Our Man in Alexandria

by Gavin Chappell

  ‘Yes, sir,’ said Ozymandias. ‘You’re right, we’ve had news of Carpocrates.’

  Paulus Alexander gripped his sword hilt. ‘You have?’ he barked. ‘Where is he? Call out the guard at once.’

  ‘No,’ said Ozymandias, flapping a hand. ‘Tribune Flaminius says we must proceed with caution. We can’t arrest them without evidence of wrongdoing. Imperial directive.’

  ‘We can arrest them,’ said Paulus Alexander. ‘Particularly if they’re not Roman citizens. We just won’t be able to hold them long without charging them. And if we have no evidence…’

  ‘That’s what the tribune is obtaining,’ Ozymandias said. ‘He’s going to infiltrate the Christians and gather evidence against them. He wants us to surround the ruined temple while the ritual is being performed inside, then raid it and arrest them all.’

  Paulus Alexander turned to the slaves. ‘Wait here,’ he instructed. Then he took Ozymandias up the steps and back into the palace.

  All was quiet at this late hour, although guards still stood at the main doors. The corridors and stairwells lay in shadow and silence. Slaves were mopping the mosaic floor. In Paulus Alexander’s office, dust danced in the dim light from shuttered windows. The commander lit a lamp and settled himself behind his desk. Ozymandias sat cross legged on the floor.

  ‘We need to plan this properly,’ Paulus Alexander said. ‘You’re certain that Carpocrates will be present at this ritual? Who is your source? Is he reliable?’

  Ozymandias squirmed. ‘My source is my sister,’ he said.

  ‘Your sister?’ Paulus Alexander’s eyes glinted in the flickering lamplight. ‘What does she know of Carpocrates?’

  Ozymandias scowled. ‘It seems that she has been a Christian for years,’ he said. ‘She joined them not long after I was enslaved. She knows all of them, where they meet, what they do…’

  ‘And you knew all this and did not tell me?’ Paulus Alexander snapped. ‘You knew where Carpocrates would be and did not tell me?’

  ‘This is all news to me,’ Ozymandias assured the commander. ‘I knew she had fallen in with a group of outcasts while I was not there to support her. I took her away from them, and hoped she had no more dealings with them. But I couldn’t keep an eye on her while I was at work. I knew she had friends I did not know…’ He explained how she had come to confess.

  ‘You allowed her to associate with Christians,’ said Paulus Alexander flatly. ‘They seem to have an irresistible fascination for women, I can’t understand it. So now we have a chance to arrest Carpocrates. He is the one who matters. We will not worry ourselves about the rest. We must go the Old Judaean Quarter and surround the ruined temple when the ritual begins. Then we will seize Carpocrates. It’s about time he met justice. I think an example needs to be made. Noon in the hippodrome[1], Carpocrates will be the star attraction—and perhaps a wild beast or two.’

  ‘But Tribune Flaminius said we are to wait until he has evidence,’ Ozymandias protested.

  ‘Scribe,’ Paulus Alexander said reprovingly. ‘I have seconded you to this imperial agent, just as I did with the last. But you take your orders from me. Is that understood? Now you will go there with a group of picked men and arrest Carpocrates.’

  Ozymandias gritted his teeth. ‘What of the man who murdered Julius Strabo?’ he said. ‘Flaminius came here to find out who killed the centurion.’

  Paulus Alexander studied the Egyptian closely. ‘Does he know who that is?’ he asked. ‘If so, we should arrest him.’

  ‘He thinks that if he can arrest the whole cult,’ Ozymandias explained, ‘he will be able to interrogate them and find out which one of them it was who killed Julius Strabo.’

  Paulus Alexander shook his head. ‘Obviously it was Carpocrates. The man’s a lunatic, and ruthless. He learnt that the centurion was an agent, and murdered him. So much is clear. The rest of the Christians are simply followers. Sheep. Like my wife and that other man, the one you were questioning. Basilides. They’re of no account.’

  ‘The tribune is very insistent that the centurion’s murderer be identified and brought to justice,’ said Ozymandias. ‘That was his mission, and until he completes it he is unable to return to his chief in Rome.’

