I frowned; there was something wrong here.
'Where was this tomb?' That was Lippillus. He'd obviously decided that he'd played the stooge for long enough.
'Somewhere in the Caere cemeteries. Clusinus wouldn't tell him the exact location.'
'He mention any more partners?' I said. 'Your brother, I mean?'
'No. Not to me. Only him and Clusinus.'
'Not a smoothie lawyer called Gaius Aternius?'
'You asked me that before. I've never heard of the man.'
'You said that about Titus Clusinus too, pal.'
'It's the truth, nevertheless.'
Uh-huh. Well, there was no reason for Bubo to tell his brother about any arrangement with Gaius Aternius. Not that that would save the Owl once the bastard got around to...
I stopped and backtracked as the implications of what we were being told caught up with me.
Shit.
We weren't talking tombs at all. The Owl had said one tomb; one tomb, precise location unspecified, with a secret way in...
Hell. If the guy was telling the truth then we were screwed. I'd been basing my theory on tombs, plural, looted over a period of months or years; also on the assumption that both the other partners would know which tombs Clusinus would be robbing at any particular time. Or at least the area involved. They'd have to, because the Cominii would need that information to work their trick with the militia.
One tomb 'somewhere in the Caere cemeteries' that only Clusinus knew about and was robbing in his free time made the whole thing a nonsense. There was no point to an arrangement with the Cominii at all. And if that went then everything went.
Jupiter's balls on a string! I felt like weeping!
'Corvinus? You all right?' Lippillus was staring at me.
'Sure,' I said. 'Just a touch of wind.'
That got me another strange look, but Lippillus was no fool and he didn't chase the subject. Oh, well, it wasn't the end of the world. We weren't beat yet. Maybe Clusinus had had his own deal going with the Cominii and Aternius had just hired him to kill Navius. When you got down to it the tomb scam didn't actually need to have anything directly to do with the murders at all, I'd already worked that out. Not Clusinus's or Navius's, anyway. And Bubo's death could still be coincidence. It was just a case of letting the pattern rearrange itself.
I turned back to the Owl. 'So how far gone was this scam?' I said. According to the original theory it'd never got further than a gleam in Bubo's wicked little eye. Now everything was back up for grabs I just didn't know what to assume any more.
'Clusinus was still...negotiating with my brother, as I understand.'
'Yeah? Using what as bait?' The eyes blinked, but that was all I got. Something cold touched my spine. Why I'd asked the question I didn't quite know, but it'd gone home. I felt Lippillus tense up, too. 'Come on, Owl! Your brother was a smart businessman. A small-time crook from out in the sticks tells him he's got a private tunnel into a big Caere tomb but wants some money up front before he starts stripping it, Bubo's going to send him away with a flea in his ear. If he can still talk for laughing. Unless the guy happens to have a couple of samples to get him hooked, prove the whole thing's on the level. And in that case Bubo would want to test the market, see how much the deal was likely to be worth. That means you. So give!'
Silence. Lippillus cleared his throat.
'Or of course if you prefer instead,' he said conversationally, 'while Corvinus here carries on his chat with you I could go round to the local Watch Headquarters and bring back Quadratus and a few of the lads to turn over your shop. In which case the provenance of everything we find – and I mean everything – will be investigated very carefully indeed, and should the requisite purchase receipts not be immediately forthcoming we will then pin your crooked hide to your fancy front door with the rustiest set of nails we can lay our hands on in the short time available to us. How does that sound?'
The Owl blinked at him. Then without a word he went over to the strongbox that stood against one of the walls, took a key from his mantle fold, opened it and brought something out. He handed it to Lippillus.
I looked. The thing was a gold bracelet with a raised granular decoration. It was old, very old, and one of the most beautiful bits of jewellery I'd ever seen. Jupiter alone knew what it'd sell for, but I'd've hated to be picking up the tab.
'Thank you,' Lippillus said formally. 'I'll give you a receipt, naturally.'
'Don't bother,' the Owl said. 'Just take it and get the hell out of my shop.'
'As you like. That's all?'
