I badly wanted to be with Helena, but first I went to check on Petronius. He and I had had fifteen years of seeing each other through troubles; Helena would expect me to offer him solace. That meant if he was drinking, I would either join in or stop him. If he wanted to talk I would listen. Hades, if the poor lad was sleeping, I would even tuck him in.
But another kind of comfort was on offer: I spotted Maia ahead of me. As I approached his door, I saw her knock quickly and go in. To reach my own room, I had to pass outside. Maia, stupidly, had left the door ajar. Maybe she thought she would be thrown out. Anyway, I could not carry on without them seeing me; once again I had been put in a position where I had to overhear my sister like a spy.
"Petronius." Maia simply spoke his name. It was more to let him hear she was there than anything.
There was a faint light from an oil lamp that must be over by his bed. I could see Petro, stripped to bare feet and an unbleached undertunic; he was standing in front of a window, leaning on the sill, letting the night air fall on him. He did not turn around.
"This is no good," Maia advised him. "Sleep. You need to rest."
"I can't."
"What are you doing, then?"
"Nothing." He did turn. He showed her empty hands. But he had a
full heart. "Nothing at all. Remembering Silvana and Tadia. Waiting for the pain to end."
"Some of it will pass," my sister said.
Petronius swore coarsely.
"Well, that ends the comforting part of the evening in good masculine style!" quipped Maia.
"I don't want people being bloody kind-I get upset." He stepped toward her then, so in the small room they were standing close. "I don't want pitying or chivvying-and I don't want your sniping wit. Either go, Maia-or damn well stay!"
"Which do you choose?" asked Maia, but the question was rhetorical for they had moved into each other's arms.
When they kissed it was neither young love blossoming nor established [love reasserting itself. This was something much darker. They were both joyless and desperate. The way they had come together was deliberate and carnal; it struck me that nothing good would come of it for either of them.
Freed by their self-absorption, I walked past unnoticed. I even managed to hook the door. I went on to my room, depressed.
Helena twined herself around me when I came into bed, her head falling on my shoulder in its accustomed place. I held her affectionately and stayed quiet so she fell asleep. I did not tell her what I had just seen.
XXXVII
It was barely light when hectic knocking awoke me. Running footsteps sounded outside in the corridor. There were cries of alarm; then I heard a brief order and all the noises were cut off.
Rousing myself, I flung open the bedroom door. Helena murmured behind me sleepily as light from the corridor lamps came in. A scared slave was waiting. He told me anxiously that the soldiers who were guarding our prisoners thought something had gone wrong.
Hilaris appeared. Hair ruffled, and pulling on a long-sleeved robe like some barbaric Eastern potentate, he confirmed the worst: Pyro had been found dead.
An hour of frantic activity later we had worked out something of what had happened. Perusal of the body told us beyond question that it was an unnatural death. Pyro was the bristle-chinned enforcer, not heavily built and yet a muscular, tough-looking specimen. He was about thirty-five or forty, an age when many die, but he had been well nourished in his lifetime and was suffering from no obvious disease. He had not been told that the torturer was coming to work on him, but even if he guessed, none of us believed this hardened brute had died of fear or killed himself.
His lips and mouth showed faint indications of corrosion burn: poison. The soldiers admitted they had found him collapsed, though he was still living at that stage. When they tried to revive him, he suffered fits. [He was unable to speak and appeared to be paralyzed. Afraid of being disciplined for not watching him more closely, they had worked on him themselves-well, soldiers always believe they know better than doctors. He died. They then wasted what must have been a couple more hours debating what to do.
This was a private house. The only reason prisoners had been kept at the residence was to be closer to the governor when he put them through his magistrate's interview. They had been locked in windowless rooms that were normally stores. The soldiers were billeted in an improvised guardroom on the same corridor, but they admitted they had closed the door, probably so they could play illicit board games unobserved. This corridor was informally closed off with a rope but it was situated in the service area of the house. That put it near to the kitchen, essentially a public wing. Adjacent to the kitchen, as in many homes, was a lavatory.
Members of the procurator's private household mainly used the other facilities in the bath complex, but visitors would automatically seek out the kitchen, knowing there was bound to be a sit-down closet alongside. It had happened last night. All sorts of people had used that lavatory, in fact, including the soldiers and a carrier bringing in late-night deliveries of food for the dinner. Any of these could have noticed that the cook had prepared trays with basic meals for all the prisoners, and that two trays had remained on a side table after word went down that Pyro and Splice were to be deprived of sleep and food on the orders of the torturer.
Those two trays had stayed for hours, just outside the kitchen. Then somebody removed them. The cook, fully preoccupied with serving up a banquet, thought nothing of their disappearance. The soldiers told us they came across the trays in the prisoners' corridor; they supposed Amicus had changed his orders so they delivered the food. Pyro ate his.
The waiters and barber, who had been fed earlier, were all fine. Splice had refused to eat: he was frightened the governor would have him poisoned-not that the rest of us blamed Frontinus for what had befallen Pyro. But thanks to his fears, Splice remained alive. His foodbowl was now taken to be tested on some stray animal. It would die; I did not need to see the results.
