Graveyard of the Hesperides

III

Tiberius Manlius Faustus, my gutsy new lover, was thirty-seven, broad-shouldered though not too heavy, gray-eyed, astute and quiet. He strigilled up well, when he wasn’t in a tunic covered with building dust. A plebeian, but from forebears who had made their pile, he never had to sell fish or hammer copper. Until recently he had lived at leisure with an uncle in the warehouse trade, from whose complex affairs Faustus was now trying to extract his own money. We needed cash to set up our new business. I had yet to find out why he wanted to be a building contractor-a decision he seemed to have taken entirely alone-or what had convinced him he could do it. But he was an interesting man. I suspected he could learn anything and be a success at whatever he chose.

I was a tricky, more complicated mix. I grew up in Britannia, an orphan of unknown parentage. Under Roman law, as I have been assured by lawyers, foundlings always rank as citizens. Rome won’t risk even one little free person being denied their rights, just because their parents lost or dumped them. Mine probably died in the Boudiccan Rebellion. Nobody knew who they were.

Freedom belonged to me, which was crucial in the Roman Empire. As I scavenged for food and dodged cruel blows as a child, it ought to have been comforting. Sadly, at the time I didn’t know. In my experience, a foundling feels like a slave.

Originally fostered by rough cabbage-sellers in downtown Londinium (a town where “rough” means grim and “down” is rock bottom, though the cabbages are robust), I sensed problems coming so I ran away. Of course I was picked up by a brothel owner. In the nick of time, I was spotted and pulled off the streets by Marcus Didius Falco and Helena Justina, he a crusty middle-rank informer and she a lovely woman of senatorial birth. They brought me to Rome, city of wonders.

So I had seen some of the best and all the very worst of life. I now occupied an awkward position where my acceptance by other people could not be relied upon. Yes, I was freeborn, adopted into the middle rank and brought up by a senator’s daughter-but I had a scavenger’s eyes and temper, and was even whispered to be a druid. The fact that, like Father, I worked as a private informer made me even more frightening to snobs. Rome was packed with snobs. For the past twelve years, since making my own way in the world, I had tried to keep my head down and avoid their notice. As an informer, I was probably on a vigiles watch list, which never helps.

Faustus had enjoyed a different life as a big-city rich boy. He had been married briefly years ago. His ex-wife, Laia Gratiana, despised me. I loathed her. Our opposing views on what Faustus deserved would never be reconciled. She could not understand my kind feelings for him; she was jealous of his open attraction to me. In whimsical moments I suggested to him that since she remained on the edge of his social circle, he ought to invite the aloof Laia to our wedding, if we had one. This almost convinced him to drop the idea.

I too had married when much younger, but was widowed when my husband died in an accident. I had never expected to find anybody else. Then Faustus swanned into my life.

Another fine concept in Roman law is that it simply defines marriage as an agreement by two people to live together. So, once Faustus brought his luggage to my apartment and stayed with me, I was a wife again. His wife. It felt right, he seemed calm, but I was still a little nervous.

My mother, Helena, had never felt the need for a wedding ceremony. I had expected to follow her example. Who needs a show? According to Mother it saved money that would be better spent on good food and books. In their early days, just like Faustus and me, Helena and Falco could barely afford either.

Also, Mother told me, you want to avoid ghastly wedding presents. She had had a doomed first marriage where the awfulness of the gifts was prophetic. According to her, she sent out the notice of divorce with the same messenger who was still taking round her thank-yous for the hideous vases.

A woman with a conscience, Helena Justina always writes polite thank-you notes, even when she hates a gift, or if she already owns three manicure sets. Of course she does have three, because she has three daughters; from time to time she must have owned at least six sets because Julia, Favonia and I often forgot what we had given her at a previous birthday or Saturnalia. She would just say, “Oh it doesn’t matter; this is a much nicer one!”-as if she meant it. As a mother she was a fine example, as our father often pointed out. That was his idea of imposing discipline. “Be like your mother, you rascals, or you can leave home.”

I counted myself lucky to have been adopted by Falco and Helena. They gave me security, education, comfort and independence. Humor. Rebellion. Loyalty, too. Falco had taught me the craft by which I earned my living. Both my parents encouraged my rampant curiosity.

Being a well-trained informer would enable me to find out what had happened to Rufia, the missing barmaid. It may not be what you want for your daughter, yet ask yourself: why not? As I set up with Faustus, I would think about this. Does the ability to tackle a mystery about a bunch of bones from under a courtyard mean an informer cannot be a trusty friend? An elegant companion? A useful contributor to the domestic purse? A sweet daughter? A loyal wife? Even a good mother? Although that was certainly not on my horizon, if the apothecaries’ products did their duty.

Above all, an informer’s task is good; we enable justice. If anyone had ever cared about Rufia, I now hoped to find them, to provide explanations and perhaps consolation. If anyone had done her fatal harm, I would make them pay.

