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Pilate felt a cramping pressure at the pit of his stomach, and his heart thumped in a mad cadence as his nerves caught fire. The letter spelled the end of his governorship, perhaps the end of his career, but for the moment he had only one thought: to maintain a Stoic calm in front of the man appointed to succeed him. Was it grim Roman efficiency or cruel calculation which had led Vitellius to notify him of his suspension in this embarrassing manner?

Pilate stared at his successor, who somewhat nervously avoided his eyes. “I need not tell you, Marcellus, that the proconsul is grossly mistaken in his opinion of the Samaritans,” he said with studied serenity, “and that his conduct in this discharge is extraordinary.”

A patrician-looking man, somewhat Pilate’s junior, Marcellus straightened and replied, “Extraordinary? The princeps will decide that…”

Pilate reread the message hurriedly, then commented, “For example, this passage about the Samaritans assembling at Tirathana ‘only as refugees from my violence.’ That’s a bald lie, their own perjury to explain the embarrassing fact that they were fully armed, all of them.”

Marcellus said nothing.

Pilate continued his case. “And what would you do, Marcellus, if you had to face an armed rebellion of thousands of your subjects astride the main highway in your province? Cheer them on?”

“Are you certain it was a rebellion, Prefect? Perhaps diplomacy might have won the day. But all this is beside the point. I’m not here to review your case but to assume your command. Will you show me where my aides are to be quartered?”

Late that night, Cornelius filled Pilate in on the background of Vitellius’s action; he had wormed the information out of one of Marcellus’s aides after a long evening of wining the man in Caesarea’s finest tavern. The Council of Samaria, the Samaritan analogue to the Jewish Sanhedrin, was so furious at Pilate’s field executions that members of the Council had traveled to Antioch to present their case to Vitellius, formally denouncing Pilate “for the slaughter of innocent Samaritan victims.” Under normal circumstances, Cornelius continued, Vitellius should have summoned Pilate to Antioch to hear his side of it before deciding guilt in the matter, but he did not do so for several reasons. Tiberius had alerted Vitellius to “keep an eye on Pontius Pilatus, who might be outliving his usefulness in Judea.” Also, on the trip to the Euphrates, Herod Antipas had been dropping gentle hints that his rival governor did not understand the Jews nearly as well as—well, he for one. Even though Vitellius knew Antipas well enough to surmise what motivated these comments, he deduced that there was no smoke without some fire. And finally, since Pilate could appeal his decision to the emperor anyway, Vitellius decided not to hear his defense. Instead, he had dismissed the Samaritan embassy with a promise of redress for their grievances, and dispatched his friend Marcellus to Caesarea.

Pilate embraced Cornelius in gratitude. The centurion had risked his whole future in the new Judean administration in order to get vital information—for a friend.

The week which followed was one which Pilate wished might have been deleted from his life, as he tried later to obscure it from memory. There was the galling task of closing a decade of administration in a few days, and in a climate of dishonor. Perfunctorily Pilate groomed Marcellus, and presumptuously Marcellus learned. Because of the legal cloud hovering over him, Pilate discouraged any social amenities by his friends in Caesarea to honor his departure.

Procula was shocked by the abrupt nature of the suspension, but she adapted rapidly to the new circumstances. Though very apprehensive about the future hearing before Tiberius, she reminded her husband that they both had been anxious to return to Rome. For him it had been ten years.

But this was scant consolation for Pilate. What galled him as much as Vitellius’s arbitrary action in the affair was his own ironical miscalculation. In his later administration, Pilate’s one fear had been that the Jews would complain about him to Tiberius and cause his recall. Now it had happened, but not because of Jews. Curiously, the despised Samaritans had done what the Jews only threatened to do. Who would have thought that their ignored, clannish, half-breed relatives would have unseated him? Pilate knew very little about the Samaritans other than that they made decent auxiliary troops. As part of his defense, which he was already framing, he would use the fact that his auxiliaries fought loyally against their racial brothers.

It was the matter of his defense which led Pilate to leave Judea as soon as possible. He wanted to hurry to Rome, since it would be to his advantage to catch the ear of the princeps before it was filled with Samaritan deception, he explained to Procula. It would require another terrible overland journey for her—the Mediterranean was closed to distance shipping in December—but they resolved to outrace the Samaritans.

Shortly before their departure, the disturbing news came like a Parthian shot. During a visit to Jerusalem, Vitellius granted a Jewish request to regain custody of the high priest’s garments, pending Tiberius’s approval. Jerusalemites greeted that bit of diplomacy with wild enthusiasm. The proconsul also announced that the emperor had ordered his Syrian legions to fight King Aretas in behalf of Herod Antipas. Now Pilate had to leave not only in dishonor, but with the knowledge that his rival had finally triumphed. With Amipas this high in the graces of the princeps, the future looked ominous for Pontius Pilate.

Cornelius had loyally volunteered to accompany his prefect back to Rome, but Pilate asked him to remain instead and communicate any future information which would aid his case, should any arise. After a final review of his auxiliaries, Pilate formally transferred command to Marcellus. His troops urged him to hurry back to Judea, but Pilate merely smiled gratefully. That night, Cornelius and his wife hosted Pilate and Procula at a small gathering of their closest friends on the eve of their departure.

Early the next morning, they set out on the road to Rome via Antioch in a caravan of four heavy carriages, accompanied by members of their personal staff. For Pilate, as for Palestine, it was the passing of an era.

Chapter 22

The return journey could not have been taken at a worse time. Late December lay almost at the center of mare clausum, the November 10 to March 10 period of closed sea, when none but the foolhardy would risk a voyage on the treacherous winter Mediterranean. Even the largest merchantmen making emergency runs during these months resorted to risky coasting passages from port to port, but prevailing northwestern gales often delayed them for weeks. There was only one reliable option for anyone who had to get to Rome quickly at this time, the land journey across Asia Minor and Greece.

Not that this route was more comfortable. Land travel stopped almost as completely as voyages during the winter because this was the rainy season, when the Anatolian plateau became a sea of mud, and the famed mountain pass at the Cilician Gates could be snowed shut for days. Even if the route were passable, howling blasts of north wind chilled warmblooded Mediterranean types.

Yet Vitellius’s letter of accusation would be in the emperor’s hands before the year was out, for the imperial post took a maximum of forty days between Syria and Rome. Pilate, therefore, had had no choice but to use the land route despite its hazards and discomforts.

Every twenty-five miles or so, the Roman highway north was punctuated by a series of mansiones, halting stations with overnight accommodations, and between each of these were two mutationes, changing stations for relays of fresh horses. In this way, the imperial post could speed its messages by exchanging horses each 8⅓ miles. Whenever Pilate’s entourage needed lodging or fresh horses, he simply produced his diploma, an official letter of introduction which the Roman government provided its traveling magistrates in order to facilitate their journeys. It also exempted Pilate’s party from any of the numerous road taxes, tolls, customs, and frontier duties.