Jail Bait (5 page)

Dwarfed by the pillars which lined the Great Hall, Cal ran barefoot up the steps of the watercourse. He was laughing, because he’d discovered yet another secret, that he could fly, come and watch, better still, take his hand and fly with him. And Claudia was laughing, too, because the water was cool, icy cool, but then a bear reared out of the stream, snarling with a half-human face, and Cal said, ‘We can outrun the beast, we can fly,’ and suddenly they were up on the roof, but he wouldn’t let go of her wrist and then she was falling…falling…

This time when Claudia woke up, she knew with certainty that, unless she saw for herself the point from which Kamar said Cal had fallen, the dreams would torment her for ever. Sluicing water over her face, she calculated there was still an hour before dawn, yet despite the sultry heat of the night, she was shivering. By this time tomorrow, Cal’s ashes would be on their way home—

Crackling torches set in motion the ships which sailed the seascapes round the Great Hall and cast diamonds and pearls on the rippling watercourse. Pausing on the central footbridge, Claudia thought, this is madness. What the blazes do I expect to achieve? But just as there was no answer to her question, equally was there no turning back.

Her bare feet slapped the marble floor of the banqueting hall, but the pine doors to the sun porch slid open on silent greased runners. The veranda was not as she’d imagined it. Sure, she’d seen the gilding on the pillars from the lake this afternoon, and certainly the Parian marble on the walls had been used to spectacular and dazzling effect, but that was only part of its splendour. White roses blasted perfume into the torrid night air, climbing between box trees clipped to resemble camels, apes and giraffes. A bronze faun piped a tune in the corner and on the ceiling, six signs of the Zodiac had been picked out in gold.

It was, Claudia thought, a very lovely place to die…

With a hammer pounding in her breast, she climbed the wooden staircase to the upper storey. ‘How can you be certain he fell?’ she’d asked Kamar, as Cal was being laid on the stretcher. There was something about the body which niggled her.

‘Because I’m a doctor,’ he snarled. ‘The boy’s neck
is broken.’

‘Yes, I know.’ The angle was hideous. ‘Only—’

‘Only nothing,’ he sniffed, twitching his fingers and making it obvious what he thought of women interfering with his professional judgement. ‘The injuries are fully consistent with a fall,’ letting his eyes pinpoint the spot from which he calculated Cal had fallen.

As the stretcher party had shuffled away across the shingle, Kamar strode off in the opposite direction and Claudia had had to run to keep up. ‘You’re not accompanying the corpse?’

‘The role of a physician is to tend to the living,’ he growled, weaving up the zigzag path towards the bath house. ‘Mosul the priest can take over from here.’

‘What do you suppose he was doing up on the sun porch that led to his toppling over the rail?’

‘Cal was an ungovernable show-off with a third of the sense he was born with,’ he snapped. ‘How the hell should I know?’ And before she could ask anything else, Kamar had collared a fat timber merchant and was enquiring after his bunions.

Cold-blooded son-of-a-bitch, Claudia reflected, lingering on the veranda’s darkened staircase. You’ll pander to the rich, they pay handsomely to have you oversee their phantom ailments, but when push comes to shove, we see you for what you really are, Kamar. A reptile without an ounce of compassion.

Upstairs were the same gilded columns, the same dazzling white walls, the ceiling studded with the remaining Zodiacal signs, Capricorn to Gemini, but instead of the back wall comprising sliding pine doors, it carried broad arches to light the banqueting hall below, and these arches were filled in with fine alabaster. A lone torch illuminated the balcony and, lifting it free of its sconce, Claudia held the flame over the rail. No one had seen Cal fall to his death, and why should they? They were too busy snoring their heads off. Claudia sighed. Kamar had called the boy reckless and whilst she herself would have preferred the term ‘spirited’, she had to admit it wasn’t impossible to picture him, leaping on to this rail to imitate the skills of the rope walkers. Had he overbalanced while waving to her, as she rowed out to the island?

Since no scuff marks marred the bright rail, Claudia wondered why she’d automatically surmised that he’d slipped from the upper balcony. The drop from the lower storey was still pretty steep! Descending the staircase, she wished she could identify what it was that troubled her about Cal’s body. Assuming he was wearing soft shoes, as everyone wore here, not only would they not leave a mark, they’d be all the easier to slip in…so what, exactly, made her suspect his death was no accident?

