Three Hands in The Fountain

XIV

I hit him hard in the stomach before he made contact. At the same time Petro swung to his feet in one easy movement. Neither of us wasted time shrieking, 'Oh dear, what's happening?' We knew – and we knew what we would be doing about it.

I grabbed the first man by the hair, since there was not enough cloth in his tunic to allow a grip. These fellows were stunted and sleepy. None had any will to resist. With one arm round his waist I was soon using him as a sweeper to shoo the others back down the steps. Petro still thought he was seventeen; he had shown off by clambering over the handrail and dropping to the street. Wincing ruefully, he was then in position to field the crowd as they rushed down. Rounding them up in a pincer movement we were able to give them a thrashing without too much loss of breath. Then we piled them up in a heap.

Holding them down with his boot on the top one, Petro shook my hand formally. He had hardly raised a sweat. 'Two each: nice odds.'

We looked at them. 'Pitiful opposition,' I decided regretfully.

We stood back and let them pull themselves upright. In a few seconds a surprising crowd had gathered to watch. Lenia must have warned everyone in the laundry; all her washer-girls and tub-boys had come out. Somebody cheered us. Fountain Court has its sophisticated side; I detected a hint of irony. Anyone would think Petronius and I were a pair of octogenarian gladiators who had jumped out of retirement to capture a group of six-year-old apple thieves.

'Now you tell us,' Petro commanded, in the voice of an officer of the vigiles, 'who you are, who sent you, and what you want.'

'Never mind that,' dared the leader, so we grabbed him and threw him between us like a beanbag until he grasped our importance in these streets.

'Hold off, the melon's getting squashed!'

'I'll pulp him if he doesn't stop acting up -'

'Going to be a good boy now?'

He was gasping too much to answer but we stood him up again anyway. Petronius, who was really enjoying himself, pointed to Lenia's girls. They were sweethearts as singletons, but together they turned into a hooting, foul-mouthed, obscene little clutch. If you saw them coming you wouldn't just cross to the other pavement, you'd dive into a different street. Even if it meant getting mugged and your money pinched. 'Any more trouble and you're all tossed to those lovelies. Believe me, you don't want to be dragged off into their steam room. The last man the washtub Harpies got hold of was missing for three weeks. We found him hung up on a pole with his privates dangling and he's been gibbering in a corner ever since.'

The girls made lewd gestures and waggled their skirts offensively. They were a cheerful and appreciative audience.

Petro had done the threats so the interrogation was mine. These pieces of flotsam would faint if I tried sophisticated rhetoric so I kept it simple. 'What's the story?'

The leader hung his head. 'You've got to stop making a fuss about blockages in the fountains.'

'Who gave out that dramatic edict?'

'Never mind.'

'We do mind. Is that it?'

'Yes.'

'You could have said it without starting a scrum.' 'You jumped one of my boys.'

'Your wormy sidekick threatened me.'

'You've hurt his neck!'

'He's lucky I haven't wrung it. Don't come around this part of the Aventine again.'

I glanced at Petro. They had no more to tell us, and we might get legal complaints if we bruised them too badly, so we told the leader to stop moaning, then dusted off his trio of backers and ordered them all off our patch.

We allowed a few moments for them to mutter about us in a huddle once they had turned the corner. Then we set off unobtrusively to tail them home.

We should have worked out for ourselves where they were going. Still, it was a good practical exercise. Since they had no idea of keeping watch, it was simple to stroll along after them. Petronius even turned off once to buy a stuffed pancake, then he caught me up. We went down the Aventine, around the Circus and into the Forum. Somehow this was no surprise.

As soon as they reached the office of the Curator of Aqueducts Petro threw what was left of his snack into a gutter and we speeded up. We marched in; the four goons had vanished. I approached a scribe. 'Where are the officers who just came in? They told us to follow them.' He nodded to a door. Petro whipped it open; we both strode through.

Just in time. The four dummies had started complaining to a superior; he had realised we would have followed them, and was on his feet to throw a bolt across the door. Seeing it was too late, he suavely pretended he had jumped up to greet us, then ordered his pitiful group of enforcers to leave. There was no need for introductions. We knew this fellow: it was Anacrites.

'Well, well,' said he.

'Well, well!' we retorted.

I turned to Petro. 'It's our long-lost shipwrecked brother.' 'Oh I thought it was your father's missing heir?'

'No, I made sure I had him exposed on a really reliable mountainside. He's bound to have been eaten by a bear.' 'So who's this?'

'I think it must be the unpopular moneylender we're going to hide in a blanket chest before we lose the key-'

For some reason Anacrites was failing to appreciate our banter. Still, no one expects a spy to be civilised. Taking pity on his head wound, we pretended to stop ganging up on him, though the sheen on his brow and the wary look in those half-closed grey eyes told us he still thought we were looking for a chance to hold him upside-down in a bucket of water until we stopped hearing choking sounds.

We took possession of his room, tossing scrolls to one side and shoving the furniture about. He decided not to make a fuss. There were two of us, one large and both very angry. Anyway, he was supposed to be sick.

'So why are you threatening us about our innocent curiosity?' demanded Petronius.

'You're scaremongering.'

'What we've discovered is cause for alarm!'

'There's no reason for disquiet.'

'Every time I hear that,' I said, 'it turns out to be some devious official telling me lies.'

'The Curator of Aqueducts takes the situation seriously.' 'That's why you're skulking here in his office?'

'I've been co-opted on special assignment.'

'To clean out the fountains with a nice little sponge?'

He looked hurt. 'I'm advising the Curator, Falco.'

'Don't waste your time. When we came to report that there were corpses blocking the current, the bastard didn't want to know.'

Anacrites regained his confidence. He assumed the gentle, self-righteous air of a man who had stolen our job. 'That is how it works in public service, friend. When they decide to hold an investigation they never use the man who first alerted them to the problem. They distrust him; he tends to thinks he's the expert and to hold crackpot theories. Instead they bring in a professional.'

'You mean an incompetent novice who has no real interest?'

He smirked triumphantly.

Petronius and I exchanged one frigid look, then we leapt to our feet and were out of there.

We had lost our enquiry to the Chief Spy. Even on sick leave Anacrites carried more clout than the pair of us. Well, that was the end of our interest in assisting the state.

We could busy ourselves with private clients instead.

Besides, I had just remembered something terrible: I had come out without Julia. Dear gods, I had left my three-month-old daughter completely alone in a rough area of the Aventine, in an empty house.

'Well, that's one way to avoid carrying a baby and looking unprofessional,' Petro said.

'She'll be all right – I hope. What's worrying me is that Helena will probably be back by now and she'll know what I've done -'

It was too hot to run. Still, we made it back home at the fastest Possible gentle trot.

When we took the stairs, it soon became clear that Julia was safe and now had plenty of company. Women's voices conversed indoors at what seemed a normal pace. We exchanged a glance that can only be called thoughtful, then we sauntered in looking as if in our honest opinion nothing untoward had happened.

One of the women was Helena Justina, who was now feeding the baby. She said nothing. But her eyes met mine with the degree of scorching heat that must have melted the wings off Icarus when he flew too near the sun.

The other was an even fiercer proposition: Petro's estranged wife Arria Silvia.