We stop to catch our breath at the corner of Serapis Street, throw a few stones at the wheels of the chariots that speed past.
‘What’s the deal with the Roman?’
‘Tell you when we get there.’ He slaps my back and runs off down a long alley that leads to the harbour. The sea breeze don’t reach down these back streets Croc takes. I’ve got a sicky feeling about what happened in the church. Kiya and Henite were so upset… their sobs cut right through me, like the brickie-wives’ wailing at Dad’s funeral.
‘Croc, I feel bad about leading Library slaves to the church.’
‘Weren’t no church. They’re squatters, like the gang in the old Egyptian tomb.’ Croc sees I’m serious. ‘Me too – those Snake People are more generous than Turk with their hand-outs.’
‘I’m going to get their book back.’
‘How?’
‘Dunno yet.’
‘You could smooch up to the old cinaedus. He was going on and on about you last night, made me promise I’d bring you with me after we done this job.’ Croc purses his lips and makes loud kissing noises.
‘Give it a rest, Croc.’ I’ll get him for that… he darts off down another alley, but I’m faster than him.
Lanky slouches against the wall of one of the Library warehouses that line the docks. ‘You two took yer time.’ He spits as he says it. He’s still angry.
There’s a fat boy with him, blindfolded and trembling with fright. Rich kid from the look of his tunic. Can’t tell his age too well with the dirty rag Lanky’s tied over his eyes. His cheeks haven’t lost their baby chub. Lanky whispers something in his ear. The boy gives out a whine like a small dog. What nasty story is Lanky tormenting him with? Lanky smiles to himself, looks at me and yanks off the kid’s blindfold.
The boy blinks, eyes wide in terror. We must look like proper scoundrels to him.
‘I got you a rich kid, Croc. Now what’s the deal with your honey-daddy?’
Croc straightens and takes charge. ‘Right, listen up. The Roman wants us to pinch an old book.’
‘We’ll never get past the Library Guard.’ Pinching apples off carts in the Agora’s one thing, break and entry’s something else. Men get sent to the quarries for that.
Croc’s getting impatient. ‘Honey-daddy’s taken care of the guard, man. Nobody will come snooping ’til morning.’
Lanky steps out of the shadow of the wall and nods up towards the warehouse, six stories high. ‘Ready for some climbing, Pretty?’
My belly tightens at the sight of the cut from the corner of his mouth to his cheekbone. It makes his mouth look painted on like a scary theatre mask. The blood’s clotted, but that’s going to scar his lip.
‘Checking out your handy-work are you, Pretty? Don’t worry, I’ll repay you for it.’ His long-toothed sneer makes me shudder.
‘It’s just a flesh wound, Lanky, man. And this is my deal I got going with honey-nose, so I’m calling the shots.’
Lanky curls his top lip at Croc. Did he growl? I can see why Kiya called him a demon. He points up at a low doorway near the top for the pulley. ‘Pretty’s gonna squeeze his tight little arse through that hole at the top.’
I look at Croc. He shrugs.
‘What about the kid?’
‘He’s going up wiv you… unless Pretty can read?’
They both laugh: Croc, head flung back, Lanky, lips peeled back from his teeth. His gums are receding. It’s not a piss take. What use are letters to a street kid?
The fat kid looks at me and blinks. You’re laughing too, aren’t you? I want to slap his fat face.
‘That’s what our little friend’s for.’ Croc rolls his eyes with impatience.
‘A very learned little shit, ain’t ya?’ Lanky yanks the boy’s tunic, scrunches it up round his neck below his double chins. ‘Don’t mess with Pretty. I told ya, he’s got a nasty temper.’ Is that respect in Lanky’s voice, or is he just tormenting the boy?
‘Pl-please don’t h-hurt me. l’ll d-do anything.’ The petrified kid stammers and shakes. Reckon he’s a worse climber than Croc, I do.
‘Too right you will. Stop crying, or I’ll cut out your tongue.’
The boy clamps his mouth shut. I’m just as scared of Lanky as the kid but I don’t show it.
I’m not risking getting caught and being sent to a quarry… or worse, a mine for a few coppers. ‘What do I get out of it?’
‘We split the fee three ways.’ Croc looks at us both.
‘Lanky? Deal?’
Lanky grunts.
‘Aeson, when you’ve got the book go down to the ground floor entrance – we’ll have it open for you.’
I nod and look around for the Library Guard. The idea of being chained for years, digging roads makes me nervous. Not cut out for gang-life, I’m not.
‘Pretty’s lost his balls.’
When Lanky calls me Pretty, it makes me want to slash his other cheek, but there’s no sense starting a fight now.
‘I ain’t scared.’
‘Aeson, fink of the money, man!… I’ll finish your night-watch if you pull this off.’ Croc’s begging me to do it… otherwise it’ll be him up that rope.
