The Roman Mysteries Complete Collection

by Lawrence, Caroline

  Flavia leaned over and whispered in Nubia’s ear. ‘I’m not the only one who’s been reading too much Virgil recently.’

  ‘And they call me a pessimist,’ said Jonathan a short time later.

  ‘I’m sorry about mater,’ sighed Pulchra. ‘She’s not well.’

  Jonathan glanced at Flavia. She silently mouthed the words: barking mad, and he had to turn away to hide the smile on his face. He pretended to stare at a lemon tree which stood at the centre of the villa’s largest inner garden. ‘I thought the elixir my father prescribed was helping your mother’s depression,’ he said.

  Lupus grunted his agreement.

  ‘Your father’s elixir helped for a while,’ said Pulchra, ‘but it’s not doing any good now. And I think I know why.’

  ‘Why?’ said Jonathan.

  ‘I don’t think mater’s just depressed,’ said Pulchra. ‘I think someone is trying to poison her.’

  ‘So that’s why you wanted books on poison!’ cried Flavia.

  ‘Shhh!’ said Pulchra. She glanced around and said in a low voice, ‘Did you bring any?’

  ‘I brought one of my father’s best books on medicine,’ said Jonathan. ‘It has lots about poison in it.’

  ‘And I brought several scrolls of Pliny’s Natural History,’ said Flavia.

  ‘Praise Juno!’ breathed Pulchra and closed her eyes for a moment. Then she looked at each of them in turn. ‘I was trying to work it out like Flavia does, and I realised mater only gets ill when we have house-guests, so I asked pater to invite back some of the guests we’ve had over the past year. The ones who accepted happen to be three bachelors and three young widows, so pater and I have told mater we’re doing some matchmaking. I don’t want her to know the real reason we invited them. I don’t want to worry her.’

  ‘But you told your father what you suspect?’ asked Flavia.

  ‘Yes,’ said Pulchra. ‘He thinks I could be right. When I suggested inviting you to help us solve the mystery he agreed at once. He always talks about how clever and brave you were when you solved that mystery of the kidnapped children last summer.’

  ‘He says I’m clever and brave?’ said Flavia, and Jonathan noticed her cheeks were bright pink.

  Pulchra nodded. ‘He admires all of you.’

  ‘Pulchra,’ said Jonathan. ‘Just because your mother gets depressed around house-guests, that doesn’t necessarily mean someone is poisoning her.’

  ‘No, Jonathan!’ Pulchra put her hand on his arm. ‘She doesn’t just get depressed. Sometimes she has terrible stomach pains and once she couldn’t move her legs, and she went all cold and blue around the mouth. She almost died!’ Pulchra’s blue eyes welled with tears. ‘It was terrible!’

  ‘That does sound like poison,’ admitted Jonathan.

  Lupus had been scribbling on his wax tablet. Now he held it up:

  SO YOU’VE INVITED SIX POSSIBLE POISONERS TO STAY HERE?

  Pulchra nodded and blinked away her tears. ‘I know it’s a risk but I don’t know what else to do!’

  ‘Don’t worry, Pulchra,’ said Flavia, putting an arm around her. ‘We’ll do everything we can to solve this mystery and save your mother! Now take us to the suspects!’

  Pulchra led them up some pink marble stairs towards the highest floor of the villa. ‘The bachelors arrived yesterday from Rome,’ she said. ‘I think they’re in pater’s library now. They were going up as I was coming down.’ She linked her arm in Flavia’s and whispered, ‘Now that you’re betrothed I’ve been thinking about a future husband, too. One of the bachelors is very handsome and highborn and rich. If he’s not the culprit, I might ask pater to arrange a marriage.’

  A moment later they moved through polished columns of purple-speckled porphyry into the highest room of the tower. It was a library, with small arched windows and walls covered with scroll-filled pigeonholes. Flavia stared in wonder. Not even in the Emperor Titus’s palace had she seen a room like this, made entirely of coloured marble.

  Three young men stood around a table with a grass-green marble top and bronze legs. They were bent over a scroll.

  ‘See if you can guess which one I like,’ Pulchra breathed in Flavia’s ear.

  The men looked up as they heard the scuff of leather sandals on the marble floor.

  ‘Flavia Gemina?’ said one of them in a deep voice, squinting at the doorway.

  Flavia gasped. ‘Floppy! What are you doing here?’

  The look of pleasure on the handsome young man’s face faded and Flavia clapped her hand over her mouth.

