The Tomb of Zeus

by Barbara Cleverly

  In spite of the obvious care someone had taken to set out the garden, Letty found she had no instinctive urge to step into it and enjoy it.

  Hesitating in the doorway, she looked about her at the library, admiring the coolly purposeful room, its walls lined with book-shelves, the centre occupied by a generous number of tables and chairs. A communal room if ever she saw one, and she calculated that Theodore Russell most probably had his own private retreat elsewhere in the large house. The lectern in pride of place, bearing an open copy of the first of Arthur Evans's volumes on his discoveries at Knossos, was sending out a sly message, she thought, and she smiled.

  “There you are! Don't stand about—come in! Good breakfast? Phoebe look after you all right, did she? Good. Good. William and I have been hard at it since five o'clock,” Theodore announced. Looking at the self-satisfied pair, each with shirtsleeves rolled up, discovered bending amicably over the largest of the tables, Letty could well believe it. The two men appeared to be examining a map extended over the table and held down at the corners with potsherds.

  “Now—who've we got?” Russell made a quick roll call: “Stewart, Dickie, and Laetitia. Step forward, Laetitia, and look at this! It's your itinerary we're planning, miss. Crete not well served by map-makers, I'm afraid. Captain Spratt had a go in…when was it, William? 1865? And made a remarkably good fist of it—for his time. But not adequate for this day and age. What you see before you…” They crowded round to inspect the paper patchwork in front of them. “…is the culmination of my own attempts to pin down this mysterious island and reduce its four majestic dimensions to a simple—two.”

  He waved a hand over the map, portions of which seemed to be printed, others hand-drawn and coloured, yet others blank. “Underpinning all this are old Admiralty charts from before the War. Out of date when I made off with them, but I've personally sailed around and hiked across the island and made many corrections and additions.”

  “Mr. Russell, I can identify two dimensions,” said Letty, trying for an alert student's voice, eagerness just in control. “Length—one hundred and fifty miles, width—thirty miles on average. But the other two…?”

  “Height, of course, nitwit!” burst from him and, for a moment, Laetitia felt herself accepted. Russell recollected himself and went on in a more moderate tone, “Even from your first view from the harbour”—he pointed to Herakleion—“you can't have failed to notice the mountains. They run the length of the island, sticking up like the backbone of a donkey, and human life here has always had to seek out its niches in the interstices. River valleys, plateaux wherever Nature has created them, coastline, of course, but it's not a country that opens its arms to settlers.”

  “And yet they came and continue to come,” remarked Gunning. “It's a stepping-stone between three continents. Down here to the south you've got Egypt and Libya, to the north and west is Europe, and to the north and east is Asia Minor. And here, at the hub, caught between these widely different and vibrant cultures, is Crete. We don't know where the first inhabitants came from—George is in pursuit with his measuring sticks—but we do know that the very earliest remains of Stone Age Man are to be found using the shelter of the thousands of caves scattered all over the island—”

  “Which brings us to the fourth dimension,” Russell interrupted. “Time! And again—this goes deep and is difficult to measure. You are about to embark on the most stimulating and worthwhile study available to an archaeologist: no less than revealing to the world one of its earliest and most attractive civilizations. It was here, Laetitia,” he tapped a hairy knuckle over a red spot on the map which she had already identified as Knossos, “in the Palace of King Minos that mankind learned to dance and sing and feast, to worship the Mother Goddess and Nature herself in peace and plenty; where he learned to respond to the beauty around him by recording his brilliant culture in the most glorious works of art of the ancient world…or of any world.”

  Enjoying the rapt attention of his audience, he strolled to a glass-fronted cupboard and took out an object which he brought back to the table cradled in his large hands. He set it down in front of Laetitia and waited to hear her murmurs of awe and appreciation. Into her silence he said encouragingly, “Four thousand years ago, a Minoan artist carved in ivory the image of his Goddess. And here she is.”

