But why would a witch woman want to kill an actor?
“What did this woman look like?”
“Don’t know, sir!”
“Why not?”
“She wore a cape, sir. One of the ones with a hood.”
“Was she tall or short?”
“Kind of stooped, sir,” Euboulides said.
There wasn’t the slightest chance of identifying her, whoever she was.
“Come with me.”
I returned to Sophocles and Aeschylus, and told them what we knew. Sophocles looked disgusted.
I grabbed an ostrakon-a broken shard of pottery-that lay on the ground amongst the seats of the theater. I scratched a message into it, then handed the ostrakon to Euboulides. I said, “Take this to Pericles.”
Euboulides nodded. “Yes, sir.” He left at a trot.
“What was the message?” Sophocles said.
“That we have a problem,” I said. “My commission is with Pericles. He needs to know.” I winced.
“You’re worried?” Aeschylus asked.
“Sympathy for failure is not one of Pericles’s strong points.”
“It’s not your fault,” Aeschylus consoled me. “I’m sure Pericles will understand.”
I wished I had his confidence.
A reply came back sooner than I expected, carried by a slave runner. He handed it to me.
PERICLES SAYS THIS TO NICOLAOS. I HAVE CALLED AN EMERGENCY COUNCIL TO DISCUSS THE CRISIS. WE MEET AT NOON AT MY HOUSE. THAT WILL GIVE MEN OUTSIDE THE CITY TIME TO ARRIVE. IT WILL ALSO GIVE ME TIME TO THINK WHAT WE ARE GOING TO SAY TO ALL THE DISTINGUISHED GUESTS FROM OTHER CITIES WHEN THEY LEARN OF THIS DEBACLE. SAME SUMMONS TO MEET IS GOING TO THE ARCHONS, TO THE CHOREGI, TO THE WRITERS, AND ALL OTHER SENIOR MEN OF THE DIONYSIA. INFORM EVERYONE AT THE THEATER WHO FITS THAT DESCRIPTION. PERICLES.
I silently handed the ostrakon to Aeschylus, who read it with raised eyebrows. He handed it to Sophocles, who handed it to Lakon, who handed it to Kiron. The ostrakon made its way around the producers, writers, and actors of every comedy and every tragedy.
“Thank you,” I said to the messenger slave. “Tell Pericles we’ll be there.”
“Sir, I also have a message for you,” said the slave.
“For me?” I said. “What does Pericles say?”
“My master Pericles says you are to arrive early, if you can manage to do that simple thing without tripping over your own feet, you incompetent moron.”
The slave grinned as he said it.
I had little doubt that the slave had passed on the message exactly as Pericles had spoken it, but I was equally sure it was the slave’s own special touch to repeat it in front of all these leading citizens.
Aeschylus broke the embarrassed silence. He squinted up at the sun. He said, “Noon. That gives us plenty of time before the meeting.”
“I’ll need it,” I said.
“Oh?”
“I have to inform a family that they’re bereaved. Where did Romanos live?” I asked, then added, “Does he have family here?”
“Not as far as I know,” Kiron said. He turned to Sophocles, who shrugged.
“I hired him because he’s a good actor, not because he’s a friend,” the playwright said. “I have no idea about his family.” Sophocles turned to the man beside him. “Do you know, Lakon?”
“I’ll need to think about that,” Lakon said. He immediately struck a thoughtful pose, hands behind his back, chin sunk to his chest. After a few moments he said, “Yes, I do believe the poor fellow lived in Melite.”
Melite was a deme to the west of Athens but within the city walls. It was a place of narrow lanes and crowded tenements. Finding the victim’s home amongst them would be a nightmare.
I said, “I don’t suppose you know where in Melite he lived?”
“I’m afraid you’ll have to ask around. I said I knew the man, not that I socialized with him.”
“You mentioned that before,” Diotima said. “Was there some bad blood between you?”
Lakon turned to her. “Not at all, dear lady, but being a woman, you wouldn’t understand.”
I quickly stepped between Lakon and Diotima, in case Diotima decided to punch out our lead actor. I’d seen her hit before in anger and we needed Lakon to remain conscious. But Diotima showed creditable restraint.
“Why don’t you try anyway,” Diotima said, through gritted teeth. “Despite my obvious limitations.”
“I am a citizen actor,” Lakon said. “I do not act for money. That would be demeaning.”
“What about Romanos?”
“He acted for money.”
SCENE 14
It was essential we find the family of Romanos, if he had one, and if not, his home, so that we could search it. Someone, somewhere, had a reason to want Romanos dead. Someone, or some evidence, was going to have to tell us why.
Lakon had told us that Romanos lived in Melite, a deme directly west of the theater. I refused to have Socrates with us when we delivered bad news. He was the least tactful person I knew. I sent him home. As we walked away in the opposite direction, Diotima said, “If Lakon turns out to be the killer, I will personally offer my thanks to the Gods with a fine sacrifice.” She was still angry about his attitude. In her sandals, Diotima kicked a loose stone on the path in anger. The stone went flying, and she spent the rest of the trip cursing her sore toe.
There are no signs to mark the boundaries of the demes within Athens, but you always know when you’ve stepped from one into another because their characters are quite different. It was only a matter of crossing the southbound road to Piraeus to take us from influential Collytos into downmarket Melite.
Piraeus Way is one of the busiest thoroughfares in Athens: all the commercial traffic from the port to the agora is on that road. The east side is lined with expensive town houses. The west side is lined with houses too, less expensive ones. Diotima and I walked along one of the paths between them into the narrow byways of Melite.
Melite had been the home deme of Themistocles, the great General and traitor whom Diotima and I had met in Ionia. We thought of him as we passed by his old house. A hundred steps further on, we passed the small temple to Artemis that Themistocles had commissioned. It was in a sad state of disrepair; a chipped façade of faded paint and wooden columns with hairline fractures.
In the days of Themistocles he’d seen to it that Melite was the best decked out deme in Athens. Since then Melite had absorbed much of the influx of metics to the city. Several families crammed into buildings that had once housed only one. To make extra room, the men had extended rooms so that they overhung the street or encroached at ground level. Streets that had once been narrow but adequate had become almost impassably narrow and claustrophobic. This change had happened in my own lifetime.
More people meant more sewage. It all went into the open drains that ran down the middle of the street. Combined with the muddy walkways and the second storeys that loomed above, Melite had acquired its own unique aroma.
Diotima and I took care to walk the outer edge of these mean streets, because what floated down the center didn’t bear thinking about.
Naked or ill-clothed children watched us from doorways. Some of them asked for money. A mother told them sternly not to bother the citizens passing by.
Diotima was having none of that. She stopped at the doorway where the mother had issued the rebuke. Diotima glanced at the mother, bent to talk to the snotty-nosed children. She held up three obol coins-half a drachma. It was a paltry sum, but the children’s eyes went round as bowls.