The Eagle and the Dragon, a Novel of Rome and China Page 7

  “They’re inventorying as best they can with the other librarii. I’ll have them find out if any report is missing.”

  Quintus turned back to Gaius and Antonius. “Good job, Centurion. Dismissed!”

  “Aye, sir!” The man turned on his heel and left as briskly as he had entered.

  “What do you think, Gaius?” said Quintus, returning to the remains of his lunch.

  “I defer to my centurion. He knew the lad. What do you think, Antonius?” said Gaius.

  “It sounds, like what yer Excellency said… ominous.”

  CHAPTER 7: THE DOCKS OF ALEXANDRIA

  Gaius and Antonius departed the III Cyr encampment in the afternoon on horseback. Gaius was pleased to note that the sentry challenged their departure, demanding their name and unit. Despite the ugly business of the morning, Quintus Albus had decided Gaius and Antonius had little to add to the investigation that they had not already given, and it might be to their advantage and safety to remain for the duration at the Senator’s inn. In any event, the accommodations were less spartan.

  They arrived there in mid-afternoon, and found Aulus preparing a covered cart. Gaius privately gave him a quick overview of the ominous events of the day, which concerned him greatly.

  “You mean to tell me, you think someone in the camp administration directed Antonius to the Bull and Dove deliberately to meet Hasdrubal – who by the way really is my shipping master – and ‘avoid’ Ibrahim whom he just happened to meet, and then was murdered the very next day, and someone searched the legion files?”

  “That’s what it looks like, cousin. What we don’t have is a good reason for any of that. But let your bodyguards know there may be trouble,” answered Gaius.

  “I don’t know as I can provide better security than III Cyr, and whoever did that apparently had no trouble penetrating theirs.”

  “We’re not sure their security was that good, though I expect it has gotten significantly better fast, but our disappearing seemed to be a good idea.”

  “Well, I’m still not satisfied. If it is Ibrahim, then he can find us here easily, if he wants. But no matter now, I will tell them to keep an extra lookout, then we can head off to the city so I can show you the kind of ship you will be traveling on.”

  Aulus left and came back a few minutes later. “They’ve doubled the guards. Not much, but the best we can do for now. Let’s go see a ship!”

  They mounted up on the waiting carriage and departed for the city with Aulus’s servant driving the two-horse team eastward along the coast road to Alexandria. After a while, the Pharos lighthouse came into view, flashing brilliantly at intervals, though it was still ten miles distant.

  “Do you know how that works, cousin?” asked Gaius, pointing at the lighthouse.

  “I’ve been up there,” answered Aulus. “The engineer showed me around, and it’s an amazing piece of machinery. I don’t understand all of it, but the flash comes from a rotating mirror, aimed at the horizon, reflecting sunlight from another mirror above it, tracking the sun. A handler leads a donkey around a walkway on the perimeter, in time to a waterclock to keep everything in step. They adjust everything just before daybreak for the sun’s movement. The rotating mirror is double-sided, so at night, fires from below are reflected from the bottom side. Day and night, it can be seen from thirty miles at sea.”

  “Quite a nice piece of work,” answered Gaius.

  Aulus continued on, “So have you been on any ships, Antonius?”

  “Troop transports on the Danube. Hundred-footers, big enough to carry a century, their ten mules an’ kit. Not enough room ter turn around without hitting yer messmate though, an’ smelled awful, ‘cuz everyone pissed in the bottom of it, beggin’ yer pardon, sir.”

  Gaius laughed. “Well, I think you’ll find these ships a bit more comfortable.”

  The coastal road led along the north side of the city, next to the beaches of the western Eunostos Harbor. The soldiers watched the water aswarm with luxury pleasure craft ranging from small day-sailers skittering along the water like water bugs, to mammoth pleasure palace yachts lolling at anchor. The beaches were full of scantily-clad people enjoying the sun and water, strolling, playing ball games, swimming in the surf, or just taking naps in the sun on blankets. Men and women wore mostly brief tunics, some men just a loincloth, and some women a loincloth and a cloth covering their breasts, with a lot of attractive midriff in between. This caught Antonius’ eye, and he gave a low whistle. “That is some amazin’ good womanflesh there. Dressed as they are, are they … er, perfessional women, Senator?”

