The Accusers

XXXIII

THE STEWARD had returned and was hovering in the atrium. As he showed me out, I took a chance: `So Perseus is parcelled off to Lanuvium?' He looked shifty, but I sensed I might squeeze him. `Things must be getting sticky. I assume the money has run out?'

`Nothing new in this house, Falco – unfortunately!'

`I thought the Metelli had funds? Still, I assume you haven't reached the low point – when the mistress sells her jewels and seeks consolation from an astrologer?'

His voice dropped. `Oh she did that some time ago!' It seemed unlikely – in fact, I had been joking – yet he spoke with feeling. And I had never seen Calpurnia wearing even a necklace.

I whistled gently. `Who's her confidante?'

`Olympia.' I noted the name mentally.

`A fortune teller?'

Nodding, he glanced over his shoulder. `Everyone's jittery. We are all waiting to hear we'll be transferred to Paccius.'

`Calpurnia says he will wait until the court case ends.'

`That doesn't help,' replied the steward.

None of the slaves had been manumitted by the Metellus will. That was mean. A quarter of the labour force, up to a hundred in number, of those over thirty years of age, could have been freed when their master died. All the Metellus slaves would have a good idea how Saffia Donata might treat them if she ever possessed them. She might take out her spiteful feelings against her husband's family on the slaves. Paccius, more likely, would be indifferent – but he would sell them.

We were on the threshold now. The slave who was acting as doorkeeper stayed back, though not far enough for me. I offered the steward, `Look, do you get time to yourself? Can I buy you a drink?'

He knew what this was for. He smiled. `No thanks. I'm not naive, Falco!'

I shrugged. `Will you clear up a domestic issue then? What was the menu for the last meal that your master had?' I thought the steward blenched. He was unhappy, that was sure. `The lunch,' I prompted. `The last lunch with his family.'

The steward claimed he could not remember. Interesting. He was the type who would regard it as his personal daily duty to plan menus and organise the shopping; maybe he even shopped himself The last meal eaten by a master who was subsequently poisoned should be etched into the elegant factotum's memory.

While I was in the Fifth Region I made another call, to Claudius Tiasus the funeral director. I implied I had lost a relative. Through a series of lesser players, I acted nervous; when it looked as if the sale might be lost, the great impresario came himself to clinch the deal..

He was a fat bundle with a greasy pigtail, at once subservient and sly. He had a disreputable air. His tunic was clean, and his hands were heavily be-ringed. It seemed unlikely he still carried out embalming, though when he patted my shoulder, thinking he was consoling the bereaved, I wondered where those podgy hands had been half an hour ago.

He realised I was a fraud.

`Sorry – though there is a corpse to bury, truly. Consider my visit official. The name is Falco. I am working with the vigiles on a suspicious death. It's somebody known to you.'

Tiasus had signalled to his staff to leave. We two sat in a small corridor partly in the open air, with a view over a fountain with a soppy nymph, and soft cushions on the bench. It would be suitable for discussing which scented oil had been a deceased's favourite, though it was inappropriate for being grilled by me. For one thing, I kept staring at the nymph. She appeared to have no nipples and two doves were sitting on her head, doing what doves do.

`Who is dead?' enquired Tiasus calmly. He had a light, rather high voice.

`Your clown, Spindex.'

`No!' He calmed down fast, no stranger to tragedy. `Spindex is a freelance. I haven't seen him since, oh -'

`For about four months? Since the Metellus do? I'll be blunt: Spindex was strangled. We think he knew too much about someone. Metellus probably.'

`This is a lot to take in,' complained Tiasus. He changed position, easing his bulk on the stone seat. I could see him thinking. When Aelianus came on reconnaissance, he received the brush-off, that would not happen today.

`Sorry to rush you. Most clients must have aeons at their disposal,' I said drily.

`Not Rubirius Metellus!' Tiasus aimed it heavily.

`Explain, please?'

`He needed fast burial.' I raised an eyebrow. `If it is all coming out, Falco -' I nodded. `The body was… not fresh.'

`I know that it stank.'