  Paulus Alexander raised his eyebrows. ‘So that’s the case, is it? Very well, nothing shall stand in his way. We will ensure the Christians are arrested. Anyone of them who can be proved to have acted unlawfully will be dealt with accordingly. What matters most is that Carpocrates is found and caught.’ He rose to his feet. ‘Go to the barracks and assemble a group of picked men. Tell them not to wear civilian clothes but to conceal weapons beneath them. I will meet you at the edge of the Old Judaean Quarter, and then we will proceed surreptitiously to the ruined temple. First, I must speak with the Judaean elders, and obtain the key to the ruins.’

  He hurried from the office. Ozymandias watched the commander stride off downstairs in the direction of the main doors and his litter, and wondered quite what game the man was playing. Nitocris had said that both she and the commander’s wife had once been followers of Carpocrates. Did the commander fear that his own errant wife would be arrested that night? Or was he really going to arrange the night’s operation with the elders?

  Time was pressing. Ozymandias couldn’t waste time waiting around. Leaving the office he went down a twisting series of palace corridors and stairs until he came to the barracks. Here he explained the situation to the centurion of the guard, a tall, thin man who had previously served with the legions.

  ‘The commander wants us to go to the Old Judaean Quarter?’ the centurion asked, looking derisively at the stylus Ozymandias wore behind his ear. ‘Why didn’t he come here himself?’

  It was a very good question. These guards would never take a scribe seriously.

  ‘Those are your orders,’ Ozymandias said, frowning up at the man. ‘We’re to go at once to the entrance to the Old Judaean Quarter and await the commander. Don’t question me. Do you want to be up on a charge of insubordination?’

  The centurion barked orders at his men. Soon they were all kitted out with civilian clothes, tunics and cloaks, the latter concealing their swords. If a contingent of guards was seen advancing on the Old Judaean Quarter it might be enough to spark more riots.

  Apart from the undesirability of this, it was likely that in the confusion of the raid the ritual would not go ahead, that Carpocrates would escape. Paulus Alexander seemed to have little regard for Flaminius or his theories, any more than he had for Julius Strabo, but he had correctly identified Carpocrates as a man who needed to face justice.

  The guards marched through the evening streets. Ozymandias had to run to keep up with the centurion.

  ‘Can’t you get your men to walk like civilians?’ he said. ‘As well as dress like them?’

  The centurion strode on. ‘If you’d ever been a guard,’ he told the scribe, ‘you’d know that it comes instinctively. We can’t walk in that sloppy way you civilians have. We’re men, not clerks. You’d understand that, you see, if you had ever been a guard.’

  ‘Of course, centurion,’ said Ozymandias, trying to look suitably impressed. ‘But we’re going in undercover. If anyone in Delta Sector sees your men marching like that, it will be round the whole city like wildfire. It’ll reach the Christians in no time. We don’t want them to get away. The commander doesn’t want them to get away.’

  The centurion grunted. Calling a halt, he spoke sharply to his men. ‘Try walking like this Egyptian,’ he told them, and the guards, all big men, peered down at Ozymandias as if he was some exotic species of beetle. The scribe demonstrated a civilian gait and they did their best to ape his waddling.

  On reaching the edge of the Old Judaean Quarter they found no sign of Paulus Alexander.

  ‘I thought you said the commander would meet us here,’ said the centurion, his face twisted with suspicion. ‘If this is some kind of joke…’

  ‘It’s not a joke,’ Ozymandias protested. ‘This is what the co
mmander told me. He’s been delayed.’

  The scribe was fretting, though he didn’t want to show it. They couldn’t make a move before the commander joined them, and yet Ozymandias had no notion of what threats his sister and Flaminius were both facing. What he had heard of Carpocrates was not reassuring. He didn’t like the idea of his sister being alone with the Roman, either. He had seen them exchanging glances in a way he disliked.

  He knew his sister loved him, but only as a sister, it seemed. They had married, but they had yet to have any children. Not for want of trying, but it seemed that she was barren. Not that she was inexperienced. She swore that she had never been a whore while she was on the streets, but she had not come to their marriage bed a virgin. Darkly he wondered what the rituals of the Christians had entailed, and what she would be expected to do tonight.

  ‘I hate them,’ the centurion confided in Ozymandias.

  ‘Hate who?’ the scribe asked.

