J. C. Abbot, Literary Sleuth

It was a dark and stormy night. I was working late at the office. Knock knock. Apparently someone was knocking at my door.

"Who's there?" I didn't look up. I was working, like I already said.

"Help!"

"Help, who?" Then I thought better of that. "I mean, help whom?"

It was seven women. Students, they said. They had a problem, they said, and they needed a detective.

"You're students. You have a problem. You need a detective."

They were astounded at my extraordinary powers of deduction. They hired me on the spot.

"So, you said something about a problem?"

Petronius was their problem. Seems this guy wrote a book. Satiricon, Sityrica, whatever.

"So what's it about? This, er, Sit. . . Sat . . . book?

Nailed it. THAT was their problem. They wanted to know what the book was about.

"Hard to say." I was stalling. Maybe it would come to me. Maybe I could take a peek at the cover and, you know, make a judgment. Or maybe not. 

A week later, they came back. By then I had read the book.

I opened the file. Then I opened my mouth. "Death," I said. I shut the file. I stood up to show them to the door . . .

They didn't budge. They were tough, these seven students. They wouldn't take death for an answer. Explain, they said. I opened the file again.

"Does this guy Trimalchio have a clock and a bugler in his dining room, and does this bugler blow his horn every hour to remind him that time is passing?

Yes, they said.

"And does this same guy order a silver skeleton to be brought into the dining room and arranged in various poses?"

What choice did they have? Yes again.

"And does one of the freedmen guests say he's just come from a funeral? And does the wizened Sibyl in a bottle say that she just wants to die? And does Trimalchio say he has silver bowls with Cassandra's dead children depicted on them? And is Trimalchio's witch story about a man whose insides are stolen by witches? And does the late-arriving guest Habinnas say he's just come from a funeral, too? And does Trimalchio read his will aloud? And does he make his guests pretend like he's dead? And do they all conduct a mock funeral?"

Yes, yes, yes, yes, yes, yes, yes, and yes. They were very agreeable, these students.

"Plus, I'm leaving out other morbid stuff. So there's your answer: the book's about death."

But why? they asked. Agreeable . . . and curious, too, it seemed. A powerful combination.

"Look," I said. They looked. "Look, you paid me to tell you what the book's about. I gave you an answer. The answer, I mean. Plus, I threw in this nifty picture of a skeleton from Pompeii, gratis. Now you want to know why? How about you tell me."

They looked at each other. Evidently they were thinking. About what? And then one of them piped up and said, "Well . . . ." 

To be continued in person