Three for a Letter

by Mary Reed

“Who else is in the line of succession to the throne, of course.”

  “Exactly. Now, when confronted, Balbinus confirmed that the man he called his brother, that is to say Bassus, was actually the illegitimate son of King Theodoric and so had a closer claim on the Italian throne than the twins’ father Athalaric, who after all was only Theodoric’s grandson.”

  Anatolius said he agreed with John’s reasoning thus far. “But Bassus is dead,” he pointed out.

  “As you say. However, Balbinus also revealed that Bassus had fathered a son and that this son was Castor. So if Gadaric’s murder was connected to the matter of succession and there seems no doubt that it was, then obviously it involves Castor, a hitherto unknown heir.”

  “Who ran off immediately after Gadaric’s murder!” Anatolius choked back his excitement. “It sounds so obvious when it’s explained, John, yet I still don’t understand how you could possibly have seen a familial connection between Castor and Minthe.”

  John waited while several heavily armed imperial guards passed nearby, their boots clattering with the staccato sounds of one of Hero’s automatons.

  “Normally I would regard my chain of reasoning to be as flimsy as cobwebs,” John went on, “but consider what I was just saying about patterns. We have established Castor as an heir to the throne. We know the identity of his late father. But what about his mother? Castor was obviously not ambitious or he would have declared his lineage long ago, but as history has repeatedly shown, mothers are often murderously ambitious for their children.”

  “That’s certainly true.”

  “So I cast about for a possible candidate to fit into the mosaic I was constructing, to see what sort of picture it made. I was looking for someone near Bassus, someone who would not be noticed carrying Bassus’ child. Remember, he had been killed in very odd circumstances. Given his lineage….”

  Anatolius looked thoughtful. “Yes, I can see it would be highly dangerous for both mother and child.”

  John quickly related what he had learned during his visit to Nonna. “She described a very vain slave with exceptionally long hair, who had, let us say, social ambitions but who was sold away to another master.”

  “Slaves are always invisible, aren’t they? And so are their children….But what made you think of Minthe? Castor’s mother could have been anyone.”

  “I considered the people living on this estate and in the village. Minthe had long hair, and she was not from the village. You’ll recall Paul mentioned that she moved into that odd little house near him some twenty years ago. Then I remembered you had said that Castor and Zeno had been friends as well as neighbors for a couple of decades. I suspect that Minthe had been keeping her eye on Castor from afar and moved to be near him when he came to live out here.”

  “Well…” Anatolius said dubiously.

  “Consider, too, how close she had managed to become to the twins. An ordinary village woman and two royal children form rather an unusual friendship, wouldn’t you say? But useful if harm is intended. It’s often those nearest the victims who strike the fatal blow. After all, they have easier access to them than everyone else.”

  “Looking at it like that, I suppose it’s not surprising that Minthe appears to be the missing piece.” Despite his agreement, Anatolius still sounded dubious. “However, I can see a very large flaw in your mosaic, John. How could a slave such as Minthe move around so freely?”

  “Slaves can be freed, Anatolius. Am I not myself one such? However, I will admit that what finally convinced me of Minthe’s involvement was when she disappeared at the same time as Sunilda.”

  Anatolius leapt to the conclusion John had already reached. “Mithra! She’s kidnapped Sunilda! She intends to kill her as well!”

  John nodded. “She’s already attempted to poison the girl.”

  “The plates and cups in the mithraeum! Of course!” Anatolius frowned. “But how could Minthe possibly have known about the children’s secret hiding place?”

  “She didn’t have to, Anatolius. You’ll recall that after the abandoned picnic Zeno found Sunilda safe with Minthe. Given everything else that’s transpired, it is not beyond the bounds of reason to assume that before he arrived, Minthe gave Sunilda a poisoned treat to bring back here. Now, the swine fed the remains of the picnic are all still alive, but there was a dead rat in the mithraeum. Dead rats are not unusual, of course, but what if in this instance the animal ate the remains of the treats for the grand party Poppaea talked about—a party we had dismissed as mere delirious ramblings—including whatever remained of what was meant for Sunilda?”

