A Forbidden History.The Hadrian enigma

by George Gardiner

  A chamber slave clapped her hands from her sleeping post beyond the entrance for permission to enter. Suetonius stammered approval as she entered and bowed.

  "Master, His Excellency, Secretary Julius Vestinus awaits you outside."

  He nodded acknowledgement and dismissed the girl.

  "My dear Surisca," he offered to his young hireling, "I must wash and dress. We have a busy day ahead of us. You too should prepare yourself for the day's chores, and make yourself presentable."

  On second thoughts it occurred to him, however, how she was quite presentable just as she was. A query crossed his mind.

  "But one question, my dear. Um, did we, er, make love last night? — or this morning?" he asked in a very small voice in case his memory of the joyful event had somehow evaded him by. He had been known to be forgetful of a night-time, especially after wine.

  Surisca looked to the ground in the manner servants or slaves pretend when they are being scolded for their slackness in performing duties and a beating might be on the horizon.

  "No, master, we have not. Have I given you bad service, master?" she replied, as any conscientious service provider would do.

  "Oh, I just wondered. That's all," he responded half-heartedly. He had hoped he might have had some simple, delicious pleasure, yet had merely lost recall.

  "Before we both address our morning toilet, Surisca my dear, one or two questions arose to mind in my sleep, my dear," he continued. "You remember yesterday at the embalmer's pavilion you commented upon the love bites on the neck of the corpse of Antinous on the table? You said you believed they were implanted by two different people, one set low at the front and another set higher on the throat stem? Are you sure in that opinion, my dear?"

  Surisca crumpled her features in a girlish manner displaying a struggle for certainty.

  "Master, I am not expert in understanding such things — especially upon the dead, who quickly develop all manner of blemishes. Nevertheless, the marks on your young friend's neck looked to me to be about a day in age. I am rash enough to estimate that the hickeys imposed by the male companion were more recent than the smaller ones with the yellow rim. Those appeared older. They could have been acquired some hours apart, possibly as much as half a day. This is my humble opinion, my lord," she concluded.

  Well, Suetonius thought, a true professional had spoken. So it seemed the boy was not as absolutely faithful to his erastes, Caesar, as common gossip would have it?

  As countless impetuous paramours discovered in the reign of past emperors, it would be a risky itch indeed to indulge oneself with Caesar's wife, favorite, or other bed partners. Such behavior could possess fatal consequences. In the past this itch had rapidly propelled offenders to lifetime exile at some far away barren desert. Alternatively, they could find themselves upon a funerary pyre following an inexplicable misadventure upon a sword or unexpected fall from a high place.

  Yet the prospect of Antinous having a concealed bit of fluff in his life was a prospect which might, or might not, possess value in fulfilling Caesar's commission, Suetonius considered. Perhaps jealousy and duplicity are involved in the young man's death, or some other commonplace passion?

  The launch of the second but final day and night of Hadrian's assigned allotment for investigation possessed interesting promise.

  CHAPTER 15

  "Hail, Gaius Suetonius Tranquillus! Welcome to Day Two of your assignment as Special Inspector!" Julius Vestinus was as efficient as ever despite the early hour.

  "My staff has arranged the list of interviews you ordered, by the hour every hour. The only person on your list who has not been located is the youngest member of Antinous's retinue, the language tutor Thais of Cyrene. I have instructed Tribune Macedo to assign soldiers to search for the woman on your behalf. In fact I've had Macedo issue a warrant to that effect under Caesar's seal in case the young lady has met with some misadventure or is being purposely evasive."

  "Thank you, Vestinus."

  "For your convenience, you are set up in the courtyard close-by. Your scribe Strabon and his assistant are waiting for you there now, as well as your Praetorian centurion Quintus Urbicus with his two sidekicks."

  "Once again, you've thought of everything, Vestinus," Suetonius acknowledged.

  Centurion Quintus Urbicus and his men were standing in the early morning light of the courtyard. They were dressed in local Egyptian habits instead of their Praetorian uniforms. The three were unkempt and their clothing was oddly stained. Perhaps their costumes were undercover disguises in the style of the local customs? In the crook of one arm Urbicus carried a bulky, stained, rag-cloth bundle.

