Callias gestured behind him. Standing amongst the columns of the stoa were Aposila, the mother of Allike, and Malixa and Polonikos, the parents of Ophelia.
Callias might be aged, but his management skills hadn’t slowed one whit. The man who ran a mine with a thousand slaves had rounded up three citizen parents with admirable speed.
Callias said, “They’re as puzzled as I am. Why are we here?”
I said, loudly enough for Polonikos and Malixa to hear, “I have some good news for you-”
“The bear! The bear’s come to eat us!”
One of the girls screamed and pointed at Rollo, who lumbered his way over the hill south of the sanctuary. A moment later Ophelia was visible beside him.
This was why we’d returned without Ophelia. She’d insisted that Rollo must return with her, and then only on condition that Rollo the bear’s good name be cleared of murder.
“Or I will never, never, never go back,” Ophelia had finished, not realizing that now that we knew where she was, I could return with enough men to force her home. I had solemnly sworn upon Artemis that I would clear Rollo of the false charge against him, and Ophelia had agreed.
WHEN OPHELIA CAME down from the hills, leading behind her a large brown bear, it caused utter chaos, fear, consternation, panic, and wonderment. Women gasped. Aeschylus, Callias, and Zeke all swore mighty oaths. Socrates explained his new theory of bears, to which no one listened. Malixa cried, “It’s my baby!” and fainted dead away.
Ophelia acted like a girl possessed, unaware of the spectacle she posed. She was sure footed as she stepped down the slope, and upon her face was a smile. In her left hand was a thin chain, and on the other end was Rollo. The bear could have snapped the chain in an instant if he wished. He could have torn Ophelia apart in a trice. He could have swallowed her in three gulps. But instead he followed the girl, as docile as a lamb. Rollo followed Ophelia because he chose to.
“It’s like something out of the legend,” Doris said in wonder.
“The legend of how the Little Bears began. Do you think this is how it happened?”
“I think the Goddess is close,” Diotima said.
“You think the goddess Artemis inhabits the body of Ophelia?” I said in awe.
“No, you idiot. The bear.”
Behind me I heard a woman sob. It was Aposila, the mother of Alike.
Ophelia stopped in the courtyard of the sanctuary. Rollo stopped behind her. She faced the assembled Little Bears. I knew she was anxious about what sort of reception she faced. The assembled Little Bears were silent for a long, uncomfortable moment. Ophelia understood the problem. “He won’t hurt you,” she said. “He’s very gentle.”
Then Malixa rushed forward to envelop her daughter Ophelia in-appropriately enough-a bear hug. Rollo stood and watched over them. When Rollo failed to eat Ophelia’s mother, the girls saw that he was safe and rushed forward to mob Ophelia, squealing.
Rollo watched in calm approval.
The celebrations carried on for some time. In fact they went on for so long that they threatened to stretch well into evening. Rollo was tied to a tree behind the stoa, and the girls took turns daring to go near him. The only person who managed to contain her joy was Sabina, who carried on with business as usual and pulled over a slave to send him running with a message-no doubt to let the Basileus know the latest developments before anyone else could claim credit. I waved my arms until people began to notice me.
“We need to talk,” I announced. “All of us.”
The children looked at me quizzically.
“All of the adults,” I amended. “There’s still a crime to solve.”
“You mean the names of the conspirators at Marathon,” Aeschylus said.
“He means who killed Hippias,” said Sabina. “And who hid him in that cave.”
“No, he means who murdered my daughter,” said Aposila.
“I mean all those mysteries,” I told them. “Each one caused the next, and if I read this right, there’s one other mystery here, buried so deep that no one’s even noticed it. It might be the most important of all.”
We filed into the temple. It was the only space large enough to accommodate every adult. Slaves lit torches to brighten the relative dark of the inner room. Then the slaves were ordered to depart. The torchlight flickered over our faces. It made for an eerie experience.
There was nowhere to sit. It was obvious from the frosty silence what everyone thought of the arrangement, but when they heard what I had to say, they’d thank me for leading them to the only place where the children couldn’t overhear. At least, some of them would thank me.
“When Allike and Ophelia discovered the skeleton of Hippias,” I began, “it unleashed anxieties that had lain unresolved for thirty years. Not in one person, but in many. The result was a sequence of disastrous mistakes.
“Hippias was supposed to have died at Lemnos, on the way back to Persia after the defeat at Marathon. The presence of Hippias at Brauron, even dead, was a blow to our peace of mind. The subsequent death of Allike clearly implied that someone among us felt threatened by the discovery, thirty years after the fact.”
I paused for a moment, to see what they thought of this. Aeschylus scowled. Callias was attentive. Thea clenched her hands in concern. Zeke stood beside her. He placed a hand on her shoulder. Doris looked puzzled. Sabina’s face was blank, and Gaïs apparently bored. Of the parents, Aposila had tears in her eyes, Polonikos was plainly uninterested, and Malixa too happy at the restoration of her daughter to care about anything else.
I continued. “Most of us assumed that any man who felt threatened must be a traitor. And when we think of traitors and Hippias, we think of the signal at Marathon that flashed to the enemy from behind the backs of our men. Pericles himself mentioned the signal straight away when he gave me this job.”
“This is obvious,” said Aeschylus. “After the battle the traitors signaled to Hippias. Perhaps their message told the tyrant to meet them here at Brauron. It’s true I wounded him, but probably Hippias was coming to Brauron anyway. Hippias knew the names of the men he was about to meet, and he wrote them in his diary. That’s why they had to remove the fifth scroll. This is all very reasonable-”
“But it’s also wrong.” I spoke over the playwright. “The death of Allike had nothing to do with the signal at Marathon. Once you get that out of the way, the rest of the mystery becomes much clearer. What’s more, the signal at Marathon had nothing to do with Hippias being at Brauron.”
“What do you mean?” demanded Callias. “It must have.”
“No. We all assumed the flashing signal was sent by a soldier. But Socrates proved a soldier’s shield couldn’t reflect light that way. The sunlight had to have been reflected by something flat. It was a mirror.”
This was the inspiration that had struck me on the sands of Marathon: that only a large mirror would answer. The source of the mirror was vital.
“Men don’t use mirrors,” Callias said.
“No, but women do.”
Aeschylus frowned. “What woman? There were no women with the army, we ordered our families to stay in Athens.”
“Perhaps a local lady?” Callias suggested.
Aeschylus scoffed. “Where would a local woman find a mirror the size of a shield?”
“How about just over here?” I said. I walked across to the temple entrance. I lifted the mirror off the wall, the one that the girls used to touch up their hair before their womanhood ceremony.
I held it up for all to see. The angle reflected light from the entrance, and the room brightened.
“This mirror, ladies and gentlemen, is the right size to have flashed the signal at Marathon.”
They stared at it in silence for a moment, then Callias spoke up. “You’re saying the signal was sent by someone from the temple.”