Lindsey Davis - A dying light in Corduba

Suddenly I felt angry on the damned spy's behalf. 'No, I mean that he was never given any money to pay for quality!' It did raise the question of how his own villa at Baiae had been acquired, but Laeta failed to spot the discrepancy. I calmed down. 'Look, he was bound to be secretive; it comes with the job. Olympus! We're talking about him as if he were dead, but that's not so, not yet -'

'Well, no indeed!' Laeta muttered. The litter-bearers were maintaining their normal impassive stare straight ahead. We both knew they were listening in. 'Titus Caesar suggests we ensure no news of this attack leaks out.' Good old Titus. Famous for flair – especially, in my experience, when organising cover-ups. I had helped him fix a few of those.

I looked Laeta firmly in the eye. 'This could have something to do with the dinner last night.'

Reluctantly he admitted, 'I was wondering about that.'

'Why was it you invited me? I had the feeling there was something you wanted to discuss?' He pursed his lips. 'Why were you keen to have me meet that senator?'

'Only my own general impression that Quinctius Attractus is getting above himself.'

'Might Anacrites have been investigating Attractus?'

'What reason could he have?' Laeta would not even admit that Anacrites might have noticed the man's behaviour just as he did.

'Spies don't have to have legitimate reasons; that's why they are dangerous.'

'Well, somebody has made this one quite a lot less dangerous, Falco.'

'Perhaps,' I suggested nastily, 'I should be asking whether you got on with him badly.' Since I knew better than to expect a sensible answer, I turned my attention back to the spy himself.

I wondered whether it would have been better to leave Anacrites discreetly at the house of Calisthenus, paying the architect to have the sick man nursed and to keep quiet about it. But if someone really dangerous was about, the Palace would be safer. Well, it ought to be. Anacrites could be the victim of a straightforward palace plot. I was sending him home to be looked after – that nasty ambiguous phrase. Maybe I was sending him home to be finished off.

Suddenly I felt a surge of defiance. I could see when I was being set up as the booby. Laeta loathed the spy, and his motives towards me were ambiguous. I didn't trust Laeta any more than Anacrites, but whatever was going on, Anacrites was in deep trouble. I had never liked him, or what he represented, but I understood how he worked: knee deep in the same middenheap as me.

Laeta, Titus is right. This needs to be kept quiet until we know what it's about. And you know how rumours fly at the Palace. The best solution is to put Anacrites somewhere else where he can die in peace when he decides to go; then we can choose whether or not to announce it in the Daily Gozette. Leave everything to me. I'll carry him to the Temple of Aesculapius on Tiber Island, swear them to secrecy, but give them your name to inform you of developments.'

Laeta thought hard, but submitted himself to my plan.

Telling him that I had a few ideas of my own to pursue, I waved him off.

I then examined the doorway where Anacrites had been found. It was easy to see where and how he had been hurt; I discovered an ugly clump of blood and hair on the house wall. It was below chest height; the spy must have been bent over for some reason, though he carried no marks of any blow that would have doubled him up. I looked around, covering some distance, but found nothing significant.

The wounded man had been propped in a chair long enough; I told the bearers to come along with him. I did walk them to Tiber Island where I unloaded Anacrites and dismissed the chair. Then, instead of depositing the sick man amongst the clapped-out abandoned slaves who were being cared for at the hospital, I hired another chair. I led this one further west along the riverbank in the shadow of the Aventine. Then I took the unconscious spy to a private apartment where I could be sure of his good treatment.

He might yet die of last night's wound, but no one would be allowed to help him into Hades by other means.

Though I was a man on a charitable mission, my greeting was not promising. I had dragged Anacrites up three flights of stairs. Even unconscious he made trouble, buckling me under his weight and tangling his lifeless hands in the handrail just when I had got a good rhythm going. By the time I arrived upstairs I had no breath to curse him. I used my shoulder to knock open the door, a worn item that had once been red, now a faded pink.

A furious old biddy accosted us. 'Who's that? Don't drag him in here. This is a peaceful neighbourhood!'

'Hello, Mother.'

Her companion was less blunt and more witty. 'Jove, it's Falco! The little lost boy who needs a tablet round his neck to tell people where he lives! A tablet he can consult himself too, when he's sober enough to read it -'

'Shut up, Petro. I'm giving myself a hernia. Help me lie him down somewhere.'

'Don't tell me!' raged my mother. 'One of your friends has got himself in trouble and you expect me to look after him. It's time you grew up, Marcus. I'm an old woman. I deserve a rest.'

'You're an old woman who needs an interest in life. This is just the thing. He's not a drunk who fell under a cart, Ma. He's an official who has been cruelly attacked and until we discover the reason he has to be kept out of sight. I'd take him home but people may look for him there.'

'Take him home? That poor girl you live with doesn't want to be bothered with this!' I winked at the unconscious Anacrites; he had just found himself a refuge. The best in Rome.

Petronius Longus, my big grinning friend, had been lounging in my mother's kitchen with a handful of almonds while he regaled Ma with the now famous finish of my big night out. Seeing my burden his mood quietened, then when he helped me shove Anacrites on a bed and he glimpsed the damage to the spy's head, Petro's face set. I thought he was going to say something but he buttoned his lip.

Ma stood in the doorway, arms folded; a small, still energetic woman who had spent her life nurturing people who didn't deserve it. Olive black eyes flicked over the spy with flashes like signal torches announcing an international disaster. 'Well, this one won't be a lot of trouble. He's not going to be here long!'

'Do your best for the poor fellow, Ma.'

'Don't I know him?' Petronius mumbled in a low voice to me.

'Speak up!' snapped Ma. 'I'm not deaf and I'm not an idiot.'

Petronius was frightened of my mother. He replied meekly, 'It's Anacrites, the Chief Spy.'

'Well, he looks like a nasty dumpling that should have been eaten up yesterday,' she sneered.

I shook my head. 'He's a spy; that's his natural attitude.' 'Well, I hope I'm not expected to work some miracle and save him.'

'Ma, spare us the quaint plebeian cheerfulness!' 'Who's going to pay for the funeral?'

'The Palace will. Just take him in while he's dying. Give him some peace from whoever is trying to get him.' 'Well; I can do that,' she conceded grumpily.

I come from a large feckless family, who rarely permit themselves to perform deeds of kindness. When they do, any sensible conscious man wants to run a fast marathon in the other direction. It gave me a grim pleasure to leave Anacrites there. I hoped he came round and got thoroughly lectured – and I hoped that when it happened I would be present to watch.

I had known Petronius Longus since we were both eighteen. I could tell he was holding back like a nervous bride. As soon as we could, we edged to the door, then bidding Ma a fast farewell we were out of the apartment like the naughty schoolboys she reckoned we both still were. Her derogatory cries followed us downstairs.

Petronius knew I realised there was something he was bursting to say. In his usual aggravating way he kept it to himself as long as possible. I clamped my teeth and pretended not to be wanting to knock him into the copper shop opposite for keeping me on tenterhooks.