Death on Delos

by Gary Corby

  “I see,” Anaxinos said. “Well, you’d know, wouldn’t you?” He sounded angry with me.

  “What do you mean, sir?”

  “I mean I want to know why you happened to be here to find him.”

  I’d been expecting that question, but I hadn’t been looking forward to it. I had an answer prepared.

  “I had offered to meet with Geros,” I said. “I wanted to see if there was some way we might . . . ah . . . assuage his concerns regarding the treasure.”

  Anaxinos stared at me. “So he agreed to meet in an abandoned house on the far end of the island?”

  “Actually, it was his idea.”

  “A likely story.”

  “This negotiation was done on my orders, Anaxinos,” Pericles cut in smoothly. “The location was indeed the choice of Geros. I think he felt that a more . . . private setting would allow differences to be aired without undue emotion.”

  Pericles had adroitly changed the subject, just enough to divert Anaxinos from an unfortunate line of questioning.

  “Hmmpf.” Anaxinos clearly was not impressed with Pericles’s words. “I wonder that I was not invited to this ‘private’ discussion.”

  There was not much Pericles or I could say to that.

  “This is a disaster on so many levels, I barely know where to begin,” Anaxinos said.

  “Why don’t we begin with the dead man,” Pericles said. “There is justice to be meted out.”

  “It’s worse than that,” Anaxinos said angrily. “Don’t you realize this entire island and everyone on it is now ritually polluted? Dear Gods.”

  Uh oh.

  Anaxinos was right. It hadn’t occurred to me, and I could tell from the look on Pericles’s face that it hadn’t occurred to him either.

  Where Pericles and I lived, and anywhere else on earth, if there was a murder then only the murderer was cursed, and the family of the victim impure until the rituals had been observed.

  But here on Holy Delos, where it was strictly forbidden for anyone to die or be born, this murder meant that every person on the island was tainted with the miasma of unholy death; every building, every grain of sand, every handful of dirt, every drop of water and mouthful of food, every weed in the ground. Even the shrines and the temples were out of action until the balance had been restored.

  “What must we do?” Pericles asked quietly.

  “First the murderer must be punished,” Anaxinos said. “Then there must be a sanctification. On every part of the island, and in every temple, including the shrines in every home. This is going to take days, maybe months.”

  I didn’t like the sound of that.

  “Athens will help in any way that we can,” Pericles said.

  “Athens caused this disaster in the first place!” Anaxinos replied.

  “Anaxinos, I swear to you that Athens had nothing to do with this,” Pericles said, oddly echoing my own words to him.

  “Then you are calling one of my people a murderer,” Anaxinos replied.

  Pericles looked very, very unhappy. “Forgive me, Anaxinos, that wasn’t my intention,” he said.

  “But it is your clear implication, because there is no other possibility,” Anaxinos said.

  Anaxinos was right again. If an Athenian didn’t kill the old priest, then a Delian must have. Neither answer was acceptable to our leaders.

  Every time Pericles tried to calm down Anaxinos, the High Priest found a new and even better reason to be upset. The fact that he was right in every one of them made me deeply uncomfortable.

  “I can only repeat that this murder was none of our doing,” Pericles said. “I am as horrified as you are, Anaxinos. I will appoint an investigator—the very best in Athens—and he will find the culprit. This I promise you. We will bring the killer to justice, no matter who he is, and he will be fully punished as the law demands.”

  “I thank you, Pericles, but we have already appointed our own investigator,” Anaxinos said. “Yours will not be required.”

  “I insist,” Pericles said. “Our man is the very best.”

  “Ours is better. I’m told she has extensive experience.”

  She?

  The High Priest signaled to someone I knew.

  “I present to you the investigator who will solve this crime. Her name is Diotima.”

  The Detective

  “Why didn’t you tell me?”

  I tried to avoid shouting. That required a major effort of my throat muscles, which caused my voice to clamp down and made my words come out as a strangled gargle.

  “I didn’t have a chance,” Diotima said. “Anaxinos spoke to me as we hurried here. Meren woke me; she told me what had happened. I threw on my clothes and ran out the door . . .” She looked down at her bump. “Well, anyway, I tried to run. The High Priest was running out his own door at exactly the same time. We looked at each other—I think he was surprised to see me—but I didn’t give him time to order me back inside. I headed up the Sacred Way before he could say a word. Anaxinos joined me, and we spoke on the way.” Diotima grimaced. “Apparently someone has told him that you and I investigate crime as a profession. I can’t say I’m too pleased he heard. I wanted to be here on Delos in my role as priestess.”

  “I know,” I said.

  “Anaxinos asked me to look into the killing for him. I have the High Priest’s full authority to question anyone.”

  “You should have told him no,” I said.

  She arched a lovely eyebrow at my words. “Are you suggesting that I, a junior priestess, refuse a direct request from the High Priest of the Delian Apollo?” she asked.

  When she put it that way, I had to say, “No. You gave him the only acceptable answer.”

  “Exactly.”

  “But Anaxinos still should have asked me. I am your husband after all, and I’m the one Pericles hires!”

