She spoke not in the tentative tone of one fabricating a lie for later use, but as if it were the truth she spoke even as she invented it. I could see she had much experience in lying. Tiro still would not look at her. ‘Please,’ he whispered. ‘Gordianus, can I go now?’
‘Absolutely not. I’ll need you here to tell me when she’s lying. Besides, you’re my witness. Leave me alone with her and she’s likely to invent sordid stories about my conduct.’
‘A slave can’t be a witness,’ she snapped.
‘Of course he can. I suppose they don’t teach Roman law to farmers’ daughters in Ameria, do they? A slave is a perfectly reliable witness, so long as his testimony is obtained under torture. Indeed, the law requires that a slave bearing witness must be tortured. So I hope you won’t scream and begin inventing trouble, Roscia Majora. Even if what you feel for Tiro is no more than contempt, I don’t think you’d want to be responsible for having him racked and burned with irons.’
She glared at me. ‘A monster, that’s what you are. Just like the rest. I despise all of you.’
The answer came effortlessly to my lips, but I paused for a long moment before saying it, knowing that after it was spoken there would be no turning back. ‘But your father most of all.’
‘I don’t know what you mean.’ There was a catch in her breath, and the anger that shielded her face abruptly vanished to reveal the pain beneath. She was a child after all, despite her craftiness. She fumbled about, trying to cover herself with that bitter shield and only half succeeding, so that when she spoke again it was as if she were half-naked, brazenly hostile, but with her vulnerability painfully exposed.
‘What is it that you want?’ she whispered harshly. ‘Why did you come here? Why can’t you just leave us alone? Tell him, Tiro.’ She reached for the arm that held her wrist and tenderly caressed it, glancing at Tiro and then casting her eyes demurely to the ground. The gesture seemed both calculating and sincere, manipulative and yet truly longing for tenderness in return. Tiro blushed to the roots of his hair. From the whiteness of his knuckles and the sudden grimace on Roscia’s face, I saw that he was squeezing her wrist painfully tight, perhaps not even knowing it.
‘Tell him, Tiro,’ she gasped, and no man could have said for certain whether the tears in her voice were genuine or not.
‘Tiro has already told me enough.’ I looked straight at her but shut my eyes to the pain on her face. I made my voice cold and hard. ‘Whom do you meet when you leave Caecilia’s house – I mean, besides Tiro? Is it here on this spot that you give your father’s secrets to the wolves who want to see him flayed alive? Tell me, you foolish child! What sort of bribe could convince you to betray your own flesh?’
‘My own flesh!’ she shrieked. ‘Betray my own flesh? I have no flesh! This is my father’s flesh, this!’ she tore her hand from Tiro’s grasp, pushed up her sleeve and pinched a handful of the flesh on her arm. ‘This flesh, this is his flesh!’ she said again, pulling up the hem of her gown to show me her bare white legs, pinching at the taut flesh as if she could tear it from the bone. ‘And this, and this! Not mine, but his!’ she shouted, tearing at herself, at her cheeks and hands and hair. When she pulled at the neck of her gown to bare her breasts, Tiro stopped her. He would have embraced her, but she slapped him away.
‘Do you understand?’ She shook as if she wept, but no tears came from her sparking, feverish eyes.
‘Yes,’ I said. Tiro sat beside her, shaking his head, still confused.
‘Do you really understand?’ A single tear sprang from one eye and threaded its way down her cheek.
I swallowed and slowly nodded. ‘When did it begin?’
‘When I was Minora’s age. That’s why —’ Suddenly she sobbed and could not speak.
‘Minora – the little one, your sister?’
She nodded. Tiro at last understood. His lips quivered. His eyes grew dark.
‘So this is your revenge – to help his enemies however you can.’
‘Liar! You said you understood! Not revenge – Minora …’
‘To save your sister from him, then.’
She nodded, turning her face in shame. Tiro watched her with a look of utter helplessness, moving his hands as if to touch her but afraid to. I could not bear to watch them both at once and turned my face to the empty, endlessly burning sky above.
