The Roman Mysteries Complete Collection

by Lawrence, Caroline

  Pliny dropped his head.

  Aristo gazed straight back into her eyes. ‘Yes.’

  ‘I am not,’ said Miriam coldly, ‘some garland to be won in a wrestling match. I’m a woman. I’m betrothed to Gaius Flavius Geminus – or will be if he ever gets round to it – and I love him!’

  ‘I’m very glad to hear that,’ came a voice on the other side of the court.

  ‘Uncle Gaius!’ cried Flavia. All heads turned to look at the man who had stepped out from behind a mulberry tree.

  Miriam turned to look up at him, too, a look of astonishment on her face.

  Gaius smiled at her and opened his arms.

  But instead of running into them, Miriam uttered a cry of disgust and rushed up the steps and into the shadowed corridor towards her room.

  The girls found the curtain drawn across the doorway of Miriam’s bedroom. Flavia scratched softly at the pale blue plaster on the wall outside.

  ‘Go away, Gaius!’ came Miriam’s voice. ‘I don’t want to see you now.’

  ‘It’s us: Flavia and Nubia.’

  There was a pause.

  ‘Can we come in?’

  Another pause. Then a very quiet: ‘Yes.’

  Miriam was standing by the window with her back to them.

  ‘Miriam,’ said Flavia softly. ‘What’s wrong?’

  For a long moment Miriam was quiet. Then she turned around. Her eyes were full of tears.

  ‘I miss Frustilla,’ she said.

  ‘Frustilla?’ said Flavia.

  ‘Old cook of Uncle Gaius,’ whispered Nubia. ‘Who died of fumes.’

  ‘I know that,’ Flavia said to Nubia. She turned back to Miriam: ‘Why her? Why do you miss Frustilla?’

  ‘Because she was so wise and kind. She told me all sorts of things that father never told me.’ Miriam sat on her bed and stared down at her hands. ‘Frustilla would have known what to do about all these men who want me.’

  ‘But don’t you like the attention?’ said Flavia. She sat on one side of Miriam and Nubia on the other. ‘You’re so beautiful,’ continued Flavia, ‘I wish I were . . .’

  ‘I hate being beautiful!’ said Miriam, with such vehemence that Flavia recoiled. ‘And don’t envy me. You least of all, Flavia. Everyone loves you because of who you are. Not because of how you look. It’s awful to have men stare at you as if they’re starving and you’re some tasty morsel of bread dipped in gravy . . .’

  ‘I’m sorry, Miriam,’ said Flavia. ‘I didn’t realise—’

  ‘I hate them fighting over me when they don’t even know me. They make me out to be some kind of goddess, when I’m only human. Frustilla knew that. She would have known what to do and . . . I miss her. I miss her so much.’ Tears welled up in Miriam’s eyes and spilled onto her cheeks.

  Flavia started to say something but Nubia put her finger to her lips. Flavia nodded and put her arm around Miriam, whose whole body shuddered with sobs.

  Presently, when Miriam’s tears subsided, Nubia said, ‘You are loving Gaius because part of him was Frustilla?’

  Miriam raised her head and looked at Nubia with swollen eyes. ‘I love him,’ she sniffed. ‘But I also loved Frustilla and the farm and the garden . . . I was happy there.’

  Flavia passed Miriam her handkerchief. ‘So it’s harder to love him on his own? When he’s poor and doesn’t have Frustilla or the farm and the garden?’

  Miriam looked at Flavia and bit her lip. After a moment she nodded. ‘Is that wrong?’ she said, and tears welled up in her eyes again.

  ‘I don’t know,’ said Flavia. ‘I only know Uncle Gaius loves you for who you are, not just what you look like.’

  ‘I know,’ said Miriam. ‘But there are other things . . . There’s your faith . . . his faith. It’s so different from ours. He worships dozens of gods and ours is only one of them.’

  Flavia didn’t know what to say. So she put her arm around Miriam’s shoulders again, and gave her a squeeze.

  As she did so, she was almost certain she heard footsteps outside in the corridor. Footsteps going quietly away.

  *

  ‘Uncle Gaius, why did you come here? Is everything all right?’

  Flavia’s uncle turned from the parapet of the violet-scented terrace. His eyes were shadowed.

  ‘No,’ he said. ‘Everything’s not all right.’ He looked at the three friends. ‘Where’s Lupus?’

