Murder in the Forum (13 page)

I had to smile at this inventive ruse. No wonder that area of the cellar had smelled so unwholesome. I was so encouraged by the confidence that I ventured a little further. ‘It was suggested that you might have met Felix once before, in Rome.’

At once every vestige of friendliness vanished. It was as if someone had pinched out a wick. He said coldly, ‘I do not know who told you that, or on what authority. I assure you, pavement-maker, I never set eyes upon the man before in my life. Nor wished to either. Now, if there is nothing more I can do to help you . . .?’

‘I wished to speak to you about this pavement, your Honour,’ I babbled, but it was too late. Not even discussion of his beloved dog could thaw the chill in his manner, and he was so dismissive that I began to fear that I had talked myself out of a lucrative commission.

In the end I abandoned it. ‘Perhaps we can speak of this later, citizen,’ I suggested, acknowledging defeat.

‘Perhaps,’ he said, stonily, and I was left to bow myself miserably out, while the slaves waiting outside looked at me knowingly and smirked. I was not even accorded the dignity of an escort down the stairs. Gaius summoned them again, and they went back into the study.

My discomfited retreat, however, was not without advantage. As I made my way towards the staircase, the door opposite was opened from within by an aged maidservant, and a moment later I found myself face to face with the woman she had opened it for – a small, round woman of such strikingly unprepossessing appearance that it could only be the famous Phyllidia.

She was, as Marcus had so succinctly put it, as plain as a sheep. I could see why that expression had occurred to him. The woman had a wide, flat, determined face with small eyes, a long nose, a foolish chin and a generally ewe-like expression of amiable truculence. Not unlike a sheep’s, either, were the short locks of coarse and hennaed hair escaping from under the unfashionable band and curling in defiant tufts around her forehead.

She was dressed for mourning in a dark dun-coloured robe which did nothing to enhance her radiance, and she carried a black mourning veil in her hand, ready to cover her face and head. An unkind man might think that an advantage – the ashes on her forehead only emphasised the sallowness of her complexion, and all the white-lead powder upon her face could not disguise a certain redness about the eyes.

She was accompanied by the aged handmaiden bearing an oil-lamp, and I recognised – from her manner and sour expression – that this must be the female jailer and family spy that Octavius had described. The hand of Felix still extended here. Yet, plain as she was, there was nothing of her father about Phyllidia: none of the malice, self-regard and cruelty which had declared itself in his every movement. For that reason, if no other, I gave her an encouraging smile.

‘You are Phyllidia Tigidia?’

She looked at me blankly. ‘I am.’ She did not even ask me who I was. I guessed that she was accustomed to being questioned at every step. ‘I am going to take my turn at the vigil.’

I did not move aside to let her pass, as she evidently expected. Instead I said, ‘This must have been a dreadful shock for you.’

‘Of course.’ It was said without emotion, and there was no flicker of feeling on her face. Yet, surely, this woman had been taken faint at the news, and had to be half carried upstairs to lie down?

I made another attempt. ‘You cared deeply for your father?’

This time there was the suspicion of a flush on the wide cheeks, and a fleeting shadow of a bitter smile. ‘Is there not always feeling between father and child? Thank you for your sympathy, pavement-maker.’

So she did know who I was. I said, ‘You know who I am?’

‘I heard that a pavement-maker was expected. I was mistaken for you, briefly, at the door. When I saw you coming out of Gaius’s study, in a plain toga and with calloused hands, the rest was not hard to deduce.’ It was intended to put me in my place. ‘Now, if you will excuse me, citizen.’ She stepped forward, and I was obliged to fall back and let her pass, together with her triumphant handmaiden.

But I had one spear left in my armoury. The girl was more intelligent than I thought, and she did not altogether despise tradesmen, as I knew. As she set foot upon the staircase, I murmured, so that only she could hear, ‘I have seen Octavius.’

She stopped. There was no mistaking the emotion now. Her whole face came alive, as though someone had lighted a candle in her eyes. She did not turn her head, but simply said firmly, ‘Marida, you may leave us. Give me the lamp.’

The maidservant hesitated.

‘You heard me,’ Phyllidia said. ‘Give me the lamp and go. Wait for me in the bedchamber. I have business with this citizen. Do it now. And do not lick your lips in that fashion. My father is dead – he will not pay you for your tales now.’

