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It all fell into place in Pilate’s mind. Clearly, Agrippa was aiming at kingship over Judea. Soon, undoubtedly, he would supply evidence to show that Marullus, like Pilate, was inadequate as prefect, and then his good friend Caligula would enlarge his diadem to include Judea and Samaria as well.

“I think I understand the situation,” said Pilate, “but tell me this: why didn’t you go along with the Pharisees in requesting my exile?”

“Several reasons,” Agrippa replied. “First, I value justice, and exile would have been too severe. You did try in Judea, Pilate. You yielded when you should have in the various quarrels with the Jews, and I think Antipas and my other uncles overreacted on those insignificant shields. But it was symptomatic that you didn’t quite have the right touch.”

Now they moved into the dry-heat room, where they lay on marble slabs while being scraped down with strigils. Agrippa looked carefully at Pilate and continued, “Another reason I didn’t press for punishment in your case was this: the Arabs have an old proverb, ‘My enemy’s enemy is my friend.’ Dear Herod Antipas may be both uncle and brother-in-law to me, but he remains my deadly political enemy. I’ll never forgive his humiliating me. Now, Antipas and you didn’t get along either, despite your half-hearted attempts at friendship…”

It took Pilate only a moment’s thought to ask, “When do you plan to indict Antipas before Caligula?”

Gaius, Pilate.” He laughed. “He insists on Gaius. Never call him ‘Baby Boots’ to his face.”

“Before Gaius, then?”

“You’re a bit ahead of me. But on the right track. If it ever comes to that, I may need a witness here in Rome who can testify to Antipas’s maladministration.”

“And I could hardly provide that witness in exile.”

“Exactly.”

“Eventually, then, his territories would be added to yours, perhaps Judea as well—a restoration of your grandfather’s kingdom.”

“It’s time for the massage and the unguents.”

When that process was completed and they had dressed, Agrippa warned, “I need not suggest that you keep this conversation confidential. If, for example, you were indiscreet enough to report any of our remarks to the princeps, I should deny them, accuse you of malicious lying, and do everything possible to secure your exile. You see, I plan to stay in Rome some months yet before taking over my new kingdom.”

Pilate nodded.

As they parted outside the baths, Agrippa said, “Oh yes, Pilate, there was another reason I felt you had governed comparatively well. I’d nearly forgotten it. You handled one case in Judea masterfully, I thought: the blasphemy-treason trial of that Galilean, Yeshu Hannosri. Oh, I can see why you, as a Roman, were lenient at first, but, believe me, that kind of heresy had to be cut down at its source. Yes…absolutely. It was a good decision, Pilate—crucifixion. A good decision.”

Chapter 24

Pilate returned home exhausted. His day on the Palatine, a lurching shuttle between hope and despair, had smothered his spirit. Whatever relief he gained in successfully defending himself was blighted by his dismissal from imperial service, even if the official explanation would be that Pilate had requested retirement. With wifely solicitude, Procula begged to be told everything, but Pilate put her off until the next morning. That night he looked up an old friend at the Castra Praetoria, and together they got quietly drunk.

Like a wounded organ trying to repair itself, Pilate’s mind supplied rationalizations for his new status. Even if Caligula had offered him another prefecture away from Rome, he would not have accepted it, since he had been away from the city too long. Nor did he need such an office. His father-in-law Proculeius had invested his funds so shrewdly during the decade of his absence that by now Pilate could retire even without pension and still lead a life of comfortable opulence. As to the negative appraisal of his competence in Judea, someday Rome would appreciate his efforts there. And how accurate were the critical opinions of an unseasoned twenty-four-year-old trying to play at emperor, whose only source of information was a Herodian opportunist twice his age but biased against Pilate? And what extraordinarily bad taste, turning the imperial tribunal into a stage just to coddle the Samaritans.

When Procula finally heard the full report of the critical hours before Caligula, she was too happy to bother consoling her husband. Privately, she had lived in mortal fear of the eventual hearing before the emperor. With that shadow removed, nothing else mattered, especially now that Rome would be their future home. Too independent to be a social climber, she was relieved that Pilate would now be anchored clear of the treacherous crosscurrents of Roman politics.

But adjusting to the role of spectator rather than actor proved very difficult for Pilate. He lived a week or two with his rationalizations, then grew tired of them. Personal candor compelled him to face reality and see there the figure of Pontius Pilatus—ex-prefect, pensioner, retired man, emeritus before his time. His idealistic goals had him rising to lofty heights in the Empire; his actual fate saw him pensioned out of government service.

“But for the few who achieve greatness,” he told Procula, “every man arrives at that point in life where he must come to terms with the fact that history will pass him by. For those with little ambition, that point comes early, so they can adjust to it with the easy resiliency of youth. Yet I aspired; that point was postponed in my life. But now I’ve reached it. And I’m not young. Accepting that realization now is difficult, terribly difficult.”

“Is it that important, Pilate, having history recognize you?”

“It is, I think. It’s the only thing which ultimately gives life a larger dimension, the one factor which finally affords it some meaning. You will have existed for more generations than merely your own. You will have affected the future, perhaps altered it for the better.”

“Why isn’t this generation enough, Pilate? It certainly is for me.”

“You’re a woman, Procula.”

“Which by definition excludes us from greatness,” she jibed. “But your life is far from over. You’re only fifty, and some of the greatest achievements in Roman politics and culture were fashioned by men older than you.”

Pilate failed to relish such consolation. While he appreciated Procula’s efforts, he resented the new circumstances which occasioned them.

Some weeks passed, and he began struggling more successfully with his problem of adjustment. But just when he was becoming reconciled to leaving the center stage of politics, something would remind him of his now-peripheral status and reopen the wound. At the end of August, for example, the Temple of the Divine Augustus was dedicated at Rome amid much pageantry. The hymn of consecration was sung by a mass choir of boys and girls from the noblest families. There was a public feast and two days of spectacles. There were horse races, gladiatorial combats which saw eight hundred bears and lions slaughtered, and finally a circuit of the hippodrome by Caligula himself, six horses drawing his triumphal chariot arid frenzied cheering by the adoring people of Rome. But even though his equestrian rank permitted him to sit in the lowest fourteen rows as spectator at these events, Pilate’s name had been omitted from the list of official invitations. It symbolized his divorce from Roman public life.

A month later, Rome was shocked to learn that the emperor was almost at the point of death. Never in fully robust health, Caligula had suffered a complete nervous breakdown which, with other complications, made palace physicians despair of his life. All Rome was tormented with apprehension at losing the popular young princeps, who had reigned but six months. Temples were besieged with suppliants. Some threatened the gods. A commoner offered to exchange his own life for the emperor’s if he recovered, while an equestrian swore he would fight in the arena as the lowest gladiator. Such devotion, of course, would not fail to impress the princeps if he survived.