The Roman Mysteries Complete Collection

by Lawrence, Caroline

  She had spoken in Hebrew but he replied in Latin: ‘Mother, these are my friends, the ones I’ve told you about, the ones who helped save your life.’ He turned to his friends. ‘This is my mother, Susannah.’

  She looked at them with a grave smile.

  ‘You should be Flavia. I am most glad to meet you. Most glad that you and my son are friends.’

  Jonathan winced. When his mother spoke in Latin she seemed different. Less confident and less intelligent. He didn’t want his friends to think she was stupid.

  ‘This is Nubia,’ he said quickly. ‘And Lupus.’

  ‘I am so happy that you come to Rome,’ she said. ‘But I ask you all one thing. Please do not tell Jonathan’s father that I live. The . . . shame is too great.’

  They nodded and Flavia said, ‘We promise we won’t breathe a word.’

  As his mother turned back to him, Jonathan caught a whiff of her perfume: rose and myrtle.

  ‘I’m sorry, Jonathan,’ she said in Hebrew, ‘you know I’m glad to see you, of course, but I wish Titus hadn’t sent for your father. It’s not as if he hasn’t brought in dozens of the best physicians in the Roman Empire.’

  ‘But father’s one of the best, too,’ he replied in Hebrew, and then in Latin, ‘I had the fever recently. Father saved my life. And he saved Flavia and Lupus and almost everybody else he treated.’

  ‘Yes,’ she said. ‘He was good man.’

  ‘He still is,’ said Jonathan sharply. ‘He’s not dead, mother.’

  ‘Yes. I know this. But I do not understand why Titus takes . . . the risk . . . to invite him here.’

  ‘He’s worried about the prophecy,’ said a soft voice. A dark-haired young woman stepped out from the shadows behind the loom.

  Jonathan glanced at her, and could not stop his jaw from dropping.

  Five Hebrew letters were branded across her lovely forehead. They spelled out a name: Delilah.

  ‘Great Jupiter’s eyebrows!’ Flavia exclaimed. ‘You’ve been branded!’ The words were out before she could stop them and she clapped her hand to her mouth. ‘I’m sorry,’ she said. ‘I didn’t mean to . . .’

  ‘I do not mind,’ said the young woman. Her black tunic and bare feet showed that she was an imperial slave. ‘Shalom.’ She bowed respectfully. ‘Peace be with you.’

  ‘Delilah is my servant,’ said Susannah, catching the girl’s hand and giving it a squeeze. ‘The Emperor’s consort Berenice accused her of flirting with him a few years ago. She branded her forehead as punishment.’

  ‘How awful!’ said Flavia. Delilah was looking at them with large brown eyes and it occurred to Flavia that she would have been extremely pretty had it not been for the brand on her forehead.

  ‘You were telling them about the prophecy,’ the slave-girl prompted Susannah.

  ‘Yes.’ Jonathan’s mother turned back to them. ‘Titus has had what he believes is a prophetic warning: “When a Prometheus opens a Pandora’s box, Rome will be devastated.”’

  ‘Pandora’s box with diseases and death in it?’ Nubia asked Flavia in a whisper. ‘Didn’t Pandora already open it?’

  ‘It’s an expression,’ Flavia told her. ‘We say someone has opened “a Pandora’s box” when they do something that starts a chain of bad events.’

  Jonathan frowned. ‘So what does the prophecy mean?’

  ‘Titus believes it is warning,’ said Susannah in her stilted Latin. ‘But he knows not what it means.’

  Suddenly Flavia snapped her fingers. ‘That must be the mystery the Emperor wants us to solve!’ she cried. ‘That’s why he gave us the Prometheus room: the prophecy is the mystery!’

  ‘It is indeed,’ said the Emperor Titus, stepping into the room. ‘It is indeed.’

  Titus Flavius Vespasianus was a stocky ex-soldier of about forty. He had a pleasant, square face and intelligent hazel eyes. Despite his thinning hair, his bull neck and the beginnings of a paunch, he was still handsome. But if Lupus hadn’t already known he was the Emperor, he would never have guessed it.

  On this cold February day, Titus was wearing two tunics and fur-lined leather slippers. The only clues to his imperial status were the many gold rings on his fingers and a short purple house-cloak.

  ‘Greetings, Jonathan.’ Leaving the door open behind him, Titus moved straight to Jonathan and lifted the sleeve of his tunic. ‘How is it healing?’