Marida sighed deeply but obeyed.

When the slave was out of earshot, Phyllidia turned to me. ‘You have seen Octavius?’

‘He was here last night,’ I said. ‘Looking for you, I think.’

She met my eyes, not the shy, sideways glance of the well-brought-up Roman virgin, but a frank enquiring stare. Yet there was something in the brown eyes which gave me hope for Octavius. If this was a sheep, it was at least a clever sheep. ‘He is alive? And well?’

It seemed a strange question. ‘He was, no more than an hour ago. Although he was strangely uneasy. He seemed to have been looking for you in the hiring stables. Then he learned where you had stayed last night and went rushing away to search for you.’

She closed her eyes. ‘Great goddess Minerva, thanks be to your name!’ She raised her voice. ‘Marida!’

The old woman came out, so swiftly that I guessed she had been listening at the door. Phyllidia unclasped a jewel from her belt and handed it to the maid.

‘Take this. Go into the town and find a temple of Minerva. Speak to the priest and see that he places this on the altar as a thank-offering.’

The crone stared at it doubtfully. It was a fine gem.

‘Do it now,’ Phyllidia said. ‘I vowed it to the goddess if she heard my prayer. And be sure that I shall learn of it if you don’t. I shall be speaking to the priests later, about the funeral. You know the punishment for theft – especially from the temple. You understand?’

Marida nodded sullenly.

‘Then,’ Phyllidia continued, ‘when you have done that, you will go and find Octavius for me. Yes, Octavius. If this citizen is correct, he will be searching the inn for me. And no excuses that you could not find him. Do not return without him, or I will have you flogged. Do not suppose that I would not. I am the mistress now. Ask him to come here. I will meet him when I have done my duty by the corpse. And tell him . . . tell him all is well. Whatever he has done.’

She took the oil-lamp from the startled maid, and disappeared downstairs in the direction of the atrium. The servant shot me a venomous look, then shrugged her shoulders and trotted reluctantly after her mistress.

I watched them go. I did not follow them at once, but stood for a moment thinking about the events of the last twenty-four hours: the deaths, the disappearances, the marriage and the would-be-marriages. Yet Phyllidia appeared to have arrived here not with bridal dresses but with garments suitable for a funeral. How, I wondered, had she contrived that? It did not seem to make sense.

As I groped my own way down the stairs a moment later I heard Phyllidia’s voice, strong and untroubled, raised in the lament.

I returned to the entrance corridor, expecting to find Junio, but there was no sign of him.

The doorkeeper came out of his alcove, with its spy-hole looking out into the street, and scowled at me sourly. ‘If you are looking for that skinny young slave of yours, he’s gone. Sent out by Marcus Aurelius Septimus with a message to his wife.’

I cursed inwardly. Marcus had slaves of his own, and there were servants of Gaius, too, whom he might have sent on trivial errands. I had only the one slave, and my patron chose to send him – simply because he had been the message-bearer, no doubt. That was my fault; I should not have let Junio carry the news of Julia’s arrival himself.

‘Well,’ the doorkeeper demanded. ‘Are you going out or not? I’m opening and closing this door like a bridegroom’s toga as it is.’

‘I think,’ I said slowly, ‘that there is little else I can do here, for the moment.’

His hand went to the heavy lock.

‘Unless there is anything you can tell me? About the disappearance of Zetso and the Celt last night?’

He sighed. ‘I have told your patron all this. And my master, too. Felix’s driver went rushing in and out several times, on missions for his master. The last time he didn’t come back.’

‘Several times?’ I queried. ‘How often was that. Twice? Three times?’

The doorkeeper glared at me as though he were a trident-holder in the arena, and I was the netman sent to trap him. ‘Great Jupiter, citizen, I can’t tell you exactly. I was letting people in and out of this door all night. How can I be expected to remember the movements of a single slave? About the Celtic gentleman, though, I am quite certain. He and his party came in through that door, like everyone else, but he didn’t go out of it again. I would have remembered him.’

‘His party?’ I had not considered that. Of course, Egobarbus – or whoever he was – since he was a wealthy man, would presumably have arrived with slaves, ‘like everyone else’ as the doorman said. ‘He had servants with him?’

