Avidius Pollio sighed. ‘I had high hopes that you would make a good replacement for Julius Strabo. He was a good fellow, even if he got carried away with some silly obsessions.’ The legate banged on the desk and pointed at Flaminius. ‘I told you to find out who killed him, not to murder the suspect. Even if Carpocrates killed Julius Strabo, you could have arrested him if you had enough evidence.’
‘I did not kill Carpocrates,’ Flaminius repeated. There was another, even louder, crash from the door, and its timbers shook. Dust sifted down from the ceiling.
Paulus Alexander laughed. ‘So you keep saying! You don’t remember killing him, clearly. But you have to admit, you have shown little sign of being in your right mind recently. I put it to you that you killed him without realising it when you were fighting him.’
‘I fought him, as you say,’ said Flaminius. ‘But I did not have that dagger on me.’
‘Come on, Roman,’ said Ozymandias quietly. ‘I recognised the dagger as the one you had on your belt. You left your belt and armour at my place. I took my sister back home went back there late last night. Your clothes were there, the dagger wasn’t.’
Flaminius shrugged. ‘That doesn’t mean I took it with me. I thought about it, mind, but I couldn’t work out where to hang it. I’d seen you slipping that knife out from under your kilt, but for the life of me I can’t work out how you do it.’
Ozymandias hauled up his kilt to show his knife strapped to the inside of his leg. ‘You didn’t think to do this?’ he asked. ‘It’s a habit I got into in my old tomb robbing days. You never knew when it would come in handy.’
Flaminius slapped his brow. ‘So simple! But no, I’m not used to wearing a linen kilt, so it didn’t occur to me.’
‘I think that’s what you did,’ said Paulus Alexander.
Flaminius whirled on him. ‘Ask Ozymandias’ sister,’ he said. ‘She was watching me while I got changed.’
‘Was she now,’ muttered Ozymandias.
‘I didn’t think of it, and what’s more,’ Flaminius remembered. ‘I couldn’t have done if I’d wanted to. The dagger wasn’t there.’ His fever was lifting now, his memory was growing clearer. ‘It had gone missing already.’
‘When do you last remember seeing it?’ said Avidius Pollio.
Flaminius frowned. ‘I noticed it was missing when I woke in the medic’s surgery after the fever got me. Before I found Ozymandias questioning Basilides. My armour and sword belt had been taken from me and heaped on the floor.’
‘Anyone could have taken it,’ said Ozymandias. ‘Are you suggesting the medic murdered Carpocrates?’
Flaminius gave a mirthless laugh. ‘He’s only dangerous if you’re strapped down to his operating table,’ he said. ‘But it must have been then when they found my dagger.’
‘Where who found your dagger?’ asked Paulus Alexander.
‘Whoever killed Carpocrates, of course,’ said Flaminius. ‘And if we can work out who killed Carpocrates I have a keen suspicion we’ll also find out who killed Julius Strabo.’
The door burst open, slamming against the wall beside it, and several guards hurtled in carrying a battering ram.
—33—
‘All this is just on your own say-so,’ Avidius Pollio said as the dust settled, as if nothing had happened. ‘You’ve not proved anything. Did anyone else notice that your dagger was missing?’
He looked up irritably and brushed dust off his breastplate. ‘Get out,’ he told the guards.
‘Sir?’ The guard holding the nearest end of the battering ram appealed to Paulus Alexander.
‘Do as the legate says,’ the commander ordered. ‘No!’ He changed his mind. ‘Two of you can stay here and repair my door.’
‘Sir,’ the guard complained. ‘We heard that a naked lunatic with a sword had broken into your office!’
Paulus Alexander rose and flung Flaminius his cloak. As the tribune wrapped himself in its folds and placed the sword on the floor beside him, Paulus Alexander turned to the guard. ‘Get out,’ he said.
Leaving two younger men scratching their heads and trying to work out how they could fix the door, the civic guards stamped out.
‘What a farce,’ Flaminius commented, sitting down on a chair, tugging the cloak to cover himself. ‘Plautus could do no better. But this is serious. This could turn out to be a tragedy. Somebody murdered Carpocrates and tried to fix the blame on me.’
‘How do you reach that conclusion?’ Avidius Pollio asked. ‘Oh, by using your dagger, you mean? But how did they do it?’
