The Bronze Bow - Elizabeth George Speare [4]
"All the mighty ones," he said, remembering Rosh's very words. "Joshua, Gideon, David, all of them fought on the soil of Galilee. No one could stand against them. It will be so again."
"Yes," breathed Joel. "It will be so again. God will send us another David." His eyes glistened, as though he too could see the shadow of a vast army moving on the distant plain.
"You mean the Messiah!" Malthace cried. "Oh Joel, do you remember? We always thought that up here we'd see him."
"I was sure," said Joel. "I knew that if we could only climb up here, that would be the day he would come. I believed it so hard, it seemed to me I could make it happen."
"So did I. And we would be the ones to rush down the mountain and tell them. And all the people in the village would drop their work and follow him. Do all children have such wild imaginations?"
Joel was instantly sober. "The Messiah is not imagination. It's the truth. It is promised."
"But straining our eyes at every cloud in the distance, and thinking we would be the first ones—"
"I still want to be!" cried Joel, so passionately that the other two were startled. "Call it childish if you like. That's why I don't want to go to Capernaum."
"But it may be years!"
"No. It must be soon. Not the way we imagined it, Thacia. I used to think he would come with a great host of angels. Now I know it must be men, real men, trained and armed and ready—" He checked himself.
"There are such men," said Daniel, keeping his eyes on the distant hills. Without looking, he felt the other boy's muscles tighten.
"I know," Joel answered. Excitement leaped from one boy to the other. The question had been answered.
Malthace looked at her brother, puzzled by something she could not understand. "We should start back now," she said. "We must be home for supper."
"I'll walk a way with you," Daniel offered. He was thinking that he would like to see them safely onto the main road.
They started down the steep slope of the mountain. Once they left the summit behind, the breeze died down, the golden sun hung close above them, and not a leaf moved beside the path. They did not talk now. Daniel could see that Joel was still seething with hidden thoughts. He suspected that for the girl this holiday had not turned out as she had hoped. As for himself, he was already beginning to wish that they had never come. He had been satisfied up here, not thinking too much, shutting out the things he didn't want to remember—working for Rosh, and waiting, nursing his hatred, for the hour that would come. He had never had a friend of his own, and he had never thought about wanting one. Why hadn't he let well enough alone?
Malthace was impatient now. Probably her conscience was beginning to trouble her. But Joel lingered, trying deliberately to fall behind. When his sister was distracted by a clump of myrrh blossoms just ahead, he spoke half under his breath.
"There was something else I hoped for when I came up here," he said. "I've heard that Rosh the outlaw lives on the mountain. I hoped I might be lucky enough to see him."
"Why?"
"He's a hero to every boy at school. But no one has ever seen him. Have you?"
Daniel hesitated. "Yes," he said.
Joel stopped in the pathway, forgetting his caution. "What I'd give—! Are the things they say about him true?"
"What do they say?"
"That he fought beside the great leader Judas when they rebelled against the Romans at Sepphoris, and that when the others were crucified, he escaped and hid in the hills. Some men say he's nothing but a bandit who robs even his fellow Jews. But others say he takes the money from the rich and gives it to the poor. Do you know him? What is he really like?"
No caution in the world could hide the fierce pride that rushed over Daniel. "He's the bravest man in the world! Let them say what they like. Some day every man in Israel will know his name!"
"Then it's true!" cried Joel. "He's raising an army to fight against Rome! That's what you meant up there, isn't it? And you—you are one of them. I knew it!"
"Rosh is the man I told you about,