Bodies Politic

by David Wishart

  But the guy had gone. There was just a dark shape in the scummy water below, about three feet down and sinking fast, with a white blob on top which was his upturned face, and a burst of bubbles trailing up from the open mouth.

  Then there wasn’t even that.

  CHAPTER SIXTEEN

  Clarus and I agreed not to mention what had happened to the ladies. Whoever he’d been, and whoever he’d been working for, the guy was dead, and there was an end of it.

  We sailed on schedule the next day.

  As sea trips go, I’ve had worse. Far worse. Like I said, the Erytheis was a big boat, built with passengers as well as cargo in mind - we weren’t the only ones, by any means - and although we just had the one cabin, with four bunk beds, it wasn’t the poky hell-hole I’d expected. Not luxury standard, sure, but a whole lot better than you can reasonably hope for unless your bank balance runs to owning a blue-water yacht. I wasn’t seasick, either, or no more than a little queasy towards the start: whatever Clarus’s father had put into his anti-seasickness pills it was the stuff of miracle. Not that I could complain about the weather: the sea was flat as an atrium pool all the way, the Etesian winds didn’t let up, and exactly ten days out from Brindisi we were sailing past the lighthouse into Alexandria’s eastern harbour.

  Me, I’m not one for gawping at buildings and monuments. Even so, I challenge anyone not to gawp, the first time. The Greeks may be smarmy oversophisticated buggers who’re too clever for their own good, but by the gods they can build cities. And when you arrive by sea - which almost everyone does - your first sight of Alexandria hits you between the eyes like a meat cleaver. The guy who designed the city made sure that it would.

  Start with the lighthouse. Forget your end-of-the-breakwater-at-Ostia tat with the smoky lamp. The lighthouse is two hundred and fifty feet high, built in three storeys, sheeted top to bottom with coloured marble and set in its own massive colonnaded courtyard. Facing you at its base when you sail past are six forty foot high seated statues of three royal couples, with the Ptolemies as pharaohs and their wives as the goddess Isis. The beacon at the top is kept lit all day every day, three hundred and sixty-five days a year, and you can see it shining from a hundred miles out.

  On your left, stretching all the way along the shore on the higher ground above it, are the Caesareum and the old palaces. The Caesareum isn’t a single building; it’s a huge complex of libraries, porticoes, basilicas and gardens behind a wall - marble-faced again - eleven feet thick, centring around the temple commemorating Augustus’s arrival in the city after Actium. In front of the sea-side entrance, flanking it, are two huge rose-granite obelisks that the Egyptians say date to four hundred years before Troy...

  Yeah. I know, I know: straight out of a tour guide, all of it, and not my usual style at all. Still, no apologies: Alexandria’s special. Unique. Beautiful. Even I can see that. And when you get your first sight of it the city is totally, totally gobsmacking. There is nowhere in the world that comes close, even Rome. That’s got to be said and understood, right at the start.

  They still dicker like hell over transporting you and your stuff to where you want to go after you’ve landed, mind. Alexandrians are Greeks, after all, most of them, and life without a good dicker wouldn’t be worth living to a Greek. It cost us an arm and a leg, even with Perilla on the team.

  ***

  Stratocles’s house was in the best of the residential districts immediately south-east of the city centre between the Mouseion and the Park of Pan. It filled practically half the length of the tree-lined side street, and the marble-faced wall around it would’ve done justice to a temple precinct.

  ‘The master’s resting at present,’ the door-slave said, ‘but I’m sure he won’t mind being disturbed. If you wouldn’t mind waiting, sir, I’ll tell him you’re here.’

  We left Alexis in charge of the baggage and followed the guy through a set of marble-pillared and mosaic-floored rooms like something off the Palatine. Successful businessman was right: for an ex-slave to work his way up to this inside twenty-odd years, the paper trade had to be a real gold mine. And it was tastefully done, too. If I’ve got one criticism of the Alexandrians, it’s that their ideas of decoration can be too garish for my liking. Marble’s all very well, but they tend to take the colour mix a bit too far.

  ‘Is this all right, sir?’ The slave had led us out through a portico into a broad courtyard garden with a fountain in the centre. There was a trellised grape arbour with a wrought-iron table and cushioned chairs. ‘You can wait inside, if you’d prefer.’

  ‘No, this is lovely!’ Perilla said. ‘And look, Marcus! Peacocks!’

  ‘I’ll have some drinks and fruit brought out. Wine for the gentlemen? And fruit juice for the ladies?’

