‘He tried to touch me on… in my secret places. I’ll swear he was no monk.’
Well, lechery and monastic vows have often been well acquainted, and at first I was inclined to dismiss Gretel’s insistence that the man hadn’t been a monk. The way she bounced around, she could have excited a stone idol. Then again, she was no stranger to the world. She’d doubtless been touched up by bishops, let alone monks. Still, she insisted this hadn’t been a monk. Either she was holding back on something she didn’t want to discuss, or she’d picked something up from his general manner that she wasn’t able to describe in words. I suspected the latter.
The old watchman disagreed. ‘He was a monk, I’ll swear. Man and boy, I’ve been watching over this house forty years. No wrong ’uns ever got in before. Isn’t that so, my lady?’
‘It most certainly is,’ said Marcella. ‘My watchman is the best in Rome, I’ll have you all know.’
‘Of course he is,’ said Lucius smoothly. ‘But we know the Evil One can take many forms. Were not even the holy saints of the desert often deceived by devils in human form?’
There was a burst of conversation at this – the thought that Satan himself had been in the house was more exciting than any martyrdom – though, by the look on her face, Marcella didn’t think it half so good for business. She opened her mouth, perhaps to defend the old watchman again. Then the diplomat spoke up.
He’d wanted to speak before, but probably was reluctant to follow mere slaves. Now Lucius had spoken, he felt no reserve. He’d seen the monk leaving as he was returning on horseback from a ride outside the city, he said. He’d dismounted and bowed low for a blessing. The monk had walked straight past. ‘Now I realise I had been in the presence of the Evil One,’ he shuddered in his slow Latin.
I asked for a description. There was none worth having. The man had been hooded. Lucius intervened with more detailed questions about height, possible age and so on – also about the direction from which he’d come and to which he’d gone. Martin wrote down the answers so far as he could, but all was vague and contradictory.
After the pseudo-monk had gone, Maximin spent time in the garden. He’d sat there a long time, drinking and looking at some flowers. The diplomat had some information here. He’d gone into the garden after communing in the stables with his groom.
‘I went up to the Saint,’ he said. ‘I asked for the blessing the monk had refused me.’ He looked round proudly. ‘I was the last man on earth to receive the Saint’s blessing before he was martyred.’
He seemed about to launch into a theological digression. But Lucius checked him. ‘Did you discuss anything worldly with the Most Holy Martyr?’
‘Yes.’ The Ethiopian smiled broadly, showing the gap between his very large and very white front teeth. ‘He was drinking deeply, and I joined him for a while in conversation. He was troubled in spirit – but who would not be after grappling with the Evil One? To refresh his spirit, he drank wine, and he spoke of his journey to Rome. He said, and I quote from memory: “Oh, that I might be once more on the road through France. I have never known such happiness as with my young friend. He is like the son I never had. We were so happy when we had none but each other. This city is a place of evil. I wish I were away from it. I wish I had never come. I fear for young Alaric. If only he could know he is among serpents.”
‘Such were the words of the Saint to me.’
I turned and walked over to the glass table. I steadied my hand on its cool surface. In a moment, I’d fight back the tears that were beginning to sting my eyes. I’d burn them out with pure hatred. For that moment, I knew everyone was looking at me.
‘But -’ Lucius turned the attention back to himself – ‘he gave you no indication of what had passed between him and the hooded visitor?’
No, the conversation had been on other matters. The Ethiopian had nothing to add of any value. I regained control of myself and returned to the front of the gathering. ‘Were there any other visitors that day?’ I asked.
The old watchman spoke again. ‘Yes, sir, there was one more for the Saint. He came just before dark. He stood in the deep shadow under the gate, and I couldn’t see his face. He handed me a note. “See that this reaches the hands of Father Maximin,” he said to me.’
‘Did you see what was in the note?’ I asked.
