The Rome Prophecy

89

Tom and Valentina eat at their hotel.

Federico stays with them for a glass of wine, but gets a call from his wife and says he has to leave.

Left alone, they leisurely pick their way through a platter of Tuscan prosciutto, before seeing off two small but delicious plates of mushroom risotto. A particularly fine and fragrant bottle of Vermentino di Gallura runs out during their main course of fresh lobster, pasta and salad.

‘More?’ asks Tom, holding the bottle aloft.

She pulls a face. ‘Would you hate it if we didn’t?’

‘Of course not.’

They both know what it means. The meal is heading to a close. Work is rearing its ugly head.

Tom mops a little of the lobster sauce with a piece of torn bread. ‘Are you starting to think about Anna?’

‘A little.’ She pins some pasta down and starts to twirl it on her fork. ‘Though I’m trying not to.’

‘And Louisa?’

‘Also.’ Her appetite’s gone now. Killed by hearing the names Anna and Louisa. ‘When I try to make sense of everything that’s happened – the murder, or murders, Anna’s death, and this latest development with Louisa – my head feels like it’s exploding.’

Tom understands. ‘I don’t know how you cope with such horrors as part of a daily job. I came upon death quite a lot as a priest, but nowhere near on the scale that you do, and there was seldom the same amount of violence involved.’

She untwists the speared pasta and uses her knife to scrape her fork clean. ‘You know, murder is usually straightforward. Wife kills cheating husband. Cheated-on husband kills cheating wife. Jealous jilted lover kills reunited husband and wife, that sort of thing.’

‘Plus the drug killings.’

‘Plus the drug killings. Then there’s not much more on the spectrum until you reach serial killers.’ She pushes her plate away from her. ‘Where do you think sociopathic cults or paedophile gangs fit in?’

‘Somewhere between the mentally ill and the spree killers? You want coffee or anything?’

‘ Non, grazie.’ She picks up her glass and swirls the last of her wine.

Tom tries to beckon a waiter to pay the bill, but has no luck. ‘You remember the number ten came up when we first talked about Cybele and the cults and the myths of the other sibyls, the prophetesses?’

Valentina has to force herself to remember. ‘Something to do with the number on the shelf at the depository where the poor left their cremated loved ones.’

‘The Columbarium, that’s right. Well, it’s been driving me crazy. I realised afterwards that while ten doesn’t mean anything to me, nine does.’

Valentina sits back. She fears a long and difficult story is about to keep her from the soft comforts of her bed. ‘Treat my brain gently. I’ve had a few glasses of wine, I’m stressed to the limit. And I’m getting very tired.’

‘Okay, I’ll make it simple.’ Tom blots his mouth with a white napkin before he begins. ‘According to Roman mythology, a sibyl offered nine books of prophecies and wisdom to Tarquinius Superbus, the last king of Rome, in return for a vast fortune.’

She grimaces. History – Roman or otherwise – was never her strong subject. ‘For how much?’

‘No idea. I don’t think anyone ever knew. Legend just says it was a fortune. Anyway, Tarquinius says no deal, and so the sibyl burns three of the books and then says she wants the same amount of money for the remaining six. Tarquinius still says no deal, so she torches another three.’

‘Plucky girl.’ Valentina drains the dregs of her glass in appreciation. ‘She’d be my choice to beat the Deal or No Deal banker every time.’

‘So, we’re down to three books, for which the sibyl demands exactly the same amount of money she did for the original nine. This time Tarquinius cracks and hands over the cash.’

‘Why? What made these books so valuable?’

‘Good questions. Sibyls were prophetesses. As well as foresight, apparently these texts gave great advice on what to do as and when disasters fell upon the empire.’

‘A sort of Dummy’s Guide to Pestilence and Plague?’

Tom can’t help but laugh. ‘Yes, if you like. Joking aside, the three sibylline books that remained were so treasured that they were kept in a guarded vault in the Temple of Jupiter on the Capitoline Hill. They were only brought out and consulted during times of crisis.’

‘Such as?’

‘Pretty much what you said: famine, pestilence in the agricultural areas, meteor showers, slave rebellions, invading armies, those kinds of things.’

‘I’ve never heard of these books. Are you thinking that they somehow have a connection with Anna and all her alters?’

‘We know there’s a connection to Cybele; it’s pretty likely that that extends to associated cults and the sibylline books or teachings.’

‘I suppose these books are in Latin or Greek or something horribly hard?’

‘Worse. They’re gone.’ Tom catches the eye of a passing waiter. ‘ Il conto, per favore.’

The young man nods and takes a split second to check out Valentina before waltzing away to get the bill. ‘The temple they were kept in was burned down and the books destroyed along with it.’

‘If only they’d backed it all up on hard disk,’ jokes Valentina.

‘Actually, they tried to do what I suppose is almost the ancient equivalent of that. They had scribes write down verbal accounts given by everyone and anyone who’d ever read or heard anything from the books. They called the new volumes the Sibylline Oracles.’

It makes her laugh. ‘God, could you imagine asking everyone who’d read the Bible to give their own account of various passages and lessons? It would be hysterical!’

Tom sees the funny side. ‘Or maybe a best-seller. Uncharac teristically, the Church seems to have missed a trick there.’

The waiter arrives with a small bill on a big silver plate.

Tom counts out cash and adds a handsome tip, despite the fact that the young man can’t stop staring at Valentina.

‘I guess you get that a lot?’ he jokes as the waiter glides away.

‘Never happened before,’ she says innocently. ‘You ready for bed?’

Tom puts down his napkin and courteously steps behind her chair to hold it as she rises. ‘I’ve been ready since we got rid of Federico almost two hours ago.’