The Roman Mysteries Complete Collection

by Lawrence, Caroline

  Jonathan inhaled the fresh sea air and looked up at the gulls wheeling above him in the bright bowl of the sky. On his right were bustling warehouses and to his left the dark blue harbour with its myriad white sails and towering lighthouse.

  From somewhere deep within him rose a strange, sweet sensation. It took him a moment to identify it and when he did, the revelation came as a shock.

  It was joy.

  Flavia and the boys followed Thonis up the marble steps of the Temple of Poseidon.

  ‘Are you ready to cut off your hair, Lupus?’ asked Flavia. ‘It is the proper sacrifice for when you survive a shipwreck.’

  Lupus shrugged, then nodded.

  ‘And you, Jonathan?’ She gave his hair an affectionate tousle. ‘Are you going to cut off all those curly locks?’

  Jonathan grinned. ‘When in Rome . . .’

  She gave him a quizzical look. ‘Are you all right?’ she added. ‘You have a strange look on your face.’

  ‘I’m fine,’ he said. ‘In fact . . .’ His voice trailed off as they entered the temple and their footsteps echoed in the vast, cool space.

  Before them sat the cult statue of Neptune. It was carved of polished black granite, which made it look as if the god had just emerged dripping from the sea. In one hand he held a bronze trident and the other was open in a gesture of acceptance. His bearded face was noble, his expression kind.

  ‘Master of the Universe!’ whispered Jonathan beside Flavia. ‘What are all those things on the walls? Are they all votive plaques?’

  Flavia turned to look at the walls, which glinted with a thousand copper plaques and other objects. She moved towards the right hand wall.

  ‘Yes!’ she exclaimed softly. ‘They’re thanks offerings. Look! Rings, necklaces, a sandal . . . and each one beneath a plaque. Oh! This one’s in Latin. It says: I, Horatius, thank you Neptune – Master of Storms – for saving me from the foamy brine. To you I dedicate my sodden clothes, my only remaining possession.’

  ‘This one’s in Aramaic,’ said Jonathan. ‘The poor man washed up naked on the beach. All he had to give was his hair.’

  ‘Maybe that’s how the custom began,’ mused Flavia. ‘A shipwrecked man wanted to thank Neptune but didn’t have anything to give except his hair.’

  ‘Where is all the hair?’ said Jonathan, scanning the wall. ‘Why haven’t they hung it up?’

  ‘We burn it as a thanks offering to the god,’ said a voice behind them in Greek-accented Latin.

  They all turned to see the priest standing benignly before them. He was clean-shaven with short curly hair and the olive complexion Flavia had come to recognise as Greek. He wore a floor-length robe of pale blue linen and around his head was a simple gold band.

  The priest smiled. ‘Hair begins to smell after a time. We wouldn’t want to offend the god.’

  ‘No,’ said Jonathan. ‘We wouldn’t want that.’

  ‘How may I help you?’ said the priest.

  ‘These children were shipwrecked,’ said Thonis. ‘They want to make the proper sacrifice of thanks.’

  ‘Yes,’ said Flavia. ‘Neptune saved us and we want to dedicate our hair to him.’

  The priest nodded gravely. ‘We’ve had a few wrecks recently,’ he said. ‘That recent storm was most unseasonable.’

  ‘Oh dear,’ murmured Flavia. ‘I hope pater is safe.’

  Behind them Lupus gave an urgent grunt of excitement.

  ‘What is it, Lupus?’ cried Flavia, turning.

  Lupus pointed excitedly at a bright copper plaque. Beneath it hung a cherry-wood flute. It was swollen by the sea, but still recognisable.

  ‘Is it hers?’ gasped Flavia, and when Lupus gave a nod, Flavia could not contain a sob of joy. ‘Oh thank you, Neptune!’ she cried.

  Jonathan hurried to stand behind Lupus. He leant forward to read the inscription on the plaque. ‘I, Nubia,’ he read, ‘daughter of Nastasen of the Leopard Clan, dedicate this my most precious possession to you, Neptune, and also to the dolphin who saved my life.’

  ‘Praise Juno!’ whispered Flavia, for the dozenth time. ‘Nubia’s alive! A dolphin carried her to safety.’

  Flavia was sitting in a curtained-off section of the temple, letting the barber priest cut her hair.

  Jonathan and Lupus had gone first. The barber had cut their hair, then shaved their heads, but he had promised Flavia he would not be so drastic with her. ‘I cut below ears,’ he had said, ‘with fringe of hair at front. In Egyptian style. As you request.’

