The Twelfth Tablet - Ebook by Tom Harper Page B

was as thin as silk and fragile as a dry leaf.
    ‘It’s the Orphic tablet,’ Paul said. ‘We had it in the Afterlives exhibition last year.’ He read the description under the photograph.
     
    The Orphic religion was one of the most successful and mysterious cults in the ancient world. Twelve golden tablets have been found in burials across the Mediterranean, in contexts ranging from the fifth century BC to the second century AD. Each is inscribed with fragments of the same poem, navigation for the dead to guide them through the underworld. Little more is known of the religion, though because of the subject and the ancient origin, tradition has always ascribed authorship of the poem to Orpheus.
     
    ‘You worked on this exhibition?’
    ‘I helped.’ Why be modest? ‘I wrote the catalogue entry.’
    ‘This piece, the tablet. It was a loan, right?’
    ‘From a private collection.’
    Ari nodded. ‘There are twelve of these in the world. Eleven are in museums. This one you had in your exhibition is the only one in private hands, and your exhibition was the first time it had been seen in public since before the Second World War.’
    ‘You obviously know a lot about it.’
    ‘Not as much as you.’
    Paul sipped his champagne. ‘It’s not really my specialism. They only asked me to do the catalogue because it’s similar to my doctorate.’ Ari’s bloodshot eyes wouldn’t let him go. ‘Most of what I do in the museum is back office stuff. Paperwork.’
    ‘Paperwork.’ Ari repeated.
    ‘Customs forms. Insurance. Liaising with other institutions that had loaned us artefacts.’
    ‘Institutions – or individuals?’
    Paul nodded.
    ‘So you know the identity of this private owner?’
    The champagne was making the world blur. Valerie’s leg had tangled in his, her stocking rubbing softly against the back of his calf. Her perfume was stronger than ever.
    ‘It’s confidential,’ he said weakly.
    Valerie refilled his glass. ‘We’re all friends.’
    ‘I would like to know his name.’ Something in Ari’s voice made Paul’s skin prickle. He remembered the hand on him at the museum, the feeling of utter powerlessness. He tried to sit up, and spilled champagne in his lap. Valerie dabbed at it with a napkin.
    A phone broke the deadlock: a brusque jangle that drew every eye in the bar. A concierge started to move towards them, then saw Ari and backed off. Ari reached in his jacket pocket and pulled out the widest phone Paul had ever seen.
    ‘ Legyeteh ,’ he said. He listened a moment, then put his hand over the phone.
    ‘One minute, OK?’
    He disappeared out the front door. Paul remembered to breathe again.
    ‘Is your boyfriend always that direct?’
    Valerie narrowed her eyes. ‘My boyfriend,’ she repeated, experimentally. ‘He’s used to getting what he wants. His father is very rich.’
    He remembered what Ari had said about the statue. ‘Did he really try to buy the Aphrodite?’
    She shrugged. ‘I don’t think so. If he did, it wouldn’t be in your museum.’
    ‘He isn’t the sort of man you say no to,’ Paul agreed. ‘Where are you from?’
    ‘Kind of all over.’ She waved a hand. ‘Ari has a boat.’
    ‘Not much good for Switzerland.’
    ‘I guess.’ She’d rearranged herself, legs crossed, hands demurely in her lap. Paul felt unbalanced, as if something had disconnected inside him. Even sitting felt unbearably awkward.
    ‘What did you hear when you listened to the statue?’
    It was an impulsive question – he wasn’t even sure what he meant – but it earned him a privileged smile.
    ‘Immortality.’
    Before he could ask what she meant, a cold breeze blew through the hotel doors as Ari came back in. He sat down opposite and drained his champagne.
    ‘I need to see that tablet,’ he said, without preamble. ‘Not me personally. For my father.’
    ‘Right.’ Paul sat back, the same posture he used when his supervisor asked him for chapters. He wondered how soon he could