Two for Joy

Chapter Ten

After Senator Aurelius left the garden to prepare for the short oration he planned to give to com- memorate the occasion, John and Anatolius-the latter the subject of the senator’s speech-lingered under the peristyle. John noticed the fountain, like the rest of the house and garden, was lavishly decorated by white roses. They almost, but not quite, succeeded in diverting the eye from the rotund bronze Eros at the fountain’s center.

John commented that he was glad to see Aurelius was pleased with Anatolius’ efforts.

“Or pleased that he is about to dispose of my future according to his own ideas of propriety.” Anatolius’ voice betrayed fatigue quite at odds with his demeanor. “But never mind, who knows what may yet happen? Perhaps these Michaelites will march into the city and promulgate their own laws and have no need of my services!”

“That might save you from joining the office of the quaestor but I doubt there would be much room for your preferred kind of verse in a city ruled by zealots such as them.”

“You’re probably right, unfortunately. By the way, have you had time to read that letter I copied out for you? I left it at your house earlier today.”

John was puzzled. A letter? A chill of understanding came to him, like a sudden draught from an open window. He recalled mentioning to Anatolius that first communication from Michael, the letter Justinian had not permitted him to examine. “Anatolius, you didn’t place yourself in danger, did you?”

But Anatolius was already stepping forward, raising his hands to draw attention.

“My dear friends, thank you for joining us this evening.” His voice had regained its usual ebullience. “I understand my father intends to say a few words shortly, but for now the entertainment will continue with a presentation of the Address of the Muses after the fashion of the ancients.”

A murmur of interest rose from the guests. Several settled down on the peristyle’s marble benches while others lounged against its columns.

When all was quiet except for the hiss and pop of torches fending off growing darkness, Anatolius clapped his hands sharply.

A procession of the nine Muses, modestly dressed in elaborately folded robes, appeared from the shadows. They were led by Isis in the guise of Euterpe. Her chubby fingers coaxed a passably grave melody from the flute disappearing beneath the billowing veil disguising her face. The huge semi-naked figure of Darius, sporting tiny gilded wings on his broad shoulders, followed in their wake. A murmur of admiration rose from the spectators as the little procession stopped beside the fountain overseen by Darius’ bronze colleague.

“I thought Darius disposed of those absurd wings when Isis abandoned her Temple of Aphrodite decor?” Anatolius had rejoined John.

“I do think she should occasionally restrain her taste for the theatrical however good it is for business,” John muttered back. “Surely Darius must find the ridiculous costumes he’s obliged to wear very demeaning, even if it is part of his job?”

“But then we all have our jobs to do,” Anatolius said in a disgruntled tone, “whether we like them or not.”

John changed the subject. “When I was a young man at the Academy, Philo once warned us that Aristotle considered flutes to be immoral because their music was overly exciting. This struck me as so ridiculous that I have never forgotten it, but perhaps Aristotle and Isis are privy to knowledge unknown to me.”

“In that case, I’m surprised that Isis does not have whole companies of flautists serenading her clients,” Anatolius replied as the plaintive melody changed to an emphatic keening.

One of the Muses, surely Calliope judging from the wax tablet and stylus she carried, stepped forward and began her recitation. John noted wryly how Anatolius’ attention focused immediately on the meticulously metered words-or perhaps it was on the meticulously painted mouth from which they were emerging. Realizing any comments he might make could never compete with such attractions, he said nothing.

As Calliope continued declaiming, he found himself thinking that there was a comforting familiarity about these soporific entertainments. Epic verse was something John preferred to read for himself in the solitude of his study, uncolored by another’s interpretation and, for that matter, unsweetened by pretty lips.

His attention wandered up to the night sky. The breeze felt cold on his face, reminding him that the seasons turned more rapidly every year, or so it seemed. His thoughts drifted away on the liquid notes of the flute.

A terrible wail yanked his attention back to the performance. At first he thought it was some impossible, piercing noise Isis had managed to wrest from her instrument.

Then he realized it was a scream.

Pandemonium broke out in the garden as a pillar of flame blazed up from the fountain. A dark figure writhed in its midst. Darius had grabbed a vase and was throwing water and roses onto the burning girl, trying futilely to douse the conflagration.

John leapt forward as Isis began to beat at the flames with her bare hands. Shouting a warning in her native tongue, he pushed her aside before her billowing veil could catch fire. She fell to the ground. The Muses shrieked hysterically as John tore off his heavy cloak and threw it over the girl, hoping to dampen the flames. Then, leaping into the shallow basin of the fountain, hardly aware of the cold water splashing around his knees, he helped Darius thrust the girl deeper into the water.

By the time the flames were dowsed and the girl had been pulled from the fountain it was much too late.

It was not Calliope, who stood nearby covering her face with her hands and sobbing, but another.

“Adula,” Darius whispered and then began shouting a string of curses in Persian, so dire as to confound John’s considerable powers of translation. One tiny gilded wing still clung to Darius’ broad back. Screaming obscenities, he ripped off the gauzy conceit and hurled it away in a fury, as if wearing the wings had somehow rendered him impotent to avert the tragedy.

