Place: patrol house, Fourth Cohort of Vigiles, Aventine.

Subject: conversation between L. Petronius Longus and M. Didius Falco, in the presence of Q. Camillus Justinus.

Mood: tense.

'I've got the story for you.'

'Something happened. That's obvious.'

'Look, Falco -'

'You're sounding defensive.'

'I'm d.a.m.n well not.'

'Well, d.a.m.n well get on with it.'

'Perseus refused to tell them anything. And he's no longer available.'

'Translate that, Petro. What pretty vigiles excuse is "no longer available"?'

'He's dead.'

'They killed him?'

'It's not their fault.'

'Oh please!'

'The courts expect a high standard of battery, if it's to count as torture legally.'

'Oh I'd really call this a "high standard"!'

'They are not all as skilled as Sergius -'

'Oh Quintus, don't you like the comparison? Sergius is the penalty man in this cohort. Here, torture is no more dangerous than a sheep shearing picnic in the Apennines. Here they can squeeze your goolies off so delicately you stay alive and keep on making helpful statements for absolutely weeks.'

'Spare me your sarcasm. The Second slipped up, Falco. Sometimes it's a risk.'

'Some risk. These incompetents have removed the one witness who might have told us the truth.'

LI.

I WAS BITTERLY angry. But in fact there were still other possible witnesses.

I badly wanted to sort this. The one thing that had always bothered me about accusing Calpurnia was that her family had a secret, one I still did not know. I was working blind. And that meant I could be caught out by some angle I had failed to antic.i.p.ate. I was right to be wary: by the end of that evening I would know it too.

I was keen to pressurise Zeuko. Anything Perseus had known was likely to have been pa.s.sed on by him to her - unless he had learned it from Zeuko in the first place. Unfortunately, since the wet-nurse had stupidly run to the Second's patrol house when she heard Perseus was in custody, the Second were now holding Zeuko herself as a suspected accomplice of the dead slave. (They had had no charge against Perseus - except that he had let himself be killed under torture, clearly a suspicious act.) To mollify me, Petro volunteered to try to inveigle himself in to examine Zeuko, but he warned me the Second were jumpy.

'I'm doing you a big favour, Falco -'

'Ah well,' I sneered, throwing his own words back to him. 'What are friends for?'

That left the Metellus steward. As the Second could not touch him because he was a free man, they had released him and he had gone home. Although it was late, I returned to the Fifth Region to attempt an interview. I went alone. Justinus had pressing reasons; to unload his travel packs at the senator's house; he needed to make his peace with his wife over absconding to Lanuvium. He was upset about losing Perseus too. He would tell me the full story of his journey tomorrow.

I found the Metellus spread in darkness, apparently deserted. Maybe Calpurnia had gone into retreat. Perhaps one of her daughters had offered her hospitality. The trial was bound to be distressing her. And she had no slaves, because they were all being processed by the vigiles.

Even the steward had failed to gain entry to the house. He possessed no latch-lifter or key; well, there had always been a porter to let people in. I found him drinking himself senseless at the nasty bar opposite. I told him about Perseus, hoping shock would make him open up. No use. He was still singing the old song: he knew that a secret shadowed the Metellus family, but had no idea what. Perseus had discovered it, but never revealed his blackmail material. Perseus had boasted that the family were at his mercy - and he intended to keep it that way.

The door porter had not been entirely immune, however. He was a slave still. His age was under thirty, so in law he could not be manumitted. And because he was a slave, when he finally went too far, Calpurnia had lost her temper and dispatched him to Lanuvium to be kept under control by the trusted freedman, Julius Alexander.

'So Alexander knows the secret?'

'He must do, but he's one of the family. He won't tell. Anyway,' maundered the steward. 'Alexander is in Lanuvium.'

No he was not. Justinus had persuaded him to come to Rome. I kept that to myself.

I offered to help the steward break in to the house, but he was content to stay in a room above the bar that night. I had the impression he would probably not bother to crawl up the stairs to a sleeping-pallet, but would remain propped up against the counter, pouring in drink like a man who had just discovered wine. He had lost all his elegance. He was as dishevelled and inarticulate as any street dosser who was down on his luck. It looked as if this steward was heading for a grim future.

Once more I encouraged him to go home. Drunkenly refusing to budge, he repaid me for my thoughtfulness by dropping me right in it.

'You asked me once, Falco - what was the last meal my master ate. I do remember -' He had never forgotten. 'It was cold meats and salad. What we always had. But my master had been sent a present, she said it was to seek his forgiveness... Lying little cow.'

Something cold tickled my upper spine. 'What present?'

'Two nice quails in a silver dish. We never had quails. Calpurnia finds little birds creepy. I never buy larks or fig-p.e.c.k.e.rs... But my master liked them. He laughed and told me he would never forgive the woman, but he was very fond of game so he told me not to mention the present - then he ate the quails.'

You can feed hemlock to quails, and then eat the quails... 'Have you told anyone else about this?'

'n.o.body asked me.'