A breeze wafted through the park, causing the leaves to hiss and then subside. Somewhere far away a woman shouted, and then all was quiet. Deep within the silence one could still make out the distant murmur of the city below. A single bird flew high overhead and bisected the heavens.
‘How did they come to you? How did they know?’
‘A man … it was here … one day.’ She no longer sobbed, but her voice was thin and broken. ‘I’ve come here every afternoon since we came to the city. It’s the only place that reminds me of home, of the country. One day a man came – they must have been watching Caecilia’s house, they knew I was his daughter. He scared me at first. Then we talked. Gossip, he called it, trying to make it sound innocent when he started talking about my father, as if he were just a curious neighbour. He must have thought he was so subtle, or else he thought I was an idiot, the way he started asking questions. He offered me a stupid little necklace, the kind of thing Caecilia would throw out with the rubbish. I told him to put it away and stop insulting me. I told him I wasn’t stupid and I knew just what he wanted. Oh, no, no, he says, and put on such a show I wanted to spit in his face. I told him to stop it, just to stop it! I knew what he wanted. I told him I knew he came from old Capito or Magnus, and he acted as if he’d never heard of them. I don’t care, I told him. I know what you want. And I’ll help you however I can. Finally he got it through his head. You should have seen his face.’
I stared into the ivy above her head, into the dense, dust-choked darkness, the domain of wasps and snails and the myriad smaller forms of life devouring and redevouring one another. ‘And you still come here every afternoon.’
‘Yes.’
‘And the same man always comes.’
‘Yes. And then I send him away, so I can be alone.’
‘And you tell him everything.’
‘Everything. What my father ate for breakfast. What my father said to my mother in their bed last night while I listened at the door. Every time Cicero or Rufus visits and what they say.’
‘And all the little secrets you can worm out of Tiro?’
She hesitated for just an instant. ‘Yes, that too.’
‘Such as my name, and the reasons Cicero hired me?’
‘Yes.’
‘Such as the fact that I asked Cicero to hire a guard for my house?’
‘Oh, yes. That was just yesterday. He questioned me very closely about that. He wanted to know very precisely what Tiro had told me, the exact details.’
‘And of course you’re very good at getting the exact details and remembering them.’
She looked straight at me. Her face had grown hard again. ‘Yes. Very good. I forget nothing. Nothing.’
I shook my head. ‘But what can you gain from it? What about your own life? What future can you have without your father?’
‘No worse than the past, no more horrible than all the years he made me … all the years I was his… .’
Tiro again tried to comfort her, and again she pushed him away.
‘But even if you hate him with such a murderous hatred, what life will you have, you and your mother and little Minora, if this thing runs its course? With no one to turn to, reduced to beggars—’
‘We’re beggars now.’
‘But your father may be acquitted. If that happens, there’s a chance we can restore his estates.’
She looked at me hard, considering what I said, weighing it while her face showed no expression. Then she delivered her judgment. ‘It makes no difference. If you offered me the choice of doing what I’ve done, or going back to the way things were before, then I’m still not sorry for it. I
’d do it all again. I would betray him in every way I could. I would do anything to help his enemies put him to death. Already he’s begun to move on her. I can see from the way he watches her when my mother leaves the room. The look in his eyes – sometimes he looks at Minora, and then at me, and he smiles. Can you imagine? He smiles to show me that he knows I understand. He smiles to remind me of all the times he’s taken his pleasure with me. He smiles, thinking of all the pleasure over all the years that he could take from Minora. Even now, with his life almost over, he still thinks about it. Perhaps it’s all he thinks about. So far I’ve kept her away from him – by guile, by lying; once I even threatened him with a knife. But do you know what I think? If they condemn him to death, it’s the last thing he’ll manage to do. Even if he has to do it in front of his executioners, he’ll find some way to rip off her clothes and put himself inside her.’
She shivered and swayed as if she might faint. In her helplessness she allowed Tiro to embrace her shoulders gently. Her voice was distant and hollow, as if it came from the moon. ‘He smiles because a part of him still believes they’ll never kill him. He thinks he’ll live forever, and if that’s true then there’s no way I can hope to stop him.’