'All I got. All my brother ever got. I swear it.'
Lippillus weighed the thing in his hand and looked at me. I nodded.
'Well, I hope you're right, Owl,' he said. 'I really do. Because if we find you're lying you'll be lucky to end up peddling good-luck charms from a tray in Cattle-market Square with both your hands attached.'
The Owl swallowed and said nothing.
As we left, my brain was buzzing. I'd seen a piece like that before; another bracelet, not nearly so fine, sure, or so big, but the style was the same. Thupeltha had been wearing it when I'd last seen her in Vesia's kitchen.
38.
There wasn't much else I could do in Rome, not as far as the case was concerned. In a way it'd been a wasted journey: finding out that Crispus was the praetor's rep for Caere had been a real bummer, and all my talk with the Owl had done was pull the plug on my pet theory. Or part of it, anyway. On the other hand, at least I knew now that the rep would be Crispus and that particular avenue was a dead end, and on the personal level I was quite looking forward to the trial. Maybe Aternius hadn't passed on my name to the Roman authorities or more likely Crispus hadn't bothered to read the preliminary info sheet properly; but whatever the reason was he obviously didn't know who Papatius's lawyer would be, and I'd been very careful not to tell him. I could just see the look on the bastard's face when he came into court and saw me on the defending counsel's bench.
Another plus was that I'd got the bracelet. I'd thought Lippillus might've hung on to it as evidence against the Owl, but he'd shrugged as he'd handed it over.
'Evidence for what, Corvinus?' he'd said. 'Sure, we've got his witnessed admission that it came from a tomb, and maybe we could nail him for fencing stolen goods. But the admission is all we've got. His partners are dead, the scam's buried and we don't know which tomb it came from. The Owl's slid out from under too many raps already, and this time I want him stitched. If you can use it to find the information from the other end go ahead with my blessing.' He grinned. 'And if the bastard does happen to get his head bashed in like his brother in the next few days Quadratus won't be shedding any tears.'
I winced. A nice guy, Lippillus, but all Watch commanders have that hard streak to them; it goes with the job. And he didn't like crooks.
I'd planned to go straight back to Vetuliscum the next morning, but I decided that wouldn't be fair to Perilla and the Princess: two ten-hour coach journeys inside three days doesn't constitute much of a holiday, and the lady still had the other half of the Saepta to buy up. So we spent the day bumming around. I took my walk through the Subura – it hadn't changed much, except some bits of it had fallen down and been replaced with other bits that looked the same, only in worse condition – and called in at Scylax's Gym to check that the financial whizz-kid Daphnis wasn't screwing me over the accounts. The place was doing pretty well. The ex-centurion I'd got in when Scylax had died to handle the practical side of the business had gone on the wagon – when he'd started to see little green and pink Illyrian tribesmen crawling up the walls his long-suffering daughter had finally blown the whistle and pocketed the wine cellar key – and the punters were getting real value for money. He was no masseur, though, and Daphnis had hired a big guy from Patavium with muscles like rocks and hands like grappling hooks. I risked one session and decided to let my flab stay where it was. In the evening we had Lippillus and Marcina round to dinner, and I sent one of Mother's
slaves to Agron's place in Ostia to ask him and his wife as well. Meton went overboard and cooked us an ostrich. Jupiter knew where he'd got it from – high-class poultry you need to order days in advance, unless it's featured on the programme at the Games in which case there's a temporary glut – but it made his holiday, too, and a happy chef is a thing of pure delight.
We made the return trip next day.
That bracelet of Thupeltha's was preying on my mind the whole journey. Yeah, the natural assumption was that she'd got it from Clusinus as a love-gift, but I had reservations about that explanation: the lady had said herself that there'd been nothing between the two but sex, and if both parties had been happy with that arrangement, which they seemed to have been, then love-gifts just didn't figure. Also, like I'd noticed at the time, the thing was worth serious money. I hadn't known Clusinus when the guy was a viable proposition, but from what I'd heard about him he didn't seem the kind to throw pricey presents around. Added to which with Larth Papatius growling away in the background it was in his interests to keep his affair with Thupeltha low-key.
