Wolf Whistle

XV

Since there is nothing like a Bull Dance to fire the blood, the atmosphere was electric. Surrounded by the rainbow awnings, trumpet fanfares, cymbals, horns and rattles, a troupe of bare-breasted dancers with painted nipples snaked up and down the aisles, tapping tambourines and clacking castanets. Dwarves in masks and clowns in silly hats scampered over the sand, mimicking the audience and telling bawdy jokes while buffoons in motley dress ran loose among the crowds, lifting skirts and tunics, blowing down the backs of necks. Ten thousand feet stamped on wooden boards, vibrating the benches and echoing round the elliptical timber structure. Voices roared and, captured by the cambric roof, the temperature catapulted upwards.

‘My word, this is not what we’re used to,’ observed Cousin Fortunata, casting sly wistful glances towards the buffoons. ‘Most uninhibited.’

Claudia ignored her. Theirs were good seats, but they were not the best seats. The best seats were reserved for the aristocracy, and there they were, in the very front row, applauding the antics of the clowns. Supersnoop appeared to have his arm fused to Miss Lovely’s shapely shoulders and they threw their heads back together when they laughed. Claudia’s nail snapped where she chewed through it.

Shuffling closer to Porsenna, she rested her arm against his. If Loverboy looked over, he’d see her practically sitting in his lap.

If.

Not that she gave a damn, anyway.

As the dancers, clowns and motley melted away, a hush fell over the auditorium. The temperature climbed further, heating the marjoram and mint strewn on the steep wooden terraces. Wraps slipped off shoulders, sleeves were rolled up, and the exposure of flesh added to the earthiness inside the amphitheatre. It was perhaps solely down to the silence that Claudia noticed the meeting of two longhaired dandies, red-faced from recent exertion, each apologizing for their own lateness, but this was not what drew her attention. That was the wolf with a streak of silver down its back. A rumble of drums interrupted both the hush and Claudia’s astonishment. With a blast on the trumpets, the curtain at each tip of the oval drew back and horsemen in bright scarlet loincloths galloped into the ring. Gasps rose up. The skill of these Thessalian plainsmen had not been witnessed in Rome before now. They rode bareback, they did handstands, they rode balanced between two foam-flecked horses, cutting across one another with breathtaking precision. As far as Claudia was concerned, the wolf was history as horsemen turned somersaults or rode clinging to their black stallions’ bellies. And this was merely a taster. The Bull Dance was yet to come.

Still Marcus Cornelius did not turn his head.

Claudia coiled herself round a smug looking Porsenna and regretted not doubling the dose of her Runaway Success. Larentia smiled. But then, so do crocodiles.

To tumultuous applause and earsplitting whistles, the panting horsemen collected their wreaths and their accolades and retired. Musicians and tumblers came on in the interlude, and it was only when Orbilio moved to stretch his long, patrician legs that he noticed the stunning creature in the apricot gown six rows behind him. One curl, as usual, had come adrift from its mooring.

‘That blond rider was particularly handsome,’ Fortunata was saying. ‘Don’t you agree, Cousin Claudia?’

‘Not a patch on Porsenna,’ she simpered, linking her hand into his and pretending not to notice the tall aristocrat turning in the seat below as she whispered ‘It’s so hot in here’ to Porsenna. Let Hotshot make of that what he will. From the corner of her eye, she saw him ease his way up the steps.

‘That’ll be the crowd,’ replied the mouse man.

Give me strength. Nevertheless, Claudia set free a silvery laugh. ‘Oh, but Porsenna, I feel we’ve been alone from the moment we first met.’ She glanced up at the man hovering in the aisle. ‘Orbilio. What a surprise.’

He seemed amused. His eyes were twinkling. Did he think she hadn’t noticed his hands all over Miss Syrian Linens down below? But of course he did. This slick, handsome bastard was playing on the fact.

He indicated the food and drink vendors. ‘Can I get you anything?’

‘No thanks.’ Her eyes swivelled to the handsome mouse farmer, who was dispensing his charm to Larentia. ‘I have everything I need right here.’

Emotion flashed across his eyes, she thought it might have been hostility. Or something worse.

He was on the point of speaking when a legionary appeared at his elbow. ‘There you are, sir.’ When he tried to salute, his arm was compressed in the crush. ‘There’s been an incident on the Palatine-’

‘Holy Jupiter! The Emperor?’

‘No, sir. Sorry, sir. Didn’t mean to alarm you. It’s another murder, sir.’

Claudia stood up and smoothed the folds of her gown as though the conversation meant nothing to her. Her eyes followed the convoluted movements of the acrobat. But her ears…

‘Well, I can’t come now, I’m-’ Even Supersleuth didn’t have the gall to say he was busy. Not when he’d been run to ground in a theatre. He glanced at the dark-eyed beauty in the front row clapping time to the lute player. Claudia bent down to check the clasp on her anklet, and refrained from sinking her teeth into his leg.

‘I think you ought to, sir. It looks like another Market Day Murder.’

‘Come, come, man, the market’s six days off.’

The legionary struggled to hang on to his helmet in the jostling throng. ‘I know, sir, but-’

‘Will you kindly stop sirring me, and relay the facts. And only the facts, please.’