  ‘Just water for me, please,’ Clarus said.

  ‘A cup of wine’d be nice, pal.’ I sat down on one of the chairs and stretched out my legs. The breeze from the coast together with the spray from the fountain made the air in the garden deliciously cool. Birds were singing in the trees all around us, and Perilla’s peacock was spreading its tail. Beautiful. Maybe coming to Alexandria - the case aside - had been a good move after all: I could do with a holiday, and I hadn’t seen Perilla looking this relaxed for months. ‘You wouldn’t have Mareotis, by any chance?’

  ‘But of course, sir.’

  Hey, great! Better and better, perfect, in fact. I’d been looking forward to trying that again on its home ground.

  ‘Corvinus, this is amazing!’ Marilla said when the guy had bowed and left. Her mouth hadn’t closed properly since we’d crossed the harbour bar: like I say, gawping at your first sight of Alexandria is par for the course.

  ‘Yeah. Let’s just hope we don’t get thrown out on our ears.’

  ‘Oh, Stratocles is a dear,’ Perilla said. ‘He was very fond of Uncle Paullus and Aunt Marcia. There’ll be no problems, I’m sure.’

  Five minutes later, the slaves came out with the drinks and fruit, together with a tall, rake-thin old guy with white hair and an impressive Greek-style beard.

  ‘Well, well,’ he said. ‘Rufia Perilla.’

  ‘Hello, Stratocles.’ Perilla got up. ‘How are you?’

  ‘I’m fine, of course. And all the better for seeing you again, ma’am.’ The old man hugged her. ‘Why didn’t you tell me you were coming? Or did the message go astray?’

  ‘It was a last-minute decision,’ Perilla said. ‘We didn’t know ourselves until a few days before we sailed.’

  ‘Indeed?’ He smiled. ‘Well, you always were impulsive, even as a girl.’ What? ‘And this must be your husband.’

  ‘Marcus Corvinus,’ I said. I stood, and we shook. Stratocles had to be seventy, at least, but he was spry enough, and he had a strong handshake. ‘Ah...“impulsive”?’

  ‘Oh, yes. The master - that was Fabius Maximus, Corvinus, rest his bones - always said he never knew what young Rufia Perilla would be up to next. How is the mistress, by the way? The Lady Marcia?’

  ‘I’m afraid Aunt Marcia died late last year,’ Perilla said. ‘No, nothing to be sorry about, Stratocles, she was very old and she didn’t mind going. But she would have wanted me to give you her greetings. This is Valeria Marilla, my stepdaughter, and her fiancé Publius Cornelius Clarus.’

  ‘Delighted.’ Stratocles shook their hands. ‘“Cornelius”?’ You’re a relative of Cornelius Gallus, perhaps, young man? A great poet, and of course an Egyptian governor himself. Such a tragedy, his death.’

  ‘No relation I’m afraid, sir,’ Clarus said. ‘My father’s a doctor.’

  Stratocles’s eyes widened. He was too polite to make the obvious comment, but I could see what he was thinking: there was only one way a doctor’s son could have one of the best middle names in Rome.

  ‘Clarus’s family’ve been citizens for over two hundred years,’ I said. ‘They came over from Greece with Africanus. He and Marilla are inheriting Aunt Marcia’s villa.’

  ‘Really?’ The old man sm
oothed his beard. ‘I knew a Cornelius Polymedes many years ago. A fine man, a fine doctor, and a good friend. He brought me through the fever the year after I had my freedom.’

  ‘My grandfather.’

  ‘You don’t say! Was he, indeed?’ Stratocles beamed. ‘Then you’re doubly welcome, my boy!’

  I grinned to myself. That’s how things work; have family or a friend in common and you’re in. I was glad that Clarus had a connection of his own.

  ‘Stratocles, we were hoping you might put us up,’ Perilla said. ‘I know it’s an imposition, but -’

  ‘Nonsense! Of course you can stay, my dear, there’s plenty of room, as you can see. In fact, you can have the whole east wing. Cleonicos!’ The guy who’d been supervising the slaves as they laid the drinks and plates of fruit on the table looked up. ‘Take care of it, will you? Your baggage is at the harbour, is it, Corvinus? I’ll have my slaves -’

  ‘Actually, it’s outside.’ Perilla had gone red. ‘I’m sorry. We brought it with us.’