  The centurion indicated the Old Judaean Quarter with his thumb. ‘That lot. With all their strange ways and strange religions.’ He looked Ozymandias up and down. ‘Mind you, you lot are even worse.’ He shook his head. ‘Worshipping beasts. Disgusting! Beasts are for eating, not worshipping. You worship beasts, you make yourself worse than beasts. And as for the Greeks!’ He made a vulgar noise of disgust.

  Ozymandias turned away. Where was Paulus Alexander? He was standing here listening to this fool of a Roman while his sister was in danger, Flaminius was in danger. And the commander was missing. Why hadn’t he come with them?

  What were Flaminius and Nitocris doing now?

  —27—

  ‘But you can’t go there looking like that.’

  Nitocris and Flaminius were still in Ozymandias’ house, preparing for the ritual. The Egyptian girl was worried that Flaminius was at risk of being recognised by Carpocrates. They had discussed false beards and hooded cloaks but nothing seemed feasible to Flaminius, even if they had possessed the means to make such things. And Nitocris’ new idea did not get his seal of approval.

  ‘It’ll take a long time to shave my head and stain my body brown,’ he protested. ‘And as for wearing kohl, forget it.’

  Nitocris put her hands on her hips. ‘Don’t you see?’ she said, blinking furiously. ‘Carpocrates will never recognise you if you look like an Egyptian. Ozymandias has another kilt and a skullcap. They’re worn and shabby, which is why he doesn’t wear them while he is working for the commander. But if you put them on and we say you’re my brother… They already know I have a brother and they also know he disapproves of cults like theirs. They’ll welcome you gladly if they think I have finally converted you. Now kneel down and let me clip your hair.’

  ‘Converted me,’ said Flaminius moodily, as she shaved his hair down to the scalp. ‘And what are you going to stain my skin with?’

  ‘Beetroot juice,’ she said, as if that was obvious. ‘Mixed with copperas. My mother was a dyer as well as an herbalist. I learnt a lot from her.’

  Flaminius looked up, alarmed, and she gave an unladylike curse as her clippers slipped from her hand. As she bent to pick them up again, he complained, ‘Clothes dye? Will it wash off?’

  She grabbed his head, forced him to bow it again then completed her work. ‘I don’t see why not,’ she said. ‘It might take some scrubbing… But we’ve got to be quick about this! Remember, Carpocrates has seen you before! Now get up.’

  Obediently Flaminius rose. Nitocris looked critically at her handiwork, then took down a pot from the shelf. Blushing, she looked at him, then away,.

  ‘You’ll have to take your clothes off,’ she whispered.

  ‘Come on…!’ Flaminius began, but after a frosty glance he hurriedly removed his tunic and undergarments. His bandages had to go too, but he was relieved to see that beneath them his wounds had almost healed. Nitocris began to knead the dye into his skin. He shivered. His scalp was cold, his body was cold. His feet were cold, too, in more ways than one. Even if he got out of this alive, and was able to turn his back on Egypt for good, Drustica would never recognise him.

  Nitocris stepped back and surveyed him. ‘There,’ she said, blinking. ‘You’re looking a lot better.’ She snatched up a linen garment and flung it at him. As he struggled into the kilt, she produced a skullcap like the one Ozymandias wore. ‘The finishing touch,’ she said, presenting it to him. He took it from her and placed it on his head. ‘Oh!’ she said. ‘I forgot.’ She produced a small double tube of green glass. ‘Galena and malachite,’ she explained. ‘For your eyes.’

  ‘What, one for each?’ he said. One tube was filled with a black substance, the other with a green one.

  Nitocris shook her head. She took out a small brush and applied the black substance to his upper eyelids, then carefully cleaned the brush and used it again to apply the green to his lower lids—malachite, Flaminius presumed.

  She stepped back, placed the glass container on the shelf, and looked him up and down. She clapped her hands and tried to stifle a giggle.

  ‘Now you look like a man,’ she told him enthusiastically. She picked up a small bronze mirror, a real luxury item Flaminius thought, very old and no doubt an heirloom. He caught a glimpse of himself in its polished surface and saw a stranger. Taller and more muscular than the pudgy Ozymandias, or indeed most Egyptian men, nevertheless he looked nothing like a Roman. He groaned.

