Lindsey Davis - Enemies at Home

‘Why did they take him? The severity of his wounds exonerated him from not helping his master.’

‘Phaedrus, the other porter, claims Nicostratus did not want to be left behind alone. Amaranta and Olympe told me they had not realised how bad his condition was; they imagined they could look after him.’

‘And do we know whose idea it was to flee?’

‘They were vague. My feeling is the steward put them up to it.’ So Polycarpus really was more loyal to the slaves he supervised than to his master. Interesting!

‘Or who suggested the Temple of Ceres?’

‘Chrysodorus. The philosopher.’ For once Manlius Faustus sounded unsure of himself. ‘Is it significant?’

‘Probably not.’

‘I wish I had pressed the point.’

I made him a reassuring gesture. ‘He will probably dodge the question … There must have been interesting discussions among those slaves — I wish we could have sight of that playscript!’

Since I had been keeping him up to date with my daily reports, there was little else for us to discuss. My client seemed satisfied I was doing my best, repeating that I should take whatever time I needed.

Faustus then talked to me about his own work. I knew something of his preoccupation with the city’s plague of random killers, so he shared the latest developments; he even asked advice. This was a sensitive subject, highly confidential. I was furious to notice Myla as she went from the dining room to the kitchen, slowing up and obviously trying to listen in.

Faustus saw her too. He stopped talking. He was naturally reticent, so when he took me into his confidence − which in fairness to him, he had always done more than I expected − I resented someone else interrupting. Was it another illustration of ‘Oh, that’s just Myla’? She acted vague, yet habitually eavesdropped?

If so, whether she exploited what she heard or was just nosy, I would have sold the woman and not put up with it. I bet Mucia Lucilia shared my antipathy.

As she sashayed along a colonnade, swinging her hips, Myla was giving Faustus an obvious sexual invitation. I might as well not have been present.

Manlius Faustus was a rare man; he disliked unsought attention of that kind. He even picked up his chair and moved it around, so his back was turned on the colonnade. The action seemed automatic. I was not sure he realised he had done it.

He and I sat in silence for a time, the way you can only do with a friend. I suppose that was when I seriously acknowledged to myself that although I disliked him when we first met, I liked Faustus much more now. How much more I would not contemplate. Best not make the same mistake as Myla.

It was late, clearly time for him to make a move. Unlike my uncle, who anyway lived nearer, he admitted he was so weary after a tedious day of meetings, he felt reluctant to walk. To reach his house, he had to trek all the way up the Aventine and across the heights.

He would never have asked, but I made it easy for him: ‘You have no bodyguards with you. You might not keep your wits about you if you’re tired. Stay here. Go back in the morning. Who is going to mind?’

I told him where to find a bedroom. It was the one Quintus commandeered that afternoon, though I did not say so. Faustus took himself off gratefully. I sat on outside, merely bidding him a quiet goodnight.

I changed to the more comfortable chair, still warm from his presence. I stayed for a while there in the courtyard, wondering if Faustus would return. He did not. That did not surprise me.

My mischievous uncle may have left us together on purpose − such a waste of thoughtfulness. Still, Holy Venus. How bad was it to be spurned because a man was tired ?

I was still there, unintentionally drowsing, when another commotion woke me. People — several this time — were in the street outside, hammering on the door for attention.

Manlius Faustus shot from his room. He pushed me behind him as he unzipped the grille and cautiously looked out. When he demanded to know who was making such a disturbance, we heard it was slaves from the Camillus brothers. Aulus had sent them. They had horrible news.

As Uncle Quintus made his way home that evening, he and his bodyguards were ambushed. His men managed to drag him to their house, but Quintus had been hurt.

Oh dear gods. It was Nicostratus all over again. My imagination filled with the terrible image of the door porter’s corpse, covered with blood from those many gruesome wounds, those injuries from which he never recovered consciousness. The injuries that killed him.

‘Is he alive?’

The slaves knew nothing.

I realised what had happened. Those men I saw earlier departing from that bar opposite were not innocent drinkers, but criminals. Watching the house. Waiting for someone to leave, with specific orders to look for a senator. The Rabirii sent them after us. The men tailed Justinus until he reached a suitable spot, then brutally set about him.

It was no random act. It was a warning. We had taken too much interest.

‘Tiberius, I have to go!’

‘Stay here, where you are safe.’

‘Was Nicostratus safe? Aviola and Mucia Lucilia?’

‘Albia, do as I say, please.’

‘Don’t give me orders.’

‘Only advice.’ Well, aedile, that is always irritating.

We were standing in the street by then. The damned man was so stubborn with me, he might as well have been one of my family. I was trying to break away and he was trying to shepherd me back into the house. I wanted to kick him, but I was wearing only house slippers. Besides, I would never have aimed right, as I havered in panic over whether to pelt straight off to the Camillus house or first rush indoors for shoes I could run in.

People were looking out of windows and doorways. The disturbance brought Polycarpus’ wife down.

‘Dromo — come. With your cudgel, fool!’ Faustus finally went along with me. I calmed down. Better he decided to help me than I rushed off by myself. I knew from experience he made a good ally.

Polycarpus must be out but, assuming responsibility on his behalf, Graecina produced a carrying chair. It must be Mucia’s, sent back by the Temple of Ceres after the slaves ran off. It had been kept in a lock-up while attempts were made to clean Nicostratus’ blood off the seat. Not very successfully, I noticed.

The steward’s wife also gave us a lantern-carrier, a callow lad who worked for her, and a cloak of her own — I was shaking — which Manlius Faustus bundled around me, a practical man, ignoring how angry I had been with him. He noticed I was on the verge of tears and murmured, ‘Don’t go jittery. This is not your fault.’

‘I don’t jitter. Let me go. I need to go.’

‘I am coming with you. Get in — go, go!’ He was shouting not at me, but the Camillus slaves who would be carrying the chair containing me.

Thank the gods it was downhill to the Capena Gate. It felt as if we were travelling across half Rome, a rough journey at the speed they ran, and I was so keyed up I soon felt sick. We had to scramble from the Fourth district, past the Fifth, across the Second and into the Twelfth. At least it was not as far as the Aventine.

It was a quiet evening by Rome’s standards. The streets were negotiable. The Rabirius gang had done their worst for one night. Nobody attacked us.

When we arrived, the men took the chair right into the house and I fell out of it in the atrium, almost before they were stationary. Someone gestured to a room. Quintus, stripped and sporting livid marks, was lying on a couch.

Aulus was attending to his brother. He had rejected the family doctor, a freedman they kept for dosing the children, who had tried to use lambswool for cleaning the wounds, only to be ordered away in case fibres killed Quintus with an infection. The doctor was still maundering on about this, while Aulus explained his reasons through gritted teeth, apparently not for the first time.