The Terror of Constantinople a-2

by Richard Blake

  ‘I know it’s Sunday, but would you mind awfully if I had the whole household taken in for questioning? I promise not to have any of them on the rack until tomorrow morning.’

  ‘My Lord Priscus,’ I said, looking coldly at him, ‘I am in charge of this investigation. It will proceed by my rules, not those of the Black Agents. There will be no use of torture until we have a definite suspect.’

  Priscus smiled and poured himself more wine. ‘Oh, come now, Alaric – none of this softie philosophising,’ he said with a dismissive wave at my bookshelves. ‘If you’d been in charge of things, Justinus would still be running about to spread his poison. The surest road to truth runs through the rack.’

  I thought of a jeering question about how many other people he’d arrested in place of Justinus, before tracking the man down to a public table in one of the city’s most expensive restaurants.

  But it didn’t do to push things too far. I went back to the business in hand.

  ‘We proceed by my rules,’ I said, ‘or you can explain yourself to His Majesty when I back out of the investigation. What you do with the criminal when I’ve produced him is for you to decide. Investigation is my business.’

  As I rose to my feet, a sound of distant cheering drifted through the window.

  ‘What’s that?’ I asked with involuntary interest.

  ‘That’, said Priscus, ‘will be my Divine and Ever-Victorious Father-in-Law declaring an amnesty for all offences but treason. He really needs the crowd on his side, now that Heraclius is moving over in person to handle the siege.’

  Fat lot of difference that would make, I grunted to myself. During my entire stay in the City, I’d not seen a single offence – from murder all the way down to cutting purses – that hadn’t been twisted into some variety of treason.

  Still, Phocas seemed to have pleased the crowd again.

  I frowned and returned to the original subject. ‘I think, My Lord, you can be spared for the important work of defending the City. I am myself under some pressure of time – I must ready myself for the funeral service in the Great Church. The investigation will move faster if I am able by myself to interview the key witnesses between now and this evening.’

  ‘Then, my darling Alaric, we shall begin tomorrow morning.’

  No, I thought to myself. Not only did I want to interview every actual and potential witness without Priscus beside me to put them off. I also needed to do it now. The longer matters were left unresolved, the more people would start forgetting important facts. Continual repetition to others would blur and distort recollections that even now were still reliable.

  Before I could think of some emollient lie to send Priscus on his way, the door opened again. It was Martin.

  ‘Aelric,’ he said, ignoring Priscus and the need to use my public name, ‘you’d better come quickly.’

  His voice shook. I saw tears glistening on his deathly pale face.

  ‘It’s Authari,’ he said.

  42

  In his last convulsion, Authari had pitched forward out of his seat. When I arrived in the Permanent Legate’s bedroom, he lay face down in the pool of now congealed blood.

  Martin had found him after he’d finished gathering all the papers he could lay hands on into one of our document crates, ready for inspection in my own office. He’d gone into the room to see if Authari wanted something to eat.

  At first he’d supposed that Authari had got himself some wine and drunk himself into a heap. Now, weeping softly, he stood back while Priscus and I inspected the body.

  ‘My darling boy,’ Priscus drawled, ‘would it alter me in your estimation if I observed that this doesn’t look at all like the Permanent Legate?’

  Yes – where was the other body? Nothing else in the room had been disturbed. The window shutters still lay open as I’d left them. There, now in sunlight, was the blood patch still on the floor. But where the Permanent Legate’s body had lain was now only an expanse of less bloody floorboards.

  Two sets of footprints led away to a rug on which bloody footwear had evidently been cleaned before the body was taken off to God knew where.

  Now, in place of that corpse, lay Authari.

  I swallowed and made no reply.

  Priscus took up the wooden cup that had lain in a corner of the room. He ran a finger round the moist inside of the cup and licked his finger. He spat vigorously and rinsed his mouth from a wine flask he carried in his robe.

  ‘It’s one of the metallic poisons,’ he said, rinsing his finger. ‘This isn’t the low-grade muck women buy in the shops to use on their husbands. You need a licence to buy it, and use is confined to the Imperial Service.

