“But it’s consistent with what happened,” Diotima argued. “Remember, there’s been not only the murder of Romanos but all the disasters during rehearsals, and they weren’t directed at the murder victim.”
“There was the broom he tripped over,” I pointed out.
Diotima snorted contemptuously. “That hardly rates with Phellis’s leg, or with Lakon almost falling off the balcony.”
“The broom was the first attempt, though, if what we’re told is true,” I said. “It makes sense it would be the mildest attack.”
“Like an escalation of hostilities?” Diotima said.
“Right. Each failed attempt to stop the play resulted in a stronger attack.”
“The only problem is, I don’t believe it. You still haven’t answered why anyone would want to stop the most popular festival in Athens.”
“Which brings us back to the crazy person,” I groaned.
“Yes,” said Diotima happily. “I like that theory.”
“Maybe there’s someone else with a motive we don’t know about?” I said. “I can’t get past the fact that there are three different victims. The actor, the play, and the man.”
There were so many unanswered questions, it was hard to know where to start.
Socrates had listened with close attention as Diotima and I discussed the different theories we might follow. (I had allowed him out of the records room for sleep and occasional meals.)
Now Socrates said, “Nico, I’ve been thinking … the machine behind the stage, it lifts a man. With the lever, men can move something that they couldn’t lift on their own.”
“Yes. So?” I said impatiently.
“How did Romanos get into the air?”
“What do you mean?” I asked. “The killer used the crane, of course.”
Socrates said, “Then the killer must have put the noose around Romanos’s neck, then walked backstage to work the machine?”
“Yes.”
“What was Romanos doing while his murderer went backstage to kill him?” Socrates asked.
“Er …” I didn’t have a good answer for that one. He would hardly have waited politely.
Diotima said, “Socrates has a point. Romanos must have been unconscious. Or perhaps he was already dead?”
“The body looked like a hanged man,” I said. “Blue face, tongue poking out.”
“Nico, you said the guards were drugged,” Socrates pointed out.
“They were. You think Romanos was drugged too? Maybe.” I didn’t like the way Socrates was finding answers that I hadn’t thought of.
“Maybe I can think of something else to help?” Socrates offered enthusiastically. He was obviously trying to avoid going back to the records room.
“Go inspect that machine again,” I said, to get him out of the way. No one was using it, and he could hardly do any damage. “But once you’re done, it’s back to the records.”
“Where will you be?” Socrates asked.
“Interviewing a suspect,” I said.
“Have you given thought to selling the other house?” my father asked abruptly.
That brought me down to earth.
“No, Father, I haven’t,” I said. “I’ve been busy, and it is the time of the Dionysia after all.”
“Not while the calendar is halted,” Sophroniscus pointed out. “There’s no point trying to delay the inevitable, Nico.”
“No, Father.”
“Give it some thought,” he said. “If you’re having trouble, I might be able to find a buyer among my friends.”
He meant to help, but what it sounded like was a threat. Diotima had kept studiously quiet every time my father mentioned her house. I felt it was time to point out that the property wasn’t my father’s to dispense.
“It’s because the house is part of her dowry that I am concerned,” he said, when I’d made my point. “You’re a husband now, Nico-”
“Yes, sir, I’d noticed.”
“You have responsibilities,” my father went on. “First and foremost is to support your wife. You’re doing that. Second is to make sure her wealth remains secure. Preferably it should earn some income. That city house is the bulk of Diotima’s dowry, son. You have to make it work for her.”
“Yes, sir. We tried to rent it-”
“And the residents trashed the place, then disappeared to their own cities before you could sue them. Yes, I know. But son, it’s still a problem, because while you dither, your wife’s dowry is going down in value.”
When he put it like that, it didn’t sound good. It did seem like I was being careless with my wife’s property.
“You are allowing your wife’s property to go to rack and ruin,” my father twisted the knife in a well-meaning way.
“Yes, sir, I’ll see to it.”
Breakfast was over. The slaves were clearing the bowls.
Diotima picked up the small leather pouch that she always took with her when she went outdoors. It contained only a few useful day-to-day items: a clean linen cloth, a handful of coins for emergency purchases, and a priestess knife sharp enough to slit any throat. Diotima jumped to her feet and hung the pouch over her shoulder by its long leather strap.
There was a great deal to do, but first, there was one absolute essential. We had to attend a funeral.
SCENE 22
Diotima and I went to the house in Melite to pay our respects before the ceremony began.
Funerals are always conducted in the early dawn or in the late evening, so that Apollo the sun god is not forced to look down upon a corpse. The family of Romanos had opted for the dawn. The season was spring but the air was chilly, with the recent unseasonable rain and the breeze. We wrapped our arms about ourselves and shivered slightly.
“I’m looking forward to this,” Diotima said as we walked through the twisty streets of Melite.
“You’re looking forward to a funeral?”
“Nico, these people are professional mourners. Nobody knows more than they do about how to run a good funeral. I can’t wait to see how the experts do it.”
There was a considerable crowd outside when we arrived, and much murmuring. After Diotima’s words it was quickly clear to me that they weren’t friends of the family, but curious onlookers. They, too, wanted to see how the experts did it.
Within, the noise was unbearable. All the women of the house, and there were a lot of them, moaned and tugged at their shorn hair and sobbed loudly. The men beat at their breasts or looked grave and despondent.
Romanos lay in the courtyard. His body was carefully positioned so that his feet pointed at the front door. That was the necessary precaution, to ensure the dead man’s psyche didn’t escape to haunt the house before the body could be cremated. Romanos had been dressed in his best clothes, then wrapped in his burial shroud. A white linen cloth was wrapped over his head and tied beneath his jaw, to keep his mouth closed. The coin had already been placed under his tongue. His psyche would carry the coin with him on his way to Hades. When he came to the river Acheron, he would pay Charon the Ferryman the coin to carry him across.
Romanos would not have been pleased by the attendance. The only actor from the cast was Kebris, the substitute third actor. He kept to himself in a corner of the room. Neither Lakon nor any of the stage crew had come to see him their colleague. Sophocles was leaving as we arrived. He nodded grimly to me and I to him. It was obvious he didn’t intend to stay for the funeral, but that wasn’t necessary to maintain the proprieties. He had done the right thing by coming to see his theatrical colleague.
Petros was chief among the mourners, as was proper. He greeted us as we entered.
“Thank you for coming,” he said.
“How are you coping?” I asked him.
“I must carry the spear of vengeance,” Petros said sadly. “I don’t know if I can.”
The spear of vengeance is always carried at the funeral of a murder victim, by the victim’s closest relative. It meant the carrier assumed the responsibility to pursue the killer. Once the spear of vengeance had been held, the carrier had not only a moral and ethical duty to avenge the deceased, but also an obligation enforceable by law.