  Stratocles laughed. ‘Don’t apologise! It’s a compliment; I’m delighted that you could be so sure of your welcome. Cleonicos?’ The major-domo bowed and left. ‘Now. Sit back down, all of you, and tell me how things are in Rome. I have my news, of course, but it’s never the same. And most of it’s to do with business.’

  So we talked, about Rome and the crossing and the wedding and old times. Finally:

  ‘Stratocles,’ Perilla said. ‘I really am sorry, but would you mind if I went inside and lay down for a while?’

  I glanced at her suspiciously. Oh, sure, we’d all hit post-travel relaxation mode - I was getting very pleasantly stewed on the Mareotis - but the lady isn’t normally one for an afternoon siesta, and once she gets herself out of bed in the morning she’s got more staying power than I have. The sudden wilting-violet act didn’t seem to fit, somehow.

  Even so, it worked with Stratocles. The old guy stopped in mid-flow - he’d been in the middle of a story about the teenage Perilla hiding a piglet in her bedroom for a month, which I just didn’t believe - and was all apologies.

  ‘Of course not, my dear,’ he said. ‘I’m being a very poor host, and very selfish. Clemens,’ - to the hovering slave - ‘show the Lady Rufia Perilla to the guest wing. And go by the bath suite on the way, tell them to light the furnace if it isn’t lit already. Dinner’s an hour before sunset, Perilla, but don’t feel you must be prompt, it’ll do my chef good to wait for a change.’ I grinned: shades of Meton. I was glad we hadn’t brought the bugger. ‘Marilla, dear. Clarus. Corvinus. You may want time to freshen up too.’

  ‘Oh, no, I’m sure Marcus is fine here for the present,’ Perilla said. I sent her another suspicious look. ‘You are, aren’t you, Marcus?’

  ‘Uh...yeah,’ I said. ‘Yeah, no problem.’

  ‘Clarus and I might take a walk,’ Marilla said. ‘If that’s all right.’

  ‘Of course it is.’ Stratocles smiled. ‘Off you go, my dear. Enjoy yourselves. I’ll send a slave with you in case you get lost.’

  ‘Oh, that’s okay,’ Marilla said, getting up. ‘We’re used to wandering on our own. Come on, Clarus.’

  A conspiracy; definitely a conspiracy. Still, the pair of them knew why we were here: as Clarus had predicted, the Princess had got that out of me before we cleared Sicily. And I should be grateful: leaving me alone with Stratocles gave me the perfect first opportunity to get my bearings where the Alexandrian side of the case was concerned.

  Which, I supposed, was the idea.

  CHAPTER SEVENTEEN

  When they’d gone we settled to our wine.

  ‘Actually, Corvinus,’ Stratocles said quietly, ‘I’m glad of the opportunity for a word in private without the Lady Perilla or the youngsters. Oh, it’s nothing to worry about, I’m sure, especially where Roman citizens are concerned, but you’ve arrived at a difficult time and it’s as well you’re forewarned.’

  ‘You mean the Jewish business?’ I said.

  ‘You knew already?’

  I shrugged. ‘Not the details. But a friend of mine back home has family here. He said there might be trouble between the Jews and the Greeks.’

  ‘Let’s hope it doesn’t come to actual trouble.’ Stratocles reached for the jug and filled our cups. ‘But it may do, now that Herod Agrippa’s here.’

  I stared at him. Agrippa was one of the imperial inner circle, a protégé of Gaius’s grandmother Antonia and a long-time friend of the emperor’s: he’d just been made, I knew, king of a large swatch of the eastern client-kingdoms that for the last few years had been under direct Roman rule. And being a Jew himself he was a shit-hot supporter of Jewish rights. I was with Stratocles on this one: if Herod Agrippa was in Alexandria then the likelikood of trouble had taken an appreciable hike.

  ‘When did he arrive?’ I said.

  ‘Yesterday. And very publicly. He’s brought an armed escort with him.’

  Gods. ‘It’s an official visit? I mean, Roman-official?’

  ‘No, not at all. At least, so he said. Seemingly he only called in in passing on his way to Judea.’

  ‘From Rome?’

  ‘Indeed.’ Stratocles’s voice was dry. Alexandria isn’t on the way to Judea, not from Rome. ‘Oh, yes, it had to be quite deliberate, and Alexandrians, whether they be Greeks or Jews, aren’t fools; we can all see the implications. The only question, and it’s crucial, is who is he representing, himself or Rome?’

