Here the streets of Alexandria worked to my advantage. The wide boulevards, the long, straight blocks, made it virtually impossible for him to get out of my sight for more than a few seconds. I was gaining on him, impatient to catch him but knowing better than to put on a sudden burst of speed that would leave me gagging on the pavement before we even reached the Rakhotis.
We passed market stalls and rumbling farm carts, braying asses and groaning, ill-smelling camels and even a couple of elephants bound for some ceremonial in the Hippodrome. Chickens scattered before us and cats watched us warily. People looked at us with interest and then went back to what they were doing. Alexandria is a city of many spectacles, and we made a sorry spectacle, indeed.
I noted that the complexion of the crowd had grown darker. White kilts and black wigs came to predominate. We were in the Rakhotis. Now I became acutely conscious of my Roman haircut and generally Latin features. If I had been chasing an Egyptian, I would probably have been mobbed immediately. I had to catch Ataxas and get out of there before they decided to do it anyway.
I reached him just before the street we were on opened onto the huge plaza surrounding the Great Serapeum. I was tempted to spit him with my sword, but something that public and that outrageous would undoubtedly result in my death, probably on the altar of some disgusting god with the head of a warthog. So instead I grabbed his shoulder and spun him around.
He was red-faced and gasping, trembling with exhaustion as I shoved him back into a space between two buildings. A couple of cats paused in their contest over the remains of a fish long enough to hiss at us. Triumphantly, I snatched the scroll from his arms. He made a halfhearted grab for his shortened axe, but I kicked him in the crotch and that made him change his mind.
"Don't mistake me for some helpless mathematician, Ataxas," I said to him as he writhed on the cobbles. "It takes more than some jumped-up runaway slave to kill a Caecilius Metellus."
"How much do you want, Roman?" he gasped. "I will make you rich beyond your wildest ambitions. There is a whole country here to loot."
"I just want to see what Ptolemy does to you. Or possibly your own followers when they see Ataxas is a runaway Greek slave in a wig and a false beard. The king's soldiers will go into your temple with sledgehammers and smash your trick statue and tear up the floors and walls to find the pipes you used to fake the sound of Baal-Ahriman's voice. You'll probably be pulled apart and devoured by priestesses with lacerated backs to avenge."
"You place great faith in Ptolemy, Roman," Ataxas said. "His time is over, as is the ascendancy of Rome in Egypt." He had worked his way back up to his knees.
"Not after I get back to the Palace with this," I said, shaking the document in his face.
"That may not be as easy as you think, Roman," he said, with no small measure of truth. I was in the Rakhotis, and these were bad times to be a Roman in that part of the city.
"Farewell, Ataxas," I said. "I'll come to your execution, should you live long enough to be sentenced." I turned and walked to the mouth of the alley. Before going out, I stopped and looked out into the street. It was getting crowded, but nobody was paying me any attention. Just as I stepped out into the street, I heard a horrible squalling sound that cut off suddenly. I could only think that it was Ataxas making some inarticulate sound of rage. Then something hit me squarely between the shoulder blades and flopped to the pavement. I turned, bewildered. Something gray and furry lay at my feet, inert. It was all so unexpected that at first I didn't recognize the thing. Then Ataxas ran past me into the street, pointing at me, his eyes wide with horror.
"The Roman has killed a cat!" he shouted, then, in a hysterical shriek: "THE ROMAN HAS MURDERED A CAT!"
The people in the street stared, mouths agape. They stared at me, then looked down at the wretched beast, as if they could not comprehend the sheer sacrilegious horror of what they saw.
"He killed a cat!" they began to murmur, in both Greek and Egyptian. "The Roman killed a cat!" It did not take them long to get over their shock as I sidled away from the little corpse. Then:
"KILL THE ROMAN! KILL THE CAT-MURDERER!"
I began to retrace my steps at great speed. This time I was encumbered with the heavy book, and it was my second life-and-death race of the morning. I thought of that Greek with the interminable name who had run from Marathon to Sparta and back to Marathon and then all the way to Athens, where he dropped dead, which served him right. After all, he didn't have a rampaging Alexandrian mob on his heels.
Every time I looked back over my shoulder, the mob was getting bigger. News of the enormity I had committed flew faster than I would have credited possible. They were calling not just for my death but for the death of all Romans. But they wanted to start with me.
It seemed ridiculous to me to be rent asunder by a rampaging mob for killing a cat. But to have this happen over a cat-slaying of which I was entirely innocent was beyond endurance. I had little love for the slinky beasts, but it never would have occurred to me to slaughter one.
I was out of the Rakhotis as if I wore the winged sandals of Mercury, but I was far from safe. The mob rampaged into the Greek quarter and picked up strength even there. There are Egyptians in all the quarters of
Alexandria, and there are always people in any city who will jump at any chance to join a riot. I had done it myself, when the riot was in a good cause.
I ran by the Macedonian barracks, screaming, "Riot! Riot! Turn out the troops! The city is aflame!" The soldiers on parade looked bewildered, but officers barked orders and the drums began to beat and the trumpets to bray.
I looked behind me to see the soldiers boil out of the gates and collide with the following mob. Many got through, and they continued to pursue me. I tried to turn up a street that led northward, toward the Palace, but members of the mob had got there ahead of me and cut me off. That was more of Ataxas's doing. Why hadn't I killed the fiend when I had him at my mercy?
There was nothing for it but to continue fleeing east, all the way to the delta if need be. I was gasping heavily by this time, bringing up phlegm with every wheeze. I began to see men in long robes wearing pointed caps and their hair loose about their shoulders. That meant I was in the Jewish quarter. These were the traditional Jews, for most of the Jews of Alexandria were dressed and barbered like Greeks, and many of them spoke no language except Greek.
With a final burst of speed I got far ahead of the cat-avengers and darted down an alley. It was intersected by another alley and I took that one. This was refreshing, almost like Rome. I pounded on a door.
"Let me in!" I begged.
"What is it?" The voice came from overhead. It belonged to a man with thin features, dressed in a red-and-white robe. His eyes had a slightly fanatic gleam.
"The Egyptians are after me!" I said.
"I don't like Egyptians," the man remarked. "They kept my people in bondage for many generations."
"Then you'll save me from them! They think I killed a cat!"
"The Egyptians are uncircumcised idolaters," he said. "They worship animals and animal-headed gods." That was certainly true, although I had no idea what the state of their penises had to do with anything.
"The Macedonians went out to suppress the riot," I said, "but some got through and they're after me. Let me in!"