“You now believe Alcibiades was innocent?” Simeon asked.
“I do.” Miriam paused. “I am sorry for Demetrius. He has lost a lover and the rain will prevent a funeral pyre.” She smiled at Simeon. “But look on the bright side: at least Olympias will not be able to stage her play!”
CHAPTER 13
The rain fell in sheets, drenching the camp; it seemed as if the heavens themselves were stretching down to complete the picture of devastation around Thebes. Miriam sat in her tent half listening to the heralds postponing the play that was supposed to take place the following morning. She looked at Castor standing before her.
“You are sure?”
“Mistress, as I am that I am standing here. The staircase was dark but the cloak the man was wearing was very similar to the one that that priestess wore.”
“But it was not the priestess herself?”
“Oh, no,” the boy said hurriedly. “But I remember that it was thick and gray, the edges trimmed with red stitches.”
Miriam glanced at Simeon.
“Very observant,” her brother replied. “That’s what Antigone was wearing but such cloaks are fairly common.”
Miriam gave the boy a coin and watched him go out, splashing in the mud.
“Brother, pass me Antigone’s gift.”
Simeon tossed it across. Miriam pressed it against her face and sniffed carefully. She could detect nothing, so she unrolled it. Near the middle, where it had been draped around the priestess’s throat, she sniffed again.
“Brother, here! Smell this; can you catch a fragrance?”
Simeon took the cloth and sniffed at it. “A slight one,” he said, “of perfume.”
Miriam took it back and sat holding the piece of silk.
“Everything is wrong,” she murmured. She recalled Antigone squatting in the temple, watching them make their discovery; the table in the garret above Memnon’s chamber and the fragrance she had detected there.
“But that’s impossible!” she exclaimed.
“What is?” Simeon demanded.
“I smelled some perfume on a table in the Cadmea. It’s the same as on this piece of silk.”
“Perfumes are common,” Simeon replied, “as are cloaks. You don’t think Antigone is the Oracle, do you?”
“No.” Miriam shook her head. “I’ve spoken to virtually everyone who used that tower. Never once were any of the priestesses seen in the citadel. But, it is a coincidence.”
“Antigone couldn’t kill a man,” Simeon declared.
“No, no she couldn’t.”
The flap was pulled back and Alexander, accompanied by Hecaetus, slipped into the tent. The king shook himself like a dog and sat on Simeon’s bed, staring across at Miriam. He had lost his look of exhaustion; the skin around his eyes was smooth. He wiped the rain from his face.
“I’m so glad the weather’s broken,” he declared. “It’s kept Mother in her tent. She hates the rain. She even talks of going back to Pella sooner than she’d planned. Hecaetus, would you like to go with her?”
“Don’t threaten me, my lord. You know I would be dead within a month. Olympias would kill me just for the sport of it.”
Alexander laughed.
“Mother hates rain.” He leaned forward. “Her face gets wet, the paint runs, and she hates to look old. That’s why she stopped campaigning with Father and why we moved to Pella. There’s supposed to be less rainfall there. Miriam, I want you to pray to your known God that it rains until the army marches. Yap! Yap! Nag! Nag! Anyway, I received your message about the Crown.”
Miriam told him what she had discovered. Alexander sat, fingers to his lips, listening attentively. When she finished, he stretched toward her and gripped her hand.
“You were always better at logic than I. I never dreamed that black iron bar was the solution. However, it won’t bring back the Crown. It won’t capture the Oracle, and Memnon’s blood, as well as Lysander’s, still cries to the gods for vengeance.”
“Does it really matter?” Simeon asked. “Soon the army will move; Demosthenes has fled from Athens. You are undisputed captain-general of Greece.”
Alexander clapped his hands.
“You are right. What happened here will soon be forgotten. Until I cross the Hellespont. Then Demosthenes will scurry back to Athens.” His face grew tight. “And do what he is very good at-whisper, gossip, gossip! Say that Alexander is cursed! That the removal of the Crown was a sign of the gods’ anger toward me! So, I want that Crown! I want the Oracle crucified!”
“This spy. .” Miriam turned to Hecaetus. “Before all this began, you knew there was a spy in the Cadmea?”
“I knew for two reasons,” the master of spies replied languidly. “First, the rumors in Thebes itself. Second, we intercepted a letter from Demosthenes to his Persian paymasters.”
“What did it say?” Miriam demanded angrily.
Hecaetus closed his eyes and swallowed hard.
“The actual quotation was, ‘So you have been informed that there’s a spy in the Cadmea to harm Macedon’s interests?’”
“Why didn’t you tell me this?”
“I did tell you, in as many words!”
“Say it again.”
Hecaetus repeated the phrase.
“So, the spy could be working for anyone: Demosthenes, the Persians, as well as the Thebans?”
“So it appears to me. Anyway,” Hecaetus added crossly, “it’s the same thing. Thebes relies on Athens, and Athens relies on Persian gold.”
“But bear with me.” Miriam held her hand up. “This was a letter from Demosthenes to the Persians?”
“Yes.”
“And he is repeating information received from the Persians?”
“I suppose so.”
“And why do you call him the Oracle?”
“It’s a word Demosthenes uses in the next sentence, ‘This Oracle,’” Hecaetus closed his eyes, “‘could be of more value than the one at Delphi.’”
“So,” Miriam persisted, “the spy could be working for the Persians?”
“Of course.”
“But who would have informed the Persians?”
Hecaetus blinked.
“What are you saying?” Alexander asked. He loosened the tight strap on one of his sandals and rubbed the top of his foot against his leg. He cocked his head sideways, a common mannerism whenever he was puzzled.
“It’s possible,” Miriam replied, “that one of the garrison simply opened negotiations with Persia. However, that’s very dangerous; he would probably have had to use someone in Thebes, or even more perilous, someone in Athens.”
“And the more people know, the more dangerous it is.”
“Naturally.”
“So?”
“There is another alternative.”
“You mean?” Hecaetus broke in, “Persia already had a spy here, who, in turn, bribed a member of our garrison?”
“It’s a possible interpretation of Demosthenes’ letter.”
“And?” Alexander asked.
Miriam heaved a sigh.
“And nothing, my lord; that’s as far as I can go. But, I beg one favor. Have the soldiers on the shrine and at priestesses’ house doubled. Tell the officers to be most vigilant. The priestesses are not to leave.”
“I can’t very well stop them.” Alexander got to his feet. “I gave them my word that they would be protected and given safe passage.”
“It’s raining,” Miriam replied. “Surely, my lord, priestesses cannot travel in such weather?”
Alexander came back and ruffled her hair.
“Let me know what happens, and by the way, Miriam, hide that piece of blue silk. If mother sees, it she’ll want it.”
Hecaetus would have stayed but Miriam insisted that she wanted to be alone. When her visitors had gone, she picked up the blue silk, lay down on the bed, and laid it across her face. She used to do this when she was a child. Different colors meant different worlds. She’d make up stories or pretend the piece of cloth was a magic mirror that would let her see her mother or Jerusalem. Now she saw the Cadmea, that grim citadel, and its lonely tower. Outside the Thebes had ringed it: Lysander’s corpse was rotting on the cross. Memnon was hiding in his chamber, wondering if he was hearing ghosts. And that garret above. The figure on the stairs dressed as a woman. Lysander squatting in the courtyard, surprised at what he had seen. Images were jumbled in her mind. She couldn’t make sense of them, and even if she did, what sort of proof could she offer? Every line she followed had proved futile.