* * *
By the time I returned to Fountain Court it was dark. I put aside my anger; I had to give my attention to keeping alert. A loose chicken scuttled across my feet in a panic, frightening me too. There were the usual feeble lamps flickering like extremely tired glow-worms on the porches of the bakery, the basket shop and one or two others. Only the funeral parlour was ablaze with cheerful strings of lights; offering a brilliant welcome was their idea of comforting the bereaved. In one deeply shadowed doorway two figures were locked together; hard to see whether it was a pair of lovers steadfastly taking their pleasure or a mugger throttling a victim. In keeping with the traditions of our area, I did not enquire. I had once helped a youth who was being raped by a carter, only to have him steal my purse while his attacker was giving me a black eye. Not a set-up; just a typical Aventine reward for my overfriendliness.
I was walking up the laundry side of the lane, which was normally quieter. This brought me to the ground-floor lockup alongside the barber’s, the set of rooms that had previously been advertised to let. The new tenants had made fast work of moving in. There was a dim lantern with a dirty horn shutter swinging from an awning support, by the light of which I could make out masses of intriguing stuff for sale. A faint chalked sign above the entrance now advertised: The Lumber Room: Bargains Aplenty and Gifts Full of Charm.
This was my last hope of acquiring a birthday present for the girl I adored. Even better, I could possibly get something cheap. I had nothing to lose, so I rapped on a cauldron hanging by the doorway, and went in.
XLI
If you liked jumble, it was a wondrous glory hole. As soon as I squeezed in through the folding doors, which had been nearly closed, I knew this was the sort of cavern that cried out for half a day’s perusal. It all looked extremely casual. There were enough mixed sacks of pictures and crocks to give the impression the proprietor had lost any chance of knowing his stock – holding out the tantalising hope of unsuspected valuables for which the sharp-eyed browser could offer a copper, intending to sell on to a more discerning dealer at twenty times the price. My father always called these places rubbish dumps; his disdain only made me like them more.
By the light of a few tiny oil lamps I tried to familiarise myself. Dust filled the air. There was a smell which I recognised from the house sales my father organised after people had died, that faintly upsetting aroma of old things newly disturbed. The confined space was very warm. From the rear of the building came a succession of muffled noises, not quite domestic in character.
I brushed through a strung-up cascade of belts, some with extraordinary buckles. Then I nearly stepped on a dismantled chariot wheel. Sandals and boots were knotted on ropes like onions. They bulged on the walls amidst hookfuls of skillets and drainers that hung in colonies like shellfish on a groyne. Around my feet were teetering piles of bowls and platters. To reach the gloom where the counter groaned under mounds of cloth items – old clothes and household drapes, apparently – required steering a path through the tableware; huge baskets of ironmongery that leant against the serving island, keeping you at a distance. Little stands dripped bead necklaces. Caskets stood open to show off glittering finger rings. There were bronze flagons, black metal cups that could well clean up into silver, and an astonishing candelabra that reached the roof.
I wondered where the proprietor got his stuff. On the off chance, I kept an eye out for Syrian glass.
A figure emerged suddenly from the rear, making me jump. He looked flustered and suspicious, as if I had invaded a shop that was really closed for the night. I stuck one thumb in my belt and applied an unthreatening air.
‘Evening. This is quite a collection! I bet you don’t even know what you’ve got.’ It was intended as a compliment; he took it as an insult, I could see.
The man was slight and seedy-looking. I had seen this type in many a dark boothful of paraphernalia before. I never know how they live. They never seem to want to part with any goods from their untidy selection, and if you bring anything to offer for sale, they despise that too.
This one had lanky strings of hair covering his ears, though the dome of his head was bald. His skin was like old cheese rind, the sort at which even sparrows turn up their beaks when you find it behind a cupboard and throw it out. He looked insignificant. I tried to tell myself he was a pent-up ball of energy and intelligence. I failed.
‘Mind if I look around?’
