Six for Gold (6 page)

Chapter Twelve

Anatolius stopped halfway up the steep incline. He bent over and stood, staring down at his boots and catching his breath. His destination, the house of Senator Symacchus, sat atop the ridge overlooking the Golden Horn. It was all but invisible from below, hidden by apartment buildings, warehouses, workshops, and bakeries piled in a jumble of brick and mortar along the hillside.

After his heart stopped pounding, Anatolius took a deep inhalation and continued the climb. He cut from one precipitous street to another, navigating by the only part of the senator’s dwelling he could see—the monumental rooftop cross that towered above everything else.

Except for this ostentatious declaration of religious belief, the late senator’s home turned out to be as modest as many of its neighbors. The unremarkable brick facade offered no clue to the high status of its departed owner.

At Anatolius’ rap, the sturdy door opened a crack.

“Can I help you, sir?” A wan face peeped out.

“I’ve come from the palace on a matter of business.”

There was movement behind the narrow gap, a chain rattled, and the door swung open. “If you have an appointment with the senator, I fear he will not be able to see you.” The deep voice didn’t match the young man’s slight frame.

“I’m aware of your master’s tragic passing. I’m investigating the matter.”

The young man gestured Anatolius into a long, dim vestibule and shut the door. “From the palace, sir? For a heartbeat I was afraid…but never mind. One has to be very careful these days, and of course with the senator so recently departed…”

The servant’s boyish face was exceptionally pale and framed by long fair curls. He looked familiar but Anatolius couldn’t recall any previous meeting.

“I will be reporting to the captain of the excubitors,” Anatolius said, truthfully. “I wish to ask the servants a few questions, in case they can shed light on this recent tragedy. And you are…?”

“My name is Diomedes. As to whether I can help, I will try, but I was merely the senator’s reader.”

Diomedes led the way into the atrium. The spotless black and white floor echoed similar tiles lining the ornamental pool gracing the airy space. A cross hung on a whitewashed wall, while an alabaster statuette of a crocodile displayed on a pedestal looked strangely at odds with the general impression of stark Christianity.

Light spilled down from the compluvium and through the open entrance to an inner garden, visible beyond an austere office.

The light accentuated the heavy powder on the young man’s face. Anatolius now remembered where he’d seen the servant before. It was in the halls of the Great Palace a few years earlier, among the band of similarly made-up and ubiquitous court pages.

Now, however, Diomedes was too old to serve as a decorative object.

“First, I wish to talk to the senator’s head servant,” Anatolius said.

“Achilles? I fear he is not here.”

A faint smell of herbs and flowers filtered into the atrium.

“Then we shall talk in the garden.”

Anatolius selected a bench shaded by a stunted fig tree. The location had the benefit of keeping their conversation private as well as allowing it to be conducted out of sight of most of the crosses sprouting from flower beds set around the edge of the green, quiet space.

He indicated they should both sit. “My understanding is that the senator lived alone, apart from his servants?”

Diomedes confirmed this had been the case. “His wife died many years ago. She was Egyptian, and distantly related to the Apions. You may have noticed the household still reflects her influence.”

He directed Anatolius’ attention to a statue of the jackal-headed god Anubis which squatted in a patch of herbs.

“That explains the crocodile in the atrium,” Anatolius observed. “And so the senator had connections by his marriage to a very influential family?”

“Indeed, sir. The master also had extensive holdings here and in Egypt.”

“In view of his death, presumably you will be looking for other employment and lodgings?”

“Oh, I shouldn’t think so! The senator had no children, but he had an estranged brother, not to mention a half-brother, and a number of more distant relatives. More than a few of them live in Egypt, and doubtless they’ll all journey to Constantinople to pay their respects now that he’s gone. The Quaestor’s office is overseeing the estate until everything is straightened out. They’re moving as fast as the law allows. Since the senator’s family will be staying here while they visit, and many visits may be necessary, I might well grow gray here.”

He brushed a stray curl out of his face. “Not that I care to go gray.”

“What was it you read for the senator? Religious works? I understand he was widely known as a devout man.”