So if not from Clusinus then where had she got it? Not from Bubo; as far as I knew there was no connection there, and in any case I couldn't see that sharp entrepreneurial bastard dishing out gold bracelets either, especially when he already had a girlfriend who'd no doubt show herself more than usually grateful for a snazzy piece of jewellery like that. And why should Bubo give Thupeltha a present of any kind?
The only other candidate was Gaius Aternius.
Sure, the Owl had said he wasn't involved in the tomb-robbing scam, and if Clusinus hadn't needed anyone to watch his back as far as the militia were concerned then he didn't have a role to play there anyway. Still, like I'd said that was no reason for scrubbing him out of the picture altogether. If he wanted Navius dead, which he did, and a suitable fall-guy to frame for the killing, which he also did, then Clusinus was as good as any and far better than most, and the connection between them still held. At the same time, Clusinus had his own scam cooking with the tomb-robbing angle, and in his free moments he was screwing Thupeltha. So. Let's put Aternius, Thupeltha, Clusinus, the tomb and the murders together and see what came up.
The first point was the lady's credibility, or rather lack of it. I'd rate Thupeltha's honesty and frankness quotient pretty low now, if not at absolute zero. She knew about the tomb, sure she did: the fact that she had the bracelet alone proved that, because you don't find these things at your friendly local jeweller's. Which meant either that Clusinus had told her or she'd found out about it some other way. And if Thupeltha knew about the tomb then we were looking at a whole new ball game.
Second there was her susceptibility where men were concerned. I didn't like Aternius myself, but the guy obviously had an attraction for women: he'd hooked Sicinia Rufina, I'd seen the effect he'd had on Mother and even Perilla had started out on his side. If for reasons of his own Aternius had made a play for Thupeltha then I wouldn't've laid any bets against her having taken him on: Clusinus may've been up to par as a local stud, but the mayor of Caere's nephew would be a real catch.
Okay; so let's work on the assumption that Aternius and Thupeltha are an item, and that they're in this together for their own separate reasons. Or maybe that Aternius is using Thupeltha to further his own schemes. How would it work?
Scenario. Aternius has fixed it with Clusinus to get rid of Navius as per the theory. Now what he has to do is to set up the actual murder so that Clusinus is sure to take the rap. The problem is that both the prospective victim and the prospective killer are free agents. He has to bring them together at a place and time of his own choosing without either of them knowing they've been manoeuvred, whereupon things will take their natural course; and that's tricky.
The answer's Thupeltha. With her on the team the problem disappears because Thupeltha's got an in with both Navius and Clusinus and she can swing the deal without arousing either guy's suspicions. On the chosen day she arranges a meeting with each of them separately, but for the same place and the same time; not in the holm-oak grove, like she said, but further up the track. She goes as far as the grove and hides in the bushes while Navius goes past. Then she waits for long enough to fit in with the story she'll tell later about talking to Navius and sets off home. Meanwhile Navius has met with Clusinus, who chops him according to contract and leaves the scene of the crime. At which point Priscus strolls up unexpectedly, does his bit with the knife and junks Aternius's whole plan for him.
So far so good, and it fitted the facts as well as anything else did. Now for the cover-up.
Thupeltha's running scared. Clusinus doesn't know about her connection with Aternius, but he knows damn well that she's lied and is lying about the grove being the meeting point, and soon he's going to start wondering why, which neither she nor Aternius want. According to the original plan it wouldn't've mattered because he'd already be behind bars and to have raised the point would've put the noose round his neck faster than he could spit, but now he isn't even on the list. Nevertheless, both he and she know he did the killing. So she talks it over with Aternius. They decide that to give them breathing space she'll offer, out of the goodness of her heart, to do Clusinus a favour: she'll tell the world that Navius left her vowing suicide.
For Aternius it's only a stopgap, sure: Clusinus knows too much to live. The problem is, he's already been tagged as the honest citizen who reports a murder, and first impressions are hard to shift. So instead of being zeroed by judicial process he has to be killed personally, and that's a bummer because as soon as it happens people will start thinking again in terms of foul play. Luckily this smartass Roman comes up with the perfect theory which lets him pin both killings on Thupeltha's husband Larth Papatius...
