'Export?' I queried. 'So what was that? - Caesar grabbing loot - or are scrolls from the Library regularly sold off? Duplicates? Unwanted volumes? Authors whose writing the Librarian personally hates?'
My informants looked uncertain. Eventually one took up the main story again: 'When Mark Antony became Cleopatra's lover, it is said he gave her two hundred thousand books - some say from the Library at Pergamum - as a gift to replace her lost scrolls. Afterwards, perhaps, Cleopatra's library of scrolls was taken to Rome by the victorious Octavian - or not.'
I made a bemused gesture. 'Some say and perhaps ... So what do you think? After all, you do have an operational library now.'
'Of course.'
''I can see why the Librarian seemed a trifle put out when the conversation flagged awkwardly and my wife asked for figures.'
'It would reflect on him badly if he was unable to say what his stocks were.'
'Is it possible,'' I suggested, 'that at various times, when threatened, wily librarians misled conquerors about whether they had taken possession of all the scrolls?'
'Everything is possible,' agreed the young philosophers.
'Could there be so many scrolls, nobody can ever count them?'
'That too, Falco.'
I grinned. 'Certainly no one man can read them all!'
My young friends found that idea quite horrible. Their aim was to read as few scrolls as possible, purely to tickle up their debating style with learned quotations and obscure references. Just enough to obtain flash jobs in civic administration, so their fathers would increase their allowances and find them rich wives.
I said I had better not keep them from that laudable aim any longer. 'I just remembered I forgot to ask the Zoo Keeper where he was the night Theon died.'
'Oh,' the students told me helpfully, 'he's bound to say he was with Roxana.'
'Mistress?' They nodded. 'So how can you be so sure that he had an assignation that night?'
'Maybe not. But isn't ''with my mistress'' what all guilty parties tell you, when they are fixing up an alibi?'
'True - though colluding with the mistress requires them to admit to a racy way of life. Philadelphion may need to be circumspect; he has a family somewhere.' I saw the young men were envious - though not of the family. They wanted to hook fabulous mistresses. 'So what is Roxana like? Bit of an exotic specimen?'
They came alive, making voluptuous gestures to indicate her curvaciousness and seething with lust. I had no need to go back to Philadelphion. Whether or not he had something to hide, he would make Roxana swear he was with her all night and any court would believe him.
When he had finished the necropsy, he had told me he was going to dine somewhere. I gained the impression at the time that, wherever it was, Philadelphion was well in. After cutting up dead flesh, he must have welcomed the warm delights of living.
I wondered at which hour of the day a citizen of Alexandria could decently visit his mistress.
I asked one last question. Remembering the item on the Academic Board's agenda on discipline (-which they had deferred very eagerly), I asked: 'Do any of you fellows know somebody called Nibytas?'
They looked at one another in a -way I found puzzling, but said nothing. I made my gaze sterner. At last, one replied shiftily, 'He is a very old scholar, who always works in the Library.'
'Know anything more about him?'
'No; he never speaks to anyone.'
'No use to me then!' I exclaimed.
XVIII
The young man took me indoors and pointed out where Nibytas generally sat - a lone table at the very end of the great hall. I would not have found it unaided; the table had been pushed right into a dark corner and set at an angle as if creating a barrier to others.
The old man was absent from his place. Well, even the studious have to eat and pee. A mass of scrolls littered the table. I walked up to have a look. Many of the scrolls had torn strips of papyrus stuck in them as markers, while some were lying half unrolled. They looked as if they had been left like that for months. Unruly piles of private note-tablets were jumbled in among the library scrolls. The reading position reeked of intense, long-winded study that had been going on for years. You could tell at a glance the man who sat here was obsessive and at least a little crazy.
Before I could investigate his weird scribbles, I spotted the tragedy professor, Aeacidas. I wanted to interview all the likely candidates for Theon's job, and do it as quickly as possible. He had seen me; afraid he would decamp, I walked over and asked for a few words.
Aeacidas was big, lolloping, bushy-eyebrowed, with the longest beard I had seen in Alexandria. His tunic was clean, but had worn nap and was two sizes too big. He refused to leave his work station. That didn't mean he would not speak to me: he just stayed where lie was, no matter how much annoyance his booming baritone caused to others nearby.
I said I had heard he was on the Director's shortlist. 'I should damn well hope so!' roared Aeacidas unashamedly.
I tried to murmur discreetly. 'You may be the only outsider, the only one not from the Academic Board.'
I was favoured with an explosion of disgust. Aeacidas claimed that if Philetus was given his head, the Museion would be run by archaic representatives of the original arts assigned to the Muses. In case I was the ignoramus he took me for, he listed them, both good and bad: 'Tragedy, comedy, lyric poetry, erotic poetry, religious hymns – religious hymns! - epic, history, astronomy and - the gods help us - song and bloody dance.'
I thanked him for this courtesy. 'Not much room at the moment for literature.'
