The Legatus Mystery

Chapter Twenty-three

He had been strangled. As I bent over him with my taper that much was clear, not only from his mottled face and bulging eyes but from the dark bruises visible around his throat. I turned back the folds of his elaborate gown to examine him better. Poor young priest. Something swift and terrible had caught him from behind, and tightened inexorably around his neck until his swollen tongue was forced between his lips. There was a mark under the left ear where the ligature had been looped into a knot.

I shivered, and not only because the night was cold.

‘As I thought, master,’ Junio said, at my elbow. ‘There was no blood on him.’

Junio had not known Trinunculus. To him this was just another body on the ground, but I remembered only too well the earnest, affable manner, the almost-too-great willingness to talk.

I nodded. ‘I think Marcus should see this,’ I said. ‘Go and tell him, Junio. I don’t know what’s delayed him; he should be here by now.’

The centurion, who had been standing restlessly behind me watching all this, saw an opportunity to take control. ‘No need for that, citizen. I’ve got soldiers here. Third rank, escort duty-’ He stopped. There was a commotion at the inner gate, a group of moving figures and a whole galaxy of lights. ‘Perhaps there is no necessity.’ The officer seemed almost disappointed as he motioned his soldiers to stand down. ‘That seems to be His Excellence now. And the high priest with him, by the look of it.’

I nodded. Even at this distance and through the trees, I could make out a large embroidered canopy supported by the slaves, the torchlight dancing on the goldwork of its threads, and two figures sheltering under it. The canopy did not surprise me. It was obviously designed for use in the procession (such things were not unusual) and would be convenient if the threatened rain began. But the appearance of the pontifex brought problems of its own.

‘Very well,’ I said to the centurion. Experience has taught me that a confident manner is best in such situations, however uncertain one might feel inwardly. ‘Have your soldiers carry this body to the robing room. It can be laid there and prepared for decent burial. I believe you have a bed there, Meritus?’

The sevir nodded, without enthusiasm. I could sympathise. The presence of a corpse in the room, even briefly, would require expensive and extensive ritual to purify it again. ‘But. .’ he began, looking to Scribonius for support.

The sub-sevir gave it instantly. ‘The temple is no place for death,’ he said. ‘The body should be taken to its home and made ready for the funeral pyre. Anointers, and professional mourners, if there is no family to lament, with proper candles, grave-goods and a feast.’

‘Trinunculus was lodging in the high priest’s house,’ I pointed out. ‘We can hardly take the body there without permission — the pontifex must not look on violent death. When it is properly prepared and cleansed, perhaps. It’s possible the pontifex will even choose to read the rites himself. But in the meantime, we can’t leave it here. For one thing it isn’t fitting for a priest, and for another, the pontifex is coming. It’s no less unfortunate to him to see it here.’

There was a certain amount of muttering, but four soldiers formed a platform with their shields, and the remains of Trinunculus were lifted reverently on to it.

‘Go with him, Scribonius,’ Meritus said softly and his balding assistant, who had been watching whey-faced, began an incantation as they lurched away.

The centurion looked at me.

‘And get rid of that abomination in the shrine,’ I said.

‘But, citizen, the gods-’

‘Are more offended by its presence there than they will be by its removal.’ I spoke with conviction. ‘Anyway, the responsibility is mine.’

He looked at once helpless and repelled. ‘What shall we do with it?’

I thought a moment. ‘Have them take it to the paupers’ pit. I think that may be where our killer got it from.’

Meritus shot me a piercing glance. ‘You think so, citizen?’

I nodded. ‘An explanation has occurred to me. That body of a beggar that was found, which Marcus ordered should be taken to the pit — it was scarcely more than bones, from what he said. Everyone here must have known of that — and where else could such a thing be found? It would not be difficult to get it back; those places are not guarded carefully. One body more or less would not be missed.’

‘But how did it get back here?’ That was the centurion.

‘Somebody must have carried it,’ I said. ‘Someone, obviously, who knew that it was there.’

