The Ironsmith (45 page)

When he came nearer, he saw that Joshua had a stick in his hand and was drawing figures in the dirt. He could hear his voice. He was naming the letters of the Hebrew alphabet.

Then Joshua glanced up and saw Noah.

“That is enough for today, children,” he said, and straightened up.

The children remained, clinging to his robes.

“Go and play,” he told them. “God loves you.”

Reluctantly, they departed. Joshua stepped forward and embraced his cousin.

“Has Deborah forgiven me?” he asked, only half in jest.

“For what?”

“For missing your wedding.”

“There is very little Deborah would not forgive you. She sends you her love.”

The expression on Joshua's face darkened just a shade.

“You bring bad news,” he said.

“Yes.”

“Then tell it to me.”

“Your father is dead.”

“When?”

“Four days ago.”

“Four days…” Joshua seemed to consider the length of time significant.

For a moment Noah thought Joshua would weep, but then his mood shifted, as if he had withdrawn into some secret place in his soul.

“The chosen of God are my family. Father rejected both my message and me.”

“Your mother told me that the last words he uttered were a prayer that God might keep you safe.”

This was too much, even for God's prophet. Joshua began to say something. He opened his mouth, but the words died on his tongue. All at once he raised his hands, as if fending off a blow.

Then he simply turned and walked away.

“There is more that you must know,” Noah called after him, but, without turning around, Joshua raised his arm and made a gesture like swatting at a fly.

“Not now,” he said, in a choked voice.

Noah found himself alone in the empty yard of an empty house.

“I found you, ironsmith!”

Suddenly he was on his knees, even before he realized that he had been struck from behind. His kidney felt as if it would burst.

Slowly the man circled around to face him, staying just beyond Noah's reach. He was bigger up close. Noah forced himself to raise his eyes to the man's face, but he had to arch his back painfully. The eyes that stared down at him were ferocious.

“You ran a good race, but it ends here,” the man said.

“Who are you and what do you want of me?”

“Only your life.”

The man drew his sword, which came out of its scabbard with a slow hiss. Noah, sure that his last moment was upon him, began to whisper the Prayer for the Dead.

“Only his life?”

The voice was Joshua's. Something had brought him back. He stood not two paces behind Noah's attacker.

The man turned to face him. But Joshua merely smiled and raised his arms to shoulder height, as if to say, “
Strike where you will.
”

“Joshua, get out of here, or he will kill us both,” Noah cried, his voice hardly more than a croak. But Joshua seemed not to hear. He never took his eyes from the big man's face.

“Do you imagine you are safe to do these things?” Joshua asked, almost mockingly. “Do you think that your Father, Who hears every beat of your heart, is too blind to see the blood you would spill?”

“My father is dead,” the man growled. But he did not strike.

“Your Father is alive, and always has lived, and will live forever. For your Father is God, Who sees you now and weeps for the evil in your heart. Do you not feel His sorrow? Can you not feel His urging? Turn aside from your intent, and be forgiven.”

“There is no forgiveness.”

The man raised his sword, as if in warning. Noah saw that the point, which was no more than a span from Joshua's face, seemed to tremble slightly in the air.

“There is always forgiveness,” Joshua said calmly. “No man is beyond God's mercy. You have turned away from Him, but He has not turned away from you. You are still His son. He still loves you and yearns for your return to righteousness. His heart is open to receive you.”

Then, slowly but deliberately, he reached up with his right hand and touched the point of the sword with his finger. The big man, who was even taller than Joshua, seemed frozen.

Slowly, Joshua lowered his hand, and his finger carried the point of the sword down with it. The arm that held the sword, raised to do murder, sank as if of its own weight.

“Do not be afraid, my son. God loves you and will redeem you. Your sins are forgiven.”

The murderer's hand opened, and the sword dropped to the ground.

By then Noah had managed to find his feet, but, like one in the presence of a mystery, he too had lost the will to action. He could only watch in awed fascination.

