‘What?’ said Messallinus. ‘I didn’t hear you over the sound of the water.’
Jonathan looked over his shoulder. ‘I said I have been telling you the truth.’
‘No.’ Messallinus smiled. He held out the plate. Ascletario took it and backed hastily away. Messallinus was caressing the whip with his free hand. ‘No, I don’t believe you have. Let me ask you again. Who killed Titus?’
Jonathan was silent.
The blind man drew back his right arm and let fly with the whip. Its crack and Jonathan’s cry of pain came at the same moment.
Lupus winced. Please God, he prayed silently. Please help Jonathan.
‘Who killed Titus?’ said the blind man.
‘I don’t know!’ wheezed Jonathan.
Again the crack of the whip and this time Flavia screamed along with Jonathan. Lupus looked at her and saw that the tip of the whip had caught her across the cheek, leaving an ugly red weal.
‘Who was that?’ asked the blind man sharply.
‘The girl, the girl, the girl,’ said Ascletario. ‘One of the children who tried to rescue him. I told you they were here.’
‘What is your name, girl?’ asked Messallinus.
‘Flavia Gemina,’ she said. Lupus could feel her trembling.
‘The mute boy is there, too,’ said Ascletario. ‘His name is Lupus.’
‘Lupus and Flavia,’ said Messallinus. ‘You are friends of Jonathan?’
‘Yes,’ said Flavia in a small voice.
‘Excellent. Ascletario, take down the boy. Tie the girl up instead.’
‘No!’ cried Flavia. ‘Please!’ She was sobbing.
Lupus gritted his teeth and stared down at the rough stone floor. If only he’d been able to cut through Flavia’s bonds. Or if only she had cut his.
But his hands were still bound and he was helpless.
Nubia sat heavily on the stool at Domitian’s feet and stared bleakly at the small circular arena. Aristo and the Beast. What creature was Domitian going to pit against Aristo? A rhino? A tiger? A bear?
The world swam around her as a door opened in the backdrop of the stage and two guards brought out Aristo. They had stripped and oiled him and dressed him in a red leather loincloth. His eyes were lined with kohl to make them stand out, and his lips were stained pink. He also had a belt with a small dagger, like the Cretan youth’s.
The crowd cheered and Nubia heard Domitia purr: ‘What a beautiful young man. He looks like a Greek god.’
‘Just wait until you see what I have in store for him,’ said Domitian with a chuckle.
Nubia took a deep breath. She must stay alive long enough to tell Aristo how she felt; to tell him that she loved him, too. Then she would kill herself. Domitia had taken her pin, but she could throw herself into the arena with him. They would die together and be united in Paradise this very day.
The guards pushed Aristo off the stage and into the arena. He fell on his hands and knees, then picked himself up and looked around. Nubia knew he was looking for her, so she stood up. He saw her at once, and his kohl-lined eyes widened. She remembered she was wearing Egyptian eye-paint, too, and a golden shift. What must he think?
Before she could call out to him, a woman’s hand on her shoulder pressed her firmly down. ‘Sit down, girl!’ hissed Domitia. ‘You’re blocking my view.’
Then the animal gate rattled from the other side, as if something big had rammed it. Aristo tore his eyes from Nubia’s. She saw him catch sight of the trail of blood on the sand left by the bull and his eyes widened in horror as he followed the trail to the gate.
‘Yes,’ whispered Nubia. ‘That is the gate the Beast will enter.’
Aristo pulled out his dagger and faced the gate. He crouched slightly, waiting, alert, silent.
The crowd gasped as the gate burst open. Then the entire theatre burst into roars of laughter.
A small black rabbit hopped out onto the sand, and its pink nose twitched as it stared up at Aristo.
‘Kill the fierce beast, Pretty Boy!’ called a nasal patrician voice behind Nubia.
‘Yes!’ cried several other men. ‘Kill the Beast!’
Nubia’s face went cold, and then hot.
The crowd was laughing at Aristo. They were mocking him. They thought he was just a beautiful young Greek, probably a slave. They didn’t know he was a gifted musician and a wonderful teacher.
‘Use your bare hands!’ jeered the nasal voice again.
‘No!’ rasped someone else. ‘See if you can capture the beast alive!’
The whole theatre burst out laughing again.
