Sophie and the Sibyl (7 page)

‘Did she ever return to Jerusalem according to the legend?’ asked Lewes, peering closely at the woman’s delicately painted breasts.

‘She was cast out from Rome,’ murmured the Sibyl, drawing her shawl closer to her massive aching jaw, ‘but no one knows where she died.’

‘I like to believe that she returned to her people,’ said Meyrick. Max now convinced himself that he had indeed recognised the magnificent breasts through the shimmering veil of convenient myth.
The Rape of the Sabine Women
, which Meyrick now displayed, contained naked breasts a-plenty and some extraordinarily convincing Roman thighs, partially covered in metal and leather. The artist’s genius for creating surfaces and tiny, convincing details loomed out at Max: the thonged sandals of the screaming women and the bloody sides of white horses, wounded in battle. That much-praised stern realism now seemed menacing and uncanny. He found himself eyeball to eyeball with the inside of a woman’s mouth as he shouldered the canvas on to the easel, with Meyrick supporting the other end. The entire painting writhed and howled. Even the blood appeared fresh and dripping.

‘I completed this last year upon my return from Rome.’ Meyrick began to explain the composition.

Max inspected the other, smaller canvases that Meyrick had prepared for them to see. Here was Echo fleeing from Narcissus and the Bacchae in thrall to Dionysus, tumbling after their erotic enchanter. The dancing god sported long ginger curls, his golden cup raised in ecstasy. Max half closed his eyes to absorb the energy of the gesture and the naked glory of the figure; he recognised the self-portrait of the artist by the intense stillness of the features. The first follower clung to his arm, and now Max smiled, quite certain that he was gazing at the very lips that had tasted his own body the night before. Here she was, the long blonde hair dishevelled and unfurled, the warm country cheeks, the vast magnificent nipples, and the abstracted glance of the professional prostitute. Meyrick’s model is surely also his mistress. Ah, and here she is again, as Titania, or could it be Queen Mab? I see Queen Mab hath been with thee tonight! Well, sir, she has also been with me. Max ogled the naked Fairy Queen, imagined his lips on her breasts, and then bent to study the picture, obscurely embarrassed by the opulence of the woman he shared with the painter.

‘My Shakespearian studies are taken mostly from the tragedies.’ Meyrick was anxious to present himself as a serious painter. ‘
Othello
,
Macbeth
and
Lear
. Here is Lear with Cordelia murdered, cradled in his arms. But ah, sir, I see that you have uncovered my Titania.’

Max raised the painting from the dusty floor to the easel.

‘Goodness,’ cried Lewes, snatching up the offered magnifying glass. ‘Polly! Come and look. Never in my life have I seen so many fairies.’

‘There’s a good-natured competition among the painters here,’ explained Meyrick, ‘to see how many fairies we can squeeze on to one canvas. Would you believe that there are one hundred and sixty-five fairies in these Athenian woods? All busy about their queen! I won the Fairy Prize for this painting,’ he added with a smug flourish, handing the glass to the Sibyl, who rose unsteadily and approached the picture.

The visitors sniffed the flamboyant varnished surface, peering at one tiny, grotesque figure after another. The little people belonged to several different species. Some marched in ranks, wearing uniforms with tiny golden buttons, others, bizarrely clothed in savage grass skirts and adorned with garlands of minuscule flowers, whirled in circles, holding hands. Two little elves with pointed ears approached bearing a parade of exotic fruits on silver platters: pineapples, apricots, oranges, dates and pears, the flesh of each delicacy painted with exquisite care. A couple galloped past on miniature donkeys and a wizen-faced crone in a cap of bells danced all alone in a corner. The surface of the painting quivered with activity and movement. Three tiny ladies peered at their faces in even tinier mirrors, others melted disturbingly into half-human, half-animal forms. A little row of blue-skinned goblins played on cithers, lutes and a large tuba. A gaggle of junior fairies, one picking his minute nose, clutched their slates, attentive to their elfin master, whose ferocious bobble eyes bulged out of all proportion to his face and reddening ears. One creature with hooves and hairy legs dived into the ground beside the giant fingers of his sleeping queen.

