“Sam. You ought call me Sam. Reckon you know me as well as any living man—since them who knew me better is all dead now.” His mouth twisted into a rictus, which I took to be a grin.
“Sam, then,” I said. “Can you show us a safe way into the city?”
He nodded, a slow dip of his head.
“And in return you want us to show you how you might escape.”
“Seen you. You came through the woods.” He placed a hand on my shoulder, and kneaded my skin lightly, as if convincing himself I wasn’t a spectre of his imagination.
“We did.” I pulled the egg from my pocket and held it so he could see it. “This offers protection against the wolves. It makes a sound they don’t like, one pitched to high for us to hear.” I tossed it to him.
Ali cried out, and stepped past me, backing Sam into the water up to his shins. But she must have thought better, for she stopped, and glanced back at me.
“As you can see, Sam, Ali values what you are holding in your hand. Enough that she would kill you for it. I might, too—if we were going back into the woods.” I looked to Ali. “But we’re not.”
Sam clutched the stone tightly in his fist.
“As you guessed, we’re headed for the tower and have no further need of it. That’s why I gave it to you, Sam. Consider it a down payment.” As I spoke, Ali relaxed her stance ever so slightly. “Go ahead,” I told him. “Take a good look at it.”
Sam looked to me for assurance, and I nodded. He opened his hand and squinted at the egg. To my surprise, he popped it in his mouth and held it there for a moment, before spitting it out. Then he looked at me expectantly.
“There is a backpack in the woods, Sam. In it is a chisel and hammer you can use to remove your shackles, as well as food and a flint, and maybe some other things that might be handy, too. I will tell you how to find the pack, and then how to make your way back to Rome. In return, you will guide us to the tower—and answer some questions truthfully.”
He rolled the rock around in his hand for a moment, then stuck it in a pocket in his filthy clothes. “Done.” He needlessly spat on a palm already covered with his saliva, stepped forward, his ragged pant legs dripping, and stuck his hand out.
I spat on mine and we shook.
“Now I’ll put my first question to you, and I want an honest answer, as you promised.”
“Shook on it,” he said. “Ask.”
“Can we trust you?”
He mulled it over for a moment, then said in his slow, careful way, “S’pose. Least as far as I can trust you.”
“A fair answer.” I pointed at his shackles. “The men in the field wear chains. And though I couldn’t say for sure because of the distance, many of those ascending the tower walk as if they are, too.”
“They wear chains.”
“When we were on the Novus Via I saw a prison wagon filled with men in the same sort of chains. Are prisoners being brought up here to work on the tower?”
Sam nodded. “For as long as they can.”
“When they can’t do heavy labour any more, they’re sent to the fields?”
“’Yes.”
“And when they can’t work the fields any more, what happens?”
He pointed. Because of his height and the bank of earth between us and the camp, I couldn’t see what he was indicating, but it was in the general direction of the ditches.
“Are they graves, Sam?”
“Them mounds between are. T’others ain’t graves. Not yet, anyhow.”
“A reasonable man would say that the Church would never make men labour to their death, and against their will, no matter what they might have done.”
“We’re dead men afore we were brought here.”
“You’ve been condemned to death?”
“Every last soul—save for them what guards us.” He shrugged. “A hole in the ground is a hole in the ground, here or in Rome. It’s all the same to them what’s put into it. Only in Rome, I’d a been planted a lot quicker.”
I considered this a moment. “You have not repented. Nor have any of the other men here.”
His eyes widened in surprise. “How’d you know it?”
“I didn’t. I guessed it. What did the Priest tell you?”
“It were the Bishop, back in Rome.”
“The Bishop, then.”
“Told us any who would not repent, that the Church in its mercy would allow them souls to live a bit longer, so they might serve the Lord and so see clear to coming into his graces. Heard good men, those what prayed each and every night, repudiate the Church and their Saviour and blacken their souls so they might live a bit more—to come here.”
