Murder in the Forum

Chapter Fifteen

My first thought was to attend my patron. The interview with Phyllidia had delayed me, and Marcus is not in any case a patient man. Pausing only to collect my cloak from the alcove where I had left it and to glance into the servants’ ante-room in case there was now a slave available (there wasn’t), I hurried to the door with the firm intention of stepping through it and making my way to Marcus with all available speed.

The doorkeeper had other ideas. Instead of opening the door at my approach, he stepped out in front of me with a ferocious scowl, and the thick baton at his side found its way menacingly into his hand. ‘You were thinking of leaving, citizen?’

It was not an encouraging opening. Obviously I was thinking of leaving or I would not have been making towards the door. However, over a long life I have learned never to quarrel, if I can avoid it, with a man who is bigger and younger than I am and armed with a baton.

I flashed the man a hollow smile. ‘I am under orders to rejoin my patron, doorkeeper, but there are still no slaves in evidence. I was resigning myself to a long lonely walk through the town.’

The smile was strictly unrequited. I remembered with unease that the doorman had been suspicious of me from the beginning. I did not expect him actually to strike me — after all I was a citizen, albeit a unprepossessing one — and I was known to be a protégé of Marcus. That alone should afford me a little protection — which was indeed why I had mentioned him at all. But from the look on the doorman’s face it would not take much to have him wield that baton.

‘Have no fear, citizen,’ the doorman said, with a nasty sneering emphasis on the final word, ‘you will not be walking through the town, lonely or otherwise. My master Gaius wishes to see you. He is awaiting you in the librarium.’

‘Gaius?’ When I had left the old man earlier he had not seemed eager to keep up the acquaintance.

‘I do not know what you have done to offend him, citizen, but he sent down his page a moment ago with orders to stop you leaving. I understand he is not best pleased with you. Now, have I to lock this door, and accompany you upstairs with this baton, or will you go up quietly yourself?’

I can make a choice, when it is presented clearly. I said, ‘I will be honoured to attend upon him again.’

The doorkeeper looked unimpressed. ‘Then I suggest you do it quickly, citizen. My master is an old man, but he can be fearsome when roused.’

It was hard to imagine the querulous old magistrate deserving that description, but I turned away obediently and retraced my steps up the stairs that I had so recently come down. I was, frankly, puzzled. What could have occurred to visit the wrath of Gaius on my head?

I tapped apologetically on the door. The young page opened it, and I was shown in to where Gaius was waiting.

The doorman was not wrong. Gaius was furious. He was sitting on a stool beside the table, and he rose to face me as I came in. His thin face was white with anger, and his eyes blazed. Even the dog crouching at his feet could sense the mood, and rose at my approach to growl at me menacingly.

‘So, you have come.’ The voice, customarily no more than a rusty whisper, had become a croaking bellow. ‘Well, I warn you, citizen, I am most displeased. Asking intrusive questions of me is one thing — I am an old man and a magistrate and I am accustomed to defending myself in the senate. But this is different. Phyllidia is more than my guest, she is my ward — or will be very shortly. I will not have you distress her in this fashion.’

I was surprised that the news of my escapade had reached him so soon. Phyllidia must have gone to him at once. The dog was straining at me in an unpleasant fashion, only restrained by Gaius’s hand upon the chain. I glanced at it nervously.

I said, as soothingly as possible, ‘Most respected Excellence, I assure you there was no disrespect intended. I went to her room simply to attempt to find a phial of poison which I knew was in the building somewhere. It is unfortunate that she surprised me searching in her travelling chest, but I was acting under the orders of my patron-’

Gaius lunged towards me with a roar. ‘You were doing what? Searching her possessions? Under my very roof? As if matters were not already bad enough! By Juno, if you were not a citizen I should have you flogged for this.’ For a moment I feared that he would strike me himself, or loose the dog at me, but instead he thumped his bony old hand down on the table with such force that his writing papers rattled, and the page boy in the corner flinched. The dog howled and sat down, eyeing me with mistrust.

I was looking at it in a very similar vein.

Meanwhile, I was thinking hastily. I had miscalculated, clearly. Whatever had been the reason for my summons it had not been my searching for the phial, and rather than assisting myself I had now given Gaius additional cause for displeasure. I tried a different tack.

