Jester Leaps In: A Medieval Mystery (11 page)

The tunnel was carved into the earth, shored up in places with some inexpert timbering. We followed our guide for about sixty feet, crouching all the way. Then the tunnel joined a larger one, with ancient stonework and some actual Roman-style arches. A trickle of water ran past us down the center of the tunnel. Several dozen pairs of small, red eyes picked up the candlelight.

“It’s all right, my friends,” called Zintziphitzes. “They’re with me.”

It was an act, I was sure. I doubted that he truly knew the rats well enough to speak to them. But they avoided us as we traversed the length of the tunnel, which was fine with me.

“We’re in a drainage tunnel,” he explained. “I don’t know when it was built. It may go back to Severus for all I know. Good old-fashioned Roman engineering. It will outlast the empire. Here we are.”

What I took for a jumble of stones was actually a stairway, leading to a hole in the side of the tunnel some six feet up. The old man scampered up the stones and disappeared. We followed before we lost sight of the candle.

What we found was a good-sized room with stone walls on three sides and a newer wall of concrete opposite the entrance. There was a proper bed in a corner, a bookcase with six shelves, completely filled with ancient tomes, scrolls, piles of scrap paper, and some empty bottles used for paperweights. There was a bureau at the foot of the bed, and a pile of carpenter’s tools, which explained how the furniture had gotten there in the first place. There was a small table and a single chair by the entrance. The wall to our right had only a plain, wooden cross to adorn it.

Zintziphitzes bustled about, setting food on the table, lighting some sputtering torches set in sconces on the concrete wall.

“I apologize for not having enough chairs,” he said. “Give me some time and a few scraps of lumber, and I’ll build a few. I’ve become quite the carpenter, you know. I’ll have to ask you to keep your voices low, however. The stables are just on the other side of the wall here, and we don’t want to frighten the horses.”

“Where exactly are we?” I asked.

“Under the Hippodrome, of course. This room was sealed off during renovation some thirty years ago. I figured out where it was, and broke through from the drainage tunnel. Thought it would be a useful little hidey-hole in emergencies. Then I made a very useful discovery. So useful that this became my home for most of the last three decades. Cheese?”

“No, thank you,” I said. “The dead fools? Did they know about this place?”

“Tiberius knew I had a place, but didn’t know exactly where or how to get here. It wasn’t important to him. He respected my privacy, and I liked him for that. Probably my only real friend in this city. He’s the one I went to.”

“With what?” I prompted, trying not to be impatient.

He led us to the exit and pointed into the darkness.

“This stadium is very ingeniously constructed,” he said. “There are drains in all the tiers. Makes it easier to get the place ready after a rainstorm. There are tunnels under every tier to carry the water off, large enough for a man to crawl through if he had a mind to. And then, all he has to do is sit and listen, and remarkable things will come down through the drains.”

“You’ve been overhearing conversations,” I marveled. “You’ve been crawling through drains and spying on people!”

“Oh, the things that people say when they think they’re alone
in a stadium box. I’ve exposed a hundred scandals to the delight of rich and less rich, embarrassed not a few high dignitaries and bureaucrats, and have aimed barbed couplets at more than one emperor. It’s a sin, of course, and a terrible addiction. Even when I began preaching, I still would come here seeking the choicest tidbits, for the preacher may use them as well as the fool. But then I learned something that was too big for me, so I brought it to Tiberius. I assume that he told the others, and that whatever actions they took led to their deaths.”

He looked at me, the rapture of the storyteller gradually subsumed by the horror of what he had to say. Suddenly, he was an old man, sagging in body and spirit.

“Go on,” I said.

He shook his head abruptly.

“I told them, and now they’re dead,” he said. “That’s on me. If I tell you, it’s because you wanted to know, and that will be on you. I’m warning you, this may get you and your little friend killed.”

“I came here to find out,” I said. “I’ll accept the responsibility for my death if that’s what you want me to do. I’ll be better armed knowing.”