‘How long have I got?’
‘Ages – until the morning shift arrives.’
‘Come on. It’s a perfect plan. Lanky’ll keep watch and I’ll pick the lock.’
Lanky shoves Fatty towards me.
My fist clenches the boy’s tunic by the shoulder and we edge along close to the wall, Croc in front. Lanky disappears back into the shadow. Hulls creak in the silence as waves slap their great bulks.
Croc holds the pulley steady while I tug the rope: it needs to hold Fatty’s weight and mine.
‘Move honey-nose.’ I give him a shove. Fatty whimpers. ‘Done much climbing?’
‘S-some… in the g-gym-gymnasium.’
He needs to be calm to concentrate.
‘Good. You take the rope in front of me.’
The warehouses aren’t lit, and it’s unlikely anyone would look up in our direction when they can look out at the Pharos, but I keep checking the docks for people.
The boy’s a better climber than I expected. ‘Don’t look down.’
‘I’m not s-scared of h-heights. I just don’t want to d-die the horrible d-death the tall man said I would if I didn’t help you.’
Better he’s scared of me.
‘You read?’
‘I can read and write Greek, Latin, Coptic, and some Aramaic.’
‘And the book we’re after. What language is that?’
‘Greek.’
‘Where did you learn?’ I tighten my grip round his hands. He winces from the pain. ‘Concentrate. You don’t want me doing any of those nasty things to you, do you?’ Jealousy is a wicked thing.
‘A-at the Library School. C-can I go home after I help you?’
‘Just climb.’ Ain’t fair some kids get an education spooned to ’em.
We’re nearly at the sixth floor. Over my right shoulder ship sails flap as they catch the breeze and a sailor sings as he stumbles along the quay like a disorientated ant.
‘Mama and Papa buy your place at the Library School?’
‘Mother died in the earthquake.’
He must be my age. It’s not Fatty’s fault I can’t write, but I can’t help wishing I was him… without the flab. Croc wouldn’t fancy me fat… neither would the cinaedus.
The window where the pulley’s attached is bigger than it looked – more of a small door with a narrow ledge. Fatty will fit.
The cinaedus better have paid off the guard. Knife secure in my belt, sandals tied round my neck. Butterflies make my belly churn.
‘Not a sound after this.’
Fatty pulls his chubby legs up and over the ledge. I hold his sweaty armpits as his legs hang through the doorway and his feet search for the floor.
Fatty’s head disappears inside. I wave down at Croc… can just about make out his shadow under the torches that line the quay. Croc had better have that lock picked in time.
Why, in Serapis’ name, would a librarian want to pinch a book when he could walk in here in broad daylight and take it himself? It don’t add up.
My toes reach for the floor as I manoeuvre my body through the doorway. That feels like wood beneath my feet. Come on eyes – they stretch to get used to the dark, my hearing alert like I’m on night-watch. The only sounds are Fatty’s breathing and the thud of my heartbeat.
So we’re on a scaffold at the top of a ladder… more a narrow staircase with a platform at the top, steadier than a scaffold. Small high windows in the huge room throw in grey light, lamps sit in niches on the landing. No lamps in the storeroom with all these books, but at least I can see the exit. Sly slits of grey light creep through gaps in the floorboards so I can just about see my feet. We’re at the same level as the tops of the bookshelves. They stack them so high. There must be thousands and thousands of books in here.
‘Well?’ My voice echoes in the silence.
‘I don’t know where they keep The Gospel of Philip. We’ll have to check the tags. Christian manuscripts will be grouped together; their tags usually have a sigma written on them.’
‘Sigma?’
He’s silent. But I know what he’s thinking: I’m just a thick street kid. Whereas Croc and Lanky think I’m thick because I’m not streetwise. Book knowledge is nothing to them.
What’s that noise? We stop. Nails scratching wood. I hold my breath and listen. Fatty grabs my arm. Let him hold it if it keeps him quiet.
A scuttle of little feet flee past ours.
‘Only a mouse.’
Fatty gives out a squeal and pinches my arm.
‘Shush!’
The faint edges of the shelves are only visible when I’m right up close. Tags hang from strings in neat rows. So this is how they stack the scrolls. What about the new books with pages that turn? The landlord used one to keep a note of our rent.
Fatty stops and peers at a tag. He turns it to catch the dim light. ‘This way.’
We shuffle along the narrow alleyways of shelves. Impressive, how Fatty navigates his way by reading those tags.
My breath comes in sharp little jabs. The air is thick with dust and as heavy as the Necropolis at night. The thought of sleeping in the Necropolis for the rest of my life makes my gut tighten. This isn’t an empty building; it’s like a cemetery, a book tomb. It’s too hot. Sweat re-forms on my top lip every time I brush it away. Fatty’s stalling. Panic jabs my chest: what if I’m caught and sent to the mines?