  ‘Oh, I’m sorry . . . I didn’t mean to—’

  ‘Floppy?’ A red-haired young man with heavy-lidded eyes turned to look at him. ‘Did she call you Floppy?’ He began to laugh.

  Pulchra rounded on Flavia. ‘You two know each other?’

  ‘Yes,’ stammered Flavia. ‘We sailed to Rhodes together a few months ago. I’m sorry, um . . . Gaius Valerius Flaccus.’

  ‘It doesn’t matter,’ Flaccus replied stiffly, and gestured to the red-haired man on his right. ‘Flavia Gemina, I’d like you to meet my friends Publius Manilius Vopiscus and Lucius Calpurnius Philodemus.’ Here he indicated a man with alert brown eyes in a shiny face. ‘Vopiscus and Philodemus,’ he sighed, ‘allow me to introduce Flavia Gemina and her friends Jonathan, Lupus and Nubia. It appears they’ll be joining us this week.’

  ‘Oh, Nubia! Why do I always say such stupid things?’

  ‘You are not always saying stupid things,’ said Nubia, opening a cedarwood chest at the foot of one of the two beds. ‘But you are always saying what you think. This is your bed,’ she added. ‘The slaves have put your things here.’

  ‘You don’t think Floppy could be the poisoner, do you? Pollux! I did it again. I promised not to call him “Floppy” anymore.’

  ‘I think you should keep that promise and not call him that even in privacy.’ Nubia sat on her bed and the dogs padded over to her, tails wagging.

  ‘You’re right,’ Flavia sighed. ‘His hair’s hardly floppy now that he’s had it cut. But look at my hair. It’s a tangled mess. Why didn’t you tell me?’ She leaned forward and peered into the silver mirror over their dressing table.

  ‘Your hair is lovely,’ said Nubia loyally.

  ‘Nubia, do you think someone’s really trying to poison Polla Argentaria? Or is Pulchra just trying to find an excuse for her mother being so strange and feeble?’

  ‘I do not know,’ said Nubia, scratching Scuto with one hand and Nipur with the other. ‘But Pulchra says her mother’s stomach is unhappy sometimes.’

  ‘We all get unhappy stomachs from time to time,’ said Flavia. ‘Dear Juno! This mirror is awful! It shows every tiny spot.’ Without taking her eyes from her reflection, Flavia turned her head to the left and then to the right. ‘Nubia? Do you think my nose is too big?’

  ‘No. It is perfect. It is Flavia-sized.’

  ‘I think it’s too big. Also, Pulchra’s right: my skin is too tanned.’

  ‘My skin is much darker than yours,’ said Nubia.

  ‘But on you it looks exotic and beautiful, especially with your hair plaited like that. And you have lovely golden-brown eyes. Mine are just grey. Dull old grey. Flaccus looked well, didn’t he?’

  ‘Flavia! Nubia!’ wheezed Jonathan from the doorway. Lupus stood behind him, his chest rising and falling as if he had just been running. ‘You’ve got to see this. The women guests have just arrived and one of them has a wild animal on a leash! Come quickly; you can see them from the library!’

  *

  As Flavia, Nubia and their two dogs followed Jonathan and Lupus along the colonnade, they passed several guest bedrooms. Some had folding lattice-work screens which could be rolled across the doorway for extra privacy. The boys’ room had such a screen so they quickly stopped to shut Scuto and Nipur in with Tigris. ‘We don’t want the dogs running free,’ Jonathan wheezed. ‘Trust me.’

  Lupus led them up marble stairs to the upper colonnade, through the villa’
s large bright atrium, then along a peristyle skirting the lemon-tree garden. Finally he ran up the pink stairs to the library of coloured marble, now deserted. The four friends crowded into an arched window and looked east towards the olive groves and the main approach to the villa.

  Lupus pointed to the space between the stables and the drive. Flavia could see several elegant women and some slaves moving around a litter with leopard-skin curtains. Another litter with blue curtains was disappearing beneath the covered road, its four bearers jogging. It must be empty, she thought.

  Suddenly Flavia gasped. As four Ethiopian slaves lifted the poles of the leopard-skin litter and carried it away, a woman in a red stola was revealed. She had pale skin, a mass of jet-black curls and an enormous black cat on a red leather leash.

  ‘She’s beautiful!’ said Flavia.

  ‘It is beautiful,’ said Nubia.

  ‘Let’s get a closer look!’ wheezed Jonathan.