  The three snapped to attention with Praetorian precision as Suetonius arrived to take his place in the center chair at a long bench. Senator Clarus and the scribes were already in place at either end of the table, with a separate chair for Surisca placed a few feet behind the Special Inspector.

  "Hail in the name of Caesar!" Urbicus proclaimed as the three Praetorians saluted on Suetonius's arrival.

  "All hail!" the Special Inspector responded in as military a manner as he could muster.

  Strabon and his assistant had their writing tools ready for action. Clarus, being the legal magistrate hearing the interviews, had now arranged for a court lictor to attend the sessions. This sturdy young man in a simple tunic emblazoned with its Imperial eagle insignia and carrying his fasces baton of punishment-rods bound around a sharp axe-blade stood impassively to one side. He was wearing the regulation-issue po-face of a court officer. A lictor's official duties often include witnessing the execution of punishment upon offenders. Clarus, in his role as supervising magistrate, had decided the presence of a lictor during interviews might give the panel greater gravitas.

  "Report, Centurion Quintus Urbicus!" Suetonius commanded with military bluster.

  Urbicus snapped to attention, stepped forward a few paces, and placed the large cloth-bound bundle on the tabletop before him.

  "Special Inspector, sir, as you have instructed, my troop searched for and located the two fishermen who Your Honors interviewed yesterday," Urbicus recounted. "The men are known to live in a nest of huts with their extended families by the river's bank outside the village of Besa. The men are well known in the town, so it was not difficult to locate them.

  On your instructions, we were to accompany them to identify a river vessel which fits the description they provided, and to determine who may have been sailing this craft upon the Nile at dawn yesterday. However, we were too late to locate the men. Other unknown persons had made contact with them earlier. They inflicted bodily harm."

  "Inflicted harm? Bodily harm?!" Clarus croaked. "What sort of harm?"

  Suetonius and the others leaned forward to hear.

  Urbicus placed the wet-stained cloth bundle onto the tabletop into a streak of sunlight falling across the bench, and began unwinding its cloths.

  Suetonius sat back in uncomfortable apprehension.

  Ani the Egyptian fisherman's severed head, still recognizable from the previous day's interrogation but somewhat battered and bloody, toppled out and rolled across the table top. His cranium's heavy weight rolled to reveal the bloody serrated neck flesh facing upwards, a mass of all chopped veins and flesh with serrated bone. The incisions seemed to have been hacked crudely with a chopper rather than sliced by sword at a swift stroke.

  "The fisherman Ani, who spoke with us yesterday, was dead," Urbicus explained. "He had been killed by persons unknown. The other fisherman Hetu who spoke less yesterday had either run away or been killed elsewhere. Their families were in a state of great distress at their losses. It seems a team of hooded men attacked the family's huts after dusk yesterday, only an hour or so after the fishermen departed us here.

  They dragged Ani into the open and killed him, and then chased Hetu away to an unknown fate. We have brought proof of the former's destiny for your confirmation," he concluded with military precision.

  Urbicus adjusted the head's p
osition to reveal to the group Ani's sagging-mouth, distantly distracted eyes, and yellowed waxen flesh. Suetonius sensed Surisca drawing her veil across her eyes behind him. Clarus and Vestinus raised themselves from their seats to more closely inspect and confirm the identity of the relic.

  "What hooded men?" Clarus demanded. "Who were they? What was their origin?"

  "I do not know, sir," Centurion Urbicus responded, smartly snapping again to attention. "The family said the offenders were fully shrouded so they could not identify their features, and they did not speak so they could not hear their language to determine their origin. They could be men of any community at Besa. Egyptian, Nubian, Greek, Jew, or even Roman.

  I was told they galloped up to the huts after dark, hunted down the two fishermen, and immediately beheaded one with knives while the other ran off into the night. The killers then followed in the same direction. I retrieved the severed head from the family when we ourselves arrived some time later. I bring it to you as proof of the death. They want it returned, of course, for burial ceremonies today. They will sew the head back to the body, so the man goes to their Underworld in one piece."

  "What does this mean?" Clarus turned to Suetonius. "Why would anyone want two humble fisher folk dead?" The two subsided into their seats.

