SPQR IV: The Temple of the Muses Page 11

  “Do you remember anything else that might help to identify this stranger? Anything else Iphicrates might have done that was unusual?”

  “I am sorry, sir. No, there was nothing else.” I dismissed him and sat pondering for a while. It didn’t surprise me that the man had not come forth earlier. Any intelligent slave knows better than to volunteer information unless asked. Amphytrion had less excuse for not asking, but that was understandable, too. It would have been beneath his philosophical dignity to listen to a slave.

  “I would like another look at Iphicrates’s quarters,” I told Amphytrion as I rose from my chair.

  “Be my guest, Senator, but we must remove Iphicrates’s belongings soon. The distinguished scholar of music, Zenodotos of Pergamum, is to arrive soon and we shall need those rooms.”

  I found Asklepiodes finishing up an anatomy lesson and persuaded him to accompany me. We found the study in good order, the completed inventory arranged neatly on the large table. I picked up one of the silver bowls.

  “You said that Iphicrates was doing research into the properties of parabolic mirrors,” I said. “Just what are the properties of these things, besides concentrating light?”

  “They also concentrate heat,” Asklepiodes said. “Come, I’ll demonstrate.” We went out into the courtyard and he squinted at the angle of the sun. With the reflector, he cast a disc of light against the side of the now-abandoned canal lock. Then he drew it back. As he did so, the disc shrank until it was an intensely bright spot the size of a copper as. “Put your hand there and you will see what I mean.”

  Gingerly, I slid my hand along the wooden surface until the tiny disc of light rested in my palm. It felt distinctly warm, but not hot enough to be distressing.

  “To what use did Archimedes put these devices?” I asked.

  “It is said that he set fire to Roman ships with them.”

  “Do you think that is possible? It doesn’t seem to make all that much heat.”

  “These are miniatures. The ones Archimedes used would have been larger than shields. And he used a great many, perhaps a hundred of them lined up atop the harbor walls of Syracuse. With that many concentrating their light, I believe they might well have succeeded in firing attacking ships. Ships are extremely combustible at the best of times.”

  So for a while we experimented with the four silver bowls. With the light of all four concentrated on a single spot, we managed to coax some faint wisps of smoke from the wood. Back inside, I went over the inventory lists, trying to find anything that might offer a clue to just what the infuriating pedant had been up to.

  “Items: a box of miscellaneous rope samples, each sample labeled,” I read. “What do you think that means?” So we rooted around until we found the box beneath the cable. It contained scores of pieces of rope, variously twisted and braided and of various materials, both animal and vegetable fibers being used. Each sample was about a foot long, and from each dangled a papyrus label adorned with shorthand lettering and strings of numerals.

  Asklepiodes selected a handful. “These are made of human hair,” he said. “What might be the use of such ropes?”

  I studied the labels, trying to piece together their meaning. “Human hair is said to make the best rope for torsion-style catapults. The women of Carthage sacrificed their tresses to build war engines during the siege. Scipio conquered a city of bald-headed women. Look here: These abbreviations give the race and nation of each donor. The man was obsessive about detail.”

  “And the numbers?” For once, even Asklepiodes was at a loss.

  I pondered them a while. “I think they measure the weight or tension at which the ropes finally broke. How he could determine such things I’ve no idea.” If my guesses about his shorthand were correct, the hair of black Africans rated the lowest in this regard, while the hair of blond German women was the strongest and most resilient. None of the vegetable fibers or cords of animal hide were as good as hair. Even silk, while strong, had deficiencies in the torsion department because it was, if I translated correctly, “too stretchy.” Besides, it was far too expensive.

  I told Asklepiodes what the slave had said. “At least now we have a description of the killer, however sketchy.”

  “Medium-sized, dark hair and beard of Greek cut … that certainly narrows the field. Surely there can be no more than twenty or thirty thousand men of that description in Alexandria.”

  “And among them is General Achillas,” I pointed out.

