She faced John. “You’re frowning, Lord Chamberlain. Don’t you like my fresco? One of my servants doesn’t like it either. She’s a superstitious girl, the tedious and stupid sort who insist on finding omens in the shape of spilt wine or the movements of clouds. She will not enter this room for any reason, because she’s convinced my beautiful decoration foretold Theodora’s death. Were she not so clever at concocting dainty sweetmeats I would dismiss her.”
“It is not difficult to be wise after the event, and especially when the event is known to be inevitable a week or two before it occurs,” John pointed out.
Antonina gave a grim smile. “Superstitious nonsense, that’s all it is. I questioned the stupid child at some length. According to her the attendant shown lifting the curtain is unveiling the afterlife, the imminent departure for which is about to arrive for one of the women represented. Further, it seems the goblet Theodora holds represents an overflowing cup of blessings. The poor girl believes it foretold the blessing of the ending of her agony. There again, for others it may well be a warning we will drain the cup of sorrow. What do you think, Lord Chamberlain? Are there any clues to her murderer to be found in the fresco on the wall of this room?”
John stood. “As much information as you are likely to give me willingly.”
Or as much as anyone else at court will, he added to himself.
As he walked out of the mansion into the shadow of the Hippodrome, he wondered who would drain Theodora’s cup of sorrow. Not people like Antonina. People like Kuria, cast adrift from palace life with no prospects except returning to a life of selling herself to strangers.
The same people who always drank from imperial cups of sorrow.
If only the painted empress could lift the veil of mist that obscured his vision and reveal the solution he sought.
Chapter Seventeen
Though it had already been a grueling day, John decided to talk to General Germanus, another interview designed largely to satisfy Justinian. If Antonina was pointing an accusative finger at the emperor’s cousin others would do the same. However discreetly, once word reached Justinian he would expect to hear John had looked into the matter.
It was not his normal way of conducting an inquiry to be pointed this way and that, but then his inquiries normally revolved around an actual murder rather than one imagined by the emperor.
Or rather one that John feared was imagined by the emperor. He hoped for his own sake and his family’s sake that his initial impression was mistaken.
For the time being John intended to interview those he would be expected to interview. Once he had fulfilled that obligation, if nothing had shown up to point him in a specific direction…well, he wasn’t certain what he would do.
John was trying to dismiss such doleful thoughts, as well as thoughts of the dinner Hypatia had no doubt prepared by now, when a supercilious doorkeeper informed him that the general was not seeing visitors. John thrust his orders and the attached imperial seal he always carried under the fellow’s upturned nose. The man cringed and explained Germanus was not seeing visitors because he was not at home. He was at the Baths of Zeuxippos.
The baths, between the entrance to the palace and the Hippodrome, was an immense complex of pools, gymnasiums, lecture halls, meeting rooms, and shops. John bought a skewer of grilled swordfish from a vendor who had set up his brazier near the wide stairs leading up to the baths’ entrance. The vendor was better at cooking it than John, not nearly as proficient as Peter. When John finished, feeling only slightly less famished, he threw the skewer into the gutter, went up the stairs, and paid an attendant the paltry admission fee.
The atrium was as vast as a public square and packed with people. Some wore elaborately decorated garments, others leather leggings and dirty tunics. Voices echoed hollowly around the towering walls and up into the distant dome. None of the baths were visible but the air was noticeably humid. Corridors led off in all directions. It would have been difficult to locate an individual quickly but it was easy to spot the entourage which accompanied generals wherever they go. John found the contingent in a gallery lined with statues.
There were enough men and arms to have conquered the entire bath complex in less than an hour. They were big men, as broad and muscular as the larger-then-life-size bronze Hercules beside whose pedestal they stood. Germanus was one of the smaller men, wearing a subdued rust-colored dalmatic rather than a leather cuirass. In his early forties, Germanus was, like Justinian, a nephew of the late Emperor Justin. Unlike Justinian, his appearance betrayed his peasant origins. He had a blocky build, powerful, sloping shoulders, a thick neck. His dark hair and beard were trimmed almost to a stubble.
As John approached, Germanus grinned, displaying square ivory-hued teeth. The big men surrounding him did not grin. They stared. Scarred fists tightened on spears and swords.
“Lord Chamberlain! I’ve been expecting you. The palace is buzzing over your inquiries and I know some busy bees have aimed their stingers at me. The question is, who sent you?”
“You’ll understand I can’t answer that, general.”
Germanus’ grin broadened. “Not that it matters. I can guess.” He glanced around at his scowling bodyguards. “You will understand why my men are surly and wary. There are those who can’t believe I intend to wait my turn to take the throne and just might want to stop me from doing so.”
“It’s common knowledge Justinian intends you to succeed him, even though he did not make it official while Theodora was alive.”
“Considering her hatred for me and my family, can we be surprised? You’ll doubtless agree I wouldn’t have any reason to kill Theodora. She might influence the emperor while he’s alive but she could hardly influence him to deny me the throne when he was dead.”
“She might have convinced him to anoint a new heir before he died.”
Germanus laughed. “I wasn’t looking that far ahead. It doesn’t matter now. I’m happy for my whole family, Lord Chamberlain. My daughter Justina and her husband can return to Constantinople. They’ve been living on one of my estates in Bithynia, near the hot springs. My son-in-law feared for his life when it was rumored Theodora ordered Antonina to have him killed merely for marrying against her imperial wishes.”
“Was there any particular reason Theodora objected to the marriage?”
“Spite, Lord Chamberlain. That was all. My sons still aren’t married. Justina defied her. She was eighteen. How much longer could she wait?”
Theodora had a penchant for interfering with marriages. John wondered if Cornelia was right, that interference in personal relationships was more likely to result in retaliation than political, religious, or financial meddling. When power or money was at stake people acted with a clear view of Theodora’s enormous power. When the issue was personal, passions reigned.
He was reminded of Europa, who had never been far from his mind lately. It irked him to have to remain in the city, chasing shadows, when he should be beside his daughter.
Germanus strolled away from the bronze Hercules and his retinue flowed with him. John remained at his side.
The gallery featured a mismatched collection of bronze figures: pagan gods, philosophers, military men, anonymous Greeks who had been famous enough to immortalize in a long distant era.
“It’s not as impressive as when I was a boy,” Germanus said. “Before the mob burned the baths down during the Nika riots, there were some magnificent works here.”
“I remember.”
“One day the whole imperial school was herded over here to hear Christodorus perform his poem about the statues. A tiny, shriveled-up Egyptian with lungs like one of Justinian’s heralds. He took us from statue to statue, thundering out his descriptions of each. The bronze was silent. He kept telling us that. Then he would help the mute bronze out by imagining what Homer or Sappho or Apollo was thinking. As if he had any way of knowing. We would have been just as happy if he was silent. We were only interested in the heroes, or at least the boys were. Pretending to battle Achilles. Hiding behind Ulysses.”