Ode to a Banker mdf-12

by Lindsey Davis

  'Would he have killed to achieve publication?' I murmured, scraping salt from a block.

  'Would he ever stop talking long enough?' asked Maia.

  'If he really has an established market, he must want the scriptorium to continue trading as normal, without any commercial upheavals caused by the death of its proprietor.'

  'Is there a sensation effect?' asked Helena. 'Might a murder increase sales?'

  'Don't know – but it's presumably only temporary.' I had other priorities. 'Where's that nice matured goat's cheese?'

  'Gaius Baebius ate it yesterday.'

  Jupiter, I hate that glutton! So did the talking man give you any inside patter on the others involved?'

  'All cooing turtledoves, according to him,' sneered Helena.

  'She does not believe it. She has met writers,' giggled Maia 'Well, she knows you, Marcus.'

  'What, no vinegar? No mean-spirited nastiness about his companions?'

  'He was far too nice about them all. Not enough envy, not enough bile.' Helena's bright eyes had been dangling bait. 'But then…'

  'Out with it!'

  'What did you find out?'

  I could play the game. I fed her one titbit. 'The historian had a large debt to the Aurelian Bank.'

  'Oh, is that all?' crowed my sister, interrupting.

  'I suspect he was to be dropped too – Vespasian wants his own version of history reported. Anyone who has been around during previous emperors' reigns is tainted. Chrysippus may well have been thinking he would look for someone more politically acceptable to the new regime. Waste of time trying to push the wares, otherwise.'

  'Anything else?' Helena grilled me.

  'The dreamer who's creating the new republic has the sniffles. An ideal society will be slow arriving, due to his funny turns.'

  'What a disappointment. Which one is that?'

  'Turius.'

  'Ah!' Helena came alight excitedly. 'Turius has a black mark against him; Scrutator loved telling us this: Turius refused to include a flattering reference to Chrysippus in his work. Chrysippus put to him that if he was prepared to take the money, he ought to respond appropriately.'

  'Toady up to the patron?' I grinned.

  'Mention how wildly generous the patron was,' said Helena in her austere way. 'Name Chrysippus so frequently that the public learned to respect him just for being so popular – make out that Chrysippus was a man of exquisite taste and noble intention, and the next Roman world-mover.'

  'Also, claim that he gives nice dinner parties,' Maia added.

  'Turius foolishly prefers not to say these things?'

  Helena answered with relish: 'According to Pacuvius – who may be lying for theatrical effect, of course – Turius was much more forceful than that. He proclaimed in public that Chrysippus was a devious philandering foreigner, who would have rejected Homer's manuscripts because a blind man would be a menace at public readings, and would need a costly amanuensis to take dictation.'

  'A feud! I love it!' I guffawed.

  Helena's eyes sought mine, brown and bright, enjoying my delight in her story. 'Then – still according to Pacuvius, who seemed rather carried away by all this – Turius raged that Chrysippus was so lacking in critical discernment he would have insisted Helen of Troy be seen constantly naked in the Iliad; he would have censored the love between Achilles and Patroclus in case the aediles sent him into exile for inflaming immorality; and in the Odyssey he would have demanded that the heart-rending death scene of Odysseus' poor old dog be cut as mere padding.'

  We all winced.

  I divided a small sausage between us with a sharp knife. 'Did Chrysippus know Turius had been so rude?'

  'They all think so.'

  'Thrills! Was there a fight? Any suggestion of violence?'

  'No. Nobody thinks Turius can even find the energy to blow his nose, despite the sniffles.'

  'Oh, but Chrysippus must have been furious – he might have picked a fight.' And Turius might have feebly run away. 'So what does Pacuvius think of Turius and his lively opinions?'

  'Watery approval – but he keeps his mouth shut. As a satirist, he is a hypocrite.'

  'Aren't they always? Anything else you found out?'

  'Hardly anything,' Helena said offhandedly. That meant there was. 'The epic poet hits the amphora too often, and it's said that the successful playwright does not write his plays himself.'

  I shook my head, then grinned at her 'Nothing to go on at all, in fact!'

