Doctor Who_ Byzantium! - Keith Topping [56]
All the while, Ian simply shook his head. The end justifies the means,' he muttered. 'Horrible, just horrible.’
Ì am forced to wash my hands of the entire affair,' Thalius concluded. 'I will not interfere in a predominantly Jewish matter.
The executions will go ahead.'
Both he and Gemellus were clearly embarrassed by the whole business. Ian thought about adding something, then decided that it wouldn't do any good. He stood and bowed to the praefectus and
his counsellor.
`Gentlemen,' he said. 'It is, in my experience, easier to regret something that you haven't done, than something that you have.'
And with that enigmatic thought, he left them.
Barbara was also learning about the forthcoming executions.
Hieronymous, contrary to her expectations, was showing neither a squeamishness when discussing such terrible events in front of his female guest, nor a bloodthirsty and vengeful delight at the prospect of nailing two heretics to a pole and watching them suffer and die. Instead, he talked about the death of the Christians in a chillingly matter-of-fact way. Barbara suddenly understood just how cheap life was in Byzantium. Just as the Doctor had predicted when they had arrived here. Death was a daily companion for these people. Physical and capital punishments were factors not to be dreaded but actually looked forward to as a release from the constant threat of pain and torture and death.
The rules were simple. Obey all the rules. If you don't, you get whipped. Or stoned. Or crucified. Or have your head chopped off. Or any one of a hundred other ways in which the Romans and the Jews and the Greeks amused themselves with methods of dispatch.
'Don't you find the idea of killing someone purely for their beliefs at all troublesome?' she asked Hieronymous in all seriousness.
‘No,' the priest replied simply. 'For it is written,
"whomsoever shall disobey the commandments of the Lord, surely he shall be put unto death".’
'Written on the wall of the local public lavatory, no doubt,' said Barbara through gritted teeth. 'I mean, can't you see how downright barbaric the concept is?'
Again, Hieronymous replied with a certainty that Barbara might have admired under different circumstances, but now just found sinister. 'An Arab woman, a Bedouin, stole into the temple one night to exact her vengeance upon one of the priests whom she had accused of terrible wrongdoing. She did it with no mercy, or pity. When found, and tried, she offered no mitigation for her dastardly and terrible crimes.'
'Was there any point?' asked Barbara. 'You'd already made up your mind she was guilty, surely?'
'Such things as guilt and innocence,' Hieronymous replied,
'can only be decided by the Lord God, in heaven. The Pharisees merely arbitrate on the execution of His law. Now, the issue of the death of the two Christians comes before us. I should attend, to be certain that the Romans have complied with our requests.'
Barbara shook her head. 'Oh, I'm sure you'll find them very efficient in such matters,' she noted. 'I don't think you should go.'
‘Why?'
The real reason? Barbara managed not to say. Because I can't share a roof with someone who attends public executions without remorse. 'Such spectacles merely incite violence,' she noted, persuasively.
Before the debate could continue, a knock on Hieronymous's door brought the conversation to a halt.
Phasaei and Titus, Hieronymous's deputies, entered into the priest's home, bowing respectfully to Barbara. She took an instant dislike to the pair of them, both of whom, Hieronymous had assured her, were usually involved in separate (though occasionally linked) power struggles against the old man.
`We were unaware that you were occupied in your private matters, Hieronymous,’ noted Titus with a cunning glance at Barbara. 'Had we known you were so busy...'
Hieronymous failed to rise to the offered bait. `You are to attend the execution this afternoon in my place,'