  ‘I’ve used it myself many times,’ he added thoughtfully. ‘When I was operating against the Persians in Mesopotamia, I once had a pair of gloves steeped in the stuff, and presented them to a barbarian ally I thought was dealing both ways. Everyone believed he died of a heart attack while wiping his arse.’

  Priscus gave me a complacent smirk, then looked down at the twisted, blackened face as I rolled the body over.

  ‘Taken as a liquid, and in that concentration,’ he added, ‘I’d say your man was dead before the first mouthful reached his stomach. The tongue would have swollen like that just after death.’

  He turned to the blood patch on the floor.

  ‘I imagine he was killed so the body could be removed,’ he said. ‘My normal preference is for something a little slower. But I can see this was an emergency.’

  ‘That seems to follow,’ Martin broke in, still agitated. Ignoring Priscus, he looked at me. ‘My suspicion is that the Permanent Legate’s killer was hiding somewhere in this room. Just because we didn’t find the hiding place on first inspection doesn’t mean there isn’t one.’

  Priscus gave Martin an unpleasant look, then turned back to an inspection of the body.

  ‘Whoever poisoned Authari must have had his trust,’ I said. ‘That wouldn’t be someone who’d just crawled out of a wall space. More likely, someone he knew came in, put him out of the way, then rescued the hidden killer and helped him lift the body.’

  It made sense that a hidden killer would need Authari out of the way. But why bother taking the Permanent Legate’s body? It wouldn’t have been an easy thing to carry. And where had it gone? The Legation was sealed.

  Perhaps there was something about the body I hadn’t noticed, but that the medical inspection I’d ordered might reveal. But this was more speculation.

  ‘My Lord Priscus,’ I said, turning back to the matter in hand, ‘if, back in my office, I gave any impression of not welcoming your involvement in this case, I apologise.’

  I steeled myself, and followed with the inevitable: ‘Can I call on you for immediate assistance?’

  Priscus smiled. He knew that everything had changed. Finding the Permanent Legate’s killer was a duty that I had to discharge sooner or later. Now I also had Authari to avenge. Unlike Martin, I wouldn’t give way to emotion in front of Priscus. I forced myself to remain calm. But I could feel the grief and the outrage clawing away deep inside me. It was dulled only by the immense weariness that was beginning to sweep over me in waves.

  Authari was dead. He’d taken hold of that cup with perfect trust. He’d drained it in front of some smiling face, blessing the man who’d thought to bring him refreshments.

  I’d catch whoever had done this. I’d have him in those dungeons under the Ministry, and I’d gladly turn the rack while Priscus played with his branding irons and hooked gloves.

  ‘Of course you have my fullest co-operation,’ Priscus said in his most slimy drawl. ‘Whatever you want is yours. Just say the word. Only one thing I’d ask in return.’ He paused and took a swig from his flask. ‘I’d be most terribly grateful if you could drop the “My Lord”. All my friends call me Priscus.’

  ‘Thank you, Priscus,’ I said. They were difficult words to force out. But I had no choice. I’d have said more, but he was over by the door. He clapped his h
ands smartly. One of the Black Agents appeared immediately. He must have followed us over, though I hadn’t noticed.

  ‘Alaric,’ said Priscus, ‘do say what you want.’

  The Black Agent produced a book of waxed tablets and a stylus.

  ‘I want this room taken apart,’ I said. ‘I want the boards taken up. I want the plaster off the walls. I want the ceiling pulled down. I want this room broken up atom by atom. If there is any hiding place here, I want it found.’

  I bent and carefully lifted the wine cup from where Priscus had left it.

  ‘I want this matched with any other set in the Legation. The building is still sealed. No one can get in or out. Whoever poisoned Authari was known to him. If we can find where the cup came from, we may be closer to discovering who filled it with poisoned wine.

  ‘And I want the entire Legation household lined up outside my office for questioning. That includes secretaries, officials, slaves – and those monks who look after the gardens.’

