Carver's Quest

by Rennison, Nick

  ‘Possible, yes, but I do not know that it is likely.’ The professor seemed suddenly deflated. His earlier enthusiasm had evaporated. ‘I did look into the matter before I left Cambridge.’

  ‘And what did you learn?’

  ‘A Swedish traveller named Bjornestahl examined some of the monastic libraries in Thessaly about fifty years ago. He found little of any interest. Musty volumes of the Greek Fathers. Some manuscripts and codices, but none of any considerable value. Everywhere he found signs of damp and neglect.’

  ‘Perhaps the monks were unwilling to show an outsider what they really owned.’

  ‘Perhaps. But scholars have long ago lost hope that a forgotten library might hold some genuine treasure.’

  ‘Who knows? Maybe we will stumble upon the lost books of Livy.’

  ‘No, they are gone for ever.’ Fields sounded like a man regretfully acknowledging an inescapable truth. ‘As are the missing plays of Aeschylus and Aristotle’s book on comedy. We shall find nothing so remarkable.’

  ‘But there might be the work of some lesser author still to be discovered.’ It was Adam whose enthusiasm was now growing as the professor’s shrank. ‘An author like Euphorion.’

  ‘I cannot bring myself to believe even that.’ The professor stared into the bottom of his cup and stirred the dregs of his coffee. He appeared to discover new hope there. ‘Although, it is true that Bjornestahl did not include all the monasteries of Thessaly in his survey.’

  ‘So, there is a chance that there is something still out there.’

  ‘A chance, yes. A systematic search of the monastic libraries might reveal hitherto unknown manuscripts. Who knows? Even lost works by ancient authors.’

  ‘Then we must go,’ Adam said, decisively. ‘We have come too far to do no more than return to London with our tails between our legs.’

  The professor shrugged, whether in agreement or disagreement Adam was not entirely certain, then got to his feet.

  ‘There is something,’ he announced rather too loudly, ‘that I must fetch from my room.’

  Adam followed Fields’s progress through the hotel’s restaurant, which was fuller than it had been when he had first come down. Several tables were now taken by those intent upon lunch. Adam looked across at a young English couple whose behaviour suggested they were newlyweds on their honeymoon. Further away, two middle-aged men, Americans to judge by their accents, were talking noisily about stocks and shares. Another man entered the restaurant and, at first, Adam assumed he was planning to join the two Americans. He moved in their direction. As he did so, Adam saw to his astonishment that the man was Lewis Garland. The MP strode confidently past the American businessmen and took a seat at a more distant table. He waved to the tall waiter who set off towards him like a contestant embarking on a foot race. Adam took the opportunity to head for the nearest door. He had no desire to engage Garland in conversation but he could not help but wonder what on earth could have brought the man to Athens.

  CHAPTER TWENTY-NINE

  The man hailed Adam and the professor as soon as they entered the house in the Square of the Mint that served as the British embassy. He was wearing a blue blazer with brass buttons and a pair of white duck trousers and was about to leave the building. He looked more like a sailor recently come ashore after years at sea than a member of the British diplomatic service.

  ‘Apologies for the outfit, gentlemen,’ he said, looking anything but apologetic. He seemed to have forgotten, possibly deliberately, that he had an appointment to see them. ‘Not really on duty at present. Taking a boat to Aegina this afternoon, but I thought I’d exchange pleasantries before I went.’

  He shook hands with Fields and then held out his hand to Adam.

  ‘You must be Carver. Don’t think we met in Cambridge.’ He paused. ‘Or did we? I’m constantly coming across chaps who claim to have known me at college and I haven’t the faintest recollection of them.’

  ‘No, we were up at different times, I think. I went down in the summer of sixty-five.’

  ‘Oh, different epochs altogether, then. I was a year into the dreariest of postings in Copenhagen in the summer of sixty-five. Ever been to Copenhagen?’

  Adam indicated that he hadn’t had that pleasure.

  ‘Wretched weather. So damned cold most of the time,’ said Sam-ways, taking a handkerchief from his pocket and dabbing at one of the buttons on the cuffs of his jacket. ‘Can’t recommend it.’