“He was of the opinion it was one’s duty to read the scriptures oneself, sir. To commune directly with the Word, as he described it. No, I read the classics for him. He loved Homer especially, and especially the way I read it. He used to say my voice could bring the dead back to life. If only it were true…”

Anatolius wondered whether master and servant sometimes sat together on this bench for such readings. Sheltered from all sight of the symbol of their faith, it would have been easier to hear the voices of those writers who believed in the old gods. “Can you think of anyone who might have wanted to kill your master? Had he lately quarreled with anyone, for example?”

“Not a soul, sir. For all his wealth and power my master was as upstanding a Christian as any desert hermit. Everyone knew of his charitable works, although he forbade any of us to speak about them. It was not just a question of monetary donations, either. For instance, he often took in court pages who had outgrown their usefulness.”

“You were once a page yourself, I believe,” Anatolius said.

“Yes, sir, I was. The senator gave many of us work and shelter. Otherwise we would have been on the street when we were turned out after becoming men. He was much-loved.”

Anatolius asked the servant for a description of the household.

“I’m the wrong person to ask, sir. While I was his reader, I also helped here and there on occasion, doing weeding or occasional cleaning, that sort of thing. Mostly, however, I spent my time in my room up on the third floor. We readers must constantly practice our orating to gain the full effect when declaiming texts, you see. So I can’t tell you much about what went on in the household. Achilles, now, he could have told you everything about everyone.”

“When do you expect him back?”

“He won’t be returning.”

“He’s left the city?”

Diomedes made the Christian sign. “No, sir. The truth of the matter is, well, Achilles has been dragged down into the underworld. Yes, demons came and took him away!”

The servant cast a frightened look over his shoulder as if he expected to see fiends lurking in the laurel or sunning themselves in a flower bed.

Dropping his voice to a whisper, he continued. “It was about a week ago now, on the very night the master was murdered. My room is at the front of the house, so it overlooks the street. It was a few hours after sunset, and glancing out I noticed three or four men—or so I thought them—were just leaving the house. I couldn’t see who they were since they were moving away so briskly and by then of course it was quite dark. Nothing about them struck me as familiar, but Achilles was with them.”

“You are certain of it?”

“I cannot be mistaken, sir. I know him well and could identify him easily. He is bowlegged, you see, and quite bald. I was puzzled but not alarmed until just as the last man was about to go around the corner after the rest, he turned and seemed to look straight at me!”

Again Diomedes made the Christian sign. “It was no man, sir. It was a demon from the pits of hell! And nobody has seen Achilles since!”

Chapter Thirteen

The crocodile nosed its way along a channel that sliced through the towering reeds stretching stiff fingers up from Lake Mareotis.

The boat for which the carved reptile served as a prow slid along behind. As the vessel glided through the water, it moved in and out of patches of shadow where smaller paths had been cleared for the benefit of those who lived on the lake’s islands.

The maze of passages reminded John of the hallways of the palace’s administrative buildings.

A startled heron flapped into the air.

Down a narrow corridor where the sky was a blue sliver glimpsed above marching ranks of reeds growing so thickly a wider boat than theirs could not have passed between them, John glimpsed a fisherman emptying a net filled with wriggling silver into his small craft.

Fortuna had smiled, John thought. He had found a captain willing to take Cornelia, Peter, and himself up river for the amount they had earned from a single, excruciating performance, and on a boat embarking within the hour.

The captain carried a full cargo of wine amphorae as well as a quantity of timber lashed to the deck Anything extra by way of payment from the half dozen or so passengers he was transporting was a gift from the gods, the more so since it would not need to be reported to the boat owner.

Soon the vessel left marshes and reeds behind and entered a network of canals that would eventually take them to the Nile. John and Cornelia sat on deck and watched men working the fields, laden donkeys plodding patiently along, and nut-brown children waving from muddy banks. Compared to the heat and noise of Alexandria, the boat was an oasis of calm.

After a while Peter approached. He was beaming.

