Two for Joy (3 page)

John voiced the thought while examining two wicker baskets beside the rusted railing. One basket held a few loaves of the bread whose enticing aroma John had smelled the afternoon before, the other a small heap of olives and figs. The hungry crows had touched neither bread nor fruit. It struck John that while the olive branch promised peace, for Matthew the Pure, the peace that comes with death had been hard won.

John squeezed sideways past Gaius, who, muttering a mild protest, continued wielding his knife intently. An impossibly filthy and tattered rag that had once been a tunic was tied to the railing. Perhaps it had been part of the stylite’s wardrobe. John prodded at the disgusting scrap with his booted foot.

“It always amazes me how these stylites attain such advanced age, given their living conditions,” remarked Gaius conversationally, glancing up. “A good many of my patients succumb to disease or accident by the time they’re thirty, despite my ministrations and not, I hasten to add, because of them, no matter what you hear from the palace gossips.” A smile briefly illuminated his ruddy face. “And yet,” he continued thoughtfully as he returned his attention to the dead man, “Matthew lived up here for longer than that, half-naked, tormented by vermin, exposed to the elements. Of course, I am told that like our emperor, he abstained from meat. Perhaps that was his secret.”

“Have you ascertained anything of use concerning his death?” John was eager to take his leave.

Gaius rubbed thoughtfully at the side of his bulbous purplish nose, the nose of a dedicated devotee of Bacchus. “Not much that wasn’t obvious to begin with, John. Look, here.” He pointed his knife at the dark cavity he and his assistants the crows had cut into the blackened corpse.

John leaned closer, waving away the swarming flies buzzing around his head. Matthew, or what remained of him, lay on his back. His head had canted to one side of his body and a large yellowish bone, a thigh bone, protruded slightly from a fire-ravaged leg. The wet mess visible inside Gaius’ investigative opening revealed nothing strange to John, who said as much.

“Our friend’s innards, as you can see, are quite unharmed, barely cooked,” Gaius replied in a matter of fact manner. “That’s because the body is full of watery substances—blood, phlegm, bile—so although the outer parts may be burnt away, the inner organs tend to be protected. It’s a very interesting and surprising effect. I regret to say that I have observed it more than once, but I suppose that’s hardly to be wondered at given that builders will insist on constructing ill-made wooden tenements and then compounding their errors by getting tenants who tend towards carelessness with their braziers.” He sighed. “But Matthew here burned from the outside. He had no brazier, and since there’s nowhere an assailant could have concealed himself, the obvious conclusion is that he was struck by lightning. And so I shall report to Justinian.”

“I would certainly agree, Gaius,” John replied, “but for three stylites to be struck by lightning, at almost the same instant…”

“The storm was severe. The world can be a strange place. It is as simple as that,” Gaius grunted as he struggled upright. “Steady the ladder, Felix!” he called down to the man below.

Pausing as he swung his foot out to the top rung, he grinned cheerily across at John. “We’re done with Matthew now. Only two more to go.”

Chapter Three

When John got home after a day spent
examining the unpleasant habitations of the
three burning victims he found Philo ensconced in his study. The philosopher had taken to that formerly private room like a stylite to a pillar, as Anatolius had remarked not long after Philo’s arrival.

“You’re late for your meal,” announced the philosopher. He was studying the odd board game— shatranj, he called it—that he had brought back from his travels and which John, unthinkingly, had allowed to be placed on a table in the study.

“I cannot claim much of an appetite after the sights I’ve seen today,” John replied softly. “I’d have arrived back earlier but I stayed somewhat longer than usual at the baths.” He did not add that his long immersion in its tepid pool had not succeeded in making him feel any less soiled.

The chair usually set behind his desk had been pulled over to Philo’s table. Suppressing a sigh, John sat down and regarded the game board. It looked to his eye much like a latrunculi board, but the heavy, carved jade pieces ranged stolidly upon its squares were unfamiliar. Alas, his mind had been occupied with other matters when Peter had brought up the question of the table Philo had requested. What had John told him? “Oh, put it anywhere.”