'Damn right!'
'Or the sciences?'
'Stuff bloody science!'All charm.
'If you wanted to get added to the Board to speak for your discipline, how are people elected? Dead men's shoes?'
Aeacidas made a restless movement. 'Not necessarily. The Board steers Museion policy. Philetus can co-opt anyone he thinks has a contribution to make. Of course he doesn't. The ridiculous little man just can't see how much help he needs.'
'Drowning in his own incompetence?'
The big, angry tragedy teacher stopped and gave me a hard look. He seemed surprised that anyone could come in as a stranger and immediately grasp the institution's problems. 'You've met the bastard, then!'
'Not my type.' Aeacidas was not interested enough in other people to care what I thought. He only wanted to stress that in his judgement the Director lacked skills. That was old news. I cut him off. 'So, wasn't the death of Theon fortunate for you? Without it, you wouldn't stand much chance of wriggling in among Philetus' tight little clique. By putting yourself forward for librarianship, you may join the Board as of right.'
Aeacidas immediately caught my drift. 'I would not have wished Theon dead.' Well, tragedy was his medium. I guessed he understood motive; no doubt fate, sin and retribution too.
I wondered how good he was at spotting the essential human flaw that tragic heroes are supposed to have. 'What's your assessment of Theon?'
'Well-intentioned and doing a decent job according to his abilities.' Always, this man managed to suggest the rest of the world failed to meet his own grand standards. Under his rule, everything would be different - assuming he ever won the post. If sympathetic man-management was a requirement, he stood no chance.
I asked where he was when Theon died. Aeacidas was astounded, even when I said I was asking everyone. I had to point out that failing to answer would look suspicious. So he grudgingly admitted he was reading in his room; nobody could verify his whereabouts.
'What were you reading?'
'Well... Homer's Odyssey! The tragedian admitted this lapse of good taste as if I had caught him out with a racy adventure yarn. Forget that; the Odyssey is one. Say, caught with a pornographic myth, involving animals - sold under the counter in a plain wrapper by a seedy scroll shop that pretends to be offering literary odes. 'Sorry to disappoint you, Falco - that's all I can do to clear myself!'
I assured him only villa
ins took elaborate precautions to establish their movements; to have no alibi could indicate innocence. 'Note my gentle inflection on could. I adore the subjunctive mood. Of course in my trade the possible does not necessarily embrace the feasible or believable.' Helena would tell me to shut up and stop being clever now; her rule was you have to know somebody extremely well before you engage in wordplay. To her, word games were a kind of flirting.
Aeacidas gave me a filthy look. He thought sophisticated verb deployment should be barred to the lower classes - and informing for the Emperor was definitely menial. I sneered like a thug who didn't mind getting his hands dirty - preferably by wringing suspects' necks - then I asked where he thought I might find Apollophanes so I could try out my grammar on him.
The philosopher, the Director's sneak, was reading, on a stone bench in an arcade. He told me it was forbidden to remove scrolls from the complex, but the walks, arcades and gardens that linked the Museion's elegant buildings were all within bounds; they had always been intended as outdoor reading rooms for the Great Library. Works had to be returned to staff at the end of opening hours.
'And scholars can be trusted to hand them in?'
'It's not inconvenient. The staff will keep scrolls until the next day, if you still require them.'' Apollophanes had a weak, slightly hoarse voice. At the Academic Board he had had to wait for a pause to open up and then jump in, in order to be heard.
'I bet quite a few go missing!' He looked nervous. 'Steady! I'm not accusing you of book-stealing.' He was so jumpy he was quivering.
Perhaps Apollophanes had a good brain, but he hid it well. Away from the Director's protection, he looked hunched and so unassuming I could not imagine him writing a treatise or teaching pupils effectively. He was like those idiots with absolutely no bonhomie who insist on running a bar.
I asked the usual questions: did he see himself as a shortlist candidate and where was he two evenings ago? He fluttered that oh, he was hardly worthy of high office - but if considered good enough, of course he would take the job... and he had been at the refectory, then talking to a group of his pupils. He gave me names, apprehensively. 'Does this mean you will question them about whether I have told the truth, Falco?'
'What is truth?' I demanded airily. I like to annoy experts by wading into their disciplines. 'Routine procedure. Think nothing of it.'
'They will believe I am in some sort of trouble!'
'Apollophanes, I am sure your pupils all know you as a man of impeccable ethics. How could you lecture on virtue, without knowing right from wrong?'
'They are paying me to explain the difference!' he quipped, still flustered but yet taking heart as he sank back into his discipline's traditional jokes.
'I have been talking to some of the young scholars. I liked their style. As one would expect at such a renowned centre of learning, they seemed exceptionally bright.'
'What have they been saying?'Apollophanes anxiously pleaded, trying to gauge what I had found out. Anything I said would go straight back to his master. He was a good toady. Philetus must find him invaluable.