  “But surely Sunilda would have eaten it too,” Anatolius argued, looking even more perplexed. “And she didn’t even get ill. It was Poppaea who almost died.”

  “But what if it contained nuts, like the honeyed dates Peter sometimes prepares for me? Sunilda mentioned in one of her letters to her aunt that the twins were not permitted to eat nuts. Apparently it’s because they provoke some undesired effect in them, just as proximity to certain plants does to you.”

  “You amaze me, John! I could never have thought of such a convoluted theory!”

  “Nor would I,” John admitted, “if Minthe hadn’t directed the gravest suspicion at herself by vanishing at the same time as Sunilda. It was too much of a coincidence not to be connected with what has taken place here. In effect, she had accused herself and as soon as I realized that, all the fragmentary information fell into place and I saw the whole.”

  “But we must be too late to save Sunilda now, she’s been gone so long!” Anatolius frantically burst out, all thought of discretion forgotten.

  John shook his head. “You’ve forgotten that Sunilda wrote about her plan to join Gadaric. It will begin when the straw man is tossed off the headland and that won’t be for a while yet since it’s not yet dawn. Unfortunately, if Sunilda balks I’m absolutely certain Minthe will be only too happy to assist her to carry out her fantasy.”

  Anatolius pointed out that Minthe must have known she could not fail to be hunted down and executed.

  John shrugged. “I may be able to hazard a guess at what someone has done or may be planning to do, but as to how such a one would propose to escape from such a certain fate I confess myself puzzled. Perhaps this is one of those situations where once the desired object is accomplished, nothing else matters and so the perpetrator’s plans extend no further beyond that.”

  “Eliminating the twins would certainly remove even the remotest possibility of any impediment to Castor assuming the throne.” Anatolius lowered his voice again, even though they were standing well away from the general flow of pedestrians. “Of course, given the enormous crushing power that Hero’s accursed artificial hand is capable of exerting, it would be easy for Minthe to employ it to kill Gadaric. To think of her using it on the boy’s throat….”

  John remained silent.

  “Why didn’t Poppaea die, John? Minthe is, after all, a very knowledgeable herbalist.”

  “Since she was responsible for the poisoning attempt, she knew the antidote to administer when the wrong person ate it,” John replied, turning at the sound of Peter’s shuffling approach.

  “You must be hungry, master. I’ve been hunting for you for some time.” The elderly servant ceremoniously offered John a hunk of bread and a piece of cheese from a small silver plate that reminded John of Nonna’s recent hospitality.

  “I regret that this was all I could obtain for you,” Peter went on in an outraged tone. “Theodora’s entourage appear to have scoured the kitchen as cleanly as a plague of locusts.”

  John quickly ate the frugal meal. When he had been requested to attend Zeno’s grand banquet in honor of the twins he had not expected the invitation to lead to the consumption of so much bread and cheese—for once, almost too much. As he finished and handed the plate back to Peter, Godomar loomed out of the darkness and, to John’s well-concealed annoyance, paused to converse with them.

 
“Lord Chamberlain,” he began with a slight bow. “I sincerely hope you do not intend to take part in this blasphemous festival. It would be unconscionable enough at any time, but when an innocent child is dead and another has vanished, to even contemplate holding it is unspeakable.”

  “As a matter of fact, we are about to resume our search for Sunilda,” John replied.

  “Then you won’t be in attendance at the service I have arranged for the villagers? Needless to say, I consider it my duty to offer an alternative to this hideous pagan rite, for it’s obviously no more than that.”

  John noticed Peter directing a furtive, sorrowful glance him. “You are free to go if you wish, Peter,” he told his servant, knowing that it was his, John’s, pagan beliefs that worried Peter much more than his master’s absence at the service just announced.

  “What of Calyce? Is she going?” Anatolius asked with over-elaborate casualness. “And Livia?” he added hastily.

