'Did he say anything about them?'
'I wasn't here then.'
'Off with a woman?'
He gave me a nasty look. 'Bloody Fabius might know.'
If Fabius knew, Phoebe knew as well. We walked thoughtfully back to the house.
Great-Auntie Phoebe was telling Helena about the time a crazy horseman whom we later discovered might have been the Emperor Nero fleeing from Rome to commit suicide (a minor aspect, the way Phoebe told it), galloped too fast past the market garden and killed half her chickens in the road. She did not know what the stone blocks were, but told me Festus had brought them on that famous last leave of his. I did find out from her, however, that two men who must have been Censorinus and Laurentius had come to the farm asking questions some months ago.
'They wanted to know if Festus had left anything here.'
'Did they mention the stone blocks?'
'No. They were very secretive.'
'Did you show them the store?'
'No. You know Fabius-' I did. He was a suspicious bastard at the best of times. 'He just took them out to an old barn we have full of ploughing equipment, then he played the country idiot.'
'So what happened?'
'It was down to me as usual.' Great-Auntie Phoebe liked to be seen as a woman of character.
'How did you get rid of them?'
'I showed them Scaro's teeth on the lararium and said those were all we had left of the last unwanted stranger-then I set the dogs on them.'
Next day we set off south again. I told Pa about the four blocks of stone. We both pondered the mystery without comment, but I was starting to have ideas, and if I knew him he was too.
He told me Censorinus and another soldier had stayed at the mansio.
'Old news!' Helena and I relayed Phoebe's tale.
'So I wasted my time! It was a lousy inn,' moaned my father. 'I suppose you two were being pampered in the lap of luxury?'
'We were!' I assured him. 'If you can stand hearing about Phoebe's chickens, and listening to Junius complaining about his brother, then it's a grand place to stay!' Pa knew that.
'I expect Junius had his eye on your girl?' he hinted, trying to annoy me in return. Helena raised the elegant curves of her eyebrows.
'He was thinking about it. I nearly took him on one side and had a quiet word-but if I know Junius, warning him against it is the certain way to make him do something.'
Pa agreed. 'It's as pointless as shouting "He's behind you!" when the Spook starts looming at the Honest Old Father in an Atellan farce… Where was drippy Fabius?'
'Off with his old trouble.'
'I can never remember what his trouble is.'
'Neither can I,' I confessed. 'Either gambling or boils, I think. He ran away to be a gladiator once, but that was only a passing aberration when he wanted to avoid the lupin harvest.'
'Phoebe asked after you, Didius Geminus,' said Helena in a stern voice. She seemed to think we were being frivolous in our discussion of the family news.
'I suppose the actual enquiry was, "How's that useless city mollock who fathered you?"' grunted Pa to me. He knew what they all thought.
He had always known. Being constantly despised by my mother's peculiar relatives must have been one of the trials that had eventually proved too dreary to endure.
IXL
Capua.
Capua, Queen of the central plain (and home of smart fleas).
Capua, the most splendidly flourishing city in rich Campania (if you listen to the Capuans) or even in Italy (if you get stuck with one of those who has never seen Rome).
Do not fail to view the grand Augustan amphitheatre, which stands four storeys high with its eighty great arches all capped with marble deities-though it is more recent than Spartacus, so don't get romantic political ideas. Also, while viewing this splendid edifice, keep your eyes in the back of your head and your hand on your purse. The people of Capua earn their livelihood from visitors, and they do not always ask before claiming it. Never forget: they are so flourishing because we are so stupid. What's yours can become theirs very rapidly in Capua.
When Capua opened its doors and its heart to Hannibal, it is said that its luxury sapped his men so much that he never won another battle. We could have endured some luxury of this disgraceful quality, but things have changed since then.
We drove into Capua on a wet Monday evening, in time to find all the eateries closing up. One carriage-horse went lame just as we reached the forum, giving us an uneasy sensation that it might not be possible to drive home when we wanted to escape. My father, who had come to protect us with his special knowledge of this area, had his money pinched within two minutes. Luckily, our main cash was hidden under the floor of our carriage, with Helena's sensible feet guarding it.
'I'm out of practice,' grumbled Pa.
'That's all right. I always make a mess of choosing my travelling companions and end up nursemaiding incompetents.'
'Thanks!' muttered Helena.
'You were not included.'
'My hero!'
After ten days of misery, which ought to have been a bare week of mild pain, we were all on the edge of rebellion.
I found us a lodging-house in the usual hurried rush when darkness is descending so fast you close your eyes to the drawbacks. It was right next to the market so there would be a racket in the morning, not to mention cats yowling on the rubbish and ladies of the night plying their trade under the empty stalls. The fleas were lying in wait with little smiling faces, though they at least had some tact and stayed invisible at first. The ladies of the night were out and about already: they stood in a line silently watching us unload the coach.
Looking for cash boxes their pimps could come and lift, no doubt.
Helena wrapped our money in a cloak and carried it into the boarding-house in a bundle over her shoulder like a tired child.
'Marcus, I don't like this…'
'I'm here to take care of you.' She was not reassured. 'Father and I will chalk up a message on the basilica saying, "Anyone who rapes, robs or kidnaps Helena Justina, will have to answer to the ferocious Didius boys!"'
