The Bronze Bow (18 page)

At night Jesus too looked weary. His brilliant flashing eyes were dark with pity. Yet he never turned away, never refused to speak to them. While he talked, they all forgot for a while. You could see their faces, turned upward to the light that streamed from the open door. And you could see that his words touched their minds and hearts like some healing ointment, and that the scars on their spirits that came from being beaten and kicked and turned away all day long, lost their smart and for a short time did not matter. Often a man's body was healed, and he leaped up, full of new strength; and then a new hope coursed through them all.

But as Daniel went home, with the black heat pressing him down, all the misery he had seen dragged at him, clinging like burs to his spirit, and he did not hear any distant trumpets. On these nights it was difficult to find anything to tell Leah. When he lay down and tried to sleep, the same question went on and on in his mind. When—when? How long must the world go on like this?

There was one story he almost wished he had not told Leah, because she asked for it over and over again.

"Tell me about the little girl who was sick," she would beg. Daniel would repeat the words that he had said so often that they were like a lesson memorized in school.

"Jesus went to her house and—"

"No, begin at the beginning," she would demand like a child. "When you were waiting on the beach."

So he would begin, knowing that nothing but the whole story, just as he had told it so many times, would satisfy her.

"We were waiting on the beach. Jesus had been across the lake to visit some of the villages, he and some of his followers, and they were coming back in a boat. People had been waiting for him since before dawn, and they were hungry and hot, but they were bound they wouldn't leave before they had seen him. Finally someone saw the boat coming, and they all stood up and strained their eyes, and as it got nearer they went wild. You'd have thought he was a prince, the way they screamed and cheered. It was all Simon and James could do to make room for him to step on shore. I think Simon was trying to persuade him to get back into the boat again, the way he sometimes has to do, because for all they call him master and teacher, they lose their wits and have no regard for him at all. But just then there was a shout behind the crowd, and everyone turned around. Those in the back were pushing to make room for someone, and we saw a man trying to get through to Jesus.

"Joel whispered, 'It's Jairus,' and then people began to step on each other's toes to get out of the way. Some of them tried to hide behind the others for fear Jairus would recognize them. Jairus is one of the rulers of the synagogue. I think even Joel looked a little scared. Jesus' friends moved up close around him. No one was quite sure what was going to happen. But Jesus made a sign for them to stand aside, and he just stood quietly and waited. Jairus passed very close to me. His cloak was twisted sideways, and he was panting as though he had been running, and no one need have bothered to hide, because he did not see anyone or anything except the one man he was looking for. What happened was the last thing we expected. Jairus went down in front of Jesus like a beggar, and stretched out his hands, and his voice was so low and hoarse that only those who stood very near could understand what he said. But the word went through the crowd. His daughter was dying. The only child he had. Then Jesus said—"

"No—tell me first what Joel said."

"Oh, Joel said, 'The only child he has, poor man. She is the apple of his eye.' "

" 'The apple of his eye,' " Leah would repeat softly, caressing the words.

"Of course I felt sorry for him, but I thought too, what a chance it was for Jesus. An important man like this—a ruler. I thought if Jesus could bargain with him—but of course he would never think of that. He only reached out his hand and helped the man up and started straight for Jairus' house. The crowd let them through and then flocked after like a bunch of sheep, and me along with them, because when a crowd like that starts to move you don't stop to think. I was curious as anyone to see what would happen.

"But halfway to the synagogue we saw a man hurrying along the street, and he met Jairus and Jesus and stopped them. I could not hear what he said, but I could see his face and I knew that he had bad news. They told me afterwards that he said the girl was dead and not to bother the teacher any more. But before Jairus could speak, Jesus put his hand on the man's arm and said something quietly, and they went on again, and all of us after.

