The Athenian Murders (31 page)

As he entered the cool, dark hallway, he heard a sound in the library and frowned.

The Academy library was a large-windowed room. A short corridor to the right of the main entrance led into it. The door was open, which was surprising, because classes had been cancelled and students didn't usually spend holidays consulting texts. Perhaps some tutor . . .

He approached confidently and put his head around the door.

Scraps of light from the sun's evening banquet came through the windows. The tables by the door were empty, the next ones, too, and at the back . . . one of the tables was covered with scrolls, but the chair was empty. And nothing seemed to have been moved from the shelves where the philosophical texts (among them, several copies of Plato's
Dialogues),
together with works of poetry and drama, were carefully stored. 'Wait, what about over there, on the left... ?'

There was a man in the corner. He was crouching, searching the lower shelves, which was why Diagoras hadn't noticed him at first. The man stood up suddenly, holding a papyrus, and Diagoras recognised him before he looked round. 'Heracles!'

The Decipherer turned with unusual speed, like a horse lashed by a whip. 'Oh, it's you, Diagoras! When you invited me here for dinner I made the acquaintance of a couple of slaves, and they let me into the library today. Don't be angry with them ... or with me, of course.'

The philosopher thought Heracles must be unwell, such was his extreme pallor. 'But why—'

'By Zeus' sacred aegis,' interrupted Heracles, shaking, 'we face a strange and powerful evil, Diagoras. An evil as unfathomable as the gorges of Pontus that grows darker the deeper into it we fall. We've been deceived!'

And just as charioteers are said to talk to their horses during races, Heracles spoke very fast, busying himself all the while unrolling and rolling up scrolls, putting them back on the shelves. His fat hands and his voice were trembling. He went on angrily: 'We've been used, Diagoras, both of us, to stage a horrifying farce. A Lenaean comedy, but with a tragic ending!'

'What are you talking about?'

'About Menaechmus, and Tramachus' death, and the wolves of Lycabettus . . . That's what I'm talking about!'

'You surely don't mean that Menaechmus is innocent?'

'Oh, no, no, he's guilty, more guilty than destructive desire! But. . . but. . .' He stopped and put his fist to his mouth. He added: 'I'll explain everything in due course. But I have to go somewhere tonight. I'd like you to accompany me, but I warn you, what we'll see there will not be pleasant!'

'I'll come,' said Diagoras. 'I'd cross the Styx, if it would help to find the source of the deception of which you speak. Just tell me this: it has to do with Menaechmus, has it not? He was smiling as he confessed his guilt. It must mean he intends to escape!'

'No,' retorted Heracles. 'Menaechmus smiled as he confessed because he does
not
intend to get away.' And at Diagoras' look of amazement, he added: 'That's how we've been deceived!'
⁹⁷

⁹⁷
He entered wearing a different mask (a smiling, male face, this time). I got up from the desk.

'Have you found the final key yet?' His voice sounded muffled behind the mocking face.

'Who are you?'

'I'm the question,' answered my jailer. And he said again: 'Have you found the final key yet?' 'Let me out of here.'

'When you find the key. Have you found it yet?'

'No!' I shouted, losing my temper, the eidetic reins of my equanimity. 'The eidesis refers to the Labours of Hercules . . . and a girl with a lily, and a translator . . . but I don't know what any of it means! I—'

He interrupted, with mock-seriousness: 'Perhaps the eidetic images are only part of the key. What's the novel about?'
'A murder investigation,' I stammered. 'The central character thought he'd found the murderer, but now . . . now, new problems have emerged. I don't know what they are yet.'

My kidnapper seemed to give a little laugh. I say 'seemed' because the mask made it difficult to tell. He said: 'Isn't it possible that there might not be a final key?'

'I don't think so’
I answered immediately.

'Why not?'

'Because if there was no key, I wouldn't be locked up in here.'

'Oh, that's very good.' He seemed amused. 'So, to you, I'm
proof
that there is a key! Or, should I say, I'm the
most important
proof.'

I thumped the table. I shouted. 'That's enough! You know the novel! You've even changed it, mixing bogus pages in with the originals! You're perfectly familiar with the
language and
the style! Why do you need me?'

He seemed thoughtful for a moment, although the mask was still smiling, then he said: 'I haven't made any changes. There are no bogus pages. The thing is, you've swallowed the eidetic bait.'

'What do you mean?'

'When there's a very strong element of eidesis in a text, as here, the reader becomes so obsessed with the images that he feels as if he's in the novel. You can't become obsessed with something without feeling you're part of it. In your beloved's eyes you think you see her love for you, and in the pages of an eidetic book you think you see yourself

Annoyed, I rummaged through my papers. 'What about this?' I showed him a page. 'Is that the case here, in the bogus Chapter Eight when Heracles Pontor talks to a translator who's supposedly been kidnapped? Have I swallowed the 'eidetic bait' here, too?'

'Yes,' he replied calmly. 'Throughout the novel, there is mention of a Translator whom Crantor sometimes addresses in the second person, and with whom Heracles talks in your 'bogus chapter'. . . But that doesn't mean
he's you!’

I didn't know what to say; his logic was devastating. Suddenly I heard him tittering behind the mask. 'Ah, literature!' he said. 'Reading isn't thinking by oneself, my friend - it's a dialogue! But the dialogue in question is a Platonic dialogue: your interlocutor is an idea. Though not an immutable idea. As you converse with it, you alter it, you make it yours, you come to believe it exists independently ... Eidetic novels make the most of this, setting cunning traps .. . that can .. . drive you insane.' And he added, after a silence: 'Which is what happened to Montalo, your predecessor

'Montalo?' I felt cold inside. 'Montalo was here?'