‘Janus!’
Claudia’s torch picked out the most amazing blue eyes, which twinkled and shone from a tiny wizened face.

‘Did I startle you?’ The sparrow of a woman smiled mischievously.

Claudia was on the point of saying you damned well know you did, you venomous bat, when she noticed that the couch upon which the old crone reclined had two wheels nailed to the front. The sparrow followed the direction of her glance.

‘I’ll bet you’ve heard my daughter-in-law playing whisper-whisper-whisper with that sourpuss physician—well, indulge them, that’s what I say.’ From beneath her thin coverlet, she drew out a wineskin. ‘Lavinia can dance across this floor any time she fancies.’ She chuckled, proffering the liquor.

Close up, Claudia saw that Lavinia was younger than she appeared, by ten, maybe even fifteen years, that the wrinkles came from years of exposure to the sun, rather than age. Unexpectedly for Atlantis, the linen she wore was coarse and untailored, simply two widths sewn together and belted with a home-made girdle, and even as she accepted the wineskin, Claudia was wondering how a simple farmer’s wife could afford a place like this.

A smoky pink light was spreading over the eastern horizon, and on the sheet of mercury that was Lake Plasimene, a single yellow flame sprang into life. With a thrill of surprise, Claudia saw it came from the Villa Tuder.

‘You don’t,’ Lavinia said, eyeing up Claudia’s jewels, ‘look like a girl who believes that crap about pine trees filtering the germs. What brings you here, if not to escape the contagion?’

Claudia passed back the wine. ‘The same as you, I suspect.’

‘I doubt that very much.’ Lavinia snorted, patting her one indulgence, a pile of immaculate curls. ‘This is the first time in his wastrel life my son has pampered his old mother, but—’ she took a long swig from the skin ‘—it’s a beautiful spot, this lake, and you won’t hear Lavinia complain.’ She wiped her mouth with the back of her hand. ‘What a treat, to be free of the olives.’

‘You own a grove, then?’

‘Near Luca. It’s just a smallholding—me, my son and my son’s wife, though since neither of them moves without a fire being lit under their tails, Lavinia relies on her field hand, but it’s not a bad old life, all things considered. Do you have children?’

‘No.’

‘Good for you, they’re nothing but trouble, especially sons,’ Lavinia said, replacing the stopper in the wineskin. ‘Take my boy—thinks sesterces grow next to the olives, and in those years we’re lucky enough to make a profit, what happens? He blows it on some harebrained venture! I tell you, Lalo my field hand is more like a son—still—’ she pulled a face ‘—my lad’s done me proud, treating his old mother to some fancy pandering, though the gossip’s as much fun as the treatments. My, my, you should see what goes on! It’s like an upper-class bawdy house and talk about scandal!’

‘Such as?’ Claudia’s tone was mild and enticing, and with a smack of her lips, Lavinia rose to the bait.

‘There was that woman who died in the mud room, for a start. Lordy, you should have seen Pylades’ face when he found out. White as a sheet, poor bugger, scared stiff the scandal would ruin Atlantis. In the end, he got Kamar to hush it up, to say she died in her sleep. Well—’ Lavinia cackled like a sea-witch ‘—that part was true. They just didn’t let on where.’

‘Anything…else?’ Claudia kept her eyes on the single yellow light burning like a beacon on the island across the lake.

‘Ffff. You wouldn’t believe what Lavinia’s picked up. That busty redhead from the fishmonger’s, palming herself off as nobility to hook herself a rich husband. The blond Adonis-type, having it off with his father’s new bride, thinks I don’t know. Ha! Because I’m crippled, folk think I’m blind, deaf and dumb—but never underestimate Lavinia, that’s my motto. Folk have tried, and worse they are for it, I can tell you. Not that they all come a cropper like that whippersnapper I was talking to yesterday—’

‘What?’ Claudia said, and a thousand worms crawled beneath her skin. ‘You were talking to Cal? When?’

‘Cheeky bugger perched against that rail there just the other night and you know what he said?’ The old woman pursed her lips. ‘Said he reckoned I was nothing but a fraud. Poetic justice, if you ask me, him falling from that selfsame spot. Told him at the time, I did, mark my words, young fellow, the gods will punish mischief-makers—’

‘Did you—’ Claudia asked slowly, her nails biting into the palms of her hand ‘—see him fall?’

