The Bread
The boy came off the cut bank feet first and struck the stones below hard enough to throw one sandal into the reeds.
Two men reached for him.
Yeshua was between them before either had a grip.
“Leave him down.”
The boy lay twisted at the edge of the crowd with a basket under one shoulder. His eyes were open. He had drawn breath but had not let it go.
Yeshua moved the basket. He put one hand against the boy’s ribs and waited until the held breath broke loose. No blood came from the mouth. The boy followed a finger with his eyes and gave his name when asked. His right hand closed around Yeshua’s fingers. The left did the same.
“Where?”
The boy pointed at his lower leg.
The leg had turned under him in the fall. Dust covered the skin from knee to ankle. No bone showed. The ankle had already begun to thicken above the strap of the sandal.
Yeshua cut the strap instead of pulling it over the swelling. He pressed two fingers against the top of the foot, then pinched each toe and watched the color return.
“Can you feel that?”
The boy nodded.
“And that?”
Another nod.
The people nearest the boy had closed around them. Beyond the ring, John stood on the wet margin where the baptisms had stopped. Men leaned over one another to hear what Yeshua would say. He said nothing to them.
“Two straight staffs,” he said. “Two litter poles. A mat. Cloth.”
Andrew went.
He returned with two tamarisk staffs, two longer poles from the shade shelter, a rolled sleeping mat, and a clean sash taken from his own bag. Yeshua split the sash down its length. He folded one strip along the leg for padding, then laid the staffs from the heel to the thigh. He tied them above the knee, below it, and loosely above the ankle. He left the toes uncovered.
The boy’s hands had found the front of Yeshua’s cloak. They held there.
“You will feel the lift,” Yeshua said. “You will not feel the ground.”
Andrew unrolled the mat. They threaded the longer poles through its edge loops and brought the litter beside the boy. Yeshua set one forearm under the shoulders and the other beneath the hips. Andrew supported the heel and the back of the knee. They moved him once.
The boy cried out and bit the sound off against Yeshua’s shoulder.
Then he was on the mat.
Yeshua checked the toes again.
Andrew found the lost sandal in the reeds and shook the sand from it. He put both sandals through his belt.
“His people are in Pella,” a woman said. “Near the lower press.”
The straight road climbed from the camp through a shelf of broken limestone. A cart track bent south along the water before rising through the olives. It was twice the distance and wide enough for two men to carry level.
Yeshua looked at the stone shelf, then at the litter poles.
“The lower road.”
Andrew took the rear ends. Yeshua took the front. They lifted.
The people opened a path.
The boy watched the sky move between the poles.
At the first stand of cane, Yeshua called a halt. They lowered the litter without tilting it. He touched the toes, loosened the lower tie by a finger’s width, and gave the boy water in three small mouthfuls.
“How far?” the boy asked.
“Past the press.”
The boy turned his face toward the road again.
They passed the steep path where it came down from the ridge. Andrew looked up it. From there a man could see John’s whole camp laid along the river, the white baptism cloths, the smoke, the crowd that had come to hear what the returned Galilean would do.
“They will wait,” Andrew said.
Yeshua shifted the pole on his shoulder. “John is with them.”
They lifted again.
The cart track had washed out at one place where winter water cut across it. Yeshua stopped before the broken ground. The right edge was firm but narrow. The left was wide and soft from the river.
He stepped into the wash alone. He pressed his heel into the left side and sank to the ankle. On the right he tested three stones with his weight, moved one loose stone out of the way, and set two flat pieces into the gaps.
“Your side first,” he told Andrew.
Andrew crossed backward one pace at a time. Yeshua kept the front low until the rear poles reached firm ground, then came through. The litter stayed level. The boy did not cry out.
At the olive press they rested again. A woman carrying pulp to the waste heap gave them a cup of water and pointed to the boy’s house. The father was already running toward them.
He reached for the litter.
“Walk beside him,” Yeshua said.
The man took the boy’s hand. He walked with it pressed between both of his own all the way to the door.
The mother came out with flour to her elbows. She dropped the cloth she carried and bent over the mat, saying the boy’s name until he answered her. Yeshua asked for the bed nearest the wall, a folded blanket, and water. She brought all three. He and Andrew carried the litter inside and set it down beside the mat. They lifted the boy once more, kept the leg straight, and raised the splint on the folded blanket.
“The bone man lives by the upper gate,” the father said.
“Bring him.”
The father ran.
The dough on the workboard had dried at the edges. Andrew picked up the fallen cloth and covered it. He fed olive twigs into the oven, filled a cup from the household jar, and held it while the mother lifted the boy’s head.
“Keep him down when he says he can stand,” Yeshua said.
The boy said, “I will not.”
His mother put a hand flat against his chest.
Andrew took the sandals from his belt. The cut strap hung from the smaller one. The boy watched it.
“It was new,” he said.
Yeshua held out his hand to the mother. “An awl?”
She brought one from a box near the oven. Yeshua sat on the threshold with the sandal on his knee. He cut the damaged end square, pierced a new hole through the leather, and drew the shortened strap through it. He tested the knot with both thumbs and set the sandal beside the mat.
The boy reached down and put two fingers on its sole.
The bone-setter came with the father. He was an old man with oil on his sleeves and a stick worn smooth from carrying. He asked how the boy had fallen and pressed along the splint with careful fingers.
“Leave it as it is today,” he said. “I will come at first light.”
The mother washed the dust from the unhurt leg. The father held the cup this time. Andrew turned the dough, added water where the skin had formed, and worked it with the heel of his hand until the mother came back to the board. Yeshua carried the litter poles out of the doorway and stacked them against the wall.
The sun moved from the door to the far wall.
The mother set food on a low table. Olives, onions, and one round barley loaf baked dark at the rim. She tore the loaf and gave the first piece to Yeshua.
He took it. Andrew received the next.
They ate beside the mat while the boy slept.
When the light left the room, the father asked Yeshua to stay the night.
“I will come back,” Yeshua said. “I must speak with John.”
The mother wrapped the remaining bread in its cloth and left it on the table for his return.
On the road back Andrew asked when the public work would begin.
“After John has finished his.”
“In Judea?”
“Galilee first.”
“And what will you ask men to do?”
“Know the Father and live as his sons.”
They walked through the washed place. The stones Yeshua had set remained under their feet.
Andrew asked who would go with him.
“Those who choose the work.”
The campfires showed through the cane ahead. Andrew stopped before the last bend.
“I have watched you since Capernaum,” he said. “I watched you with John. I watched you today. I do not understand all you teach. I want to go with you and learn it.”
Yeshua turned back.
Andrew stood with the boy’s dust across his tunic and the mark of the litter pole dark on one shoulder.
“I would be glad of you, Andrew.”
The camp noise came through the cane. Someone sang the evening hymn.
They went in together.
John was wringing river water from his hair beside the last fire. The day’s wet cloths hung from a line behind him. Beyond the fire, Simon sat with the weighted edge of a net across his knees.
Andrew crossed to his brother.
Simon kept his eyes on the cord. He pulled the next knot tight enough to bend it.
<3EKO
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