The Night Villa

by Carol Goodman

  “I thought you had excused yourself from this particular party,” she says. It’s what she said to me that morning, meaning Elgin’s Papyrus Project, only now I see that she means the party going on around us: women in black veils embroidered with silver stars stand around us in a circle, holding torches. The guardians of Night, I think.

  “Are you their priestess?” I ask.

  Odette laughs. The full-bodied sound echoes off the rock walls of the grotto we’re in and makes the torch flames quake. “Honey, you know I belong to the Greater New Hope African Methodist Episcopal Church, but others aren’t so picky about their allegiances. You’re still looking at this like a catfish swimming upside down and thinking the mud below is the sky above.” She points up, and I realize that what I had thought was a reflection of water on the grotto ceiling is actually the water itself. When I look back down at Odette and the circle of women, they sway and waver and then break apart like reflections in a pool. I’m at the bottom of the grotto looking up through the water and once again I’ve gotten my shirt snagged in the rock. I look behind me to pull my shirt loose and see that it’s not my shirt that’s holding me back, but an enormous octopus whose tentacles have encircled my waist.

  I wake up drenched in sweat, gasping for air. It’s already light out so I decide to get up and shower and get ready for my second, and I hope last, trip to the underworld. What was it Virgil had said? Facilis descensus Averno. Maybe so, but I’m beginning to think I’ve made the trip one time too many.

  I spend the boat trip over worried about how I’ll make sure that Agnes and I will be able to go our own way in the tunnels, but when we get to the site everything falls into place almost too easily. Maria volunteers to stay aboveground because she has some e-mails to take care of. She heads up to the top level of the villa to make herself comfortable in the field office, so she won’t even notice Ely when he enters the site. When I point out that the tunnel outside the Chamber of the God goes in three directions and mention splitting up in pairs, Lyros immediately suggests that Elgin go with him. I see Elgin hesitate, looking at Agnes, but when she chimes in with, “Yes, let’s make it girls against boys and see who wins,” Elgin shrugs and concedes.

  “Make sure you keep your walkie-talkie on,” he says. “And stay together,” he admonishes Agnes, looking so anxious that I’m pretty sure Agnes was wrong about his intentions, or lack thereof, toward her. Maybe he hasn’t made a move for her yet, but clearly he is interested. He can hardly take his eyes off her, even double-checking her backpack to see that she has the right climbing gear, flashlight, and water. He must notice me staring at him, though, because he entrusts me with the walkie-talkie. “Holler if you find anything,” he says, and then, lowering his voice for me alone to hear, “or if anything seems fishy to you.”

  “Fishy? As in mermaids and sea nymphs?” I mean it as a joke, but it reminds me of what Odette said in my dreams about catfish seeing things upside down. What wasn’t I seeing right?

  “As in anything that doesn’t feel right,” Elgin says, ignoring my admittedly weak attempt at levity. “Just call my name—”

  “And I’ll be there.” I finish the song lyric for him, recalling too late it was the Mariah Carey song we used to hear all the time driving through the hill country.

  “Yeah,” he says, smiling now. “I will.”

  When we reach the Chamber of the God, Lyros takes out a thin steel crowbar and slips it into the crack. The door opens easily. I’m careful to go through first because I want to make sure that Agnes and I get to go in the direction that will lead up. I’m pretty sure that Lyros, without the benefit of reading Phineas’s last entry, will want to head down toward the Sirens’ Grotto, where he probably thinks the scroll is still hidden, but still, I want to make sure. When I enter the tunnel I find the path marked with a lyre. Well, that’s easy enough, I think: I stand in front of the lyre, staking my claim on the upward path.

  Agnes comes in next, then Elgin.

  Lyros comes in last, and immediately scans the walls with his flashlight until he finds the path marked with the split-tailed siren.

  “Okay, then, this path must lead down to the Sirens’ Grotto, while this one”—he shines the flashlight directly in my eyes and I reluctantly step aside so he can see the sign on the wall behind me—“that looks like a lyre, doesn’t it?”

