Lindsey Davis - The Ides of April

"No." Perhaps I should be. Informers have to look tough, however. "I don't want him to pop out from his room and see us analysing what he may have done. It's premature. We have to assemble evidence that connects him to the crimes. Most of what you have said could equally apply to your old suspect, Tiberius."

Not the maid, though. The maid destroyed the Faustus marriage. Taking revenge on her gave a motive for murder only to Manlius Faustus.

Andronicus followed up my suggestion. "And you are no doubt thinking it's Tiberius who is regularly out on the streets."

I had not progressed that far, but I nodded.

"Think about this. Yes, Tiberius is sent out under cover, but don't be misled. You know what Faustus is like. He wants to conduct his job better than any aedile ever. The one thing anyone must say for him is that he does not sit on his togate backside in the office, waiting for news. He makes himself familiar with what happens in his area."

"Knows his own patch?"

Andronicus clapped his hands. "Exactly."

"He gets out there? He knows places like the Vicus Altus and Lesser Laurel Street? He regularly walks in the Trigeminal Porticus?"

"He goes to the Porticus to buy Rutupiae oysters. Thinks them much tastier than Lucrine."

Andronicus was starting to convince me. All the more reason to vanish from here. I repeated that I was going home, and this time did gather myself to leave.

I was not surprised when Andronicus decided that he would come with me. And, with a lift of the heart, I knew how he intended that to end. Even in public, he made that obvious. When we left the house and walked together, he had us entwined like lovers on their way to bed.

From the Street of the Plane Trees, it was a shorter distance to Fountain Court from the Tullius and Faustus house than from the other side of the hill, and my previous visits to the Temple of Ceres area. Even this stroll gave some reflection time.

I rarely feel triumphal when I may have identified a wrongdoer. More often, it seems such a waste. The cleverer a criminal, the more that applies.

Andronicus and I did not speak much. He had his mind fixed on lovemaking, as if discussing death held an erotic charge. Although pleasure had its attractions for me, which on any other occasion would have been urgent, I was lost in the case temporarily. It was not a moment for collaboration. I was not even sure I wanted that. At a critical juncture, I prefer to mull over enquiries on my own. Although Andronicus and I were close, his method of jumping to immediate conclusions every time there was a twist did not fit mine. I dwell on results. I go back and test all the clues and facts, in case of mistakes or missing links. What's more, I do it when I am ready. For me that afternoon, being silent only meant I was clearing my brain in readiness for when I did ponder. I wanted to sit alone on my own couch in a silent room, a cup of wine untouched beside me, a note tablet in my lap.

Well, that was how I would tackle the enquiry later, after Andronicus and I had fallen into each other's arms and spent delicious time together … I was human.

Two things worked their way to the front of my consciousness right then. I needed to ask Cassiana Clara to confirm if, that night at dinner, Manlius Faustus assaulted her. If he did, it was a clincher.

I wanted to ask Laia Gratiana's maid Venusia about Faustus too. Specifically: how had she known about his affair and what (if it wasn't simply her unpleasant character) drove her to say something? Was it really loyalty to Laia? A true friend might have kept the young wife in the dark and tried to preserve her happiness-or, if you are cynical about marriage, preserve it for as long as possible.

One idea I now developed was this: while Faustus and Laia were wed, had he dallied with the maid? Plenty of husbands make a grab for the wife's attendants. Venusia might have enjoyed his covert attentions, even convinced herself she was special; she would then have hated him starting an affair elsewhere, so she snitched to her mistress as an act of spite, a thwarted lover herself.

As I walked with Andronicus, I asked whether Faustus might do that. Andronicus claimed the man was notoriously fresh with female slaves. According to him, when Manlius Faustus visited other houses, people knew he was a risk and took steps to keep their good-looking girls out of his way.

"He is not the only man in Rome who has that reputation," Andronicus concluded.

"Agreed. But you are making him out to be very different from all I have heard before. Didn't you yourself once tell me he never even lays a finger on the girl who makes his bed? I hope you are not embroidering!"

"His bedroom slave is a boy, come to think of it," Andronicus replied gravely. "I never do sewing. Even when we need to have papyrus lengths stitched together in the archive office, I delegate."

"Nothing wrong with needlework," I disagreed, smiling. "It's not as dainty as people think. Stabbing the cloth, you have to use a lot of force sometimes."

"Really?"

The embroidery nonsense filled time while we moved from the end of the alley to the Eagle Building, where we were so ready to rip our clothes off and fall on each other. Even I had regained my interest. Instead, at the entrance we met an agitated Rodan.

"Oh thank the gods, Albia-I can't deal with this! It's an animal! It's on the stairs. Nobody can get past. Somebody has to get rid of it."

The great lump was nearly in tears, he was so upset at having to catch and remove a wild creature that had entered the building. I supposed it was a rat or even a mouse. Even when supplied with mousetraps, our janitor was too squeamish to empty them. He brought them to me.

"Calm down, Rodan."

When I came home with a lover, I did not want to find a domestic emergency. It looks bad. It wastes time. It spoils the mood. So, yes, I was furious. Rodan was so used to people being annoyed, he barely noticed.

Andronicus was openly chuckling. "What is this thing, an escaped lion?"

"You're a gladiator, Rodan," I grumbled. "Find a spear and deal with it." I knew Rodan had never killed anything. Faced with a serious predator, he would expire himself, of cowardice. Fortunately we did not live in the kind of area that was constantly beset with exotic pets escaping from wealthy people's show-off menageries.

Rodan passed me a broom. Accepting it, I assumed responsibility. He made the broom a baton in some kind of relay race, the wild beast sprint. I had to run with the problem now.

I cursed. With Andronicus excitedly jostling at my shoulder, I shoved past Rodan, who fled into his cubicle, covering his ears until it was over. I entered the lobby. At first I saw and heard nothing. Then came disorderly scrabbling sounds. As I inched up the first stairs, a terrible sight lay ahead. A vixen used in last night's ritual had survived the Circus and escaped. Horrifically burned in the hindquarters, she had dragged herself partway over the Aventine and into our building. Although she had managed to shed the torch they tied to her, the damage was dire: the exhausted creature had almost no tail, her flesh was charred, her long back legs hung useless.

She lay cowering in a corner of the first landing. Her amber eyes were dull and full of dread. As I approached, she struggled as best she could, too weak even to spit or snarl.

"Stop. Don't go near!" Andronicus made a grab for me.

I could see why Rodan was so upset. It was my turn to become hysterical. "What can we do? We must help her!"

"She cannot be saved, Albia. It's hopeless."

"I must put her out of her misery then. I can't leave her like this!"

The scene worsened, as the African children who lived on the first floor heard our voices and looked out of their door, where they must have been hiding. Now that there were adults to pay them attention, they started screaming. They were spooking the vixen. They were spooking me. I directed them to go indoors, but they only screamed louder.