David Wishart - Trade Secrets

‘You’ve met him?’

‘Briefly. At Correllius’s house. He dropped by to give Mamilia his condolences. Or at least that’s what he said.’ I frowned. ‘That was odd, if you like.’

‘In what way?’

‘Come on, Perilla! Why should he? Like I say, he was no friend of the family, and according to my butcher pal Rubrius he was more likely to spit in Correllius’s urn than shed a tear over it. And there was no love lost between him and the widow, that was for sure.’

‘Perhaps it was just good manners on his part. It does happen between business rivals. Correllius was dead, and so presumably was the feud, whatever it was about. Perhaps he was simply making overtures.’

‘Yeah.’ I was still frowning. ‘Even so, it smells. And putting together a case – a hypothetical one, anyway – wouldn’t be too difficult.’

‘Namely?’

I laid down my spoon. ‘OK. Say for some reason Fundanius was responsible for knifing the guy. There’s no mileage in rousing Mamilia’s suspicions, is there? Quite the opposite. Oh, sure, at present he’s not exactly persona grata in the Correllius household, but with the boss dead the family business is bound to be drifting a bit. Say that “making overtures” was exactly his intention, that he was angling for some sort of merger, or at least a spheres-of-activity deal. Oh, not right away, that’d be asking too much. But softening things up might be another matter. Like I said, we don’t know the exact circumstances – or not as yet, anyway – but something along those lines might well give him a viable motive.’

‘Of course,’ Perilla moved the chickpeas on her plate around with her spoon, ‘there is another possibility. Extension, rather. Not that I’m advocating it, mind, but it’s worth considering.’

‘Yeah? And what’s that?’

‘That your Fundanius and Mamilia were in it together from the start.’

I’d picked up my spoon again and had a piece of Meton’s chicken stew halfway to my mouth. I laid it down.

‘What?’

‘It’s as good a theory as any, dear. You’ve already suggested that Mamilia might be involved sexually with Doccius. Why not with Fundanius instead? In fact, he’s a lot more probable. At least he’s from the same social level.’

‘Lady, you weren’t there! When the guy came in you could’ve cut the atmosphere with a knife!’

‘But of course you could. I’m sure the last thing she would have expected or wanted was for her lover and partner-in-crime to drop by when a stranger whose declared intention was to investigate her husband’s death was present. All that would be needed is that she would have the nous and acting ability to carry the thing off. Or do you think she’d be incapable of that?’

Shit; it made sense. All kinds of sense. And it would explain a lot of the oddness: the fact that Fundanius, persona non grata or not, had been able just to walk in past the door-slaves, the fact that Mamilia was obviously completely un-cut-up about her husband’s death, and not least the fact that, to put it mildly, she wasn’t too keen on the circumstances being dug into. And if I’d ever met a lady who had the coolness and sheer brass neck to become mistress of the situation at the drop of a hat, then Mamilia was the one.

‘It’s possible,’ I said carefully: if I’ve learned anything these twenty-odd years it’s not to let Perilla see she’s slipped one past me.

‘I mean, how did Fundanius strike you in himself? The sort of man someone like Mamilia would go for, all being equal?’

‘He was OK, yeah.’ Better than OK, particularly when you compared him with the dead husband: near the lady’s age, good-looking, fit as a flea, and with an urbane polish about him that matched hers. Successful, too; that, I was sure, would weigh with a hard-nosed woman like Mamilia.

‘There you are, then. And the sexual element isn’t particularly necessary. You say that, as a businessman or whatever you like to call it, Correllius wasn’t held in very high regard? By his chief assistant Doccius, at least?’

‘Yeah, well, that was the impression I got. But then it may’ve been wrong.’

‘Assume that it wasn’t, which is a fair assumption under the circumstances: in his delicate physical condition Correllius couldn’t have been totally on top of things. If Mamilia was ambitious in her own right – and from your description of her I’d say that was extremely likely – then she may well have decided to cut her losses and make a more profitable alliance.’

I thought of Doccius’s changed manner when he was talking to the lady. Yeah, that would fit, too. Despite Mamilia’s claim to me that she’d no connection with the business side of her husband’s affairs I’d lay a pretty hefty bet she was involved up to her carefully plucked eyebrows. And not as a silent partner, either. I suspected that, however things had started out, latterly there’d been only one real boss of Correllius’s outfit, and that boss hadn’t been Correllius. Or even, given his behaviour vis-a-vis Mamilia, Doccius.

The theory was beginning to make sense in spades. Certainly, I’d be looking into Publius Fundanius before we were much older.

‘Well?’ Perilla finally spooned up some of the chickpeas she’d been shoving around on her plate. ‘What do you think? Viable or not?’

‘Sure it’s viable,’ I said. ‘Whether it’s right is another matter. Mind you, for it to work it’d need Doccius to be in on things off his own bat.’

‘How so?’

‘Because Correllius might be slipping his cogs where the business was concerned, but I’ll bet you anything you like his deputy was well up to speed. Mamilia might be the brains of the outfit, but she’s still a woman.’

‘Marcus, that is pure sexism!’

I grinned. ‘Agreed. But like it or not, whatever dealings the company was involved in – legit or crooked, it doesn’t matter – business is a man’s world. She’d need someone to front for her at the top level with clients and customers, and Doccius’d be too much in place already to bypass. Too smart and full of himself to con, too. Besides, it would’ve made things much easier where the Pullius angle was concerned.’

‘You think that there was an actual Pullius, then?’ Perilla took a sip of her fruit juice. ‘I mean, that he existed as an individual in his own right?’

I shrugged. ‘Not necessarily under that name. But sure, he must have done for the thing to work, because we need an actual perp who also had to be a stranger to Correllius, a complete outsider. And whatever they claim to the contrary I’d bet a flask of Caecuban against a used corn plaster that both Doccius and Mamilia know perfectly well who he was. If your conspiracy theory’s right then my guess would be that the three of them – counting Fundanius – invented the sham business meeting to get Correllius over to Rome where their specially hired hitman Pullius could safely stick his knife in. In the event, of course, that wasn’t necessary, but they weren’t to know that at the time. And it would certainly explain the cover-up now.’

‘You don’t think Doccius would have any issues with working for Fundanius? After all, he’d been the number one rival for years. There must’ve been at least a bit of bad blood, or at least distrust.’

I shook my head. ‘Uh-uh. I didn’t see much of the guy, sure, but I’d put him down as a professional to his finger-ends. Not a leader himself, but the sort who has to know that his boss is a professional too. Whatever Correllius had been in the past, he’d lost it, and he’d lost Doccius’s respect. Mamilia, on the other hand – well, Doccius clearly has a lot of respect for Mamilia, which is significant in itself. And if she decided to join forces with someone like Publius Fundanius, then I can’t see him kicking up too much of a fuss.’