by Mary Reed
He wasn’t surprised that Agnes, having grown up on the palace grounds in the house John now occupied, had not wanted to work in such a place.
A boy was sloshing lengths of entrails in a tub of water, cleaning out their contents, the very job Opilio had complained about his niece refusing. The sausage maker ordered the lad to mind the shop.
“You can see, Lord Chamberlain, that the birth of my delicious sausage is no more beautiful than any other birth.” He waved flies away from his face. “As to that absurd and disrespectful verse. Such gossip does not bear repeating.”
“You have repeated it, Opilio, and in front of Agnes. It is the only way she could have learned about the mosaic and whenever you saw her, it could not have been long ago.”
Opilio paled. “She hasn’t been spreading that tale around, has she?”
“Then you admit she got that verse from you?”
“I…er…well, I meant it as a lesson, excellency. An illustration of the depravity of the sort of people with whom she insists on associating. If our glorious emperor should discover such disrespect…” He clapped his hands together. When he opened them a enormous green fly dropped lifelessly to the floor. “That will be the end of you, just like that, I told her. But the foolish girl will never listen.”
“I’m sure you’ve heard worse. How often do you see Agnes?”
Defeated, Opilio shrugged. “Not often. She comes and goes. When she has nowhere else to stay, she turns up here. She is my niece, after all, the daughter of Comita. If Agnes had been our daughter, rather than my brother’s, she would have grown up differently.”
John could understand why the sausage maker had not been able to disown his niece entirely.
“Opilio, I regret having to tell you. Agnes is dead.”
Opilio looked at John mutely. The buzzing of flies sounded louder.
The sausage maker shook his head. He slumped down on the stool where the boy had been sitting to clean casings.
“She was found a little more than a week ago,” John went on. “I have been looking into the matter.”
“Looking into…but why…what happened? Was it an accident?”
“It appears she was murdered.”
Opilio made the sign of the Christians. “I warned her many times, excellency. Thank the Lord her mother was spared hearing this. Perhaps they are reunited. Heaven is merciful, even to actresses. More merciful than I was.” He wiped at his eyes with the back of his hand.
“You were correct to warn her against the life she took up and the associations she made.”
“Was it to do with those foolish plots her friends were always chattering on about?” Opilio’s tone was suddenly fierce. “If it was, I’ll make sure—”
“Justice is for the emperor to dispense but you may be able to help its administration. You said you did not recall the names of any of Agnes’ acquaintances, but then again you didn’t remember talk of intrigues the first time we spoke. It may be that a name or two has come back to you. Troilus, perhaps? He was a close friend of your niece.”
“Yes. Yes, I admit it. I saw that villain on occasion. He would come here looking for Agnes.” Opilio’s forehead wrinkled and he leapt off the stool. “Is he the one responsible?”
“There may be some connection between him and her murderer. Why do you call him a villain?”
“He was a malcontent, excellency. Every cloud that passed over the sun was directed by the hand of the emperor. Every cold wind that blew came from the direction of the palace. If his evening meal was not cooked enough…well…it would have been perfection if it weren’t for the demon emperor.”
Apparently Opilio’s grief had unlocked his tongue and he was now talking without thought of the possible consequences.
“There was reason for his grievances?”
“Troilus was not a courtier. I know nothing of his family, but then why would I? Sedition’s good business to him. Many of his customers are former courtiers so he adopts their viewpoint, or pretends to at least. People prefer to deal with one of their own, someone who thinks like them.”
“People like Menander? Do you know him?”
“Yes, that’s another name I had tried to put out of my mind, but I remember him now. Whenever Agnes would start chattering about whatever disreputable function she’d been so thrilled to attend, his name would come up. He’s the worst of the lot. To him treasonous talk is entertainment. That and boys. Rather than cursing the emperor he should be thanking the Lord for his good fortune. I hear it was Menander who set Troilus up in business and even now he supplies half of his stock. No doubt he receives part of the sales price.”
“You told me before you did not think any of these plots were likely to result in action.”
“It’s nothing but idle talk. That’s why I dismissed it all from my memory. There’s no harm in words which are only whispered to those who already share one’s prejudices. Besides, even people who hate Justinian love sausage. And a healthy business enriches the coffers of the empire, does it not?”
“There aren’t many men who would maintain such a strong allegiance to an emperor who had deprived their brother of his head.”
“Perhaps Glykos deserved his fate.”
A stray breeze carried a gust of fragrant smoke from the sheds in the courtyard into the workroom, rustling the bundles of dried herbs. John wondered if Justinian had taken the revenge on the sausage maker’s brother that the Christian and patriotic Opilio had harbored in his own heart.
“When you told Agnes what you overheard in Francio’s kitchen, was that the last time you saw her?”
“Yes, excellency. It was the very day I made the delivery. Otherwise, I would never have remembered even those few verses. I never could memorize my Homer, the seas like wine and such. Agnes talked about your house often. She thinks…thought…of it as home. I tried to give her and her mother a home, but my house is hardly comparable to a mansion on the palace grounds.”
