The Bronze Bow - Elizabeth George Speare [40]
"Yah!" he gloated. "A good morning's pay. He's got something to whine about now, the old camel."
Daniel said nothing, waiting.
"Did you get his dagger too?"
Daniel threw the dagger down. He knew now what was coming. Someone had already brought back a report.
"The other one?"
"I gave it back to him," said Daniel. "He wasn't fit to travel without it."
Rosh shot a derisive glance from under the black brows. "So he took you in with his whining! I gave you credit for more sense."
Daniel held his tongue.
Rosh rubbed a coin between dirty thumb and finger. "You think he'll thank you for your pains? You'll find out if he ever sets eye on you in the city. You should have finished him off."
"You didn't order me to kill him," Daniel said sullenly.
"I expected you to use your head. What ails you? Afraid of a drop of blood?"
"It is Roman blood I want!" Daniel burst out. "Do we fight against Jews?"
Rosh tossed the coins back into the bag, pulled the string tight, and got to his feet. His eyes looked dangerous, but his voice was level.
"You fool! You'll have your fill of Roman blood! Have you wasted your time with me? Are you still a stupid villager who wants to rush at the Romans with your bare hands? It will take men and arms and food. And they have to be paid for with money. And get this through your head once and for all—we take the money where we find it!"
Daniel's lips were tight, his eyes on the hard-packed earth.
"Would the old miser have given his money to free Israel?" Rosh went on. "He'd have parted with his life first! A decent death for his country was better than he deserved. And what loss would it have been—one old man more or less?"
Suddenly, with one of his lightning reverses of temper, Rosh stepped forward and laid a hand on the boy's shoulder. "I know what's in your mind," he said gruffly. "It's better to do without killing when we can. But there's a flaw in you, boy, a soft streak. I've seen it over and over, these years. Like a bad streak in a piece of metal. Either you hammer it out, the way you'd hammer out a bubble, or you'll be no good to us. When the day comes there'll be no place for weakness."
Daniel's head went back.
"Wait a minute!" Rosh warned, bearing his hand down as if to hold down the boy's leaping anger. "I didn't say cowardice. You think I don't know you inside out? But softness can be just as dangerous. And by all the prophets, I'm going to hammer it out of you, if it's the last thing I do. Someday you'll thank me for it!"
Rosh took his hand from the boy's shoulder and held it out, waiting. Daniel stared at the bearded, weather-pitted face, the fierce black eyes of the man who had been his hero for five years, and his defenses gave way. Was it Rosh's logic, or the rough friendship in the man's hand and voice that had won him back? In relief he reached out, and he could sense the man's pleasure when his own hand, trained to the anvil, returned without flinching his leader's iron clasp.
Rosh was right, he thought later, taking up his work. More right than Rosh himself suspected. Would the man be so patient if he could read Daniel's mind? Rosh knew about his passion for the day to come. Rosh did not know about the other things that bound him like cobwebs when he woke in the night. Leah. His grandmother. Thacia! A flush came up over his face. There was no room for such weakness. He raised the anvil and struck the softened metal, blow after powerful blow, beating out his weakness. He put the metal back into the fire and watched it heat to a glowing red, drew it out with tongs, and hammered on it again, till his arms ached. He would get rid of this flaw in himself!
Yet, like a treacherous bubble that fled under the hammer and formed again, a doubt returned. Was there a flaw too in Rosh's argument? He could not put a finger on it, but he felt it just the same. He wished he could talk to Joel about it. Could Joel find the answer in those scriptures of his? Somewhere, Daniel had been taught in his childhood, there would be an answer in the scriptures, for Moses had handed down in the Law