John met the barbarian’s wrath with gentleness. “I don’t doubt you are the father. I was thinking of the child’s needs, Atretes. This is not a situation without grave consequences. What of Rizpah?”
“What needs has a babe but to be fed and kept warm? As for the woman, give her another child. Someone else’s. She has no right to mine.”
“The Lord intervened on your son’s behalf. If not—”
“Hadassah intervened.”
“It was no coincidence that she brought the child to me at the moment she did.”
“Hadassah said herself that had she known I wanted the child, she would have brought him to me!”
“Why didn’t she know?”
Atretes clenched his teeth. If not for the crowd watching, he would have used force to get the information he wanted. “Where is he?”
“He’s safe. Hadassah thought the only course to save your son was to give him to me.”
Atretes’ eyes narrowed coldly. A muscle jerked in his jaw as heat poured into his face. He tried to hide his shame behind a wall of anger, but knew he had failed. Only one person had ever looked at him as though she saw beneath his skin, into his very heart and mind: Hadassah. Until now, that is. For now this man did the same.
Memories flooded Atretes’ mind. When the slave girl had come to him and told him that the child Julia carried was his, he’d said he didn’t care. What assurance did he have that the child was even his own? Despite Hadassah’s assurances, Atretes had been raw from Julia’s betrayal with another man and too angry to think clearly. He had told Hadassah that if Julia Valerian laid the baby at his feet, he would walk away and never look back. He would never forget the sorrow his words had brought to the slave girl’s face . . . nor the regret that had flooded him even as she left. But he was Atretes! He would not call her back.
How could he have expected any woman to be so unfeeling about her child as Julia had been? No German woman would think of commanding that her baby be abandoned on the rocks to die. No German. Only a civilized Roman woman would carry out such a deed.
If not for Hadassah’s intervention, his son would be dead.
Once again he focused on the present, on the man standing so patiently before him. “The child is mine. Whatever I may or may not have said before no longer matters. Hadassah sent me here, and I will have my son.”
John nodded. “I’ll send for Rizpah and speak with her. Tell me where you reside, and I’ll bring your son to you.”
“Tell me where she is, and I’ll go for him myself.”
John frowned. “Atretes, this will be very difficult. Rizpah loves the child as her own. It won’t be easy for her to give him up.”
“All the more reason I go. It’d hardly be wise to allow you to warn this woman of my intentions ahead of time so she can leave the city.”
“Neither I nor Rizpah will keep your son from you.”
“I’ve only your word on that, and who are you to me but a stranger? And a mad one, at that!” he said with a telling glance at the worshipers. “I have no reason to trust you.” He gave a sneering laugh. “And even less reason to trust any woman.”
“You trusted Hadassah.”
His face darkened.
John studied him for a moment, then told him how to find Rizpah. “I pray your heart will be moved by the compassion and mercy God has shown you by sparing your son’s life. Rizpah is a woman of tried faith.”
“Meaning what?”
“She has endured many tragedies in her young life.”
“This one is not of my doing.”
“No, but I ask that you lay no blame upon her for what has happened.”
“The fault was with his mother. I lay no blame upon Hadassah or you or this widow,” Atretes said, relenting now that he had the information for which he had come. “Besides,” he added with a wry smile, “I’ve no doubt this widow of yours will feel much better when she is generously recompensed for her trouble.” He ignored John’s wince at his words. Turning away, he saw the crowd had grown quiet. “What are they waiting for?”
“They thought you came to be baptized.”
With a sneering laugh, Atretes strode up the hill, not sparing another glance at those who gathered at the river.
* * *
Atretes returned to his villa by way of the outer road and waited again. It would be safer to enter the city after dark, and there were other matters that, in his haste, he had neglected to consider.
“Lagos!” His booming voice echoed up the marble staircase. “Lagos!”
A man ran along the upper corridor. “My lord!”
“Go to the slave market and buy me a wet nurse.”