‘No one else was in our house,’ Jonathan answered grimly.
‘What about the slaves?’
‘We don’t have any slaves. My father doesn’t think it right to keep them.’
‘But you told me your mother died when you were very young. Don’t you even have a nursemaid or cook?’
‘No. It’s just the three of us.’
‘Who does your cleaning?’ gasped Flavia in amazement.
‘I do,’ replied Jonathan, almost proudly. ‘And I garden. Miriam does the shopping and a little cooking. And Bobas was our doorkeeper and protector . . .’ He bit his lip, and Flavia said quickly:
‘Was anything stolen?’
‘No. After we buried Bobas’s body in the garden we looked everywhere. But nothing is missing. In fact, I found this in the atrium, not far from his body . . .’ He held out a little quartz cube with circles scratched on its surface. Nubia took it from his hand and looked at it in puzzlement.
‘What this?’ asked Nubia.
‘It’s one of a pair of dice,’ explained Flavia. She mimed throwing it and said in Greek: ‘For gambling. For money.’
‘It’s not ours,’ said Jonathan. ‘My father would be very upset if he ever found me or my sister gambling,’
‘Keep it safe,’ said Flavia, handing it back to him, ‘it may be a clue.’ She looked up at the fig tree thoughtfully.
‘If nothing was stolen, why did they kill Bobas?’
‘Well . . .’ Jonathan began, and then stopped. He pulled a twig off a bush and scratched idly at the ground.
‘Why? Tell me,’ insisted Flavia. She thought of pretty Bobas, with his lovely brown eyes and friendly nature.
‘We . . . you’ve probably guessed that we are different from you. We have a different religion.’
‘You’re Jewish, aren’t you?’ said Flavia. Jonathan nodded.
‘The people where we used to live didn’t like us. That’s why we moved here, to the edge of town, where no one would know who we were . . . where no one would bother us. Our old neighbours wrote things on the wall of our house and once they threw rotten eggs at father.’
‘Do you think your old neighbours killed Bobas?’
‘Maybe . . .’ shrugged Jonathan. He seemed reluctant to talk about it.
‘Why do they hate you so much?’ Flavia asked. ‘There are many Jews here in Ostia. I’ve seen their temple down by the docks.’
‘Synagogue,’ corrected Jonathan quietly and continued to scratch at the ground. It was obvious the subject made him uncomfortable.
‘Well, I intend to solve this crime,’ announced Flavia firmly. ‘Whoever did this is wicked and should be caught.’
Nubia had been listening to their conversation attentively. Now she surprised them both by saying vehemently:
‘Bad man. Kill dog. Find him.’ Her amber eyes blazed with passion and she was squeezing Scuto’s neck so tightly that he whimpered and rolled his eyes at her.
Flavia looked at Nubia and then turned to Jonathan.
‘Do you want to find the person who killed your dog?’ she asked him.
He looked up at her, and his eyes were blazing, too. ‘Yes.’
‘Then it’s settled,’ said Flavia calmly. ‘We will solve this mystery and together we will find the killer.’
Flavia decided that they should begin their quest for justice by interviewing possible witnesses.
Wax tablet in hand and flanked by Jonathan and Nubia, she began in the kitchen. Alma assured them that she had heard nothing suspicious while they were out, though she did remark that Bobas barked so often she barely noticed it.
Next they looked for Caudex. They found him in the garden, snipping the dead heads off roses. When questioned, he confessed he had been dozing.
‘Just a little nap in my room as I usually have after lunch,’ he admitted, and after a pause, ‘I could easily have heard if anyone had knocked on our door.’
The only other possible witness was Libertus, Cordius’s freedman. Flavia remembered that he had been standing by the fountain on the corner when they had returned from the river harbour.
They caught Libertus just as he left the house, on his way to the baths.
‘Around noon?’ he said, as they fell into step beside him. ‘Yes, as a matter of fact I did see someone. It was just before you came back from the harbour. I was drinking at the fountain and a man went running past. He looked very frightened and he was carrying a leather bag. I distinctly remember the leather bag. For some reason it reminded me of Perseus with the head of Medusa.’
‘What Perseus?’ whispered Nubia to Flavia.
