Three for a Letter

by Mary Reed

  As he spoke he had hoped that the goatkeeper would not ask to be rowed to shore for medical attention and, it seemed, the gods had answered his prayer. For as it transpired returning to the mainland was the last thing that Pythion desired, as he immediately declared to Barnabas.

  “Since you’re here, I am supposing that you’ll not mind staying for a few days?” he had said hopefully as he bathed the injured foot in not too clean water from a bucket in the corner.

  Barnabas confirmed that he would be happy to do so.

  “Then in that case,” Pythion had continued in a stern voice, “I must remind you that this is a sacred island and therefore I shall expect appropriate behavior.”

  Barnabas, wondering if word of his stage act involving the enormous phalluses had somehow reached even this remote island, promised solemnly that he would ensure that he did not offend either his host’s hospitality or the goats in any way whatsoever.

  “You must swear absolute secrecy about anything you learn here,” the goatkeeper had gone on urgently.

  “Of course,” Barnabas had replied, giving his oath while wondering if the man was afraid that he intended to learn the secrets of fortune-telling by goat and then set up a rival oracle in a more frequently traveled spot.

  But, he reminded himself as he poured out more vinegary wine and filled their breakfast plates with radishes, it had turned out that Pythion had more to hide than Barnabas since the famous goat oracle was nothing more than a fraud perpetrated upon a gullible public.

  Thus it was that Barnabas was now temporarily carrying out the injured man’s role of moving stuffed goats here and there around the island, giving the animals the appearance of life by occasionally venturing out to push them along the stony ground while crawling through what for most people would be knee-high shrubbery.

  “Thinking about them goats again, aren’t you?” Pythion asked. “It may seem a bit underhanded, but you know what they say—you can’t fool an honest Christian. It’s all just entertainment, officially speaking, so obviously it’s only pagans we’re misleading. How they’re dealt with in this transitory world is the least of their concerns.”

  Barnabas grinned. “If she found out about your efforts, Theodora would be just as likely to ask Justinian to appoint you to a court post than have you executed. She’s always been one to admire a rogue, especially one who’s successful, and you’ve been managed to fool everyone for years.”

  “Of necessity, may I remind you?” Pythion parried. “The herd died off during that drought a few years ago. According to tradition, the albino ones are more important than the black ones but they were the first to die.”

  “Interesting, that.”

  “Yes, but I had just arrived on the island and so I knew that the villagers were terribly impressed that the goats over here were flourishing while over there many of their animals, and even some people, were dying. The goatkeeper at the time was a man of great intellect—not to mention someone who didn’t wish to see a very old custom die with the animals, or so he said to me.”

  Pythion stopped to give an admiring shake of the head at the previous goatkeeper’s wily intelligence. “So,” he went on, “as I told you, he very cleverly stuffed the animals’ skins so that there would always be goats on the island and, more importantly, he would still have the job of keeper of the goats. After all, nobody said anything about them having to be live goats, did they?”

  “You would make a good man of law, Pythion. He must have really feasted on all that goat meat, though. I wonder how he prepared it?” Barnabas mused, thinking wistfully of all the palace banquets where, after entertaining, he had partaken of many dainty and exotic dishes that seemed now the stuff of dreams.

  “Not well enough,” was the reply. “He died not long after I arrived. It was something he ate, apparently.”

  Barnabas looked up sharply. “You didn’t mention that before. I thought you said he died of old age?”

  “What I said was that he was very old when he died and that was true enough. I suppose I forgot to mention that it happened not long after over-indulging in goat stew. Who knows, perhaps the hot weather tainted it. I advised him to cure most of the meat and even made a smoking frame for him. But he was a hasty man, so I suppose you could say his manner hastened his own death. Still, the only stews I have eaten since then have been made out of rabbits.”

