Helena Justina, fetchingly besmirched by smuts, sat on a small patch of grass, clutching her knees. Dreamily she lectured us: ‘Ctesibius, the son of a barber, was the first head of the Museion. His inventions included an adjustable shaving mirror, which moved on a counterweight, but he is best known as the father of pneumatics. To him we owe the water organ, or
Her listeners cheered. Some recovered enough to laugh.
‘Ctesibius,’ Helena added, her voice assuming self-mockery as she ventured into propaganda, ‘had the advantage of working for benign pharaohs who supported invention and the arts. Fortunately, you now have a similar advantage, since you live in the reign of Vespasian Augustus, who was of course first brought to power in this wonderful city of Alexandria.’
‘The scholars have shown today that they fully appreciate their good fortune,’ I croaked. I too could sound priggish.
‘Many thanks to all of you for your bravery and hard work,’ cried Helena. ‘And look! - Now the excitement is all over, here is the wonderful Academic Board coming to congratulate you on saving the Library!’
Through the thinning smoke, we beheld Philetus. He waddled at the head of a small bearded entourage: Apollophanes the philosopher, Timosthenes from the Serapeion, Nicanor the lawyer. On the bench at my side, Zenon growled in the back of his throat. Neither he nor I stood up. We were begrimed with smoke, our eyes red and stinging. Neither of us was in a mood to tolerate a condescending idiot.
Philetus moved among the youthful firefighters, placing a hand approvingly on one, murmuring praise to another. If he had thought to bring garlands, the oily sycophant would have draped their necks or crowned their sooty heads like triumphal Olympians. The scholars knew better than to shy away, but they looked nervous. I had worked out just how hypocritical Philetus was being about this workshop fire.
He ignored Zenon and me. He side-stepped the siphon engine too, as if appreciating mechanics, and the beauty of utility, was beyond him.
He approached the burnt-out workshop. Heat that the ancient stones had absorbed still beat off the pharaonic blocks, so Philetus only ventured as far as the granite threshold. He looked in. ‘Oh dear! There seems to be nothing left of the contents.’
I stood up. Behind me, the astronomer stayed put, but he folded his fingers together like an eager member of a popular audience who is about to watch a prize-winning play.
I crossed to Philetus and sounded apprehensive. ‘Really! What contents would those be, Director?’
‘We were storing a large quantity of library scrolls in this building, Falco -’
‘Oh no! Are you sure?’
‘I had them put here myself. They are all lost!’
‘We were able to save nothing from inside, sadly,’ I told him, apparently full of regret.
‘Then a great many valuable works of culture have been burned to ashes.’
‘Are you saying so?’ I stiffened up. ‘Good try, Philetus!’
‘What?’ He was about to resort to bluster - too late.
Apollophanes,Timosthenes and Nicanor pulled back from supporting him at the same moment. Those three worthies saw where we were heading. All were up for the post of Librarian - and if Philetus fell, they would be scratching for the directorship as well. Mental repositioning began right there. The candidates were ready for huckstering even before the old Director saw that he was finished.
‘Those would be the scrolls,’ I spelled out slowly, ‘that were taken away from here last night by a trader called Diogenes. Philetus, you sold them to him - wrongfully, secretly and for your own benefit. Not only did you dispose of irreplaceable material that had been collected over centuries, you personally took the money.’
He was about to deny it. I stopped him.
‘Don’t add to your misdemeanour by publicly lying. Diogenes was taken while in commission of your theft. Now the scrolls are in safe custody. They will be returned to the Library. Dress up what you have done, Philetus, however you like. I call it fraud. I call it theft.’
‘You exaggerate!’ He was too foolish to recognise that the end had come.
Before I could speak, someone else drawled laconically, ’Sounds good to me!’ Hardly believable: that was Apollophanes, the Director’s own sneak. He was a worm - but worms, it seemed, could turn.
I strode right up to Philetus and dragged him inside the smouldering store. The charred walls still glowed, as I kicked aside the burnt remains of a table. We could barely breathe in the smoke, but I was so angry I managed to speak. ‘What did you say -
I gripped the scared Director by the tunic edge and hauled him towards me on tiptoe. ‘Listen to me, Philetus; listen well! I bet you had this building torched. Why don’t I arrest you here and now? Only because I can’t yet prove that you had this fire set. If I ever do find evidence, you are done for. Arson to a public building is a capital offence.’
He gurgled. I dropped him. ‘You disgust me. I cannot even bear to spend my time on an indictment. Men like you are so insidiously evil, you destroy everything; you drive everyone who has to deal with you to inertia and despair. You are not worth my trouble. Besides, I truly believe in this institution that you have misgoverned and plundered. The reason for the Museion lies in those young men lying exhausted outside. Today they used their knowledge, their vision, their application. They were courageous and dedicated.
I shoved him out into the air. ‘Send your resignation to the Prefect tonight. It will be accepted. Do it yourself is my advice. Otherwise -’ I quoted words of his own back to him:’
Philetus would go, even if under protest. It would obviate the need for enquiries, recriminations, petitions to the Emperor, and, above all, scandal. He might yet be given a pension, or keep his right to a statue in the line of former directors, those great men whose impressive administrations had been instituted by Ctesibius, the father of pneumatic science. Who knows? Philetus might even keep his reading rights at the Library. I knew life was full of ironies.
I hated this, but I was a realist. I had served my Emperor long enough to know the style of action Vespasian wanted. Resignation would be painless and tidy, limiting awkwardness and adverse public comment. And it would be immediate.
LV
Alexandria might be the foremost training place for the mind, but it was ruining me physically. I looked for Helena, hoping we could gather ourselves together and go home. ‘Home’ was beginning to have a Roman resonance, even though we were nowhere near finishing with Egypt.
I was downhearted to see her on her feet, talking avidly to an elderly man. He was a typical Museion greybeard, though older than most and leaning heavily on walking sticks. Though gaunt and probably in pain, he had that look in his eye of a thinker who refused to give up while there was still any chance he might crack one of the world’s great puzzles.
‘Marcus, come quickly and be introduced - I am so thrilled!’ For the cool and refined Helena Justina to gush was unexpected. ‘This is Heron, Marcus - Heron of Alexandria! It is such a privilege to meet you, sir - my brother Aelianus will be so excited: Marcus, I have invited Heron to dine with us.’
I bet she had not told the great automaton-maker that her brother once spent weeks trailing around the New Rich of remote Britannia, trying to sell those deluded culture-seekers dud versions of Heron’s moving statues. One of the statues accidentally killed someone, but we hushed it up with the excuse that the dead man was a bath- house installer. Maybe Heron would enjoy that; he was human, for he pierced me with merry eyes and said, ’If you are Marcus Didius Falco, the investigator everyone talks about, I want a word on a professional matter - but, as your wife says, let us talk in a civilised fashion over good food.’
Clearly our kind of man. And as we all made our way to my uncle’s house on a hired cart - Heron crippled,
