Julian Stockwin - THE SILK TREE

‘Do you know what you’ve just said?’

‘I suppose if we have to go around the Persians then it’ll add at least another month – or so. A tight expedition, and I’ll agree the numbers might be a bit thin for what we’re thinking.’

‘Marius – you’ve just put paid to the whole thing!’

‘Wha-?’

‘Where are we finding the money for that? We can’t afford a couple of serving slaves, let alone half an army!’

Marius replied huffily, ‘Those Huns are mad bastards – I should know – where we’re going we’ll surely need a hell of a stout force to keep ’em off our backs.’

‘Can we find our way around them?’

‘No. Maybe we can dodge the Persians for a while but then we have to go east – this means right through the buggers.’

‘So what this is now saying is we’ll need to be funded, get some sort of investment capital into our venture.’

‘Right, so we do that.’

‘Heaven give me patience. Marius – if an investor puts more money into this than we can, he gets control. And profits in proportion. We take all the hard stuff, he sits back and piles it up.’ He shook his head. ‘Come to think of it, what’s to stop the bastard liking the plan and then ditching us entirely for his own operation?’

‘So no money man can be trusted!’ Marius paused. ‘But there may be a better way.’

‘Tell me.’

‘Who’s to get the biggest kick out of what we’re doing? Remember what I said about all that gold – it’s the Emperor! Six tons of it a year going out of the country – if we can stop that, he’ll be so happy he’ll put up statues to us both!’

‘State funding. I can see how it’ll work. In return for the subvention we undertake a perpetual contract to supply. On exclusive terms, naturally.’

Marius rubbed his hands. ‘Yes, that. Get him to pay!’ He stood up impatiently. ‘Hey, now – what are we waiting for? Let’s move!’

Nicander’s mind raced. It was too easy…

‘Marius. Sit down. Spare a minute to consider what we’re thinking of. We two, not quite in the front rank of the citizens of the greatest city in the world, do knock on that great bronze gate of the Grand Palace and demand to see His Top Highness, the Emperor of Byzantium, Justinian, because we’ve a good idea we want to share with him, and him alone.’

A fleeting memory of the vision at the hippodrome came. He shivered – their impertinence verged on the sacrilegious and the palace was a byword for intrigue and betrayal. To enter without a friend or guide, into that labyrinth… ‘On second thoughts don’t think that’s such a good move. Perhaps we…’

‘We get someone to speak for us!’

‘And lose our idea? I don’t think so.’

‘All right, then we’ve got to go in ourselves, for fuck’s sake!’

‘Who do we see first? Come on, just who do you know in the Grand Palace has the ear of the Emperor? Will not let on to others, will-’

‘So we find a bastard who knows!’

‘Who?’ But even as he spoke, it came to him. ‘I supply Sarmatian grapes to that villain Messalia. And he’s got one very picky customer out in the country.’

‘So?’

‘John the Cappadocian!’

‘Who?’

‘Count of the Sacred Largesse – or was.’

‘What’s the point of this, Greek?’

‘Well, I got it all from Messalia, the gossip. John the Cappadocian’s a legend – the most grasping and cruel tax collector of all time. Spared none, high or low, however hard they squealed. Justinian relied on him to pay for his wars and he didn’t fail him. It’s said he handed over fourteen times his own weight in gold every year, rain or shine.

‘For years he had the top job at the treasury – and power and riches – until he fell foul of Empress Theodora, who plotted to bring him down. To please her, Justinian stripped him of his wealth and banished him. After she died he let him back, but to live out of town, poor and in disgrace.’

‘And he’s…’

‘He knows every secret in that palace, everyone’s – and he can tell us how to get to the Emperor.’

Not far from the massive red-striped Thedosian Walls, nearly hidden among an olive grove on a small estate, was their quarry. It had been several hours’ walk under the hot sun and Nicander, in his best tunic, with Marius as presentable as could be contrived, stopped to rest.

‘Remember, let me do the talking. This is the most famous money man of the age and won’t be accustomed to plain speaking.’

‘If it please y’ highness,’ Marius replied in mock grovel, hoping it hid his nervousness at the prospect of addressing a minister of state, however fallen.

Nicander too felt apprehension. This was their only chance and he would need all his merchant’s cunning and guile to bring off their objective.

This was the man who’d, in his day, wielded his power directly under the Emperor and who was even said to have run a private prison within the Praetorium for the torture and execution of offenders in the matter of their tax affairs.

How would he take a visit from the likes of themselves?

There was a high fence around the modest villa with a gate that led through to a garden arbour then into a courtyard. Nicander took a deep breath and strode forward as if he had every right to, Marius at his side.

In one silent, deadly move the apparition of a northern barbarian sprang in front of them, lank-haired, clad in wolfskin and leather and with wild eyes. A hatchet leapt magically into his hands.

‘To see His Excellency,’ stammered Nicander. A sharp call came from inside the courtyard and the guard stepped aside reluctantly.

There was a table under the dappled shade of a latticed fig tree spread with a simple meal: a jug of wine, olives, bread and honey cakes. A man sat there, a sheaf of notes beside him. A dog cringed beneath his feet, its eyes only on him.

Nicander approached with as much confidence as he could muster. ‘Two gentlemen desiring to consult with His Eminence John the Cappadocian.’

There was no doubting that this was he – a near-feral presence radiated from the man, terrifying, unnerving. He was repellently corpulent and dressed in a short chlamys that left his fat legs, hairy and gross, thrust out naked before him. But his eyes gleamed with a fierce intelligence.

‘You’re a colonial Greek – a merchant, I suspect. And your friend is an exile Latin. I wonder why you came?’ he pondered. ‘If it’s to gloat over my fall then please be aware I shall ask Wulfstan to first break your heads and then throw you out, but I fancy it’s for some other reason. Am I right?

‘And if you’re thinking to sell me some oriental nostrum then I’m gracious enough to allow you a ten-second start before Wulfstan comes after you,’ he added with a cruel smile.

Nicander gulped. ‘Sire. We come for quite another purpose.’

‘Oh? Go on.’

‘On a concern that if it came to a true conclusion would be of profit to us both.’

‘You’re not being very clear, but continue.’

‘I – we seek advice in the matter of a business venture of some degree of delicacy that Your Excellency is well placed indeed to advise.’

‘I see. Would this be connected with my knowledge of the Byzantine court by any chance?’

‘Sir, I will be plain with you.’

‘That would be a splendid start.’

‘We have a scheme that promises to be of great benefit to the Emperor but requires first we approach him for funding.’

‘Ah, me. And I’d hoped the day would bring me diversion of a more worthy nature.’

The dog whined softly. He kicked it.

‘Sire, it’s to be-’

‘If you had any notion of how often I’ve heard those words you’d pity me with all your heart, you really would.’