The Bull Slayer

CHAPTER Forty-three

The 5th day before the Nones of December

Calpurnia sits alone in her room. Not her room, a strange room in a distant wing of the palace, her prison cell, though there are no bars or locks. She drinks wine laced with valerian root, hoping to sleep, but it doesn’t help. She tries to draw but can’t, tries to read but throws the book aside. Finally, she takes up her distaff and spindle and spins thread hour after hour, teasing out the wool with her fingers, watching the whorl spin this way, that way, with no purpose but to find oblivion in that simple, mindless activity. It is the seventh day since she and Agathon were caught in the cave, the fifth since she and Pliny and Ione and Zosimus shed each other’s heart’s blood in a mutual wounding that will scar them forever.

In all these weary days she has not seen a friendly face. Her new serving women are strangers to her. Ione is not permitted to come near her now—not that she wants her to. None of the wives have called on her—mercifully. No one will risk offending her husband by befriending her. She thinks bitterly how Agathon deceived and abandoned her. Is anything left of her passion for him? It feels now as if it had all happened to some other woman, someone she doesn’t even recognize. She has gathered together the dozens of drawings she made of him and has burned them one by one until nothing remains but a heap of ashes.

Ashes. She has the taste of ashes in her mouth. Her heart, her self-respect, her husband’s love—all ashes. He will divorce her. How can he not? It’s what she deserves. There can be no forgiveness for the pain she has caused him. She has ruined both their lives. All she wants now is to go home and be with her grandfather, in the old familiar surroundings of her childhood.

A knock on the door.

Can it be him? Her husband? Come to forgive her after all? Her heart leaps. If he will let her, she will love him again like the innocent girl she once was. How she longs to be that girl again! “Come in,” she says in a tremulous voice.

“Excuse me, lady. They said you were here.”

“Aulus?” She tries to compose her face, quiet her heart. “What are you doing here? I thought you were at home.”

“I was for a while. I couldn’t stand it. I came back to see the governor, but Suetonius says he left yesterday to visit someone in the country.”

“Oh, I didn’t know.” She sees his eyes widen in surprise. He’s a sensitive boy, he knows something is the matter, but he is too shy to ask. She must say something. “My husband and I are estranged.” She forces a smile.

“I’m sorry, I—”

“It’s all right. Why did you want to see him?”

He looks at his feet and grimaces, hunches his thin shoulders, wrings his hands. She’s afraid he’ll have a fit. “The cave,” he says at last. “Everyone says your husband found it. I wanted him to take me there.”

“Why in the world?” she asks, astonished. “That should be the last place—”

“You don’t understand. I blame myself for my father’s death. If I hadn’t been a coward, hadn’t tried to run away, he would have seen those men who were lying in wait on the path, he could have defended himself.”

“Aulus, you mustn’t think that.” She takes his hands in hers.

There are tears in his eyes. “If I had obeyed him and gone with him to the cave none of this would have happened. And maybe Mithras would have cured me. Maybe he still can. I want to go there now and make a sacrifice to him. I’m a man now, I’ll soon be seventeen. I mustn’t be afraid anymore. I owe my father that.”

“Oh, but you can’t, there’s no one there, no priest, the cave is empty.”

He draws back and stares at her. “How do you know that?”

She realizes too late what she has admitted. “Haven’t you heard? I was there—with someone I thought I loved.” Why lie to the boy? She’s too tired to lie anymore. She sees his confusion.

“And that’s why—”

“Why I’m here? Yes.”

“I’m sorry for you.”

“You’re kind to say so.”

He looks at her earnestly. “My parents parted in anger too. I will never marry.”

“Don’t be silly, of course you will.”

For a moment he says nothing and then he gathers his nerve. “Could you take me there?”

“No, impossible.”

“Who else can I ask?”

“One of the soldiers, Suetonius…”

“I’m afraid of them.” He pleads with his eyes. “Only you, lady.”

Oh, gods! Could she? Go back to the last place where she and Agathon had made love and face whatever feelings assail her? Is she brave enough for that? Is she as brave as this poor boy? It must be right now, before she loses her courage.

“Come with me to the stables,” she says.

