The Bronze Bow

by Elizabeth George Speare

  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 an answer for every situation a man could encounter in this life. Thou shalt not kill? But that did not apply to war. And what difference would it make if he had an answer, chapter and verse, on his tongue? Rosh was his own law.

  Suddenly words were echoing in his mind. "For each one of you is precious in His sight." Not scripture, but the words of the carpenter. That was what had confused him. Rosh looked at a man and saw a thing to be used, like a tool or a weapon. Jesus looked and saw a child of God. Even the old miser with his moneybag?

  He hammered more violently, till the sparks flew wild and the iron squashed down on the stone like clay, and he had to heat it again and begin all over. Samson, kneading the bellows, watched him broodingly.

  10

  EBOL, THE SENTRY, brought the message to Daniel one sultry August morning, a single sentence scratched on a fragment of broken pottery, "Your grandmother is dying," and signed "Simon." The message had been in Ebol's pocket for three days; no knowing how many times it had changed hands before reaching him. Better if it had never reached him at all, Daniel thought fiercely, thrusting it deep into his girdle pocket. For half the day he carried it about with him, saying nothing, the bit of clay weighing heavier and heavier till it dragged at him like a stone. Finally he showed the message to Rosh and set off down the mountain to the village.

  The door of his grandmother's house was bolted, and only silence answered his knock. As he stood uncertain in the road before the house, two women, and then a feeble old man came hurrying from the nearest house.

  "About time you came," one of the women scolded. "They've been locked in there for ten days. We don't know whether the old woman is alive or dead."

  "Why didn't you break in?" Daniel asked.

  "The girl is possessed of devils," the old man answered. "She will let nobody come near her."

  "We tossed bread through the window," a woman added. "But I'll have no more to do with it. Suppose the devils were let loose?"

  "My sister is harmless," Daniel told them impatiently. "She could hurt no one."

  But probably none of them had even glimpsed his sister in all these years. He could see that he could expect no help from them. He looked up at the small high window. Then he wrenched a portion of the ladder from the wall, braced it, and tried to peer into the house. He could see nothing but a patch of floor. There was no sound, but just as he turned away he thought he caught the flicker of a shadow.

  "Leah," he called, softly at first, then insistently. "It's Daniel, your brother. Let me in." The shadow did not move again.

  Panic crept over him. What horror did that room contain? With all his heart he longed to run from this silent house. Yet the fearful, demanding eyes of the three neighbors goaded him on. He had no choice. He would have to break down the door and go in.

  At the second thrust of his powerful shoulders the hinges burst from the rotting frame and he fell forward into foul-smelling darkness. Sunlight poured in behind him, lighting up a crouching figure with a mass of tangled yellow hair. For an instant Leah's eyes stared wildly from an ashen face. Then she darted away and coiled into a tight ball of fear against the wall. Where the girl had crouched, on a pallet of straw, lay a shrunken gray shape. Dread froze Daniel on the threshold. Then, to his shattering relief, his grandmother slowly turned her head.

  "Daniel—you've come," she whispered. They were the last words he was ever to hear from her.

  Daniel drove away the two curious women and sent the old man for a doctor. He kicked the door all the way open and let fresh air into the damp, fetid room. He threw out the rat-gnawed loaves of bread that littered the floor.

  The doctor bent over the old woman and shook his head. "Only her will has kept the life in her," he said. "She has waited till you came. Let her go now, poor soul. Look to your sister instead, and see that she eats."

  Daniel had no knowledge of nursing. Clumsily he spread a fresh bed of rushes and shifted the weightless old body. He walked to the well and filled the jar with water, and bathed the hands, thin and dry as shriveled leaves. One of the neighbors called from the roadway, and handed him a bowlful of broth, and a clay dish of hot coals to light a fire. He piled straw into the hollow in the floor and built a fire against the damp. He tried to coax the old woman to take a sip of the broth.

  In all this time Leah had not moved from the wall. Once or twice, from the corner of his eyes, he noticed that she had very slightly turned her head, and he suspected that she watched him from behind the tangled hair. He tried not to look at her, to crowd back the fear that rose in him at the sight of her disheveled figure. She had been shut in here in the dimness for ten days. Had the devils taken possession of her altogether?

  Daniel went out into the garden and milked the little goat, awkwardly, the feel of it gradually coming back into his hands. He carried the jar of milk into the house and set it on a shelf. The goat followed him through the broken door, sniffing timidly at the unfamiliar smell of him.

  Daniel was reminded that the door must be mended before it was too dark to see. The goat circled the room and found Leah, and he saw her hand go out and her fingers grip the black fur.