‘They must have been present at the ritual,’ said Ozymandias. ‘No one else went in or out of that crypt once we had got there. You say you fought Carpocrates?’
Flaminius nodded. ‘He knew me for a spy from the outset,’ he said. ‘Even with my head shorn and my eyes made up, he recognised me.’ His lips thinned. ‘That was why he put me through that sickening ritual.’ He shuddered. He still couldn’t believe it. ‘Oh yes, he told me when he revealed that he knew who I was. And yes, I lost my mind. I attacked him.’
‘You lost your mind,’ Avidius Pollio echoed. ‘And attacked him.’
‘But not with that dagger!’ Flaminius added. ‘I didn’t have it on me by then. I thought we’d established that.’
‘Could Carpocrates have got hold of it somehow?’ Ozymandias said. ‘You noticed it was missing when you were in the surgery. Could he have stolen it from you when you fought in the alleyway?’
‘What if he did?’ Flaminius asked.
‘He tried to stab you with it while you were fighting,’ Ozymandias suggested, ‘and somehow in the fight stabbed himself.’
Flaminius shook his head. ‘He had no dagger. We fought tooth and nail.’
Avidius Pollio brushed more dust from his breastplate. He raised his voice over the sound of hammering from outside as the guards repaired the door which they had removed from its hinges. ‘This is all speculation. We don’t know when the dagger went missing, we don’t know who took it. We only have your word that it ever went missing. And you have to admit that you have been acting… eccentrically would be a mild way to put it.’
He fanned at his face. ‘I wonder if you’ve not been out in the noonday sun too much. Britain was your last posting, wasn’t it? You can’t be very accustomed to this heat. I don’t want to have to send to reach Rome that I need another intelligence officer. It would take a month as a round trip, assuming there’s one available. For that reason if no other I don’t want to see you crucified or left to the tender mercies of the beasts in the arena. But you have to admit that you’ve been unable to provide any very compelling evidence. That plus your eccentric behaviour may well see you facing the death penalty.’
‘I think we can spare Flaminius a public trial,’ said Paulus Alexander. ‘We don’t want it on our records that we had an imperial agent executed, certainly not for killing a man of little account while his mind was disturbed. I’m sure the prefect will agree with me when we put it to him.’
‘Maybe that’s the next move,’ said Avidius Pollio thoughtfully. ‘It is, as you say, a civil matter. And I urgently need a skilled intelligence operative for the troubles in the Thebaid. I can’t wait another month.’ He turned to Flaminius. ‘You’ve no idea who it could have been who killed this Greek? Anything would be better than nothing.’
‘Give me a moment to think, please,’ said Flaminius.
He was tired and unwell. Setting off with the legate on a mission to the south of the province appealed to him little more than public execution. He went over everything he had learnt in the last few minutes, everything he had discovered in the last few days.
He wiped sweat from his brow with the corner of the cloak. It was sunny outside, shaping up to be one of the hottest days he had known since coming to Egypt. From here he could see right across the harbour. There the Pharos stood on its island, its light now coming from a vast mirror that reflected the sunlight, a beacon of hope to all who sailed upon the broad water
s that the Romans regarded as their own sea.
But his people were brash newcomers. The Greeks had been here much longer, and long, long before their own arrival, Ozymandias’ people had dwelt here, living their strange, alien lives in the baking heat. Ever since Flaminius had arrived he had felt that he was out of place in a world he did not understand. Oh, he’d known something of that in Britain, which had its own ancient mysteries, but Britain was a young land compared with Egypt. Egypt was old. Too old. And alien. He had fought against it, fought against its darkness, and now it seemed it was likely to devour him, as if the dark land was a huge serpent, its open jaws the Delta, Flaminius a tempting morsel on its tongue.
He gazed out into the bright sunlight but his eyes were wide as if he stared into the deepest, darkest abyss.
Abruptly he rose, and had to clutch the cloak to stop it slithering from his shoulders. ‘Last night you left the house before I did, didn’t you?’ he asked Ozymandias.
The Egyptian’s face was dark. ‘I left you with my sister,’ he said. ‘You sent me here to the palace to get a patrol of guards. Then with my sister’s aid you disguised yourself and went to the ruined temple ahead of us. Then…’
‘Thank you, I know perfectly well what I did,’ said Flaminius. ‘What I’m more interested in is what you did. You went to the palace.’
