Lindsey Davis - Last Act In Palmyra

'I can imagine. He drove me wild once by standing about like a demigod while I was trying to hitch my damned ox… Was he there all the time?'

'Until he fixed himself a bit of spice and went up among the tombs with the skirt.' The frankincense merchant's wife; he had mentioned her to Helena.

'So how long did the lading take you?'

'All bloody afternoon. I'm telling you, I was doing it as a one-man job. I still hadn't finished the stage effects – those two doorways are a trial to lift on your own – when your girl came down the hill and word whizzed round that somebody was dead. By then the rest of our party had assembled to watch me struggling. We were supposed to be all ready for the off, and people were starting to wonder where Heliodorus was. Someone asked Helena what the corpse looked like, so then we guessed who it must be.'

'Any idea where the Twins were while you were piling up the waggons?'

'No.'

He made no attempt to offer possibilities. Whether they were under suspicion or in the clear, Davos left it up to me to judge them. But I did gather that if they were accused, he would not care. Another case of professional jealousy among the players, presumably.

Probably the Twins would give each other alibis. That would land me in the usual situation: none of the known suspects actually available to do the deed. I sighed gently.

'Davos, tell me again about the night Musa was shoved off the embankment at Bostra. You must have been walking behind him?'

'I was right at the back of the queue.'

'Last in line?'

'Correct. To tell the truth, it was such a god-awful night I was losing interest in drinking in some dive with the Twins, knowing we would have to walk back through that weather just when we had got dry and warm again. I was planning to peel off unnoticed and scamper back to my own tent. I had been dropping behind stealthily. Two minutes more and I would never have heard your Nabataean shout.'

'Could you see who was near Musa when he was pushed?'

'No. If I'd seen it I'd have told you before this. I'd like to get the villain sorted,' Davos chortled, 'so I can avoid being plagued by questions from you!'

'Sorry.' I wasn't, and I refused to give up. 'So you won't want to tell me about the night Ione died?'

'Dear gods…' he muttered good-humouredly. 'Oh all right, get on with it!'

'You were dining with Chremes and Phrygia, and Philocrates was there too.'

'Until he bunked off as usual. That was quite late. If you're suggesting he drowned the girl, then judging by the time we all heard the news after you got back from the pools, he must have sped there on Mercury's wings. No, I reckon he was with his dame when it happened, and probably still hard at it while you were finding the corpse.'

'If there ever was a dame.'

'Ah well. You'll have to check with him.' Once again the disinterested way he threw it back to me seemed convincing. Killers looking to cover their own tracks like to speculate in detail about how others might be implicated. Davos always seemed too straight for such nonsense. He said what he knew; he left the rest to me.

I was getting nowhere. I tried the hard screw. 'Somebody told me that you liked Ione.'

'I liked her. That was all it amounted to.' it wasn't you who met her at the pools?' it was not!' He was crisp in denying it. 'You know damn well that was my night for dining with Chremes and Phrygia.'

'Yes, we've been over that rather convenient tale. One thing I'm asking myself is whether your party at the manager's tent was a set-up. Maybe the whole gang of you were in a conspiracy.'

By the light of his camp fire I could just make out Davos' face: sceptical, world-weary, utterly dependable. 'Oh stuff you, Falco. If you want to talk rot, go and do it somewhere else.' it has to be thought about. Give me one good reason to discard the idea.'

'I can't. You'll just have to take our word.' Actually, Davos giving his word seemed fairly convincing to me. He was that kind of man.

Mind you, Brutus and Cassius probably seemed decent, dependable and harmless until somebody offended them.

I clapped Davos on the shoulder and was off on my way when another point struck me. 'One final thought. I've just had an odd conversation with Chremes. I'm sure he was holding back on me. Listen, could he have known anything significant about the playwright's finances?'

Davos said nothing. I knew I had got him. I turned back, square to him. 'So that's it!'

'That's what, Falco?'

'Oh come on Davos, for a man whose timing is so tight onstage, you're lousy off it! That silence was too long. There's something you don't want to tell me, and you're working out how to be uncooperative. Don't bother. It's too late now. Unless you tell me yourself, I'll only press the matter elsewhere until someone gives.'

'Leave it, Falco.'

'I will if you tell me.'

'It's old history…' He seemed to be making up his mind. 'Was Phrygia there when you had this strange chat?' I nodded. 'That explains it. Chremes on his own might have told you. The fact is, Heliodorus was subsidising the company. Phrygia doesn't know.'

I gaped. 'I'm amazed. Explain this!'

Davos sounded reluctant. 'You can fill in the rest, surely?'

'I've seen that Chremes and Phrygia like enjoying the good life.'

'More than our proceeds really cover.'

'So are they peeling off the takings?'

'Phrygia doesn't know,' he repeated stubbornly.

'All right, Phrygia's a vestal virgin. What about her tiresome spouse?'

'Chremes spent what he owes to the stagehands and the orchestra.' That explained a lot. Davos continued glumly: 'He isn't hopeless with money, but he's scared that Phrygia will finally leave him if their lifestyle gets too basic. That's what he's convinced himself, anyway. I doubt it myself. She's stayed so long she can't leave now; it would make all her past life pointless.'

'So he put himself in hock to Heliodorus?'

'Yes. The man is an idiot.'

'I'm starting to believe it…" He was also a liar. Chremes had told me Heliodorus spent all his cash on drink. 'I thought Heliodorus drank all his wages?'

'He liked to cadge other people's flagons.'

'At the scene of his death I found a goatskin and a wicker flask.'

'My guess would be the flask was his own, and he probably drained it himself too. The goatskin may have belonged to whoever was with him, in which case Heliodorus would not have objected to helping the other party drink what it contained.'

'Going back to Chremes' debt, if it was a substantial sum, where did the money come from?'

'Heliodorus was a private hoarder. He had amassed a pile.'

'And he let Chremes borrow it in order to gain the upper hand?'

'You're brighter than Chremes was about his reasoning! Chremes walked right into the blackmail: borrowed from Heliodorus, then had no way to pay him back. Everything could have been avoided if only he had come clean with Phrygia instead. She likes good things, but she's not stupidly extravagant. She wouldn't ruin the company for a few touches of luxury. Of course, they discuss everything – except what matters most.'

'Like most couples.'

Obviously hating to dump them in trouble, Davos blew out his cheeks, as if breathing had become difficult. 'Oh gods, what a mess… Chremes didn't kill him, Falco.'

'Sure? He was in a tight spot. Both you and Phrygia were insisting that the inkblot should be kicked out of the company. Meanwhile, Heliodorus must have been laughing up his tunic sleeve because he knew Chremes could not repay him. Incidentally, is this why he was kept on for so long in the first place?'

'Of course.'

'That and Phrygia hoping to extract the location of her child?'

'Oh she'd given up expecting him to tell her that, even if he really knew.'