‘My word, Meyrick,’ cried Max, genuinely impressed, ‘only an overdose of laudanum could have produced these delicate and scaly beasts! How did you dream them all up?’

‘Oh, there are fashions in fairy painting,’ said Meyrick, unabashed.

‘I have seen your Titania before, however,’ said the Sibyl. ‘She is there in your Roman canvas, grappling with the soldiers, and here beside Dionysus, clinging to her chosen god. If I am not mistaken she is also Echo and Pandora.’

‘You are very perceptive, Mrs. Lewes.’ Meyrick bowed his assent. Max stared at the discerning Sibyl, suddenly feeling exposed and accused, as if the all-seeing Sibyl had watched him, oiled with lust, sucking Titania’s breasts.

She smiled slightly, raising her deeply lined face and glowing eyes towards the painter.

‘I suffer from toothache, sir, and my hearing is not what it was, but my powers of observation are undimmed. And here is a lady who has not always been an artist’s model. Your stern realism, Mr. Meyrick, betrays her earlier professions. She was either in service, or has worked on the land. Look at her hands. Those are the hands of a woman who works. They are beautiful, but they are also calloused and hard to the touch.’

The Sibyl sank back once more on to the white shroud, while all three men examined Titania’s roughened hands.

‘The Fairy Queen did not, I think, scour her own doorstep,’ continued the Sibyl from her throne, ‘but I love the busyness of this painting. It exudes the energy and bustle of a street scene in Fairyland, the more so because their ruler, even in her gigantic sleep, appears to dream their presence. This work is a miracle of varying scales, like Piranesi’s vaulted staircases, ascending into darkness.’

Lewes spun round and gazed at her with affectionate concern. ‘Shall I take you home at once, Polly? That toothache has not eased at all. You already look exhausted.’

The Sibyl raised her gloved hand to his. ‘I fear we are obliged to discuss the question of the portrait on another occasion, Mr. Meyrick.’

Max offered his arm to support her, while Lewes rearranged her shawl. She looked up at him gratefully, but remained silent.

‘Anyone who hates faults, hates mankind.’ This assertion was delivered in sweet, firm tones. Nobody dared to dissent.

The Sibyl sat in the light by their window, reading aloud to Lewes when Max entered their sitting room. She completed her sentence and looked up, every gesture slow, patient, careful. Max found it impossible to imagine her hurried or alarmed. He bowed and lowered his eyes to avoid the terrifying smile. Lewes sat by the fire with his feet perched on a low stool, balancing a currant bun on a toasting fork. The tea tray stood ready on the table by the lamp. He bounded over to shake Max’s hand, wielding the steaming bun like a Devil’s prod.

‘Come in, Max, come in. I hope we can dispense with all the formalities. You find us revisiting Lucian. Rather upon your account, I gather. Polly is gathering her forces to complete the Finale of her Great Work and then we shall celebrate.

‘For now the matchless deed’s achieved,

Determined, dared and done!

‘Well, almost done.’

Max clasped the Sibyl’s mittened paw, with, he hoped, suitably submissive reverence. And then settled down to listen to more of the odious Lucian, whose sinister
Fragment
now clearly rested in her lap. The Gothic script facing the Latin original announced the existence of a German translation. Max feared the worst. The Sibyl’s voice, low and persuasive, resumed the narrative, left floating through history by the provincial governor of Mysia and Lydia, marooned far from Rome, battling with corrupt officials, insurgent slaves and disturbing news from the frontiers. He spent his days in court and the evenings coaxing his resentful wife to sample the local spices. But he found himself confronting a new religion, which threatened to undermine the state. For the altars were deserted; no one purchased sacrificial doves or votive silver offerings for the Temple of Jupiter. The gods ceased to speak, the augurs fell silent, the entrails lay bloody upon the altar slab of prophecy, uninterpreted, meaningless and blank. Something new had arisen from the gutter, something irrational and inhuman, a heresy slithering out from beneath the wreckage of Jerusalem and the slaughter of the Jews. The thing proved as tenacious as an Asiatic infection, spreading slowly, like lichen on damp stones.