  The nine-inch-high figurine was carved from elephant tusk, making skilful use of the natural curvature of the material to convey the proud, stiff, slightly backwards-leaning stance of the Mother Goddess—or was this her priestess? She wore a high castellated crown and her long hair fell to her shoulders. Her skirt was flounced, the tiers edged with gold, and around her narrow waist could just about be made out a ceremonial apron. Her upper body was naked apart from thick golden bracelets on her upper arms. Downwards from her elbows wound more strips of gold which, on reaching her forward thrusting hands, reared up suddenly as snakes' heads, tongues flicking out aggressively. The Lady's expression was un-dimmed by aeons under the earth, still speaking to her worshippers.

  Worshippers amongst whom she could clearly count Dick and Stewart. Their eyes never left the delicate figure, held firmly in Theodore's hands.

  “I say…may I?” Letty breathed.

  “Of course.”

  As she made to gather up the figure, Letty caught a nervous movement from Gunning; his lips tightened and he looked hastily away. To other onlookers, this was the nervous reaction of a man steeling himself to watch a woman he does not trust about to handle a precious object, but Letty knew the man and thought otherwise. Consciously or not—she could not be certain—he was sending her a warning.

  With due reverence she lifted the ivory piece and looked at it closely, holding it firmly by its wide base and steadying it with one gentle finger atop its head as she'd been taught.

  All four men waited for her response.

  Her inspection complete, she turned the statuette upside down and peered at the base. She sighed.

  “Ah. Yes. There it is: Made in Athens. I feared so. It's quite lovely, Mr. Russell, but I hope you didn't pay more than ten guineas for it?”

  She turned with a bright smile to the students. “Not the work, sadly, of a Minoan Michelangelo but an Athenian craftsman—one of the Constantidis brothers, perhaps? There's a workshop just off Syntagma Square, where you can pick up wonderfully convincing…um…replicas.” Her voice trailed away encountering their shocked disapproval.

  Dick broke the frozen silence. “But it doesn't say…Oh, I see! She's joking! Laetitia—you m…m…mistake this!” He went on earnestly, crippled with embarrassment for her gaffe: “I assure you—it is indeed a genuine antique. Excavated at a palace site fifty miles from here. If you would care to take a second look, you'll see that the ivory is worn away exactly as you'd expect in an object thousands of years old. Let me pass you a magnifying glass.”

  “And the whole posture,” Stewart attacked from the left, “is so typically Minoan…so familiar from wall paintings…the details of the dress so well observed…can we be surprised that the leading authorities on the island have all authenticated this particular figure? But perhaps we should now discount the expertise of the Germans, the Italians, the French, and the Americans, for here is Miss Talbot, freshly arrived, to set us all straight. Oh, dear! Gentlemen, I fear we've all been paying tribute to a. false goddess!”

  Letty felt her cheeks reddening. She looked about her for support or understanding but saw only male antagonism, dislike, scorn. Sympathy was the best Gunning could offer before he looked away. She felt herself surrounded and alone. Only one thing to do, Letty! Her brother's voice came back to her as he'd tried to explain to his little sister the tactics he used in aerial combat over Flanders. Three-dimensional pieces of choreography—however complicated, his manoeuvres always seemed to end with the same war cry: À l'at-taque! John, she was certain, would have been yelling just that when his solitary De Havilland had run into a squadron of Fokkers. In late September 1915, with the war in the air stil
l in its early stage of chivalrous combat, the German authorities had graciously returned his remains, and the leader of the enemy squadron had sent a letter saying that the lone Englishman had managed to shoot down four of his fighters in his suicidal attack before succumbing to a hail of machine-gun bullets.

  À l'attaque! it was, then, since the enemy was massing and there was no safe way back to base. Laetitia's chin went up, her eyes narrowed, and she smiled a smile involving everyone in the room, assessing the strengths of her targets. Her brother would have picked off the weakest first.