“What an interesting country this is, master! It’s one thing to pour the wine, but quite another to see the grapes used to make it, being grown in such odd ways.”

He waved a hand at the vineyard past which they were sailing. Workers watering the vines waved back. “That one has vines growing up poles, but the one we saw after we left the lake had vines on a sort of trellis.”

“What a keen eye for detail you have, Peter,” Cornelia said.

“Thorikos pointed it out to me, mistress. He’s the stout fellow in brown robes.”

Cornelia nodded. “With the embroidered stripes down the sides.” She turned to John. “He has a rubicund face, or at least a rosy nose. His shape reminds me somewhat of a pear.”

“He was a deacon in Cilicia,” Peter put in, “and he kept a wine-importing business on the side. He’s very comfortably off. We got into a conversation about his travels. Since he’s getting on in years and has no family, he decided to spend his savings to see the world. He says that although he misses the comforts of home, so far it has been most interesting.”

“There are endless wonders to be seen in Egypt,” John said.

“That’s exactly what I said, master! Thorikos has never been to Constantinople either. I ventured to suggest he should make it his next destination, once the plague has gone. Lord willing that be soon.”

Peter waved his hands again. “And then Porphyrios chimed in and said he was of the same opinion—a traveler hasn’t seen a great city until he’d visited Constantinople. So of course I told them all about the palace and the court. I may say they were impressed.”

John exchanged concerned glances with Cornelia. Peter’s garrulous nature might turn out to be a cause for concern. It was part of the reason he did not care to reveal everything he knew concerning his mission. Not everyone had trained their tongue as well as he had. Still, it was always wise to know with whom they were travelling, especially when night fell.

“Who is Porphyrios?” John asked.

“A charioteer. He’s raced at the Hippodrome. A fascinating fellow. He said that dogs always run along the bank when they drink from the Nile, to avoid being dragged in by crocodiles! We must be careful, master!”

“I hope you aren’t developing a fear of those creatures before you ever see one,” Cornelia said. “What other stories was this character telling you?”

“He mentioned that auburn hair is considered ill-omened in Egypt. Thorikos was horrified and said he was glad his had long ago turned gray. Though he regretted that as it was also thinning, it did not protect his scalp from the glare of the sun very well.”

“Porphyrios sounds like quite the teller of tales,” John observed.

Peter nodded enthusiastically. “Indeed, master. He also told me the Blue racing team are superstitious about anything green.”

“I suppose that’s not surprising given their bitter rivalry with the Green faction,” Cornelia said. “What’s Porphyrios doing in Egypt?”

“It’s another remarkable story, mistress. It seems he’s been exiled.”

“Did he say why?” Cornelia asked.

Peter shook his head. “No, and he looks the sort of man who wouldn’t appreciate being pressed for details. Besides, no sooner had he told us than he launched into a detailed account of every race he’s been in, and what’s more, insisted on showing off that odd-looking belt of his. He had it woven from the team’s reins after his last winning race, hoping it will bring him good fortune.”

“What about that little man who’s as black as a Nubian? The beekeeper?” Cornelia wondered. “I notice he rarely leaves his hives unattended.”

“He was the first person I talked to after we came aboard. He speaks quite passable Greek. I didn’t realize those clay cylinders were hives until he told me. I asked him why he was traveling with his bees, and he said he followed the spring flowers every year. He sells a fair bit of honey. It’s used for everything from curing headaches to dressing wounds.”

“I expect he does a brisk trade,” Cornelia replied.

“He told me some terrible tales about crocodiles too, mistress. They leap up and drag people off the river bank or even boats and devour them before anyone realizes a companion has gone!”

“What’s this beekeeper’s name, Peter?” John asked, glancing toward the stern where, he noted, the disgraced charioteer and the itinerant beekeeper were now in deep conversation.

“Apollo.”

“The ancient sun god!” Cornelia said. “What an appropriate name for a beekeeper, when sunlight is so vital to the flowers from which bees take their sustenance.”

The unwelcome, unspoken thought came to John. To the ancients bees represented souls.

He hoped it was not a bad omen.