  ‘I have no plans to visit Copenhagen at present, but if I do ever go, I shall remember your warning about the temperature.’

  The young man from the embassy ignored Adam’s remark. He continued to polish the brass on his sleeves.

  ‘Not that Athens is much better,’ he said. ‘Choking in dust in summer, drowning in mud in winter.’

  ‘But surely proximity to the glory that was Greece is worth a bit of discomfort, Samways, is it not?’ Fields said, drily.

  ‘Not too sure about that, Professor.’ Samways tucked his handkerchief back into the top pocket of his blazer. ‘You may keep the glory that was Greece, in my humble opinion. Smacks too much of the classroom. Your natural habitat, of course. Myself, I can’t wait to get a posting to somewhere with a climate that agrees with me more.’

  He smiled at Adam and the professor with a look of immense self-satisfaction on his face, as if he was expecting them to rush to agree with him that the glories of Greece were much overrated.

  ‘And where would you prefer to be posted, Mr Samways?’ Adam asked.

  ‘Ah, there you have me, old boy.’ Samways was still inspecting the gleaming brass buttons on his sleeves, moving his arms to admire the light flashing off them. ‘Paris is obviously out. Still surrounded by Bismarck’s bully-boys. No doubt the French will be at each other’s throats before long. Murdering one another in their beds and that kind of thing. As is their wont. I’m none too fond of any variety of jabbering foreigner, if truth be told, but Johnny Crapaud quite takes the biscuit, don’t he?’

  Satisfied that his buttons were shining with sufficient brightness, the diplomat hauled another white cambric handkerchief from his trouser pocket and began to wipe beads of sweat from his brow. His thoughts were still running on his next posting. ‘Vienna? Berlin? Germany seems to be quite the coming place, don’t it? Wouldn’t mind going anywhere I shan’t have to deal with all these tourist pilgrims mooching about with a volume of Homer in one pocket and Byron’s verse in the other.’

  ‘I would have thought that tourists would be in short supply after the Dilessi affair,’ the professor said, doing little to disguise his low opinion of Samways. ‘Few things do so much to deter the average traveller as kidnap, murder and brigandage.’

  ‘Oh, I don’t know. Being captured by brigands isn’t all bad, you know,’ the diplomat said cheerfully, as if he was planning on being abducted himself in the near future if only he could find the time in his busy calendar. ‘Bags of fresh air to breathe and fresh game to eat. Set of picturesque rogues for company. Then, when family and friends get the money together for a ransom and aforementioned picturesque rogues release you, you’ve got a story to dine out on for years to come.’

  ‘The poor devils who were murdered at Dilessi would probably disagree with you,’ Fields said pointedly.

  ‘Oh, no doubt, no doubt.’ Samways waved a languid hand in the air. ‘Always exceptions to any rule. Poor Herbert and Vyner just had the most terrible bad luck. Problems with the ransom money and all that.’

  ‘And yet the countryside will still be dangerous for travellers.’

  ‘Safe enough for Englishmen, if you want my humble opinion. Despite all this Dilessi business. It’s not often a Greek’s going to take a potshot at you. For one thing, he’s aware of the fact that nine times out of ten either he’s going to miss or his gun won’t go off. Whereas, if you take a potshot back at him, the likelihood is the gun will go off and you won’t miss.’ Much to the irritation of both Adam and the professor, Samways continued to be fascin
ated by the buttons on his blue jacket and was still moving his arm back and forth as if to find the point at which they glinted most attractively in the sun. Fields glared at him like a schoolmaster about to rap a naughty pupil’s knuckles smartly with a wooden ruler. ‘Not to mention all the infernal fuss caused if an Englishman does get himself killed. Herbert and Vyner are shot and look what happens. People galloping like mad hither and yon. Arrests and beatings by the dozen. The game’s not worth the candle. As I say, those chaps were just damned unlucky.’

  Fields, whose face had been turning a peculiar shade of red as he listened to Samways, looked likely to roar at the embassy man in reply. Adam, noticing the professor’s poorly suppressed rage, hastened to intervene.

