SPQR X: A Point of Law

by John Maddox Roberts

  “Now you’re talking like a merchant. This isn’t helping to solve our problem.” He handed his now-empty bowl to a boy who added it to a stack of them he held nested in one arm.

  “Sometimes you have to get your mind off the problem if you’re ever going to get it solved.”

  “I’ve been considering something,” Hermes said, now handing his empty cup to a little girl who was gathering them.

  “Tell me.” I gave her my own crockery.

  “The day before yesterday, when we went on our little burglary expedition, we wondered why there were no slaves in the house. I said they’d probably belonged to whoever lent Fulvius the house.”

  “I remember.”

  “We now know that the house was owned in turn by Octavius and Caius Marcellus. They’ve probably gone back to their own households. Octavius is dead, so the slaves are unlikely to be his. I can go back to the house of Marcellus. I might be able to induce some of them to talk.”

  “Octavia impressed me as the sort of woman who keeps the household staff confined to the house and hard at work at all hours.”

  “There are ways,” he assured me. Having been a slave himself, he knew all about these things.

  “Then go there.” I divided my money with him for a bribe fund. “I am going to Callista’s. If I’m not there when you are done, look for me in the Forum. I’m to be tried tomorrow and the election is the day after, so I have to act like a defendant and a candidate, making friends and collecting votes.”

  I FOUND CALLISTA IN HER COURTyard, surrounded by stacks of books and four or five assistants—and Julia. My wife seemed to have developed a special sense for detecting when I was about to call upon an attractive woman.

  “How goes the work?” I asked.

  “Wonderfully!” Callista said, with a flushed expression most women reserve for activities of a more intimate sort. “I’ve made a reliable interpretation of at least six of the Greek letters!”

  “Just six?”

  “With these, I’ll have the rest figured out in no time!” she cried happily.

  “No time is exactly what I have,” I told her.

  “Nonsense,” Julia said. “We have all day today, and tonight if need be. That’s plenty of time.”

  “So, what have we learned?”

  “I’ve conferred with a number of scholars here in Rome,” Callista said, “and several of them have lent me their relevant books.” She gestured to the heaps of papyrus leaves and scrolls that overloaded her desks and tables. She took up a tiny scroll and held it like a trophy. “This one proved to be extremely important.”

  “How so?”

  “It’s from the collection of Xenophanes of Thebes. He is the architect who designed Pompey’s theater complex on the Campus Martius. Being an architect, he is an avid scholar of geometry. This book is by a Pythagorean philosopher named Aristobulus.”

  “I’ve met Pythagoreans,” I told her. “There are even a few senators who follow that sect. They are very boring people, with all their talk of transmigration of souls and their stupid dietary practices.”

  “Don’t be obtuse, Decius,” Julia said. “Just listen.”

  “I apologize. Please go on.” I knew better than to ignore that tone of voice.

  “Aristobulus,” Callista continued, “is a scholar of the symbolic use of numbers and symbols. He is an advocate of a concept called the ‘unknown quantity.’ It is an extremely obscure and arcane field of study. Pythagoreans, with their mystical leanings, are about the only scholars who give it any serious attention. As far as I know, Aristobulus is the only one now working on the problem.”

  She had lost me again, but I thought I understood her drift. “You think this has something to do with that—what did you call it?—that ‘symbol for nothing?’ ”

  “Aristobulus uses the delta as his shorthand symbol for the unknown quantity. It is only a short step from that to a symbol for nothing at all.”

  “This is making me dizzy,” I said, “but I trust your comprehensive knowledge of your field.”

  I took the little scroll from her hand. It was finely made, enclosed in a leather tube with an ivory tag depending from one of the terminals. Written on the ivory in tiny, precise Greek letters, was the name of the author: Aristobulus of Croton.

  My scalp prickled. Croton. Where had I heard that name spoken recently? Since this business had begun, my days had been so packed with events that I was beginning to lose track of who had told me what. To a Roman public man, educated to commit vast quantities of minutiae to memory, the sensation was disorienting.