  The curtain parted and the boys appeared, looking strangely vulnerable with their bald heads. Thonis came in behind them.

  ‘Sorry, Flavia,’ said Jonathan. ‘We didn’t see any other plaques from anybody from the Tyche. There was another wreck that same night, but it was a different ship. The priest says apart from Nubia and the three of us, there have been no other survivors from our ship. So far.’

  ‘No Uncle Gaius?’ whispered Flavia, feeling tears welling up.

  ‘I’m sorry,’ whispered Jonathan.

  ‘Don’t despair,’ said Thonis with a forced smile. ‘Perhaps he made his thanks offering at another temple.’

  ‘But Uncle Gaius couldn’t swim,’ said Flavia. ‘Lupus taught us last summer. But he never taught Uncle Gaius.’

  ‘Oh,’ said Thonis, his smile fading. ‘Oh. I see.’

  ‘And Nubia may be alive,’ murmured Flavia, ‘but we don’t even know where she is.’

  ‘I know where Nubia is,’ said the barber priest behind her.

  Flavia twisted to look at him.

  ‘Careful!’ he said with a smile. ‘These shears are very sharp.’

  ‘You know where our friend Nubia is?’

  ‘She is dark-skinned? About your age? With gold-brown eyes? From the merchant ship Tyche?’

  ‘Yes!’ cried Flavia. ‘That’s her! Where is she?’

  ‘I do not know where, but I know with whom,’ he replied.

  ‘Tell us!’

  ‘She went with a eunuch.’

  ‘Eunuch?’ gasped Flavia. ‘A eunuch?’

  Thonis turned to Flavia. ‘A eunuch is a man who’s had his—’

  ‘I know what a eunuch is!’ interrupted Flavia, and turned back to the priest.

  The priest nodded.

  ‘But who? Why? Where?’

  ‘I do not know,’ said the priest. ‘All I know is that the Nubian girl who dedicated her flute came to the temple in the company of a eunuch. He was wearing a pale yellow tunic with black edging on the hem and sleeves.’

  ‘A scribe!’ exclaimed Thonis.

  ‘Yes,’ said the priest.

  ‘What?’ said Flavia and Jonathan together.

  ‘A scribe from the Library,’ said Thonis. ‘The scribes and scholars who work at the Great Library all wear a special livery. Scribes wear yellow trimmed with black and scholars wear black trimmed with yellow. They say the pale yellow represents papyrus and the black stands for ink,’ he added.

  ‘What was the scribe’s name?’ Flavia asked the priest.

  ‘I do not know. All I know is that they came in together and after she made her dedication they departed together. I know her name because of the plaque, but I do not know his name.’

  ‘Did she seem . . . afraid?’ asked Flavia. ‘I mean, you don’t think the scribe kidnapped her, do you?’

  ‘She did not seem afraid,’ said the priest carefully. ‘But she seemed very sad. Her eyes were red and swollen, as if she had been crying. She asked me if there had been any other survivors from Tyche, but at that time there had not. I told her to check back here regularly. Oh! I remember she said to her friend “There’s nothing for me here. I will go with you after all.”’

  ‘Go?’ cried Flavia. ‘Go where?’

  ‘I am sorry,’ said the priest with an apologetic smile, ‘that I do not know.’

  An hour later the three friends and Thonis stood in the office of the harbour-master who dealt with non-imperial merchant ships.

  ‘The me
rchant ship Delphina set sail for Ostia ten days ago,’ said the man in Greek-accented Latin. ‘It was captained by one Marcus Flavius Geminus, and its cargo consisted of linen, papyrus and glassware.’

  Flavia felt a strange mixture of happiness and disappointment.

  ‘Rejoice!’ said Thonis. ‘Your father is alive and well.’

  ‘And probably back in Ostia by now,’ said Flavia glumly. ‘He’ll find out that I disobeyed his command to not set one foot outside the house.’

  Lupus gave Flavia his wry ‘you’re-in-trouble-now’ look.

  Jonathan nodded. ‘Maybe it’s just as well we missed him,’ he said.

  Flavia took a deep breath and turned to address the harbour-master. ‘Jonathan and I have imperial passes from the Emperor Titus.’ She took the ivory pass out from beneath the neck of her tunic.

  The harbour-master examined it and his eyebrows went up. ‘This allows you to withdraw the equivalent of ten thousand sesterces at any town big enough to have a Capitolium,’ he said. ‘You may also claim food and lodging at Imperial Way Stations. And free passage on any ship. I suggest you go straight to the governor with these.’

