Barabbas Page #4

Are you the man they acquitted?

What is that to you?

Chained to you, of all men on Earth.

That's what I like to see, devils and beasts

going for each other's throats.

Here's a head of you to hate each other.

Now work, you crazy dogs.

Let's see you working.

Work!

Get out! Move!

You hate my name.

You hate the sound of it.

You weren't even in Jerusalem,

but you hate my name.

That's right. We hate it.

What does it matter?

What does it matter to you?

-You know who was killed in your place?

-Still that?

So, why shouldn't we hate your name?

I thought what he said

was to love one another.

I can't imagine...

...he expects a man to have a spirit...

...as strong and patient as a dray horse.

It was only something I was told.

If you think I got the best of it,

you stay here for a generation or two.

We've got a special duty for you two.

This'll show you what happens

to fighting mongrels. Come on.

Why isn't it all forgotten?

That's what I don't understand.

Who's been spreading things about?

Keeping that tale alive all these years?

What could kill it?

When you think it was God's will

come to Earth to show what he is.

I can see the reality of that.

Which is why the name of the Master

goes on growing in the world.

I began to meet it wherever I sailed:

Phoenicia, Cyprus, Greece.

Even at the Port of Rome.

I began to understand what it meant.

But...

...it's a tough demand, the will of God.

I'm a poor hand at it.

And look where I've got us now.

Even though I've got his sign scratched

on the back of the Emperor's head.

It means I belong to him,

not to the Emperor.

It's the sign he has put on us all,

if we give way enough to see it.

Look at this.

There's the shape of the cross.

Keep your God to yourself.

Why did you come here

and rake up old lies about killing God?

What's going on down there?

Move yourselves or I'll leave you to rot.

Pull!

You think what it's like to me.

You're the only man I've met who saw him.

You were there at the beginning,

and you won't talk.

You won't tell me.

-What are you afraid of?

-Nothing I'm afraid of.

Then you can tell me.

You see the darkness that went

over heaven and Earth when he died?

Suppose I did.

The man died in a dust storm,

the same as anybody's death.

Suppose his tomb was empty.

Can't a dead man be taken away?

You want the truth? I'll give it to you.

That's all of your God you'll get out of me.

Here, what's the matter?

Come on, get up.

If they see you can't work

they take you and you won't come back.

Hey! Away!

All right, wake up.

-Come on. Move out, all of you.

-Get on your feet. You've had your sleep.

-You two, get your feet on the ground.

-Get out of there. Come on. Move!

Root yourselves out! Move, I say!

Wake up.

All right, there's work to be done.

-You've had enough sleep now.

-Wake up.

Come on, you! You, over there.

Wake up, you hear me?

-Get on your feet, I say.

-One dead man here.

I said get on your feet, all of you.

Now come on. Up on your feet.

-You've got to look as if you can work.

-What's the matter with you?

You can't stand up? Can't work?

I can work.

Here, this one's no use.

-How many survivors?

-None, sir. There can't be any.

-It was like the end of the world to them.

-The end of the underworld.

-What did you say, sir?

-Nothing.

Survivors!

Over here. Survivors.

Get ready to receive survivors!

Away.

Pull!

When they've recovered,

put them to work in the fields.

I can taste the salt in the air.

Every breath of wind is full of the sea.

I thought I could never love it

better than I did. But, oh, glory!

After the darkness of the mines...

...l could go and drown in it

like a man besotted.

Now, are you glad to live?

What? Like a damned ox?

Salt me down

and I'd praise God even for this.

How many times were you swindled

in those foreign ports?

You must've been the easiest game

they ever got their hands on.

-Why is that?

-You'd fall for any trick.

One smile...

...and you trust the world

that half kills you.

Yes, I trust it.

It has to be hard going...

...or else how will the strength come

that God has wanted?

God should make himself plain

or leave me alone.

Am I the one who lets himself be swindled,

or you?

Every time he came near,

you refused to believe it.

But it's never been out of your mind.

What other man's death

could have troubled you so long?

Stop there. Pull over to the side.

Rock to be carried.

Here.

It's a poor scratching, but the true sign.

Now will you leave me in peace?

All right, we go on.

Wait.

Julia, there are the two men

I was telling you about.

Send for them, Rufio. I want to see them.

-Bring those men over here to us.

-Very good, sir.

Stop! These two.

Take them off the plough.

Two men so strangely come up

from the underworld.

Twenty years in the mines, the old one.

Indestructible.

I heard so.

You've earned the air you breathe,

you two, by sheer good fortune.

-What are your names?

-Sahak, sir.

-And yours?

-Barabbas.

What's your age?

What does it matter?

Indeed, what should it matter?

We understand you mean to live forever.

I must touch them

for the luck that's in them.

My wife thinks your merit is contagious.

All right,

we don't want to hold up the work.

Back now.

It's from the Emperor.

It seems the gods approve

your superstition.

We're to call to Rome.

-To Rome? What does it mean?

-I'm to enter the Senate.

-We're to rise in the world.

-Rufio. Rome!

It's true. They are charmed.

We must always take them with us.

A good thing I touched them.

I see, their success, not mine.

Nothing but amiable days from now on,

and knowing everybody instead of nobody.

-When shall we go?

-Ride with us. I'll give you the answer.

How wretched to arrive

when all have gone to the mountains....

Look over there.

Well, here we have to leave your luck

to learn its business.

What do you mean?

Why do we come here?

They cannot fight yet.

They must first learn the skill.

And so they will.

But here we have to deliver them over.

Let's hope they won't disgrace us.

When a charmed life turns professional,

we can expect great things.

Flacus, the Commander.

You honour Rome and us.

Our happiness is all here, Commander.

Unsurpassable. The Emperor

has given him his freedom three times.

There's the third staff of liberty in his hand.

Always he prefers to come back.

He knows his empire

and has the sense to keep it.

Keep it he does.

He's taken a fair toll of them.

Torvald, the Senator Rufio and his lady.

I'll take this life.

Can't a man be made mad

by the smell of blood?

A man can understand this.

To throw the net, hold it to your right,

like this.

Then throw from the tips of your fingers,

like this.

Your places now.

One here, you here and you over there.

Now, start your practice. Throw your nets.

What's this?

Have they mistaken this place

for an old men's hospital?

The grey-haired one?

They say there's something remarkable

about him. Nothing can kill him.

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