A Pattern of Blood

Chapter Four

Marcus and I exchanged looks and went back to the atrium. A table had been set there, with two stools and a jug of wine.

‘Maximilian seems to be taking his new role as head of the household seriously,’ Marcus said wryly. ‘He appears to have thought of everything. Except a slave. It appears we shall have to pour our own wine!’

‘I’ll see if I can find someone,’ I said. ‘And I’ll look for this Flavius and his friend while I’m about it. They cannot be far away.’

Marcus nodded, and I left him to wait in comfort, while I set off in search of a servant to pour the wine. Strictly speaking, I should have sent a slave to find the missing clientes too, since I was a guest in the house, but I welcomed the chance to look around a little.

I had some idea, now, of the layout of the residence. The whole building was shaped like a giant H, the principal rooms across the centre, with attics above, and two wings projecting forwards and back on either side. I had been to the rear of the house. There, I knew, were the bedrooms and other private apartments ranged along each side of the central courtyard garden; while beyond the herb gardens, arbours and central water basin, the top of the H was almost closed off by a separate block which obviously contained the kitchens and the servants’ quarters, and a two-seater latrine over the drain. Presumably the rest of the household offices — the rubbish heap, oil stores, orchard, poultry yard and stables — lay beyond, the whole enclosed behind the massive wall which ran around the entire property.

I did not go that way. Quintus’s waiting room and reception salon formed one of the forward wings of the H, so instead of going into the rear courtyard, where the slave quarters were, I went out into the front court, and looked to my right, where the front entrance to the ante-room lay.

The door to the ante-room was open, and through it I could glimpse the table and a portion of the bench. Nothing more: the room was too long, and in any case the inner door would screen any view of the reception room beyond, where the funeral preparations must by now be under way. But I had seen what I wanted. Anyone coming from the reception room could have come out this way and rinsed his hands in the central fountain. Or he might have done so in the rear courtyard. In either case, he ran a considerable risk of being observed.

I looked around for possible witnesses, but there was no one in sight. As I watched, however, a page in a turquoise tunic emerged onto the farther veranda, one of those handsome young boys that every wealthy Romanised household seems to keep as a pet.

I summoned him with a gesture. ‘Slaves in this household are like donkey-hire men at a market. Lots of them around, but you can never find one when you need one. Where is everybody?’

He was obviously terrified, but he had been trained in flirtation, and batted his eyelids at me. ‘Your pardon, citizen. We are in confusion. No one is at their usual station. I, for instance, apart from carrying messages for the family or for guests, usually attend exclusively on Quintus Ulpius.’ He smiled at me ingratiatingly, but I said nothing and he babbled on, as if explanations might win my favour. ‘But since we heard of my master’s death, everyone is giving different orders.’

‘Such as?’

He counted them off on his fingers. ‘Two slaves were sent into the town for anointing oils. Citizen Maximilian demanded another four to go with him to the bathhouses, and two others were needed to attend my master.’ He was running out of fingers, and he spread his hands in a hopeless gesture. ‘Then Julia Honoria sent down orders, wanting messages carried all over the place — to funeral musicians, stonemasons, orators, anointers, and even to the market to order food for the funeral feast. She even has the garden slaves cutting greenery and herbs. In the end there were only three of us left in the slaves’ waiting room. Then Sollers came in and ordered us to come and get the study ready for His Excellence. Me, Rollo! I did my best, but I am no cleaning slave. In the end the other two said I was in the way, and sent me outside. So here I am. Can I serve you in any way, citizen?’

Not in the way he presumably served Quintus, I thought. I have no taste for pretty young pages. Nor as a witness, either. According to the testimony I had just heard he was in the slaves’ room until after the murder. I toyed for a moment with the idea of sending him to look for the missing men, but one glance at his exquisite turquoise tunic and embroidered slippers was enough to dissuade me. His function was merely to look decorative. He would be more concerned with keeping his expensive shoes clean than in doing anything useful. As the slaves cleaning the study obviously recognised.

And there was Junio, banished to the attic, I thought with irritation. But it wasn’t this lad’s fault. I tipped him a couple of copper asses, which brought a smile back to his face, then I sent him off to pour the wine for Marcus, and set out to find the missing clientes myself.

It did not take me long. They were sitting together halfway down one of the colonnades in the front courtyard, in a little leafy arched arbour with a stone seat. The place was screened from the rest of the garden by a semicircular area of thick hedge and a portly and charmless statue of Minerva — so secluded that I might have walked straight past it, had I not heard the murmur of voices.