  Nitocris looked concerned. ‘What is it?’ She glanced in the mirror, then back at him. ‘You’re perfect now,’ she added. ‘Apart from that tattoo on your chest, which looks too Galatian, but Carpocrates has not seen you naked before, I suppose.’

  ‘Perfect!’ Flaminius grumbled. ‘My own mother won’t know me!’

  On his last assignment in the far north he had had his hair limed and his skin tattooed with woad, when he went undercover as a British auxiliary. The tattoo remained, an abstract representation of the mare goddess Epona, but now what little had been left of his lime washed hair lay on the packed earth floor of the little room.

  Drustica had shown much the same inexplicable joy that Nitocris now betrayed at seeing his transformation, but he had at least been recognisable. Now he looked like the Pharaoh Sesostris’ idiot second cousin.

  ‘We’re wasting time,’ said Nitocris. ‘It’s high time we went to the ruined temple.’

  Flaminius stepped over the pile of abandoned clothes. His lancehead brooch lay there, winking in the lamplight, and beside it was the belt from which hung his sword. It was true: they had to hurry. Pollio’s ultimatum gave him until noon tomorrow.

  ‘But how will we get into the ruined temple?’ he said. ‘We’re not Judaeans. I’ll have to take this.’ He went to get the brooch but Nitocris shook her head.

  ‘I know a way into the ruined temple that we Christians use,’ she said. ‘We should go that way. It is the way I would take you if you had truly converted, Ozymandias.’

  Startled, Flaminius glanced at her. Was she forgetting herself, or was she truly getting into her role?

  ‘Take me there then,’ he said, as if it had been Nitocris keeping them waiting.

  She led him from the house.

  The cobbles of the street were hard beneath his bare feet. As a Roman he was accustomed to wearing sandals wherever he went, if not military boots, and so his feet were soft. Most poor Egyptians went barefoot, Ozymandias and Nitocris included. It was a hot country, of course. Flaminius had not been entirely comfortable in his footgear. And yet he wasn’t at all happy to be walking the streets like this, and long before they reached the Old Judaean Quarter he was limping from a blister on his right foot.

  Nitocris did not lead him along the riot scarred main street of Delta Sector, but instead she took him down a deserted side street.

  ‘Where are we going?’ he asked. It was a dead end.

  Nitocris pointed at a flagstone in the pavement on the left-hand side of the street. It was worn smooth and was evidently part of the very earliest city, contemporary with Alexander himself.
She slipped a slim hand through a crack and effortlessly swung the slab open to reveal carved rungs descending down into stinking darkness.

  ‘Since the Christians are unwelcome in most quarters of the city,’ Nitocris told him, ‘they have found ways to get from place to place without drawing undue attention to themselves. I learnt many of them when I was with them. This one is a private sewer leading to one of the bigger houses, but it has an exit near the ruined temple.’

  Again Flaminius felt nothing but admiration for her. Julius Strabo had really known what he was doing, taking her on as an agent.

  He nodded his head to show his understanding. ‘I’ll go first,’ he offered, but she shook her head.

  ‘You don’t know the way, brother,’ she said, and again Flaminius shuddered at a strange chill. Was she acting a part or had she truly forgotten that he was an imperial agent—and a Roman citizen to boot?

  She lowered herself into the hole and, gripping onto the carved rungs, swarmed down the side, vanishing from Flaminius’ sight. He sat down on the edge and lowered his own bare feet onto one of the rungs, gripping the lip of the hole as he did.

  ‘Close it behind you!’ Nitocris’ words floated up from the darkness, and he climbed back up the slimy rungs to comply. Now in total darkness he climbed down the vertical shaft. Memories of the slave tunnels beneath Hadrian’s villa swam through his mind. All he could hear was a distant dripping of water, and the slow, stealthy scuff of Nitocris some way below him. He was cold, colder than he had been since leaving Britain in the August rain. And wafting up from the bowels of the earth was a fittingly malodourous stench.

  He heard Nitocris’ descent halt, then a soft moan as she jumped. There was a splash and he knew she had reached the bottom.

  He found his legs dangling in open space. ‘How far is it to jump?’ he asked hoarsely, his voice echoing.

  ‘Not far, brother,’ she hissed back up at him. ‘Just let go.’