Lindsey Davis - The Accusers

'What advice, Ma?'

'Do not trust the freedman with the limp!'

Helena told Mother gently that she would pass all that on to Quintus, who was very good at caring for widows.

'I wish I had someone to look after me!' snapped Ma. 'If they need a good midwife -'

'I'm sure Mother has found them one,' Helena muttered. Upon mention of Julia Justa, Ma shut her mouth like a tightly pleated furnishing feature on a smooth bolster. She had a wonderful complexion, which belied her age. It was a tribute to home-macerated face cream, brewed to a secret recipe which Ma passed off as mainly rose petals (this may have been true, but on principle my mother managed to make it sound like a bluff}.

When Helena escaped to see about Claudia Rufina's progress, I claimed I was feeling poorly and needed to be left alone to sleep. After another hour of rollicking comment, my mother did leave me, removing my daughter and dog too. Exhausted, I fell into a deep slumber.

Honorius was the first of the forage party to report in.

'Negrinus refuses flatly to contest the will. No reason. I thought his sister, Carina, might argue – but she backed him up. Her husband, Laco, appeared for once – though he would not interfere.'

'So Negrinus is throwing it all away.'

Honorius sat on my bed with his arms folded. 'Negrinus is an odd body, Falco. One minute he shows all the anger you'd expect from a man in his situation. Then he suddenly implodes and seems to accept being shoved down a shit-hole by his closest relatives.'

'He is keeping something from us,' I said. 'He'll fight for himself when he's about to be charged with parricide – an offence that will get him sewn in a sack and thrown into the sea if he's found guilty. But when the penalty is less drastic, he reins back. He must have a reason to lie low.'

'So it's find the reason, then?'

'Oh yes – but you tell me where to start!'

We were both at a loss.

'I tried to see Saffia,' Honorius then told me. I refrained from throwing my water jug at his stupid head. Tantrums don't suit mature men. Anyway it was a decent jug. 'No luck. Incommunicado. Household in uproar. Males barred on the threshold. She has gone into labour, I was informed.,

'They must be putting birth-inducement powders in the aqueducts,' I growled. 'We have to see her. She seems to have gripped old Metellus by the privates – with the rest of the family all standing back helplessly to watch.'

'Well yes, but it won't look too good, Falco, if we harass Saffia for answers while she's in full birth pang!'

'You're a softie. It's just the moment.'

'That's one of your jokes,' Honorius replied stiffly.

'You're scared you'll end up snipping an umbilical cord or gathering up the afterbirth.'

The young man with the neat haircut managed not to shudder. 'Since Saffia was out, I tackled Calpurnia -' This was even worse. Honorius had no idea of following orders or working in a systematic way as part of a team. 'She was at home, I'm certain. She just refused to see me.'

With a restraint that Helena would have applauded, I begged Honorius to do nothing with our suspects and witnesses unless I asked him specifically.

'Right. So you don't want me to interview the clown, I take it?'

'What clown?' I demanded through clenched teeth.

He looked huffy. 'The one who was intended to be the satire at the Metellus funeral. I obtained his address from Biltis, that woman mourner Aelianus interviewed. Biltis,' Honorius repeated. 'Her name was in your original report to Silius. You know, before the charges we brought against Juliana… I'm trying to get things moving, Falco. I feel I am wasting my efforts, however.'

He finished whining, before I lost it and belted him. 'Any other suspects you've barged in on without consulting me?' I was livid. But it was good work to go back to the old report, and it was sensible to use the mourner, Biltis, to track down the clown. They were both marked up in Helena's notes as needing further enquiry. I myself had intended to look for the clown, when I got around to it.

Hurt, Honorius clammed up.

'Well, the clown was a bright idea.' Praise failed to mollify Honorius. 'Perhaps he'll know why Calpurnia upset her husband enough to be left almost nothing, and why Birdy has been written out too.'

'That's what I thought.'

I said I would go to see the clown tomorrow, row, but that Honorius could come with me. He quietened down.

'I wonder how funeral comedians do their research, Falco? If they just used the bland material that bereaved families supply to them, their performances would be pretty tame. At all the funerals I have attended or watched passing by, the clowns have given the dead man quite a raw deal. They can really hit on a person's weaknesses, and the crowds respond to it. Do they have methods of finding out stories the family would prefer to keep quiet?'

I smiled. 'They do. They winkle hard.' He still looked puzzled. 'They use informers, Honorius!'

Helena came home, bringing the news that Claudia Rufina had been safely delivered of a son. 'It didn't take too long and there were no panics. Claudia is sleeping; Quintus is sobbing with emotion but he'll get over it. My mother wore herself out but she's fine now – father and she are collapsed in a salon with an amphora of wine. The baby has all its limbs, and a tuft of dark hair, and seems likely to live. You're an uncle, Aulus!' Aelianus had overheard the news as he arrived. He pulled a mocking face, while presenting Nux with a large packet of skin-ailment ointment. Nux knew the scent, and hid under the bed. 'You and I have our first nephew. Be nice, and maybe they will name him after you.'

'Oh I hope not!' Helena was teasing, but her brother sounded horrified. 'I suppose now I'm expected to buy it a gold bulla to hang round its fat little neck?'

'No need, dear,' Helena told him sweetly. 'Mother has bought one to be your gift.'

Aelianus contained his grumpiness. Maybe the thought that his younger brother's bachelor spree was over had cheered him up.

As he waited for the fuss over the new baby to subside, I could see he was elated. As soon as we could politely forget about his brother, I asked what was up.

'Just as well you sent me out, not young Quintus, Falco. I started at the Forum, and was intending to work over to the eastern side, moving towards where the Metelli live. I checked all the streets at the back of the public buildings on the western side first. Around there it's bookshops and jewellers mainly, but one or two other booths can be found tucked in under the Palatine. I thought there might be incense-sellers -'

'An entirely sane presumption, given the temples.' Honorius sounded unduly straight. Aelianus shot him a surly look in case he was being sarcastic.

He let the pause linger, milking it. Then he came out with his big discovery: 'I found a man who admitted selling hemlock, last autumn.'

'Well done.' I was surprised.

'Mind you,' murmured Honorius, playing the sceptical advocate, 'was it the right hemlock?'

'It's our stuff,' smirked Aelianus. He seemed unfazed by Honorius.

'Proving this is the dose used on Metellus won't be easy after all this time -'

'This was not a simple transaction; hemlock isn't a stock item,' said Aelianus, suddenly the expert. 'You don't just turn up and pick your bunch of leaves from the bundles hanging on a stall. It was special order; the seller had to have the plant fetched from a market garden he owns out in the countryside.'

'So he had several meetings with the buyer?' I could see where Aulus was heading.

'At least two. Naturally I wanted to know more about this buyer,' Aelianus emphasised heavily to Honorius.

Honorius had an ear for a witness who was about to make a dramatic statement. 'And?'