‘Hurry up.’
‘It must be here, on the bottom shelf.’ He crouches down and leans forward to examine the tags one at a time.
‘Well, which one is it?’
‘I can’t see very well.’
‘What does it look like, a sigma?’
‘Like a Mu on its side.’
I’ll twist his pudgy ear for that.
‘S-sorry. I’ll draw it on your hand.’
His nail – no brickie has nails – makes the shape of two triangles without their bottoms, two pyramids side by side.
He pulls out a scroll and shows me the tag. The dust makes us sneeze.
Need to turn it at an angle to catch the light. I can just about make out a ∑ on the tag, written in black ink… and some other scribble. It’s satisfying to read the letter myself.
‘All these have a sigma.’
‘Each t-tag has a letter on it for its category, then the first letters of the title or the letters of the opening line of the book. Or a th-theme the scribes give it if there’s no title. Christian books often lack titles, s-so we’ll have to check all these.’
Is Fatty just buying time for the Roman to arrive and catch me in the act with the guard?
‘I th-think it must be at the bottom left hand corner of this stack.’
Why don’t he get it himself if he knows where it is? What’s he playing at? My stomach knots at the thought of being chained in a mine. I’ve got to get out of here.
My knife’s out and at his throat. ‘Is he here, the cinaedus? Is he here to catch me?’ My voice cracks close to his ear.
‘W-what cinaedus?’ Fatty’s snivelling.
Cool it, Aeson. Croc wouldn’t double-cross me.
‘Shush. Pull out the one you think it is.’
He pulls out about twenty scrolls and puts them on the floor.
‘It c-could be any of th-these.’
‘Get a move on. We can’t carry them all.’
Fatty wipes his eyes on his tunic and turns each book tag to catch the light. ‘I need to check the first line.’ The scroll crackles as he unwinds it and peers at the top. ‘The G-Gospel of Philip.’
Down the front of my tunic it goes.
‘Let’s get the fuck out of here.’
I’ll have to drag Fatty back through the shelves to the stairwell. Thank Serapis there’s lamps lit out here. Downstairs we go.
The door’s ajar. Good old Croc… but what if it’s the guard?
‘You go out first.’ I push Fatty towards the door. He looks at me like I’m abandoning him. I’ll wait here and listen. All I can hear is my heart thumping so loud it makes me ears throb.
‘Pretty, out you come.’ That’s Lanky’s voice. Thank Serapis! I wipe the sweat from my face and walk out the door.
Turk! What’s he doing here? He’s got a knife to Lanky’s throat.
‘Aeson, leg it!’ Another boy has Croc, arms held behind his back.
Where to? The gang’s got me surrounded, knives out in a semi-circle.
Turk shoves Lanky over to Druid. The tattooed Briton says something in his own language; from the look on his blue inky face, I reckon he’s cussing Turk.
‘Bind his hands. Patch, you tie up Pretty.’
There’s nowhere to run, but I dart away from Patch. Two boys grab me. Patch pulls my arms behind my back, holds my wrists together and ties the knot.
Turk swaggers over to me like he’s the Prefect. ‘What do we have here then, a little mutiny, eh?’ He juts his chin at me. ‘Take Pretty to the Necropalace, Patch. I’ll deal with him later.’
‘That double-crossing cinaedus. He screwed us over.’ Croc kicks the boy struggling to lead him away. The boy kicks him back so hard Croc falls to his knees.
‘Cinaedus yourself.’ The boy gives him another kick in the side.
‘Trade is trade, Croc,’ Turk shouts.
An older boy – I think they call him Fish because of his fat lower lip – yanks Croc up by the rope around his wrists as if it’s a handle. That will break the skin. Patch didn’t tie mine tight, but the fibres are rough as he leads me away.
What are the boys laughing and jeering at? Patch stops and turns to see. Fatty’s wet himself. He stares at his feet, shoulders heaving. Poor kid.
‘Shut it!’ Turk slaps Fatty round the face so hard his head does a sharp twist. He shakes a piece of paper close to Fatty’s face.
‘These books, can you find ’em, eh?’ Turk thrusts the paper into his hand. Fatty just gawps at him. ‘Look at it, boy, or you’ll get more than a slap.’
Fatty holds the sheet of paper in both hands to keep it still.
‘Well? Can you find them, eh?’
‘Y-yes.’ Poor Fatty – his teeth are chattering. He looks over to me like I can do something to help him.
‘Come on, Pretty.’ Patch gives me a little shove to make me walk. ‘Why d’ya go and do a thing like that? Turk don’t take kindly to betrayal. Lost my eye when I did a runner.’
I swallow. Maybe the mines would have been better.