  Barnabas pondered his companion’s words. It had not occurred to him before to ask what had originally brought Pythion to the rocky island, whether he too might have been fleeing from a pitiless pursuit. He knew Fortuna could be sometimes be crueler than a cat with a field mouse. Had he then managed to escape Theodora only to find himself on a small island with a herd of stuffed goats, an inadequate food supply, and a murderer?

  Chapter Twenty-four

  Greetings, dear Aunt Matasuntha.

  Has General Belisarius set Ravenna alight yet? I do hope not! Here we just had an awful fire. We would all have been burnt to ashes in our beds if it hadn’t been for Hero’s fire-fighting device. I’ll draw you a picture of it some time. I did draw Hero’s wine machine, as I promised. The top part was easy enough, being like a man, but it was hard to draw its goat legs. Godomar found the picture before I could hide it. He was very angry but I couldn’t help laughing because I made its face look like his.

  Anyway, I have decided Hero will come and live in my court when I am queen. He makes all sorts of toys and clever things and knows lots of interesting stories.

  But about this strange fire. Bertrada says it was a horrible accident but I don’t think it was. You see, the goats have been foretelling terrible things for some time now. I think the fire must have been what they meant, or at least some of what they meant. But nobody had taken any notice of what they said, so in a way it serves them right. Also there’s an old statue that somehow got broken, but you could hardly call that a disaster. Zeno doesn’t seem at all upset about it although he told me it was given to him by one of his relatives. He says he’s not expecting this relative to visit him in the near future and laughed as if he had said something very funny. Godomar just looked disgusted, but then he looks disgusted a lot of the time. I wonder if he ever laughed when he was younger or if he has brothers or sisters?

  But I’m getting away from what I wanted to tell you about the goats. Minthe says they have been making the worst patterns that have been seen for years and years. They’re very clever, those animals, and know much more than most people. Yes, soon the villagers will realize they were not just foretelling the fire but also my departure.

  People always seem to find a way to believe the goats are saying whatever it is they want them to say, but in this case they are telling only the truth because when I have gone a lot of people will be in great trouble. I wish I could be here to see it, but then if I were, there wouldn’t be any trouble for them to get into, would there?

  So, dear aunt, as you can see, it will be a little while before I can write another letter but I wanted to tell you not to worry. I am going with Porphyrio.

  One night recently, I will not say when, I woke up and heard Porphyrio summoning me as he sometimes does. It’s like someone blowing on a great horn, but so far off I can only feel the sound inside me, like when a cart rumbles past. I got out of bed and left the villa. I didn’t have to creep past Bertrada because Porphyrio had cast an enchantment over her. All the way through the garden and the olive grove I could hear Porphyrio calling. Even though it was really dark, I had no trouble finding my way. My feet floated over roots and rocks as if I were a leaf drifting down a stream.

  I came to the headland and went to the edge of the cliff. There was nothing to see except a great star-strewn sky, but looking down I saw the deeper darkness of the sea and the gleaming back of my friend Porphyrio. He looked so small I realized how far down below the water was, but I wasn’t frightened a bit.

  I was ready to cast myself over the edge to join him right then but he stopped me. �
�It is not yet time,” he said in his deep, silent voice. “Hide where there is nothing between you and the sunrise, Sunilda, and then when the straw man comes to the sea, that will be a signal for you to fly to meet me.”

  And so we made our final plans, but I am not permitted to tell you more. I shall write to you again after I join Gadaric and can tell you all about my journey and what wonders I have found at its end.

  Chapter Twenty-five

  “But where is the straw man?” demanded Sunilda. “I want to meet him!”

  John noted the exasperated look Zeno cast at the girl. They were standing in the workshop, looking on as Hero tinkered with the automatons Sunilda had asked to see and was supposed to be admiring.

  “Why are you so interested in a silly bundle of straw when you can see these wonderful musicians and this shining archer?” Zeno made a sweeping gesture toward the trio of almost completed automatons set in the middle of the workshop. His flapping orange sleeve struck Hero, who was squatting nearby adjusting a length of bronze tubing. Hero glanced up, blinking rapidly and obviously annoyed.