  Lupus nodded and beckoned enthusiastically, as if to say, Come on, then! He ran out of the library and down the stairs. Jonathan and Nubia followed and Flavia took up the rear. She went carefully down the polished marble steps because her sandals were brand new and the leather soles very slippery, but once at the foot of the stairs she broke into a sprint to catch up with her friends.

  But she was going too fast, and as she rounded a corner she skidded straight into a grey-haired man emerging from another corridor. Flavia squealed and flailed as she fell backwards. But strong arms caught her and she found herself looking up into the amused dark eyes of Publius Pollius Felix, the Patron.

  Pulchra’s father was not as tall as she remembered but he was just as handsome. And being in his presence still took her breath away. He was smiling and holding her bare shoulders with strong, cool hands. Her knees were trembling and she felt her face grow hot.

  ‘Hello, Flavia Gemina.’ Felix’s dark eyebrows went up and he leant towards her slightly. ‘Investigating another mystery?’ He was so close she could smell the citron-scented oil he used on his hair.

  ‘I . . . um . . . we just . . . that is, I . . . hello, Patron.’ Flavia knew her cheeks must be bright pink.

  He laughed and released his grip on her shoulders.

  ‘Come,’ he said. ‘I’ll introduce you to the exotic Voluptua and her black panther. How was your journey down? I’m sorry I missed your father.’ Felix led her through the atrium to the villa’s elegant vaulted vestibule, with its arched windows overlooking the sea on the left and the secret cove on the right. As they reached the open double-doors, he stood aside. ‘After you, my dear,’ he said with a heart-stopping smile. ‘After you.’

  *

  Flavia Gemina to her dearest pater M. Flavius Geminus.

  Greetings from Surrentum, pater! I hope you are well. We are all well. I’m not sure when you’ll receive this letter – or even if I’ll be able to send it – but I promised to write and so I am scribbling a hasty note before dusk fades to night.

  The Villa Limona is just as beautiful as I remember it, maybe even more so! The spring rains have washed away all the ash from the trees and plants in the gardens. Everything seems so much greener than it did last August after the eruption of Vesuvius. I have also discovered some new rooms in the villa, including a library!

  As well as the four of us, Pulchra’s father and mother have invited some other guests to stay. There are three young widows and three eligible bachelors. Pater, you know one of them! Remember Gaius Valerius Flaccus, the young patrician who sailed with us on the Delphina a few months ago? He is here with his two friends Vopiscus and Philodemus. Vopiscus reminds me of a sleepy-eyed fox and Philodemus is like an eager hunting-dog. They are both about Flaccus’s age (18) and they are also studying Rhetoric and Law.

  The three widows are very beautiful. Annia Serena is plump and fair, Claudia Casta is a tawny beauty with eyes like a doe, and Clodia Voluptua is dark and exotic. Voluptua caused quite a stir when she arrived in a leopard-skin litter with a black panther on a leash! Pulchra says her father calls them ‘the Sirens’ and predicts that the three bachelors will ‘run hopelessly aground on the shores of love.’ Isn’t that clever and funny of him?

  We spent most of today settling in. Pulchra showed us a little temple to Neptune which her father erected on an tiny island near the villa, and also a circular shrine to Venus, which her mother paid for. It is perched among the olive groves on the hillside above us. We made a small offering at each shrine and then had a picnic lunch beside the villa’s secret cove. It was very hot so we women stayed there to swim while the boys and men used the baths.

  Well, I must go. Pulchra’s slave-girl Leda has just come to take us to dinner.

  Don’t forget to take the tonic Dr Mordecai prescribed and to put the balm on your wounds twice a day. And use your walking stick, even if it does make you ‘feel like an old man’.

  Farewell, dearest pater. I will try to write again tomorrow. Cura ut valeas.

  ‘So, Flavia,’ whispered Pulchra. ‘Have you devised a plan to solve the mystery?’

  ‘Mystery . . .?’ Flavia was reclining between Pulchra and Nubia on the central couch of the girls’ private dining room. She had been thinking about Felix and it took her a moment to take in Pulchra’s words. ‘Oh! The mystery. The mystery of who’s trying to poison—’

  ‘Ajax!’ cried Pulchra. She glanced pointedly at the couch where her little sisters Pollina and Pollinilla reclined. ‘The mystery of who’s trying to hurt Ajax.’

  ‘Is someone trying to hurt Ajax?’ cried Pollina, Pulchra’s seven-year-old sister.

