his own front door long enough to attract a curious stare from the guard lounging outside the excubitors’ barracks across the square before he realized that Peter was not attending to his duties. When he tested the nail-studded door he found it secured from within.
Faced with the unexpected problem of how to get into his own home, he stepped back and surveyed its brick front. The first floor was a blank wall in the usual fashion and the windows ranged along the second floor were well beyond his reach. A single rap on the door usually brought Peter, if not on the run, as near to it as he could manage. But Peter had not been himself recently and John now found himself imagining the elderly servant lying helpless inside, unable to move or be heard calling for assistance. Perhaps he had fallen down the narrow stairs and now lay unconscious only a step or two away on the other side of the door on which his master had lately been pounding.
Suddenly the bolt was drawn back and the door swung open, revealing Peter’s leathery, lined face peering out. He apologized for the time it had taken for him to answer his master’s summons.
“I laid down to rest for a while and fell asleep,” he explained as he rebolted the door. Hardly were the words spoken when his legs gave way. John barely caught his arm in time to prevent him from pitching forward and breaking his gray head open on the tiled floor.
It was all John could do to assist Peter up the two flights of stairs to the servant’s room. Although Peter was too feeble to walk unaided he nevertheless protested and resisted John’s assistance, as drowning men will sometimes struggle against their rescuers.
“I can’t lie about all day, master, I have work in the kitchen,” Peter fretted when John insisted he rest.
“Bread and cheese will feed me well enough for now, and those I can get for myself.” John glanced at the large wooden cross on the wall behind Peter’s narrow cot. It struck him anew how ironic it was that a servant could display the symbols of his beliefs openly, whereas his powerful and high placed master could not afford the risk of having any symbol of Mithra in his home.
“You see,” said Peter, catching the direction of John’s glance, “you need not fear. I do not believe my time has come yet, but if it has, then surely He will send another to look after you in my place.”
“That may be, but for now you need rest and that is what you must have. I shall ask Gaius to visit you and perhaps he can prescribe something to help you recuperate more quickly.”
“That physician will have no stronger medicine than the one I am taking already.”
Peter nodded at the plate on a small table in the corner. It held what remained of Matthew the Pure’s pilgrim token, the sight of which reminded John of the dangerous speed at which another holy man’s reputation was growing.
He took bread from the basket on the kitchen table. Peter had not been well enough to go to market that morning, it seemed, for no cheese was to be found. Instead, John contented himself with a plain chunk of bread and a cup of water in what had been his study but with the arrival of Philo had been transformed into a shatranj room.
After its outing to Aurelius’ banquet, the exotic game sat once again on its borrowed table, its heavily carved playing pieces arrayed against each other in orderly ranks.
He picked up a finely wrought ship. It reminded him of his long ago journey to the chilly, misty land of Bretania at the very edge of the civilized world. The memory of crossing the choppy seas in the teeth of a gale was not a pleasant one and he set the piece back down quickly.
Thankful for solitude, he sat quietly and allowed his gaze to wander across the mosaic wall of his study. At this hour, the girl Zoe slumbered quietly behind her tesseraed eyes, waiting for the flickering light of a lamp to awaken and animate her. Yet the world in which she lived still spoke to John.
Beneath the heavenly riot of pagan gods, who like Zoe were nightly given life by lamplight although life of a much coarser nature, was the familiar bucolic scene. Staring at the bent-backed farmer plodding along behind a patient ox as he plowed his field, John’s thoughts strayed to the palace gardener, Hypatia.
Suddenly, he saw a solution to the problem of what to do concerning Peter. He would enlist Hypatia to assist with the household duties, temporarily at least. Doubtless he would still have to order Peter to accept her help, particularly since he did not like anyone in his kitchen when he was cooking, but on the other hand, he suspected that his proud servant would not resist too strongly since Hypatia was a friend who had once served with him in the same household.
The sound of Philo clattering upstairs intruded upon this happy thought.
“John! I am glad to see you’ve returned!” Philo said, breezily barging into the study. “Because although as you know I am not one to complain, I visited the kitchen earlier and it’s not quite what I would expect to find in a Lord Chamberlain’s household. No roast venison, no lark’s tongues or stuffed peacocks, none of those exotic fruits and spices which we all know courtiers dine upon every night! What is that servant of yours up to, anyway? It took him long enough to answer the door, I noticed.”
“You were here when I arrived?”
“I was in the garden, contemplating philosophical theories. Anyway, I was wondering if perhaps we could dine upon duck again tonight, although Peter needs to make a richer sauce as I was telling him just the other day. I don’t think he appreciated the suggestion, to be honest.”
“He will not be cooking anything tonight. He is unwell,” John said.
“I see.” Philo was peeved. “Perhaps you should consider engaging another servant. After all, we replace our boots when they are no longer serviceable, do we not?”
Philo’s hand went unerringly to the ship John had moved. “I see you have been examining my game. My demonstration at Aurelius’ banquet certainly attracted a good deal of interest, but I doubt if anyone will remember it now, considering all the excitement over the senator’s unfortunate death, not to mention that disreputable girl’s.”
Philo continued to prattle on about his prospects of tutoring would-be shatranj players, but had lost John’s sympathetic ear after his outrageous suggestion that Peter be tossed aside like worn-out footwear.
“Philo,” John finally cut in sharply, “Peter is my trusted servant and I will deal with his difficulties in the manner of a just master. But as for yourself, I must deal with you as master of this house. I must insist that from now on, while you are enjoying my hospitality, you will not venture outside alone. It would be foolish, since the streets are becoming extremely dangerous even for those who are familiar with the city.”
Philo glared at his former student. “You have no right to speak to me in that manner, John.”
“There is no one except for the emperor to whom I may not speak in any manner I wish,” John replied coldly. “And I am ordering you to remain inside this house for your own safety.”
The harsh words stuck in his throat, or perhaps it was the last crumbs of bread. He reminded himself it had been many years since Philo had been his tutor and further that he had no right to speak of Peter in the manner that he had used.
“Very well, John. After all, I am in no position to argue with my benefactor.” Philo replaced the shatranj ship on the board with enough force to send several smaller pieces to the floor.
The mention of Aurelius’ banquet reminded John of another matter and his anger at Philo was now directed at himself. How could he have forgotten something so important? He, the Lord Chamberlain who owed his position and his continued life largely to his unerring attention to every detail, no matter how minor it seemed in the richly woven carpet of court life.
“To change the subject, Philo,” he began, “Anatolius said he left a document here on the day of the banquet.”
“He would have left it with your servant. Why are you asking me about it?”
“Peter was not here then, being at work directing the slaves in Aurelius’ kitchen.”
Philo looked at the ceiling. “I know nothing of any such document. You have intimated that I am foolish. Would you now call me a liar as well?”
John had spoken plainly on many occasions to satraps and senators and the highest officials of the empire. But those powerful men had not taught him to decipher the magic of the written word nor walked with him along the shaded paths of the Academy, opening his mind to the wonders of history and philosophy. He could not bring himself to do it.
“No, Philo,” he finally admitted with a sigh. “I cannot call you a liar. But I must now go out, so please remain here and see that Peter does not try to over-exert himself. I have inquiries to make.”
