See Delphi And Die (22 page)

XLVII

When we looked at the map Helena always brought with her, we saw why even the waiters of elegant Delphi disparaged Lebadeia: it lay on a major route from Athens to Delphi, the processional way taken every year by dancing maids who indulge in winter rites to Dionysus. But Lebadeia, a town close to the Copais Lake, was in Boeotia. I had read enough Greek comedies. I knew that for the xenophobic Greeks, Boeotia represented the world's unwashed armpit. The district was barbarian. Boeotians were always represented as brutes and buffoons.

'Well, my darling,' Helena murmured heartlessly, 'you'll fit in well there, won't you?'

I ignored that. I pointed out hotly that Lebadeia was miles away. Well, twenty as Apollo's crow flies - though much more, allowing for one or two damn great mountains. One of those was where the maddened maenads tore King Pentheus to shreds in Bacchic frenzy; just the kind of bloodsoaked spot where informers like to dally, terrifying themselves with history.

'I am not going.'

'Then I shall have to go instead, Marcus. The road passes between the hills, I think; it's not difficult. We can have no doubt where Statiahus is. Look here at the map -' Her road map depicted mansios and other useful features, shown as little buildings. It confirmed our fears. Lebadeia has an oracle.'

I was all set to head straight back to Corinth and tell Aquillius Macer to dispatch a posse to pick up the prophecy-besotted bridegroom. Only the mention of Polystratus worried me. Phineus had said he was sending one of his people to find Statianus, and it seemed that he had. I was very unhappy with the outcome. From the waiter's description, Polystratus appeared to have encouraged Statianus to head off on a new quest for divine truth - a crazy quest, I would say - instead of bringing him back to the fold.

It was interesting that the waiter, who had never met him, had nonetheless heard of Polystratus. I had assumed he did all his 'facilitating' from the Rome office, then had no connection with the travellers until they came back to Italy and he fielded their angry complaints about their trips. So how come a waiter in a back-alley doss-house - albeit a regular stopover Phineus used for his clients at Delphi - still knew of Polystratus? What kind of reputation did he have in Greece? I had no time to enquire.

I felt anxious about what his orders from Phineus had really involved. Hades, now that I knew Phineus himself had escaped from custody, I was worried where he had got to, and what he might be planning while on the run.

'What if you were the killer, and more conventional than us?' Helena asked me. 'We have a cynical view of oracles - but what if you believed in them and thought Statianus might one day hear the truth from a prophetess?'

'You would want to stop it.'

'You might think that Delphi was too public. You might like Statianus to go to a more remote oracle and deal with him there.'

Helena was right; we had no option. We had to go to Lebadeia and find Statianus again ourselves.

We took the poet. He was a witness, one I could not afford to lose or to have coerced behind my back. I was reluctant to leave him, in case his nerve failed and he vanished. Besides, the killer might know he was a witness. For Lampon, that could be dangerous.

Anyway, poets come in handy when you are riding through landscapes which are rich in myth and literary connections. Before we reached Lebadeia, Lampon had proved himself a good source of information on the shrine we were approaching. It was called the Oracle of Trophonius. The Boeotians had made a mint there, by offering prophecies to distraught pilgrims who failed in the question lottery at Delphi. But as oracles go (and for me you can stuff them) I hated the sound of this one.

According to Lampon, the Oracle of Trophonius worked in a different way from Delphi. There was no Pythia muttering gibberish. The applicant was allowed direct contact with whatever divine force lived there. He learned the future for himself, through what he saw and heard. The bad news was that to acquire it, he had to subject himself to an appalling physical ordeal, which left people terrified, traumatised, and often unconscious.

'They lose the power to laugh,' Lampon announced darkly. 'It can be permanent. When someone is particularly gloomy, with a dark mentality, we say they must have got that way at the Oracle of Trophonius.'

As we journeyed for a day across country, that was our first intimation of what was really bad at Lebadeia.

XLVIII

The River Hercyna dashed down noisily from Mount Helike in a steep gorge. In flood, it must be icy, deep, and full of clashing rocks carried down from the lonely, near-vertical crags. Plenty of water also rises from springs on the area.

Lebadeia lay mainly on the east bank of the river. For a town in the world's unwashed armpit, it seemed decent and prosperous. Maybe the Attic Greeks were wrong. Of the legendary Boeotian brutality there was little sign in the agora, while the shopkeepers seemed to run businesses on normal commercial lines. People grunted when we asked directions, but locals do that everywhere. It would have been more unnerving if they stopped in their tracks and were helpful. Even without local assistance we found a small rooming-house. Then I started asking around for news of Statianus, but got nowhere.

