Virgin Territory

by Marilyn Todd

  Diomedes waylaid Claudia in the peristyle. ‘The old man was asking for you earlier,’ he said quietly, his eyes brushing her face. ‘Wanted to know whether you’d signed…the contract.’

  ‘Sod that for a lark.’ That had never been her intention.

  ‘Which, er, contract might that be?’ Diomedes asked mildly, wondering whether her bad mood had any connection with the letter Senbi had just handed her. He heard her sigh.

  ‘I suppose I owe it to him to tell him,’ she said. ‘How bad is he?’

  ‘Bad,’ the doctor replied. He stepped in front of her and looked deep into her eyes. ‘Claudia, there’s something I want to say to you.’

  He had to move fast. Aulus had collared him just a few minutes ago and pointed out in no uncertain terms that it was that bitch Acte who’d pushed for his appointment, but since Eugenius was shortly to join her in the Underworld, their influence was finished. Aulus was telling him now, he wanted no truck with mountebanks, Diomedes could bloody well sling his hook. And don’t think he didn’t know about the fucking whipworm, because he fucking did, and Diomedes’s fucking wages would be docked because of it. When they came back from the funeral, he wanted Diomedes gone or he would have him forcibly removed.

  He spread his accent thicker to catch her wavering attention. ‘Claudia, I want to ask you—’

  ‘Later, Diomedes.’ She brushed past him. ‘I’ll speak to Eugenius first.’

  ‘Of course.’ With effort, the Greek swallowed his disappointment and ushered her into the room. ‘Although I doubt he can hear you.’

  The first thing that hit her was the smell. They say you can smell death, but until now Claudia hadn’t realized it was so sickly-sweet, so pungent, so utterly repellant. She resisted the urge to hold her handkerchief over her nose as she crossed towards the bed.

  The man who had held the Collatinus family in his hand for seventy-seven years, playing with them like pieces on a board, controlling their lives, their marriages, their children, had finally relinquished his grip. His eyes were hollowed, his temples sunken, his nose sharp and pointed as happens immediately prior to the Great Reaper gathering his harvest. The skin of his forehead was hard and tight and translucent, and it was difficult to imagine the man behind the little walnut face terrorizing family and servants, clients and buyers with his bullying and his railing and his insults. Around her, the pornographic friezes shimmered and wavered in the light of the torches which had been lit, the leers ugly and repulsive, and you could almost hear the lewd laughter from the cripples and hunchbacks and lepers. From the figure on the couch, small as a child, came a series of harsh rattles in the throat. She would never know whether Eugenius had been genuinely grieving for Sabina or merely mourning the loss of a prized asset.

  She feared it was the latter, and couldn’t wait to pack, to get away from this house. The villa, the inhabitants, the whole place made her sick to her stomach.

  ‘Claudia, I need to talk to you.’

  ‘Later.’ She waved the doctor away and made for the bath house. Cold water. Give me cold water to wash in. As cold as you can make it.

  Now about that lowlife Varius, she thought later, towelling herself dry. Insolent little turd. She glared at the letter, innocently rolled up on top of her stola, but which had been burning a hole in her hand from the moment Senbi delivered it. In itself, it wasn’t so much an affirmation of the reasons behind his claim to Seferius blood, more a means of informing Claudia that he knew her whereabouts. Implicit was the threat that should Varius come to harm for whatever reason, others might be made aware of the circumstances.

  Bugger!

  But life isn’t always unkind and it was pure providence when, heading back to her room, Claudia heard a frantic scuffle and turned just in time to watch Senbi go flying on a mysterious patch of grease near the front entrance. There was a satisfying crunch as his outstretched arm- bone gave way at an unnatural angle.

  Fluttering footsteps approached across the atrium floor. Corinna, fully made up and looking almost pretty, was smiling.

  ‘Claudia,’ she said, laying a hand on her arm. ‘Could you spare me a moment?’

  ‘Well…’ When you looked closely, you could see it was all make-up. Beyond the carmine smile and ochre cheeks, Corinna’s eyes were dead. ‘I am rather busy.’

  She really wasn’t in the mood for Corinna’s custody plans.

  ‘Oh, but!’ Corinna gave a light laugh, the first Claudia had ever heard from her. My, my, there was nothing like a death to cheer this family up, was there? ‘You see, it’s Linus…’

  Claudia rubbed her aching temple. ‘What about him?’ she asked wearily.

