Illegally Dead

17

I was feeling pretty sick when I got back home later that afternoon and reported to Perilla on the terrace. Sick and frustrated and very, very angry.

‘I’ve sent word to Libanius that he’s got a missing kid on his hands and that she’s been missing for ten days without a fucking dickey-bird from her guardian,’ I said. ‘That’s all we can do. Unfortunately.’ I downed a good half of the wine in my cup at a swallow. It tasted sour. ‘Me, for two pins, Roman citizen or not, if I were Libanius I’d take the bitch in and sweat her. Her and her sodding brother both.’

‘Gently, dear,’ Perilla said. ‘You don’t know the girl’s come to any harm. And if Veturina’s telling the truth then she genuinely — ’

‘That woman wouldn’t know truth if it sodding jumped up and bit her. And where genuinely’s concerned — ’

‘Marcus, that is enough!’ Perilla adjusted a fold in her mantle. ‘Veturina may be guilty of the sin of omission but there is no evidence that she has actually committed a crime.’

‘Gods, lady, they’re working a double act, those two! Whether Castor’s covering for her or she’s covering for him or they’re each covering for the other I don’t know, but it’s happening, and the result is that all I’m getting from both of them is a mixture of stalling, lies and half-truths. It’s like wading through fucking glue!’ I gulped down the rest of the wine and reached for the jug. ‘And if there isn’t something rotten behind it all then I’ll eat my mantle.’

‘Very well,’ Perilla said. ‘Let’s have your case. Against Veturina first, omitting her personal motives for killing her husband, which I’m perfectly willing to concede.’

‘Okay.’ I took a deep breath. ‘Three members of the household went missing either the day before Hostilius died or on the day of the death itself: Cosmus the slave, her brother and her ward. She didn’t mention any of them until — this is the point — she was faced with hard outside evidence. Cosmus, fair enough, I’ll accept that as far as not reporting him over the wall immediately is concerned she may’ve had other things on her mind. But she lied to me about when Scopas actually told her that he’d gone, and she certainly lied deliberately first to last about Castor and Paulina.’

‘Her reasons?’

‘Assuming she’s guilty as hell? Or at least knows more about Hostilius’s death than she’s saying?’

‘Yes. Go on.’

‘Cosmus because he was supposed to disappear altogether and his body turning up so soon was an embarrassment. Castor…well, we’ll leave Castor for the moment, because he’s the biggie. Paulina…’ I hesitated.

‘Paulina?’

‘Because she heard something, or knew something, or suspected something. Maybe as a result of that last scene between Veturina and Hostilius, the day before he died. Something that was too dangerous to let her pass on.’

‘Such as what?’

‘Perilla, I don’t know, right? I can’t even make a decent guess. But whatever it was she couldn’t be allowed to repeat it.’

Perilla was quiet for a moment. ‘You think she might be dead, then?’ she said.

I nodded. I felt empty. ‘Yeah. Yeah, I do. There’s a good chance of it, anyway.’

She laid aside the book resting in her lap, that she’d been reading when I arrived. ‘Marcus, this is sheer supposition, and nonsense at that! Veturina’s no murderer, you said that yourself! To kill her husband out of kindness, yes, but — ’

‘Castor’s not Veturina.’

‘You think he’s capable of murder? Of killing not only the slave-boy but his own niece?’

‘Foster-niece. If that.’

‘Don’t split hairs. You know what I mean.’

I sighed. ‘Yeah, I know; valid point. Search me, Perilla, I’ve only met the guy once. He’s crooked to the core, sure, absolutely, no question; but a murderer? It’s possible; I think he might commit murder if it’d get him something he really wanted, or he was desperate enough, but I could be wrong. Where Paulina’s concerned I hope I am.’

‘All right. Let’s have Castor. Again, I’ll concede the motive, because we’ve been through that.’

‘Not quite. Oh, I know the details now of his spat with Hostilius, or at least what he told me they were, which isn’t the same thing, and that’s fine as far as it goes. But we’ve got another strand.’

‘Namely?’

‘The business of the will. The gods know what it has to do with Hostilius’s death, if anything, but I’ll bet you a gold piece to a poke in the eye that Castor knows more about it than he’s saying. That’s an avenue to chase. As far as the actual murder goes…you want the scenario with Castor as the killer?’

‘Yes.’

‘Okay. General motive as we said: Hostilius is blocking his career and treating him and his sister like dirt. Add to that, now, that he’s been nailed for unprofessional conduct, possibly criminal, and — again possibly — some underhand jiggery-pokery involving Maecilius’s will. Fair?’

‘Fair.’

