The Roman Mysteries Complete Collection

by Lawrence, Caroline

  And when he was finally deep in Diana’s grove, Lupus opened his tongueless mouth and howled.

  Flavia couldn’t sleep.

  She stared up at the slanting roof beams and the shadows between them, cast by the steady flame of a tiny bronze oil lamp on her bedside table.

  Lupus had come to them late in the afternoon, carrying his few belongings in Jonathan’s old leather satchel. They had welcomed him with his favourite dinner of oysters and hardboiled quails’ eggs, and later they had made up a bed for him in Aristo’s room.

  Flavia was worried about Lupus, but the main thing keeping her from sleep was the rumour he had passed on earlier that day. The rumour that a boy with dark, curly hair had started the fire in Rome. And that he was still alive.

  She had heard the rumour about the curly-haired boy before. Last month. From the Emperor’s astrologer. It was ridiculous that Jonathan could have started the fire, but was there any chance at all that he could still be alive? She rolled onto her right side and considered the possibilities.

  They had not seen his actual body, but they had seen his rings, taken from a badly charred corpse. But what if the rings had not come from Jonathan’s body? What if he had given all his rings to someone else? Perhaps to get money to buy food? Or for the fare home to Ostia? And then that person had died in the fire?

  But no. The man who had given Lupus the rings – a priest from the sanctuary – had said they were taken from a boy’s body. It was very unlikely that a boy would have enough money to pay for the rings. An adult, yes. But not a boy of eleven or twelve.

  Flavia rolled onto her left side and wormed her feet under Scuto’s warm body.

  And yet . . .

  They had never actually seen the body.

  And what if the priest had been lying? What if Jonathan was still alive in Rome, hiding for some reason? Or being kept as a prisoner?

  No, no, no. It was ridiculous.

  There was no way Jonathan could still be alive. It was just wishful thinking.

  Flavia turned to lie on her back again.

  ‘Nubia?’ she said very softly. ‘Are you awake?’

  ‘Yes.’ The reply was instant.

  ‘I know you hate Rome, but if I go back – to try to find Jonathan – will you come with me?’

  ‘Yes,’ said Nubia. ‘I will go.’

  A. Caecilius Cornix to M. Flavius Geminus.

  Greetings. I know that I have never corresponded with you before and therefore take this opportunity to apologise. I’m afraid my wife has borne a grudge against you for too long. I have not asked why; women are fickle creatures. I do know for a fact that your daughter did me a great service last month when she came to stay with us. My family – and indeed I myself – were at the Gates of Tartarus when she arrived with several friends, including a certain doctor Mordicus who put us all back on our feet.

  While your daughter was staying with us, I promised to invite her back for the inaugural games of the new amphitheatre, which people here in Rome call the eighth wonder of the world. As you know, our illustrious Emperor Titus has decreed a holiday and will open the amphitheatre with one hundred days of spectacles, including gladiatorial contests and beast fights.

  I would like to invite Flavia and her friends to stay here at our Rome townhouse for the opening days of this historic occasion.

  You are invited, too, of course, though I believe my niece said you were very busy preparing for the sailing season and might be unable to attend. My family and I will be going to Tuscany after the first day of the games; the thought of Rome on holiday for three months is a grim prospect to me. But I shall leave some slaves, including a cook. Your daughter and her friends are most welcome to make use of them and of my house. I look forward to your reply and hope this invitation will go some way in repairing the rift between our families. Your acceptance will assure me that our families are once more on cordial terms. Goodbye.

  Thank you Sisyphus, thought Flavia, looking up from the letter. I’m glad you’re our friend as well as Uncle Cornix’s secretary. To her father she said. ‘May we go, pater? Please?’

  Marcus Flavius Geminus sat back in his leather armchair and smiled. He looked thin and tired, and although he was quite old – he would be thirty-two in May – Flavia still thought him handsome.

  ‘I’m not sure,’ he said, running a hand through his light brown hair. ‘The plague might flare up again. Or there might be another fire. Or you might find another mystery and nearly get yourself killed!’

  ‘But pater, it’s an historic event! One I can tell my grandchildren about,’ she added pointedly. She knew her father longed for descendants.

  ‘I suppose you could miss a week of lessons,’ he said slowly. ‘That would free up Aristo to help me prepare the ship for next month.’ He narrowed his eyes thoughtfully at her.

  Flavia sat up straight on her stool, waiting attentively for his answer.