‘I was asked to investigate the Christians by the Emperor Trajan, who suggested that we should interrogate the servants of the main households under suspicion. At first we had imagined that the new religion remained confined to the artisan class and located near the docks, but various accusations brought before me suggested that some of the major households in the town had become tainted by the sect. My informants revealed that Christianity originated with the Jews, who await a saviour, or a messiah. The Christians believe that He is come. This is unlikely, as their young Prophet was executed by Pontius Pilate, during the reign of Herod in Judaea. So far as I was able to ascertain, no major insurrection against Rome was ever planned by these disciples. The Christians meet on the first day of the week to say prayers, chant devotional verses, and share a simple meal of bread and wine. But preachers of the hotter sort made themselves known at Ephesus. And a riot is recorded. The struggle appears to have taken place between the Christians gathered in the theatre and the silversmiths, whose business, located in the streets below the temple of many-breasted Diana, consisted of making silver images of the god and offerings to her for healing and protection during childbirth. The Christians proclaim One God, all-powerful, invisible and transcendent, who needs no idols or incessant blood sacrifice. Nor presumably any expensive, delicate, silver shrines. The silversmiths are reported to have got the better of the encounter, racing through the streets shouting, “Great is Diana of the Ephesians!” and pillaging shops supposedly owned or run by Christians.

‘It was upon the Emperor’s wise insistence that this growing flame should be quenched. This, therefore, became my mission, and I began by handling the interrogations personally. I demanded of the accused whether or not they subscribed to the new religion. If they denied the charge and offered prayers to our gods, and gifts of wine and incense to the statue of the Emperor, they were pardoned and set free, whatever the nature of the accusations made against them. If however, after persistent warnings, they refused to deny their faith, I ordered them to be led away to execution. The Emperor himself advised me that an infallible test was to demand that they spit upon the name of Christ, as no genuine Christian would ever do this. I was loath to inflict that test upon the citizens before me, many of whom were mere children, women and slaves. In fact the sheer variousness of the people brought before the courts roused my instincts of alarm. The new faith respected neither sex, nor caste, nor indeed class, for the usual hierarchies in households where the infection had taken root became unstable or were even dissolved. A maid and her mistress went to their deaths together, supporting one another, singing praises to their invisible god. This scene took place in the public arena, and caused much widespread and unfortunate scandal, engendering seditious discussions in the marketplace, for the woman had been a notorious benefactor in the town, contributing substantial sums to a variety of causes. Adepts of the Christ claim to be sinners, guilty of various spiritual crimes that I could not understand, and yet to have been made perfect through the grace of their god. I have not resolved this contradiction.’

The Sibyl laid down the
Fragment
and looked up.

‘I rather think we have not either, not in our own age. It is the misfortune of Christianity to insist, not on the fallibility of human nature, a quality even Lucian acknowledges in his gentle acceptance of our weaknesses, but on its criminal wickedness. As for the doctrine of original sin, I see no conclusive evidence in its favour. Either in the types of humankind, or in individuals.’

Lewes popped a tea cake on his toasting fork and handed the steaming bun to Max. ‘Lucian ruled Mysia with an iron fist, did he not?’ remarked Lewes calmly. ‘He never gave original sin a chance to take root. If he discovered anyone afflicted with that inherited disease they were in breach of Roman law.’

‘Lucian was an atheist. Religious convictions have never been a prerequisite for moral excellence,’ smiled the Sibyl, coming to the tea table. ‘But I agree. He prided himself on the fact that he was a ruthless governor. Lucian took no chances.’

‘Could a just ruler conduct a moral reign over his citizens or his subjects without any religious principles at all?’ Lewes clearly enjoyed a good dispute.

Max rarely troubled himself with intellectual speculations concerning ethics, let alone metaphysics, but something he had discovered in his researches for his all too easily abandoned
Geschichte des Altertums
now clanged like a rising bell.

‘Was the main city of Mysia called Sardis or Pergamum?’ demanded Max, to the general astonishment of the Leweses, whose teacups froze in mid-air. Max had sat silent, attentive and decoratively pleasant to the eye for so long that his voice boomed into the warmth of their food, carpets and furniture.