The rain was back and running down Walt’s kitchen window. The maple had been bare for two weeks. The frost that whitened the fence that morning was long gone, and the boards stood dark and wet. Walt had the stove going and the kettle on, and the kitchen smelled of cinnamon, because Denny had brought a pie from the grocery bakery and left it in its foil pan in the middle of the table, where nobody could reach the pencils without going past it.
Tomás had his colored cards stacked beside his mug. Amara came in last, scrubs under her coat, and propped her phone against the foil pan. She opened her Bible to twenty-six, checked the number at the top of the page twice, and said nothing at all.
“Twenty-six,” said Walt, easing his knee onto the second chair. “Where did we leave Paul?”
“Standing there,” said Tomás. “Festus told the king all about him with Paul in the room.”
“And Paul hadn’t said a word since eleven,” said Amara.
“Verse one,” said Walt.
She read it fast and flat. “Agrippa tells Paul he may speak for himself. Paul stretches out his hand and answers. He counts himself fortunate to answer before Agrippa, who knows the customs and questions of the Jews. He asks for a patient hearing.”
“‘Stretched forth the hand,’” said Tomás.
“Hold that,” said Walt.
“Why?” said Denny.
“Keep it where you can find it. Four.”
Amara ran her finger down. “Paul says all the Jews know how he lived from his youth, in his own nation and in Jerusalem. They knew him from the beginning, and if they would testify, they know he lived a Pharisee.”
“‘If they would testify,’” said Tomás.
“Who’s he calling?” said Walt.
“The Jews of Jerusalem,” said Amara. “Luke doesn’t put one of them in this room.”
“Neither are the Asian Jews,” said Denny. “Twenty-four nineteen. Still no show.”
“So Paul points at a witness list with nobody on it,” said Amara.
“Text,” said Tomás. “The names are missing.”
“Six,” said Walt.
Tomás read. “‘And now I stand and am judged for the hope of the promise made of God unto our fathers.’”
“Which promise?” said Walt.
“Eight’s right behind it,” said Amara. “‘Why should it be thought a thing incredible with you, that God should raise the dead?’ The resurrection.”
“Luke doesn’t name the promise in six,” said Tomás. “Six says a promise. Eight asks a question.”
“Card?” said Walt.
“Green,” said Amara, slowly. “Mine says it’s the resurrection.”
“Green,” said Tomás. “Mine says it’s bigger than that, and I couldn’t tell you what.” He wrote a question mark on the card.
“Hold both,” said Walt. “Nine.”
Amara went clipped. “Paul once thought he ought to do a great deal against the name of Jesus of Nazareth. He did it in Jerusalem. He locked up many of the saints, with authority from the chief priests. When they were put to death, he gave his voice against them. He punished them in every synagogue, tried to make them blaspheme, and chased them to cities abroad.”
“‘The name,’” said Denny.
“Don’t,” said Amara.
“‘Exceedingly mad against them,’” read Tomás, finding eleven. “That’s how mine puts it.”
“Mine says ‘furiously enraged,’” said Amara.
“Hold that word,” said Walt. “And ten. ‘Gave my voice against them.’”
“Mine says ‘cast my vote,’” said Amara. “Does that put him on the council?”
“Luke doesn’t say,” said Walt.
“Green, if somebody wants to say he sat on it,” said Tomás. “I’d rather leave it open.”
“Where have we heard Paul talk about dying lately?” said Walt.
Amara had it before he finished. “Twenty-five eleven. ‘I refuse not to die.’”
“If he’s guilty,” said Denny.
“Then a few days later he tells a king that when the saints were put to death, he gave his voice against them.” She set her pen down. “Same man, same week.”
“Does Luke say the one explains the other?” said Walt.
“No.”
“Suggested,” said Tomás, and laid down a green card. “That the second changes how you hear the first.”
“He says something close to it himself,” said Denny, flipping to a tab in the binder. “First Corinthians fifteen nine.”
Tomás found it. “‘Because I persecuted the church of God.’” He laid a pink card. “Paul’s own hand, but it lives outside Acts.”
