LIX
We were leaving Alexandria. Our ship was booked; much of our luggage - now increased by many exotic purchases - was already loaded. We had been to say goodbye to Thalia, only to find that she and her snake Jason had already packed up and moved on to whatever new haunts would be graced by their vivid presence. I had made my peace with Pa and Uncle Fulvius, who both looked too smug; I guessed they had traced their supposedly lost deposit, surprisingly, and had begun some terrible new scheme. They would remain here. So for the time being would Aulus, though from various discussions, I reckoned his period of formal study would soon end and we would be seeing him again in Rome. For Helena and me, Albia and the children, our adventure in Egypt now drew to its close. We would sail out under the mighty Pharos, back to the familiar: our own house and the people we had left behind. My mother and sisters, Helena’s parents and her other brother, my pal Lucius Petronius, my dog Nux: back home.
Now it was all fixed up, we experienced the last ridiculous pang of travellers’ melancholy, wishing we could stay after all. No use: it really was time to go. So, for the last time, Helena and I borrowed my uncle’s far-from-discreet purple-cushioned palanquin. We slipped out of the house past the muttering man, who still sat in the gutter hoping to accost us. Of course we ignored him. We had one last thing to do: I took Helena to return her library scrolls.
Unable to use the Great Library, she had been borrowing from the Serapeion’s Daughter Library. Don’t ask whether taking out scrolls was really allowed; Helena was a Roman senator’s daughter and she wielded her charm well. So we jogged there in the palanquin, jumped out, entered the stoa - then I had to go back to our conveyance because we had forgotten the scrolls. Someone was talking to Psaesis, the chief litter-bearer, but whoever it was scuttled off.
By the time I reached the Library with my armful, Helena was talking to Timosthenes. I handed in the reading-matter like her trusty pedagogue, while she continued her conversation. ‘Before we go, Timosthenes, did I hear a little rumour that your name was on the shortlist now for the Great Library post? We both want to congratulate you and wish you well - though sadly, it seems Marcus and I will have left Alexandria by the time they make the appointment. These things take so long . . .’
Timosthenes bowed his head gravely.
Helena could not resist lowering her voice to say, ’I know you must have been very disappointed not to have been included in the first place. But it is good that despite the efforts of a certain party, the Prefect was alerted to the error.’
‘By Philadelphion!’ said Timosthenes.
I saw Helena blink. ‘Oh! Did he tell you that?’
Timosthenes was sharp. He had caught her surprise. ‘Well, I believed so - when my name was added he said to me, I always thought you should have been on the list .’We watched Timosthenes reassess the remark, realising it could have been mere politeness from the Zoo Keeper. For a fraction of a second, I thought his eyes took on a new coldness.
‘We all thought that!’ Helena told him crisply.
I was studying Timosthenes. He wanted the post; I remembered him saying so. He had thought the Director’s prejudice counted too much against him, because he was a professional librarian not an academic. Even so, people had told me that when the original shortlist was announced by Philetus, Timosthenes was so livid, he threw a tantrum and flew out of the Academic Board meeting. I tried to remember if I had ever told him that I believed Philadelphion was the favourite candidate . . .
Timosthenes was contained now. His manner was almost arrogant. I felt concerned for him; yes, he should be on the list, though he probably stood little chance. He was younger than the other candidates, must be less experienced. Yet I could see he believed he should get the job. He had convinced himself. To an old soldier like me, his certainty was dangerous. His yearning showed in the merest flicker of an eye, a slight tension in the muscles of his cheek. But I saw it there and was perturbed by the strength of feeling.
He noticed me watching. Perhaps he also saw Helena slip her hand into mine. It was a natural enough gesture, to anyone who had seen us both together. What he would not have detected was the extra pressure of her thumb against my palm and the mild squeeze as I returned acknowledgement.
She sighed as if weary. I said we had to go. We said our formal farewells. I took Helena to the palanquin. I kissed her cheek, told Psaesis she must be taken home, then without further comment, I went back across the stoa on my own.
Timosthenes was walking away from the great temple trio: the dominant shrine of Serapis, flanked by a smaller temple to his consort Isis and a much smaller one to their son Harpocrates. I saw him enter a place I had previously noticed, and dreaded: the passage down to the oracle. I followed him, despite a horror of underground spaces. In all the godforsaken provinces that I had ever visited, if there was ever a hole in the ground where a man could be terrorised, I ended up going into it. Ghostly tombs, eerie caverns, cramped and unlit spaces of all kinds just waited to unnerve me with their claustrophobic interiors. Here was another one.
This was built by the pharaohs so it was civilised. It had a clean smell and was almost airy. A long, limestone-lined corridor sloped away under the stoa. Like all pharaonic structures, this passageway was beautifully built - roomy, with a good rectangular shape. The steps were shallow and felt safe. From what I knew, it probably led to a subterranean chamber used for the cult of the Apis Bull. That had rituals with similarities to Mithraism and in Egypt was connected to the cult of Serapis. The rituals for initiates took place underground; I could guess they involved darkness, fear and gore.
There were plenty of people out in the stoa but down here we were completely unobserved. I refused to go far. I stood close to the entrance and called out.
Timosthenes must have been expecting me. That meant he had lured me underground on purpose. I had supposed I would be compelled to chase after him into the fearsome dark, but at my shout he stopped and turned around pretty quietly. His behaviour had a strange, unnerving courtesy.
‘This is a secret way to our oracle, Falco.’ He stood still while he spoke. ‘Perhaps it will tell me who is to be given that post.’
‘There is something you should know.’ My voice was cool. We had liked him once, but now I knew better. ‘The night that the crocodile was set loose to kill, a witness saw a man nearby.’
‘The woman Roxana. She named Nicanor.’
‘She has reconsidered and denied it was him. I think she can be persuaded to confess the truth. So who will she name then, Timosthenes?’
I expected him to try something. All Timosthenes did was shrug, then he began to move towards me. I was still near the exit. There was room for him to pass.
I was happy for him to leave without trouble. I let him go by then I quickly turned to follow. In this great city of contrived effects, it was intended that those emerging from the underground into the bright upper world would be dazzled. As soon as I faced the exit I was blinded by the natural sunlight. Timosthenes had judged it perfectly.
He thumped me so hard I was winded. He shoved me so fast that I fell. I had no time even to curse. With the same pedantic logic that had made him try to kill the Zoo Keeper with his own beast, he tried to kill me with my knife. He must have spotted it earlier, close against my calf; he went for it instantly. I had barely begun to reach down for it myself. We fought briefly at close quarters, struggling on the steps. The knife was pulled out by one of us. It slipped through my fingers; it skittered past his hand too.
Someone let out a grunt. I heard three blows, each hard. None of them punched into me.
Timosthenes fell off me. Everything went quiet.
I was alive. If you are stabbed, you do not always know at once. I moved gingerly, testing. I sat up, easing myself by stages against the wall behind me, uncertain what to expect. Here near the exit there was enough light to see that Timosthenes was dead. I had been rescued.