Everyone in the kitchen had been working flat out last evening. Guests had come and gone. Beyond muttering, "It's that door there, sir!" several times, the staff had taken no notice.
Aelia Camilla swore by the probity of her cook. He was a big Trino-vantian with a thick mustache, who looked more like a seaman than a gourmet chef, though someone had trained him well. He cannot have had traditional knowledge of rabbit richly stuffed with calves' brain and chicken, or even simple Roman custard or roasted dates Alexandrian. I suspect Aelia Camilla had taught him herself; she certainly rounded on her husband when angry questioning from Hilaris reduced the big cook to tears.
The governor turned up, naturally furious. Frontinus gave orders to have Splice transferred to the greater security of the fort. He was forgetting one important fact: Londinium did not have a secure fort. I pointed it out. Splice was sent to the military anyway.
There was nothing more to learn. I went to find Petronius. He needed to know that Pyro had been eliminated, presumably by an accomplice from the gang. I needed to discuss the implications.
I rapped on his bedroom door, intending to hover outside in the corridor to avoid embarrassment. The secretive Petronius had known since our army days how to keep his women to himself.
When there was no answer, I forced myself to open the door. As I had guessed by then, the room was deserted, its bed neatly made with smoothed pillow and covers. He had gone back on watch already.
Anxious, I decided I would pack in some breakfast; today was likely to be busy. I had forgotten that the cook was hysterical. So far there were only a couple of roughly chopped loaves and some rubbery eggs that must have sat in the pan on a racing boil for at least an hour. Even more annoying, I was joined for my grim repast by my sister.
I expect the worst from women, but in contrast to our siblings (who were a bunch of hussies), I had always believed that my sister Maia was a virgin schoolgirl, a decent young woman, and a chaste wife. While it's true Famia had gotten her pregnant, she had then marr
ied him. And they had stayed married.
Now I had seen her embarking on a night of savage physicality-yet she appeared the next morning looking the same as usual. She gave a grunt when she saw me and was soon eating a light breakfast in her accustomed grumpy silence. I found this troublesome. What was the point of any man expending himself on white-hot lovemaking, in the arms of a woman he had eyed up yearningly for years, if the experience only left her irritably picking stale crumbs from her teeth?
It raised another doubt. Petronius and I swore by that old line all bad boys believe: you can always tell. That was evidently untrue.
"What are you staring at?" demanded Maia.
"That egg's a bit black… I found your harpist lurking in a corridor very late last night. Get rid of him, sis. He's spying."
"He's blind."
"His boy is not."
Maia fell silent. I could imagine her thoughts. The harpist was going back, no question. However, when I asked politely what plans she had today, she astonished me. "Oh, I think I'll take up Norbanus on his offer to go downriver to his country place."
And I liked to think that juggling lovers was a male preserve.
"You would do better spending some time with your children," I told her primly. My sister shot me yet another scathing glance.
I had been intending to go out to find Petro with the news about Pyro. But then we were joined at breakfast by another early-rising houseguest: King Togidubnus.
"This is a first!" I joked politely.
"Yes, you're usually long gone when I trot along-old man's privilege. Today I heard the commotion."
"I'm sorry that you were disturbed, sir. To tell the truth, since I hadn't seen you recently, I assumed you had gone back to Noviomagus."
"Things to do," replied the King, frowning at the meager supplies on the buffet. "Does this prisoner's death mean you are losing your case, Falco? What about my commission to find who killed my man?"
"I am making progress." Well, I knew how to lie.
"I heard the suspect was being tortured. Is that what killed him?"
"No, he had not yet been touched."
"So you had no evidence out of him?" the King noted sourly.
"We'll get there… I may call up help from my nephew and brothers-in-law. I guess you would be glad if they stopped carousing around your district anyway?" Larius, my nephew from Stabiae, and Helena's two younger brothers were taking leisure time at Noviomagus-up to all the ghastly pursuits of young men. The Camilli were supposed to act as my assistants, though they were untrained and probably not safe to use in a case that involved professional criminals.
"We are managing to survive their presence," said the King, commendably tolerant. The lads were rabid hitters of nightspots. If there was trouble around, they found their way straight into it. "I want Larius to stay and paint for me." My nephew was a fresco artist of great distinction. He had been brought to Britain to work on the King's palace. Maybe thinking about the project, on which Verovolcus had been his liaison officer, brought Togidubnus' mind back to the stalled investigation. "My men have been pursuing inquiries, just like you, Falco."
"Any luck?"
It was merely a polite question, but the King surprised me once again. This day was becoming stressful. All this time, the Atrebates had been in serious contention with Petro and me-and they had pulled off a coup. The King boasted genially: "I think you will be impressed, Falco! We have persuaded the barmaid from the Shower of Gold to tell us all she knows."
I choked on my beaker of goat's milk. "Oh?"
"We have her in a safe house," Togi told me with a twinkle. "In view of what has happened to your own witness, I think I had better make ours available, don't you?"
