Alexandria

XXXVII

Mammius and Cotius came to see me next morning. Being soldiers, they had been up and about since dawn. They made sure they arrived while we were eating. They had already been fed at their barracks, but I knew the rules. I let them sit down for a second breakfast. Uncle Fulvius was never at ease with the military, so he escaped with Cassius. Pa stuck it out annoyingly. He had a way of listening in on private conversations that made my bile rise.

In return for our food and a sit-down, the lads would have told me anything. I suggested they stick to facts, however.

The centurion Tenax had sent them, following his conversation with me, because they were the pair who had responded to a request from the Great Library six months ago. Theon had called them in. 'About lost scrolls?'

Yes, but to my surprise, it was nothing to do with the eccentric old scholar Nibytas.

'Never heard of him. This was a strange upset. A heap of stuff from the Library had been discovered by a member of the public on a neighbourhood rubbish dump. The Librarian had gone incandescent. If you like volcanic explosions, it was pretty to watch. Then we all trogged along to pull the dump apart -'

Helena pulled a face. 'That cannot have been pleasant!'

Mammius and Cotius, two born sensationalists, enjoyed themselves describing the joys of Egyptian rubbish dumps. Both passed over the ordinary mass of combs, hairpins, pot shards, pens and inkwells, oil lamps – with and without oil spillage – the occasional perfect winecup, many an amphora, even more jars of fish-pickle, old clothes, broken brooches, single ear-rings, solo shoes, dice and shellfish detritus. They listed more eagerly the half-rotten vegetables and fish-ends, they spoke of bones, grease, gravy, mouldy cheese, dogshit and donkey-do, dead mice, dead babies and live babies' loincloths. They claimed to have unearthed a complete set of currency-counterfeiting implements, perhaps discarded by a coiner who had had a fit of conscience. They had barked their shins and grazed their knuckles on spars, bricks and bits of roof tile. Then there were layers of love letters, written curses, shopping lists, laundry lists, fish-wrappers and discarded pages from lesser-known Greek plays. Amongst these documents, which were clearly chucked out from private houses, had been a great jumble of tagged scrolls from the Library.

'So how had those ended up in a dump?'

'We never found out. Theon dug them back out himself, brushing off the dirt as if they were his personal treasures. He bundled them on handcarts from the Library and wheeled them back safely. To begin with everyone made a great fuss. There was supposed to be a full enquiry, but next day a message came for Tenax that the Librarian had uncovered what it was all about, so our intervention was not needed.'

The thought of these two lumpish red tunics poking around the sacred cupboards of the Great Library, fingering the Pinakes with their stubby, filthy digits, then noisily shouting dumb questions at bemused scholars and fraught staff, told me just why Theon had dropped it officially. But had he then pursued this incident himself?

'If venerable works have been walking off the shelves in murky circumstances, I can see, darling,' Helena suggested to me, 'why people at the Museion might have thought Vespasian was sending you to Alexandria to be an auditor.'

'But Theon would have been well aware he had not bumped up the issue to imperial level. He hadn't requested an official recount.'

'Is that what you do, Falco?' Mammius asked, all sceptical innocence. 'Go into places and count things?'

'Is it, Marcus?' Helena ate a roll stuffed with goat's cheese in an extremely mischievous manner. I would get her for that later. She was still thinking about Theon. 'He was the one who choked with horror when I asked him how many scrolls there were.'

'Maybe he was very sensitive to criticism. Perhaps he was scared he would be blamed if other books had been lost… So what did you think had been going on?' I asked the soldiers.

They were just square-bashers. They had no idea.

'Sounds like somebody weeded the cupboards and storage stacks without asking the Librarian first,' scoffed Aulus.

'And the Librarian did not like their choice,' agreed Albia.

I grunted. 'It sounds to me as if the Librarian asked some half-baked assistant to reshelve some outstanding returns that had been littering up the place for months. Instead of sorting out the mess, the assistant just filed the scroll mountain in the ''Not needed'' skip, to avoid doing any work.'

'You have such a jaded view of underlings,' Albia tutted.

'That's because I have known so many.'

Mammius and Cotius seemed to feel they were being got at. They stuffed a few last chunks of bread into their fists, saluted and made off.

My father had eavesdropped without interruption, but now he just had to weigh in. 'Seems you were brought here to dig out a swamp of corrupt practices.'

I served myself a new slice of smoked ham, a task that required silence and concentration lest I cut myself on the very sharp thin-bladed knife. While I was at it, to prolong the activity I did slices for Helena and Albia. Aulus held out his bread too.

'All right,' agreed Geminus patiently. He recognised my delaying tactics. 'You weren't brought here for that. I believe you. You came on an innocent holiday. Problems just float up to you, wherever you take yourself.

'If I attract problems, it's inherited, Pa… What's your interest anyway?' As usual when talking to my father, I immediately felt like a surly teenager who thinks it is beneath his dignity to hold a civil conversation with anyone over twenty. I had been one once, of course, though I did not have the luxury of a father to be rude to at the time. Mine had run off with his lady love. When he reappeared, renaming himself Geminus instead of Favonius, he behaved as if all those intervening years never happened. Some of us would not forget.

Pa produced a sad smile and his personal brand of annoying forbearance. 'I just like to know what you are up to, Marcus. You are my boy, my only surviving son; it's natural for a father to take an interest.'

I was his boy, all right. Two days in the same house and I understood why Oedipus had felt that burning urge to strangle his kingly Greek papa even without recognising who the bastard was. I knew mine too well. I knew that behind any interest he took there must be a suspicious motive. And if I ever met him in a chariot at an isolated crossroads, Marcus Didius Favonius, known as Geminus, might disappear, complete with his chariot and horses, and no need to waste time on dialogue first…

'Settle down, Pa. I don't know what you're wheedling for. I'm here because Helena Justina wants to see the Pyramids -' She favoured us with her own little knowing smile. 'You go and get on with whatever tricks you are up to with Fulvius. Don't fret about any convoluted Egyptian schemes that have been going on at the Library. I can sort out a few book fiddles. Their days are numbered.'

'Is that so?'

Pa consulted Helena with a sceptical look. Her word was law with him. He had convinced himself that a senator's daughter was above practising deceit, even for the usual family reasons.

'That's right,' she confirmed. She was extremely loyal – and hilariously inventive. 'We expect to have the full facts any day now. A report for the authorities will be cracked out straight away. Marcus is on to it.'

Helena had just imposed a time constraint, though I did not know it yet.