He had slipped off his shoes while sitting cross-legged on the rock. He stood and bent over to slip them on again, then gave a little cry and reached down. He had stepped on something.
'Pretty,' was all he said as he held it up and peered at it. It glinted in the sunlight: a ring made of silver, quite small, as if for a woman's finger, and set with a single stone. The stone was dark and shiny. He slipped it into the pouch that had contained the stuffed dates. I wanted to have a closer look, but Hieronymus was in a rush. More curses were shouted at him. The crowd on either side was gradually converging toward the Sacrifice Rock.
The way down the slanting rock face was simple compared to the method by which Davus and I had climbed onto the summit from the wall. We descended more swiftly than I would have preferred, but I never felt the sort of danger I had felt swinging over empty space with Davus's hand clutching mine. Above and all around us the moaning continued. As we descended, the noise, echoing off the city walls, grew even louder and more unearthly.
Near the base the way grew steeper, so that we had to climb down backwards, facing the rock. As we neared the bottom I looked over my shoulder and was relieved to see that the area looked deserted; I had feared that an angry crowd might await the scapegoat. But where was the green litter that had brought him? It appeared that his litter bearers had panicked and taken flight.
Then I glimpsed a figure in the shadows of a nearby building and almost lost my footing. Davus was beside me. I gripped his arm.
'Look there!' I whispered. 'Do you see?'
'Where? What?'
It was the same cowled figure we had first seen outside the city, then again on the way back from Verres's house. 'Enkekalymmenor,' I whispered.
'What?'
'The veiled one.'
The figure haltingly stepped from the shadows and moved toward the base of the rock as if to meet us. He raised his hands. For a moment it seemed that he intended to push back the cowl and show his face.
Suddenly he stiffened and looked over his shoulder toward the shadows from which he had come. He bolted in the opposite direction, his cloak billowing after him, and vanished.
A moment later I saw what had caused him to flee. A troop of soldiers appeared from the shadows and marched straight to the foot of the Sacrifice Rock.
Their commander signaled for his men to halt, then crossed his arms and glowered up at us. 'Scapegoat! Reports reached the First Timouchos that you were seen on the Sacrifice Rock, trespassing on sanctified ground. By order of the First Timouchos, I command you to vacate the site immediately. The same goes for your two companions.'
'Well, really!' said Hieronymus, sounding petulant and a little out of breath. The rock flattened considerably at the base, so that he was able to turn about and take the last few steps facing the officer head-on. Davus followed him, hanging back a bit to make sure that I stepped off the rock safely.
'There, we're off the rock. Now that you've done your job, you can run along,' Hieronymus snapped at the officer. 'Unless you're here to escort me safely home. My litter seems to have vanished, and there's an ugly mob forming along the battlements-'
'I'm here to escort you, but not to your house,' said the officer, sneering.
Hieronymus's sarcasm suddenly deserted him. From behind I saw his fingers tremble. He clenched his hands to stop the shaking. He swayed as if he were dizzy.
If the soldiers did not mean to escort him home, then where? Massilia had lost its navy. Massilia had been betrayed by Pompey. Her people already faced starvation and pestilence; now they could look forward to capitulation and total catastrophe. Their city was older than Rome, her ancient ally; older even than their mutual enemy, Carthage. But Carthage had been destroyed, obliterated so completely that no trace of that once-great city, or its proud people, remained. Massilia could be destroyed just as completely. Until now, hope had staved off that cruel realization. Now hope was gone. Was this the moment for the scapegoat to earn his name? Had the priests of the xoanon Artemis determined that now, in this darkest hour, the time had come for the scapegoat to take all the sins of the troubled city upon his shoulder and, with him, into oblivion? Had these soldiers come to drive him back up the rock, onto the precipice, and over the edge-no longer trespassing, but enacting his destiny-while all Massilia watched and cursed his name?
I held my breath. At last the officer spoke.
'You're not to return to your own house, Scapegoat. I'm to take you directly to the house of the First Timouchos. And I have orders to bring along these two as well.' He glared at Davus and me. 'Come along!'
Meekly, we obeyed. The soldiers drew their swords and formed a phalanx around us. At a quick pace we headed away from the Sacrifice Rock toward the house of Apollonides.
XVI
As we made our way through the heart of the city, I had cause to be thankful for our armed escort.
The streets were crowded with men and women rushing aimlessly about in panic. Hieronymus in his green robes was quickly recognized. Shouts of 'Scapegoat! Scapegoat!' preceded, us. At first, the citizens we passed were content to yell curses, shake their fists, and spit on the ground. Then a few of them began to dog our little retinue, running alongside us, waving their arms and screaming hysterically, their faces twisted with hatred. Soon we were surrounded by a roving mob. Urged on by their fellows, a few men, and even some women, dared to rush the moving phalanx. The soldiers shoved them roughly back with their shields, but several of them managed to thrust a hand past the soldiers. They reached for the scapegoat; failing to clutch him, they made obscene gestures. One managed to wriggle his head through. He spat in Hieronymus's face before being thrown back into the crowd.
Finally the commander ordered his men to use their swords if necessary. When the next man rushed the phalanx, there was a flash of steel and a piercing scream. My face was spattered with warm drops. I wiped my cheeks. Beyond the blood on my fingertips, I caught a glimpse of the wounded man as he fell back, howling and clutching his arm.
The mob kept its distance after that, but began to throw things at us, using whatever was at hand-fistfuls of gravel and small rocks, bits of broken paving stones and fragments of roofing tiles, scraps of wood, even household items like small clay pots, which exploded with a loud pop when they struck the soldier's shields and helmets. The rain of objects became so thick that the commander ordered his men into tortoise formation. A roof of shields closed over our heads. A solid wall of shields surrounded us, with swords thrust through the breeches.
It was dark within the tortoise. I was jostled from all sides as we trudged forward. The smell of sweat from the soldiers filled my nostrils. The crashing of hurled debris was like the din of a hail storm.
'Impious fools! Hypocrites! Idiots!' Hieronymus clenched his fists and shouted at the top of his lungs. 'The person of the scapegoat is sacred! Harm me now and you only curse yourselves!' His cries were drowned by the clatter and the screams of the mob.
At last we reached our destination. The commander shouted orders. The soldiers contracted into an even tighter formation. We passed through a portal of some sort. Bronze gates clanged shut behind us, muffling the cries of the mob outside. The soldiers broke formation.
We were in a small, graveled courtyard. Relieved to be free of the tortoise and the mob, I turned my eyes upward and for a brief, incongruous moment I was struck by the beauty of the sky above us. It was the hour of twilight. The firmament was dark blue at its zenith, lightening toward the horizon to shades of aquamarine and an improbable orange, streaked with high bands of tenuous, elongated clouds suffused with the blood-red glow of dying sunlight.
I was drawn back to the moment by the clatter of debris hurled against the closed gate behind us. The mob had not dispersed. The soldiers were busy making sure that the crossbar securing the gates was properly in place. Their commander, looking a bit unnerved, mounted the short flight of steps that led up to the porch of a grand- looking house. Its door was open. On the threshold, Apollonides stood with his arms crossed, looking down at us.
'First Timouchos!' barked the officer, saluting. 'As you ordered, I've brought the scapegoat, along with the
