Three Hands in The Fountain

XLIX

By arrangement Bolanus reported to Frontinus the next day. I met them both at the house where Frontinus was staying. Bolanus was wearing the same ancient tunic and belt he had had on when I first met him, to which he had added a brimmed hat to guard against the weather and a knapsack for travelling. His plan was to drag Frontinus and me all the way to Sublaqueum, for reasons which I suspected had more to do with a wish to see the dam on which he had once worked than our search. But as a public servant he knew very well how to make a pleasant site visit sound like a logistical necessity.

Frontinus had sent a message to ask Petro if he wanted to be driven to the villa to help us take stock, but my partner refused quite shamelessly. 'No thanks. Tell his honour I'd rather laze about here counting geese.'

'Flirting with the neighbour's kitchen maid, you mean,' I growled.

'Certainly not!' he exclaimed, with a grin. I was right. He had spotted that she was plump in all the right places, eighteen years old, and given to looking over our boundary fence in the yearning hope that something masculine would glide up for a chat. I myself had only noticed the girl because I had had a perfectly sensible conversation with Helena Justina about the meagre amount of herb-plucking and goat-milking that the little madam was given to do. Helena took the view that she was trouble, while I feebly tried to argue that unseemly habits don't inevitably end in tragedy.

Petronius Longus was turning out to be more of a typical informer than I had ever been. He just would not take work seriously. If there was a flagon to drink or an attractive woman to moon at, he was in there. He seemed to think the freelance life was about lying in bed until he ruined his reputation, then spending the rest of the day enjoying himself. If that left me doing all the work, he just laughed at my stupidity.

It was a complete reversal of his dedicated approach in the vigiles. Even as a lad in the army he had been more conscientious. Perhaps he needed a supervisor to kick against. If so, as his friend I would never be able to issue orders, so that was out. And he knew how to dodge the Consul.

'Petronius Longus not with you?' was the first thing Frontinus asked me.

'Sorry, sir. He's feeling a little off-colour again. He wanted to come but his auntie put her veto on allowing him out.'

'Oh really?' responded Frontinus, like a cockerel who knew he was having his tail tweaked by pranksters.

'Really, sir.'

Bolanus grinned, understanding the situation, then quietly took the heat of by talking about our trip into the hills.

Frontinus was driven there in a fast, practical carriage, while Bolanus and I rode mules. We first took the Via Valeria, the great road through the Appenines. It climbed through gentle, attractively wooded slopes, accompanied by the graceful arches of the Aqua Claudia. At this point they followed the River Anio, though below Tibur they took a long sweep south-east, to avoid the escarpment and its sudden drastic drop in height.

The Sabine Hills run basically north and south. We started out heading in a north-easterly direction for most of the first day. The valley of the Anio widened and became more agricultural, with vineyards and olive groves. We bought a snack, then pressed on to where the river took a turn to the south and we had to leave the main road. This was near the by-way north which I was told led to Horace's Sabine Farm; as a part-time amateur poet I would have liked to divert and pay tribute at the Bandusian Spring, but we were seeking a killer, not culture. For informers, that's sadly routine.

We stayed the night in a small settlement before turning off the highway on to the little-used country road down the Anio valley to Nero's retreat at Sublaqueum. Once there next day, we braced ourselves to be amazed. There was a new village, grown from the workshops and huts provided to house all the builders and craftsmen who created Nero's villa. The place was discreet and tidy, much emptier than it would have been then, yet with inhabitants still clinging on.

The location was splendid. At the head of a picturesque forested valley, where the river collected its feeder streams and first became significant, had once been three small lakes. Nero dammed the waters and raised their levels to create the fabulous pleasure lakes around his magnificent marbled summer home. It was a typical Roman extravagance; given beautiful scenery in a private and peaceful spot, he added architecture of such astounding scope that now nobody came here to look at the views, only at the last villa complex built by a vulgar rich man. A remote, contemplative valley had been destroyed to make Nero's holiday playground, where he could amuse himself with every kind of luxury while pretending to be a recluse. He hardly ever came here; he died soon after it was built. Nobody else wanted it. Sublaqueum could never be the same again.