Isis stood beside her charge, shaking and pale, apparently oblivious to the ugly burns already blistering her hands and arms.

“She just burst into flames,” one of the senators said loudly in an incredulous tone. Others shouted their agreement. The silence that had initially descended on the garden in the face of the horrible spectacle gave way to a cacophony of agitated conversation.

“Master,” came Peter’s familiar but trembling voice. He had appeared from the kitchen, Hypatia at his side. “It was heaven’s judgment,” he went on, his voice rising. “Heaven’s judgment upon those who practice an unchaste profession.”

Isis looked at him with hatred.

“You’re burnt, Isis,” John said quickly. “Where is Gaius? He can treat you immediately.”

“I saw him a few moments ago, unconscious in a corner like a common reveler in the gutter,” a nearby senator remarked. He had been staring down, fascinated, at the charred form. John directed a look at the speaker that caused the man to slink hastily away.

“Perhaps Hypatia can make a poultice to treat your burns until Gaius can be roused,” John said to Isis. “You really shouldn’t have tried to beat those flames out with your bare hands, Isis.”

“I had no choice.” She stifled a sob. “I had to try to save my investment, didn’t I?”

John looked around the torch lit garden, struck by a sense that he had overlooked something. He realized what it was. Felix remained inexplicably absent.

“Mithra!” John muttered. “Has something happened to him as well?”

As if summoned by the question, the man’s bear-like figure appeared. To John’s surprise, Felix walked right past the dead girl and stopped in front of Anatolius. The excubitor’s bearded face was grim.

The young man stared at him with alarm. “What is it, Felix?”

Felix paused. His gaze dropped to the ground for an instant and then he forced himself to look up again into Anatolius’ eyes.

“My friend,” Felix said gruffly, “it is your father. He is dead.”

After Felix had placed the exits of the senator’s house under guard and sent one of his men to the Prefect to report the deaths, John accompanied a dazed Anatolius to Aurelius’ study.

The senator was slumped over his desk, under the merry gaze of the frolicking cupids so beloved by the wife with whom he was now reunited. Beneath his hand lay the notes for the speech that would have announced his son’s new appointment. He had planned it to be but the first step toward armoring Anatolius for that dangerous future when the frivolous young man would be left alone to fend for himself. Now, shockingly, that future was already upon him.

John could see that the room was undisturbed. Aurelius’ bluish lips revealed to John what he needed to know.

The senator had been poisoned.

By the time the rising sun turned night into the first day that would go unseen by the senator and the prostitute, the throng of banquet guests had been reduced to a group of excubitors, the Lord Chamberlain and a stocky, petulant shoemaker.

“As I have already told you,” the latter was whining, “my name is Kalus. Surely you must have noticed my large workshops not far from the Forum Bovis. How could you miss them?”

The man’s breath formed a faint mist in the chilly air of the garden. John was grateful for the cold. It was helping him stay alert, for he and Felix had spent the night questioning senators and courtiers one by one before permitting them to leave. Most, he noticed, had been more disgruntled by their personal inconvenience than grief-stricken over their host’s murder. Perhaps it was as well that Anatolius had withdrawn into the house. Now, standing beside Felix, John looked on as the bearded excubitor captain patiently made another notation on Calliope’s tablet.

“Have you written that down correctly this time?” demanded the shoemaker. His fleshy face was red with irritation and his double chin waggled indignantly. “I spoke only briefly to Senator Aurelius last night. As I have already explained, we discussed the possibility of a mutual investment in a shipment of olive oil. I’d thought to use the profits to pay for the family mausoleum I’m having built. Why would I murder a potential business partner?”

“No one suspects you,” John put in soothingly. “Please understand, we need to ascertain if anyone saw anything…”

“And since I am just a common shoemaker, of course I was detained to the very end. That’s always the way, isn’t it?” Kalus puffed out his chest, a pugnacious pose that would doubtless be immortalized in marble in the mausoleum the man had mentioned.

“How do you suppose the emperor’s soldiers would fare against their foes were they to go into battle barefoot?” Kalus railed at them. “At least Justinian knows the value of a good shoemaker.”

“The emperor can always find more shoemakers if he needs them,” growled Felix.

“You questioned those senators right away,” Kalus complained. “Epirus, now, when did he leave? I am worth twice what he can boast, yet he already sleeps in his own warm bed. I have an army of craftsmen under my command. I employ six eunuchs at my summer villa alone.”

“You are free to go,” John said curtly, wondering if the man was trying to be provocative or was just extremely careless in his manner of speaking.

Felix glanced questioningly at John as the shoemaker marched off. “He didn’t say anything about the girl, you notice. Should I summon him back?”

John shook his head tiredly. “I don’t think we need hear anyone else tell us one instant they were listening to Calliope’s recitation and the next Adula was on fire. As if by magick, or as if the hand of God had struck her down, or she was consumed from within, whichever way they wished to put it.”

Hearing John repeat the same descriptions they had been listening to all night, Felix admitted he supposed that John was right.