  “These mechanical figures are very nice indeed, Zeno,” said Sunilda, “but the straw man is really the most important one, isn’t he? It seems such a shame, really, that he’s no sooner put together than he’s dashed on the rocks. If I were Theodora I’d honor him before he was thrown off the cliff.”

  “I’ve never thought about it quite that way.” Zeno looked as if the notion distressed him.

  “If your entire life were spent leading a procession you might indeed have a short existence, but at least it would be a happy one,” Hero remarked, tinkering with the innards of a lyre-player.

  John took Sunilda’s small hand and gave it a tug. “If you want Hero to finish what he’s working on in good time, we’d best leave him to it.”

  Sunilda made an effort to pull her hand away but it was apparent John was not going to release his grip. “Oh, very well! We can go and see whoever’s making the straw man, Lord Chamberlain.”

  “It’s Minthe, John,” Zeno put in. “I gave her one of my old robes to dress it in and a rather sad-looking leather ball for its head.”

  “We can’t go any further than Minthe’s house,” John told the girl firmly as they left the workshop. “Bertrada expected you to have only a short visit with Hero and will be wondering where you are if we’re away too long.” He did not mention that he did not wish to take the girl into the village, since it was in an increasing uproar over the dire configurations of the goats.

  The smell of smoke from the forge followed them outside along with the sound of hammering and a sudden muffled curse from Hero. Godomar might consider the automatons the devil’s work, John thought, but it would take a miracle to see them finished in time to perform their allotted roles at the festival.

  “Let’s have a game of micatio!” Sunilda had managed to slip her hand loose from his and raised her small fist.

  John sighed but made a fist himself. Playing micatio was not one of his official duties at court.

  Sunilda smiled. “One…two…three…” she counted and shook her fist up and down. “Six!” she shrieked, unfolding four fingers at once. She gave a delighted laugh. The Lord Chamberlain had called “Five!” and extended two fingers.

  “Your two fingers and my four make six,” the girl explained importantly, if unnecessarily. “So I win this time! Do you want to try again?”

  John smiled and made another fist. He had discovered during the last few days that he did not care much for children’s games. Perhaps he would not have made a very good father had Fortuna permitted him the opportunity to help raise his child. Yet he had not minded pretending to race Sunilda around the garden and it had not occurred to him until afterwards that he must have appeared very foolish indeed loping along in his formal robe a few paces behind the little girl.

  “Two!”

  “Three!”

  Sunilda clapped her hands with glee. “Again!”

  They played the game for a while longer. John did not win one round. He wondered if she were cheating but could not see how.

  She laughed again and looking down at her smiling face John chided himself. He was too familiar in dealing with adults, the powerful men and women at court who survived by such behavior, not little girls who took such pleasure in a simple game. “I’m afraid Fortuna smiles more often on you than me, Sunilda.”

  “Not at all,” the girl replied solemnly. “I just know what’s going to happen before it happens.”

  “I see.” John amended his thoughts. His experience, or rather lack of it, of dealing with eight-year-olds obviously had little bearing on how he should deal with Sunilda.

  They were still standing at the edge of the courtyard by the workshop. Loud and contentious voices began to drift out of the building. John urged Sunilda to hurry if she wanted to visit Minthe and see the straw man.

  “I haven’t played micatio for a long time,” he remarked as they set off. “Who taught you how to play?”

  “Felix showed me yesterday.”

  “Yesterday?”

  “He and Bertrada are best friends again,” the girl said seriously, “so I’m glad Poppaea is getting better. I’d like someone to play with. Bertrada will be talking all the time with Felix and reading to him now. Felix is funny sometimes but when I pulled his beard, he was angry with me.” She looked contrite.

  “I’m not surprised,” John replied as they reached the coast road. “But as a proper young lady you should know that not only was it very impolite to do such a thing, but also unwise to annoy a ferocious excubitor captain.”

