‘It’s all about some wog prophecy, sir,’ he answered. ‘They’ve been told that Greek rule over the world will end when the mummy of the Great Alexander sheds tears.’
‘The translation, My Lord,’ Macarius whispered in my ear, ‘is: “The tears of Alexander shall flow, giving bread and freedom.” ’
I nodded. So the word wasn’t ‘Alexandria’, but ‘Alexander’. I wished I’d taken the trouble on arriving to start lessons in Egyptian. But how could I have known I’d be stuck here so long? I thought to ask Macarius how he’d got himself away from the mob. But the police officer was speaking again.
‘We would have come looking in more than one group,’ he explained, filling up the silence that resulted. ‘The problem is we’re stretched rather thin tonight, what with the commotion outside the Great Synagogue – oh, and the murder.’
‘Murder?’ I asked. ‘Why should that be taking up police resources?’
‘But, of course, you won’t have heard,’ he answered. ‘It was that big landowner – what’s his name? Leontius, I think – horribly murdered, you know. Horribly murdered, and in his own bed.’
Chapter 14
Priscus cocked his head to get a look at the corpse from a new angle.
‘Nasty work,’ he said appreciatively. ‘By the look on his face, they must have kept him alive and awake till close to the end. I’d imagine he was being questioned as well as put out of the way.’ He pointed at the screwed-up napkin. It stank of something that made my nose itch. ‘Useful as far as it goes for keeping a victim conscious. Of course, I know better mixtures for that. I could manage better all round – but I’d need leisure and skilled assistants. Nasty work,’ he said again.
‘You say the guts are all arranged in those pots?’ he asked the Chief of Police. He took up one of the lids and peered at the pale, slimy entrails. ‘The brains as well?’ he added, looking into another of the pots. He turned back for another inspection. ‘How were those taken without spoiling the head?’ he asked.
‘I think it was Herodotus who said they are pulled down the nose with special hooks,’ I volunteered. I gripped the back of a chair for support. I wondered again how much of the smell in the room was from a gutted Leontius and how much from what I’d managed to splash over myself in the Egyptian quarter.
‘I defer to your greater learning,’ Priscus said. ‘But are you telling me poor Leontius was killed in some parody of wog mummification?’
‘I’m saying no such thing,’ I said carefully. ‘In these cases, you make no inferences until all the facts available have been collected and weighed. As for your own inference, my understanding is that embalming went out of use after the Old Faith was abolished here. That doesn’t mean all knowledge of the process has disappeared, or that such knowledge might not be taken as a guide for murder.
‘Do have that crowd moved on,’ I said, turning to the Chief of Police. His subdued yet anxious manner was getting on my nerves. ‘I didn’t like its look as I came in.’ Indeed, I hadn’t. That combination of silence and numbers might equal trouble. I thought of the mob in the Egyptian quarter and shuddered.
I heard a familiar voice in the hall outside. I called the Chief of Police back before he could open the door.
‘And do get a blanket over that thing,’ I said. ‘There’s no reason why everyone needs to look at it.’
‘I was told you were here,’ said Martin when the door was closed again. He looked at the large but now hidden mound of flesh. A dark stain was seeping through the blanket. He swallowed and looked away. He looked at me and also looked away.
I rubbed at the bruise on my left shoulder. I’d be stiff for days but, all told, had nothing to complain about. I looked at the Chief of Police.
‘You’ll need to leave a couple of men in the street,’ I said. ‘But I see no further reason for your involvement. This is a matter for the man’s family in Letopolis.’
A look of relief on his face, he bowed his way out, muttering something about needing to make an entry for the next public order report.
‘Well, my dearest,’ said Priscus as he lifted a corner of the blanket for a final look at what had been Leontius, ‘I think I’ll take that as my own invitation to retire. It’s been a glorious day, and I have so much to consider. Oh’ – he paused by the door – ‘did I overhear you back by the Egyptian quarter talking about Alexander’s mummy? Do say that I did.’
‘I believe it’s been in the basement of the Library since the temples were closed,’ I said. ‘So far as nothing could be uglier, I suppose it must be an improvement on Leontius.’
‘Decidedly!’ he said with an appreciative smack of his lips. ‘Well, I really must have a look at the great man. After all, we have so much in common, what with the Persian War and all.’
‘Before you go, Priscus,’ I said, ‘I’ll note that you may have been one of the last people to see Leontius alive. I hope you’ll not mind if I call on you tomorrow for a brief discussion.’
Priscus stopped by the door and smiled. ‘My dear boy,’ he cried in mock alarm, ‘you surely can’t think I had a hand in this? I’ve told you I could have done it much better. Besides, aren’t there the little matters of means, motive and opportunity? You did give me a most interesting lecture on these things. Don’t think I ever forget a word of what you say to me.’
I grunted and rubbed my shoulder. I couldn’t, I had to agree, think how or why Priscus might have murdered the man. But it was annoying – so much learned in one afternoon; so little hope now of following it up.
‘Now that you’re here,’ I said to Martin once the door was closed again, ‘I want you to help me go through the man’s papers. In particular, we need to look out for a packet that may not yet have been opened and filed.
‘Macarius,’ I said, turning to the figure who’d been standing silent throughout, ‘I want the entire household lined up in the big front hall. Sit them about a yard apart, and make sure they don’t speak to anyone until I’ve had each one in for questioning.’
‘The packet you seek, My Lord, will not be here,’ he said.
I gave him a hard stare.
‘I also observed the meeting between Leontius and his agent,’ he explained. ‘I was not so close as you were, and was not able to hear all that passed between them. However, I did follow Leontius back to this house. He was met at the city gate by another man on horseback who took delivery of the documents he had bought. I heard a reference to Letopolis, and assume from this that Leontius wanted everything taken off to his manor house in Egypt.
‘Certainly, I had already discovered that he was planning a trip to his estates – this despite your instruction that no one should leave Alexandria.’
The things I wanted to ask of Macarius were beginning to accumulate like snow before an unused gate in winter. But they would need to remain unasked for the moment. He was continuing.
‘I must, My Lord, inform you that all the circumstances of this murder indicate involvement by the Brotherhood.’
‘What in God’s name are you talking about?’ I asked. Martin might have jumped as if he’d seen a ghost. I was wholly in the dark, and in no mood to be kept there.
‘The Brotherhood,’ Macarius answered, ‘does not usually operate in Alexandria, and prefers in general to shun the Greek regions of Egypt. But it does maintain a strong presence in the south of the country, where, indeed, it is often the effective power.’
I took one of the entrail pots from the chair on which it had been placed and sat down. I rubbed again at my shoulder and looked round for something to drink. It was probably for the best that the only wine jug in the room was on the floor overturned.
‘You’d better continue,’ I sighed. ‘Since I have no choice but to investigate the murder, I’ll need to know exactly what this Brotherhood is.’
‘It claims to be a very old organisation,’ Macarius began. ‘The story is that it was formed nearly twelve hundred years ago, when Cambyses of Persia invaded and extinguished the last native dynasty. For the next few centuries, it operated as a resistance movement, keeping hopes alive of a national recovery and largely confining the Persians to their garrison towns.