That old nonsense! This steward was either too scared - or-he had hoped for some gain for himself.

'So who sent the present? Who are we talking about?'

'Who do you think? Saffia.'

I warned the steward to take life easy, then I left him and went home. I walked slowly. I took the longest route I could think of. I had a lot to think about.

There was no doubt from the way the trial had been going - and the other side's desperate reactions - that we were winning. We could convict Calpurnia Cara successfully. But somebody else had killed Metellus.

For my partners and me, this was disastrous. No way out: we had to look into it. If the steward's claim was substantiated, our charge was untenable. Everything had been for nothing. And before I even dared to break the news to the others, I knew we could not sustain the damage. We had wrongly accused a woman of senatorial rank. She had a top defender on her side. The charge was a dreadful slur on the innocent; the case had been a terrible ordeal for her. Paccius Africa.n.u.s, whom I had so fiercely humiliated two days ago, would demand compensation - on a grand scale.

Marponius would lose his chance of glory with the case, so he would hate us. Why blame him? We had made the accusation and if we withdrew, we were liable. Damaging a person of status with a fraudulent pet.i.tion had always been slammed with heavy penalties. Marponius would award our victim whatever Paccius asked.

I dared not even think how high the price would be.

I knew the result, though. Falco and a.s.sociates were finished. The two young Camillus boys and Honorius would be named jointly in the penalty award. I could not shield them, even if I wanted to. I had some savings, but no financial capacity to cover their commitment. Nor could we recoup our loss through a pet.i.tion for murder against Saffia Donata; Saffia was dead. My resources would go nowhere. My future, and the future of my family, had just been wiped out. We were all ruined.

LII.

I HAD PLANNED to keep it to myself Helena winkled it out of me. She seemed less troubled than I was, but then she had never lived too long in abject poverty. Our days in my old apartment up in Fountain Court had pa.s.sed like an adventure for her. The cramped conditions, leaky roof and unpleasant, violent neighbours had been soon superseded by a larger, quieter set of rooms. Though not much better than our first dreadful nest, for Helena even they had now faded to a memory.

It all came back to me readily. The bugs. The creaking joists, threatening to cave in at any heavy footfall. The dirt. The noise. The theft and battery; the disease and debt. The threats from fellow lodgers, the smoke from wonky cooking benches, the screaming children. The smell of urine on the stairs - not all of it coming from the vats in Lenia's laundry. Lenia bawling drunkenly. The filthy, filthy-hearted landlord...

'If you were just to withdraw, honestly telling Marponius that you made a mistake, Marcus -'

'No. It's no let-out.'

'So you began the case - and you have to finish or become liable?'

'We could keep quiet, of course. Convict Calpurnia, and send her to her death... My conscience won't cope with that.'

'Anyway,' murmured my sensible girl, 'somebody else might come forward with evidence. Keeping quiet would be too dangerous.'

I fell asleep shortly afterwards. I was holding Helena, smiling against her hair - smiling at the ridiculous thought that this model of rect.i.tude might have let us cover up the truth if she thought we could get away with it. She had lived with me too long. She was becoming a pragmatist.

Helena herself must have lain awake for much longer. She knew how to keep still, shielding her busy thoughts from me. For her, if we could not hold back the new evidence, then we would d.a.m.n well fight to minimise the damage. She was planning how. Her first move was to ensure that the steward's tale was true.

By the time I was up, she had started. While it was still dark, she summoned the others, explained the situation, ordered them not to panic, then addressed avenues to be explored. Honorius was due in court again today. He was to warn Marponius that we had a new witness whose testimony we thought it fair to investigate; he would request a short adjournment. We might be allowed a day; longer was unlikely. Meanwhile, Justinus was to take a full, formal statement from the steward. Aelia.n.u.s was to revisit the funeral director, Tiasus; Helena had looked through the old case-notes and had spotted that originally we were told the Metellus funeral was to have had 'clowns', plural. She told Aelia.n.u.s to find out who the others were, and ask them for anything they knew about the background enquiries carried out by the murdered Spindex before he was paid off by Verginius Laco.

'Especially, ask who Spindex used as his informer,' she was instructing Aelia.n.u.s as I came to the breakfast table. Going vague on her, he was a.s.sessing me. I had the slow walk of a man facing disaster. Helena kept talking, as she set fresh bread in front of me. 'The vigiles haven't discovered who killed Spindex, or I presume Petronius would have told us, but you can check at the station-house, Aulus, if you have time.'

'Don't tell Petro we've been idiots,' I said.

All three young men stared at me. They were in shock too.

'Petro's not stupid,' said Aelia.n.u.s bleakly. 'He'll work it out.'

Just don't think about the penalty,' Helena advised everyone quietly. 'We have to carry on, being scrupulous about double-checking. Just because we say we have a new witness, Paccius won't immediately know we are at his mercy.'

'He will demand to know who the witness is,' Honorius said gloomily.

