For a long moment the two men looked at each other, then Nonius shrugged. ‘As you wish. He’s still lying in her cubicle.’ He turned to a slave. ‘Elpias. Show them the body.’
‘Thank you,’ said Mordecai. He turned to follow the slave and then turned back. ‘Please, Nonius Celer, will you untie that girl and cover her until the vigiles arrive?’
Hephzibah’s sleeping cubicle at the back of the villa was so small that Doctor Mordecai had to crouch to enter it. One glimpse at the dead body on the floor convinced Flavia to stay outside with Jonathan. She was happy to let Lupus follow the doctor in.
Mordecai muttered an oath as his head struck the low-vaulted roof of the cell. ‘Master of the Universe! I can’t even stand upright in here.’ He knelt over the corpse. ‘Killed by a single blow to the right temple,’ he murmured presently. ‘Death seems to have been instantaneous. But where is the weapon?’
Lupus gave a grunt and Flavia saw his hand appear, framed in the doorway and holding a ceramic jug.
‘Ah,’ said Mordecai, taking the jug by the handle and examining it. ‘This is certainly heavy enough. But there is no trace of blood or hair on it. And there is still water in the bottom. Where did you get this?’
Lupus pointed to the back of the small cubicle. Flavia and Jonathan cracked skulls as they both put their heads in the small doorway to get a better look.
‘Ow!’ said Flavia, and rubbed her head. Suddenly she stopped rubbing and looked at Mordecai. ‘If the jug was used as a weapon,’ she said, ‘wouldn’t the water have spilled onto the floor? Or onto his clothes?’ She allowed herself another quick peek at the body. The dead man’s eyes gazed up at the low-vaulted ceiling with an expression of mild surprise. Then she saw the bloody dent above his right eyebrow and she hastily looked away.
‘Yes,’ said Mordecai. ‘If that jug was the murder weapon, then I should expect to find water here. But apart from a little blood – a very little blood for such a head-wound – this earthen floor is completely dry. Also,’ he looked around, ‘I don’t see how a person could strike a death blow in such a confined space. There’s barely room for a man and a boy in here.’
‘Maybe he wasn’t killed in here,’ said Jonathan.
Lupus grunted his agreement.
‘And maybe Hephzibah didn’t do it!’ cried Flavia.
Mordecai gave her a keen look. Then he turned his head to look over his shoulder, ‘Lupus,’ he said, ‘while we interview Hephzibah, I want you to do what you do so well.’
Lupus raised his eyebrows questioningly.
‘I want you to look around the villa for signs of a spillage. Or of a spillage which has been cleaned. But be careful: don’t let anyone see you.’
Lupus nodded, his eyes shining.
Flavia frowned. ‘Spillage?’ she said. ‘What kind of spillage?’ Then her eyes widened and she answered her own question. ‘Oh,’ she breathed, ‘blood!’
The atrium was almost empty when they returned; Jonathan saw that Nonius and most of his household had gone. There were only two sullen slaves flanking the exit. And the woman he had seen at Dives’s funeral was lurking in the shadows behind a column. As soon as the woman saw them she moved quickly towards Jonathan. He remembered her name was Restituta.
‘I saw you and your friends arrive,’ she said and gripped his arm hard. ‘Since I saw you at the funeral there’s a rumour been going around among the slaves. I thought you should know.’ Restituta brought her mouth close to his ear and said in a barely audible voice. ‘They say Dives was murdered. Smothered while he slept.’
Then she released her grip on his arm and hurried out of the atrium.
Jonathan frowned after her, then turned to Hephzibah. She was sitting on a stool in the shelter of the peristyle, her auburn hair tangled and her dark eyes staring blankly ahead. Someone had draped a grey palla round her shoulders to hide her torn tunic. Someone else – or perhaps the same person – had tied one end of a rope around her ankles and the other to a pillar.
‘The vigiles obviously haven’t arrived yet,’ murmured Mordecai. ‘That gives us a little time.’
He took a chair from the tablinum and pulled it up before Hephzibah. Then he sat facing her and began to speak in Aramaic.
Hephzibah replied in the same language, and Jonathan interpreted for Flavia.
‘She told Pliny she was going to pick up her things,’ said Jonathan after a moment. ‘When she reached her sleeping-cubicle she saw Mercator lying on the ground.’
