Poseidon_s Gold

LIV

When I returned to the inn where we were currently staying, Helena was in bed. She stopped there, grumbling occasionally, while I spent half an hour trying to force the door-catch: my father's idea of keeping her safe had been to lock her in. Unfortunately, he had remained at the studio to keep an eye on Orontes. I had walked the four miles back to Capua, in the dark, getting more and more cold, footsore and miserable-only to find that my aggravating father still had the key to our room stuffed down his tunic somewhere.

My efforts to break in quietly failed dismally. In the end I abandoned caution and took a run at the door with my shoulder. The lock held, but the hinges gave. There was a terrible noise. It must have been obvious throughout the building that a Roman lady of status was having her room broken into, yet nobody came to investigate. Nice place, Capua. I could not wait to get out of it.

I squeezed inside. Unable to find a tinder-box, I bruised myself squeezing back out again to fetch a lamp from the corridor. Then I puffed my way back in a second time, cursing harshly.

Helena had eaten her own bowl of beans and all the side orders. I devoured my own cold portion, plus half of Father's, while I started to tell her what had happened. Cold beans can be fine in a salad in summer, though as a main course in winter they lack panache. Oil had gelled on them unpleasantly.

'Is there any bread?'

'You forgot to bring it. Too busy,' Helena informed me from beneath the blankets, 'ogling big-busted customers.'

I carried on talking, putting in all the details about Rubinia's unclothed bust.

Helena could always be won over by a story, especially if it featured me. At first barely the tip of her nose was visible above the bedcovers, but gradually more emerged as the tale of the silly antics and hard questioning caught her interest. By the time I had finished she was sitting up and holding out her arms for me.

I climbed into bed and we wrapped ourselves together for warmth.

'So what happens now, Marcus?'

'We've told Orontes he has to come back to Rome with us. He knows he is in real danger from either Carus or us, so he's happy to wilt under whichever option lets him return where he really wants to be. The man's an idiot!' I complained restlessly. 'He has no concept that there now has to be a confrontation-and that whatever happens, it will turn out unpleasantly for him. He's just happy to stop running.'

'But have you escaped paying all that money to Carus?'

I sighed. 'This is a problem. Carus does have written evidence that he paid Festus for the statue, whereas we ourselves have nothing to prove that Orontes handed the thing over to his representative in Tyre. Aristedon and the ship's crew drowned when the Pride of Perga sank. There are no other substantial witnesses.'

'And as for the bribe Carus subsequently paid to the sculptor, naturally an extortionist does not give a receipt to his collaborator?'

'No, love-so we cannot prove the fraud. It's Orontes's word against Carus's.'

'Orontes could appear as a witness, though?'

'Oh yes!' I agreed gloomily. 'He can appear. If we can keep him alive, sober, and willing to testify-which Carus will try to prevent. If we can keep him more frightened of us than he is of Carus, so that when we haul him into court he tells our story. And if we can make this limp, lying, unreliable character look believable to a jury!'

'Carus will probably bribe the jury.' Helena kissed my ear. 'Orontes is a bad witness,' she added. 'He ignored your brother's instructions, then sold the receipt without a quiver. The opposing barrister only has to accuse him of perennial bad faith, and you've lost your case.'

By now I was ranting moodily. 'Orontes is completely flabby. Carus is rich and single-minded. In court he would come over as an honest citizen while our man would be quickly discredited… But we're not giving this to the barristers. Why pay fees on top, when you're already up to your nostrils in dung? Pa and I are determined to do something, however.'

'What can you do?' Her hands were wandering pleasantly in places that liked wandering hands.

'We haven't decided. But it has to be big.'

We both fell silent. Exacting revenge from the collectors needed time and careful thought. Tonight was not the moment. But even if my own ingenuity failed me, I half hoped to lure Helena into contributing some devious invention. Something had to be done. She would understand that. She hated injustice.

She had become completely still in my arms, though I could sense busy thoughts working in that needle brain.

Suddenly she exclaimed, 'Trust you to leave a gap in the story!' I started, afraid I had passed over something significant. 'The luscious nude model went missing from the scene halfway through!'