  The Black Agent scratched laboriously away with his stylus. I could see he was operating at the limits of his ability. I only hoped that he and his people were up to following my instructions.

  Priscus looked at him and then back to me. ‘It will all be as you wish,’ he said quietly.

  ‘There is more,’ I added. ‘The Permanent Legate’s body can’t have gone far. With your people blocking the entrance, I can’t see how it’s left the Legation. I want a room-by-room search of the entire building – excepting only my suite, where I will arrange a search of my own. I want that body or any remains of it.’

  ‘Martin,’ I said softly, patting his shoulder, ‘please have Authari taken back to our quarters. Have him washed and dressed for burial the day after tomorrow. Can you book the church where I freed him the other day?’

  Martin got up and silently left the room. For all that it had once seemed unlikely, his friendship with Authari had become an established fact. Now, just a few days into his new and better life as a freedman, Authari lay dead. Martin was disconsolate.

  Another of the Black Agents entered the room. He handed a message to Priscus.

  ‘Just as I expected!’ he snarled. ‘Those fuckers in the Blue Faction have taken offence at the defensive role I gave the Greens. They say it’s less exposed than theirs and more glorious. I’m needed urgently to stop a battle from starting in the streets.’

  With a dramatic swirl of his cloak, he was off.

  ‘You will find the killer,’ Martin said later when we were alone. ‘You always get to the truth. You never fail.’

  He spoke like a child looking up at his father, expecting all to be put right with a few words.

  ‘Whatever can be done’, I said gently, ‘will be done. The world may be coming apart around us. But I’ll have the killer if it means arresting Phocas himself.’

  It sounded a brave promise. In truth, though, I did have an idea. It had been forming for a while without my active participation. It would continue forming until I could see its proper shape. It might not be a complete answer. In the nature of things, it would probably lead to further mystery. But I was no longer so utterly baffled as when I’d first drawn those window bolts to let in the morning light.

  I sank into a chair and looked over at Martin. The afternoon light streamed in from the garden outside my office. I sipped indifferently at the fruit squash he’d arranged in place of the wine I’d ordered.

  Martin needed a shave, I could see. There were ginger bristles all over his face. They, plus the haggard eyes, made him look like a much older man. Bad posture didn’t help. I never had persuaded him to join me in regular exercise. Now, all the compulsive gorging on honeyed things was beginning to tell. If he ever got out of here alive, Sveta would have something else to nag him about.

  I reached up to feel my own face. No need of a razor for those boyish cheeks, I decided. I rather thought my eyebrows might need plucking though, until I could replace Authari, I’d probably have to live with them as they were.

  I checked myself. Authari was dead. If my eyebrows were growing out, that was of no present consequence.

  ‘Before we have everyone in for interview,’ I said, ‘do please send a message to Theophanes. Ask him to get me written instructions on what I’m supposed to do at this evening’s service. Am I expected to officiate in some way? Or do I just watch the proceedings?

  ‘And do arrange a search party for Demetrius. He was the last person to see the Permanent Legate alive. He’ll be skulking somewhere in the building. If not, I’ll have to get Priscus to make enquiries.’

  More like his old self at the resumption of work, Martin pointed at one of our document crates.

  ‘These are all the papers I could find in the Permanent Legate’s office,’ he said. ‘I haven’t been able to go through them in detail. But you are right that they’ve been carefully sifted.’

  Martin swallowed. ‘There are, even so, many writings of a licentious nature. You may wish to commit them to the flames once we’ve checked for secret writing.’

  I tried to think of a cynical comment. Instead, I found myself wondering if I should have taken advantage of the drug Priscus had offered me. I was aching for my bed, and those berries Theophanes had given me were losing their effect.

  I changed the subject. ‘Martin, is everyone, excepting Demetrius, lined up outside?’ I asked.

  He nodded, adding that he’d made sure they were sitting far enough apart to prevent any conferring.

