Murder in the Forum

Chapter Eleven

I followed the servant up the stairs to where Gaius had his study. It was unusual not to have the librarium downstairs among the public rooms, but the design of this house, with its three large interconnecting reception rooms downstairs, presumably didn’t leave room for that. Today, too, this arrangement had particular advantages: it put a staircase and a narrow corridor between the study and the dreadful wailing issuing from the atrium.

The slave tapped on the door, and I entered at Gaius’s ‘Come in.’

The old man was standing by a fine stone-topped table on which a series of wax tablets and stili, and even a length of costly fine scraped bark (of the kind used for legal documents), had been set out. He was clearly supervising the activities of a pair of slaves, one of whom appeared to be mixing octopus ink with ashes in a glass dish, while the other prepared a series of reed and feather pens. Obviously only the best and costliest equipment was to be provided for Marcus and his letters.

When he saw me, Gaius looked surprised. ‘Your pardon, citizen. I was expecting your patron.’

I nodded. ‘He will be here shortly. He has been delayed. It seems his wife has arrived from Corinium.’

I decided not to mention the dead slaves, but changed the subject. I nodded towards the table. ‘When he does come I know he will appreciate your generosity. No one could ask for finer writing materials.’

Gaius looked pleased. ‘I could hardly do less,’ he said gallantly. ‘For Marcus, nothing is a trouble.’

There was something about the way in which he emphasised the name which made the two slaves exchange glances.

‘Most revered and senior citizen,’ I said, according him the full dignity of his magisterial office, ‘I wonder. . a word with you in private?’ He looked about to demur, and I added quickly, ‘Marcus has given his approval.’

Gaius frowned, but he waved his hand in dismissal and the two slaves hurried off. ‘Well?’

‘It has been suggested, Reverence,’ I began hesitantly, ‘that. . Felix. . It is clear that you do not share the Emperor’s extreme regard for him.’ I was choosing my words with the greatest care. If I upset Gaius now, the results could be very uncomfortable — especially if I seemed to criticise anyone.

I need not have worried. Gaius heaved a deep sigh. ‘That brute!’ he said. ‘No, I have no opinion of him at all. He was a cheat and a bully, and I cannot pretend that I am sorry he is dead.’

I tried again. ‘Are you quite wise, your Honour, to make your feelings so clear? The Emperor will certainly have spies in the town, and people will talk, accident or not.’

For a moment the old man bridled. ‘Do you dare to tell me. .’ and then thought better of it. ‘No,’ he said, ‘perhaps you are right. I should guard my tongue. I should never have dared to be so outspoken when he was alive. I should have seen that he was just as dangerous dead.’

‘You know something of Perennis Felix?’ I suggested hesitantly. ‘More than the rest of us, that is?’

Gaius looked at me. ‘Beyond that he was a thieving, brutal rogue who would do anything for money? What else is there to know?’

‘But you lent him your house?’

Gaius grimaced. ‘What choice did I have? My house is often borrowed when a dignitary comes. It would have been too pointed to refuse this time. Felix would have learned of it, and then I should have suffered. Felix was an expert at revenge.’ He smiled ruefully. ‘Although I did try. I put a piece of rotting fish in the latrine and suggested the drains were offensive. It did me no good. My objections were simply overruled. I had to send one of the servants down this morning to get it out again.’

I had to smile at this inventive ruse. No wonder that area of the cellar had smelled so unwholesome. I was so encouraged by the confidence that I ventured a little further. ‘It was suggested that you might have met Felix once before, in Rome.’

At once every vestige of friendliness vanished. It was as if someone had pinched out a wick. He said coldly, ‘I do not know who told you that, or on what authority. I assure you, pavement-maker, I never set eyes upon the man before in my life. Nor wished to either. Now, if there is nothing more I can do to help you. .?’

‘I wished to speak to you about this pavement, your Honour,’ I babbled, but it was too late. Not even discussion of his beloved dog could thaw the chill in his manner, and he was so dismissive that I began to fear that I had talked myself out of a lucrative commission.

In the end I abandoned it. ‘Perhaps we can speak of this later, citizen,’ I suggested, acknowledging defeat.

‘Perhaps,’ he said, stonily, and I was left to bow myself miserably out, while the slaves waiting outside looked at me knowingly and smirked. I was not even accorded the dignity of an escort down the stairs. Gaius summoned them again, and they went back into the study.

My discomfited retreat, however, was not without advantage. As I made my way towards the staircase, the door opposite was opened from within by an aged maidservant, and a moment later I found myself face to face with the woman she had opened it for — a small, round woman of such strikingly unprepossessing appearance that it could only be the famous Phyllidia.

She was, as Marcus had so succinctly put it, as plain as a sheep. I could see why that expression had occurred to him. The woman had a wide, flat, determined face with small eyes, a long nose, a foolish chin and a generally ewe-like expression of amiable truculence. Not unlike a sheep’s, either, were the short locks of coarse and hennaed hair escaping from under the unfashionable band and curling in defiant tufts around her forehead.

