Take This Cup by Bodie & Brock Thoene

Author:Bodie & Brock Thoene
Language: eng
Format: epub
Tags: ebook
Publisher: Zondervan
Published: 2014-01-31T16:00:00+00:00

Chapter 22

The day was cold, the air clear and biting. Blackened snow, fouled with soot and grit and churned into slush underfoot, was heaped in corners and alleyways. Only the parapets surrounding the roofs and the tops of walls enclosing terraces and gardens still boasted coats of pure white.

Red, Timothy, and I stood outside the gates of the manor belonging to Joseph of Arimathea, the Younger. It was set just inside the wall of the Holy City, on a hill atop Jerusalem’s far southwestern border. The home was modest in comparison to the palace of High Priest Caiaphas, or that of another Pharisee named Nicodemus, both of whose dwellings we had passed in coming from the caverns. Yet those grand homes were near enough to be called neighbors. The finely fitted amber sandstone of this wall and the ornate scrollwork of this gate proclaimed the wealth of the family within.

I was at my destination, but now I hesitated. My fingers touched the knob of a bell pull that hung beside the gate. I flinched away from the chilly brass and stopped.

“Go on,” Timothy urged. Guessing at the cause of my reluctance, he added, “He said you could call on him for help.”

I offered a crooked grin. “That was kind of him.” Sweeping one hand across my shepherd’s garb, I continued, “But this is daylight. Do I look like I belong inside these walls?”

“So he gives us each another penny and tells us to go away,” Red said pragmatically. “Go on, ring it. If you don’t, I will.”

Plucking up my courage, I gave the rope a tug. We heard no corresponding signal from within.

“Harder!” Timothy ordered.

This time a melodious jangling sounded inside the enclosed courtyard, followed immediately by the rhythm of swiftly tapping feet. We heard the sliding swish of a bolt being withdrawn. The portal was opened by a pleasant-faced woman older than my mother, but of the same size and build, and about the age I guessed my grandmother to be.

“Bless me,” she said, running her eyes over the three of us, then fixing her gaze on me. “However did you get here so soon? And where have you left Abel?”

“Ma’am?” I said. “Is this the home of Joseph the Younger?”

“Of Arimathea the Younger,” Timothy corrected.

“Aren’t you the link boys I sent Abel to summon?”

I was baffled and then grateful when Timothy responded as our leader. With a bow he indicated Red and himself. “We have the honor to be Jerusalem Sparrows. At your service. But we don’t know of any summons, nor were we sent here by anyone named Abel.”

“Then why have you come?” she asked, bending forward. Her brow furrowed, but it displayed the same good-natured lines as her smiling mouth. Suddenly her expression cleared, and she put her knuckles on her hips. “Wait! What did you say your names were?”

“I’m Timothy, this is Red, and the one we guided here . . . the one who is seeking admittance . . . is Nehemiah of Amadiya.”

She laughed then, a peal of laughter that rivaled the chimes of the bell pull.

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