The Bronze Bow - Elizabeth George Speare [38]
The kingdom! Daniel looked about him. What good would it do to speak of a kingdom to these miserable wretches? What could it mean to them, when not one of them could lift a hand to fight for it? But he saw their faces, white, formless blots in the darkness, all lifted toward this man. He heard their harsh breathing all around him, stifled in their straining not to miss a word. They listened as though his words were food and they could never get enough.
"But you must be kind to each other, and love each other," the voice was saying. "For each of you is precious in His sight."
The figure in the white robe swayed slightly. In the dim light from the doorway the man looked very weary. Instantly one of the fishermen was at his side. Another came from the house with a lighted lamp. Together, shielding him from the people, they persuaded their master across the garden. The crowd watched them, quieted, almost stupefied, by the spell of that gentle voice. The three climbed the outside staircase of the house and entered the shelter on the roof.
Daniel straightened his shoulders, trying to shake off the spell that seemed to bind him close to the silent crowd. At the same time he remembered the errand that had brought him to this place.
Simon listened, showing little interest in Rosh's demands. Daniel was sure that Simon was going to refuse his request, but instead the man looked at him keenly.
"This Rosh," he said thoughtfully, "you have a lot of faith in him, haven't you?"
"Of course I have."
"All right. I don't have these things to spare in my own shop. But there is a shop here in the city, on the Street of the Ironworkers. You will know it by the bronze horseshoe over the doorway. I work for the owner sometimes. Samuel is his name, and he owes me wages. Tell him to give you what you need."
"But your wages?"
"I have little need for money just now. Take what you need."
Daniel could not leave his friend without some answer. "Are you staying with Jesus, Simon?"
"If he will have me."
"Is—is he one of us?"
Simon smiled. "A Zealot, you mean?"
"Isn't that why you came? Have you asked him to join us?"
"I had some such idea when I came," Simon admitted. "But it has not worked out just as I expected. No, I have not asked Jesus to join us. All I hope and long for now is that he will ask me to join him."
Daniel saw that he would get no more certain answer from Simon tonight. The two boys went back along the road in silence. Presently Joel spoke, his young voice troubled.
"How can he call those people children of God?" he questioned. "They have never heard of the Law. They are unclean from the moment they are born."
Daniel could not attach too much importance to this. He was too far outside the Law himself. "Perhaps it does no harm for them to hope," he suggested.
"But they have no right to hope!"
Joel was silent again, struggling, in some way Daniel could not share, to reconcile what he had heard with his lifelong training. "I think Father is right," he said at last, unwillingly. "This man is not a true rabbi. He practically said it was all right to eat without washing our hands. Perhaps it's dangerous even to listen to him. And vet—"
Some unfinished question, only half formed, filled the darkness around them as they made their way back to the city.
9
FIVE MORNINGS LATER, Daniel sat at the foot of the mountain trail waiting. Though the sun weighed down on his head like a vast hammer, the palms of his hands were cold and damp. Any moment now the man he waited for would come into view. This was the first job he had ever had to do alone. He must not bungle it.
Of course, there was little likelihood he could fail, or Rosh would not have sent him. He understood that in a way this was a peace offering on Rosh's part, to repay him for mending the dagger. It was also, he knew, a test, the easy sort of test that Rosh often devised to try out a man's usefulness.
"He'll be alone," Rosh told him. "Always travels alone, the old skinflint, by the back roads. Pretends to be a beggar, whining