‘All of us knew that, citizen,’ Meritus put in. ‘I gave orders for the burial myself. But who could have gone out to bring it here? And when? With all the rituals, we have been occupied — and there were mobs of people at the gate — somebody would have seen!’

The centurion snorted. ‘Of course they would. The whole idea’s impossible. No one could carry a thing like that through the streets without attracting interest from the watch.’

Meritus looked thoughtful. ‘Hirsus and Scribonius did go into the market, briefly, to purchase sacrificial doves — the pontifex had used the only ones we had in the temple. But there was no time for them to do anything like this. I was preparing to read the auguries, overseeing the cleansing of the shrine — you remember it had been desecrated again? — and by the time I’d finished they were back again. Besides, how could they have got through the gates with that?’

I had no answer, and I shook my head.

Hirsus began to wail. ‘I did not bring it, citizen. By all the gods I swear. I would not dare touch such an appalling thing-’

I cut him off. ‘It is appalling, and a sacrilege. That’s why it must be moved, and quickly before the pontifex arrives. He and his party are already on their way. Do it — on the authority I hold. There is no time to lose.’

The centurion made off, still grumbling, and I heard him giving orders to the guard.

Meritus looked at me. ‘The pontifex is not quite on his way. Something has delayed him. Look — they’ve stopped.’

They had. When I looked more closely through the trees I could see that the whole little procession opposite had halted. There seemed some sort of disturbance at the gate, though there was little noise. I looked at Junio, took my torch, and hurried over to investigate, with Meritus and Hirsus at my heels.

Once clear of the sacred grove it was easier to see the scene, though as I skirted round the shrine of Jupiter the shadows were so deep I almost lost my footing on a stone. By contrast with the torchlit scene ahead, the night elsewhere seemed blacker and more ominous than ever.

I could see them clearly now: the high priest, wearing a ceremonial stole and with the little diadem round his brow shining against the whiteness of that ridiculous white cap, gesticulating feebly with his hand; my patron, holding himself aloof under the shelter of the canopy; and at least a dozen household slaves, some carrying the canopy, the others equipped with torches. And a struggling figure in a cloak and tunic — now being dragged forward into the light by another group of baton-wielding slaves.

I stopped at a respectful distance, out of the range of flying batons — I had no wish to find myself caught up in the scuffle. It would not take long. The prisoner was resisting fiercely, but he was no match for a retinue of slaves. Behind me, I heard Hirsus catch his breath.

At the same moment, I saw who it was. I turned to Junio, who was standing at my side. ‘Lithputh!’ we whispered, almost in unison.

The steward was struggling bravely but they had him now. He stood there, breathing heavily, his cloak ripped from him and his tunic torn. Then one of them hit him savagely across the back and head, and suddenly he slumped, all opposition gone. Two slaves took him by the armpits and dragged him like a sack towards the house, his feet trailing uselessly behind him on the path. A trickle of blood ran down his face and his eyes were closed, but even though his head lolled forward he was breathing still.

‘They are not to bind him!’ I heard the high priest say. ‘Oh Jupiter, Greatest and Best! All this when we have a procession to arrange.’ And he tottered off in agitated pursuit, followed by a number of his slaves. Only Marcus remained under the canopy, accompanied by two attendants with their lights. They too seemed ready to retrace their steps.

I stepped forward. ‘Excellence?’ I could not have timed it with more precision. At that moment a flash of lightning lit the sky and a rumbling growl of thunder followed it.

There was pandemonium. Slaves began rushing to and fro, wailing and shouting. ‘Dear Hercules! The very voice of Jove!’ one of them exclaimed, and Hirsus — behind me — began to sob. ‘It is all fate. They will kill him. Everything is doomed.’

The first heavy drops of rain began to fall.

Marcus alone seemed unperturbed. He gestured me to come and join him under the canopy, though the slaves who were supporting it looked at me nervously.

