‘What is it?’
‘Well, we’ve got what looks like an entire copy of Pliny’s Natural History, hot out of the scriptorium. How does Claudius get hold of that?’
Costas jerked his head towards the skeleton at the door. ‘Maybe he sent the eunuch to buy books for him.’
‘Let’s just think about it,’ Jack said. ‘Let’s say we’re right, that Claudius was living here in secret up to the time of the eruption, in AD 79. That’s hypothesis, but one of the most famous facts of ancient history is that Pliny the Elder was here, on the Bay of Naples, based at Misenum only a few miles away, admiral of the Roman fleet, and that he died in the eruption.’
‘You’re saying they may have met each other, here,’ Costas said.
Jack flipped open the index pages of his copy of the Natural History. ‘This is what sparked me off. Pliny the Elder mentions Claudius a number of times throughout the book, always studiously, always lauding his achievements. He owed Claudius his career, when Claudius was emperor and Pliny was a young man, but the passages in the Natural History are almost too laudatory, for an emperor who had supposedly been dead for a quarter of a century. Just an example. Listen to this. He talks of Claudius’ achievement in having a tunnel dug to drain the Fucine Lake near Rome, taking thirty thousand men and eleven years, an immense operation “beyond the power of words to describe”. That final phrase is odd, by itself. For Pliny the Elder, absolutely nothing was beyond the power of words. And another thing. He should have referred to Claudius as Divus Claudius, the divine Claudius, in keeping with his status as a deified emperor, years after his death and supposed apotheosis. But instead, Pliny refers to him as Claudius Caesar. It’s almost too familiar, almost as if Claudius is still alive when Pliny is writing this. The clues are all here.’
‘It makes sense,’ Hiebermeyer murmured.
‘From what we know of him, Claudius seems to have been a gregarious man, as was Pliny,’ Jack said. ‘Claudius may have been forced to live as a recluse, but he had always enjoyed company. He may even have summoned Pliny in secret to this room when he heard that the other man had arrived to take up his naval post at Misenum. And Pliny would constantly have been searching for informants, people who could help with his Natural History. He was a practical, straightforward Roman, and Claudius may have been a breath of fresh air for him in this place which would have seemed infested with Greek-loving hedonists, Romans with more money than sense under the spell of weak-minded philosophers like Philodemus.’
‘And vice versa,’ Maria said. ‘Claudius probably felt the same about Pliny.’
‘Claudius would have greatly admired Pliny,’ Jack said. ‘Soldier, scholar, fantastically industrious, a decent man. Pliny claimed he once had a vision of Claudius’ father Drusus, telling him to write a history of the German wars. With his bust of his beloved father in front of him here, Claudius would have loved to hear that anecdote from Pliny himself, perhaps over a few pitchers of wine.’
‘Claudius would also have been extremely knowledgeable, hugely well read,’ Hiebermeyer added, pointing at the shelves. ‘It would have been a real meeting of minds. Claudius would have been a great source for Pliny on Britain, though I don’t remember much on Britannia in the Natural History.’
‘Possibly because Pliny died before he could incorporate it,’ Jack murmured. ‘He had only been based at Naples for a year before the eruption, and he probably hadn’t found time. He was too sociable for his own good, constantly doing the rounds of friends, the ladies too. But Claudius would have been a fantastic discovery for him, a tremendous secret. I believe Pliny was here, in this room. I can feel it. I think he came to visit Claudius often, and they had begun to work together. Pliny had given Claudius the latest copy of his Natural History, but he was probably poised to make additions, once he realized what a gold mine he’d found.’
‘Maybe this is where Pliny was really coming when he sailed towards Vesuvius during the eruption,’ Costas said. ‘That letter you read me, from his nephew Pliny the Younger. Maybe he only told his nephew he was coming here for a woman. Maybe it was really a secret mission. Maybe he was coming to rescue Claudius, this fabulous library.’
‘But he was too late,’ Maria murmured.
‘I wonder what did happen to old Claudius, if he really was here,’ Costas said.
‘He was here,’ Jack said fervently. ‘I can almost smell it. Stale wine, spilt by a shaking hand. A whiff of sulphur, maybe brought back from nocturnal visits to Cumae to see the Sibyl, who we know he consulted when he was emperor. The smell of old gall ink. He was here, all right. I know it in my bones.’
Jack walked back to the desk as he spoke. He suddenly saw that words were visible where there had been none before. He realized that the sheet of papyrus below the blank one he had picked up was covered in writing, perfectly preserved for almost two thousand years. He peered down, and read across the top: HISTORIA BRITANNORVM CLAVDIVS
CAESAR.
‘My God,’ he whispered. ‘So this was what he was writing. This was why he wanted to return to the life of a scholar. A History of Britain, by Claudius Caesar. Can you imagine what this contains?’
He scanned the lines of fine, precise writing and then looked back at the title. Underneath it were two words, in the same hand but smaller: NARCISSVS FECIT
‘Of course,’ Jack exclaimed, his voice hoarse with excitement. ‘ Narcissus did this. Narcissus wrote this.’ He looked back towards the doorway, where the outstretched arm of the skeleton was visible in his headlamp beam. ‘So it is you after all,’ he murmured to himself, then looked at the others, his face suffused with excitement. ‘You remember I said that Narcissus was Claudius’ freedman? Well, his official title was praepositus ab epistulis, letter-writer. This clinches it. We know who that skeleton was after all. He was Claudius’ amanuensis, his scribe. I know Pliny always had one, and Claudius must have had one too, especially with his palsy.’ Jack looked at the page again, then at some other pages scattered beside it on the table, with no writing but covered in dark red blotches like wine stains. ‘It’s amazing. I only hope we can find something in Claudius’ own hand.’
The sound of the drill at the entrance to the tunnel had stopped, and a woman’s voice was shouting, in heavily accented English. ‘Dr Hiebermeyer? Dr Hiebermeyer? We are closing the tunnel now. Please come out immediately.’
‘ Si, si, si,’ Hiebermeyer bellowed back. Maria immediately came over with her digital camera and began taking pictures, quickly moving through everything on the table, finishing with a close-up sequence of the page of writing before picking up the blank papyrus sheet and placing it on top to protect and conceal the writing.
‘We need to decide what to do, Jack,’ Hiebermeyer said in a low voice. ‘Pronto.’
‘As soon as we’re out of earshot beyond the villa site, I’m on the phone to my friend at Reuters,’ Jack said. ‘Maria should now have a disk full of images of everything we’ve seen here, and those can be e-mailed straight through. But we keep quiet until then. Leak any of this now, to the superintendency people, and we’ll never see the contents of this room again. You need to play the danger card, Maurice, big time. We found nothing of much interest, spent our time examining some masonry fragments sticking out of the wall. Far too dangerous for anyone to come beyond that grille again. Tell them their drill destabilized the tunnel even more, and there was a collapse. But by tomorrow morning, when these images are out, splashed across the headlines and TV news everywhere, they’ll have no choice but to open up this place. It’ll be one of the most sensational finds ever made in archaeology. And by the way, Maurice, and Maria. Many congratulations.’