‘It is absolutely typical of the man,’ one of them was saying. ‘Absolutely typical. Keeps me waiting until last, and then has me sent away to kick my heels in the garden while he is “resting”. I suppose I shall count myself lucky if he consents to see me before dark.’

I grinned to myself. The rituals of visiting a patron are less formally observed here than they are in Rome. Marcus, for example, does not require me to attend him every morning and night, as many patrons expect their followers to do in the imperial city. But supplicants are usually received in strict order of social precedence. Keeping important visitors waiting is a deliberate insult.

‘It is the same for me.’ The other voice was older, high-pitched and querulous. ‘He’s kept me waiting as well. And in this cold wind, too. As least you’ve been able to walk around and enjoy the garden. With my aching joints and swollen knees it is all I can do to hobble to the nearest seat and sit on it.’

‘Enjoy the garden! Enjoy it! When it’s planted with exotic shrubs purchased with my wife’s dowry? You wait till I see Quintus. I’ll plant him — three feet deep, with a coin in his mouth to pay the ferryman. I’ll even donate the money myself.’

There was a pause, and then a nervous cackle of laughter. ‘Don’t worry! I’ll help you pay it, three times over. And if you’re going to plant him, I’ll give you some fertiliser — from my cesspit. It’s no more than he deserves.’

Eavesdropping is not very dignified, but it is often fascinating. And, in the circumstances, illuminating. I inched a little closer to the hedge.

‘Don’t worry,’ the same voice went on. ‘I hate him as much as you do. You heard how he treated me? Standing up in the amphitheatre and denouncing me to the council, persuading them not to re-elect me to office. Me, Paulus Avidius Lupus, after I have served this town as decurion for eleven years.’

Flavius — the younger man had to be Flavius — sounded unimpressed. ‘I heard that he had opposed your selection as magistrate. I also heard that you had done the same to him.’

‘That was years ago, when he first sought election to the ordo. Anyway, it isn’t at all the same thing. My father was born a Roman citizen. His wasn’t, he was merely a free man with “Latin rights” and a lot of money from doing deals with the army. That’s what I pointed out to the voters. Of course, that’s all been forgotten. Quintus has joined the equites since then — with his money he can afford to buy his way to a knighthood. And he’s been a curia member for years. But he’s never forgotten it. Never. He has used his power and influence to ruin my family — there is not a tax or imperial obligation that does not fall on me twice over, and he loses no opportunity to support my creditors in the courts.’

Flavius began to say something, but Lupus was not to be silenced.

‘He stopped my re-election, yet he is still demanding that I make a retiring contribution to the curial purse. For urgent civic repairs. You heard what happened? I imagine all Corinium knows by now. Some idiot sited the whole forum on poor ground: the Jupiter column is cracking and half the basilica is sinking into a ditch. Quintus is demanding huge contributions from everyone on the council. It will cost me thousands. He’s setting out to ruin me. My only hope was to be re-elected magistrate. That way I could at least sell a few contracts, or attract goodwill gifts from wealthy followers. I managed to get myself nominated. That cost me a fortune. And then he put a stop to it. Rest assured, young man, any enemy of Quintus’s is a friend of mine.’

Flavius gave a mirthless laugh. ‘In that case, you are the friend of half Corinium. Unfortunately, the other half adores him. The man who brings Quintus down will need a broad back. Or exceptionally good fortune.’

‘Exactly what I was thinking,’ Lupus said. ‘Do you know. .’ He dropped his voice, and I could catch only snatches of the rest ‘. . insisted on stealing him. . Would have cost me half my estate to pay the fine. . Thousands of sesterces. .’

I might have gone on listening for longer, but at that moment a servant in a smart ochre tunic came bustling out of the far wing of the house, and stopped on the veranda to stare at me. I made a feeble pretence that I was merely bending over in order to re-fasten my sandal. The slave gave me a disdainful look — real gentlemen do not go around tying their own sandal straps with one ear in the hedge — and disappeared back into the building. I should have to be more careful, I thought, or my spying activities would be common gossip among the servants. Chastened, I went around to confront the speakers openly.

