Death at Pompeia

Eleven

Minimus was almost hopping with excitement as the pageboy led us back down the passage and to the entrance. The prospect of helping me investigate this crime obviously thrilled him half to death.

I wished I could feel enthusiastic on my own account, but without Marcus here to lend me his authority I could not well interrogate important councillors — or even insist that members of this household talked to me. I had faintly hoped that I might see Pulchra in the hall, in case there was something else that she hoped to say to me, but there was no sign of her or anybody else. From the interior of the house there came the smell of burning herbs, and I realized that purification of the corpse was under way. It would not be long before the body was brought to lie in state and the formal lamenting and homage would begin. Already I could persuade myself that I could hear the steward’s distant voice raised in a faint and ululating wail.

The household was plunging into mourning and I would not learn much more from here — until the corpse was decently disposed of, anyway. I could only hope that Antoninus had some helpful news for me, otherwise there was no chance of earning Gracchus’s fee. It was not enough to argue that Pompeia was innocent, I knew: after that confession she would be arraigned for sure — it only took one witness to bring a formal charge — and I had to discover who the real culprit was.

The lugubrious doorkeeper greeted me with a faint, mocking grin. ‘You have your cloak already, citizen, I see.’ He opened the door and stood by to let me out — adding as he did so, in an undertone, ‘Though your slave need not have been in such a hurry to collect it earlier. You are the very last to leave. And you didn’t have to worry about the rituals, after all.’

This reminder of our earlier conversation made me pause. ‘You know Antoninus, don’t you?’ I said thoughtfully, remembering how he had reacted to the name.

The same result. He stiffened and his friendly tone grew colder than the Sabrina river at Janustide. ‘Perhaps I do. What is it to you, citizen? There is no law that says a slave can’t have acquaintances.’

He had said ‘acquaintances’ not ‘friends’ I noticed, though perhaps I should not place too much importance upon that. Most slaves don’t strike up friendships with aspiring councillors. ‘I wondered,’ I said, ‘if you might know where he lives. I’ve been asked to call on him today, and I know he has an apartment somewhere in the town. Not far from the temple of Jupiter, I think, but that is all I am certain of. I was hoping for directions. I thought that you might help. .?’

He was so relieved that it was almost comical. ‘Oh, is that all, citizen? That’s an easy one. It’s not very far from here. Go to the temple, take the second block along and you’ll find him on the first floor above a cobbler’s shop. There’s a public staircase leading from the street, because there are lots of people living on the top floor overhead, but if you go up there and knock the door his slaves will let you in.’ He grinned again. ‘Got to be careful while you’re waiting, though — the upstairs lodgers throw things down the steps, slops very often. Jealous of people who have braziers and fancy togas, I suppose. It’s pretty cramped and miserable in those attics, I should think, and you can see from the street that the roof is falling in. But the landlord doesn’t bother — they still have to pay the rent.’

‘I shall find it, thank you for your help.’ I slipped him a few coppers and went out into the street. Minimus followed, and we were about to walk away, when a sudden realization made me whirl round to the doorkeeper again. ‘So you have obviously visited the place yourself, my friend?’

It caught him off his guard. There was of course no ‘law’ (as he would have put it) to prevent him visiting, but it was not usual for a doorkeeper to walk around the streets — far less to call on somebody of Antoninus’s rank. And if Honorius, for instance, had visited the place he would generally be accompanied by a page or personal slave — not by the man employed to guard the door.

He stammered and turned pink. ‘I had a business errand to perform. Something from this household that I had to take to him.’

‘Something that Antoninus had left behind?’ I asked.

He shook his head and frowned, but there was a glint of grim amusement in his eyes. ‘Something of the kind. I don’t think I actually saw it at the time. I’m sorry, citizen, I can’t remember now.’

‘Perhaps Antoninus will recall the incident. I’ll ask him when we meet.’

A pause. Then: ‘How well do you know Antoninus, citizen?’

‘I have never met him. He has asked for me. He says that he has important information to impart.’

‘Then I hope you have deep pockets, citizen.’ There it was again, that hint of mockery. ‘Have you discovered why he sent for you, in particular?’

‘Because I have been asked to look into Honori. .’ I began, then trailed into silence. The doorman had a point. I was certainly enquiring into this, but how could Antoninus possibly have known? It was a personal arrangement between Gracchus and myself: true it had been witnessed by his friend Linneus, when we were standing outside the atrium, but Antoninus had not been anywhere near us at the time. Or had Gracchus and his friend been spreading the news around the town?

If so, it was against his interests, I thought. There was no reason why anyone outside the family should think that I had a special interest in investigating this — and that was what I was relying on. I didn’t want people put too much on their guard. No one is ever truly frank and free in what they say if they think their gossip might be used against them later on, or taken as testimony against someone else. And if the murderer was from outside the house, which now seemed possible, better that he — or she — continued to believe that since Pompeia had confessed, no one was looking for anybody else. I wished I had thought to say as much to Gracchus earlier.