He condescended to allow it, but appeared about as happy as if I had told him I represented the aedile in charge of licences. ‘Anything special you’re looking for?’ he forced himself to demand. He definitely had the gloom of a man whose credentials were being checked – one who knew he had not paid the right bribes to be in the clear.
‘I’ll know it if I see it.’
I wanted to browse; he just wanted me to leave. The fact that he stood there watching meant that things which had once looked attractive rapidly lost their interest. I started noticing chips and dents the minute I picked up an item, then I felt embarrassed about putting it straight down. He had no idea how to sell. Even if he suspected I was an evening opportunist looking for goods to lift, he could have watched me without letting it show. Anyone would think I had slouched in with a hook on a stick or a large swag bag.
I lost myself for a long time in a basket of handles, brackets and hinges. Eventually I straightened up. ‘Do you sell any decent-quality jewellery?’
‘I don’t have much in stock at the moment.’ He meant, if any ever came in he sold it straight on to a specialist jeweller who could present it on a pretty display and charge more. ‘My partner reclaims precious metal, and we have a good crafstman who can make it up into anything you want. We could commission you a piece.’
‘In gold?’
‘Oh yes.’
‘Would you guarantee the purity?’
‘All our work goes out with a certificate.’
Anyone who ‘reclaims’ metal can probably forge documents too, but it sounded a reasonable offer. That only made me feel more worried. This was a prime opportunity for them to pinch the materials, if I supplied any, or for me to pay a lot of money for work that entirely lacked artistry.
‘What’s your name?’
‘Castus.’
‘Maybe we can do business, Castus.’
I hated the normal class of jeweller. I hated their prices and the stuck-up way they sneered at me. I really would have liked to give some smaller firm a chance. But Helena was special. Feeling like a louse, I promised to decide more clearly what I wanted and come back later with instructions. Then I left the shop. Poor Castus obviously knew I was just a time-waster.
* * *
Back at home, Helena was in bed. I knew pregnant women have to rest a lot. When I suggested this, Helena retorted that she had just decided I was an unreliable wanderer it was no use waiting up for.
I sat on the edge of the bed, holding the skip baby, who had been awake when I came in. He gazed back with his normal, quiet, trusting expression. I had a bad conscience about this one. I kept forgetting him. I kept forgetting my niece Tertulla too. There was madness on the Aventine, a two-way traffic in youth. Some children were being abandoned; some were being snatched. I tried to make a connection, but nothing jumped out at me.
I pushed Nux off the end of the bed; she crept closer along the floor, and since she was shy of fussing me while I was acting stern, she licked the baby’s foot instead.
‘That’s a good sign.’ Helena smiled.
‘She’s good with children!’ We both giggled, thinking of Gaius Baebius making this wild claim as he fought to hold his struggling hound, Ajax.
Helena told me the brothers-in-law had achieved nothing in the search for little Tertulla (no surprise). The last sighting of her must have been soon after Marius had left her, in a street only two away from Fountain Court. Gaius Baebius had offered to come again tomorrow to continue searching. He and Junia had no children of their own, but he was a good-hearted soul.
That had never made him easier to like.
I sighed. Trying to think what I could do about this, I stretched on top of the coverlet alongside Helena. I was still holding the babe. Next thing, the damned dog started creeping up over the edge too, one paw at a time. There was hardly room for all of us. At this rate we would need a bigger bed.
Tertulla might have to wait. She had been missing most of the day, and we were now into the night. I knew what that meant. I was perfectly aware of the dangers she might be in. She was certainly frightened. She might be hurt. Or dead. But without a lead to follow, I had little chance of doing anything.
I was her uncle. I was head of her mother’s household, since Pa was an absconding scoundrel and the child’s own father was a complete deadbeat whom even Galla threw out whenever possible. It was my role to find the child. Dear gods, I hated this kind of responsibility.
‘Let me try,’ Helena urged, snuggling up to me. ‘I’ll speak to the parents of the other so-called missing children. Marcus, you can’t do everything.’