‘Perseus was a hero who had to kill a monster named Medusa. He cut off her head,’ Flavia made a chopping motion with her hand, ‘and he put it out of sight in a bag.’ She mimed that, too, and then added in Greek: ‘In myth. Monster’s head in bag.’
Nubia understood: ‘Perseus killed.’
‘Yes, Perseus killed her.’ Flavia turned back to the freedman. ‘Libertus,’ she said gravely, ‘today someone killed Jonathan’s watchdog and cut off its head. The head is still missing.’
‘By Hercules!’ gasped Libertus, and stopped dead in his tracks. ‘That is exactly the impression I got: of a head in a bag.’
‘What did the man look like?’ Jonathan asked.
Libertus shrugged and began walking again. ‘Just average, really. Clean-shaven, medium height, light tunic, short dark cloak – I can’t remember much more than that.’
They were approaching the centre of town and the streets were becoming more crowded. They all stood back to let a man pushing a handcart full of melons go past.
‘I really must hurry,’ said Libertus. ‘I’m meeting someone at the baths . . .’
‘Just one more question,’ said Flavia. ‘Do you remember which way he went at the crossroads: to the port, to the graves or towards the forum?’
‘Yes, I do recall that,’ said Libertus, frowning pensively. ‘I remember I thought it curious at the time. He was running towards the tombs.’
It was the hottest time of the day. Hidden in the sun-bleached grasses of the necropolis, the cicadas made their sleepy creaking noise. Flavia, Jonathan and Nubia – with Scuto romping ahead – proceeded somewhat fearfully along a dirt road flanked by cypress trees and tombs.
Although their houses backed directly onto the graveyard, they had approached by means of the gate and road that the running man must have taken. The road was not much used and the tombs on either side of it were overgrown and untended.
Here and there were the usual piles of rubbish that accumulated outside the gates of any Roman town: pottery shards, old sandals, broken furniture and clothes too tattered for the secondhand stall.
‘What about the wild dogs who attacked us a few days ago?’ Flavia looked around nervously. ‘I don’t want to meet them again.’
‘I’ve been hunting lots of times in the graveyard and that was the only time I’ve seen them. We’ll just have to take the risk. Besides,’ Jonathan added, ‘we want to find clues while they are fresh.’
As they walked, they looked right and left and especially down, for any telltale drops of blood. Scuto, who had begun by running back and forth to smell interesting smells, was now plodding down the middle of the road with his tail down, panting in the afternoon heat. Suddenly he stopped, looked to his left and wagged his tail.
‘Over there,’ said Jonathan, pointing. ‘He sees something.’ Scuto, tail still wagging, led them through the tombs to a small clearing among the pine and cypress trees. Beside a miniature tomb lit by dappled sunlight sat a man with short dark hair and a pale yellow tunic. He sat cross-legged with his back to them, and they could hear sobs and see his shoulders trembling.
As they came nearer, the man heard them and turned. His face was red with crying and his mouth turned down like an actor’s tragic mask. Heavy eyebrows joined above his nose to form one dark line. Flavia had never seen such misery before.
But his misery turned to r
age when he saw the little group. He rose to his feet and pointing a finger at Scuto he screamed:
‘Get that animal away from me. Get him away or I’ll kill him. I hate dogs. I hate them all!’
The weeping man wiped his nose angrily on his arm and then bent down. He picked up a pine cone, drew back his arm, and threw it at Scuto. It fell short and the man sobbed again, ‘Get away!’
He began looking around for other missiles but the three of them had already turned and were running back towards the road. Scuto loped behind them, still wagging his tail as if it were a game.
‘Is the man following us?’ gasped Flavia when they reached the road again.
‘No, I don’t think so,’ said Jonathan. He was wheezing a bit. While she waited for him to catch his breath, Flavia joined Nubia in patting Scuto.
‘Don’t worry, Scuto,’ she said in a soothing voice, ‘we won’t let the bad man get you.’
‘Not bad man,’ said Nubia.
Flavia and Jonathan both looked up at her in surprise.
‘Sad man,’ said Nubia quietly.
‘But that’s probably the man who killed Bobas!’ Jonathan cried.
‘You may be right,’ agreed Flavia.
