See Delphi and Die

47

treasuries were bathed in light beneath a monochrome blue sky of deep intensity. The cockerel who woke us this morning was still crowing in the distance. Somewhere nearer, a bullock bellowed, hoarse with anxiety." We did the tour. Now let's you and I talk about my mission, Barzanes.'

"Your mission, Falco?'

It was Falc onow. Among my group I had been" Uncle Marcus' or" Marcus Didius'. So while we had been inside the temple, someone had told the guide my third name. Olympia seemed deserted, but I had been noted. Somebody had known in advance that I was coming. Presumably, too, rumour had whistled around on sweet little wings to proclaim why.

Maybe a god had betrayed me; I doubted it.

"I am trying to imagine how it can be.' To begin with, my voice was quiet but heavy." Travellers come here, just like us. Like us, they must all be overwhelmed by their experience. This is a place where humankind is at its finest – nobility of body, allied to nobility of spirit.' Barzanes was about to interrupt me, but he held back." Athletes and spectators assemble here as a religious rite. To honour their gods. To dedicate themselves to high ideals. Offerings are left in the olive groves. Oaths are sworn. Training, courage, and skill are applauded. Guides exalt that spirit to the travellers…' My voice hardened. I had a message to send to the establishment here." And then – let's imagine it, Barzanes – somebody in this holy place shows his barbaric nature. A young bride, barely two months married, is murdered and dumped. Tell me, Barzanes, are such things understandable? Are they common? Do the gods in Olympia accept this cruel behaviour – or are they outraged?'

Barzanes lifted his uneven shoulders. He remained silent, but he had dallied to speak to me and there must be a purpose. Perhaps it had been decided by the priests that this issue should be cleared up at last.

I knew better than to hope for it.

"The group in question was brought by an outfit called Seven Sights Travel. Regulars on the circuit. A fellow called Phineus leads them.'

At last Barzanes nodded and spoke up. Everyone knows Phineus.' I gazed at him but could not detect his opinion of the man.

"They must have been shown around the site,' I said." It would have been part of their deal, because this year they certainly were not here for the Games. Phineus must have booked a local site guide. Was it you, Barzanes''

Barzanes came up with the kind of weak excuse I had heard in so

many cases. "The guide "who took that tour is no longer here.'

I scoffed." Run away?'

Barzanes looked shocked." He has finished for the season and returned to his village.'

"I guess that will be a very remote village, very many miles away… So did he talk about this group, at the end of the day, when you guides were sitting together gossiping? If not, did he comment on them, after the girl was dead?'

Barzanes smiled gently.

Helene Justina came out from the temple, carrying a scroll. After a quick glance at what was going on, she positioned herself within earshot, while pretending to engross herself in the letter.

I was not giving up." Tell me what happened, Barzanes.'

"Pilgrims come here constantly. Exercises, sacrifices, prayers, consultation of oracles – even out of season we hold recitations by orators and poets. So tours of the Altis are regularly provided.'

"But any guide would remember a tour where someone who took part was later brutally murdered. How many were there in the Seven Sights group?'

Barzanes decided to co-operate." Between ten and fifteen. There was the usual mix. mostly persons of some age, with a few young ones – adolescents who kept wandering off. One woman kept asking silly questions and a man in the party gave her answers, wrongly.'

"Sounds typical!' I smiled.

Barzanes acknowledged it." Unfortunately so. Afterwards, the guide could not even remember the bride and her husband. They had made no impression.'

"So they were just listening quietly, subdued by the unfarmliarity of travel… Or had they worn themselves out in the marriage bed?' I grinned. Barzanes gazed at the footpath.

"They were sleeping in tents, Marcus!' Helene broke in." Barzanes, would a group like the Seven Sights not stay at the Leomdaion?'

"If no persons of rank were in occupation, it would be allowed. But only if they paid. Otherwise their organiser would bring tents, or hire them. Much cheaper. Phineus would know how to do it. If the intention is to visit many festivals, he will carry his own equipment in the baggage train.'

I wondered if the newly-weds had understood this limitation when they booked in. I could imagine the toothless agent in Rome, Polystratus," forgetting' to mention that the tourists would be camping." Barzanes, those good people wanted to be enthralled by

your special site. Olympia owes them respect for their tragedy. So what happened to them?'

The guide shifted his feet." Among hundreds of people travelling around Greece, there will always be deaths, Falco.'

"We are not talking about heart attacks caused by sunstroke or overeating at feasts.'

"Valeria was battered to death, Marcus.' Helene's voice was cold. Aulus must have supplied this information; it did not match the bland details we had heard from the mother-in-law back in Rome." Juno, Aulus says she was killed with a weight.'

"A weight?

"A long-jumper's hand weight.' Young Glaucus would have to tell us more about these implements.

"Her head was smashed with it.' Barzanes knew that all right.

I scratched my chin, thinking. What had happened to Valena Ventidia – a ferocious attack, not far from her companions, with the body left in open view – bore little resemblance to what had apparently happened to Marcella Caesia three years earlier – unexplained disappearance, then discovery only much later, in a remote spot. The foundation for our visit was that these two women's deaths were linked. Not that discrepancies would stop me investigating both.

"Barzanes, we were told the girl's body was discovered "outside the lodging house." But if the party were camping, that doesn't fit. I cannot believe she was beaten to death in public, within a few feet of her companions. They would have heard the disturbance.'

Unused to speculating on crimes, the guide looked vague.

"She wasn't killed near the tent. Her husband discovered her, Marcus.' Helene was still skimming through her letter." He found her dead at the palaestra, then he carried the corpse back to the camp. Witnesses saw tears streaming down his face. He was hysterical and wouldn't leave her. He had to be separated from the corpse almost by force. But the big issue in the investigation was whether Statianus seemed like a distraught husband or a deranged killer.'

"The magistrate released him,' I reminded her." Though release is not always exoneration.'

The story was taking a dark tone. I began to see why Aulus had been intrigued when he met the group. And I wondered whether Tullia Longina, the mother-in-law in Rome, had told us the truth as she knew it, or toned it down. Nobody who knew these details could call Valeria's death an" accident'. Was Tullia Longina minimising the

horror to seem more respectable, or had Statianus lied in his letter to his mother? I did not necessarily condemn him for that. Any boy has to fib to his ma from time to time.

"Most people decided there was no proof- but the husband must be guilty,' Barzanes commented.

"Easy option.' My voice grated." Best for everybody here that the foreigners brought their own killer – and then took him away with them. The establishment can forget all about it.'

"You're being rude,' Helene reproved me softly.

"It was sacrilege!' raged Barzanes. Which told us for sure just how the sanctum priests viewed it – and why they wanted a cover-up.

Unfortunately we were then interrupted. Our youngsters came pelting out through the temple porch behind us. They had glowing faces, still enthralled by the Statue of Zeus.

"We saw the god's face right up close!' Gaius was bursting with excitement." The statue is made from enormous sheets of gold and ivory – it's hollow with a huge support of wooden beams inside.

"Full of rats and mice!' squealed Albia." We saw mice running about in the shadows!'

"Nero tried to steal the statue. Gaius, the natural leader of this little group, had found another guide and grilled him." But the god let out a huge burst of raucous laughter so the workmen fled!' Like me, Gaius avoided spiritual explanations. He lowered his voice tactfully. "It may have been the supports shifting, after the workmen disturbed them.'

I looked around. In the turmoil of their arrival, the tour guide Barzanes had made good his escape. I reckoned if I ttried to find him another day, he would be missing from the site.

Cornelius had a brisk attitude to wonders. So, Uncle Marcus! This is a grand place here – so where will you be taking us to next?'