“And First Timothy one fifteen,” said Amara. “‘Sinners; of whom I am chief.’”
“Separate card for that one,” said Tomás.
“Whether he has the vote in mind when he writes either line,” said Walt.
“Mine,” said Denny. “He never got over it.”
Walt tapped the fourth card, and Denny wrote it down.
Walt cut the pie, a thick slice for Denny and thin ones for the rest, and slid the plates around. “Twelve,” he said.
“Damascus,” said Amara, mouth half full, and went clipped again. “Authority from the chief priests. Midday. A light from heaven, brighter than the sun, shining around him and the men with him. They all fell. A voice, in Hebrew. ‘Saul, Saul, why persecutest thou me?’”
“‘In the Hebrew tongue,’” said Tomás.
“The Lord spoke to him in Hebrew,” said Walt. “Does chapter nine tell us that?”
Amara turned back. “Nine just says a voice. So does twenty-two.”
“So this is the first time we hear it,” said Denny. “Why now?”
“Who’s he telling?” said Walt.
Amara went back to the top of the page. “Verse three. ‘Expert in all customs and questions which are among the Jews.’ Agrippa.”
“Read me what the voice says,” said Walt. “Just the first two words.”
“‘Saul, Saul,’” Amara read.
“Where else does God call a man’s name twice?” said Walt.
“Moses at the bush,” said Denny.
Tomás turned back to Exodus. “Three four. ‘Moses, Moses.’”
“First Samuel three ten,” said Amara. “‘Samuel, Samuel.’ The boy in the temple at night.”
Tomás laid a pink card. “Outside Acts.”
“So Paul tells the one man in the room who’d know,” said Denny, “that the Lord called him in Hebrew, the way He called Moses.”
“Suggested,” said Walt. “That Luke saves the Hebrew for this telling because of who’s listening.”
“Green,” said Tomás, and laid it down.
“Seventeen,” said Walt.
Tomás read it. “‘Delivering thee from the people, and from the Gentiles, unto whom now I send thee.’”
Nobody spoke. Denny put his fork down.
“Gentiles,” said Amara. “First time since twenty-two.”
“Hold that,” said Walt. “Count it.”
They went down the chapter together. “Seventeen,” said Amara. “Twenty. ‘Shewed first unto them of Damascus, and at Jerusalem, and throughout all the coasts of Judaea, and then to the Gentiles.’”
“Twenty-three,” said Tomás. “‘Should shew light unto the people, and to the Gentiles.’”
“Three times,” said Denny. “Three chapters of nothing and then three in one speech.”
“Who’s speaking each time?” said Walt.
“The Lord, in seventeen,” said Tomás. “Paul about himself in twenty. Paul about Moses and the prophets in twenty-three.”
“Text,” said Amara, and laid a yellow card down. “Three voices.”
“Back to twenty,” said Walt. “Read me the order.”
“Damascus first,” said Tomás. “Then Jerusalem. Then all Judaea. Then the Gentiles.”
“Where have we seen that run of places before?” said Walt.
Amara found it in a moment. “One eight. ‘In Jerusalem, and in all Judaea, and in Samaria, and unto the uttermost part of the earth.’”
“Samaria’s missing from Paul’s list,” said Denny.
“And Damascus is added,” said Tomás.
“Suggested,” said Amara. “That the two lists are cousins.”
“Keep it on green,” said Walt. “Hold both ends of it.”
“‘Delivering,’” said Walt. “Where else this week has somebody talked about delivering Paul?”
“Twenty-five eleven,” said Tomás. “‘No man may deliver me unto them.’”
“Same word?” said Walt.
Amara had her phone up. “No. Twenty-five is the favor word. Here it’s a different verb. It means pull out, take out of danger.”
“Same English, different Greek,” said Tomás.
“So Paul says nobody can hand me over,” said Denny, “and the Lord says I’ll pull you out.”
“My app says the verb shows up in twenty-three twenty-seven,” Amara said. “Lysias’s letter. ‘Then came I with an army, and rescued him.’”
