I thought for a moment and then agreed. Behind the eunuch, the high priest of Bast smiled like a cat, no doubt anticipating my imminent demise and purring at the idea of yet another impious Roman departing from the shores of the living.
As I was lowered onto the merchant's roof, his household slaves realized what was happening and sounded an alarm. They surrounded me at once and seemed determined to throw me into the square below, but I held up my hands to show them that I was unarmed and I cried out that I was a friend of Marcus Lepidus. My Latin seemed to sway them. At last they took me down a flight of steps to meet their master.
The man in blue had withdrawn to a small chamber which I took to be his office, for it was cluttered with scrolls and scraps of papyrus.
He looked at me warily, then recognized me. "You're the man I ran into, on the street. But why have you come here?"
"Because you asked for my help, Marcus Lepidus. And because you offered me a reward," I said bluntly. "My name is Gordianus."
Beyond the shuttered window, which faced the square, the crowd began to chant again. A stone struck the shutters with a crash. Marcus gave a start and bit his knuckles.
"These are my cousins, Rufus and Appius," he said, introducing two younger men who had just entered the room. Like their older cousin, they were well groomed and well dressed, and like him they appeared to be barely able to suppress their panic.
"The guards outside are beginning to weaken," said Rufus shrilly. "What are we going to do, Marcus?"
"If they break into the house they'll slaughter us all!" said Appius.
"You're obviously a man of wealth, Marcus Lepidus." I said. "A trader, I understand."
All three cousins looked at me blankly, baffled by my apparent disregard for the crisis at hand. "Yes," said Marcus. "I own a small fleet of ships. We carry grain and slaves and other goods between Alexandria and Rome." Talking about his work calmed him noticeably, as reciting a familiar chant calms a worshiper in a temple.
"Do you own the business jointly with your cousins?" I
"The business is entirely my own," said Marcus, a bit haughtily. "I inherited it from my father."
"Yours alone? You have no brothers?"
"None."
"And your cousins are merely employees, not partners?"
"If you put it that way."
I looked at Rufus, the taller of the cousins. Was it fear of the mob I read on his face, or the bitterness of old resentments? His cousin Appius began to pace the room, biting his fingernails and casting what I took to be hostile glances at me.
"I understand you have no sons, Marcus Lepidus," I said.
"No. My first wife gave me only daughters; they all died of fever. My second wife was barren. I have no wife at present, but I soon will, when the girl arrives from Rome. Her parents are sending her by ship, and they promise me that she will be fertile, like her sisters. This time next year, I could be a proud father at last!" He managed a weak smile, then bit his knuckles. "But what's the use of contemplating my future when I have none? Curse all the gods of Egypt, to have put that dead cat in my path!"
"I think it was not a god who did so," I said. "Tell me, Marcus Lepidus, though Jupiter forbid such a tragedy-if you should die before you marry, before you have a son, who would inherit your property then?"
"My cousins, in equal portions."
Rufus and Appius both looked at me gravely. Another stone struck the shutters and we all gave a start. It was impossible to read their faces for any subtle signs of guilt.
"I see. Tell me, Marcus Lepidus, who could have known, yesterday, that you would be walking up that side street in Rhakotis this morning?"
He shrugged. "I make no secret of my pleasures. There is a house on that street where I spend certain nights in the company of a certain catamite. Having no wife at present…"
"Then either of your cousins might have known that you would be coming home by that route this morning?"
"I suppose," he said, shrugging. If he was too distracted to see the point, his cousins were not. Rufus and Appius both stared at me darkly, and glanced dubiously at one another.
At that moment a gray cat came sauntering into the room, its tail flicking, its head held high, apparently oblivious to the chaos outside the house or the despair of those within.
"The irony of it!" wailed Marcus Lepidus, suddenly breaking into tears. "The bitter irony! To be accused of killing a cat- when I, of all men, would never do such a thing! I adore the little creatures. I give them a place of honor in my home, I feed them from my own plate. Come, precious Nefer!" He stooped down and made a cradle for the cat, who obligingly leaped into his arms. The cat twisted onto its back and purred loudly. Marcus Lepidus held the animal close to him, caressing it to soothe his distress. Rufus appeared to share his older cousin's fondness for cats, for he smiled weakly and joined him in stroking the beast's belly.
I had reached an impasse. It seemed to me quite certain that at least one of the cousins had been in league with the bearded Egyptian in deliberately plotting the destruction of Marcus Lepidus, but which? If only the little girl had been able to give me a better description. "All Romans look the same," indeed!
"You and your cursed cats!" said Appius suddenly, wrinkling his nose and retreating to the far corner of the room. "It's the cats that do this to me. They cast some sort of hateful spell! Alexandria is full of them, making my life a misery. Every time I get close to one, the same thing happens! I never sneezed once in my life before I came here!" And with that he sneezed, and snorted, and pulled a cloth from his tunic to blow his runny nose.
What followed was not pretty, though it may have been just.
I told Marcus Lepidus all I had learned from the little girl. I summoned him to the window and opened the shutters enough to point out the man with the Babylonian beard, who was now overseeing the construction of a bonfire in the square below. Marcus had seen the man before, in the company of his cousin Appius.
What outcome did I expect? I had meant to help a fellow Roman far from home, to save an innocent man from the wrath of an unreasoning mob, and to gain a few coins for my purse in the process-all honorable pursuits. Did I not realize that inevitably a man would die? I was younger then, and did not always think a thing through to its logical result.
The unleashed fury of Marcus Lepidus took me by surprise. Perhaps it should not have, considering the terrible shock he had suffered that day, considering also that he was a successful businessman, and therefore to some degree ruthless; considering finally that treachery within a family often drives men to acts of extreme revenge.
Quailing before Marcus Lepidus, Appius confessed his guilt. Rufus, whom he declared to be innocent of the plot, begged for mercy on his cousin's behalf, but his pleadings were ineffectual. Though we might be hundreds of miles from Rome, the rule or the Roman family held sway in that house in Alexandria, and all power resided in the head of the household. When Marcus Lepidus stripped off his blue tunic and ordered that his cousin Appius should be dressed in it, the slaves of the household obeyed; Appius resisted, but was overwhelmed. When Marcus ordered that Appius should then be thrown from the window into the mob, it was done.
Rufus, pale and trembling, withdrew into another room. Marcus made his face as hard as stone and turned away. The gray cat twined itself about his feet, but the solace it offered was ignored.
The bearded Egyptian, not realizing the substitution, screamed to the others in the mob to take their vengeance on the man in blue. It was only much later, when the mob had largely dispersed and the Egyptian was able to get a closer look at the trampled, bloody corpse, that he realized the mistake. I shall never forget the look on his face, which changed from a leer of triumph to a mask of horror as he approached the body, studied its face, and then looked up at the window where I stood. He had overseen the killing of his own confederate.