  Night was coming on. He mended the door after a fashion and propped it against the frame. Then he discovered that there was no oil in the lamp. How many nights had they gone without a light? He had not thought to ask Rosh for money, and though it was too dark now to search the room, he doubted there would be a single coin hidden there. Just as darkness fell, there was a timid knock on the door. The second neighbor, the one who had most feared the devils, held out to him a small saucer of oil with a flaming wick. He accepted the lamp with shame. Through all these years when he had thought of the village, he had remembered the poverty, the dinginess, the quarreling and meanness and despair. He had forgotten there was kindness too.

  He put the lamp on the floor and sat down near his grandmother's mat. He was all at once very tired, more tired than after a day at the forge or a long hunt over the mountain. Dread began to creep along his nerves again. He knew he was terribly afraid to spend the night in this place. Rosh was right. There was a weakness in him. That devil of fear that held his sister helpless—was it cunning enough to find out his weakn
ess? If he could run, out into the street, back to the mountain, it could never overtake him. But he could not run. He could only sit, while the fear reached closer and closer, hemming in the small circle of light that held it at bay.

  Sometimes his grandmother stirred, the thin wrinkled eyelids opened, and the faded eyes groped toward him. If he spoke to her, she closed her eyes again, satisfied. How had she been so sure that he would come? What had he ever done for her that she would dare to believe he would come back? He wished now he could tell her why he had run away. He wished that he could explain about Rosh, could let her know that it was for her too that he worked on the mountain. But it was too late for that. The only thing he could do was to sit here beside her, to let her be sure that he was there.

  Perhaps if she could hear him, she would not have to make such an effort to see. He began to talk, as he had talked that night to Samson while he filed off the chains, not knowing whether anyone heard or understood, but out of some need in himself.

  "You thought I had forgotten," he said. "But I remember how it used to be when Leah and I first came to live with you. Your hair was still so black, Grandmother. You worked in the ketzah field that summer. But at night you used to tell us stories."

  There was no sound, not from the still figure or from the corner. But was it his imagination that a faint softening, almost like a smile, relaxed the thin tight lips? He went on talking.

  "You were the one who told me the story of Daniel, the prophet I was named for. How when Daniel refused to stop praying to his God, Darius cast him into a den of lions, and how God sent an angel and shut the lions' mouths and Daniel was not hurt. And about the three men who walked in the fiery furnace and not a hair of their heads was singed. I can remember their names still—Shadrach, Meschach, and Abednego. I used to like the sound of them. You made me feel proud of being named Daniel."

  There was a faint stir in the corner. Daniel did nor turn his head. He went on talking.

  "At night, before we went to sleep, you made us repeat a psalm after you. I have forgotten them now, but there's one I think I could remember, the one you liked best."

  He fumbled for the words, and they came, slowly, from the depths of his memory.

  " 'The Lord is my shepherd; I shall not want; He maketh me to lie down in green pastures: He leadeth me beside the still waters. He restoreth my soul: He leadeth me in the paths of righteousness for his name's sake.' "

  There was a hesitant footstep beside him. Not knowing what to do, not daring to look up, with the cold prickle of fear along his skin, Daniel held out his hand. He felt Leah's fingers touch his own. He forced himself to go on.

  " 'Yea, though I walk through the valley of the shadow of death, I will fear no evil: for thou art with me; thy rod and thy staff they comfort me. Thou preparest a table before me in the presence of mine enemies: thou anointest my head with oil; my cup runneth over. Surely goodness and mercy shall follow me all the days of my life: and I will dwell in the house of the Lord for ever.' "

  Leah sank down beside him. Side by side, without speaking, the brother and sister sat and listened to the breathing of the old woman. Leah's hand in his own was like the hand of a small child reaching out to him in trust and helplessness. It was a sign that even now the devils did not have complete dominion. Fear retreated into the shadowy corners.

  There were only the small sounds, the hiss of the wick in the saucer of oil, the wheezing and sighing of the sleeping goat, the ceaseless rustling in the thatch overhead where countless small creatures nested in the molding straw. Once the thin thread of a snake swung down, twisted back on itself, and disappeared. A rat came out of the shadows, sat on its haunches, and glared at them. Leah looked at them both without surprise or alarm. Sometime in the night he was aware that one sound in the room had ceased. His grandmother was no longer breathing.

  11

  NEXT MORNING a meager funeral procession straggled through the village toward the burial ground outside the gates. There were no flutes, no hired mourners, only a scattering of neighbor women wailing halfheartedly, and the trundling cart that carried the body of the old woman. Leading the procession was the lone mourner, a broad-shouldered young man with a fierce, forbidding scowl.

  After the burial was over, Daniel, turning homeward, saw a hurrying figure coming from the village, and presently, with a burst of gratitude, he recognized his friend the blacksmith.