‘Nothing to worry about now,’ he assured them breezily. ‘We’ve caught the man who’s responsible. Found him lurking here outside the gate, next to the pontifex’s house! He must have been here all the time, my old friend. Not like you to overlook something like that. Still, what does it matter, since we caught the scoundrel?’ He had that benevolent, self-congratulatory air which meant that he was inwardly delighted with himself.

The slaves seemed somewhat — though not wholly — reassured by this, and when he added, ‘Shall we go in and see what he has to say when he recovers consciousness?’ they had recovered themselves sufficiently to walk back through the gate, keeping the cover carefully over Marcus’s head.

It was raining really heavily by now, and I felt sympathy for poor Junio, who could only follow in the driving wet. Meritus, I noticed, had pulled up his hood, as though he were about to sacrifice again, but Hirsus was walking behind us like a man asleep — the water simply coursing down his face and mingling with his tears.

Marcus made no attempt to invite them to come and join our shelter. ‘I presume this is our murderer,’ he said cheerfully, as we picked our way back through the peristyle. ‘I see his tunic-edge is smudged with blood. He must have been responsible for it all.’

I shook my head. I still could not believe it. ‘Lithputh? I don’t understand.’ Water had seeped through the thick embroidered canopy and was beginning to drip uncomfortably on my head, while my hems were sodden with the bouncing spray, so I was glad when we reached the shelter of the house.

Marcus stepped through the door into the ante-room, leaving the shivering slaves outside to fold the canopy away. ‘You know the man?’ he said, without a backward glance, as the sudden withdrawal of the cover left me standing in the rain.

‘He is the steward of Honorius Optimus,’ I said, following him gratefully inside. ‘The ex-officer whose pavement I was laying’ — I was about to say ‘yesterday’, since it seemed impossible that so much had happened in a few short hours, but I caught myself in time — ‘earlier today.’

I sat down on the stool provided next to his, and gave him an account of what I’d witnessed, while a pair of slaves removed our wet sandals and washed and dried our feet. I saw Hirsus and Meritus come in, drenched with the rain, and be shown a place to sit and wait their turn. Junio had not appeared — bundled away to the servants’ waiting room, no doubt. I hoped that he was provided with a towel.

‘Well,’ Marcus said as — our warmed damp shoes having been returned to us — we were led away and the servants turned their attention to the seviri. ‘This must be a relief to you. No need for public self-flagellation, now that the guilty party has been found. I’ll have a proclamation made in the forum, since no doubt the procession will be delayed in any case. The thunder will be taken as a sign.’

I was tempted by this line of thought. If Lithputh was found guilty by popular acclaim, then Marcus was quite right, I would escape and this whole incident would quickly pass. Why not permit the Phrygian to take the blame, although it left so many questions unanswered? Why meddle with affairs which seemed to have so providentially arranged themselves? But the punishments for sacrilege were harsh — usually involving death by ordeal — and those for killing priests were harsher still. Lithputh was vain and self-important, but nobody deserved a fate like that.

Besides, I was beginning to develop a different theory of my own. I said as we were led towards the atrium, ‘Of course, even if Lithputh was involved, he cannot have done all this alone. A man would have to be familiar with the rituals, and know his way about the temple perfectly. I wonder what Lithputh was doing at the shrine?’

Marcus was sharp. ‘I should have thought that it was obvious. A bleeding corpse, a murdered priest — and then a man with bloodied clothes nearby? You have a better explanation, perhaps?’

He was rebuking me, and I deserved it, too. My suspicions were still not strong enough to voice. ‘Not that I can think of, Excellence,’ I said meekly, and followed him into the room.

Lithputh was there, still unconscious on the ground where they had thrown him face down in an ignominious heap. All the same, his arms were still restrained — a pair of hefty slaves had hold of them, ready to drag him to his feet the moment he woke, as he was showing faint signs that he might do. A group of other slaves was nearby, and so was the pontifex, who had ignored the chair that had been set for him, and was pacing abstractedly before the altar. He turned to face us as we entered.