'Wonderful,' she said. 'I hope your fame has reached this far.'
'Indubitably!' responded Pa. Long words had always been a form of bluff in the Didius family.
It was an uncomfortable night. Luckily by the time we went to bed, having failed to find an edible dinner, we were prepared for the worst.
Next day we moved to another boarding-house, providing more easy silver for another cheating landlord, and delight to another pack of fleas.
We started to visit artists' studios. All claimed they had never heard of Orontes. All of them had to be lying. Capua thought a great deal of itself but it was, frankly, not that big. Orontes must have been going round for weeks glueing up mouths on the off chance that someone or other might follow him here.
We stopped asking.
We moved to yet another lodging-house and kept our heads down, while Father and I started to watch the forum from doorways and arches where we could not be seen.
Hanging around the forum of a strange town, in the middle of winter, when there is a gap in the local festivals, can make a man depressed.
Helena told us on our return to the current doss-house that there were no fleas, but she had definitely found bedbugs and an ostler had tried to get into the room with her when we left her on her own.
He tried again that night when both Pa and I were sitting there. Afterwards we argued for hours about whether he knew there were three of us and had come hoping for a full orgy. One thing was definite; he would not try again. Pa and I had made it plain we did not welcome friendly overtures.
Next day we moved again, just to be safe.
Finally we had some luck.
Our new rooms were above a caupona. Ever one for a risk, I popped down for three platefuls of their green beans in mustard sauce, with a side order of seafood dumplings, some bread, pork titbits for Helena, olives, wine a
nd hot water, honey…the usual complicated list when your friends send you out to pick up what they gaily describe as 'a quick bite'. I was staggering under an immense tray, so heavy I could barely lift the thing, let alone open the door to carry it upstairs without spillage.
A girl held the door for me.
I took up the tray, grinned at my darling, stuffed some titbits between my jaws, and grabbed my cloak. Helena and my father stared, then fell on the food tray and let me get on with it. I ran back downstairs.
She was a lovely girl. She had a body you would walk ten miles to grapple, with a carriage that said she knew exactly what she was offering. Her face was older than first impressions, but had only gained in character from extra years. When I sauntered back, she was still at the caupona, buying spare ribs in a parcel to take out. She was leaning on the counter as if she needed extra support for her abundant figure. Her bold expression had silenced all the street trade, while her dancing brown eyes were doing things to the waiter that his mother must have warned him not to allow in public; he didn't care. She was a brunette, if it's of interest.
I settled down out of sight, and when she left I did what every man in the place was wanting to do: I followed her.
L
Don't even think it.
I never follow strange women with that idea.
Anyway, the darling brunette was not entirely a stranger to me. I had seen her undressed (though she was unaware of it). And I had seen her at the Circus sitting next to Festus. I could have called out her name and tried to get to know her by saying, 'Excuse me, but I think I saw you with my brother once' (that old line!).
Her name, had I wanted to play around like a barboy, was Rubinia.
I did the decent thing. I trailed her to the love-nest she shared with the sculptor Orontes. They lived four miles outside the city and must have thought themselves safe from discovery, especially during the hours of darkness. The gorgeous model had been quite unaware that expert feet were silently slipping along after her.
I waited until they had had time to eat their ribs and quaff their liquor and knot themselves together in an intimate arrangement. Then I went in without knocking.
They were very surprised.
And I could tell they were not pleased.
LI
Nudity does not affront me. Fighting it, especially in the female version, can be disconcerting for anyone.
The outraged model came at me with a dinner knife. As she ran across the sculptor's studio she was breasting the air with the formidable panache of the famous Winged Victory of Samothrace, though less formally clad. Luckily it was a large studio. I had a good view of her provocative features-and time to defend myself.
I was unarmed and short of ideas. But a pail of cold water stood near at hand. Brought in from a well I had seen in the garden, it was the best resource available. I grabbed it and hurled the icy contents straight at the screeching girl. She let out a louder, even higher-pitched scream, and dropped the knife.
I ripped a stiff cloth from the nearest statue and flung the unwieldy material around her, pinioning her arms.
'Excuse me, madam; you seem to be lacking a stole-' She took this badly, but I clung on to her. We swung round in a wild dance, while the lovely Rubinia called me some names I was surprised a woman knew.
The studio was in a high barn of a building, dimly lit by one taper at the far end. Dark stone shapes loomed on all sides, casting huge, peculiar shadows. Stepladders and other equipment lay everywhere, dangerous traps for a stranger with his mind on other things. Artists are not tidy people (too much time wasted on dreaming, for one thing; and in between the creative processes, too much drink).
I shook the girl angrily, trying to keep her still.
By this time a large man who must be the missing sculptor had struggled upright from the tangle of their bed in the far corner of the place. He too was completely naked, and recently aroused for a different kind of combat. He was broad-chested, no longer young, bald, with a bushy beard as long as my forearm. He cut an impressive dash as he powered across the dusty floor yelling abuse.
These artistic types were noisy swine. No wonder they lived in the country, with no neighbours to annoy.
