It wasn’t that we had never seen a city before. Jerusalem was fifty times larger than Sepphoris, and we had been there many times for feast days, but Jerusalem was a Jewish city—it was the Jewish city. Sepphoris was the Roman fortress city of Galilee, and as soon as we saw the statue of Venus at the gates we knew that this was something different.
I elbowed Joshua in the ribs. “Graven image.” I had never seen the human form depicted before.
“Sinful,” Joshua said.
“She’s naked.”
“Don’t look.”
“She’s completely naked.”
“It is forbidden. We should go away from here, find your father.” He caught me by my sleeve and dragged me through the gates into the city.
“How can they allow that?” I asked. “You’d think that our people would tear it down.”
“They did, a band of Zealots. Joseph told me. The Romans caught them and crucified them by this road.”
“You never told me that.”
“Joseph told me not to speak of it.”
“You could see her breasts.”
“Don’t think about it.”
“How can I not think about it? I’ve never seen a breast without a baby attached to it. They’re more—more friendly in pairs like that.”
“Which way to where we are supposed to work?”
“My father said to come to the western corner of the city and we would see where the work was being done.”
“Then come along.” He was still dragging me, his head down, stomping along like an angry mule.
“Do you think Maggie’s breasts will look like that?”
My father had been commissioned to build a house for a wealthy Greek on the western side of the city. When Joshua and I arrived my father was already there, directing the slaves who were hoisting a cut stone into place on the wall. I suppose I expected something different. I suppose I was surprised that anyone, even a slave, would do as my father instructed. The slaves were Nubians, Egyptians, Phoenicians, criminals, debtors, spoils of war, accidents of birth; they were wiry, filthy men, many wearing nothing more than sandals and a loincloth. In another life they might have commanded an army or lived in a palace, but now they sweated in the morning chill, moving stones heavy enough to break a donkey.
“Are these your slaves?” Joshua asked my father.
“Am I a rich man, Joshua? No, these slaves belong to the Romans. The Greek who is building this house has hired them for the construction.”
“Why do they do as you ask? There are so many of them. You are only one man.”
My father hung his head. “I hope that you never see what the lead tips of a Roman whip do to a man’s body. All of these men have, and even seeing it has broken their spirit as men. I pray for them every night.”
“I hate the Romans,” I said.
“Do you, little one, do you?” A man’s voice from behind.
“Hail, Centurion,” my father said, his eyes going wide.
Joshua and I turned to see Justus Gallicus, the centurion from the funeral at Japhia, standing among the slaves. “Alphaeus, it seems you are raising a litter of Zealots.”
My father put his hands on my and Joshua’s shoulders. “This is my son, Levi, and his friend Joshua. They begin their apprenticeship today. Just boys,” he said, by way of apology.
Justus approached, looked quickly at me, then stared at Joshua for a long time. “I know you, boy. I’ve seen you before.”
“The funeral at Japhia,” I said quickly. I couldn’t take my eyes off of the wasp-waisted short sword that hung from the centurion’s belt.
“No,” the Roman seemed to be searching his memory. “Not Japhia. I’ve seen this face in a picture.”
“That can’t be,” my father said. “We are forbidden by our faith from depicting the human form.”
Justus glared at him. “I am not a stranger to your people’s primitive beliefs, Alphaeus. Still, this boy is familiar.”
Joshua stared up at the centurion with a completely blank expression.
“You feel for these slaves, boy? You would free them if you could?”
Joshua nodded. “I would. A man’s spirit should be his own to give to God.”
“You know, there was a slave about eighty years ago who talked like you. He raised an army of slaves against Rome, beat back two of our armies, took over all the territories south of Rome. It’s a story every Roman soldier must learn.”
“Why, what happened?” I asked.
“We crucified him,” Justus said. “By the side of the road, and his body was eaten by ravens. The lesson we all learn is that nothing can stand against Rome. A lesson you need to learn, boy, along with your stonecutting.”
Just then another Roman soldier approached, a legionnaire, not wearing the cape or the helmet crest of the centurion. He said something to Justus in Latin, then looked at Joshua and paused. In rough Aramaic he said, “Hey, didn’t I see that kid on some bread once?”
“Wasn’t him,” I said.
“Really? Sure looks like him.”
“Nope, that was another kid on the bread.”
“It was me,” said Joshua.
I backhanded him across the forehead, knocking him to the ground. “No it wasn’t. He’s insane. Sorry.”
The soldier shook his head and hurried off after Justus.
I offered a hand to help Joshua up. “You’re going to have to learn to lie.”
“I am? But I feel like I’m here to tell the truth.”
“Yeah, sure, but not now.”
I don’t exactly know what I expected it would be like working as a stonemason, but I know that in less than a week Joshua was having second thoughts about not becoming a carpenter. Cutting great stones with small iron chisels was very hard work. Who knew?
“Look around, do you see any trees?” Joshua mocked. “Rocks, Josh, rocks.”
“It’s only hard because we don’t know what we’re doing. It will get easier.”
Joshua looked at my father, who was stripped to the waist, chiseling away on a stone the size of a donkey, while a dozen slaves waited to hoist it into place. He was covered with gray dust and streams of sweat drew dark lines between cords of muscle straining in his back and arms. “Alphaeus,” Joshua called, “does the work get easier once you know what you are doing?”
“Your lungs grow thick with stone dust and your eyes bleary from the sun and fragments thrown up by the chisel. You pour your lifeblood out into works of stone for Romans who will take your money in taxes to feed soldiers who will nail your people to crosses for wanting to be free. Your back breaks, your bones creak, your wife screeches at you, and your children torment you with open, begging mouths, like greedy baby birds in the nest. You go to bed every night so tired and beaten that you pray to the Lord to send the angel of death to take you in your sleep so you don’t have to face another morning. It also has its downside.”
“Thanks,” Joshua said. He looked at me, one eyebrow raised.
“I for one, am excited,” I said. “I’m ready to cut some stone. Stand back, Josh, my chisel is on fire. Life is stretched out before us like a great bazaar, and I can’t wait to taste the sweets to be found there.”
Josh tilted his head like a bewildered dog. “I didn’t get that from your father’s answer.”
“It’s sarcasm, Josh.”
“Sarcasm?”
“It’s from the Greek, sarkasmos. To bite the lips. It means that you aren’t really saying what you mean, but people will get your point. I invented it, Bartholomew named it.”
“Well, if the village idiot named it, I’m sure it’s a good thing.”
“There you go, you got it.”
“Got what?”
“Sarcasm.”
“No, I meant it.”
“Sure you did.”
“Is that sarcasm?”
“Irony, I think.”