Death on Delos

by Gary Corby

  The men nodded much more happily at these words.

  “Right, get to work,” I said. “The first step is, see if you can find that pit, or failing that, look for any recently filled in hole. Surely a recent in-fill would be visible.”

  The men spread out in a regular pattern under Damon’s orders.

  As they worked I said, “Philipos, I don’t think you’ve been formally introduced. I’d like you to meet the official detective on this job, my wife, Diotima.”

  Philipos looked at us oddly. “I thought Nicolaos was the detective?”

  “It’s extremely unusual,” Diotima said. “But I am a priestess of Artemis and my husband is not. Therefore in this place I have a power to judge that you Athenian men do not. A priestess may rule men on sanctuary grounds. There are precedents.”

  There were indeed precedents. The Pythoness at Delphi, the High Priestess at Brauron, the Priestess of the Games at Olympia—all these women ruled their sacred domains. With the authority of the High Priest of Apollo to back her, Diotima could command here on this one specific mission.

  “Are you married, Philipos?” Diotima asked.

  “I was. My wife died,” he said shortly.

  “Oh, I’m sorry to hear that,” Diotima said.

  I took a guess that his wife had died just before Philipos took to hanging around Pericles like a supplicant, but I didn’t voice the idea.

  “My sons are both grown,” Philipos said. “They’re in the army now.”

  Diotima had been right. Philipos was the oldest apprentice in the history of Athens.

  “There’s not much to learn about agent work,” I assured him. “You’ll get the hang of it in no time.”

  Just then the men returned. The search had been quick, but I had expected that.

  “We didn’t find a thing,” Damon reported with a friendly grin. He reached into the first of the barrows. “I brought some wine. Shall we have a drink?”

  The men drank while Diotima spoke.

  “I expected that result,” Diotima announced.

  “Then why did you waste our time by making us search?” demanded the man who had asked about psyches.

  Diotima’s smile became somewhat brittle but she retained her composure. “Because there was a small chance that you would find what my husband and his associate missed,” she said. “Now the real work begins. I want you to search again, but this time you are looking for a fallen stele that is weathered on the wrong side.”

  “What’s that mean?” the disgruntled man said. “Weathered on the wrong side? There ain’t no right side.”

  But Damon laughed.

  “The priestess is a clever priestess,” he said. “She thinks someone covered the pit she looks for with one of the fallen monuments.”

  “Exactly!” Diotima said.

  Damon laughed. “So either they rolled the stele away, in which case the side it’s weathered on will be underneath, not on top; or else there will be drag marks in the dirt.”

  “Exactly!” Diotima repeated.

  The men began the search again, this time with an air of greater purpose.

  “You know, it’s still not at all clear why we’re doing this,” I pointed out. “There’s no reason to assume that Philipos’s disappearing grave has anything to do with the death of Geros.”

  “Except that two unusual occurrences at the same place at the same time are too much to accept as coincidence,” Diotima said. “We’re still searching for a path to the heart of the mystery, Nico.”

  “I know. But I want to prepare you for disappointment.”

  “Over here!”

  It was Damon who found it. He lay flat on his stomach, his head almost beneath a large stele that had been sculpted in the shape of a cylinder. Damon’s left arm was stretched underneath the curve of the stele, dangerously so. I hoped it didn’t roll on him.

  From this prone position Damon said, “The ground here is soft beneath. I can feel it.” He dug his fingers into the gravel. It compressed noticeably more than the surrounding dirt.

  Damon ran his fingers along the underside of the stele. “Look, Diotima was right; the inscription on the stone is more weathered underneath than on top.”

  “Damon, you are a genius,” I said. “Well done.”

  I helped him back up. He wiped his hands on his tunic.

  “I suppose we have to move this great big, heavy stone now?” he said in his happy voice.

  “If what we suspect is true, it won’t be hard to move at all,” I said.

  I put my hands upon the stele, braced myself, and pushed. It rocked a little, but it was clear that I couldn’t roll it on my own. Philipos appeared beside me. Together we were able to make a small amount of progress.

  Then suddenly the stele rolled away.

  It had been too easy. I looked beside me, startled, to see Damon with a large crowbar. He had levered it under the stone.

  “I found this under the bushes behind us,” he said. “Also, this wooden chock.”

  I looked down at his feet, to see that Damon was nudging a large chock under the stone as he heaved. The system worked perfectly. I silently cursed for not having thought to look for these tools myself.

  The turning of the stele had exposed the funerary message to easy view. There was a tableau chiseled into the stone, and below it, an inscription. I inspected this with the eye of a sculptor’s son, and saw that it was quality work. Likewise the stone itself had quite obviously once been perfectly rounded and polished. It was, of course, cut from local stone, almost certainly from the small mountain that rose in the middle of Delos.

  The funerary image showed a baby boy, held in the arms of his father. The baby’s arms were outstretched, like a supplicant, toward a woman who sat upon a chair. Her expression was serene, her right hand raised in a gesture of farewell.

  The inscription was worn, as Damon had said, but it was still readable. Philipos read aloud.

  “I am Akesia, wife of Dorexides, well-deserving of him.”

