Lindsey Davis - Nemesis

'It will ruin my life.'

'Your life is in your own hands, just as it always was. You won't change,' Helena said. 'You need to work. It is what you enjoy: grappling with puzzles that no one else will undertake and righting society's wrongs. Don't become a man of leisure; you'll go mad – - and you'll drive the rest of us crazy.'

I pretended to think she just wanted reasons to pack me out of the house every morning as before. But she knew that I accepted she was right.

During the nine days of mourning, Helena and I told everyone that 'in the style of the divine Emperor Augustus and his unparalleled wife Livia', we would not be seen in public. Platitudes always work. Nobody considered that we regarded Augustus and Livia as two-faced, double-dealing, power-mad manipulators.

After the nine days, we could both just about face people again. Helena Justina was beside me at the feast, when I returned to the Janiculan.

I knew what the funeral feast would be like. I thought the day would hold no surprises. Even more hangers-on managed to bring themselves up the hill than had struggled there for the cremation. Free food, free drink, and the chance to hear or pass on gossip, brought fools out in flocks. Relatives we had forgotten were ours somehow turned up. Mother's brothers, Fabius and Junius, who were rarely seen together because they feuded so tenaciously, both came all the way from the Campagna; at least they brought root vegetables as presents, unlike the other shiftless guests. If they had ulterior motives they were too dumb to say. I thought Fabius and Junius were simply acknowledging the end of an era that only they and Ma now remembered.

I had primed my more reliable nephews – restless Gaius, overweight Cornelius, sensible Marius – - to pass among the throng, muttering that there were far more debts than anticipated and that I might refuse to be the heir… It held off some of the graspers from overt begging.

Together Helena and I went through the motions of hosting the banquet. Stuffing merrily, people were no trouble. As the long meal drew to a close, I watched the tall and stately Helena Justina pass among the guests with my secretary, Katutis, at her shoulder. He was new. I had acquired a trained Egyptian scribe at just the right moment. He was thrilled to have deaths in the family; it provided more work than I found for him normally. While Helena prised out people's names, Katutis busily wrote them all down in level Greek script in case I needed to know later. I was nervous that some of Pa's dubious business arrangements might jump up and bite. Helena had also pointed out several women who looked like off-duty barmaids, flaunting their best outfits and seemingly unaware that mourning women should leave off their jewellery. These blowsy, bulging dames might just be good-hearted old friends of my social papa; perhaps they adored him as a lovable rogue who left good tips by his empty winecup. Or they could have deeper motives. Helena was collecting their data along with details of all those old men who felt no need to explain who they were, as they called me Young Marcus and tapped their bulbous red noses as if we shared enormous secrets.

As we went about our duties, Helena murmured, 'I have said we are hoping for a mention in the Daily Gazette society column: Seen at a banquet in his elegant Janiculan villa to celebrate the life of much-admired man-about-the-Forum, Marcus Didius Favonius, were the following persons of note… Now watch the would-be persons of note rush up to help Katutis spell their names right.'

'I don't want Pa in the news.'

'No, darling. Why alert the tax authorities?' Helena's voice was thin, but she was regaining her sense of humour. Inheritance tax is five per cent, paid into the Treasury's military fund. The army was going to like me a lot.

I had used my mourning period for the traditional purpose of starting to inventory the legacy. For most people nine days is enough to cover this formality; I had barely tickled the edge.

Supposedly incommunicado, I had worked like a bath-house stoker among Pa's many possessions. I set aside the least desirable items to sell to pay the tax. I also established with Gornia that we would auction some stuff that would either fail to sell, or sell for a disappointing amount; this would show picky officials that my inventory valuations were blamelessly modest. A citizen is obliged to pay his taxes, but may adopt any legal measures to minimise the damage. I knew all about that. I had been Vespasian's Census fixer. I investigated every variation of fiscal fraud and tax-dodging – and I now planned to use my experience. Pa would expect it.

I had had an interesting chat with a treasury official about whether, if I sold goods at auction, I must pay the one per cent auction tax on top of the five per cent for inheritance; you can guess his answer.

'Thalia is here; have you seen her, Marcus?'

'I glimpsed her.' She was lurking at the far end of a table, looking more wrapped up and respectable than usual. 'Nice of her to hang back and not bother us.' In fact her demure behaviour had set up anxiety.

'I shall have a word!' Helena declared, making me oddly apprehensive.

As she paraded through the guests, Helena identified the surviving witnesses to Father's will: four of those shaky old fellows who had grasped my hand interminably. I made sure they each had a drink poured from the special amphora of Falernian, which probably shortened their lives by several months; it flowed like rich olive oil and was dangerously potent. Their presence allowed me to read out the will formally. I pretended the contents came as news to me; nobody was fooled. A restrained silence fell. My sisters heard their fates without making a public scene, but assumed foreboding expressions. Ma was too heavily veiled for anyone to see her reaction. She had seemed quiet all day, as if losing the old devil at last had knocked all the spirit out of her.

Soon afterwards, people began to leave. Helena told me it was because I was viewed as tight-fisted. 'Everybody is whispering that things would have been very different – - they mean, more money for them – if Festus had survived.'

That suited me. But many just went because the food and drink were running out. There had been plenty. Some of it was going home in people's pockets. Anyone who brought their own napkin made sure they took it away laden.

'I swear there were some "grieving friends" who came with little baskets specially,' I complained to Maia. Then I noticed her basket.

'Marcus, darling, I'm family. Any leftover egg-and-anchovy tart is mine!' She backed down slightly. 'You don't want waste, do you?'

Helena had identified my father's lawyer. Once we were freed from saying farewells in the portico, she brought him to me indoors.

He was surprisingly young, twenty-five or so. He introduced himself as Septimus Parvo. His accent was decent, though not screamingly aristocratic; it sounded as if he had learned how to speak from an elocution teacher, after a plebeian upbringing. His dress was neat, his manner polite. He told me he avoided cut-throat court cases at the Basilica Julia, instead working as a backstreet family lawyer.

'I'll keep your name handy then. I'm an informer myself. We may be able to do business.' The veiled surprise in Parvo's expression reminded me that most people expected I would now retire. It was still too early for me to be certain, though I thought Helena was probably right; work would always claim me. 'You're far too young to have prepared my father's will, Parvo – assuming the date is right?'

'No, my own late father did that. We have worked for many years with Didius Geminus – - we always called him that. Or do you prefer to say Favonius, Falco?'

'To be frank, I just called him an incorrigible swine.'