  Diotima smiled. “You’re not feeling jealous, are you, Nico?”

  “Of course not. Don’t be ridiculous.”

  “I thought as much,” she said. “You’ll be pleased to learn I said the same thing to the High Priest, that he should ask you. He told me you’re too close to Pericles.”

  “And you’re not?” I said.

  “Whoever told Anaxinos that we’re investigators also told him that Pericles and I hate each other.”

  “Someone on this island is a major gossip,” I said.

  “I thought so too. It had to have been one of the Athenians, but you know, it could have been almost any of them. Your association with Pericles has become well known.”

  “That doesn’t explain them knowing about the antipathy between you and Pericles.”

  She shrugged. “Agora gossip. Or maybe one of the slaves in his household mentioned it. Idlers will pick up anything.”

  I wasn’t so sure.

  “Anaxinos has been quite clever,” Diotima said. “He needed an investigator. There’s no one on the island with anything like the necessary experience to solve a murder. There’s never been one here. I’m a priestess, but my husband is a close confidante of Pericles and I’m an Athenian. To any observer, I’m the most neutral choice. Yet the High Priest knows I’m against the removal of the treasure and that I’m sympathetic to their cause.”

  “Yes, I agree,” I said, conceding. “The High Priest couldn’t have chosen better.”

  Everyone else had departed. Anaxinos and his priests had returned to the village. Pericles and Philipos had gone back to the boats. Soon a party of priests would return with a board which they would use to carry Geros’s remains to his home. There they would prepare the body for burial.

  That meant we—or rather, Diotima—had very little time in which to conduct the initial investigation.

  “There’s one thing you need to know right away,” I said. “Pericles asked if there’d been a stru
ggle, and I said there were no signs.”

  “So?” she asked.

  “So I lied. Look here.”

  Geros had worn a formal chiton, as befitted an old and revered priest. The chiton is two large squares of material, one front and one back, both cut to reach from wrist to wrist and ankle to neck, pinned down on both sides and over the shoulders, and tied at the waist with a belt. Such clothing creates enormous swathes of extra material that is left to hang. More importantly, the sleeves were vast.

  I pulled back the sleeves, to show Diotima what I had discovered.

  “Cut marks,” she said at once. “Geros tried to defend himself.”

  “Plus he was stabbed multiple times.”

  “By the same person?” she asked.

  “There’s only one weapon left in him.”

  “I don’t see that it helps us.” She chewed at her lower lip. It was a habit she had when she was thinking hard.

  “It certainly doesn’t help us if every man, woman, and child on this island knows every detail of the murder scene,” I said.

  “That’s true.”

  She bent over to inspect the writing on the wall.

  “Nemesis. It means revenge, or the goddess of retribution,” she said. “Retribution for what, I wonder?”

  “Did Geros write that word, or did the killer?” I asked. “It makes a difference to the meaning.”

  “Yes.” Diotima looked closer at Geros’s red fingers, then at the wall. “Do the bloody marks match the width of his fingers? I can’t tell. Nico, can you . . . ?”

  She left the question open, but I knew what she wanted. My wife wanted me to hold the dead fingers against the writing, to see if they matched.

  Diotima was not normally squeamish about such matters. But to touch the dead meant ritual pollution, and I knew she didn’t want to expose the baby growing inside her to the slightest risk. Who knew what effect an unsanctified mother might have on her unborn child?

  I took Geros’s right hand. I had to hold his fingers in my own or else they flopped too much. I carefully placed them against one of the down strokes on the wall.

  It was something of an effort to hold the dead man’s fingers steady while Diotima peered at the fingertips, then the wall.

  “The writing might be wider than his fingers,” she said.

  “Or he might have used two,” I added.

  She frowned at the wall. “No, two of his fingers are wider than the writing. It might be a smaller hand using two fingers.”

  “Or he might have held one finger sideways,” I said. “There’s enough blood for it.”

  I dropped the hand.

  “Can anyone be stabbed through the heart and live long enough to write?” Diotima asked.

  I shook my head. “But everyone knows strange things can happen on a battlefield. Men take horrendous wounds and live for days. Others seem almost untouched by a strike upon them but drop dead on the spot. It’s possible that the dagger didn’t do as much damage as it looks.”

  We sighed in unison.

  “You said you thought the killer arranged the body,” Diotima said.

  “When I first saw him, I didn’t even realize that Geros was dead.”

  “He might have fallen that way,” she suggested.

  “If he curled up as he died. Maybe.”

  “You didn’t notice the blood on the wall?” my wife asked in a way that suggested I had been unobservant.

  “Not at first. It was dark in the corner. When I came in close and my eyes adjusted, then I saw it.”

  At the moment we heard wailing from far off. The party from the village was about to arrive to collect the body. We heard the wailing from far off.

  “Quick, search him,” said Diotima.

  I tore open Geros’s clothing. Nobody would worry about the tears—this clothing was destined to be burned.

