David Wishart - No Cause for Concern

He ignored me, just waited for the major-domo to put in an appearance. Which he did a few seconds later.

‘Yes, sir.’

‘Tell Satrius I want to see him.’

‘Yes, sir.’

Eutacticus closed the door and went back to the desk.

I had a bad, bad feeling about this. ‘Uh…you want to tell me what about?’ I said. ‘You seeing Satrius, I mean.’

He sat down again. ‘I would’ve thought that was obvious, Corvinus. I told you: nobody messes with my family and gets away with it. The Paetinii are dead meat.’

Shit; he meant it, too. And it was the matter-of-fact tone that sent a chill down my spine. The guy might’ve been commenting on the weather or the price of grain.

‘Hold on,’ I said again. ‘I told you: it’s just a theory, right? No more than that. For all I know it could be complete moonshine, because I’ve no proof, none. If we can find Astrapton that might be a different matter, but for the moment we’re just guessing.’

I got the full ten-candelabra crocodile stare. Then he nodded. ‘Okay,’ he said. ‘You’ve still got the ball. But if you get the proof then you tell me. Right away. Understood?’

‘Yeah. Yeah. Understood.’ Jupiter! ‘So, uh, how’s the search for Astrapton going?’

‘Nothing yet, but if he hasn’t left Rome then I’ll find him. Even if he has, it’ll just take a little longer. I’ve got -’ There was a knock on the door. ‘Yes. Come in.’

Satrius. ‘You wanted to see me, boss?’

‘No. That’s all right. I’ve changed my mind.’

‘Only I was coming to see you anyhow. The boys’ve found Astrapton.’

Eutacticus grinned. ‘Have they, indeed? Bring him in.’

‘Nah, he isn’t here. They just got news of him. Word is, he’s holed up in a woman’s flat in the Subura.’

‘Fine. Go and get him now. Be as rough as you like, but I want him alive and able to talk. Oh, and take Corvinus with you.’

Hey, great. Purple-striper escort duty time again: busy, busy, busy. Still, at least things were moving. And I’d like the chance to have a word with Astrapton myself.

The flat was in one of the better tenements, which seeing it was the Subura isn’t saying much. We weren’t alone. Satrius had brought along his sidekick, the one who’d been with him when they’d grabbed me originally and who answered – monosyllabically – to the name of Desmus. It wasn’t a talkative journey, but at least we did it on foot and this time around I got through it with my shoulders unmashed.

‘Second floor,’ Satrius said when we arrived. ‘And, Corvinus, you’re just along for the ride, okay?’

‘Suits me, pal,’ I said.

We climbed a staircase with the usual Suburan aroma of soiled nappies, stale urine and faeces. Satrius knocked on the door. No answer. He lifted the latch and pushed.

The door opened. I was already getting a bad feeling about this. In the Subura you keep your door locked.

‘Wait here,’ Satrius said. He went inside. I heard him swear, then he came out again and held the door open for us.

Astrapton was lying on the bed. His throat had been cut, and the knife was in his hand.

‘The boss isn’t going to be pleased,’ Desmus said.

Yeah, well, I reckoned that was an understatement. Still, for a guy with the IQ of a green vegetable prognostication of any kind was a marvel.

I wasn’t too happy myself.

Satrius grunted and reached for the knife, but the corpse’s fingers were clenched round the hilt. ‘Suicide,’ he said. ‘The bastard got away.’

‘You think?’ I said.

He gave me a long, slow look while he sucked on a tooth. ‘Yeah. That’s what I think, smartass,’ he said finally. ‘Any objections? It’s better than he’d get when the boss’d finished with him, and he’d know that. Desmus, search the place.’

That wasn’t difficult: apart from a clothes chest and a couple of stools, the bed was the only piece of furniture in the room. There was a bag wedged under it that Astrapton must’ve brought with him, but like Luscius’s that we’d found in the grotto it had nothing more than a spare tunic and a change of underwear.

‘That’s us done,’ Satrius said. ‘We might as well go back and report.’

‘Hang on, pal,’ I said. ‘A couple more things. You want to frisk the body?’

That got me another look. Then he shrugged and ran his hands expertly over the corpse. ‘Clean,’ he said.

‘What about the mattress?’

‘Fuck off!’

‘Just do it. Humour me.’

‘Okay. Desmus, take the bastard’s ankles. And if I get blood on my tunic, Corvinus, you pay the laundry bill.’

‘Sure. Gladly.’

They dumped what was left of Astrapton on the floor and followed him with the mattress. Nothing underneath, just the framework of the bed. Satrius took out his own knife and slit the blood-soaked mattress all the way down one side, then shook out the straw. Nothing.

‘Satisfied?’ he said.

‘Yeah. Yeah, I’m satisfied.’

‘Good. Then let’s stop fucking around and get back to the Pincian.’

‘You go ahead. I’ll stay on here for a bit, nose around.’

‘You’ll come back with us, pal. There’s nothing else to see, we don’t want to be involved if the Watch get called in, and the boss is going to want to talk to you as well.’

‘Have it your way, friend.’ We went out, closing the door behind us. ‘What about the girl?’

‘What girl?’ Satrius was already heading down the stairs.

‘The girl who rents the flat.’

‘She’s out at work. Visiting her grandmother. Screwing the High Priest of Jupiter in Cattlemarket Square. How the hell should I know?’

‘That’s not what I meant, pal,’ I said. ‘What happens when she gets back and finds her boyfriend lying on the floor with his throat slit? How would you feel yourself?’

He grinned. ‘I haven’t got a boyfriend, Corvinus. What do you want me to do? Clean the place up for her? Now I told you: stop fucking around. The boss’ll want to know about this asap.’

Yeah. Right.

One odd thing, though. In fact, it was more than odd. Astrapton’d had time enough to collect a bag with a change of clothes before he split, but on the face of things he hadn’t bothered to take any ready cash. Either his own or what he could liberate; he must’ve had control of some sort of float for necessary business expenses. That just didn’t make sense. Whatever he needed if he intended to lie low for a while, cash money in quantity would be pretty high on the list, particularly if his girlfriend wasn’t exactly well-heeled, which judging by her choice of accommodation she wasn’t. So if the guy had committed suicide and left everything he’d brought to the flat behind him, then where was the bag with the silver? We’d got the Luscius situation again, same pattern, no difference; a missing purse meant that the thing just didn’t add up.

Unless, of course, like the Luscius situation it was murder.

‘All right,’ Eutacticus said when the three of us trooped in sans missing accountant. ‘What happened? Where the fuck is he?’

‘He was dead when we got there, boss,’ Satrius said. ‘Killed himself.’

Eutacticus looked at me. ‘That true, Corvinus?’

‘That he was dead, sure,’ I said. ‘But it wasn’t suicide.’

Satrius shot me a glare. ‘He had the knife in his hand. What else could it’ve been?’

Eutacticus was frowning. ‘You two. Get out. I’ll talk to you later. Corvinus, you sit down.’

I sat. Laughing George and the conversational sprout left, closing the door behind them.

‘Now,’ Eutacticus said. ‘You don’t think it was suicide. Care to explain why not?’