XXXVIII
The atrebates managed not to smirk. There were four of the King's retainers, loose-limbed warriors with flyaway red hair. In the summer heat they had cast off their colorful long-sleeved tunics and were bare-chested (with sunburn). All boasted gold bracelets and neck chains. A bunch of spears leaned against a wall, while their owners lounged about in a yard. They were hiding their prize at a farm in the northeast of the town. When I was brought to see her at least it livened up a boring day for them.
"Obviously we have to protect her," the King had said to me. "Once she has given her evidence and helped to secure a conviction, she will be set up in a wine shop of her own in my tribal capital, away from here. You may not approve of the way we have handled her," Togidubnus suggested rather warily.
I grinned. "When dealing with people who trade in vice and extortion, it seems only fair to retaliate with bribery."
He bridled. "I am not paying her to lie, you know!"
"Of course not, sir." Even if he was, so long as she piped up boldly and stuck to her story with due diligence, my conscience would cope.
???
She was still too stout, too ugly, and too slow on the uptake for me. She was still four feet high. But they had provided her with new clothes, so she looked like a middle-class shop owner: a role that, with the King's promise of the new wine bar in Noviomagus, she intended to achieve.
The former waitress had already assumed an expression of great respectability. She reminded me of my mother, laying aside her working clothes for a festival, combing her hair in a fancy style (which did not suit her), and suddenly turning into a stranger. Ma used to drink too much and be indiscreet about the neighbors on such occasions. This one was sober at the moment, and certainly wanted to appear polite.
When I was taken to her by the slightly po-faced Atrebatan warriors, she did not exactly offer me cinnamon bread and borage tea, but she sat, with her knees close together and her hands firmly clasped in her lap, waiting to impress me with her newfound status. She was apparently looking forward to a life where she no longer had to sleep with customers; or at least, she said, not unless she wanted to. It almost sounded as if some sharp lawyer had been talking to her about the legal rights of tavern landladies. As such, I reckoned she would be a terror. She seemed extremely keen on the idea that she would be in charge. Of course, most underlings reckon they can run places far better than the boss. (This was certainly true in the case of the legendary Flora's, a caupona run by my sister Junia, who had all the public catering skills of a ten-year-old.)
"We meet again!" I challenged her. "I don't suppose you remember me; I'm Falco. I like to think women find me looming large in the memory, but modesty is a fine Roman virtue."
She giggled. That was a new and decidedly offputting trait.
She was now being called Flavia Fronta. One of the weapons in the governor's armory was to extend Roman citizenship to favored barbarians. In return, he hoped to people his province with loyal little friends of the Emperor, obsequiously named after him. It had a knack of working. And it cost nothing.
"So, Flavia Fronta!" I was trying hard not to remember her as the grimy purveyor of sex and bad temper that I had seen twice at the Shower of Gold. The Atrebatans were observing me. Access to their witness was only granted on condition they watched to see that I did not new clues from her unfairly. It put my methods under closer scrutiny than I liked. "I understand you are now giving a statement about the death of Verovolcus?"
"Yes, sir, that was terrible." I nearly choked with laughter at her change of tune. She was quiet, dutiful, and respectful. Frankly, I thought she was lying through her teeth.
"Tell me, please."
Civilization had a lot to answer for. She had come up with a painful new speaking accent. In these affected vowels, she recited the evidence as if tutored: "A British man I had never seen before came to our bar that evening and sat down with Splice and Pyro."
"Did you hear what they talked about?"
"Yes, sir. The British man wanted to join in their business-which is rather unpleasant, as you probably know. They did not want to let him in on it."
"So they were not all friendly together?"
"No. They had met him to complain about his interest. He offered to work with t
hem, but they laughed at him. He said he was from this province and would do what he liked in Londinium. They soon showed him how wrong he was. You know what happened. They tipped him up and pushed him in the well."
"Did none of you try to stop them?"
"I was too scared. The owner would not interfere."
"Was he paying Pyro and Splice for protection?"
"Oh yes. He's terrified of them."
"Pyro and Splice are well known at your bar? And you consider them violent?"
"Yes, sir. Very violent."
"And what about the third man, their companion?"
"He comes in sometimes."
"How do you regard him?" "Someone to avoid very carefully."
"And who is he?"
"I only know he comes from Rome, sir."
"You think he is a leader of the gang?"
"Oh yes. Everybody knows he is; he brought Pyro and Splice and other people over to Britain. They had always worked for him. He runs everything."
"And let's be quite sure-he was the man giving the orders, the night Verovolcus was killed? Did you yourself hear him do that?"
"Yes, he said, 'Do the deed, boys!' And so they did."
"Did he go out into the yard where the well was?"
"No, he just sat at the table where he was. And smiled," Flavia Fronta shuddered. "That was horrible…"
"I'm sorry I have to ask you to remember. Now, when this man gave them that order, Pyro and Splice knew exactly what to do? They must have discussed it beforehand?"
"Yes. The man could not believe it was happening to him. I'll never forget the look in his eyes…" Her expression of pity for Verovolcus seemed genuine. The Atrebatans glanced at each other, nervous of the chilling, deliberate violence she described. They had all known Verovolcus, presumably.
I pursed my lips. "This organizer is an evil man. We badly need to know who he is. It is a shame you have no idea of his name."
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