  “I'll answer your objection first, Dick, since it's the one most easily refuted by scientific—indeed, forensic—evidence.” Her fore-finger trailed gently over the pitted surface of the ivory. “Yes, I agree it looks as though it's been buried for centuries, but this process of decay can be simulated, speeded up, you know. Immersion in a jar of acid of the correct dilution will do the trick. A quick treatment, but somewhat crude and easily detectable. I understand the really professional way to do this, for those prepared to invest more of their time in the operation, is to bury the carving in the back garden and have the male members of the family urinate over the spot. It takes about a year. I think we have an example of such dedicated professionalism before us.”

  “Oh, I say!” Dick could not find words to express his distress at her unladylike language.

  “And Stewart's objection…” She placed the goddess on the table and, lining herself up with the figure, struck the same ceremonial pose: shoulders down, chest out, hands extended as if in protest. “A fair copy, though any man with a working knowledge of a woman's anatomy will see at once the difference between the truly ancient version and this twentieth-century artist's view. The breasts, gentlemen!”

  In confusion, four pairs of eyes shot to the safer target of the bosom carved in ivory.

  “Minoan bosoms are high and rounded and virginal—think of apples—and they are well corseted. In the genuine museum pieces I've seen in Athens and Oxford and here in Herakleion yesterday, the lady is wearing a tight-fitting laced bodice with set-in sleeves. In the statuette before us you can see that the model used is rather…um…mature. And the artist, apparently uninspired by—or perhaps uninformed as to—the fashions in bodices has chosen to omit the garment completely. The unrestrained flesh produces the effect I observe you are now judging afresh. Pears rather than apples, are you thinking?”

  Throats were cleared, feet were shuffled. Someone—Theo— snorted in disgust.

  “And where is her pinafore?” If she was being tested, she'd give them both barrels in reply. “It forms an indispensable part of the Minoan priestess's wardrobe, but here is merely suggested in a sketchy way. Could that be because a modern eye sees a pinny as a degrading, housewifely garment? Better left out of the design. And three tiers to the skirt? Wouldn't we have looked for seven?”

  Her audience peered with renewed interest at the figurine.

  “And the face?” she continued. “The lady is quite lovely! An angel from a Gothic cathedral perhaps? A Byzantine Madonna? Next month's cover girl on Vogue magazine? Any of those. What these features are saying to me—a. woman—is: This is no snake goddess. The faces of the genuine ones always strike me with awe and—yes-horror. You wouldn't want to have one on your bedside table! They are recognisably human and female but they convey no emotion I can understand. They are wide-eyed yet inward-looking, brutal, unapproachable. From another age. But this face is one I feel I know. The English mistress I had a crush on? That's it! It's Miss Carstairs saying: ‘Oh, come now, Letty! Do stop chattering!’”

  “We are not the first to suffer, then,” Theodore rasped sarcastically. “But we must thank you, miss, for sharing with us your female and sartorial insights. Could the editress of the Butterick Pattern Book have spoken with greater authority on flounces and sleeve settings? I doubt it. Will you put the lady back in the cupboard, William? And then, let us study the archaeological highlights of the island on the map.”

  “It's a bit like a gold rush,” Dick explained to Letty. “All the nations interested have set up national Schools of Archaeology in Athens and each supports its prospectors on the ground. Sir Arthur wasn't the first to dig at Knossos, you know. Lots of people had their eye on it—it was well known in local legend to be the spot where Minos had ruled in antiquity, and there was a local man—a Cretan—funnily enough I believe his name was Minos…

  “Kalokairinos,” supplied Gunning. “Minos Kalokairinos.”

  “That's right. Thank you, Will. And this chap had been digging up all sorts of impressive stuff before Evans stepped off the boat. The old man was actually obliged to buy up the whole site in 1900 to get his hands on the excavation rights. Schliemann himself had been sniffing around, I understand. I suppose the world was lucky that the man who got ultimate control of it was a man of erudition and experience.”