She was dressed for mourning in a dark dun-coloured robe which did nothing to enhance her radiance, and she carried a black mourning veil in her hand, ready to cover her face and head. An unkind man might think that an advantage — the ashes on her forehead only emphasised the sallowness of her complexion, and all the white-lead powder upon her face could not disguise a certain redness about the eyes.

She was accompanied by the aged handmaiden bearing an oil-lamp, and I recognised — from her manner and sour expression — that this must be the female jailer and family spy that Octavius had described. The hand of Felix still extended here. Yet, plain as she was, there was nothing of her father about Phyllidia: none of the malice, self-regard and cruelty which had declared itself in his every movement. For that reason, if no other, I gave her an encouraging smile.

‘You are Phyllidia Tigidia?’

She looked at me blankly. ‘I am.’ She did not even ask me who I was. I guessed that she was accustomed to being questioned at every step. ‘I am going to take my turn at the vigil.’

I did not move aside to let her pass, as she evidently expected. Instead I said, ‘This must have been a dreadful shock for you.’

‘Of course.’ It was said without emotion, and there was no flicker of feeling on her face. Yet, surely, this woman had been taken faint at the news, and had to be half carried upstairs to lie down?

I made another attempt. ‘You cared deeply for your father?’

This time there was the suspicion of a flush on the wide cheeks, and a fleeting shadow of a bitter smile. ‘Is there not always feeling between father and child? Thank you for your sympathy, pavement-maker.’

So she did know who I was. I said, ‘You know who I am?’

‘I heard that a pavement-maker was expected. I was mistaken for you, briefly, at the door. When I saw you coming out of Gaius’s study, in a plain toga and with calloused hands, the rest was not hard to deduce.’ It was intended to put me in my place. ‘Now, if you will excuse me, citizen.’ She stepped forward, and I was obliged to fall back and let her pass, together with her triumphant handmaiden.

But I had one spear left in my armoury. The girl was more intelligent than I thought, and she did not altogether despise tradesmen, as I knew. As she set foot upon the staircase, I murmured, so that only she could hear, ‘I have seen Octavius.’

She stopped. There was no mistaking the emotion now. Her whole face came alive, as though someone had lighted a candle in her eyes. She did not turn her head, but simply said firmly, ‘Marida, you may leave us. Give me the lamp.’

The maidservant hesitated.

‘You heard me,’ Phyllidia said. ‘Give me the lamp and go. Wait for me in the bedchamber. I have business with this citizen. Do it now. And do not lick your lips in that fashion. My father is dead — he will not pay you for your tales now.’

Marida sighed deeply but obeyed.

When the slave was out of earshot, Phyllidia turned to me. ‘You have seen Octavius?’

‘He was here last night,’ I said. ‘Looking for you, I think.’

She met my eyes, not the shy, sideways glance of the well-brought-up Roman virgin, but a frank enquiring stare. Yet there was something in the brown eyes which gave me hope for Octavius. If this was a sheep, it was at least a clever sheep. ‘He is alive? And well?’

It seemed a strange question. ‘He was, no more than an hour ago. Although he was strangely uneasy. He seemed to have been looking for you in the hiring stables. Then he learned where you had stayed last night and went rushing away to search for you.’

She closed her eyes. ‘Great goddess Minerva, thanks be to your name!’ She raised her voice. ‘Marida!’

The old woman came out, so swiftly that I guessed she had been listening at the door. Phyllidia unclasped a jewel from her belt and handed it to the maid.

‘Take this. Go into the town and find a temple of Minerva. Speak to the priest and see that he places this on the altar as a thank-offering.’

The crone stared at it doubtfully. It was a fine gem.

‘Do it now,’ Phyllidia said. ‘I vowed it to the goddess if she heard my prayer. And be sure that I shall learn of it if you don’t. I shall be speaking to the priests later, about the funeral. You know the punishment for theft — especially from the temple. You understand?’

Marida nodded sullenly.

‘Then,’ Phyllidia continued, ‘when you have done that, you will go and find Octavius for me. Yes, Octavius. If this citizen is correct, he will be searching the inn for me. And no excuses that you could not find him. Do not return without him, or I will have you flogged. Do not suppose that I would not. I am the mistress now. Ask him to come here. I will meet him when I have done my duty by the corpse. And tell him. . tell him all is well. Whatever he has done.’

She took the oil-lamp from the startled maid, and disappeared downstairs in the direction of the atrium. The servant shot me a venomous look, then shrugged her shoulders and trotted reluctantly after her mistress.

I watched them go. I did not follow them at once, but stood for a moment thinking about the events of the last twenty-four hours: the deaths, the disappearances, the marriage and the would-be-marriages. Yet Phyllidia appeared to have arrived here not with bridal dresses but with garments suitable for a funeral. How, I wondered, had she contrived that? It did not seem to make sense.

As I groped my own way down the stairs a moment later I heard Phyllidia’s voice, strong and untroubled, raised in the lament.