Germanicus

5

My Falernian is pretty smooth stuff, mind, unlike the Special that after a few cups will suddenly sneak up from behind and give you a belt like a blackjack. Besides, I was a good half flask shy of Cotta, which didn't happen all that often. The result was that when we finally got rid of the guy long after the lamps were lit I was still this side of capable, while Rome's current consul was pissed as a newt and repeating every second word. Backwards.

We left Bathyllus and his minions clearing away. Perilla offered me her shoulder to lean on with a disapproving little sniff. I played along as far as the bedroom door. Then I stopped pretending and grabbed her in earnest.

'Corvinus, don't swallow my earring, please,' she said. 'You'll give yourself indigestion.'

'Mmm.' I pushed the door open with my foot. Why the hell did I have the architect build me such a big bedroom? The bed was miles away.

'Marcus, please. Give me a chance to…'

I didn't. It's more fun that way. Perilla enjoys it too, although she'd never admit it. We made it to the bed, just. After which any matronly protests were academic and not taken seriously by either party.

'We should've had Meton lay us on a few oysters,' I said after the first time around.

'They're out of season,' Perilla said. At least that's what I think she said. The words got a bit muffled because her face was pressed to the hollow between my shoulder and throat.

'Onions, then. Or is that for wind?'

'Corvinus…'

'Mmm?'

'Just be quiet.'

So I lay there listening to the carts outside and being very grateful to have Perilla wrapped round me until she started nuzzling my earlobe again and we moved on to the main course. That took some time, luckily. With Perilla slow is definitely best.

'Marcus,' she said when we'd finished and cooled down far enough to talk.

'Yeah?'

'Could I possibly let down my hair now? I mean, if you don't mind, of course.'

I grinned down at her. 'I imagined you already had, lady.'

'Oh, ha ha.' She threw me off and slipped out of bed. I watched while she took off her earrings, pulled the pins out of her hair and let the beautiful tawny mane do what it felt like…

Hold on. Something was wrong here. No self-respecting Roman matron pulls out her own pins. Pulling pins is the maid's job.

'Hey!' I said. 'Where's Phryne?'

Phryne was the cross-eyed niece of old Harpale's that she'd taken on when we'd got married. A sort of peace offering to the dead Davus.

'I gave her the evening off.' Perilla shrugged herself out of her tunic; the mantle, of course, hadn't made it the length of the bed.

Jupiter! Legs like that shouldn't be allowed short of an original Praxiteles bronze. 'Yeah?’ I said. ‘Why?'

'No reason.'

I smiled to myself. Sure there wasn't. If Perilla would insist on keeping up this ice maiden pose even when we both knew it was phoney as a woollen toupé then it was fine with me. Without the ice and prickles she just wouldn't be the same girl.

'You tired yet? I said.'

'That depends what you have in mind.' What could've been Praxiteles's best had disappeared under a baggy linen sleeping tunic. Ah, well.

'Just a talk this time.' I patted the mattress beside me. 'Unless you've got a dozen bootleg oysters and an onion or two squirrelled away for emergencies.

She came back over and slipped under the blanket on her side of the bed. Or almost on her side.

'You want to discuss Piso and Plancina, I suppose,' she said.

A marvellous body, bagged at present though it was, and intuition as well. Who says you can't have everything?

'Yeah. You mind?'

'Of course I mind. But I'd prefer it to having you mumbling away to yourself into my back half the night.'

'Would I do that to you, lady?'

'You would. You have.' She kissed me. 'So I'd like the mumbling now, please. While I'm not trying to sleep. That way I don't miss breakfast.'

'Yeah. Well. Okay.' I sat up with my back to the headboard while she snuggled against me under the blanket. 'First thing. The laundry lady with the evil eye and the penchant for poisons.'

'Martina. You think the empress had her killed.' A statement, not a question.

'Don't you?'

'It would seem logical. Somebody certainly did. Suicides don't usually hide empty poison bottles in their hair when they've finished with them.'

'You noticed that?'

'I'm not stupid, Corvinus. Stop acting like your Uncle Cotta. Whoever tied that bottle into the woman's bun wanted to make sure people assumed she'd smuggled it in that way in the first place. In other words, that it was straight suicide. And Livia and poison are practically synonyms.'

'Livia swore she wasn't involved in Germanicus's murder.'

'Not directly involved. Do you believe her?'

I considered. 'Yeah, I believe her, though I wouldn't go to the wall over it because that old fraud's more devious than an Ostian landlord. Still, she didn't have to send for me, she didn't have to do the business with the altar, and she sure as hell didn't have to ask me to dig the dirt.'

'But the empress doesn't have to be responsible for Germanicus's death to have murdered Martina. She'd only be protecting her friend.'

'Yeah, right.' I eased my arm out from under her and rested it along the back of the headboard. 'That's something else that worried me. You think they really knew each other?'