  ‘Very well,’ he said at last, and tried not to smile as she squealed with delight. He held up his hand to ward off her embrace for a moment. ‘But you must take Caudex with you as a bodyguard, and you must promise not to get yourself killed.’

  Two days later, Flavia Gemina and her friends took an early morning carruca from Ostia to Rome. It was an hour before noon when they arrived at Senator Cornix’s Roman townhouse.

  Flavia stepped out of the morning sunshine into the shade of a columned porch. ‘Dear Castor and Pollux,’ she prayed, ‘thank you for bringing us safely here.’ She glanced over her shoulder at Nubia, Lupus, Tigris and the big door-slave Caudex, still standing in the sunlight. She hadn’t told her bodyguard the real reason for the visit so as she turned back to the door she murmured under her breath, ‘Please help us find Jonathan if he is still alive.’

  As she banged the bronze knocker she added, almost as an afterthought, ‘And please, god of Jonathan, will you help us, too?’

  ‘Miss Flavia,’ said the dark-eyed Greek with a grin, ‘I can’t tell you how glad I am to see you! Rome has been so dull since you left. And you said in your letter there might be another mystery for us to solve?’

  ‘Of course!’ Flavia stepped into the atrium and hugged her uncle’s secretary. ‘It’s so good to see you, Sisyphus! Thanks for getting us invited here.’

  ‘Shhh! The master thinks it was his idea!’ Sisyphus peered over Flavia’s shoulder: ‘Hello Nubia, Lupus, Caudex! Come in.’ Then he stiffened. ‘Flavia!’ he hissed, ‘what’s that dog doing here? You know Senator Cornix detests dogs.’

  ‘Tigris is very well-behaved,’ said Flavia. ‘He never even barks these days.’ She lowered her voice. ‘Sisyphus, there’s a chance Jonathan might still be alive, and living here in Rome.’

  The Greek’s dark eyes grew wide. ‘That’s your mystery?’

  ‘Yes,’ whispered Flavia, ‘and if Jonathan is alive, we need Tigris to find his scent.’

  ‘Flavia!’ A little girl had run into the atrium. She squealed with delight and threw her arms round Flavia’s knees.

  ‘Rhoda!’ Flavia laughed and hugged her cousin. Rhoda was four years old and since her two younger sisters had died the previous month, she was once more the baby of the family.

  ‘Nubia!’ cried Rhoda, pushing between Flavia and Sisyphus and running out into the porch. Then she stopped still. ‘A doggy!’ breathed Rhoda reverently. ‘Oh Sisyphus, look: a doggy!’

  ‘Come on, then!’ Sisyphus grinned and rolled his eyes. ‘Let’s get you and the mutt installed before Lady Cynthia returns from her friend’s house.’

  ‘Thank you, Aunt Cynthia and Uncle Aulus,’ said Flavia. ‘Thank you for inviting us to stay with you so that we can see the games.’

  It was almost midday and they were sitting at a table in a sunny inner courtyard.

  ‘I just wish we could remain here with you . . .’ Cynthia – an attractive dark-haired woman in her early thirties – glanced up from her wax tablet and gave her husband a pointed look. At the other end of the table Senator Aulus kept his eyes on th
e scroll he was reading.

  Cynthia sighed. ‘Don’t strangle Flavia, dear,’ she said mildly to her youngest child. Rhoda was sitting on Flavia’s lap with her arms wrapped round her neck.

  The senator sighed, too, as he rolled up his scroll. ‘Imagine!’ He looked up at them. ‘One hundred days of spectacles. No Senate or state business for over three months! The Emperor is –’ He stopped and although he was in his own home he lowered his voice, ‘Titus has been most irresponsible. Ten days, yes. Even thirty. But one hundred? It’s too much!’

  ‘But don’t you want to see the games?’ asked Flavia. ‘You’re a senator. You can go every day.’

  ‘The great philosopher Seneca said: “Don’t attend the games. Either you’ll be corrupted by the masses or – if you remain aloof – be hated by them.” We men of noble character despise such spectacles. They are for the plebs. The common people.’ He heaved another deep sigh. ‘But it is the common people who keep Rome running. And if they all go to the games, this city will grind to a halt.’

