David Wishart - Solid Citizens

‘You can go too, Lupercus,’ Clarus said.

They left.

Clarus looked at me. ‘Come on, Corvinus,’ he said.

‘Come on, what?’

‘Like you said, it’s the festival in a few days. Bathyllus was looking forward to it. You can’t send him back to Rome now.’

‘Sometimes you’ve just got to be firm. And he is acting like a five-year-old.’

‘Granted. Still, do you want me to have a quiet talk with him? Maybe let Marilla weigh in? And I’ll have a word with Lupercus too. See if I can patch things up.’

‘Suit yourself, pal. But make it clear that it ends now.’ I got up. ‘I think I’ll skip breakfast after all. I can have an early lunch in Bovillae.’

Bugger. First Meton, now Bathyllus. Slaves. They’re as much trouble as kids sometimes.

It was mid-morning by the time I arrived. I went straight round to the brothel for another talk with Opilia Andromeda.

‘Hi, uh, Carillus, wasn’t it?’ I said when the slave opened the door for me.

‘Yes, sir.’

‘The mistress about?’

‘No, sir, not yet. But she’s usually down at around this time, so she shouldn’t be long, if you can wait.’

‘No problem, pal.’ I took off my cloak — it had been raining again, and the ride over from Castrimoenium had been pretty damp — and hung it on one of the lobby pegs. ‘She lives over the shop, then?’

‘Yes, sir. She has a separate flat on the floor above.’ Right; that explained the external staircase on the alley side of the back door. ‘But you can use her sitting room, if you like. I’m sure she won’t mind.’

‘That’d be fine.’ I paused. ‘Just out of interest, have you been with her long? I mean, did you know her before she came to Bovillae?’

‘No, I was the previous owner’s slave, sir. Rutilia Tyche. I came as part of the property when she transferred the ownership. That would’ve been about fourteen months ago.’

‘So you don’t know anything about her? Prior to then, that is?’

‘No, sir. Apart from the fact that she worked in a similar establishment in Tibur.’

‘Right.’ I followed him along the corridor to Andromeda’s room. He opened the door and stood aside. ‘Ah … One more question. Aulus Mettius. He come here often?’

‘On occasion, sir.’ Guarded: well, given what Andromeda had said about confidentiality that was fair enough.

‘Friendly with him, is she? I mean, outside professional contact, as it were?’

‘I’m sorry, I really couldn’t say.’ Guarded had gone up a couple of notches to stiff as hell .

‘So you wouldn’t know whether, for example, he was here the night of the murder?’

‘No, sir, I wouldn’t. Now if there’s nothing else I’ll get on with my duties.’

‘Sure.’ Well, it’d been worth a try. ‘Thanks, pal.’

He left, closing the door behind him.

I wouldn’t get a better chance than this to take a proper nosey around. Book cubby, small but bursting to the gunnels with a fair collection of books, mostly philosophy, in the original and translation, but also including a copy of Herodotus’s ‘Histories’, Xenophon’s ‘Memorabilia’ and a couple of Sophoclean dramas. Serious stuff again, no Alexandrian bodice rippers. And, more to the point, no pricey bronze figurines squirrelled away under the couch, either. Well, it had been a possibility, although if Andromeda did have it then it’d be far more likely to be in her private flat upstairs than in her relatively public sitting room.

Apropos of which …

There was a curtain on the far wall that turned out, when I moved it aside, to be covering a flight of steps. So, the upstairs flat was accessible by an internal staircase as well as by the external one. It was odd that I couldn’t hear anyone moving about in the room above, mind, particularly since from the light showing between the boards the sitting-room ceiling was also the room’s actual floor. But then maybe Andromeda was a late riser.

I sat down on the stool to wait for her. Half an hour or so later, I heard the sound of footsteps on the ceiling boards, then on the stairs, and Andromeda came through the curtain.

She stopped dead. For a moment she looked … Fazed? Frightened? Guilty? I wasn’t sure which, if any. Flustered, certainly, like she’d been caught out somehow. And white as a ghost.

‘Valerius Corvinus,’ she said. ‘You gave me quite a start.’

‘I’m sorry,’ I said. ‘Carillus told me you wouldn’t mind me waiting for you in here.’

‘No. No, of course I don’t.’ She lay down on the couch and tried a smile that didn’t quite work. ‘But I am rather busy this morning, as it happens. Or will have to be, shortly, with house matters. What can I do for you?’

‘Just a couple more questions. When he was here that night, did Caesius have a small bronze with him? The figurine of a runner?’

Was that a blink? It might’ve been, but I couldn’t be sure. In any case, she answered calmly enough.

‘I don’t know. He may have done. He was wearing his cloak when I let him in, so if the bronze was a very small one I wouldn’t have noticed. Why do you ask?’

‘Just checking possibilities. The chances are that he had it when he left home, and it’s gone missing. It was pretty valuable.’

‘Was it, indeed? It seems a strange thing to be carrying around, then. Would he have had a reason?’

‘Yeah. Seemingly he had a deal going with someone involving an exchange. Before he came here. But the deal fell through, so he’d still have it on him.’

‘Well, I’m afraid I can’t help you. All I can say is that I didn’t see it.’

‘How about his partner? Lydia? Would she know? Maybe I could talk to her again?’

‘Lydia isn’t here at present,’ she said shortly. ‘Her time of the month. She’s spending a few days with her mother and small son in Castra Albana.’

‘That’s pretty generous of you, lady. I didn’t think the girls in these places got days off.’

She shrugged. ‘She can’t work. Obviously. Castra Albana is close by. And I’ve been one of these “girls” myself, Corvinus; I know how valuable free time is to them, particularly if they have children, as many of them do. If you can’t accept that explanation then put it down to a purely mercenary desire to save the cost of a few days’ rations and lamp oil. Now, if you have no more questions, as I said I have work to do, so …’

‘Marcus Manlius. Would he be a customer of yours, by any chance? Or Sextus Canidius, maybe?’

It was a shot in the dark, but this time she really did blink. She hesitated before replying.

‘Both of them, yes, as it happens,’ she said. ‘But that information is given to you in the strictest confidence. Both are married — happily, as far as I’m aware — and they’re only occasional visitors.’

‘Either of them here the night of the murder?’

Again, the hesitation. Then she said: ‘Canidius did drop in. Briefly. His visits are always brief. He’s quite a cold fish, according to the girls.’

‘When would that be? When Caesius was here?’

‘They overlapped, yes. But Canidius arrived after Caesius and left before him.’

‘They ever meet at all? Here, face to face, I mean?’

‘Not that I’m aware of, and we do everything we can where the special guests are concerned to avoid that happening. That’s always a possibility, of course, and if it had happened it would have been embarrassing for both parties. But as I told you last time Caesius generally went with Lydia, so unless Canidius — or, indeed, Manlius on another occasion — happened to come along the corridor as Caesius was actually entering or leaving by the back door then the situation wouldn’t have arisen. Naturally, if it did, none of them would have mentioned it to me.’