Graveyard of the Hesperides

by Lindsey Davis

  I pretended to have second thoughts, before I quietly agreed: “By Jupiter, Juno and all the gods and goddesses, I, Flavia Albia, swear that I willingly give my consent to take this man to be my husband.”

  We exchanged rings. We kissed. My mother, Claudia and the bridesmaids kissed me. And him. I dragged them off him.

  We could not escape gobbledygook. Staberius produced a set of scales with a small weight in one pan; Tiberius placed coins in the other pan until he tipped the scales. I said I hoped that was to show he would be a just husband. My father presented him with one copper coin as a token dowry. Like many fathers at this point, Falco took huge delight in the low-value singleton coin, as if we had better not hope for any more. Instructed by Julia, Pa nevertheless handed me one further coin to hold in my hand, a second in a purse, and placed a third into my right shoe, making sure he tickled me. I remarked that this was like what he used to give us, his daughters, if we were going out to an evening party—a rather mean fare home.

  Joking that this time I’d better not come home, Falco then made an offering on the altar in front of some household gods, placing a sample toy alongside. I had never seen that toy before; I noticed a small nephew starting to cry. Mother dramatically produced a spindle and distaff, which she handed to me (emblems of domestic life—though not in Mother’s house, or mine). Again, borrowed. Ditto the slightly disreputable household gods. This Lar and his mismatched Penates, dancing with their cornucopiae, looked as if they had been bent in a violent robbery.

  Claudia’s words of advice were: “Your dowry belongs to you, don’t let him start ‘administering’ it; when children come, always insist he is home every day for their bathtime; be a center of calm in the whirlwind of the home.”

  Someone asked what wise words would be offered to the bridegroom, so my pa ordered Tiberius to treat me well or he would have his head knocked off. This was Falco’s first formal wedding of a daughter; he was very emotional.

  *

  Next came the dinner.

  Tiberius and I were bullied into our seats of honor, two chairs covered by a single sheepskin; skins being smelly, Julia and Favonia had provided a woolly rug. More guests arrived, lured through the storm by the promise of a banquet. Bearing gifts, some not even secondhand, they came up and greeted us. There were more aunts and uncles than I could place on our family tree, some with offspring I had never seen before. If a baby cried, crowds of women vied at jiggling it to sleep.

  Tiberius’ sister and family had arrived, with Uncle Tullius behaving well; he had decided to treat this like a business meeting where he needed to be pragmatic and clever to secure some tricky deal. Soon the three nephews had found branches from the decorations to use as spears and were running around, hunting down the three-year-old flower girls. After rather too much screaming, the little girls were sick down themselves, so the boys were scolded, which ended in bitter tears. For unconnected reasons, Fania and Antistius took no part in that though they could be heard having a violent row; then they disappeared separately, until Fania reappeared sobbing to Tiberius that she was desperately unhappy and wanted to leave her husband. Women swooped to drag her off for consolation. Only Aunt Maia ordered, “If you want to leave him, just get on with it, woman—don’t spoil your brother’s day!”

  Men sensibly discussed with each other how to pace themselves with food and drink—before they began sampling amphorae much too fast. The little flower girls were now scampering about naked while their clothes were washed and dried. Aunt Valeria announced three times that she was going for a lie-down, failing to interest anyone.

  I had an unexpected encounter with Camillus Aelianus, Mother’s other brother. Years before, I had had a severe crush on Aulus, which had ended in heartbreak; we had rarely spoken since. He and Hosidia Meline had divorced, each since marrying other people, yet it was Meline he brought along today.

  I could see now that Aulus Camillus was a difficult, truculent, broody man; life with him would have been a disaster, not to mention that since he was my uncle, it was illegal. He had behaved like a bastard to a very young girl who needed security, but since this was my wedding, I unbent. Every bride wants other women to suffer her fate. “Aulus Camillus, you and Meline are better and closer than ever before. Her interfering father’s dead—” The booze-fueled Minas of Karystos had failed to drown himself in drink, but fell off a ladder one Saturnalia. We all reckoned he lost his balance being sober for the first time ever. “Why don’t you and Meline remarry?”