This man who, only a moment before, had been about to steal his life from him, now lowered his eyes and stared at his sword lying useless on the ground. Then he turned to Noah, his face mirroring his confusion of mind, as if begging him for some explanation.

The strength seemed to ebb from him and he sank to his knees. He covered his face with his hands and began to sob.

Joshua calmly picked up the fallen sword and, still holding it, he walked around and knelt before the weeping murderer. He put his left hand on the man's head.

“Kill me,” the man said. “My life is a burden to me.”

Joshua drove the point of the sword into the ground. Then he took the man's hands in his own and gently pulled them away from his face.

“God has forsaken me.”

“God does not forsake us,” Joshua answered, his voice low, as if speaking to a frightened child. “We forsake ourselves. We lose our way and wander into evil, but the path back to God is always open to us. We have only to repent, to cast off sin like a soiled cloak, and God welcomes us back. A father forgives his son, and God is our Father.”

“God will not forgive me. I killed my father.”

“God forgives all sins. We have but to ask.”

“I have killed many times. I have done terrible things. I cannot sleep at night. The things I have done haunt my dreams.”

“Your sins trouble you. Cast them off. God will cleanse your heart and set you free.”

“God has cursed me for my crimes.”

“You have cursed yourself. Now lift the curse. What is your name?”

“Matthias.”

“‘Gift of God.' Now, accept God's gift of your life. Do you repent of your sins?”

“I repent. I do repent.”

“Then pray with me.”

“I cannot pray.” Matthias's voice was like a cry of pain. “God has made the words die in my throat.”

“Then repeat my words, and God will hear us both. ‘Father who is in heaven.'”

“Father who is in heaven.”

“Sacred is the name of God.”

“Sacred is the name of God.”

“May Your will be done on earth.”

“May Your will be done on earth.”

“Forgive us our sins.”

“Forgive—I can't.” With a child's feeling of helplessness, Matthias shook his head. “I can't.”

“You can. You have merely to repeat my words. ‘Forgive us our sins.'”

“Forgive us our sins.”

“As we forgive those who sin against us.”

“Please, God…” And then, slowly, haltingly, “As we forgive those who sin against us.”

Noah, who was witness to it all, could only shake his head in wonder. He remembered Joshua's dead father, who had despaired of his son, saying, “
How can he be a prophet? The prophets of old performed miracles.
”

Now, Joseph, you have your answer,
Noah thought.
Is it not miracle enough to turn a heart of stone back into living flesh?

*   *   *

It was as if Matthias had been born all over again, and as a mother tends her newborn child, so Joshua stayed crouched on the ground beside Matthias, who seemed as helpless as any infant and was in a state of confusion the newly born are hopefully spared.

Repentance led to hope, and hope, it seemed, was the parent of fear. Matthias wept and prayed and was in terror of God's just wrath as he struggled to accept the idea that he could ever find forgiveness. All the time, Joshua remained with him, speaking to him in a low voice, his hand on the huge man's shoulder that he might not feel himself abandoned.

And as a woman may labor for hours giving birth, so Joshua slowly helped this murderer, this worst of men, to be reconciled with God and with himself.

In the late afternoon Matthias, exhausted by his struggle, curled up on the bare ground and went to sleep. Then Joshua, his knees stiff, stood up and stretched like a man just waking.

“I need to piss,” he said to Noah, the only witness to this act of God's grace. “And then I think I'll take a walk. Will you watch him for me?”

“Of course.”

Joshua stooped over to pick up Matthias's sword from where it lay in the dirt, and handed it to Noah.

“Best kept out of the hands of children,” he said, and walked away.

Out of professional curiosity, Noah examined the blade and decided it was a fine piece of work. He found the maker's mark on the inside of the guard and was pleased to discover that he recognized it. “Suhis of Damascus,” he murmured to himself. “Well, the Syrians have always made excellent weapons.”

Not knowing what else to do with it, he was still holding the sword two hours later, when Matthias woke up.