'Plancina and the empress?' She grinned. 'Of course they did.'

'Cut it out. You know who I mean. Martina and Plancina. Cotta said they were thick as eels in a stewpot.'

'So?'

I sighed. 'Plancina was the wife of the governor. Also she was a bigger snob than our Bathyllus, which is putting her straight at the top of the tree. You think she'd trade pickle recipes with a Syrian laundress?'

'If the laundress also happened to be a professional poisoner and she needed her services, yes.'

'Okay. So Plancina invites this well-known local poisoner round to Government House for a spot of honeyed wine, introduces her to her friends and generally lets everyone know they're bosom pals. Then she takes her aside one day and says, "Oh, by the way, Martina, while you're washing the crown prince's smalls tomorrow the governor and I would like you to poison him. Only when you've done it don't say we were involved, will you? There's a dear."'

Perilla was frowning. 'Put like that it does sound fishy.'

'Damn right it sounds fishy! If Plancina were using the woman she wouldn't go within a mile of her. And I'll tell you another thing that's queer as a five legged cat and that's whatever game the Wart's playing.'

'Why he should put himself out to protect Plancina, you mean.'

'No.' I shook my head. 'That had to be Livia's doing. The two may not get on but she's still the guy's mother. She knows things about him that would make your hair curl, and you can be sure as hell she can still twist his arm when it matters. Also if the Wart has the guts to tell the empress to piss off when she tells him she wants a favour then he's a braver man than I am.'

'So what do you find odd, then?' Perilla was sitting up too, now. I had her hooked.

'Cotta said Piso and the Wart were pals. Yet Tiberius makes it very plain right from the start that the guy's on his own. No loaded hints to the jury, no files in the cake. Right?

'But naturally! The emperor had to show himself impartial. Piso may have been a personal friend, but he was on trial for an offence against the state.'

'Is that all?'

'Oh, and murder, of course. But as your Uncle Cotta said that charge wouldn't stand.'

I was grinning. 'You've just made my point, lady. To anybody with an ounce of curiosity — even to Uncle Cotta who didn't like the guy, for Jupiter's sake — the murder was the most important thing in this whole business. Germanicus is a five star gold plated national hero. He's Cincinnatus, Scaevola and Brutus and any other blue eyed wonder-boy you like to name rolled into one, and he's been chopped. The mob's literally banging on the senate house doors screaming for Piso to be handed out to them in cubes. Yet suddenly the actual death is shelved. Tiberius fixes it so's the Senate has to concentrate on the treason charge, whereas what they're busting a gut to know is who hung their darling's clogs up for him. You get me?'

Perilla was quiet for a long time.

'Yes, of course,' she said at last. 'You're saying that Tiberius ensured Piso's conviction, but on his own terms and for his own reasons.'

'Right. Terms that affected events postdating his son's death and which had nothing directly to do with it, and the proof for which according to that old bastard Cotta is incontrovertible. No need to dig any further. Full stop, end of paragraph, end of trial.'

'That does sound rather odd.'

'You bet your pants it sounds odd! Then there's the letters.'

'Yes. That was odd too.' Perilla's brow furrowed. 'Why should Tiberius refuse to produce the official provincial correspondence?'

'Private official correspondence. Personal to Governor and vice versa. Forget gripes about taxes or notifications of repairs to the public toilets. We're talking super-secret here. The stuff that goes out under the sphinx seal and back in the diplomatic bag.'

'Then there's your answer. The emperor wouldn't want sensitive material bandied about in open court. And Piso would appreciate that.'

'But the trial wasn't held in open court. It was held behind closed doors, broad-stripers only, no riff-raff allowed. And the Wart only had to give his word that none of the information in the letters was pertinent. He didn't do that. He just told the Senate they couldn't play. So what does that suggest?'

'That some of it was pertinent, of course.'

'Yeah. And the Wart knew it. And there's something even weirder than that.'

'Really?' Perilla stifled a yawn.

I thumped her lightly in the ribs. 'Come on, we're getting someplace! Don't quit on me now!'

'I'm sorry, Marcus. It slipped out. Don't mind me, please, I'm only exhausted.'

'Cut the sarcasm.' I grinned. 'You asked for it, you got it. The Wart's position I can understand, just, although what he had on the burner's another question. Piso's different. His life's on the line and he knows it. So why does he clam up? From what Cotta told us the guy didn't even lodge a token protest or say, “Gosh fellows I really wish I could help but my hands're tied”. Conclusion: he was as keen to keep their straight patrician noses out of the mail bag as the emperor was.'

Perilla groaned. 'Corvinus, be sensible! How could Piso agree to hand his letters over to the Senate when the emperor had already refused? If he did that he'd be finished whatever happened.'

