David Wishart - Old Bones

But I was already on my way out.

I rode down Nepos's carriage drive and turned left on to the main drag. This time I paid more attention to the scenery, especially to the bit between Mamilius's farmhouse and the wineshop. For all Nepos had talked about Navius's fancy new ideas I couldn't see much difference between his property and the rest except that it was mostly planted out with vines. Then again, maybe I was missing something.

Papatius's wineshop looked tempting but I earmarked it for later. That was a pleasure to be savoured: I'd already checked out the wine and it was as good as Flatworm's best, easy. Mrs Papatius wasn't bad either. The lady wasn't in evidence but there was an old guy gnarled as an olive stump sitting on one of the benches under the trellis. I gave him a wave and he lifted his cup in salute. Well, at least the natives were friendly, and that was a good sign: friendly natives tend to have loose mouths. If my luck held he'd still be there when I got back.

There was one other house between Papatius's and Clusinus's farm, on the other side of the road. Its terrace had been empty when I'd passed before, but now there were a pair of middle-aged spinster types in residence. I gave them another cheery wave and got a brace of glares in return that all but froze my balls to the saddle. Yeah, well: some of the natives were friendly. These two beauties looked like their faces would crack if they so much as simpered. They were wearing head-scarfs so I couldn't see their hair, but I wouldn't lay any bets that it wasn't the kind that had fangs and hissed.

I turned left up Clusinus's track. Looking around, I could see what Nepos had meant: the guy was no farmer, that was sure. The fields on either side were an anonymous sea of burned stubble from the wheat harvest, but there were vines on the slopes beyond to the right before the broken country began that even to my city boy's eye looked scraggy, like they'd been left to do whatever they liked. About three hundred yards up, the track split. A side branch led to what had to be the farmhouse; the other carried straight on towards the high ground to the north. I'd just turned the horse up this second branch when a girl wrapped in a cloak and carrying a basket came down the first.

We both looked round together. I had a glimpse of dark hair framing a heart-shaped face and black, anxious eyes; then she was hurrying back the way I'd come, towards the main road. I watched her go until she was out of sight. Even with the cloak wrapped round her she was a stunner.

Uh-huh. An eye for the girls, Nepos had said. Maybe I'd just seen why young Navius was so far off his own patch. I clicked my tongue and sent the horse on up the track and past a grove of holm oaks. Where the ground started to rise there was a ragged orchard of apple and pear trees. Goats were wandering under the shade of the unpruned branches, grazing on the stubble of what had obviously been another wheat crop. The trees themselves had hurdles round them, but from the condition of the fruit Clusinus would've done better to let the evil-smelling horned bastards have their wicked way and then sold them on as kebabs.

Nepos's gully was screened by a cleft of hill-slope from the track proper which carried on up to the higher ground, and barring a few scuff marks and a spot or two of dried blood there wasn't much to see. It crossed my mind that I hadn't asked Nepos what they'd done with the body. I'd've liked to have seen that for myself -a stab through the heart's a stab through the heart, sure, but there might've been other things to notice – but presumably it'd either been taken home or directly to the undertaker's in Caere. I kicked around for a while in the hopes of picking up a clue, but the place was clean. No scraps of cloth ripped from the murderer's tunic, no mysterious messages scrawled in the dust by the dying man's finger. No nothing, in fact, which was about all I could've reasonably expected. What you saw was what you got.

Well, there wasn't any point in sticking around here, and at least I'd got the girl. If I hurried, I might pick her up again on the way back. And if not there was the wineshop.

The old man was still there. 'Old' didn't do him justice; he would've given Tithonus a run for his wrinkles, maybe even Saturn as well. The guy could shift it, too. As I tied the horse up where the bastard couldn't reach the grapes hanging from the trellis and made my way over he poured the last of his jug into his cup and swallowed it down like it was barley water.

'Hey, Grampa,' I said. 'You manage another one of those?'

I'd been kidding, or half-kidding, but he grinned at me, turned round and shouted, 'Thupeltha!'

Mrs Papatius came out. So that was her name. She was certainly something, big as a man, easy, a Praxiteles Juno squared with the biceps of an Amazon. Women like that, you don't leer, you marvel.

I'd sat down next to the old bugger on the door side of the bench. Turning, and finding myself face to face, as it were, with a pair of breasts that were practically army ordnance grade, I swallowed hard.

'You want to bring us another jug, sister?' I said.

She picked up the empty and disappeared with it inside. A minute or so later, she reappeared with a full one, planked it down on the table and went back in again. All without so much as a smile. I got the distinct impression that our Thupeltha was a lady of few words, which wasn't surprising because the way she moved more than made up for them. Who needs ordinary conversational skills when you're put together like an Archimedean City-taker?

Ah, well, fantasy over and back to the job in hand. I turned to Tithonus and poured for both of us.

'Marcus Corvinus,' I said.

'Quintus Mamilius.' The guy was still grinning. I'd expected him to be toothless but he had practically the whole set. They were in good shape, too. 'Quite a looker, Thupeltha, isn't she?'

'Yeah.' I let the first swallow of Caeretan slip past my tonsils. Beautiful! 'She makes nice wine, too.'

'That's Papatius. Best vintner in the district. With his brains and her…' Mamilius stopped. 'Aye. Well, like you say it's good wine.'

'You're ex-army.' It wasn't a question: you get to spot these guys, and Mamilius had legion written all over him. Not just because of the amount of booze he could shift, either, although that helped. It's a funny thing, but I've never met an army man who couldn't drink two jugs to my one.

He nodded. 'Senior centurion with the Grabbers. I fought with the emperor and his brother against the Raeti.'

I whistled, impressed. 'Is that so, now?' Old was right! I wasn't sure of the exact date, but the Wart's campaign against the Raeti must've been a good forty-five years back. And if this guy had been a senior centurion at the time then he'd be pushing ninety. 'You farm the place up the road?'

'Aye. Have done since my discharge.'

'You farm it alone?’ I didn't want to be personal, but hell! I was genuinely interested.

Mamilius topped up the cups. I wondered if I could keep up the pace. 'I've a son and a couple of lads. They do most of the heavy work these days.'

'"Lads"?'

'Slaves. I bought them about thirty, thirty-five years back.'

'That so?' I sipped my wine. Well, it was all relative, I supposed. 'You know Attus Navius?'

Mamilius sank a straight quarter pint before answering. It may've been my imagination, but I felt he'd taken a sort of mental step backwards.

'Aye,' he said shortly.

'Care to tell me about him?'

He reached for the wine jug and topped up both our cups again; his needed it, mine didn't. I noticed his hand was rock-steady. Built like a rock, too.

'You're the knight's stepson, right?' he said. 'Helvius Priscus's. The man Clusinus caught with the body.'