  ‘Well, you see, I’ve killed him,’ she said, with a self-deprecating gesture. ‘Stabbed him in the stomach with a knife.’

  XXIX

  Being Corinna, of course, she was wrong on both counts. Linus was neither dead nor stabbed in the stomach.

  She’d got him in the left-hand side.

  Claudia’s first instinct was to fetch Orbilio, because if this could be hushed up, so much the better. His two-year stint as an army tribune and subsequent service in the Security Police would give him as fair a knowledge of first aid as was necessary, but unfortunately it appeared Supersnoop had succumbed to a bout of food poisoning. Serve him right, he should eat proper meals at proper times, instead of scoffing whenever he felt like it.

  Diomedes, fresh from setting Senbi’s arm, was unfazed by Claudia’s account of how Linus had been larking about with his sons, slipped and fell on his knife. The wound wasn’t serious, he assured her, the blade had missed the vital organs. Give him a week and he’d be as good as new. What surprised him was Linus’s silence throughout. Presumably he felt an utter prat, falling on a knife in front of his sons and Diomedes rather enjoyed prodding the wound as he cleaned and stitched it.

  ‘Claudia,’ he said quietly, drawing her to one side. ‘I need a word with you.’

  ‘Yes, yes, Diomedes. But later, eh?’

  Good life in Illyria, what was it with this man? If there was such a thing as reincarnation, the Greek should come back as a barnacle. Claudia slammed the door on him and rounded on Linus grey and pallid and with dark circles under his eyes.

  ‘Listen to me, you scumbag, that was just a warning.’ She had sent Corinna out of the room long ago. ‘Your wife has had it up to here with you, the beatings and the whoring.’

  ‘It was only—’

  ‘Next time, she said, it’ll be your balls she takes the knife to.’

  Linus winced.

  ‘I’m glad you understand.’ Claudia folded her arms across her chest. ‘These are her terms.’

  She rattled a dozen straight off, with Linus nodding to each condition with every appearance of compliance. Corinna might have been fooled, Claudia was not. His true colours shone clear when she drew out of her gown a neatly written document requiring only his signature.

  The painkillers had kicked in long before he finished reading the terms. ‘This is outrageous,’ he spluttered.

  ‘No more than being a eunuch,’ she replied reasonably. ‘Sign the paper, Linus.’

  Linus signed the paper, cursing under his breath. Jupiter in heaven, life was a bitch. The minute you were free of one miserable tyrant, another came along to turn the screws. And when it was your own wife, what chance did you stand?

  ‘Here.’ Claudia caught up with Corinna in the atrium, cuddling Vilbia so tight the toddler’s face was changing colour.

  She examined the contract with wide eyes. ‘You got him to sign this? Unlimited access to my children? Sack Piso? A monthly clothes allowance? Linus only goes out once a week? Claudia, he’ll tear it to pieces.’

  ‘For pity’s sake, Corinna, you place it with a goddam lawyer. And if he turns on you again, look serious with that knife.’

  ‘But I couldn’t,’ she protested. ‘I wouldn’t fight back again.’

  ‘I know it and you know it,’ Claudia said, ‘but thankfully Linus doesn’t. Don’t
throw everything away at the next confrontation. Stand up to him just once more and the occasion won’t arise again.’

  Whether Corinna would have the guts was another matter but Claudia had done all she could for the silly bitch, it was up to her from now on.

  Corinna crumpled. ‘I love Linus,’ she said, burying her face in Vilbia’s curls. ‘I didn’t mean to kill him, but he kept taunting me. Said…said Vilbia wasn’t his.’

  Bastard. Pity she hadn’t made a thorough job of it.

  Since there was nothing more to say, Claudia left Corinna by the pool and threw herself down on her own soft bed. It had been one hell of a long day, she was exhausted.

  In the corner, Drusilla began to stir. Light was fading, temperatures were falling, mice would be scampering, moths would be fluttering. A family was fine, she decided, languidly washing her forepaws, but by gum, they were a tie. Her whiskers twitched impatiently. What she wouldn’t give for a stalk through the long grass, to hear the rustle in the undergrowth, catch the scent of a musk beetle. Reluctantly, she turned her ablutions to the kittens.