Now John regretted his inattention, for the study was his sanctuary. He liked to sit there in the evenings when the sun’s dying light, streaming in through its large window, lent a rusty hue to the bright tesserae of the mosaic that transformed the width of one wall into a bucolic scene. John had developed a special fondness for one of its figures, a girl with almond-shaped eyes. He had named her Zoe and had been known to have a word with her from time to time, much to Peter’s distress.

Perhaps, John thought wryly, Peter had placed the table in the study to stop him from sitting in there talking to himself.

He realized he should ask Philo to move to some other room to contemplate the game. But the last time he had seen him, John had been a student, not his equal. Even though that had been a lifetime ago, the two weeks that had elapsed since Philo had accepted his hospitality had not been sufficient for John to overcome the long shadow of that accustomed relationship.

“How has Peter been today? Does he seem recovered?” he asked his guest.

“He’s been going about his duties,” Philo replied.

“And your day went well?”

Philo looked up. The expression of childish curiosity his face had displayed during their previous day’s exploration of Constantinople had been replaced by the exhausted, hunted look increasingly familiar to John since his former mentor’s unannounced arrival at his door.

“I spoke with Senator Aurelius as you advised me, John,” the other said heavily. “He taught at the Academy himself and yet still he refuses to offer me assistance.”

John expressed his surprise.

“He treated me so curtly,” Philo continued, moving pieces idly around the board, “that I thought my mere presence in his study was causing him pain.” A frown nagged his bushy eyebrows.

“This is a wealthy city,” he went on resentfully. “Its beggars don’t ask for less than a follis. Every baker and mason and common laborer has the dignity of work. There are scribes laboring at the palace without knowing a word of Latin, or so I hear. And yet I am to believe there is no employment anywhere in the city or at Justinian’s court for a philosopher, a man of learning such as myself.”

John detected a bitterness in Philo’s tone he had not heard before. But in the old days, this scholar, this man who had taught him to read and write and who, during John’s own brief stay at the Academy, had imbued him with the taste for knowledge, had been little touched by the dark cares of the world. The man who had so recently arrived at John’s door was almost a stranger. The carefully clipped beard and longish hair, now thinner and receding from the forehead, had turned white, the eyebrows were thicker, the eyes sunken, and the hawk-like nose more prominent. Philo had become the perfect physical embodiment of the ideal philosopher. Except for the gnawing bitterness.

“I would say, Philo,” John replied, choosing his words with care, “that a philosopher such as yourself, a follower of Plato, should not perhaps be too shocked to find a less than warm reception at a Christian court in a Christian city.”

Philo’s lips tightened. “I recall quite well that Justinian ordered the Academy closed because of its alleged pagan teachings,” he snapped. “Why do you suppose that Diomedes and I and the others who taught there spent this past seven or eight years in exile? King Khosrow at least is an open-minded patron of the arts and learning without, if I dare say so, our own emperor’s religious agenda.”

John thought it appropriate and necessary to warn Philo against voicing such sentiments in public and as he did so, he looked up into the calm, glassy eyes of the mosaic girl Zoe. He did not, however, voice his thoughts about that other Persian royal patron of the arts whose subjects had captured a young adventurer straying over the border years before and changed his fate forever. If not for them, he thought, he might have been simply John, a small landholder married to his Cornelia, raising a family in comfortable obscurity in some corner of the fertile Greek countryside.

“You must have realized that this lack of opportunity was possible when you chose to come back, Philo,” he pointed out at the end of his cautionary comments.

“It didn’t even occur to me! It’s been five years since Justinian signed the Eternal Peace, the treaty giving us the right to come back. Some of my colleagues did so at once, of course. A few are still in the east and to tell the truth I thought about staying too, but I suppose I was homesick. That’s why I returned. I’d forgotten that my only true home was the Academy.”

“No matter the unfairness of Justinian’s closing it, that’s all in the past, Philo. Nothing can be done to change it. But at least you’re no longer in exile. Perhaps that’s all the justice you’ll ever find. However little it is, it’s more than many enjoy.”