  “No, Antonius, I doubt it, though some might be, at a price that would take your breath away. That’s just normal beachwear here in Alexandria. Leaves a lot of skin for the sun to turn a nice shade of tan! This is the Eunostos Harbor, playground of the rich.”

  They reached the Heptastadia, and clattered across the mile-long causeway connecting the mainland to Pharos Island north of the city. All along the causeway, their cart passed bullock trains pulling strings of carts filled with grain and other bulk cargo to the heavy shipping on the Ptolemaic quay, fuel for the lighthouse’s nightshift. An occasional wheeled squirrel-cage crane rumbled along, its tall lift lowered to the horizontal..

  Aulus continued acting as tour guide. “The Heptastadia divides the bay into the Eunostos Harbor that we just passed, and the Great Harbor on the east, for commercial shipping and military. Smaller freighters and fishing fleets use the city docks on this side. Heavier shipping, such as mine and the Classis Alexandrina, the Alexandrian Fleet, use the dockyards built along Pharos’s flank on the other side of the bay, up ahead on your right.”

  To the immediate right of the Heptastadia, along the edge of the island, they could see a concrete dock, with a dozen quays extending up the bay to the protected shelter of a rocky promontory. Along the first four quays rode the galley warships of the fleet. Alongside the remaining quays, one and sometimes two massive ships were moored amidst a forest of man-powered cranes to feed their empty holds from the queued-up bullock trains.

  “The fleet headquarters are in the base of the lighthouse at the far right of the island up ahead, by the Great Harbor entrance beyond that rocky promontory,” said Aulus, pointing at the massive building.

  From where they were on the Heptastadia, they could easily make out the details of the huge lighthouse, built like a layer cake on a large square base the size of a fort, a tapering square second section going up perhaps two hundred feet, an octagonal third section, then a short circular tower capped by the light itself and a conical roof. It was, by any measure, the largest and highest structure that they had ever seen.

  “My ship is in the fourth quay, next to the warships. It’s a typical grain freighter. Keeps Rome’s people fed, and a well-fed population is a happy population. Sailing season is about to open up at the end of the month, so everyone is loading.”

  At the end of the causeway, Aulus’s driver expertly wheeled the cart briskly to the right, proceeding down the access road onto the fourth quay, smooth concrete like the dock. On the right, a nest of black triremes were moored nose-on to the quay, between wooden walkways that separated the ships their entire length. On the left, at the far end of the quay, a massive grain freighter was moored by the starboard side to massive bollards, with space left over to accommodate another ship of the same size on the inside berth. The harbor smells of fetid water, dead fish, seaweed and sewage filled the air, and gulls wheeled raucously in the sky, vying for various pieces of offal.

  “This is the Ptolemaic Quay, it gives you a great view of Alexandria’s buildings, beaches and waterfront,” announced Aulus. The white buildings of the city gleamed in the afternoon sun.

  The cart rolled past the triremes, their gunwales even with the level of the quay. The ships, black and red with gold trim, rode restlessly in the choppy port seas, arrhythmic clatter of rigging on masts beating time with the chop of waves trapped between the docks and their hulls. Over their quarter
decks aft, high sternposts rose and arched gracefully forward over each ship, each identically decorated in a carved white-painted papyrus bloom. And on the bow, just above the waterline and just aft of their wicked bronze ram, a pair of evil eyes glared at the dock, as though the boat intended to ram the structure that restrained it.

  “Their papyrus bloom stern figures are the emblem of the Classis Alexandrina,” Aulus explained.

  Antonius and Gaius noted dozens sailors visible on the deck of each ship or on the quay, working at various maintenance tasks, others lugging supplies below decks, or just strolling the deck, gazing back at them.

  There was no man in the Mediterranean world that was quite the equal of an oarsman on a Roman galley. Most stood six feet tall, over two hundred pounds. In sailor fashion, the men shaved their heads bald, their faces clean-shaven, though some sported long mustaches that drooped down their cheeks. They wore white linen kilts with huge leather belts, bare-chested, huge pectoral muscles glistening with oil to protect them against the sun.