  Aulus was one of the cleverest lawyers to grace the basilica, yet had not thought of that. I left him pondering. Mother would be proud of me.

  *

  The food, which was delectable, kept coming. We had to make this feast last all day, so the wedding procession would be after dark. Since the fashionable cook, Genius, did not exert himself in the kitchen, he wandered out looking important, surveying how much all the guests were enjoying his under-chefs’ wondrous achievements. I went up to thank him for his expertise. Supervising is hard work.

  “Can I ask you a food question, Genius?”

  “You are the bride, ask anything.”

  “Egyptian lentils—best in the world?”

  “Highly regarded. Much sought after.”

  “And highly priced? But might few people in Rome want to cough up? Could lentil-suppliers make a killing, or would they need to supplement their income?”

  “You are right, Flavia Albia. Upmarket lentils have a limited take-up. Suppliers would need to diversify. Either into other pulses, or some quite different business.”

  “Thank you. Genius, you are a genius.”

  “So people frequently tell me,” he answered modestly.

  Before I placed myself back beside my husband, I inspected the buffet tables. Some of the feast dishes did not come from the sophisticated skills of fashionable foodistas, but were brought by guests. Aunt Junia had given us her famous meatballs, inedible spheres that belonged in a military arsenal. However, one better cauldron was being scraped by eager people fighting to get at what I thought I recognized as one of Prisca’s peasant hot pots. There was such a queue, Genius came and requested the recipe.

  Katutis, Father’s secretary, who was still sober enough to look at his list, said this cauldron had been delivered to me as a wedding present. He retrieved a note from a bundle he was diligently saving, ready for my thank-yous.

  The note wished us long life and happiness. When I turned it over, there was intriguing news. Gavius is dead. He opened the door because it was his cousin. I can’t have that but mustn’t say who. From a heartbroken Gran. PS Rufia will meet you at Temple of the Flavians an hour after midday. Told her about wedding, but she’s going home today.

  What?

  That was no use to me. Obviously I could not attend this meeting. Rufia was on the Viminal and I was on the Aventine. It is all very well to be professional, as I always was—but this was the one day in my informing life when work had to stop. I must remain on my woolly-rugged chair, beside my adoring new husband, smiling …

  *

  No. I did it. The appointed time was long past but I took a chance. I, Flavia Albia, the bride, left a message that no one would discover for a while, then I abandoned my own wedding.

  LX

  Whatever had made me do this? I realized now I had been enjoying myself. At one with Tiberius. Seeing people who were close to me, all gathered for us. Being the center of attention, even though I had felt oddly isolated from our guests.

  It was steadily raining. I would soon be soaked through. Before leaving, I had dumped my saffron veil, changed my wedding shoes for a sturdier pair, even shed my long white tunic for a more robust one. I stole someone’s waterproofed cloak. It was hooded like that of a Celtic god, so probably belonged to Uncle Petro, who, like Falco, reckoned himself an expert on all things northern. I had glimpsed him earlier with my brother Postumus, tending the altar flames: men’s work.

  Leaving our family home low on the Embankment,
I scurried, head down, through the monumental buildings below the Capitol, then was soon skirting the fora to head up the Argiletum. Because of the weather, few people were about. Streets were navigable, though in the main Forum, even its fine Etruscan drains had too much water to take away, so I had to leap over large puddles. The Argiletum and Vicus Longus were upward slopes, where I struggled against flowing torrents even on the raised pavements.

  As I walked, I mentally reran my list of questions. Preparation is the key to a good meeting.

  *

  The Temple of the Flavians had been built by Domitian as a mausoleum and a shrine to his family. Previously undistinguished, the Flavian clan needed validation. However, they did now own two deified emperors, along with various nonentity relatives awarded godheads on Domitian’s say-so, plus his niece Julia, whom he was rumored to have bullied into sexual acts with him. Poor Julia’s ashes were here, along with the urns of his father and brother and an infant son who had been lucky enough to predecease his paranoid sire. If this imp had lived, Domitian would probably have turned against him.