‘Did she know him?’ said Flavia. ‘Ask her if she knew Mercator.’
Hephzibah turned and looked at Flavia. ‘I will speak Latin,’ she said, and then turned back to Mordecai. ‘I only knew Mercator by sight. He was one of my master’s freedmen.’
‘So he was already dead when you got there?’ said Mordecai. He was also speaking Latin now.
‘Yes. I must have screamed because a moment later there were slaves outside the door and then Nonius appeared and accused me of killing him. But I didn’t! I didn’t!’
‘Did you strike Nonius?’ asked Mordecai gently.
‘No! I didn’t touch him!’ She gazed around at them with pleading brown eyes.
‘I believe you,’ said Mordecai. ‘But I must ask you: Why did you not go straight to Nonius and offer him the gold to buy your freedom?’
‘I went to see Priscilla first,’ said Hephzibah.
‘Who’s Priscilla?’ asked Flavia.
Hephzibah lowered her eyes. ‘Just a slave. A friend. She’s pregnant, like Miriam.’
‘So you didn’t go straight to your cubicle,’ said Mordecai. ‘You went to see your friend first.’
‘Yes.’
‘Why didn’t you tell us that before?’ said Flavia.
‘I forgot,’ said Hephzibah, her eyes still lowered.
‘Hephzibah,’ said Mordecai, ‘did you see anyone else lurking near your cubicle?’
‘No. It was less than an hour ago, around noon. All the other slaves were working.’
‘Including Priscilla?’ said Flavia.
‘Yes. She helps the cook. I went to see her in the kitchen. We spoke for a short time. Then I went to the part of the villa were the sleeping-cubicles are. I was going to get my things before I went to Nonius.’
‘What things?’ asked Flavia.
Hephzibah kept her head down. ‘Two tunics and a palla. A doll my mother gave me. Then I saw the body.’ She shuddered.
‘Hephzibah,’ said Mordecai gently. ‘Are you the daughter of David ben Tobias, the priest?’
‘Yes!’ Hephzibah raised her head and Flavia saw her brown eyes were brimming with tears. ‘Did you know him?’
‘Very well,’ said Mordecai. ‘He was a good man, and a good friend. I believe you came to our house several times. Our house in Jerusalem by the Beautiful Gate.’
Hephzibah nodded. ‘Yes. I was very little, but I still remember the citron tree in your courtyard and the yellow and blue wall tiles.’ Tears wet her cheeks. ‘Playing with Miriam in your courtyard – those are the happiest memories of my whole life.’
Nubia woke with a start.
She was curled up in a dim, cramped space. It smelled of charred pine-cones and damp earth.
A tomb. She was in a tomb, with the ashes of the dead.
For a moment she could not think how she came to be here. Then she remembered running in the graveyard, dizzy from being bled and shivering from cold and shock. She must have fallen asleep.
Outside, the rain had stopped. From the look of the pearly winter light it was mid-afternoon.
She put her head tentatively out the small arched opening of the tomb.
The pine branches overhead were still dripping and she could smell the acrid scent of someone burning damp leaves.
She began to crawl out on hands and knees, because Avita’s tomb was built for a child. Then she recoiled. A dead shrew lay outside the little doorway of the tomb. Some woodland creature had killed it and chewed off its head.
She carefu
lly scooped a hole for it in the dirt, used a dead leaf to push it into the hole, and patted earth over its tiny corpse. Then she bowed her head and recited a prayer for the dead.
As she stood up she felt an ache in the crook of her left elbow, where doctor Mordecai had cut her skin. There was a spot of blood on the linen bandage, and there was blood on her butter-coloured tunic, too. That blood was not hers; it belonged to poor Papillio.
Suddenly a strong hand griped her wrist.
Nubia screamed.
Nubia screamed and kicked and thrashed her arms, but the man had grabbed her from behind and now he was pinning her wrists to her side with one strong arm while he covered her screaming mouth with his free hand.
‘Nubia!’ A familiar voice and warm breath in her ear. ‘Nubia, it’s me, Aristo.’
Her knees gave way with relief and she almost collapsed. But he caught her and turned her and now he was hugging her tightly. Her nose was buried in the soft linen of his fawn tunic and she could smell his scent and feel his heart pounding against her cheek.