Rubinia was still screaming, and wriggling so frantically I did not immediately notice that her lover had snatched up a chisel and a mallet. But his first wild swing missed, and his mallet hissed past my left ear. As he feinted, this time with the chisel, I turned sharply, so the girl was in front of me. Rubinia bit my wrist. I lost any inhibitions about using her as a shield.
Still dragging the girl, I dodged behind a statue as Orontes lashed out. His chisel zinged off a half-formed nymph, modelled by someone more slender than the solid wench I was trying to subdue. Rubinia's feet scrabbled on the floor as she tried to lock her legs around the nymph's haunches. I jerked sideways preventing it, though I was losing my grip on the dust-sheet and its astonishing contents. She had slithered lower; any minute I should lose Rubinia too.
The sculptor popped out from behind a marble group. I hurled myself backwards, just missing a ladder. He was taller than me, but made clumsy by drink and agitation; his domed forehead knocked into the obstruction. As he cursed, I seized what might be my only chance. I was losing my grip on the girl, so I flung her as far from me as I could, aiding the process painfully with my boot on her expansive rear. She crashed into a pediment, letting loose another mouthful of barracks invective.
I grabbed the dazed sculptor. He was strong, but before he realised what I was up to I had whirled him in a half-circle. Then I pressed him into a sarcophagus that was standing on its end as if made to receive visitors. Seizing its massive lid, I slid the thing sideways and attempted to close the coffin on the man who was supposed to be mending it.
The stone lid's weight surprised me and I only managed to jam the thing halfway across before Rubinia came at me again, hurling herself on to me from behind and trying to tear out my hair. Dear gods, she was a stayer. As I squirmed around to face her she let go of my shoulders and grabbed the mallet. Frantic blows rained all around me, though her idea of how to hit a target was fortunately hazy. Landing a blow was made more difficult by the fact she was springing about like a maddened polecat, jabbing kicks at the part of me I prefer not to have attacked.
With two of them to overpower, things were becoming desperate. I managed to lean against the sarcophagus lid to keep Orontes trapped behind me, and at the same time fastened Rubinia's hammer wrist in my hardest grip. It must have hurt her badly. For a few seconds she went on trying to murder me, while I tried to prevent it happening. Finally I broke her hold on the weapon, gave her a clout on the temple, and grappled her.
At that moment the door crashed open. In raced a familiar short sturdy shape, topped by frenetic grey curls.
'Cerberus!' exploded my father, with what I hoped was admiration. 'I only let you out on your own for a moment, then I find you wrestling with a naked nymph!'
LII
'Don't just stand there cracking witticisms,' I gasped. 'Lend me a hand!'
Pa sauntered across the studio, grinning like Festus would have done. 'Is this some new form of excitement, Marcus? Having your end away on a coffin lid?' Then he added, with glee, 'The high and mighty Helena Justina is not going to like this!'
'Helena's not going to know,' I said tersely-then I threw the naked model at him. He caught her and held on with rather more relish than necessary. 'Now you've got the problem, and I've got the scenery!'
'Cover your eyes, boy!' growled Geminus cheerfully. 'You're too young… ' He himself seemed to be coping, but I supposed he was used to fine art at close quarters. Holding Rubinia's wrists together and ignoring her passionate attempts to unman him, he catalogued her attractions with a deeply appreciative leer.
I fell prey to some tetchiness. 'How in Hades did you get here?'
'Helena,' he said, enjoying the emphasis, 'felt worried when she noticed you sloping off with that nasty smirk on your face. And now
I see why!' he jibed. 'Does she know what you're like when you go off amusing yourself?'
I scowled. 'How did you find me?'
'Not difficult. I was fifteen yards behind you all the way.' That would teach me to congratulate myself on my expert tracking; all that time I was hoofing after Rubinia, so pleased with myself for doing it discreetly, someone had been tailing me. I was lucky the whole of Capua had not come to see the show. Father went on, 'When you sat down on the well-head for your watchdog session, I nipped up the road for a flagon-'
Now I was furious. 'You went off for a drink? And are you saying that even after the ostler incident you left Helena Justina all on her own at a lodging-house?'
'Well this is no place to bring her!' minced my pa, at his most annoying. 'She's a game girl, but believe me, son, she would not like this!' His eyes wandered salaciously over both of our naked companions, pausing on the coffined Orontes with a harder glare. 'I'm glad you've put that nasty piece of work in a suitable place! Now calm down, Marcus. With three bowls of beans inside her, Helena will be a match for anyone.'
'Let's get on with this!' My voice was clipped.
'Right. Release the corpse from the stoneware, and we'll tell the nice people why we've come visiting.'
I turned round, though still applying my full weight to the carved lid of the sarcophagus. It was a dreary thing to see an inch from your nose-all badly proportioned heroes, leaning askew as if they were marching up a ship's deck.
'I don't know about releasing him,' I mused, curling my lip at Orontes. 'He can hear us from where he's standing. I think I'll find out everything we want before I let him hop out of it…'
My father latched on to the idea eagerly. 'That's good! If he won't talk, we can leave him there permanently.'
'He won't last long in that thing!' I commented.
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