  “A tenuous connection at best.”

  “It’s enough for me,” I maintained. “A man of that description is in Iphicrates’s quarters on the evening of his murder. The next day, Achillas shows up without warning or reason and objects to my prying into the killing.”

  “Persuasive, but far from conclusive,” Asklepiodes said.

  “There’s more. A few days ago, in a spirit of idle curiosity, I wandered into the parade ground of the Macedonian barracks. I noticed some sort of war engine under construction and went for a closer look. That lout Memnon ran me off, very rudely. I’ll wager that, were we to go by the parade ground now, we would find that the engine has disappeared.”

  “If, as you seem to suspect, Iphicrates was designing engines of war for Achillas, why would he murder the man?”

  “That has me puzzled,” I admitted. “It could be because Achillas was approaching other kings with his designs. That could have violated some agreement the two had. I have learned that he accepted a large sum of money from Phraates of Parthia for certain designs.”

  “And yet,” Asklepiodes said, “these activities of Achillas; are they illegal or understood to be some sort of provocation?”

  “They could be so construed. Our foreign policy can be a complex matter. Once an allied king has accepted our help and protection, we assume leadership in military matters. That is our right as the greatest race of soldiers in the world. When we see such a king strengthening his defenses, we must assume that he is strengthening them against us since, with our aid, he has no one else to fear.”

  Asklepiodes made one of those throat-clearing sounds that denote skepticism. “It may be that, flying in the face of all reason, some kings are less confident in the security of Roman protection than are you.”

  “Oh, I’ll admit that they sometimes suffer the odd massacre or city sacking before the legions can come to their aid, but overall, the system is reliable. Sometimes, as a gesture of confidence, we have them demolish a part of the capital city’s walls. That way, when they begin to rebuild them without informing us first, we know they are up to something. The agreement with Egypt is not that formal, but this sudden interest in improved armaments is most suspicious.”

  “Are there no other enemies who might justify such preparations?”

  “Now that old Mithridates is dead and Tigranes has had his teeth pulled, there is no one. Parthia is too far away.”

  “An uprising by disaffected nobles, perhaps? I have heard rumors that some of the nomes are in arms and defying Alexandria.”

  “That’s a job for infantry and cavalry,” I said. “I’ve toured much of the land down to the first cataract. There are no fortifications to speak of. That part of Egypt is protected by the desert from foreign invasion. The only walled towns are up here in the delta area, and all of them are under Ptolemy’s control.”

  “It seems, then, that you have good reasons for your suspicions. Now, what do you propose to do about them? Your superiors are not the sort of men to take hasty action.”

  “No, I have to gather more evidence. I have an utterly unjustified reputation as a troublemaker, and they’ll look with skepticism on anything I bring them that isn’t more concrete than what I already have.”

  “And how do you propose to assemble this information?”

  “I think a bit of travel is called for.”

  I took my leave of Asklepiodes and went to the Library. The immense place was full of the dusty smell of books and the droning sound of scholars reading. Despi
te the size and massiveness of the building, the interior was not dim, abundant light being admitted by its extraordinarily large clerestory and numerous skylights of clearest glass. All the interior marble was white, to make best use of the admitted light. There were many statues of the various gods of learning: Apollo, Athena, ibis-headed Thoth and others, as well as busts of the great philosophers. The walls were lined up to the clerestory with lozenge-shaped cells holding scrolls like so many wine jars, each cell labeled with its contents.

  By asking attendants, I was guided to the Wing of the Pergamese Books and found Eumenes of Eleusis overseeing the copying of some of his precious scrolls.

  “May I help you, Senator?” he inquired politely.

  “I hope that you may. The book that disappeared from the study of the late Iphicrates; you said it was by Biton, and entitled On Engines of war?”

  “That is so.”

  “Might you have a copy?”

  He nodded gravely. “Yes. We have copies made of every book that comes to the Library. This spares excessive handling of the more valuable originals.”