She wrapped her arms around his slim, muscular waist and tried to keep the tears in.
Aristo had found her! He loved her. He loved her as she loved him.
She held him tighter, wishing he would never let her go, but presently he did, kissing the top of her head before he held her at arm’s length.
‘Look at you!’ he laughed. ‘What a state! Mud on your cheek, dirt under your fingernails, blood on your tunic. We need to get you to the baths.’
She nodded, too happy for words.
‘I know where to take you,’ he said. ‘The perfect place. You’ll be safe there. They have a little hot plunge and a big guard dog.’ His voice was husky with emotion. ‘She can look after you and you can look after her.’
All the blood seemed to drain to Nubia’s feet. She gazed up into his warm brown eyes, so animated by love, and she felt a terrible chill.
‘Where?’ she whispered, hardly able to trust her voice.
‘To Miriam, of course. Come. I have a horse tethered just over there. We can be at the Laurentum Lodge in a quarter of an hour.’
‘There she is!’ said Lucius Nonius Celer to the vigiles. ‘There’s the murderess!’ He led two armed men into the atrium and gestured at Hephzibah, still tethered to a column. ‘Take her to Ostia and throw her in the cells!’
‘Are you calling her to trial?’ said one of the soldiers to Nonius. ‘Because we have no authority to hold her until someone brings a suit.’
‘Of course I’m bringing a suit!’ Anger darkened Nonius’ already swarthy face. ‘She killed my former patron’s freedman, Mercator. And I now have reason to suspect that she may also have killed Dives himself.’
‘What?’ cried Flavia.
‘No!’ cried Hephzibah. ‘My master was kind to me. I would never hurt him.’
‘By Hercules!’ Nonius’s good eye opened wide. ‘I believe you killed that poor magistrate, too! Papillio. You went to his apartments and stabbed him before you met us at the forum.’
‘That makes no sense,’ said Mordecai. ‘Why would this girl want to kill the one person who could prove she was free?’ His voice was calm but Flavia noticed that his accent was more pronounced, a sure sign that he was upset.
‘Perhaps because he was the one person who could prove she wasn’t free!’ said Nonius. ‘I’m going to hire the best lawyers money can buy. And I promise you: I will find the truth!’
Aristo untethered a broad-backed bay gelding named Fortis that Nubia recognised from the Laurentum Gate stables. Flavia’s father often chose this horse when he wanted to ride out to see his brother.
There was no mounting block nearby, so Aristo led the gelding to a small marble grave marker and, muttering an apology to the spirits of the dead, he stepped onto it and then up onto the horse.
He leant down and when Nubia grasped his extended forearm, he swung her up behind him.
The saddle was not meant for two and she had to press herself very close to him.
‘Hold on,’ he said over his shoulder. ‘Hold on tight.’
Nubia nodded and wrapped her arms miserably around him. For almost an entire year she had secretly loved him. Today, for one perfect moment, it had seemed that he returned her feelings. But now she knew that the love in his eyes and the beating of his heart was not for her, but for Miriam.
Aristo clicked his tongue and she felt his heels touch the horse’s side. Soon they emerged from the pine woods and trotted out onto the Laurentum Road.
The sea appeared on the right, deep cobalt blue with a thousand white horses marching in from the northwest. The wind was sweeping low clouds in from the same direction, so that sometimes she was in brilliant sunshine and others in shadow.
She took a deep breath. The storm-scoured air was fresh and cool, as intoxicating as watered wine. Birds sang in the umbrella pines and sunlit drops of water fell like diamonds onto the sandy road, which was perfect for riders on horseback.
Nubia loved horses almost as much as she loved Aristo. She should have been blissfully happy riding with him on this sparkling afternoon.
But Aristo did not love her, and never would. She suddenly realised that she was a slave after all, and a fugitive slave at that. And there was blood on her tunic from a murdered man.
She turned her head in the direction of the sea, rested her cheek on his back and let the tears flow.
Abruptly she felt his whole body stiffen as he reined in the gelding.
‘Pollux!’ he cursed. ‘Someone’s coming. We can’t risk them seeing us.’
He kicked the horse’s flank and they veered off the road and down into the woods. When they were screened by the thick trunks of the umbrella pines, Aristo expertly turned the horse so they could peer through the branches at the road up ahead.
