I wasn’t the only one having a really bad day.
Medics attended to two seriously wounded Romans lying on stretchers in the shade. I could see immediately that the man on the left wouldn’t last long. Blunt force trauma, from a club, probably, had caved in the side of his skull just behind his left eye. I was no expert, but even in a modern hospital, I would have rated his odds of survival no better than one in five.
I turned to Publius and shook my head before addressing the second case.
This man also faced grave peril. As the medics removed his blood-soaked tunic, I spotted a deep gash in his abdomen, and a closer inspection confirmed the worst: a small tear in the peritoneal sac surrounding his intestines.
I called for water as I considered what to do. The primary danger with this type of injury is infection, usually resulting from fragments of dirty clothing or intestinal material itself seeping into the abdominal cavity.
Army field protocol for such wounds calls for a soldier to press sterile gauze into the opening and then wrap the wound snugly, followed by a quick evacuation of the patient to a field hospital where physicians can clean out any foreign matter and administer the required antibiotics.
Today, though, I was on my own. I could only try and hope for the best.
As a servant placed a large bowl of water on the ground beside me, I reached into my bag and removed a small package of powdered iodine, which I dumped into the bowl and stirred until the solution was an even light brown.
The other soldiers watched curiously as I washed my hands in the iodine and then made a closer inspection of the wound. I used tweezers to pull several small fragments of the man’s tunic away from the opening before thoroughly cleaning the surrounding area with a patch of iodine soaked gauze.
Afterward, I clamped the opening with a couple of butterfly bandages and covered the area with an antibiotic laced compress. It was all I could do. He might not live, but he’d at least have a fighting chance.
To the extent that I could pantomime, I instructed the others to give the man only boiled water to drink and nothing to eat for at least a day, though I wasn’t sure how well I got my instructions across.
***
I had to wait for the soldiers’ attention to be diverted before I could slip my ear bud in once more. I tried first to reach Lavon, but for some reason, he didn’t respond.
A moment later, however, Sharon’s voice came through loud and clear.
“You wouldn’t believe this place,” she said.
She sounded as if she had entered a different world — which in fact, she had.
She explained that her litter had entered the palace about half an hour earlier and she had been unloaded, so to speak, in a verdant, sun-lit courtyard roughly the size of three football fields.
Deep channels crisscrossed lush, grassy lawns, carrying water to a remarkable assortment of shade trees and a stunning variety of flowering plants. An “oasis of serenity” she called it. Topping things off, hundreds of white doves flew back and forth between the trees.
I couldn’t help but laugh. “You sound like you’re writing ad copy for Donald Trump.”
“His resorts are a pigsty compared to this,” she said.
She didn’t add that Herod probably hadn’t filed for bankruptcy as many times, either.
“Who else is there with you now?” I asked.
In the background, I could hear what sounded like a dozen women frolicking in the water — teenage girls, by the pitch of their voices.
“Azariah sent me to join the others by the pool area,” she said.
“What about guards?”
She spotted a few pacing back and forth atop the fifty foot crenellated wall that ringed the palace complex to keep the riff-raff in their place, but otherwise, she couldn’t see any.
As I thought about it, this made sense. Based on her description so far, the palace didn’t sound like a place many people tried to escape.
Besides, an army of servants tended the grounds, and punishment of slaves in the Roman world was both brutal and collective. Everyone had an incentive to watch everyone else. If she tried to slip away, she wouldn’t get far.
I heard her sigh — a pleasurable sigh, from the sound of it. Part of me wanted to let her rest and enjoy the afternoon in the sun, but she could not afford to let her guard down. Herod’s palace might top even the most modern luxury resorts, but so did the price of admission.
Not that she had forgotten.
I explained to her what Lavon had told me about the bath treatments and that gave her an idea.
“Just be careful,” I said. “I’ll keep checking in when I can.”
Chapter 36
I tried once more to contact Lavon but had no better luck than before. I couldn’t help but worry. Though I couldn’t see what was happening, the cascade of wounded Romans streaming back into the fort told me that all was not sweetness and bliss outside.
Compounding my anxiety, I found myself going through my first aid supplies at an alarming rate. Once I ran out, my only real trump card would be gone.
I gestured to a nearby officer in an attempt to back away.
He ignored me, for at that moment, a squad of about a dozen Romans passed through the north gate, dragging five men linked together with heavy chains around their ankles, wrists and necks. For good measure, two more soldiers followed behind, prodding the captives forward with the occasional lash.
Everyone in the courtyard, even the medics, dropped what they were doing and edged over to have their first real look at their adversaries.
Two of these bruised and battered unfortunates were relatively young men, including one who looked as if he’d barely qualify to drive back home.
Whatever great adventure they had embarked on earlier in the day had gone horribly awry, and from their terrified expressions, they were only now beginning to realize how horribly indeed.
Two others appeared to be in their mid-twenties, but as if by instinct, I glanced past them to the captive at the head of the queue. This man, older by a decade and evidently their leader, displayed what I can only describe as sheer animal hatred.
No ‘hearts and minds’ for that one, I knew.
I looked to my left and spotted a servant leading an older man toward the now kneeling file of prisoners. The squad’s leader saluted Volusus and briefly explained what had happened, while I re-seated my ear bud as discreetly as I could manage.
Volusus spoke to the prisoners through an interpreter. Whether he didn’t understand Aramaic or simply wanted to use the delay in translation to formulate his next question, I couldn’t tell.
The Roman commander stepped closer to the leader and asked his name, but the prisoner didn’t even acknowledge the question. Instead, he continued to stare straight ahead, his eyes aflame with raw intensity.
Volusus repeated his question; slowly, and in an even tone.
“I will ask you again: what is your name?”
Once more, the man did not respond.
Volusus stared at the captive for a few seconds and then nodded to the closest officer. The optio drew a dagger from his scabbard; then two soldiers pressed the prisoner to the ground while the officer sliced a finger off the man’s right hand.
He didn’t utter a peep. Despite the trauma, his eyes continued to blaze defiance.
The soldiers lifted the prisoner to his knees, and Volusus repeated his inquiry a third time. Hearing no answer, he nodded again to the optio, but before the Roman could act, another prisoner cried out.
It was the youngster, who had turned a ghostly pale; and that wasn’t the only sign of the kid’s terror. His knees rested in a widening pool of his own urine.
“Hold to the strength of your father, Abbas!” he babbled.
“Your name is Abbas, then?” said Volusus.
This had a deflating effect on the man. He cast an irritated glance at the boy and then turned to the Roman commander.