`We are used to that. Even the diarrhoea…' He tailed off. I let him. He rallied. `This cadaver was, in my professional opinion, over three days old by the time we were called to the house.'

`Unusual?'

`Not unheard of. But-'

`But what, Tiasus?’

'There were odd features.'

I waited again, but he had dried up. I tried encouragement: `When you arrived to view the body, was Metellus in his bed?'

A grateful look came into the undertaker's eyes. `So you know, then?' I pursed my lips. He took it as an answer. `Yes, he was. But he must have recently been placed there.'

By now, this was no surprise. `Had they put him on his back?'

`Yes. But the dark red marks – which indicate settlement of the blood in the body after death – showed me that the deceased had lain somewhere else, in a different position, for a considerable while. Nothing too odd!' Tiasus reassured me. I blinked. I had never suspected perversion. I found it disturbing that Tiasus had routinely considered it. Did he often encounter necrophilia? `Metellus had been on his side, rather than his back, that's all. No doubt,' he suggested, with a kind of disapproval, `the family thought he looked more peaceful face-up.'

`That's normal. But why not arrange him as soon as he died, I wonder?'

`I wondered that,' Tiasus agreed eagerly.

`Any thoughts?'

`Well… You know what happened at the funeral? A lot of stress – this was an overwrought family. There may well have been panic when Metellus first died. The son was away somewhere. Maybe the widow became distraught before her son came home -'

`Not that widow, surely?' I smiled.

`Oh you met her! Well, perhaps not.'

`The death scene will have shocked her. Metellus had taken poison, Tiasus.'

`Yes but it was suicide. They were expecting it.' Tiasus paused. `Weren't they?'

`So I am told.'

`Have we been told the truth?' he mused portentously. I was sure we had not.

`You really came about Spindex,' Tiasus murmured in his comforting undertaker's voice.

`Any help you can give?'

`He liked a tipple, but he was a good satirist. He went to the heart of a man's character. And he had judgement. He knew what was permissible, what was too sensitive.'

`Not in the Metellus case. The family sacked him.'

`Ah.' Tiasus took a long breath, with his mouth wide open. He had gum problems. `Well, I don't know the story there, and that's the problem. Spindex was let go – but they never told me why.'

`Who dismissed him? Was it the son?'

`No…' Tiasus looked thoughtful. `No, I think it was another man.

`Name?'

`I never knew that.'

`Licinius Lutea? He's a friend of the son; I think he was helping Negrinus at the funeral.'

`Means nothing,' said Tiasus. `It was a freedman who assisted. I had a few words with him in a quiet moment. Alexander, he was called.'

`Not him who paid off Spindex?'

`Er… No. Possibly a relative?' Tiasus quavered. This was hard work.

`A brother-in-law?' I suggested. 'Canidianus Rufus, Rubiria Juliana's husband?'

`Yes, perhaps…'But then Tiasus wavered yet again. `I don't think it was Rufus. He had a right temper; I remember him! I think the second one dealt with Spindex.'

`Second brother-in-law? Laco? Verginius Laco, the husband of Carina, the woman who got upset?'

`Yes, that was him.'

Dear gods, just when you think you have scanned all the scenery, up pops some new participant.

The two doves had finished. The female preened, looking as if she wondered what the fuss had been. The male thought he might be up for another go. She shrugged off his nonsense. The deformed nymph shivered mournfully. Part of her drape had been chipped off in an accident.

`Do you think Spindex discovered something about Metellus or his family, something they did not wish the world to hear?'

`Oh no doubt of it,' Tiasus exclaimed. `It must have been a stupendous secret! Wouldn't it be wonderful, Falco, if we knew just what?'

I agreed dourly.

I went to visit Rubiria Carina's husband.

For once, he was at home and he agreed to meet me. He was more than a decade older than his wife, a thin, cultured man who implied he was being more patient than I deserved. `You have always refused to be interviewed, citing your privacy,' I reminded him. `Now will you answer me?'

`You can ask. I may not be free to answer.' Interesting: why?

`So what changed your mind?'

`You intend to accuse my mother-in-law of killing her spouse.' He was a man of some refinement; I omitted the obvious son-in-law jokes. `Do you think Calpurnia did it?'