  Claudia scrunched Varius’s letter into a ball, bounced it off the ceiling and called for Cypassis.

  ‘Have you seen Kleon lately?’

  ‘Now that you mention it, madam, I haven’t. Not since yesterday.’

  ‘Me neither.’

  Funny that. Damned funny, in fact. Junius she had sent to Sullium, the Nubians were engaged on another little scheme of hers. Kleon, though, should have been here.

  Where in heaven’s name was he?

  *

  Diomedes slipped quietly into his patient’s room, pausing in the doorway. There was a stillness in the air, a calmness. He closed the door behind him and padded across to the window. The hangings were tight, blocking out every chink. Lighting the oil lamp, he considered the figure on the bed. His colour was high, his breathing rapid. Diomedes checked the pulse. It was faint. Very faint.

  Laying his box on the table, he set out his medicines one by one. The cautery had gone well, he thought, encouragingly so, considering it was one of the few operations safe enough for the softer organs. He had successfully drained the empyema from the membranes, cleaned the superficial cuts and left Melinno in a haze of soothing aniseed looking for all the world like this was the first proper sleep he’d had for months.

  The late October dusk was falling fast. Diomedes heard the loud trumpeting call of a crane going back to roost, the caw of the rooks and the constant bleating of animals protesting at such enforced intimacy. Supper was under way, he could smell the beef roasting on the spit.

  He moved across to the couch. It was damp from sweat, the blanket in a huddle on the floor, apart from one corner which had caught on an ankle. He laid a hand on his patient’s forehead. Red hot.

  ‘Not long to wait,’ he whispered soothingly.

  In the looking glass he caught a glimpse of the scene, saw his own serious expression framed by a halo of blond hair. Gently he laid the mirror flat on its face. Death was never a pleasant episode to watch. He patted his patient’s hand twice, then selected a feather from the top compartment of his medicine box. It was a goose feather, robust and rigid.

  Where would he go next, he wondered? It all depended on Claudia, didn’t it, whether his dream, his golden goal, could finally be realized? Yes indeed, so much hung in the balance. When he looked down, the feather between his forefinger and thumb was shaking. Stop it, he ordered, control yourself. Soon, very soon, she will give you your answer. Soon, Zeus be willing, she will be your wife.

  He waited until the hands that had so painstakingly removed ingrowing eyelashes, explored fistulas and extracted bladder stones had stopped trembling, then turned up the lamp and removed the top from a small ceramic pot.

  As he leaned across his patient, a hand closed round his wrist with surprising strength.

  ‘Kill me and you’re finished.’ The voice was barely audible, a croak.

  Diomedes looked directly into the eyes of Marcus Cornelius Orbilio. ‘You’re delirious, my friend,’ he whispered.

  Orbilio’s eyes mocked him. ‘That feather is dipped in poison.’ He spoke with difficulty. ‘An old dodge.’

  Diomedes made to interrupt, but the patient forestalled him. ‘A report is lodged with Ennius,’ he said, ‘a second’s on its way to Rome. I repeat, kill me and you’re finished.’

  ‘Marcus, Marcus, you have a fever—’

  ‘Which you gave me, you bastard.’

  ‘Sssh. Drink this.’ He tried to put a cup to his patient’s lips, but the grip on his wrist was like an iron shackle. ‘It’s only water,’ he said. ‘You’re not thinking straight.’

  ‘Neither are you.’ Marcus slumped back on to the couch. ‘I’m her legally appointed guardian, did you know that?’

  Blue eyes narrowed. ‘You’re what?’

  The man on the bed managed a short laugh. ‘I think you know what that means, but just so we don’t have any misunderstanding on the point, let me explain.’

  The eyes were bright—too bright—and the voice ragged, but he pressed on.

  ‘In legal terms, her money is my money, anything she wishes to spend has to pass my approval.’

  ‘But… She never mentioned it.’

  The grip on Diomedes’s wrist weakened as the muscles fell slack. Children ran squealing past the door. ‘She’s a very independent woman, but the law is the law when it comes to guardians. When I die, that money goes straight to my next of kin, a brother stationed in Egypt.’ Sweat was pouring down his face. ‘Then it’ll be up to him to look after Claudia Seferius until she remarries.’

  ‘The fever’s affected your brain, Marcus, I’m not after her money. Lie still and—’

  He could barely form the words now. ‘Take your feather, Diomedes, and get out.’ He began to gasp for breath. ‘Only for gods’ sake, open that bloody window on your way.’