  ‘Greetings, Caesar.’ Jonathan bowed his head. He had been branded five months earlier, and although the Emperor had since apologised, Lupus knew a brand could not be taken back. Jonathan would bear Titus’s mark for life.

  ‘The scar is beginning to form,’ said the Emperor after a moment, ‘but it still looks painful.’

  ‘It’s not too bad, Caesar,’ said Jonathan. Lupus knew he was lying.

  ‘Brave boy,’ said Titus, and turned to Lupus and the girls. ‘I’m glad to see you brought your keen mind with you, Flavia Gemina. But why are you all standing?’ He clapped his hands and called towards the open doorway: ‘Biztha! Bigtha! Bring us some hot spiced wine! And light the lamps in here.’

  Titus turned back to Susannah and took her hand.

  Lupus saw Jonathan clench his fists.

  ‘Come. Sit.’ Still holding Susannah’s hand, Titus led them towards the silk-covered divan built against two of the room’s walls. As the others followed him, Delilah brought forward a chair for the Emperor to sit on. Then she discreetly closed the open double doors and stepped back into the shadows behind Susannah’s loom. Lupus and the others sat on the divan.

  ‘I want to thank you all for coming to Rome,’ said Titus. ‘I haven’t seen your father yet, Jonathan, because I wanted him to meet the other doctors on the Tiber Island as soon as possible. I have a serious problem.’ He leaned back in his chair and the leather creaked.

  ‘The fever here in Rome has reached epidemic proportions. Until now I have been unwilling to call it “plague” but now I fear I must. Last week, the death toll in Rome reached two thousand. I am making daily offerings at the Temples of Apollo and Aesculapius. I have summoned doctors from all over the Empire. I have also consulted my astrologer and my advisers. I wanted to know if perhaps the gods were offended by some broken vow or crime.’ He looked round at them all and in the fading light his eyes looked dark.

  ‘Then I remembered a dream I had on the Kalends of January, six weeks ago. In this dream, the god Jupiter appeared to me and spoke these words, “When a Prometheus opens a Pandora’s box, Rome will be devastated.”’

  ‘The plague!’ cried Flavia.

  Titus nodded and the chair creaked as he shifted in it. ‘Some sort of Pandora’s box has been opened. And this pestilence threatens to devastate Rome. I believe that if we can close the box or find this “Prometheus” – the one who opened it – then the plague will end. Until now I have only told Susannah and my astrologer Ascletario about this dream because I’m afraid—’

  The double doors swung open and Titus stopped talking as two long-haired slave-boys came in; one had black hair, the other brown.

  The black-haired boy began to light the lamps while the second carried in a succession of small tables and grouped them in front of the divan. On the tables were silver platters with hard-boiled quails’ eggs, tiny sausages rolled in bay leaves and cubes of melon soaked in honey and garum: the first course of a light dinner.

  Now Black-hair was washing their hands, pouring warm rose-scented water from a silver jug and catching the overflow in a bowl. As Lupus dried his hands on the linen napkin draped over the boy’s arm, he looked up to study the slave. Black-hair was almost pretty, with upward slanting black eyes and saffron-perfumed hair as silky as Susannah’s. Lupus guessed the boy was about Jonathan’s age.

  Jonathan was looking at his mother and didn’t notice Black-hair shoot him a defiant glare, but Lupus saw it and turned to watch the boys pad out of the room on silent bare feet.

  After the double doors closed behind them, Titus continued.

  ‘Last w
eek, I received a letter telling me of Mordecai’s success in treating fever victims in Ostia. I suddenly remembered how much he helped the victims of the eruption last August, and how the four of you saved my life the following month.’

  He looked round at them all, and now that the lamps had been lit, his hazel eyes gleamed green-gold. ‘Not only are you clever, resourceful and brave—’ here he raised his eyebrows at Lupus ‘—but because you are children, you can go where many adults can’t. Like slaves, people do not always notice you.’

  He fumbled in a hidden pocket of his wide leather belt and removed four small ivory rectangles on cords of purple silk. ‘But if anyone does notice you, and if they challenge you, then these imperial passes will give you access to all areas. They also show that you are under my protection.’

  Titus handed out the four passes. ‘I will ask my astrologer to help you begin your investigation tomorrow. Ascletario is the only other person who knows of my dream – apart from those of us in this room. He also knows this city better than I do. Ascletario will direct you – personally escort you, if necessary – to any place in Rome. And these passes will grant you access.’