  ‘Good,’ I said briskly. ‘We’ll have Antony in first. He’s a lawyer, which means he might understand the difference between fact and supposition. Are you ready to take notes?’

  He nodded again.

  ‘Well,’ I said, ‘we’re almost ready to start. Before we do, Martin, I’d be grateful if you could run down and see if those bastard tailors have arrived yet. I can’t be seen at the Great Church with four inches of leg showing below my robe.’

  43

  ‘Brother Thomas,’ I cried, ‘I bring you all the love and regard of His Holiness the Universal Bishop.’

  I planted as brief a kiss as decency allowed on the hairy, lice-ridden cheek of the Greek Patriarch. Several thousand pairs of eyes turned in our direction. Thomas ignored the provocation.

  ‘This is supposed to be a Christian burial,’ he hissed without moving his lips. ‘You may not be aware of it but the body comes uncovered into church.’

  ‘You haven’t seen the face,’ I whispered back. ‘It would give even the Black Agents a turn.’

  It had given me a turn, I can tell you, when Theophanes had insisted we should substitute Authari for the Permanent Legate.

  ‘No!’ Martin had sobbed – ‘In the name of God, no!’ Authari should rest in a grave under his own name, he’d insisted.

  I’d joined in the protests. The dead can feel nothing one way or the other. But that doesn’t relieve the living of their duties. I’d agreed with Martin, adding some very strong words of my own.

  But Theophanes had been adamant. Murder was one thing. A stolen body violated all the decencies of life in the city.

  It wasn’t safe to try smuggling in another body through the dense crowds now surrounding the Legation. Nor would a sealed coffin do. We could get away with a cloth covering, but, one way or another, there had to be a body.

  So Authari it had to be. He had died a freedman and glad of his status. Now, in death, he wore the white-and-purple-bordered robe of full senatorial status.

  For a moment I thought the Patriarch would step past me and pull the cloth away. But, with the Emperor glowering down from his throne, he backed off, taking this as just one more irregularity to add to all the others.

  ‘Oh, we’d better just get on with things,’ he muttered. ‘Move as I direct you. Don’t push things any further by trying to join in the service. And whoever advised you on gold leaf for your face will surely burn in Hell!’

  I’d been passing the Great Church several times a day since July. I’d been dropp
ing in for services as often as I’d thought necessary for keeping up appearances. Now, what to say about the place?

  If you’ve never been out of England, think of the biggest and most lavish church you ever saw and try to imagine it beside the Great Church of Constantinople as a lit taper next to the sun. If you know Rome, you can do better. Think in that case of the Prefect’s Basilica, but make it bigger and taller, and replace the barrel vaults of its roof with a dome that has means of support you only see if you know something of engineering.

  The Great Church had been consecrated over seventy years earlier, with Justinian himself in attendance. This was after a Circus riot that had left much of the city centre in smoking ruins. His intention was to stamp his authority on the Empire once and for all with a building that would outdo the efforts all his predecessors and Solomon himself with its size and magnificence.

  With no shortage of cash in those days, and architects of genius, Justinian had succeeded in spectacular fashion. Every stone quarry in Greece and Asia Minor had been worked double-time to supply the columns and interior furnishings. Every temple in Syria still untouched by centuries of closure had been ransacked for bronze doors and other fittings. The artists had faced problems hitherto unimagined to decorate the interior with mosaics that were in proportion to the whole.

  The result was the largest covered space ever built. From the outside, it is impressive in its mass but looks rather like a giant mushroom. It’s on the inside that it comes alive. The overall shape of the Great Church is a cross with arms of equal length. Its central space is a rectangle of about eighty yards by seventy-five. This is divided from the nave by great columns which take the weight of the galleries and, sixty yards above the floor, of the central dome.

  Our procession had set out from the Legation and crossed the square into the wide atrium of the church. At the main door, we’d been met by the Patriarch. Now, he was leading the way past the Imperial Throne towards the high altar. The interior was brilliantly lit by a constellation of lamps that were suspended from points high above.