The other shook his head. “No, John, I cannot accept that. We’ve been allowed to come home and even given the right to practice our own religion, that’s true. How often that’s been pointed at as a demonstration of the emperor’s boundless mercy. Merciful indeed, allowing some harmless old scholars to come creeping back to their homes!”

“But,” John replied, “of such pagans as remain in the empire, you’re the only ones having the emperor’s official sanction, Philo. Consider, here I am, Justinian’s Lord Chamberlain, sharing my house with a Christian servant and a licensed pagan, as it were, yet I’m the only one unable to legally profess my faith!”

Philo just shook his head more vehemently. “Don’t make light of my sorry situation, John. Has the emperor returned to us the land or the assets he confiscated? Has he offered us compensation for all we lost? Of course not. Nor are we permitted to teach. What then is the point of allowing a man to live yet allowing him no way earn his living? It’s my opinion that Justinian’s mercy is nothing more than calculated cruelty. He seeks to increase our suffering by forcing us to wander like wraiths through a world in which we no longer have a place. He wants to see us in rags, begging in the streets. What pleasure that would give him!”

“It’s unlikely Justinian will ever go walking about the streets observing beggars,” John pointed out with a thin smile. “As a matter of fact, he rarely ventures out into the city except when in procession, and in that case the beggars are all removed from his route beforehand. You must realize, Philo, that the vast majority of the populace would probably have had you all flayed alive before agreeing to allow you to return. I hope your colleagues took a more realistic view of what most likely awaits them.”

Philo thoughtfully tapped the board in front of him. “Perhaps it would be better for all if men conducted themselves by sensible rules such as those they’re bound to follow when they play shatranj,” he offered. “Now I admit that to the uninitiated, this is a game that may seem mysterious at first, but really it’s akin to one of those secret codes used by spies or military couriers. That is to say, once you possess the key to the cipher, what looks like nonsense makes perfect sense.”

He lifted one of the jade pieces. “This, for example, is an elephant. Its lot is to move two squares diagonally and it will never confound you by moving otherwise. Would not the ideal of life be to seek and hold to such a pattern of orderliness?”

John chuckled. “Unfortunately, life seems to more often resemble a game of knucklebones, where nothing can be predicted!”

Philo ignored John’s remarks. “Do you suppose I might be permitted to teach this game at court?” he wondered. “It is new even in Persia. Surely Aurelius could arrange such a concession for me?”

“But do you not realize how little political power a senator now has?” John paused. It was not just consternation he saw in his old teacher’s face, but fear as well. “Perhaps I should not tell you this,” he said, changing the subject, “but I know you are trustworthy and will keep silent upon the matter. At the order of the emperor I spent the day investigating the deaths of three stylites, the one we ourselves witnessed and two others, identical in their particulars. What do you think of the likelihood of all three being struck by lightning during the same storm? That is what Gaius believes happened.”

Philo thought for a time. “I would agree with him. It isn’t entirely surprising, considering how openly they presented themselves to the heavens. I see you are disappointed in my answer.”

“I had hoped you might have some other explanation. Nevertheless, I intend to have the circumstances further investigated.”

“Indeed? Then I should like to offer my assistance.”

John shook his head. “I appreciate your offer, but I’m afraid what I have in mind isn’t a philosophical task. I’ve already consulted Felix. He’s the excubitor captain and knows the Prefect well, not to mention that he has a horde of well-paid informants in all parts of the city. Between them, they’ll discover what is to be found soon enough.”

“I thought the excubitors’ duty was to guard the palace?” Philo displayed some surprise.

“Yes, but as Felix often says, the defense of the palace starts with control of the streets. So I’ve asked that he make inquiries about suspicious activities in the forums where the deaths occurred. I’m also rather hoping that the backgrounds of the dead will shed some light on how they came to meet their fate.”

Philo pointed out that the trio of stylites would surely have long since lost contact with anyone from their past.

“Many would doubtless say the same,” John replied, “but I think you will agree that our pasts have an exceedingly long reach.”

Philo appeared eager to pursue questioning his former student, but was interrupted when Peter tapped at the study door and hesitantly entered the room.