'Nothing your Director needs to worry about!' I assured him with a fake smile as I took my leave.
I could not find the lawyer. I asked a couple of people, suggesting that Nicanor might be in court. Both times this notion was greeted with bursts of hearty laughter.
Zenon the astronomer was easier. By now dusk was falling, so he was on the roof.
XIX
The purpose-built observatory was at the top of a very long flight of winding stone steps. Zenon was fussily adjusting a long, low seat which must be what he used when he gazed at the heavens. Like most practitioners who use equipment, astronomers have to be practical. I suspected he himself designed the star-watching lounger. He may have constructed it too.
After a swift glance at me, he lay down holding a notebook, tipped his head back and looked skywards like an augur out bird-spotting.
I tried being topical: '''Give me a place to stand and I will move the world!''' Zenon received my quotation with a thin, tired smile. 'Sorry. Archimedes is probably too earthbound for you... I'm Falco. I'm not a complete idiot. At least I didn't ask what your star sign is.' He still gave me the silent stare. Men of few words are the bane of my job. 'So! What is your stance, Zenon? Do you believe the sun orbits the earth or vice versa?'
'I am a heliocentrist.'
A sun man. He was also balding early, his gingery curls now providing a ragged halo around the top of an oval head. Above the obligatory beard, the skin on his cheeks was stretched and freckled. Light eyes surveyed me unhelpfully. At the Board meeting, he had been so quiet that compared with the others he had appeared to lack confidence. It was misleading.
'Your arm seems to have mended rather quickly, Falco.' I had ditched the napkin sling as soon as Helena and I left that morning's meeting.
'An observant witness. You are the first to notice!'
On his own ground, or his own roof, he had the autocratic attitude so many academics adopted. Most were unconvincing. I wouldn't ask a professor the time; not even this man who probably fine-tuned the Museion's sundial groma and knew what hour it was more exactly than anyone else in Alexandria. Zenon certainly did not view time as an element to be wasted: 'You are going to ask me where I was when Theon died.'
'That's the game.'
'I was here, Falco.'
'Anyone confirm it?'
'My students.' Briskly, he gave me names. I wrote them down, checking in my notes that they were different names from those Apollophanes provided. Without prompting, Zenon then told me, 'I may have been the last person to see Theon alive.' He jumped up and steered me to the edge of the roof. There was a low balustrade, but not what I call a safety barrier. It was a long way down. We looked over at the rectangular pool and the gardens that lay adjacent to the main entrance of the Great Library. 'I tend to be here until late. I heard footsteps. I looked and saw the Librarian arrive.'
'Hmm. I don't suppose you could make out whether he was chewing leaves? Or holding a bunch of foliage?'
Zenon's derision was tangible. 'No - but he had a dinner garland looped over his left arm.'
Word had got out that the garland was critical. 'It seems to be lost... Still, that's the kind of clue I like - what a geometrist would call a fixed point. All I need are a couple of others and I can start formulating theorems. Did you see anyone else, Zenon? Anybody following him?'
'No. My work is looking up, not down.'
'Yet you were curious about the footsteps?'
'We have intruders at the Library sometimes. One does one's duty.'
'What kind of intruders?'
'Who knows, Falco? The complex is full of high-spirited young men, for one thing. Many have rich parents who supply too much spending money. They may be here to study ethics, but some fail to embrace the ideas. They have no conscience and no sense of responsibility. When they get hold of wine flagons, the Library is a lode-stone. They climb in and he on the reading tables as if they were symposium couches, holding stupid mock debates. Then for a ''lark'' these boys break into the carefully catalogued armaria and jumble all the scrolls.'
'Regular occurrence?'
'It happens. Full moon,' said the astronomer mischievously, 'is always a bad time for delinquency.'
'My friends in the vigiles tell me so. According to them, they don't just experience more members of the public going crazy with axes, but increased dog bites, bee stings and absconding from their own units. This could be a ground-breaking topic for research - ''Social consequences of Lunar Variation: Observed Effects on Volatility of the Alexandrian Mob and Behaviour of Museion Layabouts...''Was there a full moon two nights ago?'
'No.' Helpful!
Zenon now changed his suggestion; he was playing with me - or so he thought. 'We Alexandrians blame the fifty-day wind, the Khamseen, which comes out of the desert full of red dust, drying all in its path.'
'Are we in the fifty days?'
'Yes. March t
o May is the season.''
'Was Theon affected by red dust?'
'People hate this wind. It can be fatal. Small creatures, sickly infants, and - who knows? - depressed librarians.'
'So he was depressed, you'd say?' I moved away from the edge of the roof. 'How did you regard Theon?'
'A respected colleague.'
'Wonderful. What kind of indemnity must I offer to obtain your real opinion?''
'Why should you think I am lying?'
'Too bland.Too quick to answer. Too similar to the nonsense all your esteemed colleagues have fobbed me off with. Were I a philosopher, I would be Aristotelian.'
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