  “Yet Iphicrates insisted upon the original?”

  “He was most insistent. He said that he did not wish to cope with the inevitable copier’s errors.”

  “I see. Might I have a look at a copy?”

  “Certainly, Senator.” I followed him to a nook where scores of scrolls rested in their racks, labels dangling from their handles. He scanned the rack expertly and plucked a scroll from its resting place. It was a good deal smaller than the massive original I had seen in Iphicrates’s study.

  “Is it in a single volume?” I asked.

  “Yes, it isn’t a lengthy work. If you wish to peruse it, please unroll it carefully It probably hasn’t been looked into since it was made here nearly a century ago.”

  “How does the Museum happen to have the original, since it was dedicated to Attalus I of Pergamum? I would think it would be among the Pergamese collection.” The rulers of Pergamum had founded a library in imitation of the Alexandrian, and in those days it still had a reputation second only to the original.

  “An earlier Ptolemy … ah … borrowed it in order to have a copy made. Through an oversight, an excellent copy was returned, rather than the original.”

  “Has this been a common oversight?” I asked.

  “Well, we do have several thousand original manuscripts from that library.”

  It figured. King or foot soldier, all Macedonians are thieves.

  “There are a number of vacant tables, Senator, if you wish to read the book now.”

  “Actually. I would rather take it to the embassy and read it at my leisure, if that is permitted.”

  “We really prefer not to lend volumes outside the Library, Senator. Now that the original has disappeared, this is the only copy we have.”

  “If my investigation is successful,” I said, “I think it very likely that I will be able to return the original to you.” I kept the scroll in a tight grip.

  “Well, that being the case, and in view of our sovereign’s eagerness to please Rome in any way he may, I think we can make an exception in this case.”

  “You have my heartiest thanks, and those of the Senate and People of Rome,” I assured him.

  Back at the embassy. I called on Creticus. I found him going over correspondence from Rome and elsewhere in the Empire.

  “If you don’t mind, sir, I think I’d like to take a few days to do some hunting.”

  He looked up suspiciously. “Since when did you like to do anything more strenuous than watch other people race chariots? What are you up to?”

  “I just need a bit of exercise. Too much of the good life, as it were.

  “It’s not as if you do much necessary work around here. Will you take Julia with you?”

  “I don’t think that would be proper, sir. We’re not married yet.”

  “You’re concerned about respectability? Now I know you’re hiding something. What happened to this murder investigation of yours?”

  “It will hold for a few days.”

  “Go, then. Stay out of trouble.”

  Hermes was no less amazed when I told him.

  “Hunting?” he said. “You mean, hunting animals?”

  “What else is there to hunt? Except for runaway slaves?”

  “You’ve never done this before.”

  “All the more reason to start now. Go find us some hunting gear. This place has clothing and equipment for every sort of activity. We leave tomorrow as soon as it’s light enough to see.” Muttering and shaking his head, he went to do my bidding.

  I found a comfortable corner and a pitcher of wine and settled down to delve into Biton’s book. I slipped off its stiff leather cover and carefully began to unroll the crackling scroll. Unlike the original, this copy was made on Egyptian papyrus, another reason for its reduced bulk.

  Biton began with a disquisition upon the history of war machines. These had been relatively rare and simple among the Babylonians and Egyptians and even rarer among the early Greeks. The Greek army that besieged Troy had not used them except for the wooden horse, which was not the same thing. But as men increasingly fought over fortified cities, these engines became necessary. At first they were mere towers for storming walls, covered galleries on wheels to protect rammers, and the various forms of missile-hurling device. Alexander’s battles had mostly been of the open-field sort, and he had rarely resorted to engines.

  Then came the Successors. These men had no new land to conquer, but they fought interminably among themselves over the carcass of Alexander’s empire. This consisted primarily of seizing each other’s ports, fortresses and capital cities. Such warfare called for engines, and to this endeavor the Successors brought the same mania for size and complexity that they brought to building.