‘But how can we be sure?’ mused Jonathan.
‘I know!’ Flavia said, after a moment’s thought. ‘We’ll all hide, and wait for him to go back into the town. When he does, you follow him, Jonathan. Try to find out who he is and where he lives. Nubia and I will go back to the little tomb and look for clues there. Then we’ll meet back at my house. All right?’
‘Yes, that sounds like a good idea. Let’s wait beside that tomb in the shade . . .’
The three of them sat on a soft layer of dust and pine needles, and rested their backs against the shady wall of a large, decrepit tomb. Fragrant dill and thyme bushes screened them from the road, but they could see anyone who came along. For a long time no one passed. The only sound was the slow creaking of the cicadas and Scuto’s steady, rhythmic panting.
Flavia gazed at the tombs around them. They were like small houses, with doors, so that new urns could be added. Some had inscriptions above the doors, others had pictures painted on their outer walls, like the two faded gladiators shown fighting on a tomb near the road.
Flavia’s own family had a tomb further down the road, for the Gemini family had now been in Ostia for three generations. She often went there with her father to honour her mother and tiny twin brothers.
Half buried amphoras marked the graves of poorer people. Wine could be poured into their necks to refresh the ashes of the dead below.
Presently an old man leading a tiny donkey passed slowly down the road towards the town. He had loaded the little beast high with firewood. They could hear him singing snatches of a song and talking to himself. Then he was gone and the road was empty again.
‘I don’t think he’s coming this way,’ Flavia whispered to Jonathan at last. ‘Unless we’ve missed him . . .’
‘No, we haven’t missed him. Wait here. I’ll see if he is still at the tomb . . .’
He crept off but a few minutes later he stood before them.
‘He’s gone,’ said Jonathan. ‘But you must come and look at the tomb. Come quickly!’
‘To the gods of the underworld,’ Flavia read. ‘Sacred to the memory of my poor Avita, eight years old . . .’
The three of them – and Scuto – stood before the little tomb while Flavia read out the Latin inscription painted over the tiny door.
‘There’s a picture on this side,’ said Jonathan. They all moved round to the side of the tomb. Someone had painted a fresco of a little girl lying on a funeral couch surrounded by mourners. The colours looked strangely bright and cheerful.
‘Little girl,’ said Nubia sadly.
‘Yes,’ said Flavia softly. ‘Probably his daughter. But where did he go? The only way back is along the road.’
‘Unless . . .’ said Jonathan. ‘Unless his house backs onto the graveyard like ours.’
‘But that would mean he lived on our street,’ said Flavia.
‘I wonder how we could find out,’ mused Jonathan, nibbling a stalk of dried grass.
‘I know just the person to ask!’ cried Flavia.
They stood in Flavia’s kitchen, munching grapes and sipping cool water from ceramic cups. Scuto was drinking long and deeply from his water bowl.
Alma bent over the kitchen hearth, stirring a pan of chicken barley soup and nodding her head.
‘Yes, I remember something about a little girl. Her father was a sailor. They lived just up our street. The father adored the girl. Hated to be away from her. That’s right, the girl’s name was Avita. Avita Procula. And his name was Publius. Publius Avitus Proculus. Came back from a voyage a week or two ago to find she’d died.’
Alma reached up and took a pinch of rosemary from a dried bundle which hung from the ceiling.
‘She lived just up the road?’ asked Jonathan.
‘Yes,’ said Alma, crumbling the herb into the soup, ‘the house right on the bend.’
‘How did Avita die?’ asked Flavia. ‘Do you know?’
‘Oh my, yes,’ sighed Alma as she resumed stirring. ‘But I never mentioned it to you, dear. I didn’t want to give you nightmares . . .’
They all looked at Alma. She stopped stirring for a moment and faced them gravely. ‘She died horribly, in great pain, of hydrophobia.’ And when they continued to stare at her blankly, she explained in a whisper, ‘A mad dog bit her!’
‘Hydrophobia,’ said Mordecai, ‘is a terrible disease.’ He was leaning over the marble-topped table in his study, examining medical scrolls.
‘The word “hydrophobia” means “a fear of water”. People suffering from hydrophobia are terrified of water, even of their own saliva.’