“It’s understandable, Opilio. We all remember places where we were happy. What else did you talk about?”
The sausage maker sighed and blinked his suddenly brimming eyes. “Nothing of great importance. We argued and she left.”
“Did she ever mention gossip about Theodora having a son? Troilus said it was the sort of thing that’s bandied about.”
“That’s just the kind of scandal that fool Troilus would relish believing, Lord Chamberlain, and about as authentic as those curiosities he sells. Why don’t you talk to Menander?”
Opilio’s shoulders heaved as he suppressed a sob. “Please, excellency. I would like to close my shop now. I must arrange my niece’s funeral. Where is she?”
“The funeral has already taken place, Opilio. I will tell you where she is buried so you can visit her grave.”
***
The boy barreled down the stairway leading up to the floor on which Menander lived.
John stepped aside to avoid a collision and grabbed a flapping sleeve, restraining the boy from crashing into Peter, laboring up behind.
“If you’re here to see Menander, he’s at home, but in no state for nothing,” the boy blurted out.
“Explain,” John demanded.
“He’s drunk again. Took me ages to get him upstairs.”
John released the boy who bounded away, almost knocking Peter down.
Menander’s door was locked. John hammered on it until he heard shuffling on the other side.
“Who’s that? Forgot something?” The words were slurred. “Wait…”
The door came open to reveal white-haired Menander wobbling from foot to foot, gazing down toward where a boy’s head should have been. He jerked his gaze up, gave a startled gasp, and staggered back.
His heel snagged on a rumpled garment and he toppled over into the glittering wall of treasures that bisected the room, dislodging a rectangular object.
Menander made a clumsy grab at it and missed. The artifact hit
a small table and vanished in a tinkling burst of color.
Menander stared down in horror at bits of glass littering the embroidered wall hanging which served for a floor covering.
“There’s a day! I have lost a day of my life,” he wailed.
John realized the object had been the changeable mosaic which had startled Crinagoras.
“Surely it wasn’t that valuable?” John replied.
“You would be surprised, Lord Chamberlain. But then, many people have no appreciation for them. Figulus takes full advantage of those of us who retain our appreciation. They cost a hefty sum, but he says he needs the money for a good cause.” Menander suddenly looked around in alarm, as if startled by his own words. “What did I say? I am very tired, excellency. So very tired. You must excuse me.”
John gestured Peter to enter. The old servant glanced around and immediately looked almost as horrified as Menander.
Menander gave a bitter laugh. “Another interview with the Lord Chamberlain? Between you and Procopius I haven’t been so popular at the palace since the day I left.”
Peter’s expression changed to outrage at the manner in which Menander spoke to John.
John ignored it. “Perhaps you have given a fuller account of yourself to Procopius. Did you admit to him what you concealed from me? For example that you knew Glykos’ daughter, Agnes?”
“What? Agnes? I…I…”
“Is the wine clouding your thoughts, Menander? You moved in the same circles and did business with her friend Troilus.”
“When did you ask me about Agnes and Troilus, Lord Chamberlain? Surely I must have mentioned them?”
“What I am interested in now, Menander, are these fanciful tales about Theodora’s son.”
“Procopius badgered me about that as well. It’s an old story. He knew more about it than I do. That’s what I said. I said you have just told me more than I know, Procopius, so go and ask yourself. My advice is to ask Procopius.” Menander swayed.
John blinked. He did not feel too steady on his feet himself. His head began to pound again.
He realized Peter had taken hold of his arm.
“Master, forgive the familiarity but you do not look well. If I may say so, you won’t get any sense out of that old wine-skin.”
“What did you say?” Menander demanded. “Wine-skin? You called me an old wine-skin. Is that my fate? To be insulted by ancient menials?”
“My servant is right, Menander. I will return when you are capable of thinking clearly.”
With the swift change of emotion of the intoxicated, Menander burst into tears. “Ah…my precious icon!” He crumpled to his knees. “A day of my life…gone…And how do I know it won’t be the very day when the tyrant Justinian dies? A day I would have lived to see. Except for this…and now I have lost what would have been the happiest day of my life.”
Chapter Thirty
Peter glanced into John’s bedroom.
Through the crack left by the slightly open door he could see a form on the bed in the shadows.
John had remained in his room all day. It was deeply worrying.
Every time Peter checked, John had been asleep despite the noise caused by the workmen downstairs carting barrels and sacks of tesserae, plaster, and straw through the atrium.
It must have been the blow to the head.
The matter worried him. Long ago during his military days, a soldier Peter knew had been struck on the head by a Persian sword. It seemed the blow had left the man unharmed. For two days he showed his helmet around camp. The force of the blow had split it open.
It had been a miracle.
But on the morning of the third day, while the soldier filled his bowl with gruel and described yet again how he prayed each day to the military saints Sergius and Bacchus, he dropped dead.
This is how close to death we all are, Peter thought. We never can be certain we will finish our breakfast.