  Titus summoned Delilah with a gesture and as she poured out seven beakers of mulsum, Lupus examined his imperial pass with interest. It was about the size of his thumb but rectangular and flat. Raised letters had been carved onto the ivory wafer and then painted red: IMP. LICET: ‘the Emperor permits’. A neat hole had been bored into one end and a purple silk cord threaded through, so that the pass could be worn round the neck.

  The Emperor and the others were lifting their cups so Lupus quickly slipped the cord over his head and lifted his drink as well.

  ‘Recruiting you may be foolishness,’ said the Emperor Titus, ‘but I am trying every imaginable means to save my city and my people. You four may be my best hope of finding this Prometheus – whoever he may be – and of stopping the pestilence. The fate of Rome may be in your hands. I drink to you: Jonathan, Flavia, Nubia and Lupus. And to the success of your mission!’

  ‘Isn’t it exciting?’ Flavia whispered to the others. ‘The Emperor wants us to solve a mystery and save Rome!’

  They were back in their garden suite. Slaves were warming the boys’ beds with heated rods of bronze so they had all gathered in the girls’ bedroom for a private conference. The four friends were sitting cross-legged on Flavia’s bed, which had already been warmed.

  Jonathan snorted. ‘I don’t believe in pagan prophecies. Even if it’s true, prophecies are as slippery as oiled weasels. They can mean almost anything. Remember the prophecy that Persian king received just before he set out to conquer Greece? “If you cross a certain river you will destroy a great kingdom”?’

  ‘It was Xerxes,’ whispered Flavia. ‘He crossed the river and he did destroy a great kingdom – his own!’

  Lupus uttered a bark of laughter, and Nubia giggled.

  Flavia nodded thoughtfully. ‘You’re absolutely right, Jonathan. Prophecies are never what you expect.’

  ‘Then how are we supposed to solve this stupid mystery?’ said Jonathan. ‘Prometheus could be anybody.’

  ‘Well, we could start by learning more about the real Prometheus. I mean the mythical Prometheus. Will you help us, Jonathan? Or do you just want to spend your time here visiting your mother?’

  He was looking at the Prometheus fresco again. Flavia saw him shudder.

  ‘Jonathan, are you all right?’

  ‘I’m fine. It’s just that . . . my brand hurts.’ He turned to her. ‘And who says Prometheus is bad, anyway? He only wanted to help mankind and he gets punished with eternal torment. Maybe it’s Jupiter who is the bad one.’

  ‘Jonathan!’ Flavia gasped. ‘You shouldn’t say such a thing.’

  ‘It’s just not fair that Prometheus was punished for trying to help mankind.’

  ‘But you’ll help us, won’t you? I mean, with the investigation? Even though it’s only a stupid pagan prophecy?’

  Jonathan grinned in spite of himself.

  ‘Good!’ said Flavia. ‘Now, I wonder if there’s a library on this hill?’

  Flavia and her friends stood on the steps of a huge white-columned temple. They had breakfasted in their rooms and their new guide had led them out through the cold shadows to the Temple of Apollo, only a few paces from their courtyard. It gleamed in the bright morning sunshine.

  ‘Great Neptune’s beard!’ Flavia tipped her head back. ‘Look at the columns!’

  ‘The white marble columns are fifty feet tall,’ said Ascletario. The Emperor’s astrologer was a tall, thin Egyptian with a face as brown as nutmeg and as narrow as an axe. ‘Please to note the Corinthian capitals on top of them. Now, please to look inside the cella. That is the cult statue of Apollo with his sister Diana and his mother Leto. The god has set down his bow and arrows of pestilence, and taken up his lyre.’

  ‘What’s that gold box at their feet?’ asked Flavia.

  ‘That is where the books of prophecy are now kept,’ said their guide.

  Lupus tugged Flavia’s tunic and pointed behind them.

  Jonathan turned, too, and gave a low whistle. ‘Look at that view!’ They turned their backs on the statues and looked out through the columns.

  ‘This is the Circus Maximus directly below us,’ said Ascletario. He turned to the right. ‘And through those columns is the Roman forum.’

  ‘What is that pink temple?’ asked Nubia, pointing to a temple on top of the hill behind the forum.