Looking around the garden which had seemed so festive only a few hours before, John noticed a small bird perched on one of the ivy garlands decorating the peristyle. For the bird it was a morning like any other. Its world was no different. It was fortunate indeed, John thought. The subtle political maze through which the court moved changed each time a person of rank died. What had once been an open path might be blocked, a former barrier perhaps removed. What had the senator’s death changed? It was too early to ascertain.

The bird took flight, vanishing into the sky, and John, wishing he could fly off as easily, forced his attention back to the matter at hand.

“Nor do we need anyone else to assure us that they never left the public rooms, Felix,” he said, “not to mention that of course they had no notion of where Aurelius had gone, let alone which room he used for his study. Was it a politically motivated murder, do you suppose?”

Felix scratched his unruly beard. “Aurelius’ death? The method would suggest it. It’s been my experience that the ambitious resort to the blade only after lawyers and poisons have failed.”

“Poison also suggests premeditation. But what of the girl Adula?”

“A obvious diversion, most probably inspired by the fiery deaths of those stylites.”

“There’s also the senator’s diplomatic mission to be considered. There may well be some in this city who would prefer not to see any negotiations at all carried out. But it could also have been a purely personal affair,” John suggested.

“You’re thinking of Gaius, aren’t you? I heard him arguing with Aurelius myself. But we both know Gaius is a drunkard, not a murderer.”

John nodded agreement. “However, I fear he can be a violent drunkard. I have noticed his servants bruised on more than one occasion and I suspect he beats them when he is in the arms of Bacchus.”

“Not praiseworthy, perhaps, but violence toward a slave can’t be compared with violence toward a senator. The former is an owner’s prerogative, after all.”

John admitted that that unfortunately was true.

“You might as well suspect that old man you’ve been harboring,” the excubitor captain continued. “He was grumbling bitterly about Aurelius to anyone who would listen. A foolish man for a philosopher, if you ask me. Athens must have been a safe place indeed for his tongue to have survived to such an age.”

“I’ll caution Philo again about that when I get home. He certainly poses a danger, but only to himself.”

Felix nodded and called out an order to one of his men.

“I’ll keep guards at the outer doors while we search the house, John, but the rest of my men can go back to the barracks now that we’re almost done here.” He paused. “Thank Mithra that Anatolius’ mother did not live to see this.”

“As you say, Felix,” John replied. “But before I leave, I must attempt to speak with Anatolius again.”

The youthful servant Anatolius had left to guard the study door replied to John’s query as he had to all those made earlier. The master was in mourning and wished to be alone with his thoughts.

As the youth recited the rote message his gaze darted back and forth as if he were looking for a place to hide. Clearly he was terrified of offending the Lord Chamberlain. However, he remained at his station by the door.

“I must respect his wishes, of course,” John told him. “What is your name?”

The servant looked even more terrified. “It’s Simon,” he stammered.

“Well, Simon, when I do finally speak to your master I shall tell him that you carried out a difficult task very diligently. He will be pleased, and since he is now head of the household, this tragic night may well serve to start you on the way to a bright future.”

To John’s surprise Simon’s face clouded with disappointment before he replied, his voice breaking. “Pardon, your highness sir, but I had hoped the old master would free me in his will.”

“Yes, of course. He may just have done so,” John told him, then added gently, “But there are thousands of freed men in this city who labor at far worse jobs than serving a man like Anatolius.”

Before the servant could reply, a strident voice echoed from the entrance hall, demanding that Senator Aurelius come out of hiding without delay.

John arrived at the hall to find Felix arguing with a man whose patrician features were familiar to everyone at the palace. And not only his features. Senator Balbinus’ orations were renowned for being as noisy as the slapping of thongs against the oracular brass plate at Dodona.

“As I have been trying to tell you,” Felix was saying, “the senator will not be seeing anyone again. He is dead.”

Senator Balbinus abruptly ceased fulminating and his face settled into a frown. John noted the dark smudges under the eyes and the half-healed wound, a long scratch, running along one cheekbone.

“It’s true that we had our differences of opinion,” Balbinus said, “but still, I am very sorry to hear this most shocking news. A great loss to the senate and to the empire. But if I may inquire…”

“There will be an official announcement in due course,” said John. “And now tell me, senator, what business did you intend to conduct here at such an early hour?”

“It was of a personal nature.” Balbinus’ hand moved to the nascent scar on his cheekbone. Catching the glance exchanged between the other two men, he blustered on red-faced. “The streets become more unsafe every day. A couple of Blues set upon me within sight of the Chalke. The factions grow bolder by the hour. Where are those engaged to protect good citizens like me?”

“I’m sure those ruffians took to their heels when you unleashed your oratory at them,” snapped Felix, taking the senator’s question as a personal insult.

Balbinus ignored his remark. “Please extend my sincere condolences to his son. He is a most astute young man, for a poet.”

After Balbinus departed, Felix made as if to spit his disgust but looked at the artfully patterned tile floor and refrained. “There’s one who’ll obviously be happy to deal with the son rather than the father,” he said tartly.

“There are plenty of others like him,” observed John. “They might be surprised when the time comes.”

“I hope so,” sighed Felix. “But I wouldn’t bet on it. If I were still a betting man, that is.”