  Thonis gave a low whistle. ‘You could sail to Ostia today,’ he said.

  Flavia glanced at the boys. They nodded back at her and she turned to Thonis. ‘We’re not going back to Ostia,’ she said. ‘Not until we’ve found our friend Nubia.’

  On the way to the governor’s villa, Thonis stopped at one of his warehouses and gave Lupus and Jonathan turbans of fine linen, indigo blue for Jonathan and turquoise for Lupus. To Flavia he gave a blue silk palla with a fringe of three colours: orange, dark blue and light blue.

  At the governor’s villa, the three friends waited while Thonis explained the situation in rapid Greek to a young door-slave not much older than Jonathan. Presently the youth ushered them into a tablinum with frescoed walls and an alabaster floor.

  At the far end of the tablinum a middle-aged man sat at a marble desk which was flanked by sphinxes with the heads of Titus and Domitian. The official was writing on a sheet of papyrus and did not look up for some time. As the friends waited, Lupus scanned the room with interest. The walls were decorated with frescoes depicting some of the animal-headed gods of the Egyptians. Lupus wondered if any of their gods were half man and half wolf.

  ‘I am Faustus.’ The man looked up at them with heavy-lidded eyes. ‘What can I do for you?’

  Thonis stepped forward and quickly explained the matter to the official in Greek. Unlike Flavia and Jonathan, Lupus was fluent in Greek and although the two men were speaking with Alexandrian accents, he could understand every word.

  ‘Shipwrecked?’ the official was saying.

  ‘Yes, and they appear to be the only survivors. Apparently a girl called Nubia was with them. They believe she also survived but have not been able to locate her.’

  ‘Nubia?’ said the official. ‘I’ve read that name recently. Do they understand Greek?’

  ‘Only the basics,’ said Thonis in a low voice. ‘And only if spoken slowly and clearly. They’re Roman.’

  The man turned back to Lupus and his friends. ‘May I see your imperial passes?’ he asked in Latin.

  Flavia and Jonathan pulled the ivory tags from around their necks and handed them to the official. Lupus shrugged and opened his hands to the sky, to show he did not have one.

  Faustus examined Flavia’s pass first. ‘Ah!’ he said, turning it over and reading the name on the back. ‘You are Flavia Gemina?’

  ‘That’s right,’ said Flavia. ‘Daughter of Marcus Flavius Geminus, sea captain.’

  Lupus moved over to the right hand wall to have a closer look. There was an interesting creature painted there: it had the body of a hippo and the head of a crocodile.

  ‘And Jonathan ben Mordecai,’ came Faustus’s voice behind him. ‘A Jew, I take it. And the younger boy?’

  ‘That one is mute. He had an imperial pass, too, but it was lost in the wreck. His name is Lupus.’

  ‘Fine, fine,’ said the official in Latin and then, in low rapid Greek: ‘I recently had a missive from an official in Sabratha about four children wanted by someone very high up. I’m certain the name Nubia was on the list. The others, too. But I’ll need to check. Can you delay them for a day and bring them back tomorrow morning?’

  Lupus stiffened and resisted the urge to look around. Because he was mute, people often assumed he was deaf. And neither Thonis nor the official suspected he was a fluent Greek speaker.

  ‘I’ll make it worth your while,’ said Faustus in a low voice, still in Greek. ‘There’s a big reward. Very big.’

  ‘Yes,’ said Thonis after a short pause. ‘Of course.’

  Lupus moved on to the next fresco, pretending to be engrossed in the pictures.

  ‘Do you have the documentation to go with these passes?’ said Faustus in Latin.

  ‘No,’ came Flavia’s stammered reply. ‘How could we have documentation? We were shipwrecked!’

  ‘The only reason we still have those passes,’ added Jonathan, ‘is that we were wearing them around our necks.’

  ‘Well, I’ll have to keep these passes overnight so that my scribes can draw up new documentation. In the meantime, I can advance you some spending money – say ten drachmae each – enough for your night’s lodging. You can come back tomorrow to collect the rest of your gold along with your passes.’

  ‘But the Emperor told us not to let them out of our sight,’ protested Flavia. ‘In fact he told us never to take them off.’

  ‘I’ll give you a receipt. Come back tomorrow before noon and I’ll give you back your passes and the equivalent in gold of twenty thousand sesterces.’