  Philipos fell silent. He glanced uneasily toward Diotima, but had the sensitivity to say no more.

  Into the sudden silence Damon said in his cheery voice, “She died in childbirth.”

  That wasn’t something I wanted to hear, just at the moment.

  Diotima affected not to notice, but I knew Damon’s words had upset her. She scuffed the ground on which the stele had lain. “It does look newly filled,” she said. “Can we dig it?”

  The men sighed, but they knew this was why they had come. They set to work.

  Diotima, Philipos, and I sat in the shade and watched the pickaxes rise and fall. The men had removed their clothes. That was normal procedure for workmen who owned only a single tunic. The sheen of sweat upon their backs was soon dripping down their backs in rivulets.

  “I’ll have to borrow money from Pericles. I didn’t bring enough,” I commented.

  “What for?” Diotima asked.

  “To reward the men,” I told her. “They’re earning their pay today and more.”

  “They are locals; their duty is to serve the Gods,” said my wife the priestess. “That’s the only reward they need.”

  “You have something to learn about encouraging men,” I said to my wife.

  Philipos dug beneath his own clothing. He pulled out a money bag that looked rather full. “I have sufficient coins,” he said. “I’ll reward them.”

  “Thank you, Philipos,” I said. I was genuinely pleased to see my apprentice enter into the spirit of investigation.

  The workmen traded pickaxes for shovels. They had broken the ground with surprising speed.

  “It’s hard to believe Geros did this on his own,” I said.

  “Damon managed to move the stele,” my wife pointed out.

  “Damon is a strong man. Geros was an old one,”
I said. “But more to the point, the digging those men are doing is serious.”

  I called out, “How is the ground, Damon?”

  The Delian looked up from the work, wiped the sweat from his brow, and called back, “It’s much the easiest hole we’ve ever had to dig on Delos. The ground here is usually hard as . . . well . . . hard as rock.”

  At that moment a shovel wielded by one of the workmen yielded a hollow thump.

  I got up, so did Diotima and Philipos. We clustered around the grave.

  The workmen scraped to quickly reveal a wooden crate of some sort. I was struck by how little earth covered the discovery.

  “Could it be an old coffin?” one of the workmen asked. There was slight fear in his voice.

  “No,” I said firmly. “That looks like a crate to me, don’t you think? See how new the wood is. Nothing has rotted.”

  Indeed the top in view was made of pine so new that the shaved wood was still almost white. The men saw the truth of this. They nodded.

  “Whatever that is, it’s buried shallow,” I said. “How deep was that grave you fell in, Philipos?”

  “I don’t know. I didn’t have a measuring rod,” Philipos said. He thought for a moment and then added, “I climbed out easily . . . maybe hip height?”

  There was enough dirt removed by now that we could open the box. Damon pulled up the lid and everyone gasped.

  Within was a fortune. The entire box was filled with coins. Diotima knelt beside the hole. She held out her hands. Damon scooped treasure with his large plams for her to hold. Coins fell from her cupped hands like water. She peered at the ones remaining.

  “They look like the three that we found on Geros,” she said. She opened her hands, and the small fortune fell back into the box.

  “Fetch soldiers,” I said to Philipos. “Fetch honest soldiers. You’re an experienced officer; you’ll know the men we can trust.” Philipos nodded, and left at a run. He knew what I was thinking. We were in imminent danger of a riot when people found out about this. The treasure had to be guarded.

  “You men, you stay here,” I said to the workmen sternly. As soon as they returned to the village, the whole island would know. “You’ll be rewarded for your service,” I told them. “That’s the security covered,” I said to Diotima. “What next?”

  Diotima turned to Damon. “Fetch Karnon,” she said to the village chief. “Only the Treasurer of Delos can tell us where this money came from.”

  The House of Geros

  “I’ll have to count it back at the Oikos, but on a rough estimate I’d say there’s about ten talents here.” Karnon looked up from his position over the grave. “I owe you a great deal,” he said. “You have recovered some of the missing money.”

  Karnon had the villagers and a small troupe of soldiers hoist the boxes. He then proceeded to watch every man with paranoid intensity as they carried more money than most people see in their lifetimes back to its proper home. I sent Philipos with this group, with orders not to let that wealth out of his sight, and more importantly to watch and report on Karnon. I said this to him quietly, out of hearing of the others.

  “You suspect him?” Philipos asked, shocked.

  “He’s clearly not the thief,” I said. “He knows better than anyone that the other accountants would catch him. Nor was he at the protest. But pressure can do things to a man.”

  What I didn’t explain to Philipos was the enormous stress Karnon was under because of his home situation. I didn’t want the rather intense accountant to do anything rash, such as gather up the rescued money, collect Marika and the boys, and try to catch a ship out. With the bad odor this theft would put him in, on top of everything else, he must surely be tempted. I liked him too much to let him try.

  •••

  It was clear that we had to learn more about Geros. We’d learned all we could from talking to the Delians.

  “How did he get into the Delian Treasury?” Diotima asked.

  “The guards let him in. We know that,” I said.