  Antonius took note of the massive oarsmen that powered these warships. “S’truth, it seems a bull can really beget a child from a woman. Look at those sailors, sir!”

  “I wonder what they feed those boys?” asked Gaius, incredulously.

  “I think pretty much whatever they want to eat, Gaius,” answered Aulus. “Those men row like hell or fight like hell, as needed.”

  Continuing down the quay, the cart pulled up to the aft companionway ladder of Aulus’s grain freighter, opposite the last of the warships. The ladder, riding on roller wheels on the dock, scaled her black flanks rearing ten feet above the level of the dock. Two masts and a maze of rigging towered a hundred feet above their heads. Over the raised poop deck, the sternpost curved upward and forward to host an intricately carved white goose with a wingspan of ten feet, in full flight over the deck. While the galleys rose and fell with each choppy wave, the freighter sat like a wall in the water, the waves breaking ineffectively against her bulk.

  It was the largest ship either soldier had ever seen. Looking down the length of the hull, a second companionway ladder could be seen servicing the bow of the ship fifty paces away. And everywhere above them, a web of rigging tied something to something else, and everything to the deck.

  Aulus cast an affectionate glance along the ship’s fine lines. “Gaius Lucullus! Is she not the grandest ship you have ever seen? This is the Aeneas, my first venture, and I am the heavily-mortgaged owner in her. That goose in flight on her sternpost over the quarterdeck, that is the emblem of the Galban shipping enterprise.” Gaius and Antonius nodded in admiration.

  “I have three ships like this under construction in Myos Hormos, the ones I told you about last night, jointly funded with the Senate. Ships of this size have never been used for the Indian Ocean trade, so it is an investment of equal interest to the Empire and to me, as well as transport for our delegation. The three are being completed in the yards there, but still require rigging, sail manufacture and fitting, trimming of the mast and so forth. And sea trials. Since this trade will link three continents, I have chosen to name them the Europa, the Asia and the Africa. We will be going south to monitor their final stage soon.”

  As Aulus was elaborating on his shipbuilding efforts, an alarm bell began to clang on one of the galleys directly opposite the Aeneas, interrupting the discussion. Still seated in the cart, the men turned to watch as sailors sprang into action, quickly putting away whatever tasks they had been performing. Some leapt to tend the lines at the bow and stern, others disappeared below decks to man oars. On the quarterdeck aft by the steering oars, an officer of the deck was crying out commands that carried clearly: “Signal in the air! Get underway at once to conduct armed operations! Captain to the bridge!”

  Aulus pointed to the naval headquarters building by the lighthouse. From a mast at the top of the first level of the building fluttered multi-colored flags, snapping in the breeze. “Don’t worry, this is a drill. The Prefect Admiral of the Fleet does this on a daily basis. Today it’s the Danuvia’s turn.”

  The sailors executed what appeared to the soldiers to be a well-orchestrated dance to ready the ship for sea, punctuated by shouted orders from the officer of the deck.

  Down the quay jogged about twenty marines at a brisk double-time, dressed in light naval armor. They turned down onto the wooden walkway by the Danuvia, their sandaled feet thudding across the gray weathered wood and down the wooden gangway to the deck of the ship, where they fell into formation. As the last marine came aboard, sailors cast off the gangway with a thud onto the dock, and the bow lines landed with a splash in the water. The stern line handlers tugged fiercely, pulling the ship by its bootstraps from the dock sternfirst. As the bow cleared the pilings, the oars emerged, backed water and yawed the bow to port with an asymmetrical stroke to line up parallel to the quay. Below decks, the monotonous beat of the drum timing the strokes began its steady rhythm, and the oars gave a forward stroke. The ship surged forward, and white foam began to break around the ship’s ram. Armed and alert, the warship began a graceful turn toward the eastern exit, her painted eyes glaring wickedly ahead searching for its foe, racing for the breakwater and open sea, her signal flags snapping in the breeze on her bare poles.

  “Well, he’ll make it easy. She has a bone in her teeth already,” smiled Aulus, watching the white foam break around her bow and form a vee-shaped wake. Wind caught the breaking crests and tore away white spindrift.