***

The air was as sharp as a knife. A morning mist lay in the hollows and the ground was white with hoarfrost. Dressed in woolen breeches and thick cloaks, their legs encased in leather puttees, Pliny, Zosimus, and Galeo tramped along in single file, stepping carefully over fallen branches in the dense underbrush. The stout, long-bladed boar spear was heavy in Pliny’s hands. From somewhere ahead of them came the baying of the Laconian hounds. They had found the scent. Diocles’ huntsmen were busy stringing up the nets of woven flax, hanging the meshes on the forked branches of trees.

Diocles—where was he? He and the other Greeks had been within sight only a moment ago—Diocles had assured him he wouldn’t have to use his spear; the huntsmen would do the dangerous work. But surely a noble Roman must relish the excitement of the chase? What would people think if their governor showed himself lacking in manliness? And Pliny, like a fool, had allowed himself to be imposed on, although Marinus had tried his best to dissuade him. The physician would have nothing to do with such foolishness himself and had stayed behind in Diocles’ house.

Pliny slowed his pace and waited for Zosimus to catch up. The young man was even less accustomed than Pliny to physical exertion. He looked half frozen. “Something’s been bothering me all night,” said Pliny, his breath coming out in white puffs of steam. “I was introduced to our host’s father last night. Poor old fellow’s lost his wits. Name’s Hypatius. Seems to me that name has a familiar ring but I can’t place it. Mean anything to you?”

Zosimus stopped in his tracks and turned worried eyes on his master. “Patrone, we should leave this place. Now.”

“Why, what is it?”

“Hypatius was the name on the deed, the owner of the estate who sold Barzanes the plot of land with the cave. Patrone, they’re all in this together. They’ve lured you into a trap!”

“Mehercule! The Sun-Runner? Diocles?”

The snarling of dogs was suddenly loud in their ears. Branches snapped. The boar burst out of the thicket in front of them, two dogs hanging from its bristling neck, others snapping at its legs. Two hundred pounds of muscle balanced on tiny feet. It charged, bursting through the net that should have drawn tight around it and ran straight at Pliny. Where were the huntsmen? He crouched and tried to take it on the point of his spear but the beast flicked the weapon out of his hands with a toss of its huge head. Pliny threw himself on his stomach, pressed his face against the frozen earth, scrabbled with his fingers. The boar worked at him with its wet snout, grunting and snuffling, he could feel its steaming breath on his face and smell its stink. If it got those wicked, upcurving tusks under him—

“Patrone!” Zosimus had been given a javelin to carry—useless in his unpracticed hands. He threw it and missed, then snatched up a fallen branch and brought it down with all his strength on the animal’s shoulder. The boar turned and slashed at him, ripping open his belly, flinging him aside like a rag doll. Then Galeo was standing over the boar with Pliny’s spear in his hands. He thrust it down between its shoulder blades up to the cross piece and held on until the animal sank to its knees and fell over. He helped Pliny to his feet.

A moment later three of Diocles’ huntsmen appeared as if from nowhere. “Are you all right, Governor?” said one. “Looks like your companion is…well, too bad.”

Zosimus lay on the ground, clutching his belly, a grey bulge of intestine showing between his bloody fingers.

***

“Calpurnia, where are you going?” Suetonius had been alerted by one of the slaves and had followed her and Aulus out to the stable.

“Are you my jailer now?”

“No, of course not, but—”

“Then get out of my way.”

“Not until you tell me where you’re going.”

She made an angry gesture with her hand. “To the cave, then.”

“With the boy? Why?”

“Because he asked me to.”

“At least let me come with you.”

“So you can report on me to my husband?”

***

Marinus’ arms were bloody to the elbows. He had done what he could, gently replacing the large intestine, trimming the ragged flesh around the wound and bathing it with vinegar and verdigris, then suturing it with the complicated double stitching recommended for belly wounds. Zosimus lay on the blood-soaked bed, scarcely breathing.

“He won’t live, will he?” Galeo had just come into the room and leaned over the physician’s shoulder.

“Not likely.” Marinus wiped his face against his shoulder. Though it was cold in the room he was sweating. He had been working for an hour.

“Where’s the governor?”