I laughed awkwardly. 'Oh her! She was there all the time. While the sculptor was unconscious we gave her the choice of shutting up and promising to stop kicking, or being tucked out of the way while we woke him up and questioned him. She preferred to stay volatile, so we penned her in the sarcophagus.'

'Dear gods, the poor thing! I hope Orontes will be allowed to let her out of it?'

'Hmm! I don't want to make sordid suggestions,' I mumbled, 'but I strongly suspect that when my ghastly parent gets bored with discussing theories of art, he will arrange that Orontes has enough wine to knock him senseless-then Geminus may surreptitiously let out the model himself.'

Helena pretended she had no idea what sordid suggestions I meant.

'So what next, Marcus?'

'Next,' I promised her with intense relief, 'you and I and my happy father, and the sculptor, and his luscious model if he wants to bring her, are all going home… I wonder if Smaractus will have bothered to fix the roof?'

Helena was silent again. Maybe she was contemplating sharing a trip home with Rubinia. Maybe she was worrying about our roof.

I had plenty to think about as well, and none of it was cheerful. Somehow I had to devise a scheme to punish Carus and Servia. Somehow I had to avoid us paying out to them half a million sesterces which we had never owed them anyway. To keep myself from exile I had to solve a murder that was beginning to look inexplicable. And somehow I had to explain to my mother that her beloved son the national hero may have been no more than a failed entrepreneur who took a long stride into oblivion simply because the pressure of his bungled business commitments was growing too much for him.

'What time is it?' asked Helena.

'Jupiter, I don't know! The middle of the night-tomorrow, probably.'

She smiled at me. It had nothing to do with anything we had been discussing. I knew that, even before she said gently, 'Happy birthday, then!'

My birthday.

I had known it was coming. I thought no one else here with me had realised. Ma would be thinking about me with her own scornful reverence, but she was in Rome, so I had escaped the nostalgia and damson cake. Pa had probably never known his children's anniversaries. And Helena… well. A year ago, Helena had been with me on my birthday. We had been strangers then, resisting any hint of attraction between us. All the same, I had given myself a brief birthday treat and kissed her, with unexpected results for both of us. From that moment I had wanted more of her; I had wanted it all. I had started the sequence that ended with me falling in love with her, while a small, dark, dangerous voice began whispering that it might be a challenge to make this unattainable creature love me.

It was a year since the first time I held her in my arms, assuming then that it would be the only occasion she ever let me come near her. A year since I saw that look in her eyes when I risked it. A year since I fled from her, stunned by my own feelings and misunderstanding hers, yet knowing that somehow I would have to hold this woman in my arms again.

'Remember?'

'I remember!'

I took a long slow breath against her hair, absorbing the sweet natural scent of her. Without moving, I enjoyed the now familiar shape of her body, cosseted against mine. Her fingers moved against my shoulder, tracing patterns that raised goose-pimples. 'Here we are in another stinking inn… I could never have dreamed I would still have you near me.'

'Oh Marcus, you were so angry with me.'

'I had to get angry before I dared touch you.'

She laughed. I could always make her laugh. 'You laughed me into adoring you!' she commented, as if I had spoken.

'Not that night! You locked yourself in your room, and refused to speak to me.'

'I was too terrified.'

'Of me?' I was amazed.

'Oh no! I knew that when you stopped playing iron-jawed demigods you would be a complete sweetheart… Of myself,' confessed Helena. 'Frightened of how much I wanted to be in your arms, how much I wanted you to go on kissing me, how much I wanted more than that-'

I could have kissed her then. Her dark eyes were soft and inviting; she was willing me to do it. But it was more fun to lean back so I could see her, and just think about it while she smiled at me.

No year of my life would ever bring me so much change. No trick of fate would ever give me anything so precious.

I put out the light so I could forget our dismal surroundings; then I ignored all the debts and disasters that were oppressing me. A man must have some comfort in his life. I said, 'I love you. I should have told you that right at the start a year ago-and this is what I should have done about it straight away…'

Then I let my thirty-first birthday begin with a celebration in the noblest Roman style.