Aculeo stared at the other man. He felt like he’d just been kicked in the stomach. “I … I don’t …” he said, his voice rough and weak amidst the sweet songs of the birds in the gardens that surrounded them.
The sophist put a hand on the other man’s arm, his eyes filled with a soft inner peace. “The will of the gods is real, dear Aculeo, as real as you and I standing here right now, and it cannot be ignored however much you try.”
Aculeo approached the entrance to the Magistrates’ offices in the outskirts of the Palace Quarter. Statues of Isis and Apollo stood overlooking the square of the Court of Justice, their impassive faces dappled with light and shadow from the morning sunlight falling through the leaves of the acacias and sweet sycamore. A slave had appeared at Aculeo’s door at the crack of dawn bearing a message from Capito summoning him to his offices. And while Aculeo half considered sending a reply to the Magistrate as to where he could stick his summons he decided to accompany the slave instead.
He was escorted into the inner chambers of the Magistrate’s luxurious chambers where he saw Capito already hard at work with his scribe, dictating something about land transfers and owed tariffs while the slave scratched the words out on a tablet. The Magistrate spotted Aculeo out of the corner of his eye. “Aculeo,” he said. “Please have a seat.”
“I’d rather you just got to the point,” Aculeo said irritably. “What is it you want, Capito?”
“I thought you’d be interested in helping me question a certain Athenian.”
“Not particularly, I’ve ...” Aculeo paused a moment. “What Athenian?”
“Cleon of Athens,” Capito said with a smile. “You recall the name, I trust. The purported witness to the slave’s murder at the Sarapeion.”
Aculeo considered him for a moment. The river slave – he’d almost forgotten about her. “I’d be pleased to join you.”
“I thought you might be,” Capito said, dismissing the scribe with a wave of his hand. “What of your murdered hetaira? Any news?”
“Not really,” Aculeo said.
“Well, let’s worry about that later, shall we? Come on. The day’s half over already.”
The crisp, even lines of the Harbor of Eleusis wrapped around a desolate stretch of beach along the eastern edge of the Egyptian Sea before tapering off into a rocky shore and a golden-brown, grassy ridge that extended far into the distance. In high season, Eleusis was renowned as an exclusive retreat for wealthy citizens and tourists who enjoyed its warm shallow waters, health spas, countless kapeleions, readily available male and female companions, and the infamously debauched festivities that took place along its sandy shores.
The Sanatorium of Asclepius By the Sea itself had a somewhat less refined appearance than its name implied, for it was little more than a collection of rundown waterfront shacks built along a bleak stretch of the shore. Yet it was to this desolate spot that Cleon of Athens, the only witness to the river slave’s murder, had decamped, according to the information provided by the remorseful acolyte Leto. The supplicant had returned to the Sarapeion again the prior evening, still seeking to be healed, and Leto, true to his word, had sent word to the office of the Magistrate Capito.
The sanatorium’s outer wall had a sun-bleached fresco of Poseidon and Hapi, father of all Egyptian gods, surrounded by faded seahorses, octopi, silvery fish and garish seashells. A damp breeze gusted off the sea, skittering sand and debris across the mosaic floor, patterned in pale blue tiles like curling waves. A slave busied himself sweeping the floor with such resigned demeanour it seemed he might have occupied himself with little else all day. He said not a word when Capito asked for Cleon, but silently led the two Romans through a garden gone to seed, past algaic fishponds and trickling waterfalls to one of the little bone-white mud-brick cottages. The waves crashed ceaselessly against the craggy grey rocks that lined the beachfront. A flock of dirty white seabirds wheeled overhead, their wingtips catching the brisk, briny-smelling wind as they glided further down the shore.
They came around a waist-high garden wall, drooping with ragged, sun-scorched rhododendrons, and there on a little patio balcony overlooking the sea sat a grossly overweight young man, busily shovelling food into his fleshy face. Before him was a banquet of eggs, winecake, bread, roast chicken, fruits and cheeses. Aculeo guessed that what the sanctuary lacked in guests, this single occupant made up for in sheer quantity of food devoured.