  “But the guards don’t have a key,” Diotima pointed out. “Only Karnon has a key.”

  “Geros must have one too,” I said.

  “I think he must have,” Diotima agreed. “How hard would it be to make one?”

  “Trivial for any blacksmith,” I said. “They’re only metal bars, bent in a certain way. Of course, you have to know where to put the bend for each key.”

  “But Geros must have seen Karnon’s key—many times, I should think,” Diotima said. “Geros would know.”

  “I’m acquiring a distinct dislike of these keys,” I said. “Door slaves work so much better.”

  Diotima nodded glumly. “If Geros had a copy, I know where it is,” she said.

  We raced as fast as a pregnant woman can race to the home of Anaxinos. There we asked to see the box of keys that Anaxinos had removed from Geros’s house. We sat on the floor and compared each of Geros’s keys to those that Anaxinos owned.

  Geros had three too many.

  “No, two too many,” Anaxinos said, when we showed him our discovery. He picked up one of the extra keys. “This one goes to the special Treasury of Artemis that houses the Hyperborean Gifts. See the name on the side?”

  There was indeed a name on the side. It occurred to me that naming a key was probably a mistake, but we already had too many problems to go looking for more.

  “Meren told us of the Hyperborean Gift. Geros was the keeper?”

  “Just so. He had the only key.”

  “What about this one?” I held up one of the remaining two. The alloy seemed different—it was a different color, and the handle was much more utilitarian, with no ivory.

  Anaxinos scratched his head. “There you have me.”

  “Did anyone open this box after you brought it home, sir?” Diotima asked.

  “Certainly not,” the High Priest said.

  The collection looked the same as the one I had seen when I first found the box in Geros’s office. I said as much.

  “Then Geros must have had a use for this key,” Diotima said. “I’ll bet this is the copy we’re looking for. Let’s try matching them.”

  But it wasn’t. We held pairs of keys side-by-side, to compare the bends. This odd key didn’t match any of the others.

  Diotima set it aside. “What about the last one?” she said.

  We quickly proved that the second odd key also matched none in Anaxinos’s possession.

  “Send for Karnon,” Anaxinos ordered a slave. “Tell him to bring his keys.”

  Karnon came quickly. One of the two extra keys precisely matched Karnon’s key for the Porinos Naos.

  “I was afraid of that,” Karnon said. He turned an unnatural shade of gray.

  “This key looks different, though, from all our usual ones,” Anaxinos said. He held it up. “Do you see? Our temple keys have ivory handles and are inscribed with the sun and the bow, the insignia of the divine twins. But this key’s handle is a plain, utilitarian style.”

  “Yes, High Priest,” Diotima said. “It’s probably a copy. Geros must have acquired the real key and had a copy made.”

  “Do you have an explanation for this, Karnon?” Anaxinos turned to the accountant.

  “No, High Priest,” Karnon said weakly. He realized how this looked for him.

  Diotima said, “Can you honestly say that your key has been in your sight every moment for the last year?”

  “No, of course not,” Karnon said. “When it’s at home, I keep it in my own bedroom. Nobody else goes in there . . . well, almost nobody.” He looked uneasy.

  “What about at work?” Diotima persisted.

  “Then the key is tied to my belt,” Karnon said.

  “Even when you’re in the Oikos?” Diotima asked.

  “Well, the key hangs heavy—you see how unwi
eldy it is. In my office I lay it on the table before me.”

  “No harm in that,” Anaxinos said.

  “None at all,” Diotima agreed.

  “But nobody on this island bars their door. Has Geros ever come to visit you, Karnon, or waited for you in your office?”

  “Yes, many times. He works here too, you know.”

  “There’s the answer then.”

  “That explains the first of the two odd keys. But what about this last key?” Anaxinos held up the one that matched no known door. “What does it go to?”

  “What a very good question,” Diotima said. She took the mysterious key from the High Priest’s hands, and passed it to me. “I think Nico and I will go find out.”

  I knocked on the door of Geros’s house. It opened a crack and an eye peered out.

  “Nicolaos, son of Sophroniscus,” I said brusquely. “We met before. You also met my wife, the priestess Diotima. We are appointed by Anaxinos High Priest of the Delian Apollo to search this house.”

  It never hurts to overpower a slave with authority.

  The slave opened the door, and looked even more worried than he had the first time we’d visited. He rubbed his hands absently and said, “Yes, I remember you. I am relieved to see you.”

  But he stood in the doorway and did nothing.

  “Perhaps we could come in?” I prodded.

  “Oh, yes, of course.” He stepped back to reveal the atrium and courtyard.

  The body of Geros still lay in the traditional position, in the middle, upon a table, with his feet pointing toward the door. The priestesses who had been preparing him when we were last here had done a good job. Geros was dressed in his priestly robes; the staff that he had carried in life was laid beside him.

  Geros had lain like this ever since his body had been taken from the murder scene. The days since then had been hot ones.

  “Isn’t he becoming a little bit . . . er . . . rank?” I suggested.

  “Yes, sir. The smell is becoming quite difficult,” said the slave.

  “You don’t perhaps want to bury him?” I asked.