Chapter 9 #2
Blinking rapidly, Mantheria reached into the green water and pulled out a soaked black armband, like the one Andrew was wearing as a part of his mourning clothes.
The water and the cloth were both warm. Where was he?
Surely not at the bottom of this pool. Her father had taught him how to swim at Hampford Castle, and her son had gone swimming in the Mediterranean Sea with his aunts.
Surely he wouldn’t have drowned in a little, stagnant pool.
She set down the torch and was about to jump into the pool when she felt two strong arms encircling her waist, stopping her.
“Andrew isn’t in there, Mantheria,” Sunny said, and then let go of her with one hand to point to a trail of wet prints on the other side that led to a corridor. “He swam and left.”
She breathed in deeply to calm herself and then exhaled slowly.
In her panic, she had stared without seeing, lost her head and let her worries overwhelm her.
Mantheria realized that Sunny was still directly behind her, his arm around her waist and his body pressed against her back, and she was shaking.
Unlike the comforting embrace from earlier that day, this one felt unsettling.
She stiffened and gently removed his arm from her waist. “I suppose we must follow the trail.”
Sunny stooped down and picked up the torch.
He held it in the air, and she saw that the left side of the pool went to the wall.
There was no passing on that side. The right had only a small ledge, but it was their only choice.
With tight shoulders, Mantheria inched slowly around the side of the green pool until they reached a small, angled courtyard.
Sunny followed behind her. On one side, there was the door that led back to the Assembly Rooms, and the other seemed to lead to another building entirely.
The wet footprints went underneath a set of arches.
They had missed him by minutes.
The slur of curse words that Sunny had said after his arm was injured went through her mind. But swearing wouldn’t help. Mantheria’s shoulders slumped, and she wished to curl up in a ball and cry.
Why had she not come sooner?
Where would Andrew go now?
Where could he sleep so that he would be safe?
She heard a jingle of keys. Glancing over her shoulder, she saw Sunny give both the torch and the master of ceremonies’ set of keys to the footman as well as a tip for his efforts.
“We will continue our search without your help. Please convey my gratitude to Mr. Heaviside for his assistance tonight.”
The footman bowed his head and left them.
Sighing, Sunny pointed. “This leads back to the road, but we dare not leave any stone unturned.”
In the darkness, they went under the stoned arches and followed the footprints.
Instead of entering the opposite building, they led to a small, narrow alley passageway out to the road.
Mantheria barely squeezed through it, and Sunny’s broad shoulders got stuck.
She pinched her lips together. At any other time, she would have been able to see the humor in the situation, but right now, every minute counted.
The ground was still wet, and Andrew could be near.
Slipping through the rock walls, she went out onto the cobblestone road.
She cupped her hands around her mouth. “Andrew! Andrew, can you hear me? Andrew, it’s your mother. Please answer me.”
Her yells echoed against the stone streets and walls, but there was no response. She’d barely missed him again. Mantheria squeezed back through the dark and narrow passageway to where Sunny was currently stuck. She let out a strangled sob and sank to her knees.
“You. Can. Leave. Me,” he said, his speech punctuated with little breaths. His chest was wedged in tightly between rock and stone.
Breathing in deeply, she was tempted to. But she’d left him this morning only to realize how much she needed her friend’s company and help. “He’s already gone, and it’s dark. There isn’t much else we can do until morning—except to get you out of here, of course.”
“I. Am. So. Sorry.”
Carefully getting back to her feet, Mantheria leaned against his shoulder that was wedged between two stone buildings.
It did not budge. She was so frustrated that she could have screamed and thrown a tantrum like a small child.
Instead, she huffed and attempted a bit of humor.
“Perhaps you should follow Lord Byron’s diet of boiled potatoes and soda water. ”
Sunny laughed, and it sounded a bit like he was being strangled.
She pushed all her weight against his shoulders again with little to no success. “There are many other successful slimming methods. Andrew told me that Roman soldiers ate a great deal of legumes and vegetables with different spices.”