‘Excellence,’ I said, in the best imitation of Marcus’s manner that I could muster, ‘this house has been the scene of a most unfortunate event. More unfortunate, perhaps, than you suppose.’ I saw his features change, and I pressed my advantage. ‘I am merely obeying the orders of my patron. If aspects of this reach the Emperor-’ I stopped dramatically and nodded towards the door. ‘Between ourselves, perhaps. .?’

Gaius was not a magistrate for nothing. At the hint of international intrigue his manner altered abruptly. He nodded sharply to the page and gestured to him to leave, so peremptorily that the slave went scuttling from the room like a startled chicken.

The old magistrate sat down on his stool again, and his hound skulked under it to lie at his feet. That at least was a more favourable sign. ‘Well?’ Gaius said sharply. ‘Tell your tale, pavement-maker, and make it plausible, or I shall see that you never lay a tile in this town again.’

That was a threat which worried me more than a beating. I made a rapid calculation. Rumours that Felix had been poisoned could not now be long in starting, at least in this house — the arrest of Octavius had seen to that. Indeed, if Gaius had spoken to Phyllidia, he had presumably heard it already, and my own blurted explanation a moment earlier had mentioned a poison phial.

I took a deep breath. ‘It appears, Excellence, that the death of Felix may not have been quite the accident that it appeared.’

He had been white with fury, but I swear he paled. ‘Nonsense!’ he said shortly. ‘The man choked. I saw it myself.’

‘And your dog?’ I said.

The old man glanced towards his remaining animal with such affection I almost warmed towards them both. ‘Poisoned,’ he said sulkily. ‘I would like to lay my hands on the scoundrel who did it. Felix, I dare swear. He has always hated this household. Unfortunately he is-’ he broke off suddenly. ‘Is this something to do with that poison phial you mentioned?’

‘I believe it is not entirely unconnected.’

‘You cavil like a Greek. Is it, or isn’t it? In any case I cannot believe that Phyllidia is involved. Why should she want to poison my dog? And how? She was not even at the feast.’

‘That was fortunate for her,’ I said carefully. ‘I have reason to believe that the poison was not intended for the dog.’

He thought about that for a moment. ‘You are telling me that there is some connection? Felix was poisoned too?’

‘I believe it is a possibility. And my patron is of the same opinion.’

‘Juno and Mercury!’ the old man cried. ‘No wonder he was urging me to hold my tongue. But surely. . you saw Felix take the nut. That idiot Tommonius cannot have contrived to poison them all. Even if he had planned that Felix should be offered nuts, how could he know which one the man would take?’

I thought again of the scene at the banquet, Felix with his goblet in his hand lurching forward, flushed with drink and lust, to seize a nut, while the young acrobat swayed forward, teasing him, with the nut bowl balanced on his upturned feet. So it was Tommonius who had put the bowl there. That was something I had not realised until that moment.

‘An interesting point,’ I murmured. ‘Perhaps I should tell you that, according to the maid, Phyllidia did have poison in her possession. She had stolen it from Felix himself.’

‘You think that she intended to poison her father?’

‘An interesting question, magistrate. You say “intended”. That suggests that you are certain she didn’t. Is that, perhaps, because you know who did? You yourself had no cause to love him, and you were very defensive, a little earlier, when I asked you about meeting Felix once before in Rome.’

He flashed me a glance. The anger had gone out of him now, and he was clearly frightened. ‘You really believe this? That the man was poisoned? Here, under my roof? Dear gods! But he was an imperial favourite.’ He buried his head in his hands.

I said nothing. Experience has taught me that silence is sometimes a formidable weapon when a man is gripped by terror. I continued saying nothing long enough to allow Gaius to conjure graphic pictures of what might constitute a fitting punishment for a man who had allowed — perhaps had caused — one of Commodus’s favourites to die of poison at his table.

It was enough. Gaius gave a little whimper of despair. I almost moved towards him, but the dog at his feet growled warningly and I thought better of the impulse.

‘It is true,’ he said at last, ‘I did meet the Perennis family once, in Rome — Felix among them. He was an objectionable man, even then, and treated us badly, but I was forced to have dealings with him. His wife, however, was very good to mine.’

‘Indeed?’ I was surprised, remembering Marcus’s scornful dismissal of the lady.