There was a pause. Then the mask burst out laughing and said: 'For a long time! In fact, like you, I came across
The Athenian Murders
thanks to Montalo's edition. But I
knew
that there was a hidden key to it, so I locked him up and made him find it. He failed.'

He said it as if 'failing' was exactly what he expected his victims to do. He paused and the mask's smile seemed to widen. He went on: 'But I lost patience, and let my dogs feast on him. Then I dumped his body in the forest. The police thought he'd been attacked by wolves.'

After another pause, he added: 'But don't worry, I won't get fed up with you for some time.'

My fear turned to rage. 'You're ... a vile, ruthless ...' I stopped, searching for the appropriate word. Murderer? Criminal? Executioner? In the end, in desperation, realising that my disgust could not be translated into words, I spat out: '. . . twaddle!' And I went on, defiantly: 'You think you frighten me? You're the one who's scared, hiding your face like that!'

'Would you like me to remove my mask?' he said.

There was a deep silence. I said: 'No.'

'Why not?'

'Because I know that if I see your face, I'll never get out of here alive.'

I heard his odious little laugh again. 'So, my mask
ensures
your safety,
and your presence ensures
mine!
That means we have to stay together!' He went out, slamming the door before I could reach it. His voice came through the cracks in the door
: 'Carry on with the translation. And remember, if there is a key, and you find it, you'll get out of here. If there isn't, you'll never get out. So it's in your interest to see t
hat there is one, isn't it?' ('T
.'s N.)

X
⁹⁸

‘W
ould you like me to remove my mask?'

'No, for I wou
ld never get out of here alive.’
⁹⁹

A dark mouth was dug into the rock. Together, the gently curving frieze and threshold formed a huge pair of woman's lips. But above the frieze, the unknown sculptor had carved an androgynous moustache, decorated with aggressive, naked male figures. It was the entrance to a small temple dedicated to Aphrodite on the northern slope of the Pnyx but, inside, one had the feeling of descending into a deep chasm, a cavern in Hephaestus' kingdom.

⁹⁸
'The penetrating scent of a woman. And the feel - oh, firm and velvety! - has something of the toughness of an athlete's arm and the smoothness of a young girl's breast.' This is Montalo's absurd description of the texture of the papyrus for Chapter Ten. (T.'s
N
.)

⁹⁹
This password (we'll find out it's a password in a moment) is a strangely exact repetition of part of the conversation I had with my kidnapper only a few hours ago. Another piece of 'eidetic bait'?
(T.'sN.)

'On specific nights every moon,' Heracles explained to
Diagoras on the way there, 'secret doors are opened leading to a honeycomb of galleries on this side of the hill. At the entrance there is a guard in a mask and dark cloak, who could be a man or a woman. It's important to give the right answer to the question, or we won't be allowed in. Luckily, I know the password for tonight...'

The steps were wide, and Heracles' and Diagoras' descent was further aided by torches placed at irregular intervals. The smell of smoke and spices grew stronger with every step. The mellifluous, inquiring tones of an oboe and the virile response of a cymbal reached their ears, disguised by echoes, together with the voice of a rhapsode of indeterminate sex. Rounding a bend at the bottom of the stairs, they came to a small room. There appeared to be two exits: a dark, narrow tunnel to the left, and another on the right, through a pair of curtains nailed to the rock. The air was almost unbreathable. A figure stood by the curtains, in a mask frozen in an expression of terror. It wore a small, almost indecent
chiton
but, since much of its nudity was clothed in shadows, it was impossible to tell whether it was a particularly slim young man or a small-breasted girl. On seeing the new arrivals, it took something from a shelf on the wall and held it out to them like an offering. It said, the voice young, ambiguous: 'Your masks. Sacred Dionysus Bromios. Sacred Dionysus Bromios.'

Diagoras glanced at his mask. It was very much like those worn by the chorus in tragedies, with a handle made of the same clay as the rest, and a happy or insane expression. He couldn't tell if it was a male or female face. It felt very heavy. Gripping it by the handle, he held it up and observed everything through the mysterious eye slits. As he breathed, his view misted over.

It (the creature that had handed them the masks and whose identity, Diagoras found, wavered disturbingly with each word and gesture between one gender and the other) parted the curtains and let them through.

'Careful. There's another step,' said Heracles.

They were in an underground room as closed as the chamber where life itself begins. The walls exuded red droplets, and the penetrating smell of smoke and spices filled one's nose. The rhapsode and musicians stood on a smallish wooden stage erected at the far end. The audience was crowded into a small area - it was indistinct shadows, heads swaying, one hand resting on a neighbour's shoulder, the other holding up a mask. A golden bowl on a tripod stood in the middle of the room. Heracles and Diagoras went to stand in the back row, and waited. The philosopher guessed that the incense burners hanging from the ceiling and the rags tied round the torches must contain colouring herbs, for they produced strange, blue-red tongues of flame. 'What is this place?' he asked. 'Another clandestine theatre?'

'No. These are rituals,' replied Heracles through his mask. 'Not the Sacred Mysteries, something else. Athens is full of them.'

Suddenly, a hand appeared in the field of vision allowed by Diagoras' eye slits. It held out a small krater filled with dark liquid. Diagoras swivelled his mask and found another mask facing him. In the red light he could not tell its colour, but he could see that it was hideous, with a long nose like an old witch's; hair spilled abundantly around the edges. The figure -man or woman - was dressed in a diaphanous tunic, like those worn by courtesans to arouse guests at licentious banquets, but, once again, its sex was skilfully concealed.