  “Decius?” Julia said. “You’re getting that look again.”

  “What look?” Callista asked.

  “The hit-on-the-head-with-the-sacrificial-hammer look,” my wife elucidated.

  “I think he looks like a Dionysian reveler in a state of ektasis, the mind completely out of the body.”

  “Isn’t that something like enthousiasmos?” my loving Julia inquired.

  “No, that’s possession by the god. He’d be much more lively.”

  “Instead of talking about me as if I weren’t here,” I said, “you could give me some help. I’m trying to remember where I heard Croton spoken of recently.”

  “There was some question whether you were here,” Julia said. “And how can we help you remember? We weren’t there when it happened.”

  “Let’s consider how the subject might have arisen,” Callista said. “For what is the city of Croton famed? It was the home of Pythagoras, naturally.”

  “Let’s see”—Julia mused—“Croton? Athletes. Jewelers.”

  “That’s it! The day before yesterday, Hermes and I found a seal ring in Fulvius’s desk. The lapidary I consulted said that the carving on the stone was in the style of the Greek cities of southern Italy. He was pretty certain that it was from Croton.”

  “I love this sort of logic!” Callista said happily. “I know that applied logic is rather disreputable, but I find this exhilarating. But what is this about a ring?”

  So I told her about this minor theft. What with murder and burglary and conspiracy and intrigues of one sort or another, it occurred to me that the felonies were beginning to pile up.

  “If this conspiracy was hatched in Baiae as you think,” Callista said, “where originates the connection with Croton? The two towns are not close.”

  “Baiae is about midway between Rome and Croton,” Julia put in. “It’s a substantial trip in both directions.”

  “The conspirators,” I said, “wanted a code. As I’ve mentioned, certain senators follow the teachings of Pythagoras—not these men, of course, but one of them might have heard of Aristobulus in conversation. Or, who knows, one of them might have spent some time in Croton and studied with the man and knew of his theories. In any case, they probably hired him to devise this cipher for them. For a good fee, he would have been happy to go up to Baiae to confer with them.”

  “But why a ring from Croton?” Julia asked.

  “This business is full of little anomalies. But I doubt that it’s a coincidence. There are no coincidences in a conspiracy.”

  “That sounds like a quote from Euripides,” Callista said.

  “I don’t cadge from Greek playwrights,” I told her. “What do you know about this man Aristobulus other than what you’ve already told us?”

  “Virtually nothing. He’s quite obscure. He never taught at the Museum, or in the other schools of Alexandria, or I would have heard about it. I could make inquiries in the Greek community here.”

  “No, please, there’s no time for that. I’ll talk with Asklepiodes. He travels all over Italy with Statilius’s troupe, and he loves to hobnob with the scholarly crowd wherever he goes. If he’s been to Croton he may know Aristobulus.”

  “Excellent idea,” Julia said. “Why don’t you go along and do just that so that we can work on this code.”

  I can take a hint.

  I FOUND ASKLEPIODES IN THE KITCHEN of the Statilian school.
Supervising the diet of the gladiators was one of his duties. Satisfied that all was in order, he led me to his spacious surgery, a room so draped with weapons that it looked more like a Temple of Mars than a medical facility.

  “More bodies to examine?” he asked me.

  “Not this time. Do your travels ever take you to Croton?”

  “Usually once each year. The city and its district are Greek, so there is not as much demand for gladiators as in Rome and Campania, but the city authorities sponsor a modest show each fall. What is your interest in Croton?”

  “In your travels there, did you ever meet a mathematician named Aristobulus?”

  His face, usually so maddeningly serene, showed genuine surprise. “Why, yes. Whenever I am in Croton, I attend the weekly dinner and symposium of the Greek Philosophical Club. Croton has a small but distinguished community of scholars, as you might expect of the home of Pythagoras. He was always there until—well, Croton is all the way down in Bruttium. How is it that you are investigating his case?”

  Now it was my turn to look astonished. “His case? What do you mean?”