At dinner in a foodshop with few customers, we found a waitress who was willing to expound on the oracle. It involved much pursing of the lips and sucking in of breath. She wiped down her hands on her skirt and sombrely told us that there was a great deal of ritual, much of it taking place in darkness, and all designed to put the applicant into a state of dread.

First, he had to spend three days living in an appointed house, washing only in cold water, and making sacrifices. Then, at the dead of night, two young boys would lead him to the moonlit river, wash him in its freezing water, anoint him, take him through various acts of worship, dress him strangely in a beribboned outfit with heavy boots, then pass him on to the priests for his scary initiation. He would drink Waters of Forgetfulness, to wash his mind clear. Then he descended by a flimsy ladder into a purpose-built underground chamber, where he was left alone. In pitch darkness, while holding barley-cakes in either hand, he had to insert his body, legs first, into a narrow cleft, where - according to the waitress - supernatural forces would physically suck him in, reveal the truth in an awesome manner, then spit him back out, a shattered wreck. Priests would take him to drink the Waters of Memory, after which he would remember and record for posterity all he had learned - if and when he recovered consciousness. His friends and family had to gather him up and hope he would survive the experience. Not everyone did.

Unnervingly, we were told of one person who avoided the full ritual and was fatally punished. Perhaps he entered the oracle in search of treasure. He disappeared that night, failing to emerge from the sacred fissure. His dead body was found days later, some distance from the oracle.

That was one way to ensure no one rebelled against procedure. All the best magical sanctuaries have horrible stories to warn off blasphemers and looters. The details of what happened to genuine applicants at this shrine were nasty enough.

'You would have to be very desperate,' Helena commented. Our waitress, who had grown up with Trophonius, agreed - but her sympathy was fleeting and she then skipped off to fetch us a big dish of honey into which we could dip pastries. She had never been to the oracle, and knew nobody local who had taken part in its ritual. Clearly it was a tourist trap.

We sat silent for a while. We knew one man who was desperate enough for this. We were appalled at Tullius Statianus being subjected to rites that were intended to overwhelm a fragile mind in torment. To put himself through this terror all alone was dreadful. He had no devoted friends or family to wait outside the shrine for him. Even if we had believed that Trophonius really would reveal the truth, what Statianus then heard in the sacred chamber might be unbearable. But I for one thought oracles like this all worked by trickery.

Neither Helena nor I slept much that night.

Next morning we went straight across the river looking for the oracle. Since river water was needed during the ritual, we knew it would not be too far away. There were various shrines on the banks of the Hercyna. In a grove on a hillside stood a small temple to Trophonius, a local king and minor deity. Just beyond the grove, the oracle itself consisted of a sizeable man-made earth mound. This supported a round drum-shaped feature constructed from white marble, about the size of the average threshing floor and roughly three feet high. On top were bronze posts, linked by chains, and a double set of trapdoors. Through these, hapless enquirers must descend for their ordeal.

I was dreading this. In the course of my work, I had been forced to enter several ghastly pits and wells. The mere thought of another made me claustrophobic. I could do it if I knew I had to rescue someone, but I liked to have back-up from a group of strong men I trusted. 

Bad memories were lurking close. Helena slipped her long fingers around one of my clenched fists. Cold sweat trickled down my back; it had nothing to do with the weather. Now here was another pitch black hole down which, if I knew anything, sooner or later I would be sent.

Before it came to that, we asked a priest about Statianus. The priest tried the usual blank response, citing confidentiality. I cited the Emperor and threatened to close down the shrine. He saw reason. Faced with loss of revenue, they generally do.

'Such a young man as you describe came to seek the truth here,' he admitted.

'Who came here with him?'

'Nobody.'

'Are you sure of that?'

'He carried out the full ritual. We had him in our community for three days. We would have known if anyone was in Lebadeia with him.'

So no Phineus or Polystratus - apparently. Well, that was something. But then whatever poor Statianus went through, he endured it alone. I would not have let that happen. Dear gods, if the young fool was fully determined to suffer this pantomime, I would have escorted him to Lebadeia myself. I would at least have been waiting to lift up his comatose body and wrap him in a blanket once it was all over.

The priest told us the story. Statianus had turned up, looking frantic. They were used to that. This oracle was not for the casually curious.

The temple attendants had calmed him, and carefully explained what he would have to do. According to them, they used every means to dissuade him from going through with it. If that was true, the bastards were now making sure they were morally covered. No chance here of a compensation claim afterwards for personal injury. I was only surprised they did not make all applicants sign a disclaimer.

'Do you suggest people make a will?'

'Unnecessary, Falco!'