Bolanus proudly advised us that the middle dam, on which he had worked, was the largest in the world. Fifty feet high, the top was wide enough to drive ten horses abreast, if you were that kind of ostentatious maniac. It was paved with special tiles, with a dip in the middle to act as a spillway so the waters could continue on their natural route downstream.

The dam was truly enormous, a massive embankment of core rubble, covered with fitted blocks and sealed with hydraulic lime and crushed rock to form an impenetrable, waterproof plaster. Very nice. Who could blame any emperor who had access to the world's finest engineers for using them to landscape his garden in this way? It was much better than a sunken pond with a lamprey and some green weed.

A bridge high across the entire dam gave access to the villa and its glamorous amenities. Bolanus told us plenty of stories about the place's opulence, but we were in no mood to go sightseeing.

Bolanus walked us out on to the bridge. By the time we got to the middle, I for one just longed to return to land. But if the height made the Consul sway, he showed no sign of it. 'We have come along with you, Bolanus, since we trust your expertise. Now convince us this visit to the dam has a salient point.'

Bolanus paused. He gazed down the valley, a sturdy figure, unmoved by the importance of the ex-Consul grilling him. He waved an arm at the scenery: 'Isn't that marvellous?' Frontinus screwed his mouth up and nodded in silence. 'Right! I wanted another look,' said Bolanus. 'The Anio Novus aqueduct is needing a complete overhaul. It was never helped by being drawn off the river; we already knew from the bad quality of the original Anio Vetus that the channel would deliver too much mud. I reckon that could be improved dramatically if the Emperor could be persuaded to extend it right up here and draw the waters off the dam -'

Frontinus had pulled out his note-tablet and was writing this down. I foresaw him encouraging Vespasian to restore the aqueduct. For the struggling treasury to find the enormous budget for an extension might take longer. Still, Julius Frontinus was only in his mid-forties. He was the type who would mull over a suggestion like this for years. In a few decades' time, I could well find myself smiling as the Daily Gazette saluted an Anio Novus extension, when I would remember standing here above Nero's lake while an engineer's assistant earnestly propounded his theories…

This had nothing to do with the murders. I quietly mentioned that.

I sensed that the dogged Bolanus had another of his long educational talks ready. I shifted unhappily, looking at the sky. It was blue, with the slight chilly tinge of approaching autumn. Far away, buzzards or kestrels wheeled. Bolanus, who had a weak eye, had been suffering from the glare and the breeze. Even so he had removed his hat, in case the wind lifted it and spun it over the dam and down the valley.

'I've been thinking a lot about the Anio Novus.' Bolanus liked to drop in a vital point, then leave his audience tantalised.

'Oh?' I said, in the cool tone of a man who knew he was being sneakily played with.

'You asked me to consider how human hands and such could enter the water supply. From where they end up in Rome, I decided they must come via the four major systems that start above Tibur. That's the Claudia, Marcia, Anio Vetus and Anio Novus aqueducts. The Anio Vetus, the oldest of all, and the Marcia both run mainly underground. Another point: the Marca and Claudia are both fed by several springs, connected to the aqueducts by tunnels. But the Anio Vetus and Anio Novus are drawn direct from the river whose name they both bear '

We gazed down at the damned river running far below us. 'Relevant?' prodded Frontinus.

'I think so.'

'You always believed the remains were first thrown into the river,' I said. 'You suggested that when we first talked.'

'Good memory!' He beamed.

A bad thought struck. 'You think they are thrown in here!'

We glanced at one another, then once more looked down over the dam. I immediately saw problems; anyone up here on the bridge tossing things off the top would be visible for miles. The dam had a vertical face on its reservoir side, but a long sloped bank on the river side. Hurling limbs far enough to ensure they landed in the Anio would be impossible, and for the killer entailed a risk of throwing himself off with them. It would be particularly dangerous if there was more wind; even today, when the valley itself was full of birdsong and wild flowers, warm, humid and still, up here constant blusters threatened to make us lose our step.

I explained my doubts. 'Picturesque thought – but think again!'

Bolanus shrugged. 'Then you have to look at the river between here and the Via Valeria.'

All I wanted was to walk very carefully back to the firm ground at the end of the dam.