“With Diocles, I think. Why?”

“Because I went back out to the woods and had a look at the nets. In the excitement nobody bothered to take them down. I know a little bit about boar hunting.”

“And?”

“And they were only tied to bushes at the bottom, not to the tree trunks as they should have been.”

Marinus answered with a wordless stare.

***

“Do drink some wine, Governor. And please sit down. You’re badly shaken, of course. Quite understandable.”

Diocles’ private study, which overlooked a spacious courtyard, was a virtual museum of Greek culture. Centuries-old Athenian vases sat on antique tables; busts of Plato, Socrates, and Homer stood on pedestals. On one wall hung ancient weapons and pieces of armor. He pointed to an ivory-hilted short sword in a jeweled scabbard. “Said to have belonged to Mithridates the Great. The bane of the Romans. He was a hero to us, you know.”

Pliny said nothing.

“Yes, well,” Diocles’ genial smile faded, replaced by a look of concern, “terrible business this morning. But boar hunting is a dangerous sport and no place for a scribe. You really shouldn’t have allowed him to go along. I expect you’re blaming yourself.”

“I’m blaming you! Where were your huntsmen, where were you when it happened?”

Diocles’ eyes narrowed. “I hope that isn’t an accusation of some sort? You asked to speak with me privately. Was it only to complain about my huntsmen?”

“Diocles, man, come out of there”—the distant, boisterous shout of one of the guests—“we’re waiting lunch for you.”

“I have more to accuse you of than that,” Pliny said. “You’re a thief and a murderer, Diocles. You were in league with the procurator and the banker Didymus to steal tax money. Tell me, how did you all come together? Balbus needed a place to hide the money he planned to steal and a way to invest it secretly. A crooked banker like Didymus was the obvious choice. And was Didymus already a member of your cult? Did he bring Balbus to you? How convenient for all of you. A cave, a meeting place where money could be distributed in return for favors, and all of you bound to one another in secrecy by the mystery of initiation, and poor Barzanes imagining all along that it was for the glory of his god! And you, Diocles, pretending to resent Roman rule while you profit from its corruption. How much of that money flowed into your coffers? And what did you give in return? The support of your faction? A docile city council that would ask no questions, make no complaints? Was my predecessor part of this too? I was sent here to clean up the financial mess in this province and who do I find at the heart of it? None other than you. I’m placing you under arrest. You will accompany me back to Nicomedia for trial.”

“Remarkable.” Diocles’ golden voice flowed like honey. He leaned back in his chair. “What an imagination you have. I wouldn’t have suspected it. I can see you aren’t well, Governor. I urge you not to excite yourself. An imbalance of the humors can affect the mind, produce strange fantasies. I think you should ask the emperor to relieve you at once.”

“You’d like to see the last of me, wouldn’t you? The cave of Mithras, where Balbus was going when he was killed, is only a few miles from here. In fact a certain Hypatius sold Barzanes the land. Hypatius, your father.”

“But this is absurd. I don’t know any Barzanes and we don’t sell land, with or without caves. I’m neglecting my other guests. If there’s nothing more—”

“I have the bill of sale to prove it, thanks to my secretary, who now lies dying. You used that religious zealot for your own ends, and finally you had him killed when you realized I had found him. You are the mysterious Sun-Runner that Balbus wrote to, complaining about Didymus. And Didymus has confessed to everything, even though he fears you. I know how you and your friends stole the money, how you invested in aqueducts, temples, and baths that would add to your glory as benefactors and philanthropists—although often enough, in your greed, you pocketed the money and never even finished the buildings. And I might never have uncovered any of this if Didymus hadn’t quarreled with Balbus. Didymus has given you up.”

“That greedy, stupid little man!” Now the golden voice grated like iron. The pretense of civility was gone. “I admit nothing, and you are bluffing, Governor. Didymus hasn’t named me and he won’t. Pancrates is a most useful man. Did you imagine he peddles his secrets only to you? I, too, was anxious to know who killed our friend the procurator. And I thought that you, with your power to summon witnesses, and that charlatan, with his network of informants, might discover the truth together. And you haven’t disappointed me. Naturally, Pancrates has kept me informed. You say Didymus has implicated me? Not true. Pancrates has just delivered to me a letter from him, vaguely threatening that he might talk if I don’t rescue him. But I will rescue him, you and I together, Governor. Let me suggest that you arrange to leave his cell door open one night and a carriage waiting, and I will see that he and his family are taken care of somewhere out of the province.”