  XXIV

  A good picture of jealousies and quarrels was building. I always like a case with a crowd of seething suspects; I allowed myself to enjoy lunch.

  When the conversation turned to family matters, Maia told me she had been to see Pa. Although she had investigated his situation at the warehouse, she had not come out and directly offered help. 'You tackle him. You and Helena know him better than I do. Anyway, it's you two who want me to do this…'

  She was prevaricating. Helena and I took her back to the Saepta Julia straight after we had eaten.

  We found my father frowning over a pile of what looked like bills. He was perfectly able to deal with his financial affairs; he was shrewd and snappily numerate. Once he had found a basket of odd pots and finials to keep Julia happy, I put it to him bluntly that he seemed to have lost the will to keep his daily records, and that he would be doing my sister a favour if he allowed her – and paid her – to become his secretary.

  'There's nothing to it,' Pa avowed, trying to minimise the salary. 'It does not need keeping up every day -'

  'I thought all business deals were supposed to be recorded in a daybook,' I said.

  'That doesn't mean you have to write them up the same day they happen.' Pa looked at me as if I were simple. 'Do you write your expenses on a tablet the minute you pay out a witness bribe?'

  'Of course. I am a methodical consultant.'

  'Pigs' pizzle. Besides, son, just because I can, when challenged, produce a daybook looking all neat and innocent, doesn't mean it has to be correct.'

  Maia shot him a look; that was about to change smartly around this office.

  Despite this difference in ethics between them, we settled the matter easily. Like most arrangements that appear fraught with problems, once tackled, its difficulties evaporated. Straight away Maia began to explore and soon extracted a pile of accounting notes from under Pa's stool. I had seen how she kept her own household budget; I knew she would cope. She herself obviously felt nervous. While she sat down to get the hang of our father's systems, which he had devised especially to bamboozle others, Helena and I stayed to distract the suspicious proprietor from overseeing Maia so closely he would put her off.

  'Who do you bank with, Pa?'

  'Mind your own business!' he retorted instinctively.

  'Typical!'

  'Juno,' Helena muttered. 'Grow up, you two. Didius Favonius, your son has no designs on your moneychests. This is just an enquiry related to his work.'

  Pa perked up, always eager to put his nose into anything technical of mine. 'What's that then?'

  'A banker has been killed. Chrysippus. Ever come across his agent, Lucrio, at the Aurelian Bank?'

  Pa nodded. 'I know a few people who use him.'

  'Given the prices you extract at auction, I'm not surprised buyers have to get financial help.' Pa looked proud to be called an extortioner. 'I hear he specialises in loans.'

  'This Aurelian outfit going down, then?' Pa demanded, ever anxious to be first with gossip.

  'Not that I know.'

  'I'll put the word around.'

  'That's not what Marcus said,' Helena reproved him. Her senatorial background had taught her never to do or say anything that might excite a barrister. She was related to a few. It had not improved her view of the advice they gave. 'Don't slander the banker if there is nothing wrong!'

  Pa wriggled and clammed up. He would be unable to resist pretending to his cronies that he knew something. That there was nothing to relate would not
stop him bending ears with a sensational tale. Patter was his business; he would make it up without noticing his own invention.

  I too should have kept quiet. Still, it was too late now. 'I suppose you've seen plenty of credit-brokers hanging around at auctions, ready to help out buyers with on-the-spot finance?'

  'All the time. Sometimes we attract more money touts than interested purchasers to take them up. Persistent bastards too. But we don't see Lucrio.'

  'No, I think the Aurelian Bank works more secretly.'

  'Dodges?' asked Pa.

  'No, just discreet.'

  'Oh really!'

  Even I smiled knowingly 'It's the Greek style, I'm told.'

  'You do mean dodges then,' sneered Pa. He and Helena chuckled together.

  I felt myself looking pompous. 'No need for xenophobia.'

  'The Greeks invented xenophobia,' Helena reminded me.

  'The Greeks are Romans now,' I claimed.

  'Not,' sneered Pa, 'that you would claim it when face to face with a Greek.'