When we first saw what we presumed were the barmaid’s remains, Faustus and I closed our lunch basket and discussed how to proceed. We were now alone. He had told the workmen to stop what they were doing; he sent them back to the Aventine to their normal evening job, refurbishing the house at Lesser Laurel Street. I hadn’t been much involved with that, so I still found it hard to accept it as “our” house. Faustus had said I could decide whether to live there once I saw it renovated. But I knew I would agree. Meanwhile we lived in my apartment-and, like most people in Rome, spent as much time as possible outside the home.

Here, we were sitting on one of the bar’s crude wooden benches, which we had pulled out of a stored pile so we could snuggle up to share our lunch. Our seat was an old, worn, splintery contraption. Perhaps the landlord would purchase a handsome new set of garden furniture when his project was finished, though I doubted it. The Hesperides had never been that sort of place.

It was a workaday bar. Most customers stood in the street, probably at the main counter, which was longer than the return around the corner. They had the usual food vats, never washed out. For a sit-down drink, you came in through a purpose-built gap in the crazy-paved marble worktop, squeezed by the inner tables and service area, maybe glanced at the unreadable drinks list painted on a wall by the beaker shelf, exchanged a word with whoever was serving, walked down a very short corridor with a dark staircase, then emerged into this not very airy, so-called garden.

It was larger than you might expect. Rustic trellis used to divide up semi-private table positions. I saw no trace of climbing greenery, though two empty birdcages hung on the rough-hewn trellis posts. A canopy shaded one part. There was a half-dead bay tree in a large pot with a rim piece missing. I had yet to work out what kind of customers would ever have used this interior. In Rome, we tend to socialize on the streets.

The bar owner had never mentioned the mystery, but our foreman, Larcius, had told us the public rumors with a grin: “The site is supposed to be haunted. They say some murdered waitress was buried out here years ago.”

Faustus had given him a cool look. He and the workforce would have to feel their way together, though it seemed to be working out. They had realized he was no soft touch. He would turn up on-site, where the conversation soon showed them he fully understood what they were doing and anyone who failed to get on with him might lose his job.

“Not afraid of ghosts, are you, Larcius?” I asked dryly. Larcius did not bother to answer.

“I find it hard to believe,” said Faustus, playing the serious-minded aedile who discouraged gossip, “that drinkers have downed their tots here for decades, knowing a corpse was right beneath their sandals.”

“No one remembers much about her.” Larcius seemed to think that justified it. “She’s just always been ‘that missing barmaid.’”

Not any longer. Now we had found her.

It would be to her advantage that she had been found by us.

So, after his men left, Faustus and I considered what we could do. We discussed whether to tell the landlord yet, but decided to keep quiet for the time being. I would begin discreet inquiries about Rufia: who she was, why people believed she had come to a sad end, when it happened, what suspects fell under suspicion originally, what new ones we could identify. I might have wondered why nobody made a real fuss at the time, but I knew. People hate to interfere. Nobody invites trouble. Regulars are always loath to start a hue and cry that might end with their favorite bar being shut down. Many things can be excused as “loyalty.” It’s pathetic, but it’s how people think.

Before we left that afternoon, we took a last look at the bones. The jumbled haul would not make a complete skeleton. Possibly there were more bones to be found, if they had not decayed completely. These were definitely old, though impossible to say how old. But for hearing past mention of Rufia, they could have been dismissed as really ancient, some prehistoric ancestor who lived here even before Rome was founded. If we were pious, they might have been collected up and reburied in a pot in a proper cemetery, though to be honest, most people would deposit them on the nearest midden heap and walk away fast.

Faustus pulled down the awning to wrap them. It was stiff with what could well be mold, but Rufia would not complain. We left her bones there, though we carefully locked up. The back gate onto a narrow alley was always left very secure, to stop anyone coming in to steal tools or materials. Faustus blocked the passage to the courtyard with a heavy old door (all building sites contain old doors that don’t belong anywhere, don’t ask me why), piling sacks and timbers against it. Fortunately he employed a night watchman, who had probably heard what happened today because we found him in the main bar; he had come early.

This was just as well. We had no chance of keeping the discovery private. A small crowd of sightseers had already gathered in the street.

Faustus used his authority as an aedile to order these ghouls to disperse. They were not impressed, freely ignoring him, and there was a danger that others would join them. He made the best of it with an announcement: “I presume you have heard that human remains have been found. I am aware of the rumored disappearance of a waitress some years ago. There may be no connection. But anyone who knows anything pertinent should come to see one of us.” He indicated that I was included, though I was his wife now, so he didn’t bother with introductions. I smoldered like an appendage who would cause trouble at home later. “Now please, go about your business quietly.”

Had the Hesperides been open for business, he would have stood no chance of moving people on. As it was, some shuffled off but many simply shifted themselves to the Medusa or the Romulus along the street, then stared across from there.

Because of the public interest, we went back and, helped by our watchman, reopened the passageway indoors so we could fetch the bones safely away with us.

After that, since too many people already knew, we set off to inform the landlord after all.