He nodded, then sat on his bed, cross-legged, and resumed speaking.

“The voices came through one day. Two of them, both men. ‘He’s gone. It’s safe to speak,’ said the first. I perked up immediately and moved toward the voice. ‘The timing is crucial,’ he said. ‘You have to be ready on a moment’s notice.’ ‘Fine,’ said the second man. ‘You just make sure that once I get in, I can get out again.’ ‘That’s my lookout,’ said the first. ‘That’s why I am where I am. You’ll have the passwords to get past the guards. Once it is done, you’ll be safely out of the city before the cock crows.’ ”

He paused, mopping his brow.

“Then the second man laughed,” he continued. “A soft, evil sound. ‘This will be interesting,’ he said. ‘I’ve never killed an emperor before.’ ”

The wise man’s eyes are in his head; but the fool walketh in darkness
.

ECCLESIASTES I
:14

T
here was no sound other than the sputtering of the torches and, somewhere in the distance on the other side of the concrete wall, a hammer hitting an anvil. Zintziphitzes sat on his bed, his knees pulled up to his chest, his eyes closed.

“But the Emperor still lives,” said Claudius finally.

“I suppose the appropriate time has not yet arrived,” replied Zintziphitzes.

“Did they say what they were waiting for?” I asked.

“The conversation ended there,” he said. “I didn’t recognize the voices. The first spoke unaccented Greek. The second I would guess was from somewhere north, but he didn’t speak enough for me to pin it down. Nor have I heard him since then.

“I brought this to Tiberius, figuring it was more his business than mine. I’m not particularly concerned with who runs the ever-dwindling empire.

“Tiberius was interested, of course. He thanked me and said he’d let the others know. I told him to keep me out of it, and he promised he would. About two weeks later, it occurred to me that I hadn’t seen him or Demetrios in the area. I dropped by the stables and chatted with Samuel, and I learned during the
course of casual conversation that they hadn’t been at the Hippodrome in a week. I went by their places, but they had vanished. Demetrios’s landlady was busy selling his belongings.

“Now, I was well and truly worried. I decided to change my appearance by shaving off everything that could be shaved. I’m much colder now, by the way. Then I hobbled up to Blachernae, but no trace of Thalia, Niko, or Piko. And that was that. Your troubadour showed up, apparently got wind of something, and took off like a bat out of hell, which was smart. But then he returned, and no more troubadour.”

“Why didn’t you warn the Emperor?” asked Claudius.

He looked at her with scorn.

“An apprentice, right, Theo?” he spat, and I saw her head snap back with the sting of the remark. “Because the Emperor is shielded from rabble-rousers like me. He’s surrounded by an outer layer of guards and walls, a middle layer of courtiers and courtesans, and an inner layer of boneheadedness that no helm rivals for protection.”

“Is there no one close to the Emperor who you could trust?” I asked.

“Theo . . . I mean Feste,” he said hurriedly as I raised a finger in warning. “I don’t think you understand what’s happening. Where do you think I was when I heard this?”

“You said already. Under the tiers.”

“But under which tier, Feste? I was just outside the Kathisma, the imperial box. Only those of great privilege—either by wealth, position, or power—sit that close to the Emperor. They lie back on silk cushions, surrounded by the Imperial Guard and wined and fed by servants, and watch the games while they play their own. The plot against the Emperor is coming from someone very close to him, which is usually the case. And if I go traipsing in,
bellowing about an assassination, they’ll look at me and laugh, saying, ‘Isn’t it that old fool, Zintziphitzes? I thought he was dead. What a funny fellow!’ And then one of them will arrange to have me quietly snuffed out after the show is over.”

“You’re the boy who cried wolf,” I said.

“Isn’t it the truth?” he replied, chuckling. “Just when I need them to take me seriously.”

“Was there any talk about the fools all disappearing like that?” asked Claudius.