“Lysias,” said Denny. “The man who never came down.”
“He came down once,” said Tomás. “Into the riot. After that Felix said he’d wait until Lysias came down to Caesarea, and Lysias never does.”
“Suggested,” said Walt. “Until somebody checks the Greek properly.”
“Sent to the people he needs rescuing from,” said Denny. “Like hiring a roofer and telling him the ladder’s wet.”
“Twenty-two,” said Walt. “What does Paul say he’s saying?”
“‘None other things than those which the prophets and Moses did say should come,’” read Tomás.
“Where does Moses first say it?” said Walt. “The Gentiles.”
Tomás was already there. “Genesis twelve three. ‘In thee shall all families of the earth be blessed.’”
“Peter says it in Acts,” said Amara, scrolling. “Three twenty-five. ‘In thy seed shall all the kindreds of the earth be blessed.’”
“Before Paul ever opens his mouth,” said Denny.
“Verse six,” said Walt. “‘The promise made of God unto our fathers.’ Does it say which?”
“No,” said Tomás. He looked at the question mark on his card and did not cross it out. “Abraham’s one of the fathers.”
“Green,” said Amara. “And mine’s still on the table.”
“Both stay,” said Walt. “Twenty-four.”
Tomás read it. “‘Festus said with a loud voice, Paul, thou art beside thyself; much learning doth make thee mad.’”
“Mad,” said Walt.
“Eleven,” said Tomás at once. “‘Exceedingly mad against them.’”
“Mine says ‘enraged’ there and ‘out of your mind’ here,” said Amara. She looked at her phone. “It’s the same root. Eleven, twenty-four, and twenty-five.”
“‘I am not mad, most noble Festus,’” read Tomás.
“Who’s mad in eleven?” said Walt.
“Paul.”
“Who’s called mad in twenty-four?”
“Paul.”
“Who says he isn’t?”
“Paul,” said Denny. “Same man, same word, three times.”
“Text,” said Tomás, and laid a yellow card. “What it means is yours to hold.”
“What does Festus say did it?” said Walt.
“‘Much learning,’” said Amara. “He doesn’t say Gentiles.”
“What was Paul on when Festus broke in?”
“Twenty-three. The word.” Tomás’s voice dropped. “Twenty-two twenty-two, the crowd on the steps. They stopped listening at the same word.”
“List every time he gets cut off,” said Walt. “And where he was.”
It took a while. They went back through the chapters with fingers in the pages.
“Twenty-two twenty-two,” said Amara. “The crowd. He’d just said Gentiles.”
“Twenty-three two,” said Tomás. “Ananias orders him struck on the mouth. Paul had just said he’d lived in good conscience.”
“Twenty-four twenty-five,” said Denny. “Felix. ‘Go thy way for this time.’ Paul’s on righteousness, self-control, and the judgment coming.”
“And here,” said Amara. “Gentiles.”
“Two of four,” said Tomás.
“Yellow for the list,” said Walt. “What does the list tell you?”
“Half the time it follows the word,” said Amara. “That’s as far as I’ll go.”
“Any time Paul quits talking about himself and starts talking about everybody else, somebody yells,” said Denny.
Walt tapped the fourth card. Denny wrote it.
“Twenty-six,” said Walt.
Tomás read it. “‘For the king knoweth of these things, before whom also I speak freely.’”
“Paul tells the king he knows,” said Amara.
“Who else has Paul told that to?” said Walt.
“Festus,” said Denny. “Twenty-five ten. ‘As thou very well knowest.’”
“And Felix knew,” said Tomás. “Twenty-four twenty-two. ‘More perfect knowledge of that way.’”
“Three judges,” said Walt. “What did the first one do with what he knew?”
“Nothing,” said Amara. “Two years of nothing.”
“The second?”
“Offered Paul a favor,” said Denny. “Then said Caesar.”
“And the third?”
“Hasn’t done anything yet,” said Tomás. “Keep reading.”
“Twenty-seven,” said Walt.