  Yeah, right. The obvious answer was ‘himself’, sure: he’d been careful to stress that the visit wasn’t pre-planned or official, and from all I’d heard of Agrippa he wasn’t the sort to play things down; if he’d come as Gaius’s personal rep then he’d’ve made sure that everyone knew it and treated him accordingly. On the other hand, it was a delicate situation: Herod Agrippa, emperor’s bosom pal or not, king of Judea or not, was still technically only a private citizen in Roman terms, and for Gaius to clap a rep’s hat on him and send him into an official head-to-head with his own appointed governor would’ve been downright stupid and really have blown the lid off things. An unofficial carpeting on the emperor’s behalf, now, or even a covert investigation of whatever the hell Flaccus was up to...

  ‘It means trouble all the same, whichever it is,’ Stratocles said. ‘Agrippa’s no stranger here, far from it, and he’s not popular at all, not with the Greeks.’

  I took a sip of my wine. ‘Yeah? And why’s that?’

  Stratocles smiled slightly. ‘Because - not to mince words, Corvinus, and meaning no disrespect to Gaius Caesar regarding his choice of friends - he’s what you would call a chancer. When he was last here a couple of years ago he borrowed a large sum of money which he has failed to pay back. Nor does he seem likely to, especially now he’s so far in the emperor’s favour. In this city reneging on a debt is something that isn’t easily forgotten or forgiven, especially when it’s obvious that the man can fully afford to repay it, as Herod Agrippa now can. No, I’m afraid that if he takes up cudgels on the part of the Jews he’ll find the Greeks here are more than willing to give as good as they get.’

  ‘You, ah, including yourself in that?’ I said.

  ‘No, I am not. Most definitely I am not. Oh, I’m as much an Alexandrian as any. I was born here originally and after the master freed me I moved straight back and I’ve lived here ever since. But although I can understand my fellow Greeks’ feelings and sympathise with them to some degree I like to think I’ve more sense than to take it further, especially at my age. Unfortunately I’m in the minority.’

  ‘That friend in Rome I mentioned. He said something about a guy named Isidorus.’

  ‘Ah, yes.’ Stratocles touched his wine cup but didn’t lift it. ‘Isidorus is quite a different matter. If he had his way there would be no Jews in Alexandria at all, or since that’s clearly impossible that they should be confined to their original quarter in the east part of the city. Herod Agrippa is a godsend to Isidorus. If he needed a spark to light the tinder then I’m much afraid he h
as it.’

  A spark to light the tinder. Shit; that I didn’t like the sound of at all. Well, we’d just have to see what happened. ‘I understand the governor threw him out a couple of years ago. How long has he been back?’

  Stratocles looked at me in surprise. ‘You’re remarkably well informed about Alexandrian affairs, aren’t you?’ I didn’t reply. ‘For about four months. Since late April.’

  ‘And he and Flaccus are quite close these days, aren’t they?’

  ‘Yes, they are. Oddly so, perhaps, and unfortunately so in my view, but there it is.’

  ‘You have any idea why?’

  The look I was getting now was definitely suspicious. ‘No. How should I have? My business is with paper, not politics, and my interests don’t lie in that direction either. There are rumours, of course, but only a fool trusts to them.’

  ‘Rumours such as?’

  ‘Corvinus, I’m sorry, but what precisely is this about? We seem to have moved from discussing the likelihood of trouble during your stay, which I grant is something you have every right to be interested in, to bar-room gossip concerning the murkier side of local politics. Or pseudo-politics, rather, because the topic has no basis either in fact or reason. And in that subject I can see no logical cause for you to have an interest at all. Or do you?’

  Bugger, the guy was smart! Still, like I said, you don’t work your way up from ex-slave to millionaire without having a smart head on your shoulders, and self-confessed apolitical or not Stratocles could tell how many beans made five. Even so, I couldn’t let him in on the real reason for me coming to Alexandria. It would’ve complicated things, and it wouldn’t be fair. Or possibly, for that matter, safe for the old guy. ‘No,’ I said. ‘Not as such. Just straight curiosity. Perilla’s always telling me I’m too damn nosey for my own good.’

  The suspicious look cleared, and he laughed. ‘The Lady Perilla’s not the one to lay that charge, young man! Not unless she’s changed a great deal herself over the past twenty-odd years. Very well. It’s probably arrant nonsense, of course, or if it isn’t then there’s nothing to be done about it, but people are saying that it’s by no desire of Flaccus that the two are so hand-in-glove; that Isidorus has some hold over the man he’s using to advance Greek interests.’