I wish I could say I was surprised by what Sam told us; but I knew that men, even those of the Cloth, would bend reason beyond repair to justify their vanities. No matter how convinced one might have been of the necessity of the tower, no one could look upon it and not know in his heart it was a blasphemy. And if it was, then putting men to work on it would be akin to putting their souls in jeopardy—which itself would be a mortal sin. But if those who laboured on the tower were already in a state of mortal sin, and unrepentant, there was no risk to them, or to those Clerics whose orders they followed. “They don’t allow you to speak when you’re on the tower, do they?”
Sam shook his head. “Them that does is sent to the Cross.” He leaned in, as if to share a secret. “Call it the Babel Tower, only not out loud, on account of them Priests don’t like to hear it called that.”
I asked Sam about the construction of the tower. He confirmed it was hollow on the inside, and that the ramp, on which four men might walk abreast, was the only means of ascent. When I’d first seen the tower, it appeared to span the gap between the Apostle Peter’s Sphere and Lower Heaven; however, the firmament was the same uniform colour, making it impossible to judge exactly how close the apex of the tower came to the Sphere above. And the scaffolding near the summit suggested it hadn’t yet been completed. Sam confirmed this. “It were close to finished when I was last there, a fortnight ago. And them that’s still working on it says it’s all but done.”
“How many men guard the entrance to the tower at night?”
“Two,” he said. “Don’t need no more. Gardes don’t like coming near it, and none will set foot on it save when they must. Guess they reckon it’s a sin. Only I’d say they ought not worry so much about that and think more on the sin of how they treat them what do their dirty work.”
I nodded my agreement. As young as I was, I’d already worked out that men often punish others to assuage the guilt of their own crimes. Looking now at the immense shadow of the tower, at how it must loom over every thought and action in the valley, I could think of nothing that might engender more guilt. “Then I’ve only one more question, Sam. How will you take us there?”
Samuel pointed again, this time under the bridge. “Other side, there’s a waste pipe big as a man.”
Of course. Where there was an aqueduct, there’d be a sewer. When we’d left the road, we’d moved into the woods upstream of the bridge and surveyed the encampment from there; a large pipe, close to the bridge and emptying into the river downstream, would have been hidden by the structure. Still, I felt stupid for not having thought of this.
“Show us,” Ali said.
Sam turned and strode into the dark beneath the bridge, following a strip of mud; I hustled to keep up, Ali in my wake. Just as he said, half a dozen metres beyond the bridge was the black maw of the sewer. A thin stream of brackish water ran over its lip and crawled down to the river. Sam had called it man-sized, but he’d have to hunch, while Ali and I could walk upright. We peered inside; the dark was absolute. A dank breeze wafted from the opening. I had feared there would be the stench, but the pipe had clearly not been used to flush waste for a long time.
“I could fetch our kindling for torches,” Ali said. Her voice echoed inside the pipe, and there was a scuttling in response.
“No,” I said. “You’
d have to cross the bridge again and risk being seen. There might also be pockets of gas in the sewers. We’ll take it slowly. Go by feel.” I turned to Sam. “Do you know the tunnels, Sam? Good enough to find your way in the dark?”
He shook his head. “No. But I seen grates in the streets big enough for a man. It’s dark outside, but there’s still enough light to see you by. So I reckon inside it should be easy enough to see a way out when we pass one.”
“You said we, Sam. Do you mean to come with us?”
“Said I’d take you there. Know the streets. Leastwise, most what leads to the tower.”
Something occurred to me then. “You know we hope to find our way into Lower Heaven?”
“Thought as much.”
“And you know you can’t go with us?”
He shook his head. “An’ I wouldn’t want to, if it’s all the same to you. Ain’t ready to be judged. Not yet, leastwise.” He pulled the egg from his pocket. “There’s a man I wronged. Mean to make amends in this world first.”
I nodded, wishing I had the same luxury. “Thank you for your honesty, Sam.”
He shrugged, putting the egg away. “Deal’s a deal.”
“Then let’s make haste,” I said, suddenly aware of the minutes of the night that had already crept past. I turned to Ali, and pointed at her sword. “Put it away. It will only slow us down.”