  'Sensitivity to others. Why rub Attic noses in the rich dirt of Latium? Let them believe they are superior, if that's their religion. We Romans tolerate anyone – except, of course, the Parthians. And once we persuade them of the advantages of joining the Empire and having their long hair cut, we may even pretend to like the Parthians.'

  'You are joking,' scoffed Pa.

  I let a brief silence fall. Any moment now, somebody would mention the Carthaginians. Maia, whose husband had been executed for cursing Hannibal in his home region and then blaspheming the Punic gods, looked up from her work briefly as if she sensed what I was thinking.

  'So which company do you bank with?' Helena asked my father, with rather wicked insistence.

  He indulged her, though not much. 'This and that. Depends.'

  'On what?'

  'What I want.'

  'Pa never keeps much on deposit,' I told her. 'He prefers to have his capital in saleable goods – artworks and fine furniture.'

  'Why pay somebody to keep my currency secure?' Pa explained. 'Or allow a halfwit who couldn't spot a good investment in a goldmine to gamble with my cash? When I want a loan to make a big unplanned purchase, I can get it. My credit's good.'

  'That proves how stupid bankers are!' I joked.

  'How do they know they can trust you, Geminus?' Helena asked, more reasonably.

  Pa told her about the Columnia Maena, where credit merchants posted up details of clients who were looking for loans. It was the same story Nothokleptes had given me. 'Apart from that, it's all word of mouth. They consult one another; it's a big family party. Once you acquire a good reputation, you are in.'

  Helena Justina turned to me. 'You could do that kind of work, Marcus – checking that people are solvent.'

  'I have done, on occasion.'

  'Then you ought to advertise it as a regular service. You could even specialise.'

  'Make a change from being hired by the vigiles to solve cases they cannot be bothered to investigate.'

  I knew why Helena was interested. I was supposed to be going into partnership with one of her brothers – Justinus, if he ever deigned to come home from Spain. Both brothers, if we could build up a large enough client base. Regular customers, such as bankers checking whether clients were creditworthy, could be useful to our agency. I pretended to be dismissive – but then winked to let her know I had heard the suggestion.

  'Looking into the backgrounds of people who have not actually bludgeoned their relatives would be less dangerous too,' said Helena. I did not share her view of the business world.

  'I could start with my own father's background, I suppose.'

  'Get stuffed,' said Pa predictably.

  This time we all laughed together.

  The conversation reminded me about discovering who had poked Chrysippus with the scroll rod. I said I was going back to his house; Helena decided that first, while we were over at the Saepta Julia, it made sense to hire a litter, cross the Tiber, and visit our own new house on the Janiculan. She would come there with me. She could shout at Gloccus and Cotta, the bathhouse contractors.

  By reminding him about his terrible recommendation of these two home-destruction specialists, Helena persuaded Pa to look after Julia. Maia offered to bring the baby home for us at least as far as her house. We then were able to stroll out into Rome like lovers in the midafternoon.

  We spent a long time trying to advance things at the new house. Gloccus and Cotta packed up, rather than hear any more of our complaints. At least this time they had a good reason for leaving early. Usually it was because they could not work out how to rectify whatever had gone wrong with that morning's labour.

  Even after they vanished, we did not go straight back across to the Clivus Publicius. I'm not stupid. It was far too hot to flog all the way back to the city, and during the siesta there was no hope of finding any witnesses. Besides, this was a rare chance of solitude with my girl.

  XXV

  The stupid bastards were still working their way one at a time in order down the visitors' list. The epic poet had his turn with me next.

  I rather liked him. Euschemon had called him dull. Maybe his work was, but luckily I was not obliged to read it. One of life's odd quirks: authors you warm to as people somehow cannot see where their strength lies, but will insist on pouring out scroll after lifeless scroll of tedium.

  It was early evening. Rome shimmering after a long hot day. People coming alive after feeling utterly drained. Smoke from the bathhouse furnaces creating a haze that mingled with scented oven fumes. Flautists practising. Men in shop doorways greeting each other with a grin that meant they had been up to no good – or were planning it for later. Women shrieking at children in upper rooms. Really old women, who no longer had children to keep in order, now standing at their windows to spy on the men who were up to no good.