Without taking his eyes from the rabbit, Aristo slowly replaced his knife in its scabbard. Suddenly he dived for the rabbit. He caught it, but his arms must have been too oily, for the rabbit slipped away and hopped a few paces behind him.
The crowd was in pandemonium.
Nubia glanced behind her and saw the emperor doubled over, helpless with mirth. Domitia was crying with laughter, too, the tears making tracks down her powdered cheeks.
Aristo scrambled to his feet, sand sticking to his oily skin. He whirled around and crouched, ready to leap. But the rabbit hopped away a moment before he landed, and he ended up face-first in the sand.
The crowd roared with laughter. Nubia’s eyes filled with tears of embarrassment and outrage.
He stood up again, coated in sand; shaking it from his hair, spitting it out of his mouth.
Nubia hid her face in her hands.
She peeped through her fingers in time to see him leap for the rabbit yet again. But this time he succeeded in keeping hold of it.
This drew a standing ovation, and now the men were throwing coins at him, and the chant arose: ‘Pretty Boy! Pretty Boy! Pretty Boy!’
Domitian rose majestically to his feet, using the corner of his purple robe to wipe the tears from his cheeks.
He faced his delighted audience and gestured for silence. Presently they were quiet.
‘Thank you, pretty boy Aristo!’ he proclaimed, nodding over his shoulder. ‘For giving us the best performance of my short reign.’
‘Hear, hear!’ shouted the crowds. ‘Euge!’
Aristo’s smooth, muscular chest was rising and falling with exertion or fear, or both. He was clutching the rabbit tightly and he was looking at Domitian. Nubia knew he was wondering what this sadistic emperor had in store for him next.
‘Pretty Boy Aristo!’ proclaimed Domitian. ‘I have a very special reward for you!’
Now the blood drained from Aristo’s face and for a moment Nubia thought he might faint. This might be her last chance to tell him how she felt about him. So she took a deep breath and rose trembling to her feet.
‘Aristo, I love you!’ she called out. ‘I love you!’
‘I am sorry, I am sorry, I am sorry,’ muttered Ascletario, as he bent to untie Flavia’s hands. Flavia felt him pause and she knew he must have seen the cuts in the vine made by Lupus’s oyster shell. But he made no comment. He resumed fumbling at her bonds. In a moment she would be free. Her mind was racing.
She knew this was their best chance for escape. Ascletario had unchained Jonathan from the sluice gate, and although he was bruised and beaten, he was mobile. In a moment her hands would be free, too. If she could just push Ascletario into the channel of water, they could easily elude the blind man. Or maybe push him in, too.
Then she would untie Lupus, and together they could take Jonathan across the lake to Tranquillus’s house. Then they would rescue Nubia and Aristo.
At last the vine fell away from her wrists. As Ascletario helped her up, Flavia lowered her head and charged at his stomach.
But the Egyptian twisted away and now his hand was like a vice on her wrist. ‘If you try this again I will throw you in the water,’ he said, and for the first time he sounded really angry. On the stone wall were some metal brackets for torches. Ascletario tied her wrists to one of these, so that her arms were above her head and her back to the channel.
&nbs
p; ‘It’s too tight,’ she said, fresh tears filling her eyes. ‘And my cheek hurts, too.’
‘Do you hear that, boy?’ said Messallinus. He had manacled Jonathan to the sluice gate again. ‘We’re hurting your little girlfriend.’
Flavia twisted to look over her shoulder at Jonathan. He stood swaying on his feet and shivering. He wore only a soiled loincloth and she could see all his ribs. They must have been starving him as well as beating him. He was so weak they had not bothered to tie him up.
‘Jonathan!’ she pleaded. ‘If you know something, tell them.’
Jonathan did not reply.
Across the channel, Messallinus drew the whip through his hand and gave it an experimental crack. ‘I can tell where you are by the sound of your whimpering,’ he said. ‘Let us discover if this whip is long enough to reach you.’
Flavia turned and faced the cold, unfeeling rock and cringed. ‘Jonathan. Please.’
The whip cracked and Flavia screamed. Even through two tunics she felt a searing stripe of pain flash across her back.
‘All right!’ wheezed Jonathan. ‘I’ll tell you . . . who killed Titus . . . It was me!’
‘I killed Titus!’ gasped Jonathan. ‘I am the guilty one.’