  “That was well-executed,” said Gaius Lucullus, admiringly, as the Danuvia rounded the breakwater and turned into the open sea. Neither Gaius nor Antonius had had much contact with the Navy throughout their career. However, the discipline and flawlessly executed timing of the galley’s sortie bespoke considerable training, which had impressed both the soldiers.

  The Danuvia in the distance met the rollers of the open Mediterranean, her bare poles pitching against the blue sky.

  “The legate an’ I agree, those was the biggest youngsters I has had the pleasure to see. I bet they’d make a great wrestlin’ team!” said Antonius, obviously enjoying the show.

  “They do, and remind me to tell you a story about them! So let me show you two my ship. I think you will find this a bit more comfortable than your last troop transport, Antonius,” said Aulus, dismounting from the cart and walking along the dock toward the distant bow.

  “Our ships will be similar to this one, a bit bigger, with a third mast aft just about there,” Aulus said, pointing to the deck above them. “My shipbuilder is on new ground with that rig. He isn’t sure about how it will handle. He’d rather leave it off, but I think we can shave days off a long trip with just a few more knots of speed.”

  They continued walking forward along the dock adjacent to the ship. Antonius leaned his head back to gaze skyward through the complicated rigging, estimating the yardarm to be at least seventy-five feet up.

  “We hoist the mainsail and main topsail here. With all sheets to the wind and a fair breeze, our ships can cover as much as two hundred miles in a single day, fully loaded. But right now, it’s the winter season, and sails are being refurbished.”

  They continued on to the bow companionway ladder, under the foremast, inclined at a jaunty forty-five degree angle.

  “Yer Excellency, what is this odd… mast, yer call ‘em?” asked Antonius.

  “That is the bowsprit that carries the artemon, a small sail rigged to that yardarm there. It helps bring her head around.”

  “Hail, Aulus Aemilius, and please bring your party aboard!” A black-bearded figure hailed them in Greek from the elevated quarterdeck above the stern. “You are expected!”

  “Hail, Appollonius, and we shall do so, now.” Aulus responded, also in Greek, and turned toward his cousin. “That is navarklos Appollonius, captain of the Aeneas.” He motioned the two men toward the forward companionway. “Grip the line, Antonius. It’s sturdier than it looks.”

  Antonius seemed unconvinced. Damned ships! Ev
erything moves! He grabbed the single rope accommodation line gracing the right side of the gangplank, and stepped up onto it cautiously. He swore as the gangplank’s dockside wheels slipped under his weight and he momentarily lost his balance. Grasping the accommodation line in his white knuckles, Antonius proceeded gingerly up the gangplank, trying not to watch the choppy water slapping between the dock and the hull of the Aeneas beneath his feet. Gaius followed, a bit more at ease, and finally Aulus, who slipped effortlessly and casually up onto the ship, despite his bulk.

  As they landed on the finely-finished deck planking, Appollonius greeted each with a handshake, and a “Welcome aboard.” The landsmen found the Aeneas a steady, immovable platform. From the deck, they could watch the naval galleys swaying with the chop of the harbor current, but the Aeneas could well have been part of the dock.

  “You’ll pardon my empty ship, Aulus Aemilius. We have only a skeleton crew of caretakers aboard, now that repairs from the last sailing season are completed. Since we will begin preparations for the spring season in earnest in a week, I have given most of them time off now. Today there are only myself and ten men aboard,” said Appollonius, scanning the mostly empty ship. “The crew will begin returning next week.”

  “You have always kept your ships in such immaculate shape, Appollonius. These two soldiers will be journeying with me out across the Indian Ocean. I thought I would show them the type of craft to expect,” said Aulus. “But you know the Aeneas so much better than I, would you do the honor of showing them around?”

  “Certainly.” Appollonius turned toward the two soldiers. “You gentlemen will be traveling on the three finest ships ever to be built. Three masts, not two, and half again as much sail as this one. And fifty feet longer.”

  Antonius tried to picture a ship fifty feet longer than this one, without much success.

  Appollonius turned his attention back to Aulus. “How is the third sail working for you?”