I turned my head and gazed at her sadly. ‘You’re beautiful!’
‘What’s that for?’ She was suspicious at once. ‘What’s happened?’
I closed my eyes wearily. This had to be confession time. ‘I can’t do anything right. I bought you a wonderful present for once – and it’s been stolen from me.’
‘Oh no! Oh my darling.’
‘It was marvellous. Something I’d probably never be able to better.’ I was really depressed. ‘I’ve been trying to replace it, but I can’t find anything I like as much.’
‘Ah Marcus … It doesn’t matter. Come to bed properly.’
‘I didn’t want to have to tell you this.’
‘It’s not your fault.’
‘I’m supposed to be catching the bastards. I thought I’d get it back.’
‘You will,’ she said. I loved her faith, but it was terrifying. Helena put her arms around me. I began to feel drowsy straight away. That was no good. I had too much to worry about. If I dozed I would have bad dreams. I might as well just stay awake and ruin my chances of sorting out anything by making myself completely exhausted for tomorrow.
Tomorrow was going to be a difficult day. ‘Helena Justina, what are we going to tell your mother when she asks you what you had from me?’
‘I shall just smile mysteriously and say it’s a secret.’
Helena’s mother would take this for a salacious reference to the child we were expecting. Once she knew of it. ‘Well what, if it isn’t too much to ask, are we going to tell your mother about starting a family?’
‘Don’t worry.’
‘I do worry. I’ve bungled enough things. I’d like to handle this with decorum and tact.’
‘I’ll tell her that was my birthday present.’ Exactly as I feared: ‘He’s made me pregnant. What more do you want?’
What a wonderful household. A hopeless informer, a girl he should not be living with, a strange little foundling baby, and a dog I didn’t want. And somehow between the four of us, we were trying to solve half the conspiracies in Rome.
* * *
By next morning there was another crime for us. During the night Alexander, the doctor who had told Nonnius he was dying, was found by the watch lying in his open surgery. The place was a wreck and he was surrounded by scattered instruments and spilled medicines. His throat had been cut with one of his own scalpels. Various disgusting experiments had been perpetrated on him first. His brother, Scythax, the Fourth Cohort’s medico, happened to be out with the night patrol that came across the corpse.
XLII
Helena’s birthday. My poor girl loyally spent her time trying to find my lost niece. She set about interviewing all the Aventine householders who had reported missing children. Gaius Baebius had turned up just as I was myself leaving home, so I found a piece of rope in my skip to tie Ajax to a pillar in the laundry portico, then arranged with Gaius that he would stick close to Helena. It was protection for her, something I could not spare time to provide myself, and kept him out of trouble too.
Lenia bawled something angrily about the dog.
‘Leave off, Lenia. If I’m to provide your augury, you owe me a favour or two.’
‘Don’t push your luck, Falco! Seems to me you’re using this as an excuse to behave like a complete tyrant.’
‘Don’t underestimate the lies I’ll have to make up.’
‘If you feel like that I’ll find somebody else.’
‘I wish you would.’
Nobody else would do it, we both knew. Every lockup shopkeeper in Fountain Court had already given himself a hernia laughing at the thought of me having to suffer under the sacrificial veil.
Dear gods. That was another problem: I would have to acquire a headdress to parade in at the altar on the wedding day.
‘Gaius Baebius, you look like a man with a sense of duty. Have you got a priest’s veil?’
‘Of course,’ smirked my brother-in-law. Trust him. What a pious operator. How could even Junia have married him? (Answer: for his customs salary. Do not ask me, however, how a placid lump like Gaius ever married a spiteful stick like her.) ‘Marcus Didius, I am hoping to be elected to the college of the Augustales soon.’