  “As well as of resources and connexions,” Gunning added. “A man's reputation can rise or fall in an hour according to the whim or preference of a newspaper editor these days.”

  Russell heard him and turned his comment into a challenge for Letty: “I'm quite certain our Laetitia, modern young miss that she is, is already a skilled manipulator of the Gentlemen of the Press.”

  “I think we all learned lessons when the Howard Carter Circus came to town,” said Letty quietly. “Young King Tutankhamen was fortunate indeed to be unearthed by an excavator who knew how to secure the attention of editors on both sides of the Atlantic.”

  “Unless, of course, the Pharaoh would have preferred to continue his sleep of centuries,” Dick suggested.

  “Oh, come off it, Dickie!” said Stewart. “No place for sentimentality in modern archaeology! You have to admire the skill with which it was all presented to the world—the drama, the flashlights, the wonderful artefacts, and all that nonsense about the curse! Showmanship, I dare say, but very effective!”

  “And, contemporary with that civilisation, and no less wonderful,” said Theodore, approving, “here we are at the heart of the realm of Minos. The Palace of Knossos.” He pointed to the map. “There are palaces, villas, and towns scattered all over the habitable parts of this island, but it is at Knossos that you ought to start your studies.”

  Everyone nodded agreement.

  “So I'd like you to begin, Laetitia, by taking the rest of the day off to go there and get your eye in. It's only a mile or two up the road—you can walk, though I recommend a donkey. Not many roads in Crete, you'll find, and the ones we have are damn dangerous. Can't imagine why that son of mine would bother to bring a motorcar here! There are less than fifty miles of drivable road available to him. Old Evans has a sort of glorified cocktail-bar with engine by Royce that he uses to impress his distinguished guests, ferrying them between the port and the Villa Ariadne. And there they run out of road. Everyone else gets about using the ancient track ways. Most of them laid down by the Minoans themselves. When you get to Knossos you should introduce yourself to the folk at the Villa Ariadne before you start poking about. You'll be expected. It's all laid on. There'll be people from the British School there but you won't be received by the great man—Sir Arthur is not in residence at the moment. He was there last year and plans to return, but his digging days are running out. He's approaching eighty, after all…One must expect it.” A note of triumph gave the lie to the sighing sympathy in his voice.

  “Now observe! The road past Knossos—just keep going along the Arkhanais road…” Letty eagerly followed his pencil. “And after a few more miles you come to the village where you're going to be based during the digging week—Kastelli. And it's here that your own excavation will be carried out. At weekends you will of course return here to us at the Europa. Lots of social events staged for you, I understand from Phoebe. Can't tell you how pleased she is that she's to have some female company in the house.” Had a trace of puzzlement crept into his voice? “And after five days of roughing it out there in the country you'll be dying to get back. I'm s
tarting you off with a small but skilled digging team—my best men. You will have under your direction eight diggers as your first team, plus any extras you may require to be recruited in the village.

  “The foreman of your team is a Cretan—Aristidis. Kapitan to his men! He comes from the village so he's well known locally. Middle-aged and thoroughly reliable. Safe pair of hands. He speaks excellent English and will act as interpreter as well as go-between for you and the diggers. Aristidis's enthusiasm for the sport and his…shall we say, candour?…you'll find, are the equal of your own, miss.”

  He paused, his expression speculative and mischievous. He appeared to think better of pursuing his entertaining thought and continued briskly: “Now…we come to the selection of your team members.”

  Letty noticed that the other men had fallen very still in anticipation of his next announcement.

  “You'll be needing another European to accompany you. As your Deputy Director.”

  Glances were shot from side to side, wondering, she guessed, who had drawn the short straw.

  “I've decided that William would be the perfect choice. He can photograph and sketch any finds you may make, and his Greek is really rather good. Besides which, he it is who has been most closely concerned with the project development.”

  Dick and Stewart sighed in unison. Gunning out-sighed them both.