‘Over in the Wolf Grotto, si- They found another body. Butchered, like the rest.’

Claudia watched the patrician age ten years in as many seconds. ‘What colour hair?’ he demanded.

The soldier looked confused. ‘Um-’

‘For gods’ sake, man, was she blonde? Yes or no?’ Orbilio shook the boy roughly by both shoulders.

‘N-no, sir. I believe she had dark hair.’

The years dropped away again. Claudia heard him exhale. ‘Then let’s go.’

From a discreet observation post beneath the royal box, a young woman in an apricot tunic watched a wavy-haired aristocrat bend over the bench and gesticulate towards the entrance. The dark-eyed beauty’s face dropped and as he twirled his toga out from underneath his seat, it half-concealed the kiss he’d leaned across to plant, and then he was gone, striding through the actors’ doorway as though he owned the place. Claudia moved across and sat beside her.

‘It’s Lucina, isn’t it?’

Miss Fancypants smiled tentatively. ‘Camilla, actually.’

‘That’s what I said. Marcus has told me so much about you. Never stops.’

Camilla’s exquisite features puckered. ‘You know Marcus?’

‘Intimately,’ she purred. ‘I’m his wife.’

Beautiful eyes widened in surprise. ‘But…I thought you were divorced. Weren’t you living in Lusitania? With a-’ Decorum stopped her.

‘Sea captain?’ Decorum never held Claudia back. ‘That’s what he likes to tell people. I think he’s ashamed of me, on account of the stink I kicked up at the time.’

‘Of the divorce?’ Camilla moved up so Claudia could get comfortable.

‘At the time of the scandal- Did you say divorce? Oh dear, I suppose the fiction makes him feel more comfortable about his, erWell, best not to speak of it.’

Lights danced off Miss Lovely’s multitude of gold. ‘I’m sorry, I…I don’t understand.’ Her voice softened. ‘Please tell me,’ she pleaded. ‘It is…very important to me.’

Claudia laid a sympathetic hand upon her arm. ‘It’s not a pretty story,’ she sighed. ‘In fact, I’m willing to bet he didn’t arrange to meet you here, that this was some chance meeting in the street.’

‘Why, yes. As a matter of fact, it was.’

Claudia tutted. ‘And was he coming out of the gym? He was? You know, I really hoped he’d change,’ she said sadly. ‘Was he alone, Camilla? Or was there a pretty boy holding his hand?’

‘Boy?’

‘Please. Camilla. Don’t distress yourself, it’s just the way Marcus is. For years,’ she dabbed at her eye, ‘I’ve resigned myself to being-’ she considered ‘celibate’ and said ‘-childless.’

Camilla looked aghast. ‘You’re not making this up, are you?’

Claudia’s eyes widened convincingly. ‘Next time you see him, ask him where he got those bruises. Or better still, ask that chap over there.’ She pointed to the gallery, to a kohl-eyed transvestite surrounded by a dozen powdered youths. ‘It was in his whorehouse, dear. And that’s the truth.’

*

Some distance from the Field of Mars, in a house untouched by the thunderous echo of hooves or the clouds of sand kicked up from the ring, more mundane pursuits were in progress. Silver was buffed up, torn seams mended, skillets scoured, chickens plucked. Outside, shops which had closed for siesta were starting to re-open with the inevitable clangs, drowning the background oaths of builders trying to lay the foundations of yet another splendid public building.

Nemesis, tucked beneath a couch and wrapped in a cloth stained with red, was aware of none of it.

When the street herald trumpeted the hour, the door to the bedroom creaked open and the weapon’s owner padded into the room. A deep, fulfilled sigh rippled the air.

‘This is good,’ the voice whispered. ‘Very good.’

Discarded clothes, rank with freshly clotted blood, were bundled into a sack, along with the piece of cloth in which Nemesis lay wrapped, then the knife was plunged into a bowl of warm water, where, to a gentle whistle, it was agitated until the water turned red. It was shaken, examined, then, with great reverence, Nemesis was raised high and twisted slowly to the left, then slowly to the right, so that all its deadly contours could be inspected and each wicked gem admired.

‘You are mine, Nemesis.’

Twisted to the left. To the right. A tunic slid to the floor. To the left. To the right.

‘And I am yours.’

Cold steel rippled upon hot flesh. To the left. To the right. Between the legs.

‘Oh, yes!’

Panting, sweating, sated, two hands clutched the hilt and held the knife aloft.

‘Good boy,’ the voice whispered. ‘Good boy, Nemesis.’

With a final hiss, the knife sliced through the air before the maroon cotton shroud concealed it from view. Until the next time it would be needed.

*

If the Forum is the heart of Rome, then the Palatine is the brain. It was from here the arch-strategist Augustus stamped out banditry, opened new trade routes, tightened up the law and consolidated the might of the Empire, and it was from here that he would have to unravel the mess left by the premature death of his close friend and Regent, Marcus Vipsanius Agrippa. All around, imposing architecture reflected the Palatine’s supremacy-the Imperial Palace, the semi-circular basilica where Augustus heard petitions, the temples honouring Victory, Apollo. In fact honouring anyone you could put a name to, really. There were marbles from Alexandria, limestones from Sicily, creamy corallina from beside the Sea of Marmora. A far cry from the days when the hill looked down upon the river and wide open spaces of its marshlands and the villagers huddled inside huts.