Ozymandias looked to Paulus Alexander in appeal. ‘Why is a murder suspect cross-examining me?’
Paulus Alexander gave an impatient gesture. ‘Just answer the questions,’ he said wearily, but leant forward to watch with quiet interest.
‘Yes, I went to the palace!’ Ozymandias told Flaminius. ‘On your orders! Should I not have done? Obviously not! I shouldn’t have trusted my sister with you. You…’
‘And you gathered a group of guards,’ Flaminius said patiently. ‘Yes?’
Ozymandias looked again at Paulus Alexander. Avidius Pollio watched the whole exchange lugubriously.
‘The scribe found me as I was about to return to my wife,’ said the commander. ‘I listened with interest to what he had to say and arranged for a contingent of guards to go to the Old Judaean Quarter to provide you with reinforcements.’
‘We went there,’ said Ozymandias after further prompting from Flaminius. ‘The commander said he would meet us there. I took that to mean he would meet us on the edge of Delta Sector. We waited.’
‘Did you meet the commander?’ Flaminius asked.
Ozymandias paused. ‘Yes,’ he said at last.
‘When?’
Ozymandias glanced away. ‘He didn’t come at once. I knew you would have only so much time. Besides, I was concerned for my sister.’ He stared down at the mosaic floor. ‘So… I disobeyed orders.’
‘How exactly did you disobey orders?’ Flaminius asked.
Ozymandias looked up. ‘I told the guards we were to go to the ruined temple if the commander was delayed. We broke open the gate to the ruined temple but we came too late. The smoke was pouring out from that hole in the ground. I sent my men in to do what they could. It was only then that I reencountered the commander.’
‘You ran into delays,’ Flaminius suggested to Paulus Alexander.
‘Yes, my wife was sick,’ he replied.
‘You returned to your villa?’ Flaminius asked.
‘I wanted to explain to Clara that I would be late,’ the commander said. ‘And that made me late again!’
‘Did you not appreciate the urgency of the case?’ Flaminius asked.
‘With respect,’ said Paulus Alexander, ‘it was your case, not mine. I despatched the guards you had requested.’ It was certainly a hot day; the commander was sweating.
Ozymandias looked pensive. ‘You said you were going to speak with the Judaean elders, sir,’ he remembered.
‘You appeared at much the same time as the Judaean elders,’ said Flaminius. ‘Was it with them that you ran into delays?’
‘Yes,’ said Paulus Alexander. ‘I…’
‘I see,’ said Flaminius. ‘Then you came to join your guards just in time to see the Christians arrested as they fled the crypt. May I ask you a question?’
‘By all means,’ said Paulus Alexander.
‘How did you know that I fought Carpocrates? I mentioned it to no one.’
—34—
Paulus Alexander stared at him. He glanced at the others and laughed humourlessly. ‘Of course you did,’ he said. ‘You were talking about it to all of us. You fought tooth and nail, you said.’
‘Yes,’ said Flaminius, ‘but it was you who first mentioned it. I didn’t tell you.’
‘Ozymandias must have referred to it,’ Paulus Alexander said dismissively.’
Flaminius shook his head. ‘I didn’t tell Ozymandias either,’ he said. ‘I didn’t speak about it until you brought it up. So how did you know?’
‘I think that’s a very interesting question,’ declared Avidius Pollio, an ugly expression on his face. ‘Do you have an equally interesting answer?’
Paulus Alexander shook his head. ‘I don’t know how I know they fought,’ he admitted. ‘It must have been mentioned by someone. Everything was very confused. The smoke, the questions. Tribune Flaminius has forgotten. He has, after all, suffered considerably from fever and concussion.’
Flaminius shook his head. ‘That won’t work.’ His eyes narrowed. ‘You say you went to the Judaean elders, then came with them to the ruined temple. But you appeared separately.’
‘And his breastplate was stained with soot,’ Ozymandias said suddenly. ‘I don’t know where he came from, but he appeared out of the darkness after you did, Roman, although it was before Dionysius and the other elders. Then the body of Carpocrates was brought up with your dagger in its ribs.’