  "I am sorry, my friend," Simon said, wringing his hand. "I tried to get here in time for the burial. I'll go back to your house with you, if you don't mind."

  Simon was the only guest at the funeral feast, which the neighbors spread outside the house. They ate in silence, and when the women had cleared away the dishes and left them alone, Simon turned to Daniel.

  "What now?" he asked.

  "Is there more to be done?" Daniel asked wearily.

  "I meant tomorrow. What are you going to do?"

  Daniel looked away. Since he had received Simon's message he had managed not to ask himself that question.

  "I had another reason for coming today," Simon went on. "I told you in Capernaum that I intended to follow Jesus. But it weighs on my conscience that the smithy is closed. The money does not matter. I've learned to do without that. But it worries me that the tools lie idle while the men have no one to mend their plows. It has been on my mind for some time that you might help me. If you could take over the shop while I'm gone—keep the place from going to seed, I'd be very grateful to you."

  It was like Simon to make it sound like a favor! Daniel stared down at the road and kicked up a spurt of dust with his bare foot. He was almost at the point of tears. Yet in the same instant such a fierce resentment sprang up in him that he dared not look his friend in the face. They had it all worked out for him. Everyone—the doctor, Leah, the neighbors, and now Simon, took it for granted that he had come home to stay. Did he have nothing to say about it? What about his life on the mountain? What about Rosh and Samson, and the work that must be done in the cave? Wasn't that more important than a few farmers who wanted their wheels mended? Everything he loved the wind on the mountain top the irresponsible life the excitement of the raids rose up and fought off the shackles that Simon held out to him in kindness.

  The battle did not last long. He was trapped. Simon knew he was trapped. Though he longed to defy them all and fight for his freedom like a mountain wolf, the weakest one of them had defeated him. He could not leave Leah to sit alone in a house with the door barred. Simon, who had waited without speaking a word, was carefully looking off down the narrow street when Daniel finally raised his eyes.

  "Will they bring their business to me?" the boy asked miserably.

  "That will depend on you," Simon smiled.

  "If I can find someone to care for Leah while I work—"

  "I had thought of that too," Simon said. "My house is connected with the shop. No use having it empty. Why don't you both move in there and use my things? Better to have her where you could keep an eye on her yourself."

  Not a word about the crumbling mud or the sagging roof or the gaping door which Simon could see plainly from where he stood. Daniel's throat suddenly ached.

  "Thank you," he managed. "It is good—"

  "It's just good business," Simon said crisply. "I'm sure of your work. I know my reputation is in good hands."

  He went on, in a practical tone, explaining some of the problems of the trade, the work that this or that man was likely to demand.

  "One more thing," he added. "From time to time—not often—one of the legionaries comes into the shop for something, a broken harness or clasp. They have their own forge at the garrison, of course, but sometimes a man needs a repair done quickly."

  Daniel bristled. "I will never serve a pig of a Roman!"

  "Yes," said Simon levelly. "You will serve him, and civilly too. There is something you will have to learn, my friend. An outlaw may think he is accountable to no one. But in a village every man holds his neighbor's safety in
his hands. If a legionary is in a mood for trouble, any excuse will do. A single insult could cost half the fives in the town in the end. This is one thing I must ask of you."

  To Daniel it seemed the final blow that struck his shackles into place.

  Simon laughed. "It's not so bad as all that. After all, a horse deserves a comfortable bridle whether he belongs to a Roman or no. Besides, a good Zealot does not bring down suspicion on his roof."

  Daniel looked at his friend sharply. Did Simon mean—?

  "Did you think you had to give up serving your country? All the patriots don't live in the mountain. There are Zealots in blacksmith shops too. Do what you will—the place is yours now. So long as no harm comes to my neighbors. Can I count on you for that?"

  "You can count on that," the boy said, feeling a measure of hope and a great gratitude toward his friend.

  "I'm going back to Capernaum tonight," Simon said. "Perhaps you can find a neighbor to help you move your things."

  Before dark Daniel climbed the mountain and explained to Rosh that he must stay in the village. Rosh heard him out in silence. Then he spoke.

  "This witless sister is more important than your country's freedom?"

  Daniel flushed. "No. But I cannot leave her alone."

  "They boast of charity in the synagogue, don't they? Let them care for her."

  Daniel remembered the untouched loaves of bread tossed through the window. "She would starve," he said.

  "I have said it before," Rosh said with scorn. "You're soft."

  This time Daniel did not look away. He faced his chief levelly. "I will prove you are wrong," he said quietly. "I will work for the cause in the village. You will see. I belong here on the mountain. I'll never forget that. But now I am going back, and tomorrow I will move into the house of Simon the Zealot."