  The weather was too atrocious to admire the place as intended. Relieved to spot a waiting chair, which could mean Rufia was still here, I hurried across a large square enclosure and through an arch to another, containing a beautiful grandiose temple in white Pentelic marble amidst dotted cypress trees. It was extremely tall. An enormous statue of the late Emperor Titus tried to belie Domitian’s paranoid jealousy of him. Ditto Vespasian, whose house had once occupied this spot, close to that of his brother Sabinus, in whose home Domitian had been born in a back bedroom when Vespasian was just a poor relation. Ultimately, the purpose of the Temple of the Flavian Gens was to glorify Domitian’s own birthplace.

  All I cared about was that you could go inside to shelter.

  Now I was here, the rain suddenly stopped. Thank you, Jupiter Pluvius and the benign Tempestates!

  *

  There were no attendants; any temple slaves must be hiding from the storm. I shook myself on the threshold just as Rufia was about to make her way out.

  “You’re late!”

  “I am here now! Be grateful. I left my wedding for you.” As I pushed back the hood of my borrowed cloak, the six coiled ringlets, still tied in their ridiculous topknot with their now bedraggled ribbons, proved that.

  “That’s why I waited. Get on with it then.”

  Her manner was as gruff as I expected, though she quickly settled. From all I had heard, I was not surprised that Rufia felt a grudging respect when people stood up to her. There would have been so few. She was elderly, badly crippled, her heavy body difficult to support with her two sticks. Her face had never been beautiful and now showed all her years. Thin gray hair was fastened with bone pins like the one I remembered from her old room; she wore the silver bangle Annina had said she put on every day; she had small feet.

  I did not take notes. She would never have stood for it. Wasting no time on pleasantries, I began by crisply summing up what I wanted: what had happened on that deadly night at the Hesperides, who did it, and why? And why had Rufia herself disappeared, leaving the world to believe she was murdered?

  “I’ll tell you what went on, so you can back off and stop prying.”

  So that was why she agreed to talk to me. But I would decide for myself whether to stop. I wanted to find the killers.

  We both stood in the gracious vault of the Flavian Mausoleum, watched by huge busts of that ambitious family. Rufia had settled her back against a wall for support. I stayed on the opposite side, aware that she could use her walking sticks as weapons. If she lashed out, I was too wet and cold, and too abstracted by my guilt about the wedding, to put up much of a fight.

  “Rufia, I know the six corpses found are Rhodina and some Egyptian traders. I also know, and have a witness to support it, that Old Thales organized the murders.”

  “He couldn’t organize a pissing contest.”

  “But he could run bets on it!” I snapped back. “So did he do this?”

  “All the blame for the killings is on him.”

  “I thought you would say that. What happened? Tell me about the Egyptians.”

  “You don’t know it’s them,” she attempted.

  “Yes I do. They came from Alexandria; they sold lentils: Julius Ptolemaïs, their leader who had a damaged leg, then Pylades, Isidorianus, Hermogenes and Sesarion.”

  Rufia scoffed. “You’re good! That’s more than I ever knew.”

  “What got them killed? Surely not pulses?”

  The old woman shrugged. “Partly. I ran a little lupin round, sold beans and grains to all the bars. I trained up Menendra; she’s doing it now. There’s money in it. Old Thales never realized—he was too lost in his own grimy concerns.”

  “Was Ptolemaïs trying to move in on your patch? Those men sold a very expensive product, for which the market is limited. Did they want to branch out into ordinary bar supplies?”

  Again my companion gave me an admiring look. “Yes, they were thinking about it—and I was determined to stop them. I was doing well. I was a rich woman, training up Menendra to do all the work for me. Not bad, for a one-time Illyrian slave! Those menaces could have taken themselves anywhere; I was not having them lose me valuable income.”

  “So you decided to wipe them out—to prevent encroachment?”