  ‘He’s sleeping,’ said Jonathan, coming out of the triclinium into the sunshine. ‘He nearly drowned today. He’ll be all right, but he needs to rest.’

  ‘Poor boy.’ Gaius shook his head. ‘He’s the reason I came. I need to talk to you. But not here. Somewhere private. And open. I need some air.’

  ‘We can go into the big garden,’ suggested Flavia.

  Her uncle nodded, so Flavia led the way back through the triclinium, down another long terrace with the sea on their left and the baths on their right. The sun was low in the sky now and the mulberry and fig trees cast bluish shadows back across the bright green lawn and rosemary borders.

  Near the centre of the garden stood an enormous and ancient mulberry tree whose trunk was encircled by a marble bench. Gaius made for this tree. He brushed some ripe mulberries from the marble seat and sat down on it. Flavia and Nubia sat on one side of him and Jonathan sat on the other.

  Gaius pulled a scroll from his shoulder bag and turned to Jonathan. ‘Bato the magistrate came to see your father yesterday,’ he said. ‘Apparently Lupus tried to hire an assassin a few days ago.’

  ‘What?’ they all cried.

  Gaius nodded. ‘A man named Gamala. He used to be a member of the sicarii, a group of Jewish assassins. Somehow Lupus found out and approached him in the baths a few days ago. He asked this Gamala how much he would charge to kill Venalicius. Luckily Gamala is a friend of Bato’s. He played along: named some ridiculous amount which Lupus could never hope to raise . . .’

  Flavia jumped up from the bench. ‘But Uncle Gaius! He does hope to raise it. That must be why he wants the gold so badly. He wants to hire someone to kill Venalicius.’

  ‘But why does Lupus hate Venalicius so much?’ said Jonathan. ‘I mean, we all hate him. But this is ridiculous!’

  Suddenly Flavia knew. ‘Venalicius must be the person who killed Lupus’s parents and cut out his tongue!’ she whispered.

  Gaius nodded. ‘Correct. It’s all here.’ He tapped the scroll.

  ‘What is?’ Flavia frowned and sat down again.

  ‘The story of how Lupus lost his tongue,’ said Gaius.

  Flavia stared at him, then took the scroll and examined it. It was a slender roll of papyrus, without a central rod, sealed with a red disc of wax.

  ‘Hey!’ Jonathan exclaimed. ‘That’s my father’s seal.’

  Gaius nodded.

  ‘Why is my father’s seal on Lupus’s story?’

  ‘Venalicius must have told him,’ cried Flavia, ‘when they were imprisoned together.’

  ‘Correct again,’ said her uncle. ‘Venalicius confessed everything to Mordecai. Jonathan’s father swears that Venalicius has repented of his former ways. That he wants to make up for his bad deeds . . .’

  ‘I don’t believe it!’ cried Flavia.

  Jonathan frowned. ‘Why didn’t my father tell us this before?’ he asked.

  ‘Venalicius’ change of heart is very recent, and this information about Lupus is very . . . private. I think Mordecai hoped that Lupus would tell you himself one day, in writing. But when we found out that Lupus tried to hire an assassin . . . that is very serious.’

  ‘And dangerous,’ added Jonathan.

  ‘Exactly,’ said Gaius. ‘You’ve got to talk him out of it. Mordecai thought you might have a better chance of convincing him if you knew the whole story.’

  ‘Do you know the whole story?’ asked Flavia.

  ‘I know enough,’ said Gaius, getting to his feet. ‘Mordecai told me the gist of it. But he thought you should hear a fuller account.’

  He ha
nded the scroll to Jonathan and looked up into the fading sky of dusk. Above them a huge flock of starlings had begun to wheel and swoop.

  ‘It’s getting dark,’ said Gaius. ‘I have to get back to Ostia and return my horse to the stables. And I have an early morning meeting with Rufus and Dexter, the bankers.’

  Have you found out any more about why they’re trying to take our house?’

  ‘Not yet,’ said Gaius. ‘Rufus has been in Rome on business. He only just got back. Good luck with Lupus. I hope you can help him.’ He glanced towards the villa and for a moment Flavia thought he was going to say something else. But he only shook his head and strode towards a gap in the box hedge. Flavia and her friends followed him and waved as he rode off down the tree-lined drive. But he did not look back.