  "I'd say the sailors of that river craft emblazoned with the Eye Of Horus might not want to be identified?" the biographer suggested forlornly. He moved closer to Clarus to add a further observation in a low whisper.

  "But it also seems, my good friend, that someone among us here has communicated our desire to identify that river craft to some other party with an interest in this matter," he murmured low. "That other party wanted those two witnesses out of the way promptly."

  Clarus paused thoughtfully.

  "But who in this godforsaken place, Suetonius," the ageing senator murmured, "has the authority or soldiery to prosecute such an attack? They were mounted on horses! Whose horses? Who has the power to organize a cohort of riders to kill two mere fishermen? Neither Caesar nor his officers have issued such orders, to our knowledge. Nor why should they? Who else here has such authority?"

  "Unless those priests of Amun are more combative than we imagined," Suetonius rationalized, "or there are local bandits involved somewhere? There aren't many options really. The local town militia is a scruffy ragbag of imported Nubians, but they keep well out of Rome's way. The local nobility are few and far between. This then leaves only our own people."

  Suetonius shifted closer to the senator so only Clarus, Surisca, and the scribe could hear his conjecture.

  "Are Governor Titianus and his Alexandrians on a private mission? Or, have some of Tribune Macedo's Praetorians gone feral? Are there disaffected Horse Guards around Caesar, unknown to anyone? Yet who traveling with us has the authority to instruct soldiers or cavalry independently of Caesar's commanders? But then, why should they murder simple fishermen? Is it because they were the only known witnesses to that suspect vessel on the river yesterday?"

  Suetonius gave Centurion Urbicus new orders.

  "The death of the fishermen affects our enquiry greatly, Praetorian. Even if they have both been killed, it doesn't change our need. In fact, it makes it more necessary. We must discover who was sailing the craft emblazoned with the Eye of Horus. Who? To where? And why? This is your primary duty, Praetorian," he affirmed. "And we need the details by high sun today. Perhaps their families know of other fisher folk who can assist you?"

  Urbicus cleared his throat.

  "We've taken the liberty, sir, to do a preliminary search at first light of the riverside by the Temple of Amun. There is a craft fitting the Egyptian's description moored nearby. But we have yet to discover who was sailing this craft yesterday," he explained.

  "Then find out, Quintus Urbicus, by high sun. You might have to consult one of the priests and take them into security," Suetonius instructed. "Our uncertainties about the Bithynian's death now grow with each hour."

  Urbicus raised a clenched salute and announced, "It will be done, sir!"

  A trooper rewrapped Ani's butchered head. He wiped-up the moist stain on the bench-top where it had dribbled juices, and then marched off with his colleagues.

  Suetonius looked at the stain on the table and decided he didn't feel especially hungry for breakfast. Surisca developed a similar lack of appetite. Clarus returned to devouring his platter of victuals and signaled a slave to pour wine.

  "Where is the Bithynian youth Lysias? He is due here now! He's late!" Clarus called.

  "He is not to be found, gentlemen," an oddly-accented voice unexpectedly interrupted.

  Geta the Dacian had arrived at the courtyard accompanied by one of Caesar's Horse Guards.

  "I have been to visit Lysias at Antinous's apartments to summons the lad to attend Caesar, only to learn he is not to be found," Geta repeated. "The chamber slave says he hasn't seen the Bithynian since late last night. The youth slipped away somewhere in the night, the slave told me. I had hoped he might be here with you already?"

  Geta scanned the clustered team gathered around the long bench. His eyes fell upon Surisca and lingered momentarily. He displayed surprise. Surisca returned the gaze, only to then lower it demurely to the ground. Suetonius noted this interesting exchange.

  "What of the language tutor, the slave Thais?" Suetonius added.

  "I am told she too is not to be found," Geta stated.

  Clarus reacted angrily.

  "What? Have these two absconded? Have we been deceived by the Bithynian?!" he clamored. "Issue a warrant to apprehend them both!"

  The lictor departed briskly to his new commission.