  ‘Dilessi has undoubtedly been the scene of a tragedy,’ he said smoothly, ‘and yet it is not the subject we came here to discuss. If I understand the professor correctly, you are the one man in Athens who may be able to help us. In our quest for manuscripts. We need the help of someone like yourself who knows the town inside out.’

  Adam’s flattery worked. Samways’s delight in being considered the one man in Athens capable of offering assistance was obvious. His self-regard, already enormous, visibly increased. He drew himself up to his full height and looked around the lobby of the embassy as if inviting the admiring glances of anyone who might be passing through it.

  ‘If I say so myself, I have become something of an authority on the place. I may not like the town but I’m here now. Representing queen and country and all that. So I reckon it’s my duty to learn all I can about it.’

  Fields made a strange snorting noise. Adam was once more swift to speak.

  ‘Your knowledge of Athens and its inhabitants will doubtless prove invaluable to us. We are looking for someone to advise us on the sale of ancient manuscripts. A Greek, if possible. Perhaps someone from your large acquaintance in the city springs to mind?’

  ‘Been thinking about that since the prof first spoke to me the other day.’ Samways beamed at his two visitors. ‘It seems to me that the man you need is Alexander Rallis.’

  Fields made a heroic attempt to control his temper. ‘And who is this Rallis?’ he demanded.

  ‘He’s a decent sort,’ Samways said. ‘About as close to a gentleman as you’re likely to get in Athens.’

  ‘We have certainly met very few gentlemen since we arrived in the city,’ Fields said, pointedly. ‘Either Greek or English.’

  ‘What more can you tell us about him?’ Adam asked, hurriedly.

  ‘Not a lot, old boy.’ Samways had entirely missed any hint of irritation or innuendo in the professor’s comment. ‘His father was a government minister back in the days of Good King Otto. Left politics after Otto was forced to abdicate and head back to Bavaria. Rallis senior retired to his estates outside Athens.’

  ‘And what of Rallis junior?’

  ‘He’s a lawyer. Greek lawyers usually cause nothing but trouble, but he don’t. Quite the reverse. He’s even helped us with some tricky business.’

  ‘Why should we have need of a Greek lawyer?’ Fields asked, the little patience he had been able to muster for their conversation with Samways ebbing away. ‘We have no intention of falling foul of the law while we are in Greece. We are here to investigate the country’s antiquities. As I told you, Samways, we are looking for manuscripts.’

  ‘Absolutely. That’s why Rallis is your man.’

  ‘We don’t want legal manuscripts.’ Fields raised his voice in his annoyance.

  ‘No need to get in a bait, Professor.’ Samways seemed to notice the older man’s simmering temper for the first time. ‘Alexander’s not just a lawyer. That’s the point. Did I not say? He’s a bit of a scholar as well. Has some connection with the university, although I’m never quite certain what it is exactly. If anyone knows where to find musty old parchments with Greek poetry and whatnot on them – and I understand that’s what you’re looking for – then Rallis does.’

  Adam glanced at Fields. The professor’s intense irritation with the embassy man seemed to have rendered him unexpectedly speechless. His eyes spoke volumes but his lips were clamped shut. It was, Adam thought, best that they should remain so.

  ‘How shall we make ourselves known to the gentleman?’ he asked Samways. ‘Perhaps you might be able to arrange a letter of introduction?’

  ‘No need for that, old man. There’s a reception in the embassy the day after tomorrow. For some rich merchant we want to butter up. Rallis will be there. Why don’t you both come along and I’ll introduce you to him there.’

  ‘That would be most kind of you, Samways.’

  ‘Don’t mention it, old chap. Always glad to give people like yourselves the benefit of my knowledge. Anyway, must dash now. Don’t want to miss that boat to Aegina.’

  Waving his arm in farewell, the diplomat almost ran from the building. Adam and the professor followed him into the sunshine.

  ‘We will meet this fellow Rallis,’ Fields said, as they watched Samways climb into a carriage standing outside. ‘If even that insufferable little pup recommends him, he must be a man of some consequence.’

  Fields paused and stared gloomily about the square.

  ‘Unless, of course, he turns out to be as big a damned fool as the man who’s recommending him,’ he said.