  “The empress has decreed that all of her attendants, including the ladies-in-waiting, will accompany her to the event. No doubt they’ll be much educated in the ways of wickedness after witnessing it!”

  “That’s a lesson Theodora would be well qualified to teach, if it weren’t that her ladies have already been long enough at court to be well practiced,” muttered Anatolius as Godomar departed for the village with Peter trailing behind.

  Watching his servant leave, it struck John, not for the first time, that the aging Christian—who was after all a freed man—might well decide to end his days contemplating the world from a monastery rather than cooking meals for a pagan master with the culinary tastes of an ascetic. Should that come about, what would his house be like when it no longer sounded with Peter’s tuneless singing of lugubrious hymns as he scrubbed the kitchen floor or his scolding when his master did not eat what he considered adequate nourishment?

  He quickly drew his thoughts back to the immediate problem of Sunilda. There, at least, was a loss that it might be in his power to prevent. He had to find her before she had the chance to harm herself.

  Unfortunately, children loved to play hide and seek. And they were experts at it. John had remained ignorant of her intentions for too long and now, if he were to save the girl, he had only until sunrise to discover her hiding place.

  Chapter Thirty-one

  John left Anatolius to stand watch with the guards at the villa and set off down the shore road toward the village.

  The road was as crowded as the Mese at midday, with villagers either making their way to the headland where the celebration would culminate or claiming good places from which to observe the procession as it passed by. John saw no one he recognized except Paul, who was standing at the end of the path to his house. A quick exchange between them confirmed that the man had seen no sign of Minthe or the missing girl.

  “I expected you to be attending Godomar’s service,” John observed.

  Paul took a long time to respond. When he finally spoke, his words were hesitant. “If it were being held at any other time I’d certainly be there, faithful follower that I am. Godomar himself invited me as he went by a little while ago. Quite a flock he’d gathered already. But the straw man goes to the sea and the sea is ancient and all powerful. And though you may say I’m just a foolish old man, still….” His voice trailed away.

  John did not press him further. It had struck him on more than one occasion that the Christians’ rigid insistence on their god’s exclusive sway, so at odds with human nature, would finally prove to be their undoing.

  He continued on his way. The dark sky was strewn with a dusting of stars against which loomed the black masses of trees and bushes. An owl called from the towering shadows of a stand of pines as he passed.

  Just before the road passed through the center of the village, John arrived at an open space illuminated by a huge bonfire. In its shifting light he saw Zeno supervising the drawing up of the procession. Flapping back and forth, long hair flying, the elderly man was directing groups of his servants, villagers, and Felix’s excubitors into their places with equal and enthusiastic impartiality.

  Two of Zeno’s younger servants stood at the head of the line. They wore golden-colored tunics and were harnessed to a cart decorated with fragrant greenery and bundles of straw on which the well-stuffed sacrificial figure was laid out, surrounded by piles of vegetables and fruit. The cart was brightly illuminated by torches held by two men, dressed entirely in red, who flanked it. The sight of the duo immediately reminded John of Mithra’s torchbearers. The notion was strangely comforting.

  Behind the straw man’s cart three or four young village women, dressed in long white garments with chaplets of olive leaves on their hair, were chattering. Their role, Zeno explained to John when he dashed up for a quick word, was to dance in celebration of the straw man’s fate.

  “It’s customary for the rest of the villagers to carry torches and follow behind the young ladies and sing as they walk to the headland for the final ground event. This year, of course, it will be even grander. But I see I am needed. A small problem, perhaps. If you would excuse me…”

  Zeno hurried away. John strolled along the line. Two husky men were standing at its mid point, each grasping one end of a stout pole passing through the center of a wooden wheel to which bundles of brushwood were tied. The bundles would, John guessed, shortly be set afire so that when the wheel was trundled along it would present the appearance of a whirling mass of flames.

  “It’s a sun-wheel,” Zeno confirmed, having reappeared at his side. “I wonder what Lord Mithra’s foolish followers would make of such a thing? I can certainly imagine what Godomar would say about it.”