  ‘But a million people live here in Rome,’ said Flavia’s aunt, ‘and the new amphitheatre only seats fifty thousand people. Surely they won’t all –’

  Her husband interrupted her. ‘Don’t forget about the events at the Stagnum,’ he said. ‘If the plebs aren’t at the new arena they’ll all be over there. They’ll devour meat from the sacrifices and collect their free grain and watch their mock sea battles and gladiator combats. And in the end they’ll forget that the first months of Titus’s reign were marked by a volcano, a plague and a fire. It will be a holiday for them. But for us patricians it is so tedious.’

  ‘But you’ll attend the opening day, won’t you?’ asked Flavia, her arms still around Rhoda.

  ‘We really have no choice.’ Senator Cornix sighed deeply. ‘These are the first games to be sponsored by our new emperor. Titus will be showing Rome his capabilities, character and political agenda through these spectacles.’

  ‘I am not understanding him,’ whispered Nubia.

  Flavia shifted Rhoda on her lap and leaned towards Nubia. ‘He said the games are a big “I’m-the-new emperor” party. If we don’t go, we’ll hurt Titus’s feelings.’

  ‘Oh.’

  In the distance Flavia heard the noon gongs announcing the opening of the public baths.

  ‘Excuse me, my dear,’ said the senator to his wife. He rose to his feet and adjusted his toga. ‘I promised Gnaeus that I’d meet him at the baths. Dinner as usual?’

  ‘Yes, dear.’

  ‘Sisyphus, I need you to come and take dictation on the way.’ The senator strode off towards the front of the house. Sisyphus gave Flavia a mock sigh and hurried after him.

  ‘I want to go to the games, too,’ said Rhoda. ‘I want to go to the games with Flavia and Nubia and Lupus and the doggy.’

  Flavia kissed the top of Rhoda’s head. The little girl had light brown hair, the same colour as her own. ‘Aunt Cynthia, have you ever heard of something called Potsherd Mountain?’

  ‘I have,’ said a boy, coming into the bright courtyard.

  ‘Hello, Aulus!’ said Flavia. ‘How are you?’

  He shrugged. ‘Hello, everybody.’

  ‘Hello, Aulus,’ said Nubia, and Lupus waved.

  ‘Are your lessons finished for the day, dear?’ asked Cynthia.

  ‘Obviously.’ Aulus slumped onto the bench next to Lupus and reached under the table to give Tigris a scratch behind the ear. ‘Potsherd Mountain,’ he said to Flavia, ‘is a hill made of broken pots and amphoras. It’s over beyond the Aventine, outside the city walls between the river and the pyramid.’

  ‘I didn’t know that,’ said Cynthia, putting down her stylus. ‘How did you know that, dear?’

  Aulus shrugged. ‘Everybody knows it,’ he said, and looked at Flavia. ‘Would you like to see it?’

  ‘We want to see it! We want to see it!’ cried two boys, running into the courtyard. Quintus and Sextus were five-year-old twins with dark hair and bright eyes.

  ‘No. You two can’t come,’ said Aulus with a yawn. ‘And neither can you, Hyacinth.’ This last was addressed to a girl of about nine who had stopped by one of the columns which flanked the entry to the courtyard.

  ‘Hello, Hyacinth!’ called Flavia. ‘Hello, Quintus and Sextus.’

  ‘It’s not fair, mater!’ cried the twins. ‘We want to go, too.’

  ‘I want to go, too!’ said Rhoda from Flavia’s lap.

  ‘Well, you can’t,’ said Aulus. ‘You have to be nine or older to come.’

  ‘Lupus isn’t nine,’ said Hyacinth from her column.

  ‘Actually he is,’ said Flavia. ‘He turned nine last month.’

  ‘I’m going to be nine in May,’ said Hyacinth, lifting her chin.

  ‘Well, that’s just too late!’ Aulus smirked at her.

  ‘Who died and made you emperor?’ said Hyacinth. ‘Mater, may I go with them?’

  ‘You don’t even know where we’re going!’

  ‘Potsherd Mountain! Potsherd Mountain!’ chanted the twins. ‘We want to go! We want to go!’

  ‘Mama!’ squealed Rhoda, bouncing up and down on Flavia’s lap. ‘I want to go, too. Can I be nine?’

  Nubia burst into tears.

  ‘Are you feeling better now?’ asked Flavia, putting her arm around Nubia.

  Nubia nodded.

  She and Flavia were walking down a steep hill behind Caudex, Aulus, and Lupus. Tigris led the way, stretching the lead in Lupus’s hand taut.