'Things couldn't be any worse. What could the Wart have done to him that his senatorial pals weren't about to do anyway?'

'He could have set aside his sons' inheritance.'

That brought me up sharp. Yeah. Sure. She was right. Tiberius could've done that, and guys like Cotta would've supported him with both hands. But he hadn't. He'd done exactly the opposite and included them in the special plea for amnesty. Even though the elder had committed active treason. And that could mean…

'They had a deal!' I said. 'The Wart and Piso had a deal! Or at least Piso thought they had.'

Perilla shifted against me impatiently. 'What do you mean, "thought they had"? The only member of the family to suffer was Piso himself, and quite rightly so. He left his province illegally while still its official governor and then tried to incite the Syrian legions to mutiny. Now I'm willing to accept that your deal idea is possible and that Piso agreed to co-operate in exchange for a family indemnity, but if so the emperor fulfilled his side of the bargain.'

'Yeah, but what if the deal went further back than that? What if the Wart and Piso refused to produce their love letters because they were evidence of a conspiracy to murder?'

That hit home. Perilla's eyes widened.

'You think Piso murdered Germanicus on the emperor's instructions? That's crazy!'

'Crazy, hell!' I was getting really excited now. 'It's what everyone believes, and why shouldn't they be right for once? Why else would Tiberius want the murder charge played down? Why else would Piso co-operate over the letters, unless he knew he was finished either way? The Wart probably had Martina put underground as well. Or at least connived with his mother to have it done.'

'All right. Then tell me why.'

I frowned. 'Why what?'

'Why should the emperor arrange to have his own son and heir murdered?'

'How the hell should I know? We're only talking theoretical possibilities here.'

'Very well.' She sat up. 'Let's consider the possibilities. First. Do you think Tiberius is by nature a poisoner?'

I opened my mouth to say yes. Then I closed it. Shit. She had me, of course. The Wart might be six different kinds of bastard but poison wasn't his style. We'd been through that one before.

'Germanicus was poisoned,' she went on. 'Or so his friends claim. So was Martina. That does show a certain consistency of method, don't you think? Livia I would believe, but not the emperor. Not even by connivance.'

'Plancina arranged the first death. She may've arranged the second too, for all we know. Or maybe it was Livia and her together, with Tiberius's blessing.'

'Don't quibble, Marcus. It doesn't matter who arranged the actual killings. Not in that sense. But if you're asking me to believe that the Emperor Tiberius connived at two crimes involving poison, the first through a woman and the second with a woman as victim with perhaps another female intermediary, then I'm sorry but I can't accept it.'

Yeah. Put that way I couldn't accept it either, and it was my theory. Shit.

'Okay.' I fell back on my last line of defence. 'So what about the note? The one Cotta wasn't sure existed.'

'Perhaps it didn't.'

'Oh, come on, Perilla! Who'd make a story like that up?'

'Lots of people, mostly ones with nasty minds like yours. You were going to tell me Piso thought the matter over and decided to tell his lawyers about the arrangement with Tiberius after all, and that Tiberius had him murdered. Weren't you?'

'Uh, yeah.' I shifted uncomfortably. 'Yeah. Something like that.'

'Very well. So answer me four questions first. One. What made Piso change his mind and decide that telling the whole truth would do him any good? Two. Was the note ever delivered, and if so who to and what were its contents? Three. How did Tiberius know Piso had taken an independent line in time to arrange a fake suicide? And four. If Piso was in his own home surrounded by his own slaves how did the emperor manage the murder?'

Oh, bugger. I wasn't up to this at two in the morning, not without some liquid encouragement. I suddenly felt tired. She was right. Again. This was getting monotonous.

'Yeah, okay,' I said. 'And you can add a fifth for good measure. If the Wart found out Piso was thinking of welching on the deal then why should he go ahead and save the guy's sons? Tiberius may be straight but he isn't soft. He wouldn't give a convicted traitor anything but the rope to hang himself with.'

'Exactly.' Perilla kissed me on the cheek and snuggled back down under the blanket. 'Never mind, dear. We'll get there eventually.'

'Sure,' I said sourly. 'When pigs lay eggs.' I lay down and pulled her against me. 'Night-night.'

'Goodnight, Marcus.'

Five minutes later I sat up again, the hairs on my neck tingling. Okay, I couldn't answer any of the questions, but at least I knew where to start. Piso's defence lawyers. And the guy who'd been given the phantom note to deliver in the first place, the freedman Carus. Carillus. Whatever. We weren't done yet. Not by a long chalk.

I thought about digging Perilla in the back and telling her, but she looked asleep. She was probably shamming, but even so I wouldn't've risked it. I like to wake up slow myself, and a grouchy Perilla at the breakfast table is more trouble than I can handle.

I curled up beside her and closed my eyes. Tomorrow was another day.