  “Fortunately for all concerned he won’t see it, Zeno.”

  “And Sunilda hasn’t been found yet?” the other said in a worried tone. “You know, John, if everyone gathered here were to forsake the procession and join in the search…but there are Theodora’s orders to be considered. If the empress wants the festivities to go forward, what choice do any of us have?”

  Their walk had brought them to an ox cart on which sat a trio of Hero’s automatons, two holding lyres and the third grasping a flute. Hero was crouched in the middle of the cart, making small adjustments to the flute player. A gust of wind coaxed a faint, discordant noise from the lyres. It sounded like a far-off groaning.

  Felix, standing nearby, grimaced and tugged at his beard. “I hope these musicians produce a more pleasing sound once you start them up,” he complained to Hero. The inventor, intent on his task, did not answer. Felix lowered his voice for John and Zeno’s benefit. “I must say that that strange sound matches the look of them. They’re extremely odd creatures.”

  The automatons had metamorphosed from the skeletal beings John had last seen in the workshop. Now they were dressed in deep blue dalmatics, their metal skulls sporting wigs of horsehair. Only the metallic surface of their faces and sightless glass eyes betrayed their lack of breath. Hero, of course, would bring them to life at the appropriate point.

  The breeze elicited more moans from the mechanical musicians’ instruments as four burly villagers arrived on the scene, carrying a small litter. Its tasseled curtains were tied back to display another automaton sitting in solitary splendor. Dressed in green and sporting long, fair hair, the creature’s metallic hand grasped a bright emerald-colored bow in which was notched a long gold-painted arrow.

  “Is this all not absolutely magnificent? Everything was completed in time!” Zeno exclaimed. “It is such a good omen that I can hardly believe Sunilda will not reappear soon, safe and sound. I think that all our preparations are completed now. Hero, if you would be so kind as to give the signal?”

  For the space of a few heartbeats nothing happened. Then there was a creaking noise and the head of the flute-player turned slowly as its stiff hands raised the instrument to frozen lips. Silvery notes filled the night air.

  “Mithra!” breathed Felix.

  As th
e procession slowly began to move forward, John glanced at him. The excubitor was closely scanning the area. “I’ll follow along for a while and keep an eye on things, John, in case the girl attempts to slip into the procession,” Felix said. “She might try, so she could get up on the headland among the crowd.”

  John left him at his post and swiftly strode along the length of the slow-moving line as it snaked towards the road.

  Now the fire wheel was set alight, flinging sparks into the starry sky. As the sound of lyres joined the cascading music of the flute, Theodora arrived. Far larger and more ornate than that of the mechanical archer, the empress’ litter announced its presence by the chiming of small bells hanging along its sides. Naturally, her place was at the head of the procession.

  Among the attendants, servants, and soldiers accompanying Theodora John noticed Bertrada and Calyce. Livia was some steps behind them, firmly holding Poppaea’s hand.

  John stepped forward and asked the child how she was faring.

  “She insisted on observing this abominable ceremony,” snapped Livia, keeping her voice low. “Theodora thought it was a splendid idea as well, but then our dear empress has never had to worry about a sick child going out in cold night air, has she?”

  “Oh, mother!” Poppaea said in an exasperated tone. “I am quite well now.”

  “Look, Poppaea.” Livia yanked her daughter’s hand impatiently. “You see that wheel of fire? There are those who worship fire, you know, but such people will see enough of it in the hereafter, as Godomar will tell you. I wish you to be attentive. Tomorrow you will relate to him the lessons you have learned from this disgusting pagan exhibition.”

  Poppaea stared obstinately in the opposite direction.

  John stepped back into the shadows and watched the procession depart. Theodora, he noted, was leaning out of her litter, staring intently back toward the blazing fire wheel. He smiled thinly at the sight. The noisy ceremony was akin to many that the ancient shore must have seen since the world was young, and yet here was the wife of the ruler of an avowedly Christian empire completely enthralled by it, to judge from the curve of her scarlet lips.