The old watchman was offended. ‘No, sir, most certainly not. I never look at the correspondence of my lady’s guests. Anyway, sir, I can’t read.’
Well, that was a conclusive answer. But a letter. It was probably lost, along with the others. Or it had been taken by the dispensator’s men. Even so, I asked: ‘Did anyone else see this letter?’
There was a stir at the back of the meeting. Marcella’s face took on a look somewhere between anger and embarrassment. An old woman stood up. She was one of the lower slaves in the household. I’d seen her boiling linen in a big pot, and mixing piss with something else to make bleach from it. Looking down at her feet, she was mumbling something.
‘Speak up, Griselda,’ said Marcella, speaking sharply. It was to no effect. The old woman was simply too nervous to speak in front of so many people. I walked over to her. She pointed to Martin. He reached into his files and took out a slip of parchment. I brightened. Here was the letter. We might have an answer to some of our questions.
‘It was in the Saint’s clothes,’ she explained. Marcella had given her these to wash after the embalmers had called to collect the body. ‘I got off most of the blood. I scrubbed and scrubbed, but I couldn’t get it all off. I give it to your secretary. Please don’t blame me, sir. I tried.’
I took the slip from Martin. She had tried. The parchment was about three inches by two. Except for a dark patch that covered most of the skin side, it was about as clean as when it had first been dried and scraped.
There was no point in blaming the silly old woman. I took the slip over to the old watchman. ‘Do you think this might have been what was given to you?’ I asked.
‘Most certainly, sir. I never forget the size of parchment. That’s what I was given.’
It was almost maddening to hold that slip in my hand, yet not be able to read it. Lucius and I went over to the doorway into the garden. We examined the skin side in the sunlight.
‘That word there is “letters”,’ said Lucius. I looked, and perhaps it was. ‘Look – “ E-P-I-S-T-O-L-A-S.” ’ He slowly spelt the letters, pointing at each one. He pointed again. ‘Could that be “with you” – “ T-E-C-U-M ”?’
‘ “Letters with you”?’ I broke in. ‘Was this a message telling Maximin to go to a certain place and take the letters with him?’
‘With respect, sir, those marks could say anything.’ Martin had come over to join us. ‘I’ve been looking at the marks for some time, trying to see if anything could be recovered.’
He was probably right. I forced myself to obey the command not to jump to conclusions. I agreed with Lucius about the first word. The second was possible. All else was lost beyond recovery. You can often see the old writing on parchment that is reused. But this had been fresh ink, and the parchment had been scrubbed as clean as it could be.
The last matter was Maximin’s departure from the house. I asked who had heard him say where he was going. It was Marcella. She’d stopped him as he was going out. ‘You shouldn’t be going out alone,’ she’d told him. ‘Surely let me send one of the slaves with you as a guard.’
But he’d insisted he knew where he was going and would be safe. ‘No one will be interested in a shabby old priest,’ he’d told her. ‘I have business with the Sisters of the Blessed Theodora,’ he’d said, adding that he’d be back before late or send a message.
That was it. He’d swallowed two of his opium pills to steady himself from all the wine. He’d gone out. We knew he’d got to the foot of the hill, then been set on. There was much still to be settled, but we now had the outlines of Maximin’s last day on earth.
After this, there was no more evidence. There had been other callers that day. But these were all known or had been visiting other guests. I thanked everyone for sparing the time to attend. Lucius made a circuit of the hall, thanking everyone in person – even the slaves. Then he asked one last question: ‘Did Holy Saint Maximin burn anything on his last day? Were any ashes cleaned from his room?’
There had been no ashes.
We were to visit the convent in the afternoon. Marcella promised to send over to arrange a meeting there with the abbess. Before that, however, there was the matter of the dying secretary. There might be some scrap of information to be had there. The old watchman made sure his deputy was in place, and set off with Martin to find the wine dealer’s slave.
So far, a productive morning, Lucius and I agreed. We hadn’t found any answers yet. But we were now
