. He stood up with merely a cloth around his waist.
    He had been unchanged by death. Once his eyes opened, he stared at the sun with a deep unearthly puzzlement and then at the sky around the sun. He seemed not to see the crowd; some sounds came from him, not words exactly, something closer to whispered cries, or whimpers, and then the crowd stood back as Lazarus moved through them, past them, looking at no one, being led by his sisters back to their house, the world around remaining stilledand silent, and my son too, I am told, stilled and silent, as Lazarus began to weep.
    At first they noticed just the tears, but then his crying came in howls as his two sisters led him gently towards the house, across the path, followed all the way by the silent crowd as the howling grew louder and more fierce. By the time they reached their door he could barely walk. They disappeared inside and closed the shutters from the burning sun and did not appear again that day, despite the waiting crowd who lingered hour after hour, even as night fell, and some indeed through the night itself and even as the morning came.

    There was in those first days a strange atmosphere in Cana. I noticed the stalls and the stallholders had more things on display than ever before, not merely food and clothes, but also cooking utensils and locks for doors. And there were animals for sale – monkeys, birds, like jungle birds, gorgeous creatures coloured red and yellow and blue, of a brightness I had never seen before, causing a crowd to gather around them in wonder. And there was a levity about the stallholders and those who walked the streets, as though some burden had been lifted, and there was much calling and yelling and figures on street corners guffawing.Even in Jerusalem on market days, when I used to go to that place before I was married, there had always been a gravity, a sense of people doing business who meant business, or preparing themselves with due decorum for the Sabbath. But Cana was full of raised voices and raised dust, sly laughter, young men laughing without restraint, the air full of whistling and catcalls. As soon as my cousin Miriam and I removed ourselves indoors, she told me the story of what had happened to Lazarus, and how no one now would even pass the house near by, where he and his sisters lived, but would cross the street instead, and how she believed that he was in bed in a darkened room, that she had heard that he could barely swallow water and barely hold down soft bread which had been soaked in water. The hordes had moved on, she said, followed by an even larger caravan of hucksters, salesmen, water-carriers, fire-eaters and purveyors of cheap food. All were being watched with a ferocious zeal by the authorities, some of whom were in disguise, but others of whom were following openly and then quickly departing for Jerusalem to be the first to arrive with word of some new outrage, some new miracle, some new breach in the great order that was maintained to keep the Romans pleased.
    Miriam had sent word to my son that I was in Cana and word had come back that he would be atthe wedding and his place would be beside his mother. Then, I thought, we could speak. I remained calm. I dozed and then slept deeply after my journey. I listened to Miriam go over and over the story of Lazarus. I was ready to confront my son and ready also to keep him in one of the inner rooms of Miriam’s house until things grew calm, until some other novelty arrived on the scene, and we could slip quietly back to Nazareth. I noticed