  ‘Don’t worry,’ said Thonis to Flavia. ‘That’s how things are done here in Alexandria. You can’t blow your nose without filling out a form. You’ll get your money.’

  ‘All right,’ said Flavia. Lupus could hear the reluctance in her voice. ‘If you say so.’

  ‘Now come!’ said Thonis, clapping his hands. ‘We’re here in the greatest city in the world. Let me show you around. Then you must come and stay at my house. Nice quiet street. No noise, good food, soft beds.’

  ‘Tell them I’ll try to find out what happened to their friend,’ said Faustus in rapid Greek. ‘Just make sure you bring them back here tomorrow.’

  ‘Of course,’ said Thonis, and turned to Flavia: ‘Faustus here says he’ll try to find out what happened to your friend Nubia.’

  ‘Oh, thank you!’ cried Flavia.

  ‘Now,’ said Thonis, ‘let’s not waste any more of this busy man’s valuable time. Let me show you Alexandria.’

  Lupus’s heart was thumping. They were wanted! And Thonis was prepared to betray them. He needed to warn his friends. But how?

  As they climbed back up into Thonis’s chariot, Lupus gave Flavia and Jonathan his bug-eyed look and mimed writing something.

  ‘Thonis,’ said Flavia. ‘May Lupus borrow your wax tablet? He lost his in the shipwreck.’

  ‘Of course,’ said Thonis. He searched in his belt pouch. ‘This is just a little one. Keep it.’

  Lupus took it with a smile and a nod of thanks. It fit into his palm and had two boxwood leaves coated on the inside with yellow beeswax. A small bronze stylus had been pushed into the leather thongs which acted as a hinge. He waited until Thonis had taken the reins and was busy driving before he wrote on it and showed it to Flavia and Jonathan.

  SOMETHING NOT RIGHT. WE NEED TO TALK. SAY YOU ARE TIRED AND WANT TO REST.

  As soon as his friends had seen it, he rubbed out what he had written with his thumb and drew some of the hieroglyphs he had seen, in case Thonis asked to see the tablet. But Thonis was too busy driving.

  ‘Thonis,’ said Flavia. ‘Could we go to your house now? I’m tired and would like to rest.’

  ‘Me, too,’ said Jonathan.

  ‘Yes, of course,’ said Thonis over his shoulder. ‘In fact I need to do a few errands here in town. Why don’t the
three of you have a nap? I’ll come back around the fourth hour after noon and show you the sights.’

  ‘That sounds perfect,’ said Flavia.

  ‘That’s very kind of you,’ agreed Jonathan, and glanced at Lupus.

  Lupus gave them a secret thumbs-up.

  ‘Here we are,’ said Thonis, turning into a road with workshops beneath jewel-coloured awnings. ‘Gem-cutter’s Street in the Gamma District.’ He reined in the horses and pointed. ‘Mine is the cedar wood door between the red awning and the blue one.’

  He followed Flavia and the others down from the chariot and tethered the horses to a marble post with a bronze ring on top. Then he led the three friends across the wide pavement to a cedar-wood door with a lion’s-head knocker.

  On the left, Flavia saw an old gem-cutter at work in his shop, his face bathed pink in the light filtering through the red awning overhead, his wares laid out on dark blue velvet before him.

  The moment Thonis banged the knocker a huge deep barking made them all jump back.

  ‘That’s Scylax,’ said Thonis. ‘My watchdog.’

  ‘Doesn’t “skylax” mean puppy in Greek?’ asked Flavia.

  Thonis chuckled. ‘It’s one of my little jokes.’

  The door swung open to reveal a young door slave holding a massive black mastiff on a thick leather strap.

  ‘Sambas,’ said Thonis to the boy. ‘Tell Petesouchus to stable the horses. Make sure he gives them a good rubdown. Hello, boy!’ This last was addressed to the big dog, whose tail was a blur of excitement.

  ‘Master!’ cried a voice and a tall Egyptian emerged from a side room into the bright atrium. ‘Back from your party?’ He stopped when he saw the three children.

  ‘Helios!’ responded Thonis and turned to Flavia and the boys, ‘These are some friends of mine. They’d like to spend a few nights here.’

  The Egyptian’s face betrayed only a moment’s surprise. Then he smiled and said, ‘Of course. Very good, sir.’

  ‘Children, this is my steward Helios. He’ll look after you until I return.’

  Helios looked at Thonis. ‘No luggage? No bags?’

  ‘No,’ said Thonis in Latin, and then added something in Greek so rapid that Flavia did not understand a word.