The Red Cell by André Gallo (the top 100 crime novels of all time TXT) 📕

“Yes, my lord,” replied Tammuz. “At first I was distracted, steering the ship, and did not realize at once that it was I who had been called. But upon the second call, I was surprised, for no living soul on that small Greek isle knew me; nor did even the ship’s passengers themselves know my name. By the third time my name was called, the passengers were looking about them, for ours was the only ship at all in this part of the dark sea. Therefore, collecting myself, upon the third call of my name I replied to the hidden voice that called out to me across the waters.”

“And what happened once you’d answered?” asked Tiberius, turning his face away from the first dawn light toward the shadow, so the sailors and guards standing nearby couldn’t read his thoughts when he heard the Egyptian’s reply.

Tammuz said, “The caller cried out: ‘Tammuz, when you come opposite to Palodes on the mainland, announce that Great Pan is dead!’”

Tiberius leapt to his feet, his height towering over all, and he looked Tammuz in the eye. “Pan?” he snapped. “Which Pan are you speaking of?”

“My lord, he is not one of the Egyptian deities, those in whom I was raised to believe. And though now, as a resident of the great Roman Empire, I have done with those pagan ideas, I fear that I’m not well schooled in my newly adopted faith. But it is my understanding that this lord Pan is the half-divine son of a god named Hermes, whom in Egypt we call Thoth. And therefore, as a half-divine, perhaps the lord Pan is available to death. I hope I do not commit a sacrilege by saying so.”

Available to death! thought Tiberius—the greatest god in thousands of years? What kind of absurd tale was this? With a masklike face, he rubbed his jaw as if nothing were unusual, resumed his seat, and nodded for Tammuz to continue, though he felt the first tingling presentiment that something might be very, very wrong.

“The passengers and crew were as astounded and confused as I,” Tammuz went on. “We debated among ourselves whether I should do as the voice had demanded, or whether I should refuse to be involved in this strange request. At last I resolved the problem thus: If, when we passed Palodes, a breeze was blowing, we would sail on by and do nothing. But if the sea was smooth, with no wind, I’d announce aloud what I had been told. When at last we came opposite Palodes, there was no wind and a smooth sea—so I called out, ‘Great Pan is dead!’”

“And then?” said Tiberius, leaning out from his shadow to look the pilot again in the eye.

“At once there was an outcry from the mainland,” said Tammuz. “Many voices, weeping, lamenting, and many loud wailings of amazement and astonishment. My lord, it seemed as if the whole coastline and the deep interior beyond were in mourning at some hideous family tragedy. They cried out that it was the end of the world: that it was the death of the sacred goat!”

Impossible! Tiberius nearly screamed aloud as he heard those phantom cries in the darkness echoing through his mind. It was completely mad! The first soothsayer had cast the first lot for Rome’s fate in the time of Remus and Romulus—who were raised by wolves, as was also prophesied. From that age down to the present moment, no dark event such as this had ever been hinted at by anyone. Tiberius felt his skin cold and clammy despite the warmth of the morning sun.

Wasn’t this era merely the dawning of the Roman Empire, which, after all, had just begun with Augustus? Everyone knew the “dying god” was a god in name only, for the gods themselves could never actually die. A surrogate was chosen: a new “god” to rejuvenate, regenerate the old myth. This time it was to be a poor shepherd, farmer, or fisherman—someone who drove a wagon or a plough—not one of the most ancient and powerful gods of Phrygia, Greece, and Rome. The great civilization of Rome, suckled at the teats of a she-wolf, would not be brought down by one old, heirless, hermit king ending his days in exile on an isle named for a goat. No, it must be a lie, a trick launched by one of his many enemies. Even the name of the pilot himself, Tammuz, smacked of myth, for this was the name of the oldest god who died—older than Orpheus, Adonis, or Osiris.

The emperor drew himself together, signaled for the guard to give the pilot some silver for his trouble, and turned away to signify that the audience was ended. But as the money was handed to Tammuz, Tiberius added: “Pilot, with so many passengers on your ship, there must be other witnesses available to confirm this strange story?”

“Indeed, my lord,” agreed Tammuz, “there were many witnesses to what I heard and did.” Deep in the unfathomable black eyes Tiberius thought he saw a strange light. “Regardless of what we believe we know,” Tammuz continued, “there is one witness alone who can tell us whether that Great Pan was a mortal or a god, and whether he is alive or dead. But that sole witness is only a voice, a voice calling across the waters—”

Tiberius waved him away impatiently and departed for the isolated parapet—his prison. But as he watched the pilot being led down the slope to the harbor, the emperor called his slave and handed him a gold coin, motioning toward the Egyptian on the trail below. On swift feet the slave descended the trail and handed the coin to the pilot, who looked up to the terrace where Tiberius stood.

The emperor turned away without a sign and went into his empty quarters in the palace. Once there, he poured aromatic oil into the amphora on his altar and set it alight in the service of the gods.

He