‘Ah!’ he exclaimed. ‘At last! Be pleased to seat yourself, Excellence, and then, please gods, send for your troops and have them take this accursed slave away. We should lock him up, before Jove visits any more miseries on us tonight. And you are here too, pavement-maker! What’s this I hear about a pile of bones? Don’t look so startled, citizen. One of your torch-bearers has been telling me.’

The little slave who had fled the shrine, I guessed. I gulped, ready to tell the story once again, but Marcus (who had taken the proffered chair) was already telling it — how Lithputh had killed the messengers, and tried to hide his crimes by smuggling the first body from the shrine, and changing the other for the beggar’s corpse. ‘No doubt, if we had them search the public pit, we’d find the other body we were looking for,’ he finished. He looked at me triumphantly. ‘Well, Libertus, what have you to say? You disagree with my analysis?’

I did, on several counts, but I know better than to ‘disagree’ with Marcus, especially since Meritus and Hirsus were now being ushered in. Marcus did not like to be contradicted even in private. In front of witnesses I must be a dozen times more circumspect.

‘I’m sure you’re absolutely right, Excellence,’ I said. I gave him time to smile before I added, apologetically, ‘In some respects.’

His smile grew tight, but I had done enough. He nodded.

‘Had you considered, Excellence,’ I ventured, ‘that there might be only one body here?’ An appeal to his intelligence was better than a simple explanation, as I knew.

He frowned for a moment, and then his forehead cleared. ‘I see. You mean that the body yesterday might be the same one as the priests saw today?’ I was aware of a tense hush around the room. Everyone was listening carefully to this. Then the smile reappeared, more broadly. ‘Indeed it might! Perhaps the substitution was intended to take place earlier — after all, the body of the tramp was there! But why? Simply to terrify the populace?’

Marcus could be a clear thinker when he tried, though his account was not exactly accurate.

‘Something very much like that, Excellence,’ I said. There was a rustle of relief around the room.

‘One body, then,’ he said. ‘Two if you include Trinunculus.’

I bowed my head. ‘Exactly, Excellence.’

The high priest had whirled around. ‘Trinunculus!’ he gasped, and I realised with horror that this was the first the old man had heard of the death of his assistant priest. It had shocked him deeply, by the look of him — his face was whiter than his robes, and his pale eyes seemed to have lost their gleam.

This time it was Meritus who explained — his voice so resonant that even the pontifex could hear — ‘Strangled, Mightiness! Probably a cord, or band — the soldiers found him lying in the grove. He must, I now realise, have been coming here — there was an angry mob outside the gate, and it would have been difficult for him to pass. I know you told him, Pontifex, to summon other priests to the procession. I imagine he had simply hoped to go out this way. But this worthless wretch’ — he gestured to the inert figure on the floor — ‘must have been loitering, and encountered him.’

‘Who is he, anyway?’ the high priest asked, his voice no more than a ghostly whisper. ‘I seem to have seen him somewhere before.’ He came forward to have a closer look, and the two slaves lifted up the lifeless form for him to see, then dropped it back cruelly, so that the head struck the floor.

‘Lithputh,’ I murmured, but Hirsus stepped forward. His anxious rat-face was more strained than ever, but he found an uncharacteristic courage from somewhere.

‘Don’t hurt him any more,’ he begged. ‘He didn’t kill anyone, not Luce. .’ His voice broke and he burst into sobs. For two quadrans, I realised, he would have flung himself to the floor beside the Phrygian and bathed him in tears.

But he had started to say ‘Luce. .’ and I was staring like a fool. The scattered pattern settled into place, and I saw what I should have seen hours before. The slave that Hirsus loved and hoped to ‘set up a household with’ — why had I assumed that it was a woman? Hirsus, who visited Optimus’s house when its owner wasn’t there. I’d seen him walking from there in a cloak, and taken him for a female myself!

I turned to face the pontifex.

‘I called the prisoner Lithputh, Mightiness,’ I said. ‘But that is not rightfully his name — merely a nickname I gave him with my slave. I think his slave name is Lucianus. “Lucianus the wretched” as he calls himself.’