  ‘Yes,’ said Pulchra, ‘Ajax is in danger.’

  ‘Oh, poor puppy!’ Six-year-old Pollinilla slid off her dining couch and wrapped her arms around Ajax, who had been snuffling at the dining room floor with the other dogs, looking for old scraps.

  ‘Put down the dog, Pollinilla,’ said the girls’ pretty young Egyptian nursemaid. She gently lifted the little girl back onto the couch.

  ‘Don’t worry,’ said Pulchra to her sisters, ‘Flavia here is very clever and she’s promised to think of a plan to stop the bad . . . animal . . . from hurting Ajax.’ Pulchra looked at Flavia. ‘You do have a plan, don’t you?’

  ‘I suppose the best plan,’ said Flavia, ‘would be for each of us to choose a suspect . . . I mean one of the er . . . animals, and watch them carefully for any suspicious behaviour. For example, I could take the tawny doe.’

  Nubia looked puzzled.

  Jonathan grinned. ‘I’ll take the dog. The one with brown eyes and hair – I mean fur. I have a feeling he’s from my part of the world.’

  I WILL TAKE THE FOX wrote Lupus.

  Suddenly Nubia’s eyes lit up. ‘Oh! I understand! I will take the panther,’ she announced.

  ‘I suppose that leaves me with the sheep,’ sighed Pulchra.

  ‘Yes, those sheep can be vicious,’ said Jonathan.

  ‘What about the um . . . horse?’ said Flavia. ‘The horse with the floppy mane?’

  ‘I don’t think he’s a suspect,’ said Jonathan.

  ‘Still,’ said Pulchra, ‘one of us should watch him, just to be sure.’ She blushed prettily. ‘I volunteer.’

  ‘I’ll watch pater’s cockerel,’ announced Pollina in a solemn voice. ‘Sometimes he chases Ajax.’

  ‘Good idea,’ said Pulchra with a smile.

  ‘I’ll watch the chickens!’ piped little Pollinilla. ‘They are bad chickens!’

  Everyone laughed.

  ‘I’ll watch the pigeons, too,’ she cried, delighted at their reaction. ‘And the goldfish in the fish-pond and all the flies and the bugs and every single animal in the whole world!’

  ‘With help like that,’ said Flavia with a smile, ‘I’m sure we’ll find the culprit in no time.’

  Later that night Flavia lay on her bed staring up at the stucco ceiling. The pretty roundels painted on it flickered in the dim light of a small bronze oil-lamp. Nubia had been asleep for nearly an hour, and the dogs were snoring
gently, but Hypnos refused to visit her.

  Flavia sat up, fluffed her pillow, then flopped down on her other side.

  It was no good: she was not the least bit sleepy. Rising from her bed, she moved out into the colonnade and rested her forearms on the cool marble parapet. The sea was as black as polished marble and the sky above it was peppered with a million stars. A lopsided moon hung overhead, throwing a path of silver across the inky water.

  It was a deliciously warm night, and above the pulsing of the cicadas she thought she heard music. The sound drew her along the colonnade and up the marble stairs. Reaching the upper level, she could clearly hear the textured chords of a lyre and the laughter of adults at a dinner party.

  She moved forward on silent bare feet, keeping to the shadows. Presently she found herself in the lemon-tree courtyard. At the far end of this inner garden she saw an illuminated triclinium with three couches and eight diners. So this was why she and her friends had been given an early dinner and hustled to bed: the adults were having a banquet!

  Flavia crept closer. Crouching behind a potted rosebush, she gazed into the triclinium. Bronze oil-lamps made the red frescoed walls glow and cast a flattering rosy light on the diners. Felix and his wife reclined on the central couch; she wore a pale blue stola and he looked elegant in a synthesis of the same colour. On the couch to their right – the lectus imus – reclined the three young men in cream tunics. On the lectus summus opposite the men were the women; blonde Annia Serena in dark blue, doe-eyed Claudia in brown silk shot with gold, and raven-haired Voluptua in a filmy red stola. Voluptua’s black panther lay chained to one of the legs of the dining couch on which his mistress reclined. Flavia’s throat tightened with longing. Oh, to be grown-up and beautiful, reclining in that room on a couch near him.

  She could tell it was near the end of the meal, for the diners were wearing their garlands and drinking wine. Red-haired Vopiscus was strumming a lyre and reciting verses in Greek which Flavia did not recognise. Everyone smiled and applauded as he finished his poem and handed the lyre on to Flaccus.