“Or have him quietly murdered like you did Barzanes? And why would I leave his cell door open?”

Diocles sighed and ran a hand over his silver mane. “We wondered what to do about you, Governor. Some were for bribing you but I knew that was pointless. Unlike our previous governor, you are incorruptible. The boar hunt, as you may have guessed, was also a bad idea. I was against it, too much could go amiss. As usual, I was right. Poison would have been simpler, but I suppose you’ve been careful to dose yourself with theriac, and, if not, it would raise suspicions if you succumbed at my dinner table. But, in fact, I know exactly how to deal with you. I’m not a violent man. Information is my weapon. Excuse me a moment, will you?”

Diocles went to the door of an antechamber, and opened it. “Join us,” he commanded. “Yes, now. And do try to act like a man.”

A young man stepped through the door, his eyes, like a frightened deer’s, looking everywhere but at Pliny.

Diocles smiled. “Here’s someone I want you to meet, Governor. You may recall you met him briefly at Balbus’ funeral. Our estates neighbor each other and his father, as it happens, owes me quite a lot of money. See how pale and trembling he is. Allow me to introduce you, once again, to Agathon, your wife’s lover. Ah, you know I’m telling the truth, I see it in your eyes. Agathon has told me how they were found together in the cave. She’s been carrying on an affair with him for months right under your nose, you poor man. And he will declare it publicly if I tell him to. And, if you think his word isn’t enough, I happen to possess a letter to him in your wife’s handwriting. Foolish woman, she made the mistake of entrusting it to her tutor, who brought it to me instead. He resented being treated as an errand boy, you see, though that never would have occurred to her. Would you care to read it? Do sit down, Gaius Plinius, before you fall down. Women!” Diocles spread his arms in a theatrical gesture, “Zeus only made them to cause us grief, all the poets say so, no? And yet we love them anyway. The boy is good-looking, I grant you, though not very bright. Really, I don’t understand what your wife sees in him.”

Pliny felt the breath go out of him. This was his rival? He had tried to imagine her lover—a handsome older man, he supposed; strong, with a noble face. Not this boy! Anger and shame filled him all over again. He tasted bile in his throat.

“I had hoped this wouldn’t be necessary,” Diocles murmured. “I’m not a cruel man, I don’t relish the spectacle of humiliation. But think of the scandal if you should become the laughing stock of all Bithynia. The governor with a cuckold’s horns because his wife preferred a Greek lover—and not any Greek but this unimpressive youngster. We Greeks are a virile race, whatever you may think. Among us there is no greater shame than being cuckolded. You won’t be able to show your face, much less govern. The emperor, who will learn about it from my Roman friends, will, with many expressions of regret, be forced to recall you. And he will force you to divorce your wife. I’ve done my homework, you see. I’m familiar with your Roman laws. They even compel you to kill the lover with your own hands. What an appalling piece of folly, but there it is. And you, of all men, Gaius Plinius, are devoted to the law.

“Your wife is not exactly the faithful Penelope, fending off the suitors—how far we have sunk since the days of Homer!—still, I suspect that you don’t want to divorce her. She’s a charming and beautiful woman, after all. Your man Suetonius was good enough to lend me his copy of your published letters. I had them translated and read them with interest. You see, I believe in knowing my adversary. I was impressed by the touching love letters to your wife. The picture of domestic bliss you paint! Did she really sleep with your speeches when you were away from her, and set your poetry to music? I can scarcely credit it. Young love! Indeed, I envy you. Now surely those tender feelings aren’t entirely extinguished? You and she may yet spend many happy years together with this unpleasantness forgotten. And I suspect you are not prepared to play the outraged husband now and disembowel young Agathon here. Are you? Let us see.”

He went to the wall of weapons, took down the sword of Mithridates from its peg and tossed it on the table in front of Pliny. Agathon blanched. Pliny did not move.