"Then we heard the women wailing, and the flutes playing, and the women in the crowd began to howl too, out of sympathy, and Jesus turned around to us and said, 'Do not weep, she is not dead but sleeping.' And none of us knew what to think. The women at the door of the house were weeping and jeering at him, both at the same time. Then Jesus told the crowd to stay back, and he gave a sign to Simon and John and James, the three who are always nearest to him, and he took them into the house with him. And in a moment all the mourners who had been wailing in the house came out. Some of them were angry and some of them were frightened, but Jairus shut the door behind them."

"I wish you had gone inside," Leah would say now.

"Well, I couldn't, and neither could any of the others, except those three. We have only their word for what happened. They said the child lay on her bed, and they would have sworn too that she was dead. But Jesus did not hesitate at all, he just walked up to the bed, and reached down and took her hand and spoke to her."

"Tell me," Leah would whisper. "Tell me exactly what he said."

"He said, 'Little girl, get up.' Just as though she were asleep. And she woke and got up and walked.

"And then Jesus said, 'Give her something to eat,' and he went away, before her father or mother had a chance to say anything. When he came out to the street no one dared to ask what had happened because there was something about his face—I can't describe it, but I have seen him look like that at other times, as though he had come to the very end of his strength. Simon and John understand when he looks like that, and they got him through the crowd and back to their house, and everyone knew better than to try to follow."

"The little girl—she was really well?"

"Yes. I have seen her walking with her father. You'd never guess she had been ill."

"Is she pretty?"

"Yes," Daniel would say, although he had not actually noticed, because it seemed to please Leah to have her pretty.

"Yes," Leah would sigh. "Of course she must be pretty. And she must be very happy."

Daniel wished she would not keep asking for the story. It had seemed wonderful to him at the time, but it had a puzzling aspect as well. It hadn't seemed to make any difference. Some of the followers thought that Jairus had offered to pay Jesus and that Jesus had refused, and Daniel could not understand this when all those people were clamoring to be fed every night and Jairus would never have missed the money. At any rate, the thing had been hushed up, by Jesus' own order, they said. Some of the disciples had grumbled about it too. Simon, who had been in the house when it happened, would not talk about it at all. But Daniel noticed that Simon seldom went out in his boat now, that he stayed close to Jesus wherever he went. The fisherman watched his teacher more carefully than ever, protecting him from the carelessness of the crowd, and when Jesus spoke, Simon's eyes never left his face.

One day, as Daniel finished the story, Leah sat silent for a long time. "Do you think Jesus will ever come to our village?" she asked finally.

"He did once, and he may again."

"If he came here would there be a great crowd of people?"

"There always is, wherever he goes."

"Like the people who watched the day we came here?"

"You think that was a crowd? That was only a handful. Where Jesus is they come by hundreds." He could see she had no way of imagining people by hundreds.

"Do women come?"

"Of course."

"Do the people—crowd together and push each other?"

"It's all you can do to stay on your two feet sometimes."

She was silent so long that he thought she had stopped thinking about it. Then she asked, "Are there children too?"

"Oh yes, usually some children."

"Do they hurt the children?"

"Of course they don't. What gave you such an idea?"

"Jesus wouldn't let them hurt the children, would he?"

"He won't even let them send the children away when they're a nuisance. He insists on talking to them, and finding out their names, and listening to their foolishness. It makes some of the men furious—as though he thought children were important."

She sat silent for a long time, and this time Daniel asked, very carefully, "If he comes, will you go with me to see him?"

Leah did not speak, only lowered her head and hid her face behind her veil.

How changed she is, he thought, filled with hope as he looked at his sister. It must be Thacia's visits. For Thacia came often now, walking out from the city with Joel to stay with Leah while the boys met in the watchtower. Each time she brought some small gift, a lily bulb to plant in the garden, a tiny alabaster jar of perfume, a skein of scarlet thread. She had opened for Leah a whole new world.