  “He was murdered earlier this year. You mean you aren’t investigating? Since you always seem to be around wherever there is a murder, I supposed—”

  “Murdered? I first heard of the man less than an hour ago, in connection with the case in which I am embroiled, and now you tell me he was murdered! How—”

  Asklepiodes held up a hand for silence. “Let’s not confuse one another further.” He pointed to the chairs that flanked a table by a window. “Have a seat.” He clapped his hands and one of his silent Egyptians appeared. He said something incomprehensible to the man, then took the chair opposite mine. “I’ve sent him for some wine. My very best wine because I know you speak most easily with proper lubrication.”

  “That is thoughtful of you, old friend.” I am sure I had that hammered look again. I do not object to things moving fast, but they shouldn’t move in so many directions. The wine came and it was, indeed, excellent.

  While I sipped I looked out the window, which overlooked the training yard. About a hundred men were practicing noisily with sword and shield, some paired in the traditional way with a lightly armored man bearing a big shield fighting another who carried a small shield but wore more protective armor. But many were Gauls plying their national weapons: a long, narrow, oval shield and a long sword, with no armor at all except for a simple, pot-shaped helmet. Such men were appearing in the arenas in ever-greater numbers. It was easier to let them fight as they were accustomed to than to try to teach them to fight like civilized swordsmen.

  As I pondered this sight and tried to calculate odds for the next big munera, I told Asklepiodes of the latest twists in my case. He listened with rapt attention and when I finished, he clapped his hands and chuckled as if he’d attended the cleverest comedy ever written by Aristophanes.

  “I rejoice that someone is getting some amusement from my plight,” I said, with perhaps too much heat for one drinking my host’s excellent wine.

  “But this is so splendid!” Asklepiodes said, not at all abashed. “Over the years you have investigated hundreds of murders”—a gross exaggeration, but he was a Greek—“and I have aided you in many of these. But this is the first to involve scholarship, mathematics, a cipher—it is all just wonderful! Now, let me tell you what I know.”

  “Please do.” I helped myself to some more of his speech lubrication.

  “Aristobulus—he didn’t call himself ‘of Croton’ at home since they are all from Croton there—”

  “That is understood.”

  “Aristobulus was a small man, advancing in years but not in fortune. He wore rather shabby clothes, but he tried to pretend that this was a virtue, as philosophers so often do. He was not argumentative, neither was he talkative. Rather, he was aloof, as if the company were unworthy of him. But I learned that he never passed up one of these weekly dinners, which were not paid for by subscription from the members of the club but by the testaments of wealthy members in times past.”

  “I never knew a philosopher to turn down a free meal,” I said, nodding.

  “Anyway, when the time came for the symposium after dinner, Aristobulus drank his share and more, and he grew more talkative. This often consisted of boasting about his discoveries in the mathematical field. He had some rather radical ideas, as the learned lady has tried, without success, to explain to you.”

  “I never claimed to understand mathematics. When I had charge of the Treasury I had slaves and freedmen for that, fortunately.”

  “He was never mocked by the rest of the company, but he was regarded with, shall we say, a healthy scepticism,” Asklepeodes commented. “The last time I attended that gathering but one was the last time I saw him alive—he was better-dressed.” He paused and took a sip, waiting for my reaction. Asklepiodes always did that.

  “Well? What did this signify?” I was never good at restraining my impatience.

  “He did not precisely boast, but he hinted heavily that he had acquired a patron, a highly placed person who understood the importance of his work. His clothes were not gaudy, you understand. He adhered to the principles of philosophical simplicity. But they were new and of excellent quality. And, for the first time since I had known him, he wore jewelry: a ring.” That maddening pause again.

  “Ring! What sort of ring? Quit stalling!”

  “There was a massive seal ring on the index finger of his right hand. Eumolpus the Cynic, a rather acerbic gentleman as you might gather from his appellation, took note of this new adornment and made comment that it contrasted oddly with Aristobulus’s customary, not to say flaunted, austerity. Aristobulus replied that it was a gift from his patron, that he used it as a seal on all his correspondence with this mysterious benefactor, and that he must wear it as a symbol of their mutual pledge.”