  ‘That would be difficult, would it not?’

  ‘It would be very nearly an impossibility that one city the size of Athens should include two men of such idiocy,’ the professor acknowledged. ‘But I doubt that Samways has come to an opinion about Rallis alone. Others at the embassy must think highly of him.’

  ‘And, as a rule, they think little of most Greeks,’ Adam remarked. ‘If there is one subject on which all the foreign residents of Athens agree, it is the rascality of the natives. French, Italians, English, Germans, Americans – they seem to argue about everything else, but there they speak with one voice.’

  ‘That is true. It is rare to find a Greek they admire. So we shall come to this reception on Friday and we shall talk to Mr Rallis.’

  * * * * *

  ‘The parliament building was begun more than ten years ago.’

  Adam and Fields were sitting outside a café at the junction of two roads. One led back towards the Angleterre. The other, which they faced, provided them with a view of the Acropolis and the Parthenon silhouetted against the horizon. The professor had embarked upon one of his favourite topics of conversation – the decadence of the modern Greek when compared with his ancient ancestors.

  ‘They talk of its opening next year but will it do so?’ he continued, picking up his cup and looking at its contents dubiously. ‘This is Athens. The home of idleness and procrastination. Who knows?’

  Fields sipped at his coffee. Adam, who knew better than to engage his companion in debate on this particular subject, stretched back in his seat and clasped his hands behind his head. He gazed at the distant temple to Athena on its hill and thought idly of the history it had witnessed over the centuries. The sound of the professor lecturing became no more than a background buzz requiring only the occasional, random interjection in reply. The dust rose and the Athenian traffic, its carts and carriages and pedestrians and animals, continued to thunder past them but Adam felt himself tempted towards sleep. He closed his eyes.

  ‘Be off with you!’

  Adam opened his eyes again in surprise. An ugly dark-haired woman and a child were standing by the table, hands outstretched. The professor was waving them away with a theatrical gesture, like a father in a Drury Lane melodrama dismissing his erring daughter from his sight. Carver offered a ten-lepta coin to the girl who was barefoot, filthy and dressed in torn clothing. She snatched it and the two grubby figures moved on.

  ‘You should not encourage them, my boy. They will batten upon your weakness and you will never see the back of them.’

  ‘I can see the back of them now, sir,’ Adam remarked mildly, watching as the beggar-woman and her daughter walked away.


  ‘Ah, you may be flippant but, mark my words, they will return. Or others will do so. Give but once to these Athenian mendicants and you will be pestered throughout the rest of our time here.’

  The young man doubted Fields was correct. He had given freely to the city’s destitute since they had arrived and he had never seen the same beggar twice. He gazed down the narrow street ahead of them. A sad procession of emaciated horses, a dozen or more of them, was being led down it. Their destination, he thought, was almost certainly the knacker’s yard. The horses, with the man lead-

  ing them, turned to the left. The traffic, which earlier had been so busy, had almost disappeared. The road ahead was clear for the best part of a hundred yards. The only vehicle that could be seen was a wooden cart, drawn by a sturdy-looking chestnut horse, which was trundling steadily towards them. Adam turned in his seat and peered through the window behind them into the gloom of the café.

  ‘I suppose we should pay mine host and return to the hotel.’

  ‘I shall not accompany you back to the Angleterre, my boy. I shall visit my friends at the National Library again.’

  ‘I do not believe the waiter plans to venture outside again for the rest of the day.’ Adam stood. ‘I shall beard him in his den.’

  He brushed aside the curtain that hung across the café door and entered. Almost blinded by the change from light to darkness, he squinted into the interior. There were several rickety tables inside but only one was occupied. Two middle-aged men in shabby suits, wreathed in the smoke from their cigarettes, stared expressionlessly at Adam. As his eyes adjusted to the shadows, an older man emerged from the innermost depths of the building, smiling and nodding. Adam paid him for the drinks and turned to leave. He glanced through the window. The professor was standing with his back to the street. He was patting the pockets of his jacket as if he suspected that the beggar-woman who had importuned them might also have been a pickpocket and he was in danger of having lost his wallet.