‘I freed you from slavery,’ Paulus Alexander told the scribe coldly. ‘A freedman has responsibilities, loyalties, duties he owes his patron.’
‘I can only say what I saw,’ Ozymandias replied. ‘And I know that your story doesn’t fit what I remember.’
‘Shall we call Dionysius here?’ Avidius Pollio suggested. ‘See what he remembers of the night? If it fits your account?’
Desperate, Paulus Alexander looked from one man to the next. He received nothing but stony stares. He fidgeted with a stylus on his desk, then flung it down savagely.
‘Very well,’ he said. ‘I went there under cover of darkness. There’s a way to the ruined temple that only a very few know about, but the Christians know. My wife told me about it. I got there ahead of the guard, I got there ahead of the elders. They came of their own accord when they heard about the fire, I assume.’
‘You didn’t get there ahead of me,’ Flaminius said.
‘No,’ said Paulus Alexander. ‘The ritual was in full sway when I got there. I waited outside, hoping for an opportunity… I didn’t want you to learn the truth. Then there was the fire. It was a god-given chance! As the Christians came pouring out, I waited. There was no sign of Carpocrates or you. I plunged into the smoky subterranean passageway. In the firelight I saw two figures fighting. One flung the other against the wall and ran. I pressed myself against the wall and you didn’t see me, tribune, but I recognised you. As soon as you were past, I went to the other man, who was getting up. It was Carpocrates. He recognised me. I stabbed him. Blood splashed onto my armour, but I scrubbed it away, then hurried from the passage.’
‘Why did you stab him? And why with my dagger?’
‘Why shouldn’t I kill him?’ Paulus Alexander said. ‘He was an evil man. He debauched my wife.’
Ozymandias grunted, and gave Flaminius a suspicious look.
‘If that was the case,’ Avidius Pollio said, ‘why didn’t you have him brought to justice? You’re the commander of the civic guard, while he was a nobody, a Greek. You would have won the case.’
‘There was a time when my wife persuaded me to join her in one of these rituals,’ Paulus Alexander said remotely. ‘After everything I had heard of the Christians, I thought it would be nothin
g, but I got the same treatment as Flaminius. I am guilty of unnameable horrors. And then there was that commissary centurion, threatening to expose the whole cult. I stopped my wife from attending Carpocrates’ rituals, but I couldn’t stop Julius Strabo, however much I tried to discourage him. He dropped out of sight and I sincerely hoped someone had slit his throat. But then I got the message from Ozymandias and I had to go to meet Julius Strabo at the ruined temple. When I met him, he was running away from Carpocrates. Something had gone wrong. He’d been recognised, exposed. I killed him.’
‘With your own dagger on that occasion?’ Flaminius suggested. ‘You civic guards have daggers identical to those worn by legionaries.’
Paulus Alexander nodded. ‘Carpocrates and his Christians appeared. Carpocrates laughed to see I had dealt with his own problem, but he was full of spite. He desecrated the corpse. “One more sin for the list,” he commented. Then we arranged it that I would say I had found the body.’
‘Then I turned up and life got difficult for you,’ Flaminius said. ‘You arranged those riots so I wouldn’t be able to get to the crime scene.’
‘It was Carpocrates’ idea,’ Paulus Alexander said. ‘I didn’t think it advisable. He knew people in the Greens, and there were a few of my guards, plainclothes men, who I persuaded to work for him undercover, for a sizeable pay rise which had to come out of my own purse. All dead now, thanks to you... Then I had to step up the patrols in the city. He didn’t like that, particularly when it interfered with his attempts to kill you. In the end, you were inconvenient to us both. When the medic told me that you had left your dagger behind in his surgery, I took it, saying I would return it. But at once I saw it was a way to catch two boars in one bush. On learning that you were going to spy on Carpocrates’ ritual, the temptation was too great. I thought it a gift from the gods, but now…’
Avidius Pollio rose with a creak of armour. ‘This is the end of you, Paulus Alexander. Such a promising career. If only you hadn’t let your wife to get herself mixed up in a downmarket religious cult. What I’ve heard of this Christian superstition sickens me. Nero had the right idea. If I got my way, it would be destroyed even if we had to kill every man, woman and child.’
Our Man in Alexandria Page 22