Shadows in Bronze

LXXII

There were still pieces of wreckage to untangle from the trireme, and broken oars to pull in. Even then we ought to have caught up. But as we set off in pursuit, we ran into the regatta I had seen earlier as we first sailed towards the island. The Sea Seel" had already positioned herself the far side of this line so our great craft had no choice but to pick its way diagonally through the little boats, none of whom understood that we were involved in a chase. Their owners were senators' sons and equestrians' nephews, and once we had disrupted their race these high-spirited youths decided it would pay us back if they dodged their zippy yachts round us like mad minnows pecking at a waterlogged bread roll.

'Oh, for heavens' sake!' roared Gordianus. 'Pertinax must have overpowered Laesus somehow, and now he's making off' A thought struck him. 'He's got Milo!'

'Never mind Milo,' I uttered in a hollow voice. 'He's got my nephew Larius!'

The trireme carried a sail, but it had been lowered for action so we lost precious minutes raising her mast again and setting the canvas aloft. Meanwhile, the merchantman was running for the end of the peninsula. The breeze which had carried us out to Capreae was still sending her along at a good five knots as she made for the headland. Then she turned in around the Amalfi coast, and we lost sight of her.

'How could he manage it?' Gordianus fretted.

'Well-placed friends!' I said grimly. 'Your ally and mine, the trustworthy Laesus, must have been in league with Pertinax from the start!'

'Falco, what do you mean?'

'I mean we're victims of a Calabrian clique. When I first met Laesus in Croton that was no coincidence; he must have been there to meet Pertinax. I thought he looked shocked when I said Pertinax had died! Once Laesus discovered what I was there for, I’m damn sure he tried to poison me. Then when Pertinax attacked your deputy at Colonna, I'll bet the Sea Scorpion took him off. When Laesus conveniently agreed to take you to Paestum, he was marking you for Pertinax-'

'But why?'

'They both come from Tarentum. They must have known each other long before Marcellus adopted Pertinax. Tarentum is the sort of crooked Calabrian town with unshakeable local loyalties.'

I remembered with a sinking feeling that Laesus had admitted he used to sail to Alexandria: Pertinax must have asked him here for his knowledge of the corn ships' annual run. Crispus was dead, but now Pertinax was on the loose with full knowledge of his colleague's plan to blackmail Rome. Pertinax, whose adopted father had filled him with ludicrous ideas of his own worth…

On the face of it, compared to a candidate with heavyweight talents like Crispus, Pertinax posed no threat to the Empire at all. But I happened to be more cynical. Think of Caligula and Nero: Rome has a habit of taking lunatic would-be emperors to its heart.

The magistrate Aemilius Rufus came up: more trouble.

'We'll soon overtake,' he boasted. Wrong as usual. We never caught the Sea Scorpion. When we finally made it round the headland towards Positanum, the sea was full of litter from her decks, but the ship had disappeared.

There was no point in hurrying; they reefed our sail.

Then a marine yelled. The Pax rowed up nearer and gently stopped. Some of the sailors were there, clinging to driftwood; we pulled them in. Then I let out a hoarse sob of relief: Grinning weakly, but so tired he could not speak, I recognized my nephew floating on his back. He was desperately struggling to subdue a half-submerged figure who was thrashing stupidly: 'Milo!' cried Gordianus. 'Falco, your brave young nephew has saved my steward!'

I muttered that Larius had never showed much sense.

We must have missed quite a party. When Milo saw Atius Pertinax grinning in triumph as he was greeted by the sea captain, the steward ran amok. In the process of being overcome he was beaten and roped up with fishing lines. Meanwhile, my nephew stood by looking innocent; the sea captain suggested to Pertinax keeping Larius as a hostage.

'Did he, by Jupiter! But how did you get in the water, Larius – and where is the ship?'

Larius assumed his expression of playful nonchalance. 'Oh, I could see the Sea Scorpion needed a new coat of pitch so I guessed she was pretty barnacled. I pretended to feel seasick and went below decks. I had a chisel in my satchel from when we were selling lead, so I just set to in the bilges. The worms had nearly done the job anyway; she was so spongy one good storm would have claimed her as a wreck. I soon punched her hull full of more holes than a wine strainer-'

‘Then what happened?'

