Richard Blake - The Curse of Babylon

The Master of the Timings was back in action. Next item was a break from petitions. ‘A gift for His Magnificence!’ he cried with slow jollity. He held up a box of painted wood that seemed to have been badly scratched along its underside. ‘Behold the love and respect in which the Lord Senator Alaric is held by the entire universe!’ he intoned. The response was a long monosyllable. It is best described as the sort of appreciative sigh you let out when something tasty is pushed under your nose. It began on the left side of the hall and moved, as etiquette prescribed, in stages to the right. Meanwhile, it was for the old eunuch to try, with decreasing elegance of movement, to get the box open.

Oh, bugger! I thought — not a birthday present. And not in public! My birthday had been the day before and I was hoping no one had noticed. Rotten luck I had to sit here now, getting ready to smile and nod at greetings that would soon be repeated across the City. Telling myself not to sneeze, and trying to ignore the tears that must be ruining my paint, I watched as elegance was abandoned and a penknife was used to prise the box open. I heard the groan of long nails levered out of wood. Leaning forward an inch, I caught a flash of coiled and polished silver. It could have been worse, I thought. If you must admit to a birthday, the presents might as well be worth having. I leaned forward another inch. Now fully open, the box was on the little table set before my chair.

I found myself looking into the old eunuch’s glowering face. ‘Can people not write messages in a civilised language?’ he whispered. ‘It shows such disrespect for My Lord.’ He waved the lid under my nose. I glanced at the slip of parchment that was coming loose from where it had been stuck. I looked harder.

‘I know your secret,’ it said in Latin.

Though I kept my face steady, the shock was instant and overpowering. I turned cold all over. My heart beat faster and faster, and there seemed no limit to how hard it would eventually beat. There were dark spots before my eyes. A colder chill was radiating from the pit of my stomach. I looked again at the message and struggled to keep my legs from giving way.

‘I know your secret ,’ it said.

Desperately, I fought for control. But cold panic now seemed to have spread through my entire body. In its suddenness and intensity, the attack was best compared to an orgasm — or, leaving aside any talk of pleasure, with the shock you feel between getting a possibly fatal stab wound and its actual pain. It can’t have been more than a few moments that I stood there, looking at the little, stained slip of parchment. But I could have sworn at the time it was an age.

I barely noticed the muffled squeal the Master of the Timings gave as he pitched head over heels down the steps, or the bump of metal on carpet, and then its clatter across the marble. But, as if through a mist as thick as anything produced by incense, I did notice that the eunuch had collapsed and was lying, still on his back, with his mouth wide open.

That was enough to free me from the worst of the attack. I glanced up from the fallen eunuch. No one else had stepped from his appointed place. On every face I could see the kind of look that goes round at an execution, when the victim hasn’t cried out for a while and it will soon be time for lunch. Someone stoked the brazier again and a cloud of yellow smoke blotted out the petitioning agents. Someone else in the gallery behind me began another rendition of all my titles and supposed attributes.

But the Master of the Timings wasn’t dead. Before I could trust myself to end the audience and call for a doctor, he opened his eyes. With a soft moan and the writhing motion of a bug that’s fallen on its back, he sat up and frowned. ‘It must be something I ate!’ he said firmly. He looked about and frowned again. ‘Has nobody any respect in this modern age?’ He pointed at the silver object where it had fallen.

The Listings Clerk hopped down the steps to retrieve it. He held it up and rubbed hard with his sleeve at the scratch it had taken from the floor. ‘It will polish off,’ he said with a desperate smile into my blank face. He buried it in a soft area of his robe and rubbed it furiously all over. ‘It really will be as good as new.’ I ignored him. I ignored the sweat that was still trickling into the small of my back. The break in proceedings had given me time to pull myself together. I said nothing and had my first proper look at the Horn of Babylon. It was untarnished then. Except for the scratch on its rim, it was still a fine thing to behold — no dent yet halfway down its length, nor any scratches deep inside its bowl.

Using his staff for support, the Master of the Timings got to his feet. ‘Better give it back to me,’ he said faintly. He took it into his trembling hands and looked for a moment as if he’d go over again. No problem this time, however. He cuddled it against his flabby chest and bowed to me.

‘Who brought this?’ I asked in a voice too quiet to show its tremor. I got nothing from the Master of the Timings. The Listings Clerk broke in with a kind of snivelled yawn. I let my eyes dart about the hall. The crowd had reappeared through the fog of incense and was showing its first sign that morning of active interest. But no one looked shiftier than usual.

I stood up and took the silver cup into my own hands. My legs were shaking and I had to steady them against the seat of my chair. But, as quickly as it had come over me, the attack was gone. Its afterglow was rapidly fading. It no longer felt as if I had a pint of vinegar swilling about in my stomach. My heart was steady again. With every heartbeat, my legs were shaking a little less. Everyone stepped one pace forward and went into a three-quarter bow. This was followed by another long blast of Latin. In hands that didn’t tremble, I held the cup at chest height for everyone to see.

It’s a birthday joke, you idiot! I told myself. And what else could it be? Though the Emperor hadn’t chosen to notice, let alone object, I had been four years now on the Imperial Council, and I’d been Lord Treasurer for two years. All this and I was currently a day past my twenty-fifth — that is, I was one day into my manhood, as these things are counted under the laws of the Empire. Of course, it had been a quiet joke throughout the City. But, if an emperor doesn’t notice or object, why should anyone else — in public, that is? I was only now eligible for the increasingly exalted offices I’d been occupying these past few years. Someone was having a laugh at me.

I looked for support at the bizarre and probably impossible act Tiberius was committing on the far wall with a dolphin. No support there today. I looked again at the cup. It screamed every possible expense, tinged with an odd sense of humour. Who could have sent it? Heraclius? This was the sort of joke Emperors played on their friends. But it couldn’t be Heraclius. He had no visible sense of humour. Besides, he was a hundred miles away in Cyzicus, consulting some smelly old monks on pillars about how to beat the Persians. Even granting he’d discovered a playful side to his nature, he had other things on his mind. I gave up on questions. Doubtless, someone important would come up to me later in the day and give me a knowing slap on the back.

I felt a returning trickle of moisture into my mouth and was able to stand forward. By now, the adoration of my gift had run its course. I gave my present back to the Master of the Timings and sat down. I closed my eyes for a moment. When you have a Secret, of course, any mention of secrets will set you off. This was hardly the first panic attack I’d had in the past year. But it was the oddest. None other had faded so fast without opium or cannabis to knock it on the head. If only I could think what to do about their cause. .