  Most notable of these was Demetrius Poliorcetes, “the Besieger,” son of Antigonus One-Eye and the greatest military hobbyist of all time. He designed some of the strangest and certainly the largest engines of war ever conceived. He mounted storming towers on yoked ships for assaulting harbor walls. He built towers a hundred feet high equipped with dozens of catapults and completely plated with iron.

  Others were not far behind. Dionysus, tyrant of Syracuse, had formed a sort of academy of military arts where the best engineers worked on engines and new designs of warship and new types of weapons and armor.

  All this military experimentation had come to an end with the ascendancy of Rome. We beat them all because we knew that the ultimate weapon is the Roman legionary and the organization of the Roman legion. With them, even mediocre generals turn in victory after victory with monotonous regularity. An inspired general like (even now I hate to admit it) Caesar could accomplish marvels. And the Successors cared only about fighting. It was all they were good for. Romans value law and sound rule. But somebody believed that this inevitable tide of Roman rule could be reversed, and they thought that possession of some magic weapon would give them victory over the invincible legions.

  There followed a lengthy text, with drawings, of the various engines, including the fanciful monsters of Demetrius. A final section concerned the defenses designed for Syracuse by the great Archimedes. The incendiary reflectors were mentioned, although there was no description of them. The ship-lifting crane Iphicrates had ridiculed was not mentioned. That, apparently, was an invention of later tale-tellers. There was a cranelike device made to swing out over the harbor and drop heavy weights upon the attacking ships, smashing through deck and hull to sink them. Perhaps that was the origin of the story.

  When I was finished, the light was dim and my pitcher was almost empty. It had been fascinating reading, but it had not explained some things. I still did not know why the murderer had taken the scroll. Surely he knew there was at least one copy, and doubtless there were others in other lands. Might Iphicrates have written in the original? That seemed unlikely. The Librarians would have regarded it as a desecration. The text and drawings wo
uld have been extremely useful to a captain of engineers with a city or a fort to besiege, but I saw nothing in the book that would convince even the most gullible would-be conqueror that here was something that would tip the balance against the might of Rome. There had to be more, and it had to be in the original manuscript of Siton, dedicated to Attalus more than a century before.

  7

  BY LAMPLIGHT, I DRESSED IN THE hunting garments Hermes had found in the well-stocked embassy wardrobe. The tunic was a dark rust-red, with twin stripes of olive green running from the shoulders to the hem. The high boots of red leather were elegantly topped with spotted serval skin, with the dainty paws dangling over the shins. It made a dashing outfit, and I was sorry that Julia wouldn’t have the opportunity to see me wearing it.

  Hermes awaited me outside my door and followed me as I left the embassy. He was loaded with our other gear: short hunting spears, a roll of two cloaks, a satchel of travel food and an enormous wineskin.

  “I won’t have to carry this far, will I?” he groused.

  “Hermes, how would you ever manage in the legions? Do you know what a soldier has to carry?”

  “What of it?” he said. “The legions are for citizens. And I’ll bet you never had to carry much. You were an officer.”

  “To answer your question, we are going to do most of our journeying by boat.”

  Even so, it was a long walk. The city was all but deserted so early. As we passed the Macedonian barracks, there was enough light to discern that, as I had predicted, the war machine was nowhere to be seen. We went to the Canopic Way and took it almost the whole length of the city until we reached the canal that cuts through the Rakhotis from north to south, connecting the Kibotos Harbor to the Nile canal and Lake Mareotis.

  We stopped at the bridge over the canal and Hermes set down his burden, puffing away. I descended the stair by the bridge to the broad pavement that ran the length of the canal. It was crowded with boats and rafts, mostly those of farmers bringing produce to the city markets. Along one section I found a line of travel barges. The bargemen sat in their craft. At my approach a dockside foreman came to my, eying my attire.