‘I wonder how Antoninus heard the news?’ I said aloud.

The doorkeeper raised one eyebrow half an inch. ‘I see that you are learning what kind of man he is.’

I bridled. ‘Indeed. And I intend to learn a little more. My patron, Marcus Septimus asked me to talk to him. Antoninus wishes to become a magistrate and hopes that my patron will support his claim.’

‘I see!’ He was looking sceptically at me. ‘Then visit him by all means, but be on your guard. He can be a difficult man to satisfy. He does not only deal with wealthy and important men, you know.’ And to my astonishment, he leaned forward and gave me a confidential wink as though we were conspirators in some unspoken way.

I was wondering what I should reply to this, when I saw the pageboy coming down the hall. ‘Doorkeeper! You are to come and have the dark bands sewn around your hems. I am sent to keep the door for you till you return. And go and see Helena Domna in the atrium on the way — she has an errand for you when you are relieved. She wants to hire additional musicians for the funeral.’

‘Why me? I’ve already been on duty here since dawn! Isn’t there another slave that she could send?’

The pageboy grinned. ‘She’s got all the other servants running round with herbs and things, ready to put the master’s bier into the atrium, and the steward is standing by to start up the lament. I offered to go for her, but she said you’d know the place, because you went there when the former mistress died. And she is waiting for you, so you’d best be on your way.’

The older man gave me a lugubrious shrug and turned away.

‘I don’t know what he’s looking glum about,’ the pageboy said, watching his colleague walk away. ‘He’ll get a tip, no doubt, from the musicians’ guild, as a reward for bringing trade. Not that he’ll need it now. He’ll get his promised freedom from Livia, I expect, now that she won’t have her husband to convince. Honorius has been half-promising for years, but never found it quite convenient.’

‘Leave the household? What will he do then? He doesn’t have a trade.’ I meant it. It’s no light matter for a man to live without the certainty of food and shelter every night.

The pageboy grinned. ‘Oh, he has money. Quite a lot of it — I saw him counting it the other night. He’s been saving for his slave price for a long time now, and wears it in a little leather bag around his neck.’ He gave a giggle, like the little boy he was. ‘The other servants joke that that’s what makes him stoop! He’ll have enough to rent a room and perhaps set up a stall. Isn’t that what every slave aspires to do?’

I nodded. That was exactly what I’d done myself. I slipped the pageboy a small coin (he looked grateful, too!) and hurried off to join Minimus in the street.

My slave looked at me sideways. ‘What was that about, master? It took you quite a time. I thought we were hurrying to visit Redux now? There is some way to walk and it is already long past noon.’ It was obvious that his enthusiasm hadn’t dimmed.

I nodded. ‘Then we must set off at once. Though it is not certain that Redux will be there — after all, he was expecting to be at a wedding feast all day.’ I saw the young face fall. ‘But we might learn something. You can lead the way.’

It was indeed a long way to the dock, especially as Minimus confined us to the streets. There was — as I knew — a much quicker route than this, through the putrid alleys and byways of the town, in the marshy area where the floods had been and where ruined buildings lay abandoned in damp, dismal courts. But that was the domain of the outcast underworld, the thieves and maimed and homeless, the ‘ghosts’ who haunted the night-time streets and lived on what more fortunate people threw away. I knew this, because I had briefly lived among them once, but today I was happy to walk the broader streets, though from this direction even those were not as wide and clean as in other, more salubrious parts of town. Figures lurked in doorways, watching us, and I had to tell Minimus to take my cloak from me, wrap the silver salver in it and at least hide it from view. Carrying it openly in this area was asking to be set upon and robbed — though a bulky parcel might well have the same effect, I thought.

We hurried on past greasy hot-soup kitchens and public wine shops — all open and busy with jostling customers, even at this time of day, with more people swaying and vomiting in the street outside. Girls in scanty costumes and in various poses smiled at us from lurid pictures painted on a pair of doors nearby, advertising the delights which might be had within, and as we passed an archway an actual girl appeared, lifting her tunic up to flaunt her scrawny knees and giving us suggestive gestures with her eyes. I hurried Minimus past before she spoke to us, and almost stepped into a pile of stinking muck, washed up in the last flood and simply left to rot.

I was much relieved to reach the busy dockside on the riverbank. There was more activity than a beehive here, and with a louder buzz of noise. A large ship from somewhere was unloading goods — its sail furled and its owner supervising the gang of dockyard slaves carrying the heavy sacks down creaking, wobbling planks on to the shore, while their overseer shouted at them that they were too slow and threatened to encourage them with lashes from his whip. From the safer streets at the other corner of the dock, donkeys and handcarts were appearing to take away the goods. The air was full of oaths and curses and the sound of bartering.