I shook my head. ‘You hate him so much you don’t care whom your treachery hurts or how many innocent men you destroy. Twice now I might have been killed, because of you.’
She blanched, but only for an instant. ‘No man who helps my father is innocent,’ she said dully. Tiro’s embrace began to loosen.
‘And any man is worthy of your body if he can be of use to you?’
‘Yes! Yes, and I have no shame for it! My father has every right to me, so the law says. I’m just a girl, I’m nothing, I’m the dirt beneath his fingernails, hardly better than a slave. What weapons do I have? What can I use to protect Minora? Only my body. Only my wits. So I use them.’
‘Even if your treachery means my death?’
‘Yes! If that’s the price – if others have to die.’ She began to cry again, realizing what she had said. ‘Though I never thought, I never knew. It’s only him I hate.’
‘And whom do you love, Roscia Majora?’
She struggled to quiet her weeping. ‘Minora,’ she whispered.
‘And no one else?’
‘No one.’
‘What about the boy in Ameria, Lucius Megarus?’
‘How do you know about him?’
‘And Lucius’s father, the good farmer Titus, your father’s best friend in the world?’
‘That’s a lie,’ she snapped. ‘Nothing happened with him.’
‘You mean you offered yourself, and he refused you.’ I was almost as surprised as Tiro when her silence admitted the truth. He pulled away from her entirely. She seemed not to notice.
‘Who else has known your favours, Roscia Majora? Other slaves in Caecilia’s household, in return for spying on your father? The spy who meets you here, this creature of the enemy, what about him? What happens after you give him the information he wants?’
‘Don’t be stupid,’ she said dully. She was no longer weeping now, but sullen.
I sighed. ‘Tiro means nothing to you, does he?’
‘Nothing,’ she said.
‘He was only a tool that you used?’
She looked into my eyes. ‘Yes,’ she said. ‘Nothing more than that. A slave. A foolish boy. A tool.’ She began to look at him, then turned away.
‘Please—’ Tiro began.
‘Yes,’ I said. ‘You can go now, Tiro. We’ll both go. There’s nothing more to say.’
He did not attempt to touch her again, nor did he look at her. We stepped between the tangled leaves until we emerged into the slanting rays of the afternoon sun. Tiro shook his head, kicking at the dirt. ‘Gordianus, forgive me,’ he began, but I cut him short.
‘Not now, Tiro,’ I said, as gently as I could. ‘Our little tryst is not quite over. I suspect we are being watched even now – no, don’t look over your shoulder; look straight ahead and notice nothing. Every afternoon, she said. She would not have seen the man before your visit; she will see him after. He’s only waiting for us to leave. Follow me to that willow tree that stands at the corner of Caecilia’s house. If we stand behind it, I think we shall be able to watch the approach to Roscia’s hiding place unobserved.’
We did not have long to wait. Only moments later a man in a black tunic stole across the open street and disappeared into the green defile. I motioned for Tiro to follow. We hurried back and made our way into the greenery until I began to hear their voices. I motioned for Tiro to stop. I strained my ears but caught only a few words before I glimpsed Roscia in a break between the yew trees. As luck would have it she saw me as well. For an instant I thought she would be silent, but she was loyal to her father’s enemies to the end.
‘Go!’ she shouted. ‘Run! They’ve come back!’
There was a sound of crashing foliage as the man blundered towards us.
‘No!’ she screamed. ‘Go the other way.’ But the man was too panic-stricken to hear. He crashed headlong into my arms, butting his head against mine and knocking me to the ground. An instant later he was on his feet again, knocking Tiro aside. Tiro ran after him, but the pursuit was useless. I followed and met him in the open street, returning with a defeated look on his face and streaming sweat. He was holding his forearm, where a thorn on one of the rose bushes had scratched him.
‘I tried, Gordianus, but I couldn’t catch him.’
‘Good; if you had you’d probably have got a knife in your ribs. It makes no difference. I got a close enough look at his face.’
‘Yes?’