“Are you Cleon?” Capito asked.
“Ah, at last,” Cleon groaned, dropping his half-eaten chicken leg on his plate with a damp thud. “I had another dreadful sleep last night. For all the money I’m paying to stay at this fleapit I would think at least I’d get some decent rest.”
“You’re feeling better I hope?” Aculeo asked. “Recovering from your injuries?”
“Oh I suppose, still a little tender of course, but still, praise Sarapis,” Cleon said, quaffing a long swallow of wine.
“I’ve had more than my fill of Sarapis, thanks,” Aculeo said, taking a seat at the table and, to Cleon’s astonishment, helping himself to some wine.
“I understand you were at the Sarapeion a week ago where you witnessed a murder,” Capito said, taking the seat next to Aculeo.
Cleon almost choked on his food. “I’m sorry, who, ah, who did you say were again?” he asked, still gasping.
“Magistrate Marcus Aquillius Capito. And my associate Tarquitius Aculeo.”
“Oh?” Cleon said warily, wiping his mouth with the back of his greasy hand. “A Magistrate you say?”
“Indeed. I deal with any capital crimes committed in Alexandria.”
“Capital crimes?” Cleon said, sweat trickling down his fleshy, troubled face. “But what do you want of me?”
“We just need to ask you a few answers and we’ll be on our way,” Aculeo said.
“Well, I, uh, I’d be happy to help you normally, of course,” the florid young man stammered, “but in fact I’m rather busy right now. Perhaps another day, next week even?”
“It will only take a few minutes,” said Capito. “Tell us about the slave’s murder.”
“I’m still trying to forget it,” Cleon said, mopping his profusely sweating brow as he stuffed some cake in his mouth, washing it down with a hurried swallow of wine, half of which spilled down his chin, staining his tunic.
“You have the rest of your life to do that,” Aculeo said. “Think about it for just a few more minutes first.”
“Please, I came here to be healed, instead I must bear witness to some horrible murder,” the young man said, his eyes welling up, his mouth full, his voice quavering. “I simply want to be left alone.”
“When did you arrive in the city?” Capito asked.
“Just last week. The same day as the cursed murder.”
“Attend any symposia while you’ve been here?” Aculeo asked. Capito gave him a puzzled glance.
“What? No. Why do you ask?”
He seemed an unlikely killer, Aculeo mused. Still .... “Tell us exactly what you saw that night in the Sarapeion.”
“I don’t know what to tell you, really,” Cleon said. “I’d just finished my prayers to Sarapis as the priest instructed me and entered the sanctuary to rest and receive my visions when I noticed someone skulking about in the shadows. I came closer and saw it was a man in the midst of assaulting that poor woman, before my very eyes. I called on him to stop, but then he turned on me! It’s a wonder I wasn’t slain myself.”
“This man attacked you?” Capito asked.
“More demon than man. He threw me to the ground as he made his escape,” Cleon said, his voice catching with emotion. He held up for examination a plump elbow, which had a small yellowish bruise on the tip and a smaller scrape along the side. “There was a great deal of blood. It was quite dreadful.”
“What did the killer look like?” asked Aculeo.
“He was a brute of a man. Broad shouldered, powerful. A lunatic’s face.”
“Describe his face,”
said Capito.
“I don’t know. Filthy, for one thing, rotten teeth, his hair and beard unkempt, matted. And a nasty scar running down the length of it.”
“A scar?” Capito said sharply.
“Yes. He was wholly disreputable looking,” Cleon continued.
“You know the man he’s describing?” Aculeo asked Capito.
“Yes, I believe I may,” Capito said. “A vagrant by the name of Apollonios.”
“Then why is such a monster still running around in the street?” Capito cried. “Why aren’t you doing your job? I was certain he was going to murder me as well.”
“You seem to have survived alright. Anything else you can tell us?”
“Only that I hope for everyone’s sake you catch him, and quickly.” Cleon closed his eyes, putting a limp hand to his sweaty forehead. “Now if it’s all the same to you, I’ve a pounding headache. Mother was right – I never should have come to this cursed city!”