  "My good Septicius, to where can they abscond?" Suetonius posed. "Beyond this encampment lie irrigated fields of grain and then a wilderness of desert. There's nowhere to go, my friend." He turned to Geta. "You know these people well, Dacian," the biographer queried Geta. "Where will they have gone?".

  The man with the faint blue circles tattooed across his cheekbones hesitated.

  "I have no idea, Suetonius Tranquillus. You are the Special Inspector, not I."

  His eyes drifted back towards the Syrian female standing nearby with lowered eyes.

  "What does this mean?" Clarus called rhetorically. "Two witnesses are killed, two others disappear into the night, while the hours pass quickly towards our deadline. And our heads are at stake!"

  The biographer avoided response by making a formal introduction of the Syri entertainer to the Dacian.

  "You have met the lady Surisca of Antioch, Prince Geta of Dacia?" Suetonius asked in his best silkily polite manner. He was offering an unlikely social gesture to two people of impossibly unequal status. He followed their interaction closely as Surisca dipped a suitable curtsy.

  "Just Geta, Special Inspector," the Dacian responded with unexpected modesty. "I am a simple man of little consequence. Yet I am pleased to acknowledge the lady Surisca of Antioch."

  Suetonius sensed the two already knew each other regardless of his genteel introduction. It occurred to him their meeting may have been of a professional nature it might not be polite to explore.

  "Dacian," Clarus proclaimed, "it's time you gave us your opinions of the death of Antinous. You probably know things we don't? You have lived close-by the lad daily. You knew him over several years."

  "I am at your disposal, gentlemen, though I must also attend to my duties shortly," Geta responded evasively. "Feel free to ask what you will."

  His eyes barely departed Surisca.

  "Strabon, our scribe will record your words. We have several questions to put to you, so take a seat," Suetonius intoned. "This is a legal statement, a deposition, Geta, as Caesar commanded us. State you name and titles, your age and place of birth, and your functions in the Imperial Household. Remember, you are under oath to your titular deity."

  "Under oath? I, Geta, am being interrogated?" he asked with dismay. He sat against the edge of the bench table, not in the chair provided, implying o
nly brief participation. Strabon's stylus was poised ready to flutter. Geta gathered himself reluctantly.

  "This is unexpected, gentlemen, but I'll try. By Sacred Zalmoxis of the Dacians, I am known among Romans simply as Geta. This is a mistaken praenomen given to simplify my proper titles in my mother tongue. My true name is Dromichaetes, a tarabostes prince of the royal house of The Getae," he announced with quiet pride. "I was born at Sarmizegethusa in the year when Palma Frontonianus and Sosius Senecio were consuls at Rome, I'm told. Caesar Trajan was ruler. I was taken hostage as a child after the wars against my father, the king of the Dacians known as Decebelus.

  Rome's victory against my father saw me assigned into the care of Hadrian when he was a commander of Legions. I remain even today under Hadrian's protection in his household. Yet I possess my own independent wealth endowed from my father's treasures. Hail Caesar!" the Dacian added diplomatically.

  "What do you know about the death of Antinous?" Suetonius continued. "Tell us what you know or have heard. The Household gossip mill must be running riot?"

  "I have no special knowledge, gentlemen," Geta stated plainly. "Like you, I'm appalled at the tragedy. I can only imagine he fell into the river two nights ago? How, or where, or of what misadventure, I do not know. Perhaps he had taken too much wine? Perhaps he foolishly tried to swim while armored? Who knows? Perhaps he was dealt cruelly by some enemy? It is a waste of a young man's life, and a serious hurt to our Caesar. Hadrian has taken it very badly, as you saw."

  "Do you believe the youth may have taken his own life? If so, why would he do so? Or was he a victim of treachery?" Clarus contributed.

  Geta considered thoughtfully before responding.

  "At Court there is always the possibility of foul play. There are many eddies of conflict at Court, political or romantic or financial. Some of them are dangerous, even life threatening. Others are trivial.

  Yet Antinous was not caught up in factions or politics. He seemed quite apolitical, perhaps intentionally. He simply brought Hadrian great pleasure and relaxation from the ordeals of government. He was like a lively son, a frisky hound, or a well-loved horse. And we've come to realize Caesar's affection was more than skin deep.