Tomás read it. “‘King Agrippa, believest thou the prophets? I know that thou believest.’”
“Twenty-eight,” said Amara.
“‘Almost thou persuadest me to be a Christian,’” said Tomás.
“Mine’s a different sentence,” said Amara. “‘In a short time would you persuade me to be a Christian?’”
“Which way does he say it?” said Walt.
“Sarcastic,” said Denny.
“Sincere,” said Amara.
“Either reading fits,” said Tomás. “Luke doesn’t give the tone.”
“Leave it,” said Walt.
Denny sat very still.
“Christian,” said Amara. “Go on.”
“I’m not saying anything,” said Denny. “Everything’s about the name this month.”
“How many times in the whole book?” said Walt.
Tomás counted. “Eleven twenty-six. Antioch. ‘The disciples were called Christians first.’ And here.”
“Two,” said Amara.
“Who says it here?”
“The king.”
“Twenty-nine,” said Walt.
“‘I would to God,’” read Tomás, “‘both almost, and altogether such as I am, except these bonds.’”
“Mine says ‘whether short or long,’” said Amara. “Same sentence, different picture.”
“‘Except these bonds,’” said Tomás. He looked up. “Verse one.”
“The hand,” said Amara, quietly.
“Luke said ‘left in bonds’ at twenty-five fourteen,” said Tomás. “The entrance only says ‘brought forth.’”
“Paul says bonds himself,” said Amara.
“Suggested,” said Walt. “That he’s gesturing in them.”
“Thirty,” said Walt.
Amara read it clipped. “The king rises, and the governor, and Bernice, and the people sitting with them. They go aside. They say among themselves, ‘This man doeth nothing worthy of death or of bonds.’”
“Death or bonds,” said Tomás.
“That’s Lysias,” said Amara. “Twenty-three twenty-nine. ‘Worthy of death or of bonds.’ In twenty-five Festus said only death.”
“We said we’d be back to it,” said Denny. “Whether anybody else would say what Lysias wrote, death or bonds.”
“Who says it here?” said Walt.
“They do,” said Tomás. “All of them, aside. Luke gives us the room.”
“Thirty-two,” said Amara. “Agrippa to Festus. ‘Might have been set at liberty, if he had not appealed unto Caesar.’”
“The king says that,” said Walt. “Does Luke?”
“Luke gives it to the king,” said Tomás.
“Hold it with twenty-three eleven,” said Walt.
“The Lord said Rome,” said Amara.
“What does the third judge do with what he knows?” said Walt.
Amara counted on her fingers. “He rises. He goes aside. He talks it over. He says Paul could have been set free.”
“A man who knows,” said Denny, “and walks out the door.”
“Luke gives us the verbs,” said Walt.
“Tidy,” said Denny.
“Don’t,” said Amara.
“Didn’t.”
Denny took a pencil from the jar and turned it over to the pink eraser. He found the question mark he had penciled on his binder tab back at chapter nine, the one that said kings?, and rubbed it out until the paper was clean.
“Chapter nine,” he said. “The Lord told Ananias that Paul would stand before kings. There he was.”
“Print it?” he said.
“Print it,” said Walt.
Denny wrote it again in pencil, without a question mark. Tomás laid a yellow card over it.
“That’s thirty-two,” said Amara. She turned the page to the first line of twenty-seven and stopped. “‘And when it was determined that we should sail into Italy.’”
“‘We,’” said Tomás.
“Luke’s in the boat,” said Denny.
“Honest break?” said Walt.
“Yes,” said Amara. “The hearing’s over. It’s a new scene.”
“‘Determined,’” said Tomás. “By whom?”
“Luke doesn’t say,” said Walt.
“Three,” said Denny.
“Don’t read ahead,” said Walt.
“I wasn’t going to.”
“Your thumb was,” said Walt.
Amara took her thumb out of the page. Tomás tucked the cards into the sandwich bag and pressed the seal shut. Denny cut himself a second slice of pie and ate it standing, with his coat half on, looking out at the rain and the bare maple.
“Bring a pencil,” said Walt.
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