The Judas Case, page 31
“Are you Solomon, the grammateos?”
Solomon the Writer. Grammateos. Solomon the Oenarch no more. I looked down at Nico’s purse. My purse. I was back on my feet. The Oenarch again.
Until Nico arrived I had been making a living in my destitution as the paid writer of the obscure little community of foreigners and Jews in the poorer side of Damascus, at the wrong end of the Straight Way where I had finally stopped when the search for my beloved Zenobia wore me out. Letters to distant families, bills of trade and business instructions, whenever one of my neighbours among the Damascus poor needed to make a formal complaint or petition the magistrates, Solomon Grammateos was the man to whom they came. Last greetings on death-beds. Confessions and life-testaments a speciality. The dying who wished to leave a scant record of their deeds, however modest, in witness that they had passed through this world, so that they would be remembered by their sons when they lay below in the long grey-shaded attendance of Sheol. They sought me out, they begged me to make them remembered.
“Sorry lads,” I said to the soldiers, “if it’s a love poem for one of your girls at Thais’ place – or for one of your boys – I can’t help you. I’m done with all that. And your girls too.”
“That’s not what we come for,” said the taller one, and shifted his weight.
“We was told to ask for you special.”
“And you are Solomon, right? The Grammateos?”
“Only there’s someone who wants a word.”
“And who sent you?” I asked, imagining it must be one of their officers, too embarrassed or reluctant to approach me in person.
“One of the prisoners.”
“He wants to have something in writing,” shorter one said. “Can’t understand why.”
“Go and get the Writer called Solomon to come and do it for me, he said. He’ll want to, Solomon will, when he hears.”
Oh will I. I put down my cup. They were eyeing the purse, anticipating their reward.
“And why would he think that, this prisoner?” I asked. “What’s his name?” A vision of Marcus Varro’s corpulent, puffy-eyed face, haggard and hollowed-out by two years of lightless confinement, rat-bites and sickness, came unbidden into my mind.
“He’s another one of you Jews,” said the short one. “So he asked for you. Thaddeus is his name. Thaddeus bar Ptolemai.”
I dropped my cup, spilling wine across the stone ledge I used as a table. Azizus breathed deep, whistling in astonishment. I said nothing, but looked across, first at Nico then at Azizus, and then back at Nico.
“You’d better hurry if you’re coming,” the shorter one said.
“He said he’s got a lot he wants you to write down for him,” said the taller one.
“And you’ve not got long. We’re executing him tomorrow.”
Acknowledgements
The seeds of this novel were planted in conversations with the late Theodore Hines, whose intellect and wisdom illuminated everything he addressed. I owe him and his wife, the late Lois Winkel Hines, an enormous debt of gratitude. Andrew Biswell, Peter Davidson and Jane Stevenson have been consistent sources of encouragement and insight over many years. Stephen Badsey shared numerous conversations on how history and fiction can come together. Nicholas Royle and my classmates at the Writing School of Manchester Metropolitan University were unfailing supporters of first steps. Finally, Ashley Stokes, Henry Doss, Christine Arvidson and Ken Powell have all been careful and sympathetic readers of The Judas Case at various stages of its development. I am grateful to them for their criticisms and suggestions.
I would also like to acknowledge the support of a 2016 Northern Writers’ Award from New Writing North, supported by the Literary Consultancy, Northumbria University and Arts Council England.
Nicholas Graham, The Judas Case