'Say the query arose out of the vigiles torturing the slaves,' Aelia.n.u.s suggested - another of the Camillus family who was willing to bend the truth. 'Paccius will waste time following up with the Second Cohort.'

'No, Paccius will scent victory,' Honorius disagreed. I had always suspected lack of funds was a big problem for him; he seemed utterly deflated by our dire situation. He would need watching.

'Forget Paccius!' Helena retaliated crisply. Her eye landed on her younger brother. 'Quintus, you're quiet. I suppose you thought you would be the centre of attention today, with your news from Lanuvium?'

He shrugged. When I saw him last night he had been weary, stressed by his encounter with the vigiles and livid that they had killed Perseus. Now he was down, but seemed glad to be here with us. His wife must have greeted him with a lively scene. 'I'll tell you very quickly. I had a hard time getting anything out of the freedman to start with; he sees it as his role to act as guardian over the Metellus family troubles. He refused to admit that Perseus was there, then he did everything he could to prevent me finding the porter. Still, I tracked him down on the sly, roped him up and was bringing him back a prisoner.

'Didn't Alexander spot you leaving his property?' I asked.

'No, Perseus was on a different farm. Alexander runs a big outfit in his own right - but I found another place locally in which he has a disguised interest. Marcus, I reckon this is where the money from the corruption was salted away.'

'So Julius Alexander may have bought property at Lanuvium anonymously?'

'He did indeed, although he denies it. Perseus told me.'

'But did Perseus confess what the real secret is?'

'No. He only started gossiping about the property to stop me asking other questions - and we were almost back in Rome by then.'

'Just at that point, you ran into the vigiles?'

'Yes. If I had known,' Justinus growled, 'I would have thrown Perseus in a ditch and hidden him. In fact, I might as well have killed the c.o.c.ky b.a.s.t.a.r.d myself and at least enjoyed it. When the Second pulled us over and asked who we were, Perseus piped up and admitted his ident.i.ty. The vigiles s.n.a.t.c.hed him off me, and tore back to their station-house with me panting after them, unable to get word to you.'

'It's not your fault.'

'We could not have held on to him.' Honorius sounded pompous. 'Stealing a slave is bad enough if you deprive his master of possession - depriving the vigiles would be madness.'

Annoyed at his pedantry, Helena briskly stirred her hot drink. 'Don't forget: we think that Saffia poisoned Metellus. We think we know how she did it too - but we still have no idea why.'

'Impatient to get at her legacy,' Aelia.n.u.s replied.

'If they were lovers, it could be a love quarrel.' His brother, so used to wrangling with his wife, gloomily put up a counter-suggestion.

'I don't believe they were ever lovers.' Helena looked as if she had a theory. 'I suspect Saffia Donata was just a very efficient blackmailer.' She would not tell us more. She said she did not have time to look into it today; she was going to see her father, to warn him we were all bankrupt. Meanwhile, she had one last instruction, this time for me. I had to visit the midwife Euboule, and her daughter Zeuko too, if the vigiles had released her.

That was a waste of time. Zeuko was still in custody, but if she was as hard-bitten as her mother, I would have obtained little from her.

Once I made my inspection of their house, I agreed with Helena that the children seemed well cared for and treated with kindness; there was no apparent reason why Ursulina Prisca had heaped disparagement on the two women. The house itself was well furnished and warm. A couple of young slave girls were playing with the children, who had a large toy collection. Walls and floors were covered in a collection of Eastern carpets, a highly unexpected luxury. Helena and I had no walls tapestried with Eastern carpets, even though they were attractive, useful as an investment, and difficult for casual thieves to whip away. My father had a few. But carpets were for auctioneers and kings; they were well out of our reach.

Euboule was a boot-faced, belligerent old bag of bones in layers of green and blue, with a heavy antique necklace that looked like real gold. I wondered how she had acquired it. The granulated links lay on a skinny chest. There was so little meat on her it seemed unlikely she had ever been full of milk for other women's babies, but no doubt her daughter was fully endowed now.

She stood up to my questioning like a hardened criminal. If I had not known she was a nurse and foster-mother, I would have thought she kept a chop-house with an upstairs brothel, or one of those back alley bath houses that are famous for perverted ma.s.seurs. She seemed ready for me; expecting to be tackled; determined not to give.

Taken with the expensive carpets, I knew what it meant: Euboule and Zeuko were being paid for their silence. Whether the income was current or only in the past, I could not tell. But at some point in their history this pair had been paid a great deal.

My sense of foreboding deepened. I went to my banker for a rundown of my own a.s.sets; I was unimpressed. At least when I warned him I was done for, Nothokleptes scarcely blinked; he had heard this so often in my bachelor days. He would learn how serious it was now. A new villa at Neapolis was out, that was for sure.

It was another dreadful day, with thunder in the storms. Lightning flashed around the Forum as I made my way to the Basilica. Honorius must have persuaded Marponius to hold up the trial. Nothing was going on. Tomorrow we would have to come clean, though. I nearly decided to ask for a meeting with Paccius, but held off and went home to find out what the lads had turned up for us.