"Yes, I know, Judith," he answered, and stood up. He was so tall that he had to bend his head in order not to strike it against the ceiling. His beard hung down in thin strands; it was not yet grey, despite his pale, tired face.
"They will stone you, Levi, if you continue to serve the Romans," exclaimed the woman.
"They hated me even when I did not serve the Romans," said the man. "Since that Feast of Tabernacles at Tiberias when I said that Mammon and desire of luxury had estranged the God of Abraham from the chosen people, and subjected them to Jupiter, they have hated me."
"But you yourself follow Mammon," she returned.
"Because since they hate me I must create a power for myself which will support me, if all are against me. It is the power with which the contemned man conquers his bitterest enemies. You don't understand me? Look there!" He bent down in a dark corner of the chamber, lifted an old cloth, and displayed to view a stone vessel like a mortar. "Real Romans," he said, grinning; "soon a small army of them. And directly it is big enough, the neighbours won't climb on to the roof and sing praises to Levi with pots and pans, but with harps and cymbals."
"Levi, shall I tell you what you are?" exclaimed the woman, the muscles of her red face working.
"I am a publican, as I well know," he returned calmly, carefully covering his money chest with the cloth. "A despised publican who takes money from his own people to give to the stranger, who demands toll-money of the Jews although they themselves made the roads. Such a one am I, my Judith! And why did I become a Roman publican? Because I wished to gain money so as to support myself among those who hate me."
"Levi, you are a miser," she said. "You bury your money in a hole instead of buying me a Greek mantle like what Rebecca and Amala wear."
"Then I shall remain a miser," he replied, "for I shall not buy you a Greek mantle. Foreign garments will plunge the Jews into deeper ruin than my Roman office and Roman coins. It is not the receipt of custom, my dear wife, that is idolatry, but desire of dress, pleasure, and luxury. Street turnpikes are not bad at a time when our people begin to be fugitives in their own land, and with all their trade and barter to export the good and import the evil. Since the law of Moses respecting agriculture there has been no better tax than the Roman turnpike toll. What have the Jews to do on the road?"
"You will soon see," said Judith. "If I don't have the Greek mantle in two days from now, you'll see me on the road, but from behind."