She did so, sliding it into the sheath on her back. Then, like rats returning home, we scuttled into the thickening darkness—Sam, his long arms extended to touch either wall, leading the way.
A Lie in the Dark
In hermetic darkness we walked, seeing nothing and hearing only the irregular drip of water, the unnaturally loud scrape of Sam’s chain, and the tap-tap-tap of his foot as he tried the way. I found I was having trouble keeping my equilibrium; so I stretched out my arms, as I’d seen Sam do, but the diameter of the pipe was too great for me to touch both sides at the same time. So I swung my arms up until they were almost vertical and I felt slick stone. I held my arms thus for a time, until my shoulders ached so badly I could hold them up no longer. After that, I alternated, one hand at a time. Surprisingly, there was less debris to stumble over than in some of the Vatican tunnels. I had no idea what calamity had befallen the city that would make the former inhabitants abandon it—the nature of decay I’d observed suggested it had been abandoned, rather than destroyed by strife or natural disaster. But whoever had made this sewer had expected the city above to still be thriving.
We felt our way along for perhaps fifteen minutes.
Although I had said nothing to Sam or Ali, I was dubious about how far we might get in the sewer. I suspected the pipe we had entered might be the sole point of discharge for the entire city, which meant that if we did not find an egress from this pipe, then we would be forced to search down smaller and smaller branches. I also wondered if we’d even be able to see any of the grates Sam had mentioned, for rubble from the buildings, or lighter debris like leaves, had likely accumulated on most, rendering them invisible from within. Yet I’d felt a breeze, and Sam had said he’d seen grates, so some, at least, were not blocked. How many, though, and whether or not they were directly above this pipe, worried me.
I had another worry, too. It had occurred to me that Sam might have been lying. He admitted, after all, to being a condemned man, who’d spent time in prison and here, with other condemned men. Even if he had scruples before, it would have been hard to keep them in such company. I wondered if perhaps his abjection and self-abasement were merely an act, one designed to lure us into the sewer. Here, our weapons would have been less useful. And, for all I knew, Sam might have confederates lying in wait. I listened closely for the telltale clink of other men’s chains. What I heard instead was the drag of Sam’s own chain, and his tapping, abruptly stop.
I froze, and felt Ali’s hand tentatively touch my back. “Sam,” I said, placing my hand on the hilt of my sword, “what’s the matter?”
“Floor gone.”
“Can we—” I jumped when cold metal pushed against my ankle.
There was a basso chuckle. “That only Sam,” he said, and I realized he had prostrated himself, so he could lean over the edge to test its depth. “Can’t touch no water. No bottom I can reach, neither.” I heard a pebble tick against brick, then a small splash. “Water, though, down a ways.”
Relief—at least as much as was possible in this situation—swept through me, and I let go of my sword. “Are the bricks broken at the edge?” I asked. “Or is it finished, like it was made to end there?”
I heard him running his hands over the brick. “Finished.”
“Then it must be a catch basin or cistern,” I said. “If it is, there’s likely a way on one side or the other to skirt it.”
I heard him scrabbling for a moment. “This side.”
“Which side, Sam?”
He laughed at himself this time. “Left.” His chain, which was still against my leg, pulled away. “Narrow. Wall curves. I can manage.” I heard him shuffling forward, the clink of his chain multiplied by more confounding echoes as he entered the larger space of the cistern. “Hands and knees for me. Easier for you, I’d reckon.”
Leaning on the left wall, I moved forward, found the brink with my right foot. I edged around the bend onto the narrow walkway that ran around the cistern. The wall here curved inward over the cistern, pressing against my shoulder and bowed head; it seemed to be trying to force me off. I decided it might be best to follow Sam’s example and go down on all fours, and suggested Ali do the same. In the absence of light it was impossible to tell, but I don’t think she took my advice.