It was a world where Roman law and order ruled again, and when a surly soldier asked where we were going, I told him and he pointed out the place.

‘Redux’s warehouse? It’s right over there. And that’s his foreman steward with the handcart and the slave. After a bit of this cargo, I expect. Salt, for the most part, from the salt pans further south — so it’s to be hoped his warehouse is still dry. Hey!’ He thumped his baton on a cask near by. ‘You! The fat one with the cart! You’ve got a visitor. This citizen would like to have a word with you.’ He looked at the parcel wrapped up in the cloak. ‘Are you returning goods?’

I shook my head. ‘I want to talk to Redux, that is all. Something that happened at a wedding feast.’

‘You won’t be the first that wants to talk to him. There has been a bit of trouble down here, once or twice.’ He cleared his throat, importantly. ‘So, if you have any difficulty, you get back to me. We don’t want the kind of problem we had here yesterday — people trying to knock down the door, and fighting in the street. Very nearly had someone in the dock — and it interrupted trade. One of the captains nearly missed the tide. We had complaints from several quarters at the time. That’s why they’re posting one of us down here, to see that nothing of the kind occurs again. Now here’s the foreman — but remember what I said.’ He tapped his nose, to signal secrecy, and turned away to watch the docks again.

The fat foreman had left his cart and slave beside the gangplank on the dock and was trundling up to us. ‘What is it, citizen? You want something with me? I can’t spare many moments. I got work to do. My master wants me bidding for any extra salt — the last few sacks they fill are sometimes tinged with sand, but they bring them up to see what they can get for them.’ He was a big man, more fat than muscular, but bulging in his orange tunic — and he did not look pleased to see us. I have seen battering-rams that looked more welcoming.

‘It was your master that I was looking for.’ I tried to summon a disarming grin. ‘Is he in the warehouse?’

‘I couldn’t tell you that.’ There was no answering smile. ‘Who is looking for him, citizen?’ he said.

So Redux was there, I thought privately. Aloud, I said, ‘I am a citizen — as you can see, my friend. I was a guest with him at a wedding feast today — but there was an unfortunate incident and the ceremony had to be postponed. I hoped to speak to Redux at the time, but he left before I could have a word with him. He will know me, I am sure of that.’ Of course he would, he had seen me standing on that table in the hall. I did not mention that I’d never met the man.

The fat man put both thumbs underneath the belt that tied his tunic in, hitched it upwards over his ample stomach, and sniffed impressively. ‘I don’t know if the master is here or not, citizen. Give me your name and I will go and see.’

‘I am the citizen Libertus,’ I replied. ‘The representative of His Excellence Marcus Septimus. This is his slave who is accompanying me. Perhaps you would care to tell your master that.’ That was a formula that ought to do the trick.

He had small, greedy, beady eyes with fleshy eyelids, like a pig, and he was squinting suspiciously at the pair of us. But his tone became decidedly more civil as he said, ‘Your pardon, citizen.’ He ran a hand across his jowly chin. ‘Of course I’ll tell the master — when I get a chance. I’ll go and look for him. Though of course I can’t answer for whether he’ll be there.’

‘Master?’ Minimus whispered urgently to me. ‘If we can’t see Redux, perhaps we should move on. It must be almost the ninth hour by now.’

I glanced at what I could make out of the sun. It was clearly nearing the last quarter to the west. ‘Perhaps you’re right,’ I told him. ‘We are not succeeding here. I’ll leave a message for Redux and come back another day. Antoninus will be expecting us.’

That name had a charm which my patron’s name had lacked. The beady eyes looked furtively at me. ‘Did you say Antoninus, citizen?’

I nodded. ‘I have business with him at his apartment later on.’

‘Then I’m sorry to keep you waiting out here, citizen. Though perhaps you wouldn’t mind explaining what you’ve got in there?’ He gestured towards the parcel that Minimus still held, and from which the corner of the salver was now peeping through.

‘It is a piece of silver, fashioned as a tray,’ I said, ‘though I don’t understand what business that might be of yours.’ Then, conscious of the soldier still on guard nearby, and fearing that I should be accused of stealing it, I added hastily, ‘It was to be my patron’s wedding gift at that marriage earlier.’

‘I see.’ He nodded. ‘Well, I’ll go in and see what I can do for you. But I can’t make promises. You’ll have to wait and see.’ And with that he lumbered off towards the warehouse door, leaving the handcart in the charge of his sleepy-looking slave.

I gave that individual a tentative grin, but he looked away and pretended to be engrossed in the unloading of the salt, so there was nothing we could do but wait and hope the fat foreman had helpful news for us.