  “No, Thales took them out. I’m innocent.” That generally means guilty. “He was more under threat than me. They hadn’t really come to the bar to sell grains. They came for the betting. It was the Amphitheater year. Those Egyptians had been down at the arena, trying to lay wagers on races, finding it difficult. They met some people from up here who told them we had good nights at the Hesperides, with no official hassle. Higher stakes, more action, all in a pleasant venue with a lively atmosphere.” I could tell Rufia was proud of the offered amenities. “It was invitation-only. You had to be introduced to Thales. He needed to be sure men who came were a safe prospect—not only that they wouldn’t snitch to the authorities, but they possessed big spending money.”

  I nodded. This was the usual story.

  “People couldn’t just knock and walk in.” Rufia was one of those narrators who keep emphasizing their point even when you have got it.

  “Invitation-only. I see.”

  “You’re a bright girl!” she sneered. “But you haven’t worked out why Thales took against those Egyptians, have you? It was because of the gambling. He didn’t really run it himself. I told you, he was too hopeless; that was all done by a man he knew, Rabirius.”

  “The crime lord.”

  “Oh you have been working hard!”

  “I know of Rabirius and Gallo and their protection rackets. So they involve themselves in gambling too? No surprise! They killed the Egyptians?”

  “Not that stupid. Rabirius was keen on the Egyptians. All Gallo did was send trusted diggers afterward for the graves.”

  “And why did Thales want the Egyptians dead?”

  “Because they had spotted what a good little earner we had. They palled up with old Rabirius, that cheating devil, to take over the syndicate. Thales would have been cut out altogether. But that Gallo was just establishing himself at the time, so he put a different idea to Thales. They would remove the Egyptians, outmaneuvering Rabirius, so Gallo could start building his power base. He was making the rackets all his own. The only thing was, Thales had to fix up the deaths to stop Rabirius knowing Gallo was behind it. He didn’t have the oomph to kick out Rabirius altogether, not then, so he still wanted to pretend to be loyal.”

  “I get it,” I said. “Rabirius was cheerily double-crossing his old friend. Gallo came along behind his chief’s back, spelled out how Thales was being cheated, offering to help out. But Thales had to find someone to carry out the killing; he had to host the incident, and take all the risks.”

  “Gallo’s a smart operator!” Rufia scoffed. “And Thales was a fool. In the end, Gallo did practically nought.”

  “So w
ho did Thales commission for the deed?”

  “That I don’t know.” She must be lying, but I guessed she would never change her story. This woman was as tough as everyone said. She had spent ten years avoiding any comeback for that night at the Hesperides; she would not lose everything now by confessing.

  “All right, change the subject. How did Thales persuade his killers?”

  “Money, of course.”

  “Oh what else! I understand why the Egyptians, but why Rhodina?”

  Rufia spat. “That silly little cow. Juno, how I hated her. Girls who build their lives on cozying up to men … As it happened, she was dreaming. Thales was never prepared to share his cash. If he had been, let’s face it, I would have tied him up myself. Sure, I despised him, but the money would have sweetened it.”

  “You had earned your share.” I showed that I realized her situation. “You spent years running that bar on his behalf because he wasn’t capable. He never gave you credit. You were only ever known as a barmaid.”

  She grudgingly agreed. “And Rhodina would never be anything different, but the silly woman never saw that. Let’s get on. So, those men came to the Hesperides, thinking it was a gambling night. Thales said the others weren’t there yet, so while they waited for things to kick off, he got them drunk and we used Rhodina to distract them. The boys came in—”

  “These boys whose names you never knew?”

  “The same.”

  “You didn’t recognize them?”

  “Oh no.” Barefaced lie.

  “How did they kill the Egyptians?”

  “Cut their throats. Slick and quick. They did for two before Rhodina, the idiot, started squealing at the blood. The rest were slurring and tipsy, but took in what was happening; one of them grabbed her. She couldn’t move fast; she was a lump when she was pregnant. He broke her neck, so one of the boys broke his for him, then they finished off the rest in no time. Very professional. We laid the bodies in a line, ready for their graves. That’s it.”