‘A familiar face in the Subura, and in the Forum for that matter. A hireling of Gaius Erucius the prosecutor. I thought as much. Erucius stops at nothing to obtain his evidence.’
We made our way wearily down the slope of the Palatine, and though the way was downhill it nevertheless seemed long and hard. For interrogating the girl so harshly I felt a deep and bitter shame, but I had done it for Tiro’s sake. He had loved her before; the revelation of her suffering made him love her even more – I had seen it blossom before my eyes. Such a hopeless passion could only bring him unending pain and regret. Only her own rejection could set him free, and so I had striven to stir up all her bitterness for him to see. But now I began to wonder if Roscia had conspired with me for Tiro’s sake, for the final look she had given me before she spoke had told me she understood, and when she spoke of Tiro with such naked scorn it may have been the truth, or it may have been the last gift of tenderness she could give him.
XXIV
We returned to the house on the Capitoline to find Rufus gone. Cicero was resting, but had left word that I should be shown to him at once. While Tiro quietly busied himself in the study, Old Tiro, the doorkeeper, led me deeper into the house, into a region I had not seen before.
Cicero’s bedchamber was as austere as the one he had given me. The only concession to luxury was the small private garden which opened onto the room, in which a tiny fountain sparkled and wept, reflecting in gentle waves the pensive face of the Minerva which stood over it. Cicero’s idea of rest was apparently to work lying down rather than standing up. I found him lying flat on his back, poring over a sheaf of parchment in his hands. More bits of parchment lay scattered about the floor.
I told him in cold, simple language the facts of Roscia’s treachery – her father’s abuse, her bitterness, Gaius Erucius’s wiliness in turning the girl’s desperation to his own advantage. The news seemed to have no effect on Cicero at all. He asked a few questions for clarification, nodded to show that he understood, then resumed reading with a curt wave of dismissal.
I stood over him, puzzled and uncertain, wondering if the revelation of Roscius’s character could have no effect on him at all. ‘It means nothing to you?’ I finally said.
‘What?’ He wrinkled his brow in irritation, but did not look up.
‘Parricide or not, what kind of man is this
Sextus Roscius?’
Cicero lowered the parchment to his chest and met my gaze for a long moment before he spoke. ‘Gordianus, listen to me carefully. At this moment I have no interest in weighing the character of Sextus Roscius, or in assessing his moral peccadillos. The information you’ve brought me yields nothing that might be of help to me in my preparations; I have no use for it. I have no time for it – no time for anything that distracts from the simple, closed circle of logic I’m striving so earnestly to build in Sextus Roscius’s defence. Your duty, Gordianus, is to help me build that edifice, not to go kicking at its foundation or pulling out bricks I’ve already mortared in place. Do you understand?’
He didn’t bother to see whether I nodded or not. With a sigh and a wave he dismissed me and went back to studying his notes.
I found Bethesda in my bedchamber. She was busy staining her nails with a new henna compound she had discovered at a market near the Circus Flaminius, where she had spent most of the day strolling and gossiping. She was just finishing her big toe. She sat leaning forwards with her leg bent so that her gown folded back to bare her thigh. She smiled and wiggled her toes like a child.
I stepped close to her and stroked her hair with the back of my hand. She narrowed her eyes and raised her cheek, brushing the soft, smooth skin against my knuckles. I felt like an animal suddenly, weary of thoughts and craving only to sink into the body’s sensations.
Instead I found myself beset by confusion. The image of Roscia kept flitting at the edges of my mind, inflaming me, making my face burn with a heat that was neither purely lust nor shame but both mixed together. I ran my hand over Bethesda’s flesh, closed my eyes and saw the girl’s naked, quivering body locked between the wall and Tiro’s thrusting flanks. I put my lips to Bethesda’s ear; she sighed and I shuddered because I imagined I heard her whisper the little girl’s name, ‘Minora, Minora.’ Surely I had seen the child when I first interviewed Sextus Roscius, but I couldn’t remember her face at all. I could only see Roscia’s face contorted with anguish while I interrogated her, the same look she had worn when Tiro had his way with her.
Gordianus The Finder Omnibus (Books 1-4) Page 26