Flow Down Like Silver: Hypatia of Alexandria by Ki Longfellow

man’s house, no matter how large the house or worthy the man.”
    “What, then,” asks a now sober Helladius, “shall we do?”
    “We will do as the Jews once did.”   By name a Greek, Meletus is the one Jew here, and head of the Jewish Schul of Alexandria.   Though all other stares are blank, the stare of Meletus threatens.   But as Meletus is older than Palladas, older even than Didymus, and has not a single hair on his head but hair enough for a cleaning broom over both eyes, Hypatia pays him no heed.   “When Rome threatened the books of the Jews, what did they do?   They gathered them from everywhere, took them out into their deserts of arid heat, sealed them in great jars, and hid them in caves.   The books exist, though three hundred years have come and gone.   This is true, is it not Meletus?”
    Clearly, Meletus does not want to answer, but must.   “Yes, it is true.”
    The others stare at the bald Jew as they stared at Hypatia.
    “Is this not Egypt?” says this woman of a girl, “and are we not surrounded by deserts, greater than any in Judea?   And do we not have caves, and are they not dry and hot?”   Yes, they all nod, yes, there are caves in the desert and they are hot.
    Pappas holds up a hand.   “But what of grave robbers, more numerous than lice?”
    “Robbers seek gold, not books, and what they seek is near the Nile, not here.”   Pappas concedes her point: Alexandria has no pyramids, no valleys of kings and queens.   “We will gather the books, each from where it is hidden.   We will find the right and proper caves.   When these are discovered, there will be drawn three maps that if found or stolen will make no sense to its finder.   Each map will be seemingly different yet in meaning the same, and three men will hold in trust these differing maps.   You must decide who these three men are.   As for the devising of symbol, who better than my father: Alexandria’s most fiendish geometer?”   Even Theon listens with open mouth.   Yes, yes, yes .   I see them begin to calculate, already wondering which of them would be map-holders.
    Pappas has paid close attention, so now asks the obvious question.   “And where shall we keep the books before they are hidden in desert caves?”
    The answer to this is as ready on Hypatia’s tongue as all else she has said.   “They will be taken to the one place no Christian would think to look.”
    “And that is?”
    “Only those in this room will know, swear on it.”
    They all swear, even me, and of them, I hope none betrays what they swear to; this while looking at Paulus and thinking of myself.
    “The place is obvious.   Where else than in the Didascalia, the confusing, complex, and enormous Christian school of Didymus the Blind?”
    Ahhhh, they all sigh.   Bold.   Ingenious.   Risky.   For the space of a breath, they pause, then fall to discussing which of them should be the three to hold the maps.   Only I am left to gaze upon Theon’s second daughter.   Not one man here questions her judgment.   Yet no man gapes in wonder at wisdom standing before them.   I am in danger here; my heart is threatened as well as my loins.   I scold myself.   Step lightly, Egyptian, speak with care.   No sword has proved more dangerous than this.
    I banish the woman with thoughts of the man.   Bishop Theophilus is my true master.   What I hear in this house, should I not tell him?
    No doubt.   But not now.   Yet if not now, when?   The answer is simple.   When it suits me.
    ~
    Hypatia’s plan to remove the books from private hands and to hide them in a Christian school began that day.   I watched them moved through the streets in bullock carts, in bundles on backs as if they were kindling or laundry, even secreted one by one under mantles.   My own I carried openly.   What Christian would take offense at, or even notice, the work of Theophilus, for each of my books was disguised as one of his.
    It was good to see Lais