“I shall start a Roman slimming diet . . . as soon as I am no longer stuck . . . between Scylla and Charybdis.”
At least Sunny was now able to speak in short sentences. Perhaps she had actually moved him a little.
Mantheria leaned her back against the cold wall behind her and took a rest from pushing against him. “I take it those two words are similar to being stuck between a rock and a hard place.”
He gave another breathless laugh as if he couldn’t take a deep breath with his torso stuck. “They were two monsters that the Greek hero Odysseus, known to the Romans as Ulysses, had to pass by. He chose to sail by the lesser of two evils, but Scylla still ate several of his men.”
“Where was he going that was so important?”
Sunny was silent for a few moments, and Mantheria wondered if perhaps he didn’t know the full story.
“To the River Styx that leads to the underworld to consult a dead prophet, but ultimately, home to his wife, Penelope. He risked his life over and over to get home to both her and their son.”
It was a rather lovely sentiment, but Mantheria had experienced a most unhappy marriage. “If he loved Penelope so much, then why did he leave her in the first place?”
“Honor. Alliances,” Sunny whispered. “Odysseus was pledged to Agamemnon, who attacked the city of Troy to rescue his brother, Menelaus’s wife from Prince Paris.
The stories say that the goddess of love, Aphrodite, bewitched Helen to follow Paris home.
The Greeks fought in the Trojan Wars for ten long years to take her back. ”
Mantheria vaguely recalled Matthew mentioning that Prince Paris had already been married when he wooed and fled with Helen.
The classical war had been fought because a wife had not been faithful and a husband had been untrue.
If only people lived up to their vows, then it seemed even wars could be avoided.
Or in her case, a great deal of misery and regret.
“If Penelope waited ten years for him to return, she was certainly a good wife.”
Sunny gave another little breathless laugh. “She actually waited twenty years. It took Odysseus ten additional years to sail home to Ithaca.”
Mantheria had only been married for twelve years.
It was just a story, but she had to admit, even just to herself, that it was rather lovely that the wife had been true for so long.
Too bad it was only a fictional story. “No doubt Odysseus was having all sorts of adventures and enjoying the company of other ladies while his wife waited patiently at home for him to return.”
“Penelope had struggles of her own. She was plagued by very intrusive suitors who wished to marry her, and so she told them she couldn’t marry until she finished embroidering her tapestry. But every night, she unpicked the stitches, waiting for her true husband to return.”
“And when he came home, no doubt she accepted him with no questions asked about his adventures or lady friends.”
“No,” Sunny whispered. It was dark, but she knew that his eyes were on her face.
“She didn’t. She asked him to solve a riddle that only her true husband would have known.
Penelope asked him to move their marriage bed, and Odysseus said that he couldn’t because they had carved it from a tree that grew in the middle of their house. ”
Harrumphing, Mantheria let her shoulders drop a little. “It still seems like a long time to wait for a happy ending.”
“Sometimes happiness requires patience.”
Mantheria was fresh out of patience and desirous for her own bed, whether or not it had been carved from a tree that had grown up through the middle of the George Hotel.
She allowed herself to slump lower, for there was more space near their feet than by their heads—and then it hit her.
She was pushing Sunny the wrong way—from side to side.
She needed to push him down toward the ground, where there was more space. They could crawl out.
Grabbing his closest shoulder, Mantheria put both of her hands on it and then hung against him with all her weight.
Slowly, his torso began to inch down until at last, they were on their knees, and his chest was no longer wedged between a rock and a hard place.
They inched out on their hands and shins.
Sunny gave her a hand to help her to her feet.
After standing up, she brushed off her hands and her dress as best she could.
But it was probably filthy now. She picked up the small, wet black armband.
At least she had some proof that Andrew was in Bath, and had been well enough physically to go for a swim in a Roman bath.
“Shall we return to the George and start our search again in the morning?” Sunny asked.
Mantheria nodded and pointed. “After you, Odysseus.”