Venus in copper

Chapter II

My troubles were over-partially.

When I stumbled out into what passed for a reception area, the jailor was closing a heavy drawstring bag, grinning as if it was his birthday. Even his grimy sidekicks seemed impressed by the size of the bribe. Blinking in the daylight, I made out a small, pinched, upright figure who greeted me with a sniff.

Rome is a fair society. There are plenty of provincial backwaters where prefects keep their felons in chains, ready to be tortured when other entertainment palls, but in Rome unless you commit a horrendous misdemeanour-or stupidly confess- every suspect has the right to find a sponsor to stand surety.

'Hello, Mother!' It would have been surly to wish myself back in the cell with the rat.

Her expression accused me of being as degenerate as my father- though even my father (who ran off with a redhead and left poor ma with seven children) never landed himself in jail… Luckily my mother was too loyal to our family to draw this comparison in front of strangers, so she thanked the jailor for looking after me instead.

'Anacrites seems to have forgotten you, Falco!' he jeered at me.

'That was his intention, presumably.'

'He said nothing about bail before trial-'

'He said nothing about a trial, either,' I snarled. 'Holding me without a court appearance is as illegal as denying bail!'

'Well if he decides to press charges-'

'Just whistle!' I assured him. 'I'll be back in my cell looking innocent in two shakes of a bacchante's tambourine.'

'Sure, Falco?'

'Oh sure!' I lied pleasantly.

Outside I took a deep breath of freedom, which I instantly regretted. It was August. We were facing the Forum. Around the Rostrum the atmosphere was almost as stifling as the bowels of the Lautumiae. Most of the aristocracy had dodged off to their airy summer villas, but for those of us at the rough end of society, life in Rome had slowed to a sluggish pace. Any movement in this heat was unbearable.

My mother examined her jailbird, looking unimpressed.

'Just a misunderstanding, Ma…' I tried to prevent my face revealing that for an informer with a tough reputation, being rescued by his mother was an indignity to avoid. 'Who provided the handsome ransom? Was it Helena?' I asked, referring to the unusually superior girlfriend I had managed to acquire six months ago in place of my previous string of flea-bitten circus entertainers and flower girls.

'No, I paid the surety; Helena has been seeing to your rent-' My heart sank at this rush of support from the women in my life. I knew I would have to pay for it, even if not in cash. 'Never mind about the money.' My mother's tone indicated that with a son like me, she kept her life savings continually to hand. 'Come home with me for a good dinner-'

She must be planning to keep me firmly in her custody; I planned on being my footloose self.

'I need to see Helena, Ma-'

Normally it would be unwise for a bachelor who had just been redeemed by his little old mother to suggest sloping off after women. But my mother nodded. In the first place, Helena Justina was a senator's daughter so visiting such a highly placed lady counted as a privilege for the likes of me, not the usual depravity mothers rant about. Also, due partly to an accident on a staircase, Helena had just miscarried our first child. All our female relations still regarded me as a reckless wastrel, but for Helena's sake most would agree that at present it was my duty to visit her at every opportunity.

'Come with me!' I urged.

'Don't be foolish!' scoffed my mother. 'It's you Helena wants to see!'

That news failed to fill me with confidence.

Ma lived near the river, behind the Emporium. We crossed the Forum slowly (to emphasise how Ma was bowed down by the troubles I caused her), then she set me loose at my favourite bathhouse, which lay behind the Temple of Castor. There I sluiced away the stench of prison, changed into a spare tunic which I had left at the gymnasium to cover emergencies, and found a barber who managed to make me look more respectable (under the blood he caused to flow).

I had come out, still feeling grey in the face after being locked up, yet much more relaxed. I was walking towards the Aventine, running my fingers through my damp curls in vain attempt to turn myself into the kind of debonair bachelor who might arouse a woman's ardour. Then disaster struck. Too late, I noticed a pair of disreputable bruisers posing against a portico so they could show off their muscles to anyone who had to pass on their side of the street. They wore loincloths, with leather strips tied round their knees and wrists and ankles to make them look tough. Their arrogance was horribly familiar.

'Oh look -it's Falco!'

'Oh cobnuts-Rodan and Asiacus!'

Next moment one of them was behind me with his elbows clenched round my upper arms, while the other shook me charmlessly by the hand- a process which involved pulling out my wrist until my arm joints strained in their sockets like bowlines fighting their couplings on a galley in a hurricane. The smell of old sweat and recent garlic was bringing tears to my eyes. 'Oh cut it, Rodan; my reach is already long enough…'

To call these two 'gladiators' insulted even the clapped-out hulks who usually feature in that trade. Rodan and Asiacus trained at a barracks which was run by my landlord Smaractus, and when they were not smacking themselves silly with practice swords he sent them out to make the streets even more dangerous than usual. They never did much work in the arena; their role in public life was to intimidate the unfortunate tenants who rented homes from him. For me, being in prison had had one great advantage: avoiding my landlord, and these pet thugs of his.

Asiacus lifted me off my feet and shook me about. I let him rearrange my guts temporarily. I waited until he grew bored with it and put me back on the paving slabs- then I carried on downwards, pulled him off balance, and threw him over my head at Rodan's feet.

'Olympus! Doesn't Smaractus teach you two anything?' I hopped back smartly out of their reach. 'You're out of date; my rent's been paid!'

'So the rumour's true!' leered Rodan. 'We heard you're a kept man now!'

'Jealousy gives you a nasty squint, Rodan! Your mother should have warned you, it will drive away the girls!' You may have heard that gladiators trail throngs of infatuated women; Rodan and Asiacus must have been the only two in Rome whose special seediness deprived them of any following. Asiacus got up, wiping his nose. I shook my head. 'Sorry; I was forgetting: neither of you could interest a fifty-year-old fishwife with two blind eyes and no sense of discretion-'

Then Asiacus jumped me. And they both set about reminding me why I hated Smaractus so bitterly.

'That's for the last time your rent was overdue!' grunted Rodan, who had a long memory.

'And that's for the next time!' added Asiacus- a realistic forecaster.

We had practised this painful dance so many times that I soon twisted out of their grip. Throwing back one or two more insults, I skipped away up the street. They were too lazy to follow me.

I had been free for an hour. I was already battered and despondent. In Rome, a landlord's city, freedom brings mixed joys.