  Elgin steps forward to examine the carving while Agnes and I exchange a glance. “A lyre could symbolize Orpheus,” Elgin says, “who led Eurydice out of Hades. This could be a route up. If Iusta stole the scroll she could have taken this route up to the surface.”

  “But we don’t know if Iusta ever got the scroll,” Agnes says, “or if she did, whether she made it this far. Shouldn’t we check the tunnel to the grotto first?”

  I try hard not to stare at her. She seems to be suggesting that she and I take the wrong path.

  “Only,” she continues, “to tell you the truth, it kind of gives me the creeps to go farther down. I know that seems silly—”

  “Not at all,” Lyros says, shaking his head. “It’s psychological. The descent is always the trickier part.”

  “If Agnes is really that afraid of being underground, maybe she should go back to the surface and wait with Maria,” Elgin says. Maybe he doesn’t buy her excuse for taking the upward path. Fortunately the excuse seems enough for Lyros.

  “Well, that should be up to Agnes. What about it, Miss Hancock. Are you up for this?”

  “Yes, absolutely,” she answers.

  “Good girl,” Lyros says, smiling at her. “It’s settled then. Agnes and Sophie will take the path of Orpheus while we take the sirens’ path. Then we’ll all meet back here in—” He looks down at his watch. “Say an hour? It’s half past ten now so let’s make it eleven-thirty. Anyone finds anything, or runs into trouble, use the walkie-talkie. And remember what Iusta said about traps. Stay tethered to each other, walk slowly, and watch your footing. Okay?”

  I nod as Agnes clips a line to my harness, attaching us together. She starts up the tunnel marked with the lyre and I turn to follow her, but Elgin grabs my arm and holds me back.

  “I have a bad feeling about this whole thing,” he whispers in my ear.

  It’s on the tip of my tongue to tell him that maybe he should go up and wait for us aboveground, but then I see the expression in his eyes. He looks really scared and for once it doesn’t seem to be for himself. Is he really that afraid of losing me? But then he says, “Make sure you watch out for Agnes,” and I realize it’s not me he’s worried about losing.

  “Will do,” I say curtly and then, feeling the tug of the line pulling me, I turn and follow her into the tunnel.

  “I’m sick of everyone thinking they know what’s best for me,” Agnes says when I catch up to her in the tunnel. “My parents, my teachers, Sam…I’m old enough to make my own choices.”

  “Of course you are. It’s just that anyone would be shook up after what happened back in Austin.”

  “You mean everyone thinks I made such a bad choice with Dale that I can’t be trusted to make any other choices.”

  “That’s not what I meant—” I begin, but then stop, wondering if maybe that is why I feel so protective of Agnes. “Maybe you’re right,” I say. “It’s just that I know how easy it is to go from one bad choice to another.”

  “Is that what you did?”

  “It’s exactly what I did. I was so upset when I found out that Ely had joined the Tetraktys that I had an affair, with Elgin Lawrence of all people, and I ruined any chance I had of holding on to Ely. I practically pushed him into a cult.”

  “You shouldn’t hold yourself responsible for that.” Agnes has stopped and turned to face me. Her flashlight, lowered in front of her, throws a ghastly shadow on her face. “Maybe he had his own reasons for joining the Tetraktys. Maybe you shouldn’t have fought it so hard.”

  I shake my head. “You have no idea, Agnes. This group is really dangerous. You know that Dale was involved with it, r
ight? Did it ever occur to you that the Tetraktys made him shoot those people—” This is further than I’d meant to go. Agnes’s face looks pale and stricken in the glare of the flashlight. Her jaw clenches, a blue vein throbs at her temple. “I’m sorry,” I say. “This isn’t the time or place to talk about it. Let’s just go on.”

  “Which way?” Agnes swings her flashlight in an arc that shows two passages in front of us. We’ve come to the first fork Iusta referred to.

  “I don’t see any markings…. Wait, here’s one.” On the right-hand path I find a ship carved into the stone. “It’s a boat of some kind….”

  “There’s a picture of a boat on this path, too. How are we supposed to know which one leads to the surface?”