  ***

  When John entered Felix’s room its occupant looked up from the codex on which he was concentrating.

  John did not mince words. “You are consorting with the girl Bertrada again?”

  Felix replied shortly that his private life was his own affair.

  “When it leads you to neglect your duties it is the entire household’s affair, and especially mine.”

  Felix snapped the codex’s leather covers shut and tossed it down on the bed in a manner much too careless for so costly an object. John assumed it belonged to Castor. Every other volume he had seen in Zeno’s villa thus far seemed to have come from his neighbor’s library

  “If you weren’t a good friend, I would draw blood for your suggestion that I neglect my duties, John,” Felix said with a scowl. “Do you suppose I’m some dreamy poet like Anatolius? When I’m on duty, I’m on duty and not sewing a fine embroidery of romantic fantasies in my head.”

  “You wield an excellent metaphor for a military man!”

  “What would you know of…” Felix caught himself. He shook his head. “I’m sorry, John. I do sound like Anatolius, don’t I? Making a fool of myself over a girl. No woman should cause strife between two old comrades such as you and I.”

  “It’s a common enough occurrence, my friend,” John replied. “Of course, you need not fear me as a rival for her affections.”

  “I didn’t mean—”

  John gave a slight smile. “Then let’s put our argument behind us.”

  He picked up the codex, noting that it was Cassiodorus’ Gothic History, and leafed through a few of the pages. They retained a faint smell of ink.

  “This is a heavy tome in more ways than one, if I may say so, Felix.”

  “And it’s only the first of twelve,” was the doleful reply.

  “But you’re not a Goth, are you? I hope you aren’t supposed to memorize the history of all these tribes. There are scores listed here, what with the Aeragnaricii and the Ahelmil, not to mention the Vinovilith, the Suetidi—”

  Felix gestured to John to cease reading. A faint smile flickered behind his unruly beard. “And none of them my kin either! However, like the Goths, my tribe has Germanic roots, so we’re practically related, Bertrada and I.” He looked at the floor and then suddenly asked, “John, do you ever grieve for an opportunity you f
ailed to grasp?”

  “In a word, no, or at least not so far as court goes. Or do you mean an opportunity to hear warm words from a young woman’s pretty lips?”

  Felix’ jaw set firmly as his nascent smile vanished. “No, I didn’t mean that, but since you mention it, younger eyes sometimes see more clearly than old and it’s certainly true that I’m not advancing as quickly as I should.”

  “The emperor and the empress always see very clearly everything that might affect them, Felix, including discontent among the palace guards. Even the merest appearance of improper ambition is extremely dangerous. More than one such foolish dreamer’s head has been set free to wander, as you should know.” He paused, aware suddenly of the uncharacteristically cold tone in his voice. “I’m sorry, my friend. I’m getting short-tempered. I’m afraid I’m not advancing quickly enough with my current task.” He waved the codex he was holding. “And this has reminded me again of how utterly I have failed in my search to learn anything of the whereabouts of its owner.”

  “I’m sick of the cursed thing! Much as I love history, by the time I finish twelve volumes of it, I’ll be history myself. If anyone remembers me, that is.”

  John leafed thoughtfully through the codex. “This set must have been an expensive acquisition. Why would Castor be so interested in the Goths?”

  “He was interested in everything, John. Obviously he knew that Zeno had Goths as guests this summer and it piqued his interest.”

  “That’s probably so.” John snapped the codex shut. “But have you noticed, there’s something exceedingly strange about all this? The murdered child was an heir to the Ostrogoth throne. And yet, look at those who have died or vanished since. A mime, a servant, an unworldly Roman patrician. None of them Goths or even politically involved. How often, would you say, is a royal heir murdered for reasons having nothing to do with succession?”

  “I doubt you’d find anyone who would give you good odds on that. After all, innocent people often die when the powerful squabble.”