That was the stumbling block. Sure, the marriage was no marriage at all in the real sense, and Thupeltha was a cold bitch, but was she cold enough to stand by and see her husband set up for a murder he hadn't committed? Because this, if anywhere, was where the bracelet had come in. I remembered her telling me categorically the morning Papatius had been arrested that the guy hadn't done it; telling me, not Aternius, and that was the point. Him she hadn't spoken to at all. She hadn't said a word, in fact, from the moment we came in to the time they'd left taking her husband with them, and maybe that had been significant. Jupiter knew how Aternius had found out about Clusinus's tomb – maybe he'd known all along, or maybe he'd forced the information out of the guy before he'd killed him – but if the theory was right Thupeltha had traded her husband's life for a cut of the deal, and that I just didn't like to think about.
Yeah. It was all possible, sure. Whether it was true was another matter. What was certainly true was that I'd have to have another talk with Thupeltha.
39.
The day after we got back was another one of these close, thundery ones with lightning flickering in the hills to the east. The rains couldn't be far off now. I had an early breakfast and set off into Vetuliscum. I'd got the Owl's bracelet in my pouch to show Priscus in the hopes that he might be able to tell me about it, maybe even suggest a tomb it might've come from.
I called in at Thupeltha's first. She was in the yard round the side of the wine shop, collecting eggs. Pleased to see me was something the lady wasn't.
'Corvinus.' She straightened. She was still wearing the bracelet. It winked at me in the sunlight. 'I thought you were in Rome.'
'I was. I found this.' I pulled out the Owl's bracelet. 'Snap.'
She looked at it, then slowly set the bowl down and wiped her hands on her tunic. 'So?' she said.
If I'd thought she'd show some signs of guilt I was disappointed. Cold was right. I pushed a bit harder. 'Who did you get yours from, Thupeltha? Gaius Aternius? And why did he give you it?'
I wasn't expecting what happened next. She took two steps towards me, brought back her fist sideways and slammed me hard across the face. It was like being slugged with a marble column.
'Now you get out of here,' she said
quietly.
At least I'd managed to stay on my feet. I felt my jaw. It moved, but it hurt like hell, one of my teeth felt loose and I could taste blood. Jupiter, the lady packed a punch! I'd been socked before, but not often as professionally as that.
'Clusinus was robbing tombs,' I said. 'Or rather a tomb. That's where the bracelets came from. I had this one from a guy called Herminius Bubo's brother in Rome. So how did you get yours?'
'Titus gave me it.' She picked up the eggs. 'I wouldn't touch that slimy bastard Aternius with a barge-pole. Now get off my land, and don't come back.'
Maybe she was lying, but it sounded true. And that clout had carried conviction. Well, maybe I had over-theorised a little here. Still, it was too late to back out now.
I shook my head. 'Not this time, lady,’ I said. ‘That's stolen property you've got there. You can tell me about it, or you can tell the authorities, but you'll have to tell one of us. The difference is the second way you'll be facing a receiving rap, maybe worse.'
She stood glaring at me, her heavy breasts rising and falling above the bowl she was clutching to her stomach. Finally, she nodded.
'All right,' she said. 'So Titus robbed a tomb. He was a crook, but then I knew that. It had nothing to do with anything.'
'Which tomb? Where?'
'How would I know? The bracelet was a gift. You never met Titus. He could be generous when he could afford it. And he obviously thought he could afford it.'
'He never told you?'
'No.'
She was lying, or at least hiding something: there was hesitation there.
'Look, Thupeltha,' I said, 'this is important. I couldn't care less about the bracelet itself, but I have to know where it came from. Clusinus is dead, but I've a fair idea now who killed him and why. And the why has something to do with the tomb; maybe not directly but it's a factor. Anything you can tell me might just pin the guy responsible.'
Old Bones (Marcus Corvinus Book 5) Page 24