  I swing my flashlight from one picture to the other and then smile. “This one on the right has its sails down and is being poled along by a shrouded figure,” I say, “but the one on the left has its sails up and is being pushed by the wind. I’d say the one on the right is Charon’s ferry to the underworld and the one on the left is embarking for the isles of the blessed—in other words, the upper world.”

  “Gosh, I guess so, but it’s not as clear as Iusta made it out.”

  “No, it’s not. I say we take the left-hand path, but that we go slowly and carefully.”

  Agnes nods her agreement and we set off again, carefully sweeping the tunnel floor with our flashlights to watch for any traps. I’m glad in a way that we’re concentrating too hard for conversation. I hadn’t meant to bring up the shooting or the Tetraktys, or the fact that they might be related to each other. Will it make Agnes feel worse or better to know that Dale was being used as a tool of the Tetraktys? Would she blame herself, as I had, for not trying harder to keep Dale out of the Tetraktys? I’m tempted to ask these questions, but then we find the next fork, the two passes marked with two flowers.

  “Okay,” Agnes says, “I give up. How are we supposed to tell the difference between two flowers?”

  “Well, this one on the left is an iris—”

  “Goddess of the rainbow!” Agnes says quickly. “So it must be the right way to go.”

  “Well, she was also the goddess that came to release the soul at death, but I think you’re right. The name means ‘eye of heaven.’ This one on the right is a poppy, which is associated with the Eleusinian rites, sleep, and forgetfulness….”

  “Oh, so definitely that path would lead back to the underworld.”

  “Or at least to death.” I shine my flashlight down the path marked by the poppy. After six feet or so the ground drops away. Agnes inches forward and I follow her, curious to see one of the traps Iusta warned Phineas about, but when I peer over the edge I’m sorry I looked. The pit is lined with jagged rocks that would slice your hands if you tried to hold on and is so deep our flashlights can’t find the bottom.

  “Man, if Iusta fell into that we’ll never find her.”

  “Let’s hope she didn’t.” I back away from the pit, taking the path marked by the iris. “After all, she was a bright girl and educated in mythology by Gaius Petronius.”

  “But imagine having to decode these symbols while you’re running for your life. It’s like a final exam where the wrong answer means you die.”

  We both lapse into silence again, contemplating that last trip Iusta made through these tunnels. The ground would have been shaking, the air filling with sulfurous fumes. Would anyone have the presence of mind to stay on the right path, to make the right choices? We navigate through the next fork, which is marked with two trees: a cypress, tree of mourning, and the almond, the tree of hope. I steer Agnes up the path marked with the almond tree.

  “I get the cypress part—they’re gloomy trees—but how did the almond get to be the tree of hope?”

  “The story is that a Thracian princess, Phyllis, fell in love with an Athenian prince, Demophoon. He promised to marry her, but first he wanted to pay a short visit back to Athens.”

  “Oh, let me guess. He never returns.”

  “Well, he does, but not for many years. By the time he comes back, Phyllis has died of a broken heart and been transformed into an almond tree. Demophoon embraces the leafless tree and it suddenly bursts into bloom, and so it’s a symbol of love persisting after death.”

  “And after betrayal. I wouldn’t burst into bloom for any guy who left me for years.”

  I smile, thinking that Agnes is young and beautiful enough not to have had to make this particular decision. Who would abandon her? What could she do that would require that kind of forgiveness? “Well, it’s also a symbol of forgiveness. I wonder if Iusta thought about the story when she came to this turning. Did she consider going back to save Phineas?”

  “Oh no!” Agnes wails, breaking into my wishful thinking. “Look at these two symbols! Two women’s faces and they’re almost identical. How are we going to figure out which is the right one?”

  I step around Agnes and look at the two faces carved into the rock. Agnes is right; they are almost identical, two beautiful women in profile, their hair bound up with flowers. “The one on the left is wearing poppies and stars in her hair while the one on the right is wearing roses and wheat. The one on the left is Night, and the one on the right is Day.” I shine my flashlight down the right-hand tunnel and the beam hits a solid wall of tufa. When the pyroclastic flow that covered Herculaneum rolled down Mount Vesuvius around midnight on August 24, it apparently flowed into the tunnel. “It must have been the right way because it was open to the surface.”