  ‘That temple is nothing less than the symbol of Rome,’ said Ascletario, rubbing his hands like a fly. ‘It is the Temple of Jupiter Optimus Maximus. Best and greatest. Greatest and best.’

  They looked at him.

  ‘Best and greatest.’

  ‘Why is it pink?’ asked Flavia. ‘And it looks a bit squashed.’

  ‘Please to note that the white columns are painted with red stripes,’ said Ascletario, ‘in the Etruscan fashion. From a distance they give the impression of pinkness. Do you see the pediment? The triangular part on top of the columns? Please to note it is open, with no scene depicted inside. And the lower, broader proportions of the whole temple are also Etruscan, Etruscan, Etruscan.’

  ‘So that hill is the Capitoline!’ cried Flavia. ‘Where the famous geese live!’

  Ascletario bobbed his head.

  ‘Geese?’ Nubia looked up with interest.

  ‘That hill was the first citadel of Rome,’ explained Flavia. ‘And once when the barbarians were creeping up it to attack, some geese raised the alarm and saved the city! So now they are sacred geese and nobody can hurt them.’

  Ascletario nodded again.

  ‘And where’s the Tarpeian Rock?’ asked Flavia. ‘It’s also on the Capitoline, isn’t it?’

  ‘It is,’ said Ascletario. ‘That cliff to the left of the temple – nearest the river – is the Tarpeian Rock.’

  ‘What is tar pee un rock?’

  ‘It’s a cliff with razor-sharp rocks at the bottom,’ said Flavia. ‘They throw traitors off it.’

  This time it was Lupus who looked up with interest.

  Ascletario gave a small bow and said to Flavia, ‘You are very knowledgeable. I think you will like what I am about to show you. Please to come with me.’

  One side of the Temple of Apollo almost touched the Imperial Palace. Ascletario led them around to the back of the temple and down some steps. On either side stretched two beautiful colonnades with red tile roofs and yellow columns. Between the columns were statues of alternating red marble and black marble.

  ‘Behold!’ whispered Nubia. ‘What is happening to the poor statue people?’

  Flavia saw that the black statues were of boys and the red ones of girls, and that all of them were shown writhing in agony.

  Lupus mimed someone being shot by an arrow in the neck.

  ‘He’s right!’ cried Jonathan. ‘Some of the statues have bronze arrows in them. No, all of them.’

  ‘They’re Niobe’s
children!’ cried Flavia and looked at Ascletario.

  ‘Correct.’ He gave a little bow.

  ‘Who are my oh bees?’ asked Nubia.

  ‘Ny-oh-bee. She had fourteen children, seven boys and seven girls. She boasted that she had more children than the goddess Leto, who only had two.’

  ‘Uh-oh,’ said Jonathan.

  And Lupus scribbled a word on his wax tablet:

  HUBRIS!

  ‘Exactly,’ said Flavia grimly. ‘It just so happened that Leto’s two children were Apollo and Diana. They killed all Niobe’s fourteen children to punish her for her hubris.’

  ‘Please to note,’ said Ascletario, ‘that Apollo is the god of plague and his arrows strike men down.’

  Suddenly Flavia noticed that the inner wall of the colonnade was covered with niches and shelves.

  ‘Great Neptune’s Jupiter!’ she gasped. ‘It’s a library. I’ve never seen so many scrolls!’

  Ascletario bowed. ‘It is one of the finest libraries in the Roman Empire. On the right you have the Greek. On the left the Latin. The Latin . . .’ he gestured with his left hand ‘. . . and the Greek.’ He gestured with his right. ‘The Greek and the Latin. The Latin and the Greek.’

  Behind him Lupus was imitating his hand gestures and Flavia turned quickly so the guide wouldn’t see her laugh.

  ‘Are there any scrolls by Aeschylus here?’ she asked, when she had regained her composure.

  ‘Of course, of course, of course. Do you want your Aeschylus in the original Greek?’ he asked, rubbing his hands together. ‘Or in translation?’

  Flavia considered for a moment. ‘May I have one of each?’ she asked. ‘My Greek isn’t good enough for me to read it on its own. But if I have the translation beside it . . .’

  ‘Certainly, certainly, certainly,’ said Ascletario. He led them between a black marble boy and a yellow column into the Latin section of the colonnade. It was flooded with pure morning light except where the columns cast their shadows. ‘Take a seat at this table and I’ll be back in a moment.’ He turned to go, then swivelled in a full circle as Flavia cried: