I sighed. ‘I just want four hundred thousand sesterces-which I know I cannot get!’
‘Borrow it,’ said Helena.
‘Who from?’
‘Someone else who has got it.’ She thought I was too mean to pay the interest.
‘We’re in enough trouble. We don’t need to expire under a burden of debt. That’s the end of the subject.’ I tightened my arm around her and stuck out my chin. ‘Let’s see if you’re a woman of your word. You’ve been rude to me, princess-now how about being affectionate?’
Helena smiled. The smile itself made good her boast; the sense of well-being it brought to me was uncontrollable. She started tickling my neck, reducing me to helplessness. ‘Don’t issue a challenge like that, Marcus, unless you are sure you can take the consequences…’
‘You’re a terrible woman,’ I groaned, bending my head as I feebly tried to avoid her teasing hand. ‘You make me have hope. Hope is far too dangerous.’
‘Danger is your natural element,’ she replied.
There was a fold at the top of her gown which gaped slightly from her brooches; I made it wider and kissed the warm, delicate skin beneath. ‘You’re right; winter’s dreary. When clothes come back from the laundry, people put on too many of them-‘ It did provide entertainment when I tried taking some of them off her again…
We went to bed. In winter, in Rome, with neither hot air in wall-flues nor slaves to replenish banks of braziers, there is nothing else to do. All my questions remained unanswered; but that was nothing new.
XXXV
Gaius Baebius had not exaggerated how many records of incoming ships we would have to scrutinise. I went out with him to Ostia. I was not intending to stay there, only to provide initial encouragement, but I was horrified by the mounds of scrolls that my brother-in-law’s colleagues happily produced for us.
‘Jupiter, they’re staggering in like Atlas under the weight of the world! How many more?’
‘A few.’ That meant hundreds. Gaius Baebius hated to upset people.
‘How many years do you keep the records for?’
‘Oh we’ve got them all, ever since Augustus dreamed up the import duty.’
I tried to look reverent. ‘Amazing!’
‘Have you found out the name of the agent Festus used?’
‘No I haven’t!’ I barked tetchily. (I had forgotten all about it.)
‘I don’t want to find myself having to read this mountain twice-‘
‘We’ll have to ignore that aspect and do the best we can.’
We settled that I would run my thumb down looking at the ships’ names, while Gaius Baebius slowly perused the columns of whoever had commissioned them. I had a nasty feeling this method of splitting the details was likely to lose something.
Luckily I had left instructions with Helena that I would return home for any emergency-and to define ‘emergency’ liberally. Only next morning word came that I had to go back to see Geminus.
‘Sorry. This is a fiendish nuisance, Gaius, but I must go. Otherwise I’ll be breaking the conditions of my bail-‘
‘That’s fine, you go.’
‘Will you be all right carrying on for a while?’
‘Oh yes.’
I knew Gaius Baebius had decided that I was flicking through the documents too casually. He was glad to see me depart, so he could plod on at his own dire pace. I left him playing the big man among his gruesome customs cronies while I fled back to Rome.
The request to visit Geminus was genuine. ‘I would not send a false message when you were working!’ cried Helena, shocked.
‘No, my love… So what’s the urgency?’
‘Geminus is afraid the people who disrupted that auction are planning to strike again.’
‘Don’t say he’s changed his mind and wants my help?’
‘Just try not to get hurt!’ muttered Helena, hugging me anxiously.
As soon as I reached the Saepta, I had the impression the other auctioneers were greeting my appearance with knowing looks. There was a disturbing atmosphere. People were gossiping in small groups; they fell silent as I passed.
The rumpus had happened, this time right in the warehouse. Overnight intruders had vandalised the stock. Gornia, the chief porter, found time to tell me how he had discovered the damage that morning. Most of it had already been cleared up, but I could see enough smashed couches and cabinets to guess the losses were serious. Potsherds filled several buckets on the pavement, and glass fragments were rattling under someone’s broom. Bronzes stood covered in graffiti. Inside the wide doorway, what had been a garden statue of Priapus had now, as they say in the catalogues, lost its attribute.
‘Where’s himself?’
‘In there. He should rest. Do something with him, will you?’
‘Is it possible?’
I squeezed between a pile of benches and an upturned bed, stepped over some bead-rimmed copper pans, knocked my ear on a stuffed boar’s head, ducked under stools hung lopsidedly from a rafter, and cursed my way to the next division in the indoor space. Pa was on his knees, meticulously collecting up pieces of ivory. His face was grey, though he applied the usual bluster once I coughed and he noticed me. He tried to stand up. Pain stopped him. I grabbed him with one arm and helped him ease his stocky frame upright.
‘What’s this?’
‘Kicked in the ribs…’
I found two feet of free wall he could lean on and propped him there. ‘Does that mean you were here when it happened?’
‘Sleeping upstairs.’
‘Helena said you were expecting a racket. I could have been here with you, if you had warned me earlier.’
‘You have your own troubles.’
‘Believe me, you’re one of them!’
‘What are you so angry for?’
As usual with my relatives, I had no idea.
I checked him over for ruptures and fractures. He was still too shaken to stop me, though he did protest. There was one monstrous bruise on his upper arm, a few cuts on his head, and those tender ribs. He would live, but he had taken all he could. He was too stiff to make it to the office upstairs, so we stayed there.
I had been in the store enough times before to realise that despite the clutter there was more empty space than usual. ‘I see a lot of gaps, Pa. Does that mean you had the stuff smashed to ruins last night, or are you generally losing custom nowadays?’
‘Both. Word gets around if you’re having liveliness.’
‘So there is something wrong?’
He gave me a look. ‘I’ve called for you, haven’t I?’
‘Oh yes. Times must be bad! And I thought you just wanted to check that I hadn’t jumped bail.’
‘No chance of that,’ my father grinned. ‘You’re the cocky sort who is bound to think he can clear himself of the charge.’
‘As it’s murder, I’d better.’
‘And as it’s my money bailing you, you’d better not skip!’
‘I’ll repay the damned money!’ We were hard at it quarrelling again. ‘I never asked you to interfere! If I’m desperate Ma will always assist with a judicial bribe-‘
‘I bet that stings!’
‘Yes, it hurts,’ I admitted. Then I threw back my head in disgust. ‘Dear gods, how do I get in these messes?’
‘Pure talent!’ Pa assured me. He too breathed heavily and calmed down. ‘So when will you be solving the murder?’ I merely grimaced. He changed the subject: ‘Helena sent word she had to bring you back from Ostia. Did you scavenge a bite on the journey, or can you finish off my lunch for me? I couldn’t face it after the punch-up, but I don’t want her-at-home to start…’
Some traditions continued, regardless of the personnel. Ma had always sent him out with his midday meal in a basket. If he was sleeping away while he guarded some particularly valuable hoard, she doggedly despatched one of us with the bread, cheese and cold meat. Now the redhead was supplying him with his daily snack-probably no longer to keep him out of expensive
foodstalls, but simply because he had been trained to the routine.
I hated to be drawn into these new domestic arrangements. However, Helena had pushed me off without sustenance, and I was starving. I ate his meal. ‘Thanks. Not up to Mother’s standards, she’ll be glad to hear.’
‘You always were the charming one,’ sighed Pa.
He lived in style, actually. After I had chewed through the cold kidneys rolled in bacon, with slices of must cake soaked in a piquant sauce, my father roused himself enough to say, ‘You can leave me the beetroot.’
That took me back. He had always been a beet addict. ‘Here, then… Your bacon’s filled a hollow, but I could do with something to wash it down.’
‘Upstairs,’ said Pa. ‘You’ll have to go yourself.’
I made my way to the office. Here there was no evidence of the vandals, so perhaps Pa’s intervention had stopped them reaching this far. Presumably they would have tried to break into the money chest. There was a possibility they would come back again for it, I reflected anxiously.
I was still poking around for a wine flask when Geminus staggered up behind me after all. He found me looking at that week’s special.
It was one of the pots he loved, painted in a warm amber, with darker reliefs in several earthy tones. He had it set up on a none-too-subtle plinth. It appeared to be extremely old and Ionian, though I had seen similar at sales in Etruria. It had panache. There was a pretty striped foot, then a base decorated florally, above which the wide body carried a scene of Hercules leading the captive Cerberus to King Eurystheus, the king so terrified he had leapt into a large black cooking pot. The characters were full of life: Hercules with his lionskin and club, and Cerberus every inch a hound from Hades, his three heads distinguished by different shades of paint. Apart from his wriggly entourage of spotted snakes, Cerberus reminded me of Junia’s dog, Ajax. The vessel was beautiful. Yet somehow I felt dissatisfied.
Geminus had come in and caught me frowning. ‘Wrong handles!’
‘Ah!’ The oldest story in the world of fakes. ‘I knew something was odd. So your repair man needs a lesson in art history?’
‘He has his uses.’ The noncommittal tone warned me not to pursue this; I was intruding on the profane mysteries.
I could guess. Sometimes an article comes up for sale with an uncertain history or unconvincing provenance. Sometimes it is better to adapt the said item before it appears publicly: change a bronze palmette to an acanthus leaf; swap the head on a statue; give a silver tripod a satyr’s feet instead of a lion’s claws. I knew it was done. I knew some of the handy adaptors who did it. Sometimes I had been the frustrated member of an auction audience who suspected the changes but could not prove deceit.
It was part of my informing job to be aware of these procedures. I had a sideline tracing stolen art, though it never paid well. Collectors always expected a bargain, even for normal services. I grew tired of presenting an expenses bill, only to be asked if that was the best I could do on it. Most people who had treasures thieved were full of cheek, but they were novices. Giving them a ten per cent discount ‘for trade’ was an insult to the real connoisseurs at the Saepta.
‘It’s not what you’re thinking,’ my father told me suddenly. ‘I got it for nothing. The whole top was missing. My man re-created it, but he’s an idiot. With a wide neck, it should have body loops-‘ He gestured to make two lugs set below the shoulders. The repair had its two handles carried up and hooked on to the throat, like an amphora. ‘He can’t tell a vase from a bloody jug, that’s the truth of it.’ Catching my sceptical look, he felt obliged to add, ‘It’s for sale “as seen”. Naturally I’ll mention what’s been done-unless I really take against the customer!’
I restricted myself to saying, ‘Strikes me the demigod has tied Cerberus on a rather thin piece of string!’
Then Pa produced the ritual wine tray, and we sat around with the silly cups again.
I tried to take a firm filial grip. ‘Now stop behaving like a bonehead. This time you’re going to tell me what is going on.’
‘You’re as bad as your mother for having a rant.’
‘Somebody doesn’t like you, Father,’ I said patiently. ‘Somebody other than me!’
‘Someone wants some money,’ sneered my honourable parent. ‘Money I refuse to give.’
‘Protection?’
I saw his eyes flicker. ‘Not in essence. Paying up would protect me from this aggravation, certainly; but that’s not the dispute.’
‘Oh there is a dispute then?’ I demanded.
‘There was.’
‘Is it not settled?’
‘Temporarily.’
‘So they will leave you alone for now?’
‘For the time being.’
‘How did you achieve that?’
‘Simple,’ said Geminus. ‘While they were kicking seven bells out of me yesterday evening, I told them the person they really needed to argue with was you.’
XXXVI
I assumed an expression of Roman steadfastness and calm.
‘What’s up, son? Fly gone up your nose?’
‘I’m staying detached.’
‘You can’t. You’re in this-up to your neck.’
‘I’ll abdicate.’