  Jonathan sat back down on the marble bench between the girls. They all looked at the scroll in his hand.

  ‘That’s it,’ whispered Flavia. ‘The story of how Lupus lost his tongue.’

  Jonathan nodded and took a deep breath. Then he put his thumb under the edge of the scroll and slid it up the textured papyrus towards the wax disc. He felt a pop as the seal broke. Slowly, the scroll unrolled itself in his lap. It was not a very long sheet, only about the length of his arm. He quickly scanned the text.

  Flavia looked puzzled. ‘Why are you starting at the end?’

  ‘What? Oh, Hebrew is written right to left. We start our scrolls from the other end.’

  Flavia peered over his shoulder. ‘Your father wrote it in Hebrew? Why?’

  Jonathan shrugged. ‘I guess to make sure nobody else could read it, even if it was opened.’ He frowned at the scroll. ‘That’s a strange rubric,’ he said.

  ‘What is a rude brick?’ asked Nubia.

  ‘The rubric is the heading. The title.’ Jonathan pointed: ‘Here. In red ink. It says The Story of Philippos . . . I don’t understand that.’

  ‘But you understand the Hebrew?’ said Flavia.

  ‘Of course.’

  ‘Then read it, Jonathan. Please.’

  Jonathan cleared his throat and began to read, translating from Hebrew to Latin as he went along.

  The Story of Philippos

  My appreciation of beauty has been the greatest curse in my life. If only I had been born blind, like other people, I might have been happy.

  Perhaps it was because my mother Elena was so beautiful. She was the most beautiful woman on the island of Symi.

  Or perhaps it was because my father was so ugly. He was a sponge-diver with crooked teeth and small black eyes. His huge nose was a shapeless mass squashed across his face. Even from a very young age I couldn’t bear to see them together.

  Luckily my father was often away with the other men of the island, diving for the best sponges, so my mother and I spent many happy days together alone. I would sit and watch her weave and listen to her sing. Whenever my father came home, I ran out of the house onto the beach. When father sailed away again, I would return to my mother.

  The summer I was seven, we barely saw my father. And it seemed to me that my mother grew even more beautiful. Her belly grew like a ripe fruit. Sometimes, when I rested my head on it, I felt something stir inside.

  Then one day, my father returned.

  He embraced my mother. Presently he saw me and lifted me up. ‘How’s little Philippos?’ His breath stank of garlic and there were tiny black dots on the leathery skin of his nose and cheeks.

  I thought he was horrible and shrank away. He laughed.

  Suddenly my mother cried: ‘The baby! It’s time!’

  Soon the house was full of women in black. My father and I were pushed outside. We sat beneath our grape arbour with the men from the village and listened to my mother’s screams. At last she grew silent. The women brought out my baby brother and presented him to my father.

  Then they told us that my mother was dead.

  I hated my father. It was his fault she had died. The baby’s, too. Sometimes I tried to smother it, but my father always caught me and beat me.

  As my little brother Alexandros grew older, I realised that he had my mother’s beauty. When people saw him, their eyes lit up. But their faces remained blank when they looked at me. Then one day I discovered the reason why. For the first time in my life I saw my own reflection.

  I will never forget that day. I knelt over the puddle of rainwater for a long time, not believing what I saw.

  I, Philippos – who was so aware of beauty – looked like my father. It was a cruel joke of the gods.

  I hated myself and everyone around me. Perhaps my hatred made me even uglier. Gradually people had nothing to do with me at all. Only one person on the island befriended me. A little girl named Melissa, about my brother’s age.

  Because she was kind to me, I wanted to get her a gift. Something special. But the people of my island were so poor that we could not afford mirrors or silk or even the very sponges which we dived for. Then one day I found a bed of oysters. Although my father had made me dive the full seven dives that day, I decided to dive again. Diving was something I was good at. I would dive once more and get a pearl for Melissa.

  I ignored the warning of the gods and made eight dives. Nine. Ten. I brought up oysters, but none of them had a pearl. Then my vision grew red: my left eye had filled with blood. The pain of losing the sight of one eye was terrible, but not as bad as the pain I felt when I ran to find my reflection in the water. A horrible monster glared back at me. A face that would make children cry and men turn away.

  I was thirteen years old.