Statianus chose to proceed. So they made him stay at an approved lodging to prepare himself, dwelling on it. On the third night, he was taken to the river by two teenaged acolytes, bathed, dressed in a special costume of tunic, ribbons, and very heavy boots, and anointed with oil. The priests transferred him to what they called the Fountain of Forgetfulness, from which he drank. After worshipping a secret image of Trophonius made by Daedalus, and praying (no doubt that it would all be over quickly, Statianus was led in procession to the oracle. He climbed the mound. Its trapdoors were opened, the ladder prepared, and he climbed down alone into the chamber. The ladder was removed; the heavy doors clanged shut above him.

He knew what he must do then. Between the walls and the floor he would find a crevice, into which he had to press himself, feet first. Presumably he got that far.

'Presumably?' My voice was harsh with foreboding.

'Something happens occasionally,' the priest said, coldly. He made it oblique, distancing himself.

I felt sick. 'He was harmed there?' I saw the priest's face and guessed the worst. 'You can't mean this. You lost him?'

Appalled, Helena Justina begged, 'Tullius Statianus never emerged from the oracle chamber?' The priest finally confirmed it with a stiff nod. 'He vanished? Then you had better tell us, 'Helena instructed fiercely,' whether you have found that poor man's body yet - and if not, where you suggest we look for him.'

XLIX

We never found him. I could tell the priests were nervous from the start. Whatever they planned to happen must have gone badly awry. Since they refused to admit what was normal procedure, we could only guess how.

Sure of a tragedy, I made it official straight away. I chivvied the priests and involved the elders of the town. We scoured Lebadeia itself. Then parties of men searched in all directions: along the main road to Chaironia, up a track that led over Mount Helike to Delphi by a wilder route, and also out along the famous road to Thebes. Riders and youths with dogs came out to look for him. We beat the rocks and dragged the river. He was nowhere.

When it grew dark, we had to abandon our efforts. The townspeople had done all I could expect. They had devoted a day to it. They wanted to exonerate their oracle, so they showed willing, even though we were foreigners and strangers. But when I gave up and returned to my room that night I sat wearily with my head in my hands, and knew they would do no more. We had all failed. By then I was sure we would never see Statianus alive again - and we might never even know if he was dead.

At that point, Helena was not with me. When I stumbled back to our hired room, I failed to find her and assumed she had gone to eat without me. I was surprised. Soon, anxiety took me in search of the poet. Lampon said she had gone back to the sanctuary; she had wanted to try to find out what really happened to questioners down in the chamber. She was sure the oracle worked by some trick.

That had been this afternoon.

I crossed the river and raced to the oracle. Lampon came with me, guilty that he had not told me earlier. I wished he had gone with Helena, but I knew her independence and could not blame him for it.

The grove was dimly lit with tiny lamps. The mound was more brightly illuminated, as if somebody might be consulting the oracle that night. But nobody much was there, just two boys in matching long white tunics, aged about thirteen. They were hanging about playing knucklebones and hoping for excitement. One saw me coming, took fright at my grim face, and decided he had to go home to his mother. The other either had a feckless mother who would never miss him, or else he just could not bear to miss anything. Lampon and I accosted him. I assured him he was not in any trouble, then slowly extracted news.

Helena Justina had come to the oracle, and had found these same boys. She sat down and made friends with them. She guessed they were the pair who took part in the ritual, leading questioners to the river for ceremonial washing. Winningly, she asked whether they knew more about the oracle than that. Of course they did. They knew how the priests worked it.

I gazed at the lad who was telling me. Helena and I had already discussed this. We had heard numerous tales of temple 'magic' from Marinus and Indus. Egypt was particularly good at trickery, but delusion happened everywhere. Statues that eerily nodded or talked, for instance. Temple doors that swung open mysteriously, after priests lit fires on altars, activating buckets of water or mercury, hidden beneath, so they operated pulleys; doors that then miraculously closed when the altar fires were doused. Compared to these manoeuvres, it would be simplicity to bamboozle a man you had locked up in the dark underground - especially in a contraption built specifically for that purpose.

'I bet I know what Helena suggested. When the initiate is down there in the chamber, somebody else goes inside?' The boy seemed amazed I too had worked out this obvious ploy. 'Is there a secret passage?'

With an eagerness that suggested he had a guilty conscience, the boy admitted it. He knew of the passage for the simplest of reasons. 'When the doors shut and the questioners are in the dark, most of them shit themselves. I get paid a bonus to go in next day and clean up.'

Then to my horror, he confessed he and his friend had shown Helena where the secret passage was. She had gone in. She was a long time there. They called, but she never came out. They knew Statianus had vanished and were too scared to investigate. Frightened, the two boys had hung around outside, hoping somebody would come along and deal with the situation for them.

Like most boys in trouble, our informant had not confessed until he was asked. He was very relieved to be telling me at last. I myself was hysterical. I ordered him to show me the hidden entrance immediately. My urgency was a mistake. The lad leapt to his feet and fled.