  I had reached the dogleg of the Clivus Publicius alone. Helena had gone to Maia's house to fetch Julia. We had been close for long enough not to want to part. But work had called.

  Now I was in a quiet mood. After loving the same woman for a period of years I had gone past both the panic that she might reject me and the crass exultancy of conquest. Helena Justina was the woman whose love could still move me. Afterwards, I bathed at an establishment where I was not known, unwilling to engage in conversation. Communicating with the Chrysippus writing circle held no real charm for me either. Still, it had to be done.

  It was a welcome surprise, therefore, to discover that the next of the hacks bothered to turn up for an interview, and that I took to him.

  Constrictus was older than the previous group, in his late fifties at least. Still, he looked spry and bright-eyed – more so than I expected since he had been accused by Scrutator of draining too many amphorae.

  Of course the flamboyant Scrutator, with his fund of off-colour stories, had carried his own traces of debauchery.

  'Come in.' I decided not to complain that he should have turned up this morning. 'I'm Falco, as I'm sure you know.' If Turius and the other two had warned Constrictus that I was a bastard to deal with, he hid his terror bravely. 'You're the epic poet?'

  'Oh not only epic. I'll try anything.'

  'Promiscuous, eh?'

  'To earn a living by writing you have to sell whatever you can.'

  'What happened to write from your own experience?'

  'Pure self-indulgence.'

  'Well, I was told that the big historical pageant is your natural genre.'

  'Too hackneyed. No untapped source material left,' he groaned. I had already observed this as a problem with Rutilius Gallicus and his heroic banalities. 'And, frankly,' confided Constrictus, 'throw up when I'm constantly trumpeting that our ancestors were perfect pigs in an immaculate sty. They were idle shits like us.' He looked earnest. I really want to produce love poetry.'

  'Source of contention with Chrysippus?'

  'Not really. He would have loved to discover the new Catullus. The p
roblem is, Falco, finding a suitable woman to address. It's either a prostitute – and who wants to be afflicted with helpless infatuation for any of those these days? Prostitutes are not what they were. You'll never find a modern version of sweet Ipsiphyle.'

  'The whores have deteriorated just like the heroes?' I sympathised. 'Sounds a good lament!'

  'Or the alternative is to fall obsessively for a highly-placed, beautiful amoral bitch who attracts scandal and has dangerous, powerful relatives.'

  'Clodia's long gone.' Catullus' famous high-born hag with the dead pet sparrow was another generation's scandal. 'For the best, some would say. With special thanks that Rome is free of her brother, that rich gangster thug. Are today's senatorial families too refined to produce such a bad girl?'

  'Jupiter, yes!' the poet lamented. 'Even good-time girls are not what they were And if you do strike it lucky, the bloody women won't co-operate. I found a playmate, Melpomene by name, lovely creature; I could have devoted my all to her. We were magic in bed. Then, when I explained that she needed to dump me or it was no good for my work, she burst out wailing. What does she come out with – listen to this, Falco! She said she really loved me, and couldn't bear to lose me, and why was I being so cruel to her?'

  I nodded, more or less with sympathy, though I assumed he was being humorous. 'Hard to work up a metaphorical sweat over honest loyalty.'

  Constrictus exploded with actual disgust. 'Jove, imagine it: an eclogue to a nymph who wants you, an ode about sharing your life.'

  For a moment, I found myself thinking about Helena. It took me far from this hard-edged, unhappy lyricist.

  'You could turn it into satire,' I suggested, trying to cheer him up 'How's this for an epigram – Melpomene, astonishing joy of my heart, I want to say "Don't go", but if I do, you'll die from lack of nourishment and the landlord's heavies will carve me up in the gutter for my unpaid rent. Poetry relies on misery. Leave me, please, and be quick about it – or my work won't sell.'

  He looked impressed. 'Was that extempore? You have a gift.'