  The injury meant I couldn’t risk diving again. Now I was useless. Good for nothing. Melissa was still kind to me but I could see she was repelled by my blind eye. I decided to end my life and so I climbed a cliff above jagged rocks. But my courage failed me and I crept back down again.

  Not long after that, my father sold me to slave-traders. He needed the money, he said.

  On that day, I vowed revenge.

  Twenty years later I returned to Symi, a rich man with my own ship.

  But I had not forgotten my vow.

  Unseen, we dropped anchor in a secluded cove and I went alone to my father’s house on the beach. It was dusk. I hid behind a trellis twined with honeysuckle and waited for darkness, my knife in my hand.

  It was not my father who came out of the house, however, but a beautiful woman. She had been a little girl the last time I saw her, but I knew it was Melissa.

  Standing there behind the honeysuckle I prayed to Venus, vowing that if Melissa would have me, I would become the kindest of men and renounce my evil ways. I would stop dealing in slaves and use my money to help the poor and unlovely. Even as the thought occurred to me, I felt my spirit lift.

  At that moment a young man and a little boy ran up from the beach. The boy sat down to eat and the man kissed Melissa.

  As I recognised Melissa’s husband, I felt something like a blow to my heart. It was my younger brother Alexandros. The gods on Olympus had played another cruel joke on me.

  That night my brother and his son went fishing. When they were gone, I went into the house after Melissa. Vengeance was in my heart, but she turned away my wrath with kind words and we talked all night.

  When her husband and son returned in the morning, something made Melissa scream. Before I could explain that I hadn’t hurt her, Alexandros overpowered me and took my knife. I fought back and in the struggle he cut off my ear.

  The searing pain drove me mad and gave me new strength. I won back the knife and used it. The boy threw himself at me, but I easily knocked him to the ground. Soon Alexandros lay on the floor, too. I stood panting, and stared down at my brother’s dead body. There was no room for remorse now.

  ‘If you ever tell anyone of this,’ I warned Melissa through a screaming haze of pain, ‘I’ll kill you, too.’

  ‘I won’t tell,’ she sobbed, but then my good ear heard a voice ring out:

  ‘I’ll tell on you! You’re Uncle Philippos!’

&nbs
p; My nephew must have been about five or six. A brave boy. But foolish.

  ‘No, you won’t tell,’ I said. I took the knife and cut out his tongue before his mother’s eyes. Then I said to her: ‘I’m taking the boy with me. If anyone comes after me, he dies.’

  Jonathan stopped reading for a moment and swallowed hard.

  ‘I feel sick,’ whispered Flavia. The others nodded.

  ‘I don’t understand,’ said Nubia presently. ‘Who is Philippos?’

  ‘Philippos,’ began Flavia, but her voice caught. ‘Philippos,’ she attempted again, ‘must be Venalicius’ real name. He is Lupus’s uncle. The one who killed Lupus’s father.’

  ‘And cut out Lupus’s tongue,’ said Jonathan.

  Nubia was still frowning. ‘This story is written by Venalicius?’

  ‘In a way,’ said Jonathan. ‘I suppose my father wrote it down as Venalicius told it to him.’

  ‘Is there any more?,’ asked Flavia, swallowing again.

  ‘A little,’ said Jonathan. ‘Listen.’

  I left Melissa weeping and sailed away with my nephew. He was ill for many days but hatred made him strong and he recovered. When we docked in Ostia he escaped. I was almost sad. He had begun to remind me of myself at that age.

  *

  Flavia had been watching Jonathan’s finger move from right to left as he read the story. When he stopped again, she pointed. ‘What’s that? Did you read that bit?’

  ‘It’s just another rubric. It says:

  I, Mordecai, servant of the living God, wrote this story as it was told to me on the fifth day of Tishri in the first year of the Emperor Titus. I wrote it as accurately as I could and without making judgment. May God have mercy on my soul and on his.’

  As Jonathan read these words a movement caught Flavia’s eye.

  ‘Lupus!’

  The boy had stepped out from behind the mulberry tree. He was wearing a clean tunic and his arms hung loose beside him. In one hand he held a wax tablet.

  ‘Lupus, we’re sorry,’ said Jonathan. ‘We just wanted to help you.’

  Flavia braced herself for Lupus’s fury. But he did not run away or scream or tear up the scroll. Instead, he took a single step towards them.