But the origins remained for all to see.

The shrine of the shepherd goddess who gave the hill its name might now be encased in gold and Numidian marble, but the Festival of Pales still smacked of country ritual. One single hut, with a thatch and walls of woven osiers, had been preserved as a national monument, a reminder of Rome’s humble past. And finally, facing the setting sun, was the Lupercal. Once a dank, slimy cavern famous only for being where the she-wolf suckled Romulus and Remus, Augustus had turned the site into a magnificent indoor grotto complete with bubbling spring, painted statues and a fig tree. Although the vast oak grove which once sheltered it lay beneath the Circus Maximus, gilded goat horns and acorns fashioned from gold studded the ceiling, goatskins and pan pipes hung on the walls as mementoes of its rural roots. It was behind the bronze she-wolf, between the statues of Faunus and of Pan, that the body lay in its lonely pool of blood.

‘Move along, now,’ the soldier addressed the gawping crowd. ‘There’s nothing here to look at-oh, it’s you, sir. Beg pardon, only I didn’t expect to see you at the crime scene.’

The legionary, a wily old footslogger called Ancus, hurriedly crossed the marbled floor to where the patrician Orbilio lingered at the entrance, his unfocused gaze taking in the misty hills across the river, and saluted.

‘Why’s that?’ he was asked.

‘This is quite straightforward, sir. Throat cut, no signs of sexual interference.’ Ancus stared down at folk hunched under their hoods and cloaks, hugging the walls of the great racecourse for shelter. ‘Probably find the boyfriend round the corner, his eyes cried out of their sockets, saying how he never meant to harm her, but when he realized she was dead, he tried to cover his tracks by making it look like the others.’

‘The young soldier-what was his name, Probus? – seemed convinced we’re dealing with another ritual murder.’

Ancus made a dismissive gesture. ‘As you say, sir, the boy’s young.’ From the escarpment, he could glimpse the murky flow of the Tiber, her ferries quiet, since the public parks on the opposite bank held very little attraction. Indeed, only a fool (or a soldier under orders) would be out of doors on a day like today. ‘You know what they’re like at that age, everything’s sensationalism. He sees a body bathed in blood and- Sir?’ The aristocrat was no longer at the cave entrance. Squinting, Ancus could see him hunched over the body.

‘Who found her?’

‘Don’t rightly know, sir.’ He had to raise his voice to carry beyond the gushing springwaters. ‘Me and Probus were on patrol when we heard people yelling, and by the time we’d got here, quite a crowd had formed.’

‘Was she like this when you arrived?’

Ancus scratched his head. ‘Dead, you mean?’

‘I mean,’ Orbilio said patiently. ‘Was she lying on her back?’

‘Oh. Er, no, she was propped against the podium of the she-wolf. Look.’ He held up the torch to reveal a puddle of blood at the base. ‘I pulled her away to look for the hair.’

‘What hair?’

‘Well, that was it.’ The old footslogger smiled pityingly. ‘There wasn’t no hair, not even lying underneath the body. As I said, Probus jumped the gun.’

Orbilio lifted the torn flaps of the girl’s sleeve. ‘The blue dragon.’

‘Yes, but as you can see, sir, the throat’s been cut, and those other wounds were made after she had died.’

Same thing happens every time, thought Ancus. No sooner do we get a batch of ritual killings, than some other warped bastard comes along and tries to imitate them.

The tall patrician straightened up, brushing his hands. ‘Possibly,’ he acknowledged. ‘But ask around, Ancus. See whether anyone heard a whistle, only don’t say why.’ So far, the whistle was something only the military knew about. ‘Find out her name, start asking questions about her background, who she was friends with-?’

Ancus scratched his armpit. ‘We know her name, sir, it’s Zygia. Don’t look surprised,’ he chuckled. ‘She’s well known for running errands for the aedile who organizes the Games. Lives up there on the Capitol.’ He smiled knowingly. ‘Take it from me, sir, this’ll be the work of a boyfriend.’

‘What makes you so certain?’ Orbilio leaned his weight against Pan’s cloven hoof.

‘Well, her clothes have been ripped off, but her hands and feet weren’t tied and there’s no hair in the lap, but most of all,’ Ancus tapped the side of his nose, ‘this place, sir. The Wolf Grotto. I’d say she gave him the old heave-ho and he turned nasty. Perhaps it was a married man she was meeting here in secret-folk do that, you know.’ He laughed outright. ‘They think this cave’s romantic.’

The young investigator smiled non-commitally back.

‘No, don’t you waste your energy worrying about this girl’s killer, sir. Me and Probus will have the boyfriend in the nick in no time. You concentrate on protecting the life of the Emperor, sir. Here, did you know they’ve already uncovered one plot…’

Few things in this life can be classed certainties, but one thing you can bank on. The older the soldier, the more gossip he’ll have to impart. Ancus didn’t stop talking for a full ten minutes.