Flavia opened her eyes and turned to stare over her shoulder at Jonathan.
‘You?’ said Messallinus. ‘I find that hard to believe.’
‘I killed him!’ cried Jonathan. ‘I killed him because he destroyed Jerusalem and ruined my life. He was a monster!’ wheezed Jonathan. ‘That’s why I killed him.’
Flavia felt sick.
Now she understood why Jonathan had not wanted her to follow him.
Now she understood why he had been angry when they appeared.
Now she finally understood why he had said the Truth was not always a good thing.
‘Tell me how,’ said the blind interrogator Messallinus. ‘Tell me exactly how you killed the emperor.’
‘I used poison,’ said Jonathan.
Even above the gurgle of water Flavia could hear his teeth chattering.
‘The truth at last,’ said Messallinus. He laid the whip on the ground and moved closer. ‘What kind of poison did you use, Jonathan?’
‘Venom of a trygon,’ said Jonathan through his battered lips.
Although Flavia’s hands were still tied above her head, she managed to twist her whole body to see him.
‘I don’t know what that is,’ said Messallinus.
‘A sea creature,’ wheezed Jonathan. ‘Also known as stingray. Trygon is the Greek word. Its poison is deadly.’
‘Yes,’ said Ascletario. ‘Yes, that fits the prophecy. Like Odysseus from the sea . . .’
Messallinus nodded, took off his toga and wrapped it around Jonathan’s bare shoulders. ‘See? That wasn’t so difficult.’ Then he held out his hand. ‘Give me the dinner, Ascletario.’
Ascletario picked the plate up from the stone ledge and put it in Messallinus’s outstretched hand. The blind man took a piece of chicken from the plate and sniffed it. ‘What puzzles me,’ he said to Jonathan, ‘is that the emperor always had a taster.’ Messallinus took a bite of the chicken and chewed it thoughtfully. ‘Mmmm. Seems all right.’
‘The poison wasn’t in his food,’ said Jonathan. Flavia saw that his eyes were fixed on the piece of chicken. ‘I used another method.’
‘You must have,’ said Messallinus. ‘His tasters were very capable.’ He held up the piece of chicken. ‘Would you like some?’
Jonathan nodded and took the chicken and tore at it ravenously.
Messallinus put the plate on the floor. ‘Tell me, Jonathan. How did you administer the poison?’
‘I couldn’t get at Titus when he was on the Palatine Hill,’ said Jonathan through a mouthful of chicken. He swallowed. ‘So I waited until he left for the Sabine Hills. Everybody knew he was going home.’ Jonathan devoured the last shreds of chicken, then broke the bone in half and sucked out the marrow.
‘Excellent, excellent,’ said Messallinus. He bent and groped and took an apple from the plate and held it out. ‘Tell me more.’
Jonathan snatched the apple and bit into it. ‘When the emperor left Rome,’ he said through his mouthful. ‘I was waiting outside the gate. I followed behind the cortege, disguised as a charcoal-seller.’
‘Yes?’ said Messallinus. ‘Go on.’
‘When the cortege stopped at a roadside tavern, I had my chance. I heard Ascletario asking where the latrines were. I got there first, and when the emperor came in I was already there, sitting on the bench with my hood up. I had some of the venom on a sharp object and as I stood up, I gave him a quick prick on the leg.’ Jonathan ate the core of the apple. ‘He thought he’d been bitten by a spider.’
‘What sharp object?’ said Messallinus. ‘A dagger?’
Jonathan reached out a hand. ‘May I have that piece of bread?’
Messallinus bent and groped for the piece of bread. When he had it he said again: ‘I repeat the question: what sharp object?’
‘Um . . . I used . . . a quill,’ stammered Jonathan. ‘The quill of a sea-urchin.’
Flavia stifled a gasp.
Messallinus turned and cocked his head at her. ‘Yes?’ he said. ‘Do you have something to add?’
‘My wrists hurt,’ she whimpered. ‘I can’t feel my hands. Please untie me?’
He looked at her with his terrible blank eyes, then said to Ascletario: ‘Unbind her. And the mute boy, too. The Emperor will want to hear this. And I don’t want to bring him here. It’s damp.’
Messallinus pressed the piece of bread into Jonathan’s hands and turned to Ascletario. ‘Get this one bathed and dressed,’ he said. ‘He smells. The Emperor will want to interview him and I don’t want him to have to endure a stinking murderer.’