`No,' he said.

`There is a case to answer,' I told him. `Metellus made unhealthy provision for his daughter-in-law, and disinherited his wife. It's vicious and it's public; Calpurnia Cara must be furious. Murky circumstances cloud what happened when Metellus died.' Laco shrugged. He wanted to see what I knew. `At first I was told that your wife refused to go to lunch that day – but she says she was not invited.'

`No.'

`Neither of you?'

`I was not close to Metellus. I would have gone if my wife did.'

I did not feel this man would lie. Yet although we had been told he and Carina stayed aloof, now I knew he had been operating on behalf of the Metellus family.

`Did you see Rubirius Metellus just before he died?'

‘No.’

`Did you see Negrinus?'

`No.'

`There is a suggestion that he was away.'

`I cannot answer for his movements.'

`I'll ask him. It is important.' Laco looked surprised. `Laco, if he was away, someone else poisoned his father and Birdy has an alibi.'

At once Laco retracted: `He may have travelled to Lanuvium. It was around the time of the suicide.'

`It was definitely not suicide. Rubirius Metellus collapsed in his garden, not in his bed – and I know that was about three days before the body was paraded for the witnesses.'

Had he known this? Laco gave nothing away. He was reclining on a reading couch, where he now simply linked his hands and looked thoughtful. He had long, almost elderly fingers. With thinning hair and an old-fashioned expression he seemed too mature to be the father of three young children, though this was common enough among the senatorial class. Both he and Carina gave the impression they were content in their marriage. They were comfortable in their domesticity – and so they should be. Theirs was domesticity with battalions of slaves, and gold finials on the furniture. I had called here more than once, and not seen the same slave twice.

Nor had I heard any music, been charmed by a vase of flowers on a side table, seen a scroll lying half-read, nor caught advanced scents of dinner. This was a cold house. It had a cold, unemotional master – and yet, he allowed his wife to give sanctuary to a brother who was implicated in a corruption scandal and now charged with parricide.

`Don't ask me what really went on, because I don't know – but I will find out. I sympathise with your position.' I spoke levelly. It seemed best to show restraint. `Your wife's family must have become an embarrassment.'

`My wife and I,' replied Laco, `live with the troubles of her family as stoically as we can.'

`That's generous! Do you know who their banker is?'

I had abruptly changed the subject, but Laco did not seem startled. 'Aufustius.'

`Same as Licinius Lutea! What do you think of Lutea?' Laco shrugged. `Not your type? A bit of an entrepreneur, I gather… Tell me,' I sprang on him, `what happened two years ago?'

Verginius Laco made no reply.

`The Metelli were happy and prosperous,' I pointed out. `Then they became desperate financially and something tore them apart. I think it had to do with Metellus and his partiality for Saffia Donata. Legally that was incest, of course. I can see why it is being shuffled under a mattress, so to speak…' Laco simply let me speculate. `You have been helping to keep this great secret. When the clown Spindex discovered it, you undertook his dismissal.' Laco did not deny my claim. `That was dangerous. Deprived of his fee, the clown might have sought public revenge.'

`No,' said Laco patiently. `I paid him off, Falco.' He was not stupid. Of all the people on this case, I reckoned him the most intelligent. In his way, he was being quite open. I formed a picture of him coolly dealing with Spindex on behalf of the rest of the family – though I sensed it had needed his own money.

`You paid him well?'

He nodded, wryly. I was right about the cash.

`Spindex is dead.' I passed on the news conversationally. `Strangled. I don't imagine you organised that, so there must be someone else with an interest in guarding the Metellus secret.'

Verginius Laco made no comment.

`Someone else knows, Laco. Spindex had a source. It may even have been his source who silenced him. I'll find the source eventually. Now it's a murder hunt, the vigiles are on it.'

Still nothing.

`I understand your position, Laco. You know the story, but you are a man of honour. You stand aside, except when you can give practical help. Maybe when you do act, it is to protect your wife. I suspect you disapprove of the way the family are handling matters. I think, if it was your choice, you would tell me the secret and have done.'

For a moment I felt Laco was about to say something.

But he did not.