Nubia could hear it now: the sound of horses’ hooves and the jingle of armour and the squeaking wheel of a cart.
Presently a carruca appeared around a bend, travelling in the direction of Ostia, with two riders flanking it.
‘By Apollo!’ muttered Aristo. ‘It is the vigiles!’
‘How did they find us?’ asked Nubia. She was trembling so much that her teeth were chattering.
‘I don’t think those particular vigiles are looking for you. I think they’re escorting that carriage. There are three people inside; can you see who they are?’
‘I can not see inside yet, only that Doctor Mordecai is driving. Maybe the men torture him and force him to reveal where I am hiding.’
‘No. Mordecai seems fine.’
‘Now I see! It is Flavia and Jonathan inside—’
‘And a girl with tangled red hair. She’s wearing leather manacles. They’re arresting her.’
‘That is Hephzibah,’ said Nubia. ‘We saw her this morning in the forum. Do you not remember? She is Miriam’s friend. The one who wants to be free.’
Ostia’s basilica was a tall, marble-veneered building at the south-western corner of the forum next to a large temple of Venus. The law court occupied its spacious ground floor, with a gallery giving way to offices on the first floor. At the back of the basilica were four small prison cells where prisoners could be held until they stood trial.
‘It wasn’t too bad,’ said Mordecai as he came down the basilica steps to where Flavia and Jonathan were waiting. ‘I convinced them to put her in a cell by herself. Let’s hope it stays that way.’
‘You mean they could put her in with male criminals?’ gasped Flavia.
He nodded grimly, ‘If it gets busy. It’s the same cell I was privileged to occupy last year,’ he added.
‘Does she have to stay there?’ asked Flavia.
Mordecai nodded. ‘Until we’ve raised the money for her vadimonium.’
‘How much?’ asked Flavia and Jonathan together.
‘Fifty thousand sesterces,’ said Mordecai. ‘A ridiculous amount for a Jewish slave-girl.’
‘We can pay that,’ said Jonathan. ‘I got all that rewa
rd money in September.’
‘That’s generous of you,’ said Mordecai. ‘But I’ll still need to obtain a promissory note, and the bankers’ stalls have closed for today. Hephzibah will have to spend the night here. Not a pleasant prospect.’
‘Oh, Doctor Mordecai!’ cried Flavia. ‘Can’t we do something?’
‘All we can do,’ he said, ‘is smuggle her a blanket and some food and perhaps a writing tablet. I have a feeling she’s still not telling us everything.’
Miserably, Nubia watched Aristo and Miriam come together.
After the vigiles and the carruca had passed out of sight, Aristo had urged the gelding back up onto the road and galloped all the way to the Laurentum Lodge without slowing. As the foaming horse skidded to a halt at the end of the gravel path, Aristo jumped off, vaulted the gate, ran to the front door and pounded on it. A tearful Miriam opened the front door, and Nubia suspected it was only the sight of her swollen belly that prevented Aristo from embracing her.
‘Miriam!’ he cried breathlessly. ‘They’ve arrested Hephzibah!’
‘I know!’ As she took a step forward, Nubia saw Lupus standing behind her in the doorway.
‘Lupus has just walked up from Dives’s estate.’ Miriam held up a wax tablet. ‘And he’s just written an account. There’s been another murder and Nonius has accused Hephzibah! Luckily my father and Flavia and Jonathan and Lupus arrived in time to help. Lupus stayed behind to look for clues, didn’t you, Lupus?’
Gaius’s big guard dog Ferox appeared in the crowded doorway. He saw Nubia dismounting from the horse and gave a single bark of greeting.
‘Oh, Nubia!’ cried Miriam. She followed Ferox carefully down the steps and hurried to open the gate. Lupus waved as he and Aristo followed Miriam.
‘Oh, Nubia, what’s happened to you?’ cried Miriam. ‘You’re covered with blood and dirt. And you’re shivering.’ She took off her soft lilac palla and draped it around Nubia’s shoulders. ‘Senex is firing up the hot plunge for Lupus, but I think you need it more.’
Lupus nodded and held his nose and grinned at Nubia.
Miriam turned to Aristo. ‘I was waiting for Gaius to return, but now that you’re here . . . Can you ride to Pliny, tell him what’s happened and ask him to come here at once?’
The Roman Mysteries Complete Collection Page 186