Crawling along that edge was unnerving, not knowing what lay a few centimetres ahead, and made worse when I imagined ragged men with good-sized rocks in their hands, waiting patiently at the other end for us to crawl around the corner. When I’d crawled perhaps half a dozen metres, I was seized with a sense of vertigo much more disorienting than what I’d felt when walking upright, and had to pause to collect myself, lest I veer off the edge. I meant to lean against the wall—and experienced a flash of panic when my shoulder didn’t encounter brick. Or at least not where I expected it, for here was a indentation in the wall, two bricks wide and perhaps two deep, into which I’d leaned.
“Other side.” Sam’s voice drifted back. “Not too far now.”
He must have missed this notch, or it was unimportant to his scheme—had that been a note of anticipation in his voice? “Hold up,” I said over my shoulder, to keep Ali from stumbling on my heels. “I’ve found something.”
I felt around the indentation, discovering that it rose vertically along the wall, and that horizontal iron bars had been set into it at regular intervals. I grabbed one, and hauled myself to my feet. The cut continued along the curve of the wall, up and out over the basin, at least as far as I could reach. Letting myself down into a crouch, I turned, eager to peer into the depths of the cistern.
“Sam, Ali. Look down, into the centre of the basin.” I waited for a moment to let them do so. “Can you see anything?”
“If my eyes are not playing tricks,” Ali said, from a metre or so behind me, “I think I see a small grey square.”
After a moment, Sam said, “Same.”
“Me, too. But I wanted to be sure. I think it’s the reflection of the light from above.”
I heard Ali shift behind me. “I can’t see anything above.”
“The ceiling is domed,” I said. “But the dome does not reach the street. A manhole must lead from the apex of the dome to the street above. We can’t see the opening directly because it’s centred over the cistern and the ceiling blocks our view.” I stared into the darkness, believing I could make out the faint scallop where the roof of the dome intersected the vertical tunnel.
“If it’s true, it will do us no good,” Ali said. “We have no way of getting there.”
I turned to face the wall, grabbing hold of the farthest iron bar that I could. I put a
foot on a low rung and started climbing. “There’s a ladder of sorts. I think it runs up the wall to the access tunnel.”
I heard Ali shuffling forward, as I knew she would, to try to stop me, but I had already pulled myself out of her reach. I dragged myself up another couple of rungs and, leaning back at an acute angle, nearly lost my footing. I realized that if I wished to stay on the ladder, I’d have to simultaneously push down hard on the rungs with my feet while holding most of the weight of my body with my arms. Moving up each rung would become increasingly difficult.
“Thomas!” Ali’s shout echoed madly in that domed space. “Don’t be a fool!”
I took another two rungs and paused, my arms already shaking, my fingers slipping—and immediately knew I shouldn’t have hesitated. So I clambered up as quickly as the awkward angle would permit, until I reached out for a rung and my hand closed on air. At the same instant my eyes were dazzled by the weak light from above, so much so I had to avert my gaze. I gasped, all my weight on my left arm, and swung my right back wildly, slapping my palm against the wall of the access tunnel above, until my fingers closed on a rung just as my feet slipped free. I swung my other hand up and gripped the rung higher. My arms were on fire, my legs dangling in mid-air. It was all I could do to haul myself up one more rung. I raised my knees almost to my chest—and my feet found purchase on the last rung in the access tunnel.
My heart hammered, and my arms shook uncontrollably, but I’d made it around the bend. I rose, grasping higher bars, and was grateful to straighten and let my legs take my weight.
“Thomas?”
The access tunnel was narrow, and I found I could lean back against the wall and still hang onto the ladder. I did so, and took a moment to catch my breath, looking up, blinking until my eyes adjusted to the light leaking through the grate only a few metres above my head. The grate’s ironwork did not have the regularity of those in Rome, but appeared ornate, like the wrought iron grilles I’d once seen as a boy in the gardens of our Parish manse, decorated with leaves and tendrils of climbing plants. I wondered what kind of place this had been, that would have such elaborate sewer covers.
The Book of Thomas - Volume One: Heaven Page 21