  “Did you get a good look? Can you describe it?”

  “As it occurs, Aristobulus reclined to my immediate left during that banquet, and I was able to examine the ring closely. It was of massive gold and had an exotic, finely granulated surface. It was set with a handsome sapphire. I have spent much of my life in Egypt, and I know Egyptian stone when I see it. It was carved intaglio with a gorgoneion.”

  This was more than I had expected. “Did he say anything else? Anything that might identify his patron or the business they had together?”

  “Nothing definite,” Asklepiodes said. “And you must remember that I was not giving this matter any special attention. I was far more involved with my more congenial friends. I do remember that he hinted his patron was a powerful Roman, not a Greek, and that the man was interested in ‘the truly important things,’ by which I presume he meant the arcane field of mathematics that consumed him.”

  “If so,” I said, “he was flattering himself. Philosophers are prone to do that in my experience. His patron was interested in one thing only: an unbreakable cipher he could use to keep secret his doings and those of his coconspirators. Aristobulus’s absurd ‘symbol for nothing’ was used for no greater purpose than separating the words in a text. He might as well have simply left a space between the words.”

  “That might have made the code easier to break,” Asklepiodes pointed out. “As it is, a mind less penetrating than Callista’s might never have divined the implication. Then the code would have been truly incomprehensible.”

  “I suppose so. Anyway, how did the man come to be murdered?”

  “When I accompanied the troupe to Croton two months ago, I attended the club dinner as usual. Aristobulus had never been my favorite among that company so it was only after the dinner and well into the drinking bout that I noticed he was not there. I asked where he might be, and the others said he had been murdered and were surprised that I had not known about it. Apparently the killing gained some degree of notoriety in the southern part of the peninsula.

  “In any case, it seems that Aristobulus had left on a rather sudden trip to Baiae—”r />
  “Baiae!” I cried triumphantly.

  “Yes, I thought that would get your attention.”

  “You have it already! Go on!”

  “Calm yourself, my friend. Unrequitable passion has a deleterious effect on the bodily humors. He must have completed his journey to Baiae because he was on the road south, returning to Croton, when he was fallen upon and slain,” Asklepiodes said.

  “ ‘Fallen upon’?”

  “Yes, it appeared to be the work of bandits. They’ve become rare in the vicinity of Rome, but southern Italy is infested with them.”

  “It always has been. Southern Italy is more like Africa than civilized Latium.” I wasn’t being quite fair to our southern brethren. Southern Italy was full of desperate, dangerous men because the peasants of that region were the most thoroughly ruined in the peninsula. The entirety of the land south of Capua and the whole island of Sicily had been turned into latifundia. Land that had supported thousands of peasant families had been converted into a few vast plantations worked by cheap slaves, leaving the dispossessed farmers to fend for themselves.

  “So,” I went on, “how is it that the murder was attributed to bandits? I don’t suppose anyone came forward to confess?”

  “Of course not. When does anyone confess to a crime save under torture or when caught in the act? But, according to those who found his body, it bore all the signs of a bandit attack: He was discovered stripped to the skin, even his sandals taken. Also missing was the hired donkey he had been riding.”

  “How was he dispatched?”

  “Stabbed through the body. That is all I know of his fatal wound. Had I been able to examine the corpse, I might have discovered many revealing details. But he had been cremated more than a month prior to my visit. Apparently, it never occurred to the authorities to inquire into the incident. Bandit attacks are so common in the region that they saw no reason for an investigation.”

  “And he was traveling alone? Not even a slave or two?”

  “Apparently. As a penurious man of simple habits, he had only a rather elderly housekeeper.”

  I mused for a while, studying the weapons on the wall. “Stabbed, eh? And through the body? Bandits usually favor a club to subdue their prey. It gets less blood on the clothes.”