Death was close to old men such as himself. Some nights, alone in his room with the lamp extinguished and the only light that which came through his tiny window, the faint effulgence of the city, light from thousands of torches under colonnades and the glowing dome of the Great Church, Peter could sense the Angel of Death standing on the other side of his door. He would hold his breath, praying silently, waiting for the knock none could refuse to answer.
He heard nothing, could see nothing. Yet he could feel a presence. So far the angel had always chosen to go away.
Peter peeked around the edge of John’s door, reassured when he saw John’s chest rising and falling as he breathed.
He intended to prepare the sweetened cakes John liked but had found the jug of honey on the kitchen shelf was almost empty. Fortunately there was more in the storeroom at the back of the house.
Peter went downstairs. He wondered how the work was progressing. He’d be happy when he no longer had to repeatedly sweep away the straw and plaster dust the workmen dropped.
He sighed. Once again muddy footsteps pointed the way to the bath. Worse, the mud had been smeared all over the floor by whatever the inconsiderate fellow had dragged behind him.
Peter clucked in annoyance, then stopped himself. Cornelia might be in earshot.
Her residence in the house made him self conscious. He no longer felt free to sing his favorite hymns while he worked. The house had changed since she had arrived. He never knew when he was going to run into her rounding a corner or coming out a room. She was a kind woman, if ill tempered, he thought with a smile, and devoted to John.
For that latter he was grateful.
However, he knew both he and his master had become used to their solitude.
It was true that John had hired the Egyptian girl, Hypatia, who had once worked in the same household as Peter in the days when they were both slaves. But now she worked in the palace gardens.
He wondered if she might be persuaded to return.
Peter’s trips in search of fresh produce took longer now. He had found a new market, farther away than the one he usually frequented, which, he had convinced himself, sold superior leeks. He also spent more time in the garden, trying without success to keep alive the herbs Hypatia had planted.
Perhaps John would ask her to return. Anyone who had lived in a house such as this would be dissatisfied with a cramped room elsewhere.
Perhaps…
The artisans were finished for the day, but had left tools and material littered along the hallway.
Good workmen would not be so careless with their tools, Peter thought as he picked his way between barrels.
Peter paused and glanced around.
Not that the mistress could have any objection to his checking to see how far the delicate task had progressed.
He opened the door and entered.
The activities portrayed in the mosaics, he noted, were shocking. Not anything a good Christian would take pleasure from. He hadn’t seen their like outside a brothel.
His lips tightened as he suppressed a smile. The room always reminded him of an incident from his youth involving a pretty servant and his owner’s bath. At the time he had cursed his stupidity for inviting punishment for the sake of a brief tryst with a girl he had never seen again.
Now, decades later, he could recall the young lady down to the smallest detail—and often did—while he could not even bring to mind the vaguest image of his owner’s face.
The Lord would forgive him. After all, it was the Lord who chose to make young people the way He had.
Red light from the dying sun spilled down from the circular opening in the roof and caught the voluptuous torso of a marble Aphrodite, sparkled across a heedless couple depicted on the wall behind her, and limned the figure seated in the basin at her feet.
Peter stepped forward and took a closer look.
An old man sat at the bottom, a big fellow with a craggy face and bushy, white hair. A purplish bruise circled his neck.
His eyes were wide open but he was not looking at anything so earthly as the mosaics. He was clearly dead.
Chapter Thirty-One
The official sent by the Master of the Offices climbed out of the basin in John’s private bath. “Menander, you say? I seem to recall the name.”
The man’s pinched features suggested he had suffered long employment by the prickly administrator. “A little too vocal about the emperor’s revenue raising methods, wasn’t he?” he added. “I suppose it’s Menander who got the last laugh. He ended his days in the palace after all. I don’t suspect you, Lord Chamberlain. I’m certain you have a servant who would do the job. Some sturdy, youthful fellow.”
The official glanced at Peter who stood on the other side of the room, alongside Cornelia and Anatolius, both of whom had walked in on the unexpected drama. If there had ever been so many people in the tiny facility before it had been during the tax collector’s ownership.
“I can assure you John didn’t kill Menander,” Cornelia flared. “Or for that matter order his death.”
“Makes no difference to me,” the official replied. “It would if it was Theodora lying there. A Lord Chamberlain’s free to remove anyone who troubles him so long as the disappearance doesn’t displease the emperor.”
While his assistants wrapped the body in a length of canvas, the official studied the wall mosaics. His pained expression didn’t change.
The body was pulled up out of the basin and strapped to a board. Before long Menander, the official, and his assistants vanished down the hallway, Peter leading them.
“It’s not Peter’s fault,” Cornelia said. “He tried to keep an eye on the comings and goings today but there’s only one of him. Not that I’d want an army of servants underfoot. It would make me nervous to have people waiting on me.”
Anatolius laughed. “I’ve never seen such a household. You’re both better suited to be hermits. A nice cave or a pillar might do.”
“I wouldn’t care to live on a pillar,” John told him. “I like to walk while I think.”