After Thacia's last visit, he had come into the house and found Leah peering into the tiny hand mirror of polished bronze that had been Thacia's latest gift, peering so earnestly that she had not even heard him come in. There had been something in her face, a searching and a wistfulness that still haunted him. Sometimes, when he talked, she did not seem to hear him at all, but seemed to be listening intently for some expected sound. Often there was a dreaming look in her blue eyes. Twice when the first patter of early rain had passed like footsteps along the street outside, she had flown to the garden door and flung it open and stood looking out into the dark damp garden. Girls were strange creatures. Would Thacia understand all this? Perhaps it was only his imagining, but it stirred in him an odd uneasiness that he could not put into words.

There was another satisfaction in these days. As Daniel grew confident of the skill in his own hands, his work became a source of pleasure. It was satisfying to give a villager a pair of hinges for his house, and to know that they were not only strong and well balanced, but exactly matched and pleasing to look at as well. He became aware that something more than usefulness could take shape under his hammer, and he began to experiment.

One sultry afternoon when the work was slack, he picked from the floor a bit of bronze which had dropped from a molten mass. Seeing its dull shine between his fingers, he had an idea. He heated it carefully, pulled it from the fire with the smallest tongs, and tapped it gently with Simon's finest hammer. After several tries he achieved a stroke delicate enough so that it would not flatten the small lump, and presently he managed to beat out a fine wire. He heated it again, and twisted it between his fingers, and watched it slowly take the shape of a tiny slender bow, no longer than his little finger. For a moment he stared at it with pure pleasure. Then he had a further inspiration. He rolled out and sharpened a slender bronze pin which could pass down like an arrow between the bow and the fine wire of its string, so that the bow became a brooch such as he had seen the city folk wear to fasten their cloaks.

Then he hid his experiment away, half ashamed of it and half proud. He would keep it to remind him of his purpose.

He trains my hands for war,
   so that my arms can bend a bow of bronze...

He thought again of Jesus, and his hopes flared anew. Surely this man, like David of old, had the strength of God in him. If he willed, he could bend the bow 'of bronze. But was Jesus training his hands for war? Daniel was not sure. He must go back again that night to the garden in Bethsaida.

For Daniel the month of Ab was a time of waiting. It was only afterwards that he remembered these days as a time of quietness and hope.

I'
LL DO ANYTHING
, Daniel. You know that—anything!" Joel's voice shook with earnestness. His eyes in the flickering lamplight were fixed on his friend's face. The three sat crouched in the narrow passageway of Joel's home.

Earlier that day Daniel had received a summons by messenger from Rosh. He had climbed to the cave, and then, after a brief conference, had gone straight to the city. Shortly before dark Joel and Thacia had crept through the passageway to join him.

Daniel brought with him the long awaited orders from Rosh to Joel. At first, waiting in the dark passageway, Daniel had battled with his own jealousy. That Joel should have the first chance to act, while he himself, the one who had brought Joel in as a recruit, should stand aside and wait! But now he was beginning to see the thing reasonably. This was only the beginning.

"Rosh needs some information," he told his eager friend. "You're the only one who can get it, Joel. You know your way around the city and everyone is used to seeing you. None of the rest of us could get near."

"What does Rosh want? I'll get it, whatever it is!"

Daniel told him, his voice echoing the contempt with which Galileans always spoke of the tetrarch—the half-Jew, Herod Antipas, who had been appointed to rule over them—and of the extravagant city he had built on the sea. "Herod is entertaining a special legation from Rome. While they're at Tiberias they plan to come up to Capernaum for a day or so to inspect the garrison here. For some people, the rich ones who toady to Rome, that will be a great occasion. Mattathias, the banker, is giving a banquet for the whole legation, and some of the richest men in Capernaum will be there."

"Mattathias would do anything to gain favor with the tetrarch," said Joel with scorn. "How does Rosh know about the banquet?"

"Don't ask me how. He has his own ways. What he wants to know is what others will be there. The names of all of them, and the day and the time when the banquet will take place."