  With a slow, sad shake of his obedient blond hair, Diomedes watched Orbilio sink into oblivion. He scratched at an itch behind his left ear for several minutes, staring at the motionless form on the couch before shaking his head again and slowly replacing his medicines in their compartments.

  ‘Oh, Marcus,’ he said softly.

  Finally he picked up the oil lamp and held the goose feather to the flame. He swept the ashes from the table into his hand and funnelled them into a rag before closing the lid of his box.

  Almost as an afterthought he unhinged the shutters to let in the cool, healing evening breeze.

  *

  ‘Good morning!’

  Claudia plumped herself down on the edge of the couch and dangled a bronze manicure set from her right index finger.

  Marcus Cornelius Orbilio opened one eye. ‘What’s that for?’

  ‘Well, it was difficult to know what to give the man who has everything and virtually all of it contagious.’

  He gave a sickly grin. ‘Thank you.’

  She dropped the manicure set on the bed. ‘You can play with your toys later,’ she said airily. ‘I came to update you on the news.’

  Since he’d declined the offer of grapes, Claudia placed the bowl in her lap and began to strip the bunch one by one.

  ‘Around dawn, Eugenius finally did what Old Conky’s been praying for these past sixteen years. Collatinus, like the reptile that he was, sloughed his mortal skin and slithered away to join his ancestors.’

  ‘There’ll be a sign up,’ he said. ‘“Under New Management.”’

  ‘You’re not well, Marcus. Leave the jokes to me.’ She decapitated another grape. ‘I also have to report that Linus, as of today, is a reformed character.’

  Unlike Diomedes, Orbilio found his imagination stretched to its very limits picturing Linus, purely by chance, falling horizontally on to a vertical fruit knife, but wholeheartedly agreed that it couldn’t have happened to a nicer chap.

  ‘What else?’

  ‘Sarcasm doesn’t become you,’ she said, turning the bunch over to attack the grapes from the o
ther side. ‘Lots of things have happened while you’ve been idling away in your pit. Tanaquil, for instance. Antefa went to give her her supper and guess what he found?’

  Orbilio struggled to prop himself up on his pillow. ‘Don’t tell me, let me guess. Four guards unconscious, door open, Tanaquil gone.’

  Claudia’s mouth pursed. ‘Have you heard this before? Swear it?’

  He swore it.

  ‘Then how did you know?’

  A sparkle danced in his eyes. ‘I’m a policeman. What was I supposed to make of two big strong Nubians hanging round the litter shed? The puzzle is, why did you let her go?’

  The grape about to enter Claudia’s mouth was brandished like a weapon. ‘Who said I let her go? Don’t get me wrong, Orbilio, I’m not saying I’m sorry she’s free, but why you suspect me is a mystery. Are you sure you don’t want a grape?’

  ‘And deprive you of the last four?’

  ‘Oops. Sorry about that. Anyway, that’s not all, guess who’s vanished?’

  ‘Surprise me.’

  ‘Diomedes.’ She started in on his dish of figs. ‘Upped and went last night without a word. What do you think of that?’

  ‘Astonishing.’

  ‘Then sound like you mean it. They’ll track him down, of course, he won’t get far.’

  ‘Who wants to track him down?’

  Claudia spread her hands in an exasperated gesture. ‘You, for one. Ever since you arrived.’

  ‘Ah. I have a confession to make. I was wrong about Diomedes.’

  ‘No, I was wrong about Diomedes.’

  ‘No, I was.’

  ‘Orbilio, I said I was—’

  ‘Diomedes didn’t kill Sabina or Acte, he—’

  ‘Rubbish, he’s as guilty as hell—’

  Orbilio banged his head three times on his pillow. ‘Dammit, Claudia, listen to me—’

  ‘There’s a chap in the clipshed called Melinno—’

  ‘The shepherd?’

  ‘Marcus Cornelius Orbilio, will you shut your mouth for thirty seconds and use your damned ears for a minute?’ The instructions were so utterly absurd that they both fell into fits of laughter. Then the figs slithered to the floor in one sticky heap and the manicure set slipped elegantly off the bed to land right in the middle, like a cherry on a custard. You could have fried a dozen flatfish in the time it took them to calm down.