The merchant Harpalus’ pottery factory was a small, windowless building in the Ceramicus, tucked in a squalid section behind the harbour’s edge southeast of Lochias. The still, dry heat from the kiln fire inside the shop was unbearable. A dozen or so exhausted looking slaves were hard at work at narrow wooden benches, their naked backs gleaming with sweat, some of them spinning wet clay on the potters’ wheels at one long table, others etching elegant glazed patterns and designs onto the pretty reed-green faience vases and deep brown urns stacked on the tables. The designs were all of a consistent theme – women and impressively endowed mythical beasts copulating with one another in anatomically unlikely positions, a popular item for the tourists, apparently. A number of ancient looking stone icons were stacked against the wall.
Harpalus was in the midst of haggling with a couple over a knee-high pink granite Egyptian sphinx. He tried his best to ignore the arrival of Aculeo and Capito.
“We need to talk,” Capito said.
“Magistrate Capito, my dear friend, such an honour to see you!” Harpalus gushed. “I’ll be with you in one moment. These lovely people and I were just …”
“Where’s Apollonios?” Aculeo demanded.
The merchant grinned fiercely at him. “I’m sure I don’t know what you’re talking about, but if you could just … oh!” Capito had tipped one of the vases off the table, letting it tumble and smash on the floor. “Please, be careful, Magistrate! Not to worry,” he said, smiling at the customers.
“I’m sure he already told you these pieces are all forgeries,” Capito said to the customers. “Probably made only a year or so ago, then chipped and buried in lye-soaked earth to add a millennium or so of wear. Decent enough quality – I’m sure your friends at home won’t be able to tell the difference.”
“A preposterous accusation!” Harpalus cried. “I’m the most honest and scrupulous of men, I love my customers, I … wait!” The would-be patrons had slipped out the door as quickly as they could. The merchant stared after them, crestfallen. “They were just about to buy.”
Capito shoved him up against the wall, making the nearby tables stacked with pottery rattle. “I hear your brother’s back in Alexandria. I need to talk to him.”
“Apollonios? But …”
“He’s murdered two women, damn you! Now where is he?”
The slaves’ activity at their benches had slowed to a crawl, though they didn’t dare look up at their master. Harpalus glared at them. “Get back to work.” He turned to his visitors. “Let’s go somewhere and talk. Eupolis, you’re in charge until I return. No slacking or I’ll beat you all, I swear!”
Harpalus escaped into his office, fell into a chair and poured himself a cup of undiluted wine, which he quickly drank and followed up with a second.
“When did he get back to town?” Capito demanded.
“Really, Magistrate, Apollonios never …” Harpalus caught a warning glance from the man and slumped back in his chair. “A few months back. He promised he’d stay for a few days only, a week at most, but then he simply … stayed on. What could I do?”
“He murdered a hetaira,” Aculeo said. “Dumped her body like a piece of trash in the canal. Not to mention a slave he murdered in the Sarapeion.”
Harpalus stared at the men, eyes wide. “I don’t believe it. Not my brother.”
“Oh stop it!” Capito snapped. “What of the porne he attacked last year? You remember her, don’t you? He’d have killed her too if those Assyrian sailors hadn’t come along.”
Harpalus sat in silence for a moment, gazing at the unfiltered debris that swirled on the surface of his wine, his mind a thousand miles and many years away. “He’s a war hero, fought in the Battle of Teutoburg, honoured by Tiberius himself.”
“Spinning tales of Teutoburg doesn’t make a man a hero,” Aculeo said. Barely a handful of men were said to have even survived the battle, yet countless old veterans begging for coins on Alexandria’s streets claimed to have been heroes on its blood-soaked battlefields.
“He’s my brother.”
“He’s also a murderer,” Capito growled. “Now, where is he?”
“I don’t know,” the merchant cried, tearing at his tunic. “My oath. I haven’t seen him in days. We had an argument and he hasn’t been back.”