“Well? Have you the stomach for it? No? I didn’t think so.” Diocles seated himself again, not bothering to look at Agathon. “You’ve done an admirable job here, Gaius Plinius, helping us poor Greeklings to put our sorry affairs in order. But your labors have taken a toll on your health. Time to rest on your laurels then? Time to return home after a job well done? The emperor will understand if you beg to be relieved of your post. You and I are reasonable men, we don’t need to resort to violence. You may frighten young Agathon here but you can’t frighten me.”

“You have misunderstood our law,” Pliny said very softly. “I can only kill him if I actually find him in my bed.” Then with one swift motion he seized the sword, drew it from its scabbard, and struck at Agathon’s head with the flat of the blade. The boy let out a scream and fell backwards, clutching his head. “If you ever approach my wife again you will wish I had killed you!”

Agathon scuttled crab-like toward the door.

***

They dismounted at the foot of the hill.

“It’s halfway up the hillside and to your left. You can almost see it from here.” She pointed.

“Come in with me?”

“No, you go, I’ll stay here with the horses.” She felt the panic rising in her breast again. This was close to the spot where the soldiers had surprised them. She pulled her hooded cloak tighter around her shoulders. “It’s cold. Don’t be long.”

Aulus held a trussed up cock in his arms; it struggled and he felt its heart beating as fast as his own heart. Over his shoulder he had slung a wineskin. His offerings to the god.

He found the entrance and descended the seven steps. A dim and dusty light sifted through the cave’s mouth. He looked around in wonder at the dully glowing stars strewn across the walls and ceiling. What message might they hold for him if only he knew the key? Slowly, feeling his way, he walked down the nave, forty paces, until he was face to face with Mithras. The beautiful youth—manly, fearless, plunging his dagger into the bull’s neck, shedding its blood for him, for him. Aulus sank to his knees in front of the altar. With what words could he pray to this strange god? His yearning was beyond words—an end to shame, an end to self-loathing. Mithras would hear him and understand. He drew a knife from his belt and cut the cock’s throat, letting its blood spurt over the altar. “Are you here, Lord Mithras? I give you this. Help me, come to me…”

And he felt it, he felt the god near him, felt his power and his indescribable sweetness. And he understood in an instant of clarity that all his visions, the exploding bursts of light inside his skull had been mere glimpses of this reality beyond reality, of Mithras’ starry realm. And the lights were exploding in his head now—he was shaken, he was lifted up, his chest swelled with such joy that he thought it would burst…

And as Aulus slumped, twitching and jerking, before the altar, the earth did rumble with the bellow of a subterranean bull, and shake and split open, and the roof of the cave came down on him, burying him under a ton of rock.

***

The horses reared and screamed as the earth heaved under them. Calpurnia was thrown to the ground half-stunned. Was this her punishment? Were the Furies coming for her? She looked up in time to see a tree—the very tree under which she and Agathon had coupled—lift its roots from the quivering earth and slowly, slowly fall toward her.

***

“Well, Governor, you surprise me. But you should have killed him, you know. It’s too late now. This is your last chance to be reasonable. I’m offering you a way out. Simply resign and go home, with or without your wife, it’s up to you. But if you refuse, consider that you are in my house, far from home. And though, as I have said, I personally dislike violence…”

The antique vases began to vibrate.

A bronze shield fell from its hanger with a ringing crash.

The bust of blind Homer, leapt from its pedestal and rolled crazily across the floor.

Diocles looked around, wild-eyed. “No!”

With a groan of splitting timbers, the floor buckled and the ceiling cracked. Pliny and Diocles were both on their hands and knees, Pliny nearest the door, which hung from one hinge.

Diocles, crouched against the farther wall, was trying to get to his feet when the wall fell inward, pinning him under a weight of brick and plaster. Pliny, in the doorway, glanced back and, through a choking cloud of plaster dust, saw Diocles stretch out his arm. “Help me!”

Pliny crawled back, picked up the marble bust of Homer where it lay and lifted it high. Their eyes met. “You won’t kill me,” Diocles whispered.

Pliny brought it down on his head. Again. And again.

Then he dashed for the door just as the ceiling collapsed in a cloud of choking dust.