Lindsey Davis - Shadows in Bronze

When my mouth was thoroughly scalded I put my bowl down then stretched, looking round. No sign of Marcellus, and few staff. The usual gardeners were raking out a big bank of mimosa. Their heads were well lowered over it. Somewhere indoors I could hear a woman scrubbing, accompanying herself with rasping song. I poured more tea through a pointed strainer for her ladyship, standing idly beside her afterwards as if I was merely watching the slow curl of the steam…

The great house seemed relaxed and quiet. Normal people going about their normal tasks. I touched Helena's shoulder quietly, then strolled off on my own like a shy man going to answer a natural call.

Seeing the racehorse trainer had aroused my interest. I walked round the outbuilding in the hope of finding him. The stables lay on the left as you faced out to sea. There was an old livery block, used for pack mules and carriages. And a large new section, built about five years ago, with signs of recent activity. With the discretion of half a lifetime I managed to infiltrate myself indoors unseen.

There was no doubt, this was where Pertinax and Barnabas had once kept their bloodstock. The tack room contained one of the silver equine statuettes I had seen in the Pertinax house in Rome. Most of the stabling was empty now, presumably since his death. But two horses I was confident I recognized from that morning were sweating contentedly in adjacent stalls. They had just been rubbed down by a burly hostler who was now swabbing out the walkway between the rows.

'Hello!' I cried, as if I had permission to be there. The man leaned on his besom and gave me a shrewd look.

I strolled down to the two hones and pretended to take an interest. 'These the two Atius Pertinax had in Rome?'

I hate horses. They can tread on you, or lean on you, or roll heavily on top of you to break your legs and crush your ribs. If you offer them titbits they will gobble off your fingers. I treat them as cautiously as lobsters, wasps, and women who regard themselves as lively sexual athletes; horses, like any of those, can give you a nasty nip.

One was all right. He was really something special; even I could tell that. A proud-necked, sweet-spirited stallion with mulberry colouring. 'Hallo, boy…' While I was petting this beauty, I glanced at his stablemate. The hostler jerked his head with shared disgust.

'Little Sweetheart.' Someone had a sense of humour. Little Sweetheart was rubbish. He stretched his neck at me, jealous of his neighbour receiving attention, though he knew in this heady company a rapscallion who looked like an overworked bottle brush stood no chance.

'Bit of a character? What's this one called?'

'Ferox. He gets twitchy. Little Sweetheart calms him.' 'Ferox your champion?'

'Could be.' The stableman looked canny in a professional horsey way. 'He's five now, and pretty well furnished… You a racing man?'

I shook my head. 'I'm an Army man! When the legions want to go anywhere, they march on their own feet. If horseflesh is a real strategic necessity they hire in hairy short-legged foreigners, who can ride like hell in battle, know how to doctor the staggers, and will discreetly deal with dung. Works superbly. In my view, any system that works for the legions is good enough for a citizen in ordinary life!'

He laughed. 'Bryon,' he introduced himself.

'Name's Falco.' I went on fondling Ferox to sustain the conversation. 'You're the trainer! What are you doing mucking out? No stable lads?'

'No anything. All sold up.'

'When Pertinax took the ferry into Hades?

He nodded. 'The horses were his passion. First thing the old man did: all the stock, all the staff- gone overnight. He couldn't bear them here.'

‘Yes I heard he was cut up. What about these two? '

'Maybe he regretted it later. Ferox and the Sweetheart were sent to him from Rome.' I knew about that. When we cleared out the house on the Quirinal we found bills of sale for these two in Marcellus' name. I never saw the animals but I had signed the chitty for their transfer home myself. ‘So what's your interest, Falco?' Bryon eontinued. He seemed friendly, but I could tell he was sceptical.

‘You know Barnabas?'

'I used to,' he answered, without committing himself.

'I've got some cash that belongs to him. Has he put in an appearance here lately?' Bryon looked at me, then shrugged. ‘I reckon,' I pressed on with a warning note, ‘you would certainly have seen him – in view of the horses.'

'Perhaps… In view of the horses!' He agreed the hypothesis without giving an inch. ‘If I do see him, I'll tell him that you came.'

I fended off Little Sweetheart, who was nuzzling insistently, and pretended to change the subject. ‘Things seem quiet round here for a villa on Vesuvius in summer. Is no one staying at the house?'

‘Only the family,' Bryon informed me in his straight-faced, stony way.

‘And the young lady?'

'Oh she's one of them!'

This trainer had a shrewd idea I was someone without authority; he drew me firmly out of doors and began to walk me to the house. As we went by the livery stables I made sure I scanned every stall. Bryon finally lost patience with our good-mannered pretence. 'If you tell me what you're looking for, Falco, I'll tell you if we have it here!'

I grinned, unabashed. I was looking for the two horses that had followed me from Rome to Croton – not to mention their mystery rider, whom I deduced had been Barnabas.

'Try this then: two top-quality riding nags – a big roan that looks as if he was bred for the racetrack but just missed, and a squatter skewbald packhorse-'

'No,' Bryon said tersely.

He was right; they were not here. Yet the abruptness of his answer convinced me that at some time he had seen the two I meant.

He marched me back to the colonnade then backed off seeming both disappointed and relieved as Helena Justina, the young lady who was one of the family, greeted me with her sleepy, unperturbed smile.

When I strode back to Helena with my happy harpist's whistle, she had just been joined by her father-in-law. Making no reference to the retreating horse trainer, I apologized for my presence as I gave Caprenius Marcellus a vague explanation of events: 'I ran across Helena Justina, with a touch of the sun… '

The arrival of Marcellus put an end to my exploring. There was no help for it; I took my departure formally, with a calm nod to her ladyship-all I could do to answer the question in her dark, deeply inquisitive brown eyes.

Marcellus must have found my story easy to believe. Helena looked completely drained. I felt she needed more than a rest under a rug and a hot drink. She needed someone to look after her. The worst part was, my normally competent lady looked as if she thought so too.

As I rode the steward's mule back down the villa track I could hardly remember a word from her between when I brought her to the house and when I left. Only those eyes, which had settled on me with a stillness that made me hate leaving her.

Something was wrong. One more problem. One more buried relic to excavate as soon as I had time.

Damn the steward, waiting in Herculaneum for his mule;

I stopped off and took dinner in Oplontis with my friends. Frankly, I thought they all seemed more relaxed, now I had pushed off to live elsewhere.

Helena's prophecy about the maid was correct. The daft chit had been sent to the slave market! Incredible. I hoped she found a more charitable mistress; I never saw her again.

Nothing was said to me. Next day I raised the matter with Aemilia Fausta myself. She heard my views, then threatened to terminate my teaching post. I advised her to do it; she crumbled; I stayed.

My disgust was not simply because the girl had been attractive. After half a day with Helena I could barely remember what Fausta's maid was like. But I thought there must be better ways of keeping discipline.