Jonathan, standing behind his father, allowed some spittle to bubble out of his mouth, looked down at it and opened his eyes wide in mock horror. Flavia and Nubia tried not to giggle. Mordecai went on:
‘Victims also lose their appetite –’
Jonathan pretended to refuse an imaginary plate.
‘– suffer hallucinations’
Jonathan opened his eyes wide again and screamed silently, brushing wildly at imaginary insects crawling on his arms. Flavia bit her lip to stop from laughing. Nubia covered her mouth with her hand.
‘– and eventually become paralysed.’
Jonathan clapped his arms to his sides, went stiff as a plank and crossed his eyes. The girls, unable to contain themselves any longer, burst out laughing. Mordecai glanced up at them briefly.
‘Jonathan, please,’ he said without looking round, ‘it’s not a laughing matter.’ He read on. ‘The disease is also known as rabies, which means “a raging”. Hmmmn. Let’s see what Pliny has to say – I have his new volume here somewhere –’
‘Who is Pliny?’ asked Flavia.
‘He’s the admiral of the Roman fleet and a brilliant historian,’ said Mordecai as he shuffled through the scrolls on the table. ‘He’s just written a superb natural history in thirty-seven volumes . . . Lives just down the coast from here . . . Ah!’
Jonathan’s father held a scroll to the lamp, for it was nearly dusk and the light was fading quickly.
‘Yes! Here’s what Pliny says about rabies: “greatest danger of humans catching it when the dog-star is shining” – that’s now – “it causes fatal hydrophobia . . . to prevent a dog from catching this disease, mix chicken dung in its food.”’
Jonathan screwed up his face and stuck his tongue out.
Mordecai smiled indulgently at their laughter, then suddenly hissed at them to be quiet.
They all heard a strangled cry and the sound of barking.
‘They’re in the graveyard again,’ cried Mordecai between clenched teeth, ‘but this time I’m ready.’
The doctor hurried out of the study and ran upstairs, almost tripping on his long robe. Jonathan, Flavia and Nubia followed him into a narrow bedroom with one s
mall window. Under the window a small pile of stones lay on an octagonal table, and next to them a bow and arrow. Mordecai pushed his head out and they heard him grunt.
‘There they are!’ He reached for the bow and arrow and aimed it through the window.
Jonathan and Flavia jostled to see, but the window was too small. Mordecai was blocking their view.
‘Quickly!’ cried Jonathan. ‘The other bedroom has a window. Follow me!’
The girls followed Jonathan into a second narrow bedroom with bright, mustard-yellow walls. They ran to the window and Jonathan yanked out a wooden lattice-work screen that fitted into its frame. Peering through, they were just in time to see Mordecai’s arrow fly into the midst of the pack of dogs which surrounded a tall umbrella pine.
The arrow missed.
The dogs swarmed around the tree, barking loudly and gazing up into it.
‘Use your sling,’ Flavia urged Jonathan.
‘I can’t. There’s not enough room in here to swing it. I need to be outside.’
Their three faces crowded into the tiny window frame.
‘What are they barking at?’ asked Jonathan.
‘There’s something up that tree.’
‘Yes,’ agreed Jonathan. ‘There’s something on the other side, clinging on – ‘It was difficult to see in the fading light.
‘I can see hands. Or maybe paws,’ said Flavia.
‘Boy,’ said Nubia.
‘No, it can’t be a boy. Look how fast it’s climbing now,’ cried Jonathan.
‘It must be a monkey,’ gasped Flavia.
The dogs had stopped barking and were watching the climber with interest, too.
Suddenly the creature moved round the trunk and they could all see its silhouette against the yellow sky of dusk. The creature was not a monkey, but a boy no more than eight years old.
As they watched in amazement, he shouted incoherently down at the dogs: not a scream of fear, but a mocking taunt. This enraged the dogs, who began to bark furiously again.
Another arrow whizzed down from the window. This one found its mark. One of the dogs yelped, leapt into the air, then fell back with a shaft in his gut. The others sniffed at him and, when a second arrow struck the leader, they ran off into the woods. Two dogs with arrows in them lay writhing on the ground. High up in the tree, the small boy clung to the trunk.
The Roman Mysteries Complete Collection Page 5