Read Online My Glorious Brothers by Howard Fast - Free Book Online Page B

as a school by day and a village center at night and a house of prayer when the sun was rising or setting, studying and poring over the scrolls, but I was not so minded when the sun shone and the birds sang and my heart sang back. I was in love, and an hour without Ruth was dark and endless.
    We learned each other then. She made me probe myself, reach into myself and see what that subtle and bitter thing between Judas and me was, what it meant. How well she knew me, this tall and beautiful woman! How little I knew her! I remember once when I spoke to her—and I did not speak of it again—about Judas, and she turned on me almost in a fury:
    â€œYou said you knew Judas—you don’t know him! And you don’t know me. I’m not a person to you, alive, a human being!”
    I looked at her, long-legged and high-bosomed and regal—and more of a person than anyone I had ever known.
    â€œIs it the old times?” she said. “A man had ten wives and ten concubines, and if a child was a girl, her name was not even recorded! If I have a daughter—”
    â€œYou?”
    â€œIf I have a daughter,” she said, “will it be precious to you, and good?”
    â€œIf you have a daughter,” I said.
    â€œSimon, Simon—what are you afraid of? Judas is a great and beautiful man, and so are you. I’ve always known that. When I came into your house, I came into the house of Mattathias and his sons, and it was like no other house, no other house. Shall I get down on my knees to you, Simon?”
    â€œOh, my darling, my darling.”
    â€œSimon, when you know me, you will not be afraid any more. I promise you. I’ll be strong for you, Simon. There are bad times coming; I know that, and I know where the sons of the Adon will be; but I’ll be strong for you, Simon. We have such a long life ahead, so much of it, so much—and someday it will be as it was, with the whole land quiet and gentle in the sunshine…”
    She loved the land the way I loved it, the way a Jew can love the land and the fruit of it. She was fertile and I would have sons and daughters to follow me—and the old seed would be planted again and ever again. I told the Adon that in a month we would be married.
    â€œYou’re a man,” he said, “and past the marriage age. Why do you tell me?”
    â€œBecause you’re my father and I want your blessing.”
    â€œYet you didn’t ask me.”
    â€œI love her and she loves me.”
    â€œWhere is your brother?” the Adon said.
    â€œDid I send him away? Did he tell me where he went? Is that my whole life—Where is my brother?—always, Where is my brother?”
    â€œIs it your life?” the Adon asked somberly. “Your life is God’s, not mine, not yours. There is grief all over Israel, yet nothing matters but your happiness.”
    â€œIs that wrong?”
    â€œDo you talk to me of right and wrong, Simon ben Mattathias, or of what is just and what is unjust? Have I whelped you so poorly that you are not a Jew, that the Law is not a covenant with you? Have you forgotten already that we were slaves in Egypt?”
    â€œA thousand years ago!” I cried.
    â€œAnd was it a thousand years ago,” the Adon said coldly, “that you went to the Temple and saw what I saw?”
    ***
    I told Ruth.
    â€œHe is an old man, Simon,” she said. “What do you expect? When he went to the Temple, his heart broke.” Her eyes searched mine. “Simon, Simon—”
    â€œGod help me!”
    â€œSimon, do you love me?”
    â€œAs I never loved anything on earth.”
    â€œIt will be all right, Simon, I promise you.”
    I avoided Mattathias’s roof tree when I could. I sat in the house of Moses ben Aaron, who had loved me since I was a child, and listened to his rambling tales. This was her home and she was with me, her hand ready to touch mine, her eyes ever looking