‘So he decides, there and then, to kill Hostilius. Only he’s got a major problem because if he does kill him it has to be more or less straight away, to stop him blowing the whistle. Unfortunately the quarrel’s been witnessed, and if Hostilius is too obviously stiffed then he’s the prime suspect. Unless — ’

‘Unless he disappears from the scene forthwith and Hostilius’s death seems due to natural causes.’ Perilla was frowning. ‘You know, dear, this is quite clever.’

‘Then he has his stroke of genius involving the medicine bottle, which gets round the obvious murder snag. The only problem now is that he can’t manage things without help, witting or unwitting, because ostensibly from now on he’s shacked up with his girlfriend in Bovillae, with whom ten gets you fifty he’s since arranged an alibi.’

‘The help being Veturina.’

‘Right. How much the lady knew or guessed about what was going on beforehand I don’t know, but let’s be charitable and say she only made the connection much later, when Libanius told her about the medicine. Anyway, Castor rides back to the villa, explains the situation — that he’s had an almighty row with Hostilius and has to leave first thing in the morning — and clears off out of the way — ’

‘Hold on, Marcus. What about Scopas? Wouldn’t he have known, if Castor was in the house?’

‘Scopas could be squared, lady; after all, Veturina and Castor are family, and if push came to shove, given the circumstances, he might well support them over Hostilius. Besides, as far as he was concerned the actual murderer was Cosmus.’

‘Yes, what about Cosmus?’

‘I reckon you can play him two ways, depending on how much of a cold, calculating bastard you think Castor is. Not that it matters all that much, because it comes to the same thing in the end. Scenario one is that Cosmus’s involvement wasn’t deliberate on Castor’s part. Maybe the boy suspected something for some reason and kept his eyes open, maybe it was a total accident, but he finds out what’s going on and Castor has to take him into account. Scenario two is that Castor set him up from the start so as to have an insurance policy in case things went wrong.’

‘The first seems much more likely.’ Perilla was twisting a strand of her hair. ‘It’s the same argument we used for Veturina: recruiting Cosmus would’ve been more of a risk than a benefit.’

‘Yeah.’ I took a sip of wine. ‘Fair enough. Besides, the impression I’m getting of Castor is that he’s someone who can improvise and think on his feet. The same goes for Veturina. Remember, the subject of Cosmus didn’t come up until his body was found, and like I say I don’t think that was supposed to happen, not until all this had blown over anyway. My bet is that Castor thought that if he had to kill him — which he did, for safety — he might as well turn a profit on the deal, make him an insurance policy after all. When he did his trick with the medicine bottle, he stole the ring and so on out of the desk drawer and gave them to Cosmus. Then if things went pear-shaped in future — ’

‘Marcus. Wait. Are you saying that Cosmus wasn’t in Hostilius’s room at all?’

I nodded. ‘It was Castor, the whole thing. If Veturina saw anyone at all from her room coming out through the portico — and I’d bet good money that she didn’t — it was her brother. Like I said, they’ve been covering for each other: Castor makes sure that, if a murder is suspected, there’s a ready-made murderer provided with a ready-made motive of simple theft; while Veturina conveniently remembers seeing said murderer leaving the scene of the crime. It fits. It’s perfect.’

‘Then Castor gives Cosmus the stolen articles and tells him to run off to the Bavius farm where he — ’ Perilla stopped. ‘I’m sorry, but that doesn’t make sense.’

‘What doesn’t?’

‘If Cosmus hadn’t been directly involved in the murder, then why should he run? Especially with stolen goods from the dead man’s room in his possession. The boy may’ve been stupid, but he can’t’ve been that stupid. He would have suspected he was being used, surely.’

‘Fine. So what’s to stop Castor from having planted the stuff on the body after he killed the kid but before he pitched him down the well?’

‘That’s…more viable.’ Perilla was looking thoughtful. ‘You’d still have to explain how he persuaded Cosmus to go to the Bavius place and stay there, mind. And if he did manage to invent a plausible reason for sending him to an empty property, one that didn’t involve the element of subterfuge where the boy was concerned, how would he know that Cosmus wouldn’t tell someone where he was going, or keep his presence there a secret? I’m sorry, Marcus, but it still raises serious questions of practicality.’

‘Yeah.’ I frowned. Bugger: she was right. In any case, it was pure theorising. What we needed now were hard facts. ‘Okay, never mind. That’s as far as we can go at present. Leave it.’

‘Very well. So what’s the next step?’

That was the biggie; worse, it was a question I really, really didn’t have an answer to. ‘The gods know. Follow up the business with the will, at least; that’s a loose end that needs tying. Apart from that’ — I took a morose swallow of wine — ‘just hope like hell that somewhere there isn’t another body.’

The problem with the last one was that the cold feeling in my gut told me that there was. It was only a matter of time before we found it.