‘Me?’ There was an almost imperceptible pause. ‘Too damned hot for Lavinia, this weather.’ A gnarled brown hand slipped the wineskin out from beneath the coverlet. ‘Like a lazy lioness, she’s taken to sleeping through the daytime, only my son mustn’t get wind that I let my field hand sleep in my bed at night, he’d go apeshit.’ A faraway look came into the startling blue eyes. ‘Well, maybe not these days, because I do believe my lad has finally changed his ways. Mind.’ She gave a small, self-conscious laugh. ‘When I say lad, he’s forty-seven, but then some take that long before they grow up, and usually death is the catalyst.’

Claudia watched her take a deep draught of red wine, and thought, Cal was right about you, my girl, you’re not what you appear. And you didn’t actually answer my question, did you, about whether or not you saw what happened to Cal?

‘Whose death?’ she coaxed. ‘Your husband’s?’

‘Him? That old miser slipped his anchor when I was thirty-two, no, no, no.’ Lavinia handed the wineskin to Claudia. ‘I’m talking about a shipwreck, that’s what sobered my son. Every single hand went down, see.’

As the sky began to brighten, Lake Plasimene yawned and stretched and prepared itself for another sticky day. Round the margins waterfowl honked to one another, frogs began to croak and, from the myriad of trees which grew along this promontory, birds called out the daily news—bluetits, blackcaps and siskins, swapping tales of how many eggs they had raised, weren’t oak apples prolific this year, and who’d have thought millipedes grew so fat. And Claudia asked herself what it was Lavinia was hiding…

‘It was the same old story. Every time we made a little profit, he’d invest it in some stupid get-rich scheme and every time we’d end up broke. That’s why I refused to remarry, even though it’s against the law, but I wasn’t going to hand my grove over just—’ she snapped her bony fingers ‘—like that, and my boy wasn’t competent! Take this last venture. Two years’ profit he invested in grain and what happens? Bloody ship sinks in a storm off Alexandria, fully laden. Mind, it shook him to the core, did that. Set him rethinking all his values, because next thing he’s whisking me off for a month of solid pampering and I tell you straight, I’m relishing every single second.’

So how come, thought Claudia, plugging the stopper back in the neck of the wineskin, the son could afford to send his old gossip of a mother here…?

‘Sadly I’m stuck with my daughter-in-law and her frightful sister—’ Lavinia began, then pulled up short, as though catching sight of something over Claudia’s shoulder. However, before Claudia could turn to face the sliding doors, Lavinia broke into a cough.

‘My…medicine,’ she croaked. ‘In my room. Would you mind?’

Claudia could hardly refuse a sick woman’s request, yet she had the strangest feeling Lavinia had contrived to get her out of the way. That cough was pretty unconvincing. But why? Why should an impecunious, weather-beaten olive grower want her out of the way?

So busy was she conjuring up a list of possibilities that Claudia was completely unprepared for the sight which greeted her when she flung wide Lavinia’s door. On the couch, their limbs naked and entwined, a dark-haired girl and a negro were worshipping Eros with uninhibited abandon.

‘Who the blazes are you?’ the man demanded, hauling up the sheet as they sprang apart.

‘The medicine,’ Claudia barked. ‘Where’s Lavinia’s medicine?’

‘Merciful Jehovah, is she all right?’ It was the girl who sprang off the bed and grabbed a small phial from the table.

‘How the hell do I know?’ Claudia snapped, whipping the draught from her hand and racing back to the sun porch where, surprise, surprise, Lavinia had stopped coughing.

Shall I fetch Kamar?’ she asked sweetly.

‘That useless fool!’ the old woman retorted. ‘Couldn’t tell a fracture from a freckle. No, no,’ she waved away the phial, ‘I’m all right.’

And Claudia thought, I bet you are.

‘Ah, Ruth! Lalo!’ Lavinia addressed the amorous couple. The negro, his skin still glistening from his aerobic endeavours, had pulled on a tunic of such rough quality it would have curled Pylades’ lip, while the girl was wearing a fringed skirt below a tight high bodice which revealed her ancestry as much as her midriff. ‘You three have met, then?’ Lavinia asked, her blue eyes shining with mischief.