“Where is he?” he asked, addressing no one in particular—he seemed unaware of Noah's presence. He seemed frightened.

“He has gone for a walk,” Noah answered. “He'll be back.”

Matthias's eyes came to rest on the sword in Noah's hand.

“If you mean to kill me, I wouldn't blame you,” he said.

At first Noah didn't know what he was talking about, and then he remembered. He looked down at the sword blade, and then set it down on a bench beside the door to the house.

“I wouldn't know how,” he said, surprised at his own anger. Then it occurred to him that his reaction was more one of fear than of anger.

“Then you are blessed,” Matthias answered, and then shook his head. “You take a man's life, it changes everything. I will never be innocent again.”

His sincerity was so obvious that Noah could not restrain a feeling of pity.

“I'll get you something to eat.”

He picked up the sword again and carried it with him into the house, where he hid it under a pile of kindling.

The house was empty, but Noah found a pot of cold beans that only needed heating up, and there was bread and a few jars of beer. He made a fire, and in a few minutes he was able to go back outside carrying two plates of food and one of the jars.

They sat together on a bench beside the door. Matthias did the food justice, but he would not touch the beer.

“Why not?” Noah asked him.

“Because when I drink it is to kill thought. I drink until I am too drunk even to dream.”

“A man can choose how much he drinks,” Noah explained patiently, as if such an idea might never have occurred to this man. “Besides, in this instance you are perfectly safe, as there are only two jars of beer and I mean to claim my share.”

Matthias laughed and, after a moment's hesitation, raised the jar to his lips.

“I won't be tempted,” he said. “It's not very good beer.”

Probably it had been meant as a jest, but Noah could not bring himself to laugh. It seemed so odd to be sharing a meal with someone who, only hours before, had intended to kill him.

They ate in silence for a time, and then Matthias said, “I am sorry I hit you.”

“Which time?”

Matthias seemed confused.

“Which time that you hit me are you sorry for? Today, or on the road from Nazareth? In the dark.”

“Both times. And I am sorry I tried to kill you.”

“Well then, we'll forget about it. What are you going to do about Caleb?”

“You know about him?”

“Yes. He becomes vindictive when people don't do what he wants.”

Matthias stared into the distance, considering this. He did not seem stupid, and no one would know better than he what Caleb was capable of.

Finally, he shrugged.

“If he has me killed, so be it. I will stay with the Master.”

“His name is Joshua.”

“I know.”

Joshua came back from his walk and, seeing the two of them sitting together, raised his eyebrows in mock astonishment.

“Then all is well between you?”

“So it would seem.” Noah stood up. “We must talk.”

“About my father?”

“No. About something else.”

“Then come inside.” Joshua glanced at Matthias. “You come as well. We have no secrets here.”

Noah nodded his agreement. “I think it likely he is intimately concerned.”

They went into the house and sat down around a rough wooden table. Joshua found a lamp and lit it.

“Well then, what is it?” he asked.

“You have a spy in your midst. Judah bar Isaac.”

Both of them observed the sudden change in Matthias's face but pretended to ignore it.

Noah then described his interview with the Lord Eleazar, and all that he had learned in Tiberias. “How Judah got into Caleb's hands, I have no idea. He is suspected of having fled after killing a prostitute.”

“I did that,” Matthias said suddenly. “I kidnapped Judah, on the Lord Caleb's orders. The girl drugged his wine, and I killed her to keep her from talking.”

For a moment no one could say anything, and then Joshua touched him on the hand.

“Even for this you have been forgiven, my son. Now tell us what you know of this matter.”

Matthias described everything he had done. “Judah was asleep the whole way to Sepphoris. He must have awakened in his cell. The Lord Caleb has a taste for such things. He likes to put a man's mind in chains.”

“And then, after a few months in Caleb's hands,” Noah said, glancing at Joshua, “Judah comes to you, claiming to have lost all his money and to have taken this as a sign from God.”