  “Damn. Iusta could be under that,” Agnes says. “It could take months of excavation to find out.” She sounds close to tears, as if we were trapped under the tufa with Iusta.

  I shine my flashlight back on the other tunnel, the one marked by the goddess Night, and take a tentative step forward, but hold my hands up to stop Agnes from following. Two feet from where we stand the tunnel falls away into black space. I crouch down to look inside. Unlike the trap we saw before, with its sharp, jagged stones, this one is a round hole with smooth stone walls, like a well bored deep into the rock. A slab of rock lying next to the opening could have been a lid for it, but clearly no one had to close it to kill the person who fell in. The skeleton at the bottom of the well lies as dropped there, the skull’s blank eye holes peering up at us as if waiting for help at last. Next to one skeletal hand lies a long thin object, like a log or…

  “It’s the scroll,” Agnes says, her voice reanimated with hope. “It must be.”

  I nod even though I know Agnes isn’t looking at me. I don’t trust myself to talk. It’s not excitement over possibly finding The Golden Verses and Iusta’s diary that makes my throat feel swollen, though, it’s grief at finding Iusta like this. Even though she’s been dead for almost two thousand years, I can’t help feeling bad that I’ve come too late to help her, and that any change of heart she might have had about saving Phineas came too late for both of them.

  “One of us will have to go down to get it,” Agnes says. “If you want me…”

  “No,” I say. “I’ve done more climbing. I can do it.”

  “Are you sure? I mean, I did go climbing once with Sam…only I wasn’t much good, especially when it came to going down. I wasn’t making up that part before. I actually am kind of afraid of heights.”

  “I’ll go.” I look around the tunnel for a stable rock we can use as a belay station and find one just above the pit opening. I unclip my rope from Agnes’s harness and loop it around the boulder, tugging hard to make sure it’s steady. “I think this will hold fine, just keep an eye on it to make sure the rope doesn’t snag. You can keep your flashlight trained on the bottom so I can see where I’m going.” And so I don’t land on those bones.

  “Okay.” Agnes sounds relieved that she’s not the one to go. “Do you think you should leave your bag up here? It might get in the your way.”

  “Okay.”

  I hold on to the rope and let myself over the edge, wedging my feet into the wall and leaning out as
soon as I can. It’s not a bad climb down—only a dozen feet or so—easier than the drop into the Chamber of the God, but still I feel worse going into this narrow pit. The pit of Night, I think to myself. I feel the rock walls pressing in on my chest, constricting my lungs. It’s a death pit, designed to trap the unwary. I wonder why Iusta wasn’t able to avoid it. Was it because she was rushing to get out? Or because an earthquake jolted her?

  When I near the bottom I scan the ground to avoid stepping on the bones. It’s hard. The circle is only about six feet in diameter and the skeleton is stretched out across it—arms and legs splayed like the diagram of the Vitruvian man, or like a torture victim stretched out on a Catherine wheel. She must have landed flat on her back and broken her spine in the fall. Had it killed her instantly or had she had time to lie here waiting for help that never came? Had she been alive when the final surge hit Herculaneum at midnight and turned this pit into an inferno? Had she thought she was being consumed by the fires of Hades as punishment for leaving Phineas behind?

  I crouch next to the skull, staring into the empty eye sockets as if they held the answers to my questions. I came here—to Italy, to this pit—because I wanted to hear Iusta’s voice. I wanted a glimpse of this first-century girl who’d had the gumption to sue her mistress for her freedom, but instead of deepening my knowledge of her I found she became more of a mystery than ever. Elgin was right. I’ve overromanticized her. I’ve identified with her too much.

  “Dr. Chase? Are you all right? Can you get the scroll?” Agnes’s voice brings me back to the present. Perhaps I’ve done the same with her. I’ve been reading my own story into hers, believing that she blamed herself for what Dale Henry did and fearing that she’d throw herself into Elgin’s arms just like I had. Clearly the girl, even if she did date a crazy boy who turned into a killer, has more sense than I had.

  “Yeah, I’m fine. The scroll’s right here—charred like the others but intact. I’ll need something to bring it back up.”