  Nubia remembered the first time she had seen this street, which Aulus called the Clivus Scauri. She had been riding with Flavia in a litter on a hot summer’s evening. Now it was cloudy and grey with a strange wind from the south. The wind moaned through the columned porches on either side and rustled the dark tops of the umbrella pines high above. Nubia shivered.

  ‘Are you cold?’ asked Flavia.

  ‘No. My lionskin cloak is keeping me warm.’

  ‘Then what’s wrong? Why were you crying earlier?’

  Nubia tried to find the words. ‘I miss my family,’ she said at last.

  Flavia nodded. ‘I forget sometimes how hard it must be for you. Maybe it was a bad idea: us coming to stay with my cousins.’

  ‘No,’ said Nubia. ‘Your cousins please me: the twins and the little girl Rhoda and the mother like a tall palm tree who sways if the wind beats it but is never broken . . . My mother was like that.’

  ‘Oh, Nubia. They remind you of your family. That’s why you cried.’

  Nubia nodded and tried to swallow the tightness in her throat.

  As they reached the foot of the Caelian Hill, Aulus turned left. Although wheeled traffic was not allowed into Rome during the day, some people were boldly driving donkey carts laden with supplies. Tigris strained at his lead with his nose down and Nubia noticed his tail wag now and again. They skirted the southern end of the great Circus Maximus and moved through a crowded shopping district full of people hurrying to buy oil, wine, dried beans and wheat on the last day before the games.

  Presently they came into a square so full of people that at first Nubia did not recognize it. But then she saw the three white arches of the Trigemina Gate rising above the crowds. Through those arches lay the road back to Ostia.

  She felt the crowd pushing her strongly from behind and tried to ignore the wave of panic rising up in her. She was used to the empty space of the desert, not crowds of smelly, noisy people. Someone’s elbow dug into her ribs and a fat man trod on her toe with his hobnailed boots.

  ‘Coming through!’ announced a slave in a high nasal voice and the pole of a sedan chair caught Nubia a glancing blow on her cheekbone.

  ‘Watch where you’re going!’ Flavia shouted angrily and Nubia felt her friend’s grip.

  ‘Over here, Nubia,’ said Flavia. ‘It’s safest in Caudex’s wake.’

  Nubia and Flavia stayed close behind Caudex. He was a big man and the crowds parted before him as they began to move again.

  F
inally they passed through the gate.

  ‘Behold the pyramid,’ said Nubia wistfully, recognizing a landmark on the road back to Ostia. But they did not take the left-hand road, which led to Ostia, and they did not take the right-hand road, which skirted a green hill. Instead, Aulus led them along the middle way. And now Nubia saw what she had never seen before.

  Rome had expanded beyond the city walls. Behind the tomb-lined roads were the workshops of potters and blacksmiths. One shop made carts and carriages and another displayed gates and tables of wrought iron.

  ‘Behold the tall brick buildings ahead,’ said Nubia, ‘like at Ostia.’

  ‘Warehouses,’ said Flavia. ‘The river must be over there.’

  As they moved towards the warehouses, Nubia saw more and more shops had furnaces which blanketed the area with their smoke.

  Tigris sneezed, then lifted his nose to test the air.

  ‘There it is,’ said Aulus Junior, nodding towards a low hill between some two-storey workshops and the warehouses beyond. ‘Potsherd Mountain.’

  ‘That is being Potsherd Mountain?’ asked Nubia. She had imagined a towering red cone made of broken pottery so sharp that Jonathan’s knees and hands would be bloody from trying to scramble over it. ‘It is not a mountain,’ she said to Aulus, ‘it is just a hill.’

  Lupus grunted his agreement.

  ‘And I didn’t think it would have grass growing on it,’ added Flavia.

  ‘Well, I wasn’t the one who named it,’ said Aulus. ‘And it only takes a season for grass to start growing.’

  ‘Look how they’ve arranged the pieces neatly into layers,’ said Flavia. ‘I suppose they’d have landslides if they didn’t.’

  ‘Behold!’ cried Nubia. ‘There’s a person up there!’

  ‘Stop saying “Behold!”,’ snapped Aulus. ‘Nobody says that.’

  ‘It’s poetic,’ said Flavia. ‘We like it when Nubia says “Behold!”’

  ‘But it sounds stupid,’ said Aulus. ‘And she looks stupid in that lionskin.’

  ‘What should I say?’ asked Nubia in a small voice.