Lindsey Davis - Ode to a Banker

'I've heard a few rumours lately…'

Ma bristled. 'What rumours?'

'Just some nonsense.'

'What nonsense?'

'Not worth mentioning.'

'But worth thinking about until you get that silly grin!'

'Who's grinning?' I felt about three years old. The feeling was confirmed when my mother took hold of my ear, with a fierce grip that I knew too well.

'What exactly are you talking about?' demanded my mother. I wished I were fighting Bos again.

'People get the wrong idea.' I managed to writhe free. 'Look, it's none of my business -' My mother's Medusa stare told me that was probably true. 'I just happened to hear someone insinuate – obviously under a ridiculous misapprehension – that you might have taken up with a certain person of the male variety who sometimes frequents this place…'

Ma leapt out of her chair.

I sidestepped and hurried to the door, more than happy to leave indisgrace. With the door safely opened, I turned back and apologised. Ma said rigidly, 'I'll thank you – and I'll thank whatever busybodieshave been gossiping about me – to keep their noses out of my affairs.'

'Sorry, Ma. Of course, I never believed it -'

Her chin came up. She looked as if someone with his boots fresh from a cow-byre had dared to walk across a floor she had just washed. 'If I wanted a little bit of comfort in my final years, I am surely entitled to it.'

'Oh yes, Ma.' I tried not to look shocked.

'If I did have a friend I was rather fond of,' explained Ma heavily, 'assuming I dared to think I would be allowed to get away with it – then you and your high-minded sisters could rely on me to be discreet.' So she guessed it was one of my sisters spreading the story. I had better warn Junia to leave Italy.

'Sorry, Ma -'

'The least I could expect in return is a modicum of privacy!'

Dear gods. As a rebuttal, this was much weaker than I had hoped to hear. 'Yes, Ma.'

'I am not entirely decrepit, Marcus! I have had my opportunities.'

'You are a fine woman,' I assured her, unintentionally echoing Aristagoras. 'You can do what you like -'

'Oh, I will!' agreed my mother, with a dangerous glint.

As I retreated slowly down to street level, I was feeling tired even though I had done hardly anything that morning. In fact, I felt as if I had been sucked down a whirlpool then spat up stark naked on some extremely pointed rocks.

The old man in the portico had managed to fix on somebody, so I slid past unobtrusively – only to hear my name called in a loud bellow by a horribly familiar voice. I turned back in horror.

'Pa!' Olympus, this was turning into a family festival.

I felt astonished. I had not seen my father in this vicinity since I was seven years old. He and Ma had never met since he bunked off. For years, Ma pretended Pa did not even exist. When they were a couple, he had used his real name, Favonius. To her, the auctioneer 'Geminus' was a raffish scamp both her sons had sometimes chosen to mess about with in some masculine world she would not deign to investigate. When he wanted to communicate, even to send her money, it had to be done through an intermediary and using codes.

A mad thought struck, that when she had been talking about a new friend she might be fond of, Ma had meant that after Flora died she had made up her old fight with Pa.

No chance.

'What on earth are you doing sloping round Ma's front porch, Father? It's risking a thunderbolt.'

'Time some things were sorted.' I winced. Pa must be crazy. Interference from him was likely to bring wrath on all our heads. 'Junia just brought in the caupona takings. She told me the fine news that Junilla Tacita has acquired a follower!'

'Our Junia loves a vulgar story to spread -' With a quick glance at Aristagoras, who blinked at us from under his sunbathing hat with bright-eyed curiosity, I tipped Pa the wink that we ought to bunk off to a winebar. As one, we gave the old neighbour a farewell grin and wheeled off together, Pa's arm heavily around my shoulders in unaccustomed amity. We must have looked more like brothers than father and son.

As soon as we were out of sight, I shook myself free; I dragged Pa as far as I could – not far enough, but he soon started grumbling and wanting the drink. I reminded him that my suggestion was not really for refreshment, but saving our skins if Ma had come out and foundus gossiping. 'I just tackled her, and got a sore ear – literally. That was before she told me what she thinks of people spreading rumours – a diatribe I won't dwell on.'

My father laughed. He could. It was not his ear she had twisted with her brutal digits. Well, not this time. But he looked as if he remembered the experience. We wheeled into a bar and plumped ourselves down on benches.

'Of course it must be a mistake,' I raved bitterly. It was time somebody stood up to Pa. 'We all think she's in bed with the lodger – but perhaps it's much more disgusting: she may be secretly getting back together with you.'

'Now there's an idea! Think she would hear it?' Pa never had any sense – or any tact, either. He leaned across the bar table urgently. 'So what's the real story with Anacrites?'

'Don't ask me. I've been forbidden any scandalous speculation. I'm not stupid enough to risk it now.'

'This is dreadful, son.'

I was close to agreeing, then found myself wondering – as Ma would do – what possible connection there could be with him.

'Come off it, Pa. That it's the spy is horrible enough – and it's certainly bloody dangerous – but you have a nerve interfering with Mother nowadays.'

'Don't be pious!'

'Nor you then. She says she is entitled to a private life – and she's right. Maybe she's doing it just to annoy other people.'

'Me, for instance?' muttered Pa darkly.

'How did you guess? Who knows what's really going on. Mother always enjoyed a situation where everyone else was going frantic, while she just let them think whatever they liked.'

'But not if it involves that creep Anacrites!'

'Ah well.' I tried viewing it philosophically. 'He has been behaving too well lately. It was time he did something in character again.'

'Screwing your mother?' Pa sneered crudely. 'It's revolting-' He suddenly thought of a fine excuse for his own pompous attitude: 'I'm thinking about my grandchildren – especially baby Julia. She has a connection to the Senate; she cannot have her dear little reputation soiled by scandal.'

'Don't bring my daughter into it. I'll protect Julia Junilla – if it's ever needed.'

'You couldn't protect a chickpea,' said Pa, in his usual affectionateway. He craned his head, checking me over for bruises. 'I hear you were thrashed again last night?'

'You mean I saved the life of Petronius Longus, stayed alive myself; and rid Rome of a bullying piece of dirt the size of a small house.'

'Time you grew up, son.'

'Look who is talking! After walking out twenty-five years ago, and after all the floozies you have bedded before and since, coming to preach at Mother today is just grotesque.'

'I don't care what you think.' He drained his cup. I started to drain mine in a similar gesture. Then I slowed down and deliberately made the move delicate, so as not to look like him. The thoughtful, moderate one in the family (The unbearable, good-natured bastard, my father would say.)

I stood up. 'Well, I've quarrelled with both my parents now. That's enough grief for one day. I'm off.' Pa had leapt up even faster than I did. I felt nervous. 'Now what are you up to?'

'I'm going to have it out.'

'Don't be so stupid!' The thought of him broaching Ma on this subject was so ghastly I nearly brought up the wine I had drunk. 'Have some self-respect. Well, self-preservation, anyway. She won't thank you.'

'She won't know anything about it,' came his rejoinder. 'Her boyfriend keeps office hours, presumably – well, he won't be out taking risks, not him. He'll have a nice cool nook to hide in – which is about to become hotter than he'll like. Goodbye now, son. I can't hang about here!'