Official religion. Oh spare me, Gaius! ‘Excellent fellow! And thanks for the loan of your bonce sheet,’ I cried, setting off in the opposite direction from Helena and him at a fast pace. I could see him looking puzzled; Helena would explain. If I knew Gaius Baebius, lending me his head veil would make him think he had the right to attend Lenia’s nuptials. Things were looking up. He and Junia were bound to bring their dog; Ajax was their child substitute, treated as one of the family. Maybe Ajax could be trained to bite the bride’s beloved. Maybe, if the gods were very kind, they would give me time to train Ajax myself.
Walking to the station house, I enjoyed myself thinking of fierce canine teeth being sunk into my landlord’s most personal assets on his wedding day.
* * *
I already knew how my own day would be unfolding. Fusculus had called at the apartment early to break the news of the doctor’s murder. He said Petro had been up half the night pursuing investigations into the Saepta thefts. When he heard of Alexander’s murder he had given up and gone home to grab a hasty nap. The plan was for us all to meet at midmorning in order to tackle the new disaster after the crew had rested and were fresh.
This gave me a couple of hours to spare. Time for serious preparations: I went to the gymnasium and put in some wrestling and weapons practice. Given the grim state of Rome it seemed a good idea.
I had forgotten about my shoulder. That very promptly sent me out of the gym and into the massage room.
‘You’re full of flab,’ complained Glaucus the proprietor, who acted as my personal trainer whenever I allowed him access.
‘Get me into condition then.’
‘In half an hour, Falco?’
‘Half an hour is all I have.’
‘You’re slow, you’re weak, you’re dopy. It’s going to take me months to undo this. I hope you’re not planning anything dangerous in the near future.’
‘Just tackling a gang of vicious murderers. And mind it, man! I had a dislocated shoulder poked back yesterday.’
‘Jupiter, Juno and Minerva! I presume’, moaned Glaucus sarcastically, ‘somebody also landed some heavy blows to the soft part of your head?’
I do like to approach threatening situations with such warm encouragement.
* * *
Petronius Longus was in a filthy mood. ‘What in Hades is wrong with these bastards? Can’t they give us time to run ourselves into the ground on one job before they have to jump up like flea-bitten rabbits? Time was you could rely on growing thoroughly depressed with your first case before some cluck decided to throw the next at you…’
He was just ranting. I could understand why.
He had Scythax in the interrogation room. The poor man was so deeply in shock he seemed drunk. Every few minutes
he wandered out muttering a confused suggestion, or asking the same question he had put to us three times already. ‘What did they think they were achieving? Why did they have to torture him? Why, oh why?’
‘Revenge, Scythax. Porcius, make yourself useful. Go in there and sit with him.’
‘Just talk to him,’ counselled Fusculus in a low voice. ‘Or if he talks about his brother, just nod and listen.’
As the nervous recruit obediently led the grief-stricken man indoors again, Petro covered his face briefly. ‘I can’t send him home. Oh gods on Olympus, Falco! What a mess. He lived with his brother. He’ll go mad in those surroundings. Besides, these bastards may be looking for Scythax too.’
‘The patrol couldn’t hold him back,’ Fusculus told me. ‘The door was ajar. As soon as Scythax saw the situation, he was in like an arrow, howling and covered with blood himself. They had a terrible time dragging him away from Alexander and getting him back here. He still keeps trying to return to the surgery.’
Everyone present was white-faced. There was plenty to do, but they were sitting together in the patrol house, impotent. They saw violence daily; hideous death far too frequently. This had struck too close. This affected one of them. This – though nobody had yet mentioned it – was something their own work had caused. Alexander might have been attacked by a deranged patient, but we all thought this was directly related to his false diagnosis of Nonnius Albius.
We spent a day trying to make sense of it. First we all said there was no point going to look at the surgery – or no point all of us going. We all went. It seemed a gesture of respect. We had to force ourselves to see what the man had endured. Petronius imposed it on himself as a punishment. Some of the others made it serve as an apology. I went because I knew from experience that if you don’t, you never stop worrying whether there was some clue you could have spotted if you had been there. We badly needed evidence. The squad was so shaken up that any clues there were might easily be missed or misinterpreted.
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