My voice must have betrayed me, for Gaius hurried on, ‘When we arrived in the Imperial City and my young bride was exhausted by the heat and the journey, it was Phyllidia’s mother who befriended her.’ To my embarrassment, his voice was shaking with emotion. ‘Of course, she was much scorned by Roman society — she was no beauty and she had few graces — her father had to dower her well to get her married at all — but she was a kindly woman. Her husband held her in open contempt because she had never given him sons — but she took my wife into her own home, treated her like a sister and was with her when she died.’ He looked me squarely in the eye. ‘For her sake alone, I would have hated Felix. And for her sake I will make Phyllidia my ward.’

‘Felix treated her badly?’

‘Appallingly. There are some in Rome who think he murdered her, though naturally this is not a rumour one would dare repeat. Certainly, he sent her a gift of wine and she died shortly after, but the connection would be hard to prove. She would have watered the wine, and there was a problem with the well. Others died at the same time, who drank from it.’

‘I see.’ I did see; there were often epidemics in Rome. ‘Does Phyllidia know of this rumour?’

He glanced at me sharply. ‘You are persistent in this, citizen. You seriously believe that she murdered her father? How could she have? She had not even arrived in the town. I cannot believe the maid servant. She has a spiteful tongue. No doubt she hopes to implicate her mistress and claim a reward from the Emperor. I wager ten denarii you will find no poison phial in Phyllidia’s possession.’

I could not resist it. ‘You are right, magistrate,’ I said. ‘I will not find it. I have found it already. She gave it to me with her own hands. But the maid’s accusations are in vain. Her poison has not been used. Octavius has confessed to the murder.’

Gaius paled. ‘That is why you have had him locked up in the attic?’

‘Indeed.’ A sudden inspiration came to me. ‘I take it Phyllidia complained of that — and that is why you had your doorkeeper detain me?’

‘Octavius is detained in my attics,’ he said, with some dignity. ‘Naturally I made enquiries. Phyllidia swore that you had had him arrested — for a crime that you knew he had not committed — and that you had locked up her maidservant with him. She came to me in distress.’ He sighed. ‘She did not tell me on what charge Octavius was being held. It seems, citizen, that I owe you an apology.’

‘On the contrary,’ I said. ‘You have been more helpful than you know. And, honoured magistrate, if I might suggest — Phyllidia was rightfully discreet. It is expedient that no one else should hear rumours of poisoning. Better that everyone assumes that Felix choked to death as it appeared.’

He nodded. ‘I understand. Although, if it was a murder, I do not know even now exactly how the thing was managed.’

I grinned. ‘Neither do I,’ I said cheerfully. ‘Though I intend to find out. But Phyllidia was right about one thing. I am perfectly sure that Octavius didn’t do it.’ The expression on his face was comical, and I gave him a swift bow to disguise my smile. ‘And now if you will excuse me, magistrate, my master awaits me.’ And before he could prevent me I had opened the door, let in the page, and made my way downstairs. I glanced into the atrium. Tommonius was still wailing dutifully.

There were still no slaves in evidence, and I did not stay to look for one. I had meant what I said to Gaius. Marcus would have been impatient long ago. It pleased me, however, to say, ‘Good afternoon and thank you,’ to the astonished doorkeeper before allowing him to open the door and see me out.

Outside there were still a few long-suffering mourners waiting. I threaded my way through them and set off walking briskly. I did, though, take a moment to make my way reluctantly to the waste-pile. Marcus ought to see that moustache, I felt — if that indeed was what it was.

But I could not find it, not even after poking around diligently with a stick. For a moment I was despondent. Perhaps it had been a tail after all, and some animal had dragged it away to gnaw on. I scratched around a little deeper, and came upon something which might have been another fraction of the same. Part of the other side of the moustache, perhaps?

I picked it up dubiously. It was even smellier than the other, and I devoutly wished for a piece of stout leather in which to wrap my find. I could find no such thing, however, and I was obliged to content myself with a piece of old stained linen which I could see, just out of reach upon the heap. I availed myself of my stick, and scratched it closer.

As I did so, however, something caught my eye, and I abandoned all thought of delicacy. Wrapped in the piece of linen was another little blue glass phial, exactly like the one I already held.

Except that this one was empty and smelled of almonds.