  I ran my fingers around his back, and particularly underneath the leather belt about his waist. Men typically keep things tucked underneath their belt, but Geros didn’t. Nor was there anything about his shoulders. I silently cursed. I moved my search to his legs. This was deeply unpleasant because Geros had let go when death came, as happens to everyone. It did, however, suggest that he had died standing, because the stickiness and the stains ran down his legs, not sideways across his buttocks.

  It was when I reached his thighs that I felt the leather strap.

  “There’s something here.”

  The wailing of the mourners was almost upon us.

  “Hurry, Nico.”

  “I think it’s a pouch.”

  I pulled, but it was buckled on tight. To loosen I would have to roll him over, and I didn’t have time. I snatched my knife, which I keep under my belt at all times, jabbed it beneath the strap and sawed away. The strap broke. I pulled it out—there was indeed a small pouch attached—and threw it to the opposite corner of the room just as the first of the mourners entered.

  First came the men. They carried between them a large board, exactly the right size to transport a body. The leader of this group was Damon, the man I had met the night before, who had brought me dinner. Slightly to my surprise he offered me a nod as he entered.

  After the men came the women. Just like they would have in Athens, and everywhere else in Hellas, the women were letting off an awful cacophony of screams and wails. This didn’t necessarily mean that Geros had been well-liked or particularly mourned. It was the traditional way to show respect for the dead.

  Men and women alike had shorn their hair in ragged lumps. The women had rent at their clothing, so that it was artfully torn in a fine display of despair while at the same time not relinquishing their modesty.

  I stood in respect to the mourners and moved away from the body. I carefully stepped back to the opposite wall, so that one foot discreetly covered the pouch that I had liberated. No one would see it if I stayed where I was. Diotima likewise had quietly exited the room. It was exceedingly crowded, rank with the smell of the dead man, and this part of the exercise was nothing to do with her.

  Damon said, “Hello, Nico. Fancy meeting you here.”

  I couldn’t tell if Damon was simple, or too clever for his own good.

  I said, “Hello, Damon. I’d wish you good morning, but . . .” I shrugged.

  “I know what you mean,” he replied. He, too, shrugged. Then his mood brightened. “Ah, well. Come on, lads, let’s get Geros on his way.”

  The men obeyed him without question. They lowered the body board beside the corpse. I hadn’t realized, the night before, that Damon was a leader.

  Damon positioned himself by the head. Two other men went to the feet.

  “Ready?” Damon said, putting his hands to Geros’s shoulders. “One, two, three, lift!”

  They lifted, with more care than I had shown when I searched the body, and placed Geros upon the board.

  Damon wiped his hands on his tunic. “That wasn’t too hard, was it?” he said cheerfully.

  The men agreed. I noticed for the first time that none of them were priests. These must be regular villagers. I wondered how many of them there were.

  Damon said, “Are we ready to go, then? Let’s be off.”

  He stood to the side while two men at each end raised the makeshift bier.

  The women had ceased their wails while this was going on. I suppose they needed to catch their breath. Now they resumed their cacophony as the men edged Geros through the door and down the path. The women followed the men. I was relieved to hear the noise receding. I went outside, where Diotima waited.

  Diotima wrinkled her nose. “You smell awful.”

  “That’s no surprise.”

  I held up my hands, which due to the search of Geros were covered with blood, urine, and feces. I was about to wipe them on my tunic when I caught a glance from my wife, thought
better of it, and said, “Excuse me, I’ll be back in a moment.”

  Diotima picked up the pouch under my foot while I went to the beach.

  Washing in seawater is the official cure for the ritual pollution of having touched a dead body, and if there was anything Delos had plenty of, it was seawater. It was also very good for washing off the unfortunate remains of the victim.

  It occurred to me that I hadn’t had a chance to bathe since we’d left Athens two days ago, so I walked into the water as I was, clothing still on. I was surprised at how far I could walk from shore before the water was deep enough to wash me.

  I scrubbed my hands thoroughly. I watched as Geros’s blood and other bodily fluids parted from my skin and mixed with the seawater, to flow away on a journey to what distant places only the gods would ever know. I removed my tunic when my hands were clean. I washed my tunic, then lastly my body. I emerged from the sea, naked, streaming water, but thoroughly clean. I squeezed my clothing, then dropped the tunic on the sand to dry.

  That made me stop and stare. There was something on the sand that I hadn’t expected to see. Something important.

  I rushed naked back to the abandoned village—it was only a hundred paces—where Diotima was still hunting for clues.

  “Come with me,” I told her.

  “What is it?”

  I grabbed her by the hand. “You want to see this before it disappears.”

  I dragged her back to the beach.

  “Look!” I pointed.

  Diotima looked.

  “It’s your wet tunic,” she said.

  “Look beside the tunic,” I said.

  Etched into the sand was a long furrow, not very deep, but deep enough that it was unmistakable. It ran from the water’s edge to a dozen paces above the waterline. To both sides of the furrow were drag marks.

  Light dawned in Diotima’s face. “Someone’s dragged a boat up here,” she said.

  People had already walked across the drag marks. That was no surprise considering how many people had been here this morning. That, and the breeze, would soon make those marks disappear.

  “Within the last day,” I said. “Look how the marks have already worn.”