David Wishart - The Lydian Baker

Yeah. That would work. Sure it would. Maybe I was on to something here.

The crowd had begun to thin a little when I turned left at the Eleusinion onto the main drag round the north face of the Rock. I glanced back. Memnon was still with me. Just for the hell of it I waited to see if he'd catch up, but he didn't. Suit yourself, pal, I thought, and carried on walking.

So. With Smaragdus dead Felix is stymied. He has to work on two contradictory assumptions at the same time; one — less likely, but still a possibility — that the sneaky Roman bastard knows where the Baker is, two that he doesn't, but being a sneaky Roman bastard he'll move heaven and earth to find out. So he has PC slug me outside the Scallop and cart me down to a handy cellar where he endeavours to scare the wollocks off me in the hopes that I'll spill any beans I've got just to avoid ending up like Argaius. In the process — for the sake of future security, because killing me is not an option — PC encourages any half-arsed theories I might have as to who's behind the scam. That part was true, at least: if I'd misjudged anyone in the course of this business, it'd been PC. Whatever else he was, PC was no dumbo, that was sure: he'd told me just what he wanted me to know, or think I knew, no more and no less. Okay. So when the strong-arm approach doesn't work and I insist on meeting his boss PC takes the second option. He leaves the cellar and his mate Memnon takes over. Memnon stages a phoney rescue and I'm restored to the bosom of my caring family, full of gratitude and with an idea of the setup as valid as a radish's views on cosmic order.

Yeah. It held together, and it might even be true. The problem was, there were loose ends. I couldn't just dismiss Melanthus and Demetriacus as irrelevant because that would involve more coincidences than even one of Perilla's favourite dramatists allowed: Melanthus was my professional contact over the Baker, he was definitely involved with Demetriacus, and for him to get himself killed just at the most convenient moment was too pat by half.

Unless, of course, Felix had lifted him himself to provide his own authentification of the Baker. And the only reason Demetriacus fitted into all this was his connection with Melanthus. But then if Felix didn't have the statue he'd still need Melanthus; so why get rid of the guy before he'd had a chance to use him? Unless he already had used him. But then why should Felix..?

Ah, hell, there were problems whichever way you played it, and I was giving myself a headache here. Theorising isn't easy when you're sober; maybe I should've stopped at Phoenix's and got expensively smashed after all. Now it was too late to turn back, and home and a jug of my own Setinian was still a long way away.

Time for a change of plan. Up ahead of me a chubby guy was paying off his litter. I broke into a run and grabbed it a yard in front of an Egyptian tourist who'd evidently decided his gilded papyrus sandals wouldn't last out the trip back into town. I was grinning as I settled down among the cushions: Egyptian curses are pretty hot stuff, and this guy was clearly an expert. I'd have to remember that one if Perilla and I ever did the pyramid tour.

Memnon wasn't too pleased either. Especially when I waved goodbye.

Forget the quiet afternoon. When I got back it was to find Bessus the Piraeus stevedore waiting for me in the hall where Bathyllus had left him sitting on the door slave's bench and kicking his plebeian heels. Jupiter! Things were moving now with a vengeance!

'You've found Tiny, pal?' I said.

He nodded. 'He showed up first thing this morning, lord. Another loading job. We finished early and I followed him home.'

'Uh-huh.' As I picked up the regulation wine jug and cup from the hall table and led the way through to the atrium I should've been crowing, but I wasn't. I had a nasty feeling about this. Sure, Bessus couldn't have done it any other way, but I suspected that Tiny was a man who valued his privacy. 'He see you, by any chance?'

The guy looked uncomfortable. 'He may have done, lord,' he said at last. 'I didn't think it mattered.'

I groaned. He didn't think it mattered! Oh, great. Fantastic. That put the lid on. Well, it was my own fault, I should have warned him, and there wasn't anything I could do about it now. At least he'd found where the guy lived. I poured and drank.

'You want some wine?' I said.

'Sure.' The stevedore grinned; probably surprised I hadn't chewed his balls off.

I turned to Bathyllus, who'd padded in on my blind side and was pointedly ignoring Bessus. 'Bring us another cup, little guy. And tell Lysias to bring the coach round.'

'Yes, sir. At once, sir.' Stiff as hell: Bathyllus's standards don't allow for serving Setinian to dock hands. Still, from Zea to the Hippades Gate was quite a walk, unless he'd hitched a lift on a wagon, and the guy's tongue would be trailing the marble. 'Do I take it, then, sir, that you'll be going straight out again?'

'Got it in one, Bathyllus. You win the nuts.' I sank another quarter pint: if I had to go all the way to the Piraeus and back, even by carriage, I needed to get tanked up first. Especially if I was meeting Tiny. 'Is the mistress around, by the way?'

'No, sir. She's visiting her friend Euelpida, as I understand.'

Nestor's latest victim. I grinned, wondering if she'd taken the ivory plaque with her. I hoped so: Euelpida needed as much fun out of life as she could get. 'Okay. Just say to her when she gets back not to hold dinner.'

'Very well, sir.' Bathyllus oiled out. I'd been counting those 'sirs' and I made it five. The little guy was seriously miffed.

'Now.' I waved Bessus to a chair. 'Tell me.'

'He's camping out in one of the old trireme sheds.'

'Yeah?' That made sense. The Zea sheds might've been out of commission for the past two hundred years, but they were a dosser's dream. If he could get into them, that was. 'I thought these places were kept locked up. They're still government-owned, aren't they?'

'Sure.' Bessus shrugged. 'But he'd broken off the padlock. And who cares, these days? Most of the sheds are empty.'

Yeah, that was true. Ninety percent of the Piraeus trade went through the main harbour on the other side of the peninsula. Even let out as warehouses the sheds wouldn't be at a premium.

Bathyllus came with the extra cup and I filled it. Bessus downed the Setinian in one while the little guy fizzed.

'Lysias says he's ready when you are, sir,' he said.

'That's good.' I poured out two more belts and gave Bathyllus the jug. 'Put that into a travelling flask, would you, sunshine? And wrap up a sausage or two and a bit of bread while you're at it. We may get peckish on the way.'

'Peckish, sir. Indeed, sir.'

That made it eight. A record. He left, radiating disapproval, while I went through to the study to restock my purse. First the carriage drivers, now the stevedores' guild. This was getting serious: if I wasn't careful the Roman aristocracy would lose their reputation for exploiting the provincials.

We set off for the Piraeus.

Even if I'd known Tiny was living in one of the trireme sheds finding him wouldn't have been easy, because there were a good two hundred of the buggers, stretching all the way round the harbour. Bessus led me to one of the last in the line, not far from the harbour gates. It was big — it would have to be, to take four warships plus their tackle — and access from the land side was by a heavy wooden door fastened with iron bolts and a padlock. Or rather, the door should've been fastened; the padlock was missing and the bolts were drawn. Uh-huh. So either Tiny was in residence or he hadn't bothered to lock up when he left.

I looked round carefully before we went in. The harbour area wasn't exactly deserted, but as far as I could see there was no obvious candidate for a tail. Which didn't mean much. Sure, we'd probably given Memnon the slip with our fast turnaround, but that didn't mean to say we were running free: Felix would've had the house watched as well, and by a face I didn't know. Maybe Demetriacus, too, if his alibi was pure moonshine and he was our villain after all.