‘Afraid not,’ he confessed. For once he looked guilty. ‘Not possible.’
This was ridiculous. Marponius was going to be planning a new trial list soon; I should have been back at Ostia seeking to clear my name.
No, I shouldn’t have been in this mess at all. I should have been living with my beloved in some peaceful villa in the country where my worst concern was whether to spend the morning catching up on my correspondence, or peel an apple for Helena, or go out and inspect the vines.
‘You look upset, son.’
‘Believe me, even before this news I was not exactly overflowing with Saturnalian jollity!’
‘You’re a Stoic’ I knew my father had no time for any flavour of philosophy. A typical Roman prejudice, based on the simple concept that thought is a threat.
I blew out my cheeks in irritation. ‘Let me struggle to understand what is happening. You know some violent people who have a long-standing grievance, and they have just been told by you that I’m the person they want to tackle about their debt? So good-mannered of you to warn me, Didius Geminus! Such fatherly respect!’
‘You’ll dodge out of it.’
‘I hope so! After I’ve dealt with any inconvenience from the auction-busters, I’ll be looking for somebody else to attack. I advise you to start getting nippy yourself.’
‘Show some piety,’ complained my father. ‘Show some parental reverence!’
‘Cobnuts!’ I said.
We were both breathing heavily. The situation felt unreal. Once, I had vowed I would never speak to my father again. Now here I was, sitting in his office with curious Egyptian gods peering over my shoulder from some inconsequential red and yellow furniture, while I let him lumber me with Hercules knows what troubles.
‘Was your roughing-up arranged by the legionaries?’
‘No,’ said Pa. He sounded pretty definite.
‘So it’s unconnected with the death of Censorinus?’
‘As far as I can see. Are you going to help out?’
I swore, not bothering to keep it under my breath. If I had stuck to my contempt for him, I could have avoided this. I ought to walk out now.
Yet there was only one answer to give him. ‘If you’re having a problem, naturally I’ll help.’
‘You’re a good boy!’ Geminus smirked complacently.
‘I’m a good informer.’ I kept my tone low and my temper cool. ‘You need a professional for this sort of work.’
‘So you’ll do the job?’
‘I’ll do the job, but while I’m trying to save my neck on the other count I can’t spare much time to dabble in auction fraud.’ He must have known what was coming even before I dished it up: ‘If I break into my schedule to do you a favour, you
’ll have to pay me at top rates.’
My father leaned back and stared at the ceiling in momentary disbelief. ‘He’s not mine!’
Unluckily for both of us, I certainly was.
‘If you don’t like it,’ I mocked, ‘you have a father’s usual remedy. Go ahead-disinherit me!’
There was a shifty pause. In fact I had no idea what would happen, on my father’s death, to the proceeds of his long auctioneering career. Knowing him, he had not addressed the issue. So that was another mess for me to sort out one day. If only to avoid it, I did my duty mentally and wished him a long life.
‘I gather you’re short of collateral?’ he smiled, immediately all smoothness again. He passed a weary hand through those uncombed grey curls. ‘Ah well, what are fathers for?’ More than I ever got from this one. ‘I’ll hire you if that seems to be the form. What are these rates we hear so much about?’ I told him, making a quick calculation and trebling them. (Well, he wanted me to get married.) He whistled in outrage. ‘No wonder you never have any clients. Your charges are deplorable!’
‘No worse than the auction percentage-and I work a lot harder for my wages. All you have to do is bawl loudly and bluff people. Informers need brains, bodyweight, and a gripping business sense.’
‘And too much cheek!’ he commented.
‘So that’s a contract,’ I said.
Whatever it was we were clinching had yet to be revealed. That did not bother me. Shyness was usual among my clients. The inquisition of the prospective customer was the first part of any job I ever did, and usually the trickiest. Compared to that, asking questions of mere villains, cheats and bullies was easy labour.
Pa poured himself more wine. ‘Drink on it?’
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