“If I find out you’ve been lying to me, Harpalus, I swear you’ll never …”
Something on Harpalus’ wrist caught Aculeo’s eye. “Where did you get that?”
“This?” the merchant asked, holding up the piece of yellow twine tied around his wrist. “Apollonios asked me to wear it – something about a symbol of Sarapis’ love or some such nonsense. Why? What does it matter?”
“Show us where he sleeps.”
Harpalus reluctantly led them to the backroom of the shop. “Down there,” he said, nodding glumly to a stairwell leading down to the basement.
Aculeo took up an oil lamp and headed down the stairs, Capito right behind him. The ceiling was low and the walls stacked with various figurines, pottery wheels covered in dust and cobwebs and soon-to-be-antique icons. There was little room to move. There, at the far end of the cramped, windowless room, a filthy-looking mattress and some blankets lay on top of the dirt floor. He squatted down beside the mattress, lifted up the blankets. Nothing. He turned over the mattress. Again, nothing. He didn’t know what he might have found, but … The soil was soft in one spot beneath where the mattress had been. Aculeo dug the soft, sandy dirt with his hands. Something wrapped in wax cloth. He removed it from the ground and unwrapped the musty-smelling cloth.
A knife handle missing its blade.
A small dead bird, dry as dust, clumsily wrapped in papyrus.
A trio of mismatched earrings.
A gold fibula, embedded with glittering semi-precious stones.
A small piece of torn blue linen … stained with blood.
“What is it?” Harpalus whispered.
“Your brother’s death sentence,” Aculeo said.
“What pieces am I missing, Aculeo? What is it you’re not telling me?” Capito demanded as the capo brought a jug of wine to their table. Capito was smiling, but it was clear he wasn’t playing about.
“Please trust me,” Aculeo said. “It’s better left unsaid until I know more.”
The Magistrate swirled the wine about in his cup. “It’s well within the privileges of my position to arrest you, even torture you if I thought you had information important to operation of the Empire.”
“Are you planning to torture me, Magistrate?” Aculeo asked irritably.
“I was hoping for a gentler approach to start.”
Aculeo drank some wine – it was terrible stuff, but his thirst got the better of his palate. He wanted to tell someone, anyone, what was going on – the whole thing was driving him mad, but it was terribly risky. The Magistrate was an influential man with good connections, he could be useful up against men like Ralla and Gurculio. But that was part of the problem too. Any inquiries that his office might make could scare them off,
force them to cover up, and that would be the end of his chance to learn what had happened to Iovinus. No, it was better to be quiet for now, to stay beneath their notice.
He smiled at Capito. “Better you stay out of this for now. You don’t want the wrong sort people taking an interest in the Junior Magistrate of Alexandria’s fledgling career.”
“Why don’t you let me decide that,” Capito said stiffly.
“You’re too virtuous a man. You wouldn’t be able to let it go. Wait till I have some proof first.”
Capito said nothing for a while, weighing Aculeo’s words as he sipped his wine, reluctantly swishing it about on his palate. Finally he swallowed. “Fine. But I want your oath you’ll involve me when you’re closer. When you have your proof.”
Aculeo held out his hand. “You have my oath.”
Capito smiled and gripped Aculeo’s hand. “We’ll hold off on the torture a little longer then.”
Xanthias was perched at the door when Aculeo returned at the end of the day, exhausted. “Not a word, Xanthias, I just want to sleep,” Aculeo said.
“Yes, Master,” the old slave said without another word, critical or otherwise.
Aculeo looked at him suspiciously. “What’s the matter?”
“You’ve received mail,” Xanthias blurted, nodding towards to the scarred wooden table where a cylindrical leather case sat.
Aculeo felt a chill descend. “Oh?”
“From Rome, the courier said.”
Aculeo sat at the table and picked up the case, turning it slowly in his hands before carefully opening it. A thin scroll slid onto the table, its red wax seal marked with the initials of the family Lucullus. “It’s from Titiana, I imagine,” he mused.
“I believe so, Master,” the slave whispered hoarsely, watching his master carefully, his lower lip trembling.
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