“Less than you might suspect,” he replied. “The Emperor apparently whined for a day or two about missing his pet dwarves, but found solace in old wine and a very fetching young flutist from Alexandria. The Empress and he rarely consort, so no one was particularly aware of Thalia vanishing at the same time. The other two worked this part of the city. It may be that the only person who noticed it was me.”

“What has to happen before they go ahead and kill the Emperor?” I wondered.

“That’s what has me puzzled,” he said. “There’s been ample opportunity, especially if he has the passwords to get past the Imperial Guard. The Emperor has not been reticent about being seen in public. He hunts, he feasts, he makes the requisite appearances in the Hagia Sophia, does his ceremonial distributions for charity. Hell, I could probably kill him if I had a mind to.”

“I’d like to get into Blachernae. How would a fool get admitted there?”

“I’d start by performing here,” he said. “Are you in the Hippodrome yet?”

“Playing the games in three days,” I replied. “After the entrance fee is paid.”

“What’s Samuel charging nowadays?” he asked curiously.

“A piece of gold and a tithe.”

“Really? I must have gotten the old-timer’s rate. Just as well I got out when I did.”

“For many reasons,” I said.

He pulled a blanket over his frail body.

“I’m tired,” he announced. “Can you find your way back?”

“I think so,” I said. “Lend us a candle.”

He waved to one on the table. I lit it, and we cautiously picked our way down the pile of rocks to the tunnel.

“He must . . . .” began Claudius, but I hushed her.

We continued on for some distance before I spoke softly.

“Sound travels here,” I said. “I don’t know how well Zintziphitzes can hear, but I don’t want to take any chances. What were you going to say?”

“He must get trapped in that room when there’s a heavy rain,” she said, looking back into the darkness. “I think that I would go mad under those circumstances.”

“ ‘The prophet is a fool, the spiritual man is mad,’ ” I said. “He may have been mad from the start. That’s why it’s difficult to know if this is how it all started. But it certainly has the ring of truth.”

“Do you think the event that will lead to the assassination is the coming of the Venetian fleet?”

“Good girl. That’s my best guess. And thanks for not bringing that up in front of him. We don’t know who he gossips with.”

“But why wait so long?”

“Because the way things are going, Alexios is an invader’s best friend. He’s completely mismanaged the defenses of the city. The Crusaders lay siege, the population realizes there’s no navy to drive them away, and before you know it, they’re rioting against the throne. And then our unknown killer sneaks in and eliminates him just when his usefulness has come to an end. The Crusaders
march in to the cheers of the liberated populace, take the traditional three days of rape, sack, and pillage, and then install their puppet on the throne.”

“It sounds plausible,” she conceded. “But what did the fools have to do with it? I thought the Guild didn’t care who was on the throne here.”

“That’s true up to a point. But we’d favor whichever outcome produced the least amount of slaughter. The fools here had to operate on their own most of the time because it took so long for instructions to go back and forth from the Guildhall. Niko and Piko generally were in charge of the others. Tiberius sounded the alarm, and they must have decided that this was something that had to be stopped. But the something stopped them first.”

We came to Zintziphitzes’ tunnel. She stopped me before I went in.

“Before we go back up, there’s something I want to do,” she said, and she hauled me down into a fierce kiss. “It’s been a while,” she said when we finally came up for air. “I’m getting a bit tired of being a man.”

“Agreed,” I said. “But this is not exactly the place for anything further.”

“True enough,” she said, looking around. “I prefer to make love without rats watching. It’s a peculiarity of mine.”

I lifted the flagstone a crack and peered out. The alley was deserted. I clambered out.

“Come, Eurydice,” I said, holding out my hand. “Your Orpheus has brought you safely from the underworld.”

“Don’t say that,” she said hurriedly. “That was an ill-fated match. And you’re looking back before I’m out. It’s bad luck.”

She climbed out quickly and covered the entrance. We merged easily into the stream of commerce in the street.