‘What do you think? She sank.'

While my sister's boy was being treated like a hero, I discovered that when the Sea Scorpion had started to wallow everyone had leapt overboard. Those who could swim, did. Milo was still tied up. My nephew's tricky conscience made him save the steward: no small task for a fourteen-year-old lad. Even when Larius edged a floating spar half under them, buoying up fifteen stone while Milo wrestled around in panic took a determined effort. By the time we found them, my boy looked pretty limp.

We rowed the Pax as close to the rocks as possible, and took bumboats ashore. We picked up a few more soggy crewmen, but both Laesus and Pertinax had made good their escape. They had been spotted heading up into the Lactarii Mountains together. Aemilius Rufus took the trireme into Positanum and made a great fuss organizing a search.

He had no success. Trust him.

I stayed in the port below the steep little town and bought a meal to revive Larius. Milo stuck to him too, with pathetic gratitude, but if I was hoping he would repay us by digging into his pocket for a flagon I was wrong. Once things quietened down around us, Larius murmured privately, 'Pertinax has a bolt hole he uses, back towards Neapolis – he said something to the sea captain about hiding up.'

‘On the farm!'

The quiet voice came from Bassus. We had pulled that big, breezy man from the water after the trireme had sunk the his, just before he was submerged under the weight of his own gold amulets. Here he had been drinking heavily in silence: mourning the loss of his employer, the yacht, and especially his livelihood. I signalled him to join us. The bench sagged dangerously under his bulk as he huddled in with Larius, Milo and me.

'You been to this farm, Bassus?'

'No, but I heard him complaining to Crispus that it was grim. That was his excuse for coming aboard with us-'

‘Bassus!' Bassus, who was already drably sozzled, frowned as he dimly deciphered that my appeal was made to him. ‘Bassus, give us a clue about this hideaway.'

'He said it was a farmhouse – and it stinks.'

Then Milo contributed, 'Must be that run-down dungheap.'

'You know it?' I rounded on him urgently. 'You tailed him there? Can you find it again?'

'No hope, Falco. He was dashing all over the mountain that night, trying to shake us off. It was dark and we lost ourselves 'What mountain? Vesuvius? Near his father's estate?' Larius laughed suddenly – a quiet, confident chortle deep in his throat.

‘Oh no! Oh Uncle Marcus, you really will not like this – it must be the one where that man chased you: the one with the pretty girl – and the big friendly dog!'

As soon as he said it, I guessed Larius was right.

Without more ado we drained our cups, dragged ourselves upright and started outside. I asked the bosun, 'You with us, Bassus?' But, deeply depressed by the loss of the sir, Bassus said he would stay in Positanum with the drink.

He came with us to the door though. As we reeled in the sudden sunlight that glanced off the harbour, I heard him let out a chuckle ironically. 'That's fate for you!' Then he pointed southwards out to sea. 'Here they come…'

Bearing slowly towards the Amalfi coast was the most amazing vessel I had ever seen. The Royal Barge of the Ptolemies was supposed to be larger, but I had never been privileged to gawk at the Egyptian fleet. This one was a monster. If her deck was less than two hundred feet in length, the shortfall could not be more than any lad on the Tiber waterfront could spit. When she docked she must tower above everything else like the multistorey apartments in Rome. Across the beam she was forty feet easily. And the depth of her hull, labouring so heavily, was probably even more than that.

To power this immense bulk she had not merely the normal square sail but a fabulous arrangement of red topsails as well. Far behind her I could just make other dark smudges, apparently motionless on the horizon, though they too would be heading towards us, low in the water beneath their huge cargoes, at an inexorable pace.

'Bassos! Whatever in Hades is that?'

He squinted at her thoughtfully as she loomed imperceptibly nearer the rocky coast. Parthenope, probably… but could be Venus of Paphos-'

I knew before he said it: the first of the corn ships had arrived.