‘Oh yes. Two – or was it three – big strapping fellows in tunics. Three, I am almost sure.’

This was interesting news. One man may disappear. A group of three of four men is more difficult to hide. ‘The servants must have left again, too?’

His scowl deepened. ‘Do you think I am Janus, citizen, to remember the comings and goings of every slave? I don’t know.’

I reached into the money-pouch at my belt, took out a coin and began fingering it ostentatiously. It is amazing how the prospect of an
as
or two can sometimes improve the memory.

He did his best. ‘They probably went out afterwards, when there was a general rush for litters. I rather think they did.’ He eyed the coin hopefully, but I made no move. ‘I am almost sure.’

This was no use. The man would swear to anything for a reward. I tossed him the coin. ‘If you think of anything, tell Marcus,’ I said. ‘I am going out now, but I will return.’

The man opened the door and I went out into the street.

The air was cool and fresh after the heavy smoke of the funeral herbs and candles, but the crowd awaiting their turn at the lying-in-state had increased. Several of the magistrates, I noted, had left their slaves to do their waiting for them and gone away to do other things, but my former customer was still there. I avoided his reproachful gaze and sidled away down a side street.

I had thought, vaguely, of presenting myself at Marcus’s apartment, but I thought better of it. My patron would expect me to have made some progress before I reported to him again. Then I remembered what Junio had told me and, avoiding the unwanted attentions of the fortune-tellers, money-lenders and beggars who always lurk in the less frequented streets, I made my way across the town to the North Gate.

Somebody there had obviously remembered Egobarbus’s arrival, since Junio had heard about it.

I looked around for a suitable informant. There was no shortage of candidates. Tinkers, hawkers and doubtful medicine peddlers spread their wares at the foot of every pillar, and the usual grimy scoundrel with his pretended viper was performing his tricks to the astonishment of the innocent.

However, compared to my servant, I was at a disadvantage. Everyone expects a slave to indulge in gossip – who has come to the town, and who has left – since his livelihood may well depend upon tips and disbursements given in exchange for information. For a citizen – even an elderly citizen in a scruffy toga – to begin asking questions about a visitor is to invite immediate interest. Already the guards at the gate were looking at me suspiciously.

Outside the gates, in the straggle of buildings close to the walls, there was a
thermopolium
, a hot-food stall, selling hot drinks and questionable stew. I went through the archway and made my way towards that. These places are always hives of rumour. At the price of a bowl of greasy soup – in which goat’s hooves and something else’s eyeballs appeared to be important ingredients – I might find the information I was looking for.

‘Ooh, yes,’ the girl behind the counter said, pocketing the proffered coin with a grimy hand, ‘I see everything from here, citizen.’ She tossed her head, so that her long unwashed braids of hair swung treacherously close to the serving ladle, and favoured me with what she probably imagined was an inviting smile. It would have been more alluring, had she possessed a few more teeth.

‘You saw the red-haired Celt arrive here yesterday?’ I prompted.

‘Fellow with red hair and long whiskers? Of course I did. You could hardly miss him. There was such a fuss about the carriage. It almost came to blows. The driver said he hadn’t been paid, although he had been promised I don’t know how much to drive halfway from Letocetum, collect them from an inn and bring them here.’

‘Letocetum?’ I was surprised. I had never been to Letocetum, but I had heard of it. An important staging post for the imperial army, a day’s ride north-west on the road to Eboracum. Interesting, I thought. Eboracum was the town which Felix had been visiting on business.

‘That’s where the driver came from. I heard him tell them so, when they were arguing about the price.’ She twined her greasy hair with a greasier hand.

‘Them?’ I said, seizing on a word. ‘How many of them were there?’

The girl smiled again, showing her blackened gums. Unmarriageable, I guessed, and eking out a meagre living providing hot food for unsuspecting travellers and probably other services for any soldiers who had gambled too much of their pay and were no longer very particular.

‘Only the man and his two servants,’ she said. ‘Funny that you should mention that. The carriage-driver kept insisting that he should have been paid for four. He threatened to fetch the
aediles
, but the Celt gave him a few
denarii
and he calmed down in the end.’