They were not a prepossessing pair. Flavius, the younger man, was perhaps thirty-five years old, but already thickset and paunchy. He might have been handsome, once, but he had gone to seed, and now managed somehow to combine dark features with a high colour, so that he appeared at once swarthy and florid. The idea of such a man being married to the beautiful Julia seemed an outrage to natural justice.

The other was older, probably even older than I was: stooping and scrawny, with wiry limbs and grey, thinning hair which he had vainly attempted to hide under an absurd and very obvious hairpiece. His skin had the yellowish-white tinge which is often associated with the infirm, and he clutched his right arm stiffly to his bosom as though it pained him, but the alacrity with which he leaped to his feet when I appeared suggested a certain sprightliness. Clearly the aching knees he had complained of were not troubling him now.

‘And who in the name of Mithras are you?’ Flavius demanded furiously. ‘Bursting in unannounced upon your betters in this way?’

‘Forgive me, citizens,’ I said, trying to look humble. Purple-edged togas demand deference. Even the younger man was a narrow-striper, and the badly draped robe of the other carried the broad stripe of senior office — though, incidentally, how I was supposed to deduce this through a thicket it was hard to see. ‘I am Libertus, a pavement-maker. I have come from Glevum with my patron, the governor’s representative, to see about laying a mosaic. We are guests in this house.’

The mention of Marcus won me a little more respect. Flavius, who had been scowling at me aggressively, glanced nervously at Lupus and took a step backwards. ‘You were looking for us?’

‘I was, citizens. I bring serious news. Did you know that Quintus Ulpius had been stabbed?’

It was not, taken all in all, the most intelligent of questions. If Junio had been there he would undoubtedly have reminded me of the fact. But the results were startling.

Flavius reacted angrily. ‘Of course I know. That is why I am obliged to dance attendance on him here, like a tradesman begging for payment. Of course he was stabbed. But if you are looking for sympathy, or a subscription, you have come to the wrong people. If I could find the man who stabbed him, I would clap him warmly on the back. And I dare say Lupus here feels the same. He was just telling me his grievances.’

If he was looking for warm support, he was disappointed. Lupus’s pale skin grew even paler, and when he spoke his voice seemed scarcely under his control. ‘Flavius, my friend,’ he plucked at his own toga folds with his stiffly held hand, ‘be careful what you say. Words spoken in jest are quickly misconstrued.’ He turned to me. ‘I had grievances against Quintus, yes, but I did not stab him. I have been sitting here on this bench all the time. Flavius will tell you.’

Flavius looked from Lupus to me and back again. ‘What? You mean Quintus has been stabbed — again?’

Lupus looked shaken, but he said steadily, ‘Well. . I imagine so. This good citizen would hardly come to tell us something which the whole town has known for a month. This is some new attack. Is that not so, citizen? That is what you mean?’ His eyes, deep-set and too close together, gazed at me anxiously.

‘That is exactly what I mean,’ I said. ‘Ulpius was recovering from his first wound, but he has been stabbed again, in the last hour. And this time fatally.’

It was Flavius’s turn to pale. ‘Quintus is dead?’ He shook his head. ‘Well, that solves my problem, then. And yours too, Lupus. And since I do not imagine that his family will expect me among the mourners, I shall return home. Excuse me, gentlemen.’ He made to walk past me out of the arbour.

I forestalled him, choosing my words carefully. ‘I am afraid not, citizen. I think my patron will wish to question you. When Ulpius was found there was a dagger in his back. A very unusual dagger, with a carved black wood handle. They say it is yours.’

He looked at me for a moment, the colour in his cheeks darkening. Then he snorted. ‘Mine! Well, what of that? It was on the table in the ante-room for all to see. It does not mean I killed him. What sort of assassin would leave an identifying knife in his victim?’

Perhaps the sort of assassin, I thought, who expected us to reason in that way. But I did not say so. ‘Perhaps a man who had no choice,’ I said. ‘Withdrawing the knife from the wound was difficult. It is possible the killer intended to remove it, but could not stop to do so. There was so little time in which to commit the crime — unexpected delay would be fatal.’

Flavius licked his lips. ‘So you think. .?’

‘I do not think anything, citizen. Except that owning the murder weapon does not absolve you from the crime. Marcus will wish to question everyone. You too, I’m afraid, Lupus.’

Lupus looked too terrified to protest, but Flavius was still scowling. For a moment he was silent. He seemed to be thinking furiously. Then he did speak, and when he did so his words were unexpected.

‘I want to speak to Julia,’ he said.