An hour later, Jonathan sank down into the scented water of a hot plunge in the baths of Domitian’s Alban Citadel and tried not to cry out as the wounds on his back sang with pain. Presently the agony subsided to a bearable throb and he closed his eyes. The steam helped him breathe a little easier.
He had done it. He had confessed to the murder of Titus. Would his execution be swift or lingering?
He let himself sink right under the water, until he was completely submerged. The thought occurred to him that he himself could choose the manner of his going, as the philosopher Seneca always urged. All he had to do was open his mouth and breathe in water. Then the pain in his back would be gone and the pain in his spirit, too. He would be in a better place: a place with no pain and no tears. He would be in the Garden.
A hand closed around his neck and pulled him up out of the bath. Jonathan choked and spat out water and opened his eyes to see a muscular guard in full armour.
‘Emperor would be very angry if I let you drown,’ said the guard, shaking drops of water from his arm. ‘I might end up drowned, myself. Get out. Go dry yourself. There’s a doctor waiting to put balm on your stripes.’
After Jonathan’s confession, Ascletario had taken Flavia and Lupus up to Domitian’s Alban Citadel, to a room on the third floor. The room was flooded with the golden light of late afternoon. Flavia went to the window and looked out. She could see the flat coastal plain far below her, and beyond it the Tyrrhenian Sea. A path of dazzling gold led from the coast to the horizon; the sun would soon be setting. She knew her beloved Ostia was only twenty miles away as the crow flies. She tried to make out the thread of smoke from the lighthouse at Portus. But she couldn’t find it, so she turned to look at Lupus, who was investigating the room for means of escape.
‘Lupus,’ she said. ‘Do you think Jonathan really killed Titus?’
Lupus looked at her, pursed his lips in thought, then shrugged and nodded.
‘I don’t understand it. I thought he had changed. In Ephesus he seemed so calm. He seemed full of . . . something. Peace. Contentment. Purpose. I don’t know.’
Lupus unflipped his wax tablet and wrote: HIS REASONS MADE SENSE
‘I know
,’ murmured Flavia. ‘But something about his story doesn’t make sense.’
Lupus sat on a purple-cushioned ivory couch and shrugged, as if to say: what?
‘He was so detailed about the poison he used and how he administered it. But then at the last moment he said he used the quill of a sea-urchin.’
Lupus nodded, then raised his eyebrows and turned up the palms of his hands: And?
‘But we found that needle-sharp stylus in the latrines. Do you still have it?’
Lupus nodded and reached under the black silk tunic and fished in his belt pouch. A moment later he produced the stylus in its papyrus wrapping.
Flavia carefully unwrapped the bronze stylus and let it roll onto the inlaid wooden surface of a side table.
‘This has to be the murder weapon,’ murmured Flavia. ‘I pricked my finger on it and that’s what gave me the fever. Great Juno’s peacock!’ exclaimed Flavia suddenly. ‘Do you realise what this is?’
Lupus frowned and shrugged.
‘This stylus is proof,’ said Flavia, ‘that Jonathan didn’t kill Titus!’
Jonathan lay naked on his stomach, on towel spread over a couch in the apodyterium of Domitian’s private baths. Presently he heard the swishing robes of the doctor and felt gentle hands smooth a cooling balm on his wounds. The cream hurt as it went on, but then the pain subsided and he felt a delicious numbness.
‘That’s good,’ he wheezed.
‘Sit up,’ said a voice in Aramaic.
Jonathan twisted to see who it was. He saw a thin young man with curling sidelocks and a turban: a Jew. The man had large dark eyes in a pale ascetic face. His small mouth was curved into a smile. ‘I’ll wrap your ribs in strips of linen soaked in aloes,’ said the doctor, ‘and I want to put some salve on your face, too. I’m just brewing a beaker of ephedron for your asthma.’
‘Ben Aruva,’ said Jonathan. He wrapped the towel around his waist and sat up.
The Jew’s smile faded and his eyebrows went up. ‘You know my name?’ And then he said, ‘Of course you do. You preceded us all the way from Rome to Reate.’
‘I’d heard about you before that,’ wheezed Jonathan. ‘In the Jewish quarter in Transtiberim they talk of you.’
The Roman Mysteries Complete Collection Page 268