David Wishart - Old Bones

'Navius is dead. There's an end of it.' Papatius drained his cup and got up to pour another. Deliberately, I leaned back so that the knife in my belt was visible. Papatius glanced at it without interest, then away. He came back to the bench and sat down.

'Yeah,' I said. 'That's the point, pal. Only there are different kinds of dead, and I'm still not sure which category he fits into, murdered or suicide.'

'You say you've asked Thupeltha. She'll've told you clear enough.' He took a swallow of wine. 'The boy killed himself.'

I emptied my own cup and refilled it from the jug. 'Yeah, well, that's still a moot point. Sure, he might've threatened it, but no one saw him actually die. Or did they?'

He set the cup down slowly. 'What do you mean?'

'Vipena's sisters saw you follow him up the road towards Clusinus's place. I just thought maybe you might've -'

I stopped. Thupeltha's head had come up and she was staring at Papatius, her mouth open.

She hadn't known! Thupeltha hadn't known!

Papatius didn't move. He didn't look at Thupeltha, either; his eyes were fixed on me.

'Maybe I might've what, Corvinus?' he said. His voice was level; too level.

My brain was racing. 'Seen something,' I said.

'I was going that way, sure.' He was looking at me like he would've cheerfully hauled out my guts and strangled me with them; he could've done it, too. 'But I wasn't following Navius. I was on my way into Caere. If it's any business of yours. And I didn't see nothing.'

'Yeah. Yeah, right. That's fine, pal. It was just an idea.'

'Then another time keep your ideas to yourself.'

'I'll do that. I most certainly will.' I finished off the cup and got to my feet; there was still a quarter of the jug left, but I'd got what I came for and I had the impression I'd outstayed my welcome. Papatius hadn't moved, but he was sending out what definitely felt like bad vibes. 'Thanks. I'll see you around.'

I'd got as far as the door when Thupeltha called out:

'Corvinus!'

I turned. 'Yeah?'

'That'll be a silver piece. For the wine.'

'Oh. Right. Sure.' I took the coin out of my purse and laid it on the table. 'Nice talking to you both.'

There was no answer from either of them. I left.

I was sorry I wasn't a fly on the wall. With me out of the way the next ten minutes would've been interesting.

As I walked back, I thought about where all that had got me, apart from within spitting distance of a few busted ribs. Sure, Navius could've killed himself like Thupeltha had said. Suicide made a lot of sense; all there was against it as a solution was its simplicity, and I wasn't stupid enough or vain enough to take that as a valid argument. It fitted with the nature of the wound, for a start – I wouldn't care to slit my throat myself, and cutting your wrists is messy and too long-drawn-out – and also with Navius's character, as far as I'd been able to piece it out. Killing himself was just the sort of stupid thing the moonstruck young bubblehead might've done, and he'd had the knife to do it with. Last but not least, he'd told Thupeltha he was going to finish things, and whatever faults that lady had I didn't think lying was one of them. Not out of any moral compunction, mind; the bitch just couldn't be bothered to make the effort.

Okay, so if Thupeltha was telling the truth suicide was possible, maybe even likely. What about murder, which was equally likely? In that case we were back to suspects. Thupeltha herself would've been capable, sure, physically and mentally, and she'd had both the motive and the opportunity. Papatius was an even better candidate in both categories, especially now; that claim to've been going into Caere had rung as fake as a lead penny. When he turned up Clusinus's road he could've left the track and taken to the higher ground to the right where the scrub would hide him. From there he'd be able to see what was going on; hear it, too, if the argument had developed into a shouting match. As for motive, the guy had that in spades. Forget the jealousy angle: Thupeltha had said it didn't figure, and I believed her. If Papatius had killed Navius it wasn't because the kid had been screwing his wife; it was because he'd just been threatening to spread the word around. And that got rid of the problem of the year's delay, too. Lastly, the fact that Thupeltha hadn't known he was following her – and she hadn't, that I'd swear to – meant that the lady could genuinely think the kid had killed himself like he'd said he would, because she'd no reason to suspect otherwise.

It would work. Sure it would, especially since there was still the outside possibility that Thupeltha might change her mind and marry the kid after all, taking the farm with her…

Yeah. I liked Papatius. I liked him a lot. He was definitely a possibility.

There was no sign of Perilla when I got back, but Bathyllus was waiting for me on the terrace with the wine tray.

'Hey, little guy.' I took the cup from him. 'Where's the mistress?'

'Getting changed, sir.'

He had his grave look on again. Uh-oh. This looked like trouble. I sat down on the nearest chair.

'Don't tell me, sunshine. Corydon's broken into the library and he's browsing through Flatworm's pornography collection.'

Bathyllus didn't smile. Not that I'd expected him to; the guy had all the sense of humour of a grapefruit. 'No, sir,' he said. 'It's more serious than that, I'm afraid.'

'Meton's put too much fish pickle in the sauce? You've run out of spoon polish?'

Not a flicker. Trouble was right. 'Neither, sir.' He cleared his throat. 'We've just had a message from Licinius Nepos. There's been another death. Your mother's doctor friend.'

'Hilarion?' I set the cup down.

Jupiter!

They'd put Hilarion’s corpse in a corner of the wine cellar on the north side of the villa's ground floor, where it was nice and cool.

'One of my slaves found him in the hills just north of here.' Nepos was frowning down at the body on the stretcher.

I looked at the guy's head. Whatever he'd been clouted with had been pretty effective. The skull was stove in like an eggshell. 'What was he doing up there?' I said.

'Walking. He usually takes – took – a constitutional after lunch, and he went that way more often than not.'

'It couldn't've been an accident? He couldn't have fallen or been hit by a falling rock?'

'Not a chance.' Nepos shook his head. 'He was lying on the path. There're no overhanging cliffs there. No big rocks near the body, either.'

'This path you mentioned. That'd be the one that runs round the top of the farms and down by Clusinus's place, right?'

'That's it. I understand the fellow made the circuit and came back along the main road.'

So. He hadn't gone all that far before he was killed. And if he'd left just after lunch that put the time of death mid-afternoon at the latest; about the time, maybe, we were with Tanaquil and Ramutha. 'Would this be common knowledge?' I said.

Nepos shrugged. 'You knew him yourself. He lived by routine. And most of Vetuliscum uses that track, for one reason or another.'

Hell’s teeth, it didn't make sense! Who would want to kill Hilarion? Apart from being a pompous self-opinionated bugger with all the charm of a wet poultice he was a complete nonentity. And being a stranger he had no local connections at all.

Unless he'd seen something, of course. Like Navius's murder…

Only that didn't make any sense either. Navius had died half-way through the morning, Hilarion took his constitutional in the afternoon and besides the guy had been in Caere all day; to my certain knowledge he hadn't got back until the early evening. Mind you, that only covered one end of it.

'What time did he leave yesterday, by the way?' I said. 'You remember?'