David Wishart: Trade Secrets

‘Yeah, well, that’s just the point, isn’t it?’ I said. ‘The time your paths crossed you weren’t working for Correllius, were you? You were working for Fundanius here, or at least the two of you were partners in the wine and oil scam along with the Porpoise ’s owner, Titus Nigrinus.’

Doccius smiled. Then he laughed and set his feet back on the spare chair. ‘Corvinus,’ he said, ‘you are so full of shit it’s unbelievable. I told you: I’ve never even heard of this Tullius guy, let alone met him. And if he claimed that there was any funny business with the consignment then he was lying for reasons of his own, just like that crane operator of yours. As for Nigrinus, well, there was no scam to begin with, so there couldn’t’ve been a partnership, could there? I’m sorry for the man, he’s down one ship, but that’s one of the risks you take in this business, and at least if I’ve heard rightly he survived the accident.’

‘Publius is quite correct.’ Fundanius was smiling too. ‘I’m sorry, gentlemen’ – his look included the heavies standing behind me – ‘but all this is complete nonsense. As far as your accusation concerning the shipment is concerned, Corvinus, your only proof, correct me if I’m wrong, is the word of a drunken crane operator and an obscure Roman trader of whom neither of us has any knowledge and who is in any case now dead. As for the trader himself’ – he shrugged – ‘well, what more can I say? I know nothing of him whatsoever. Now if that’s your only business here-’

‘Fuck that.’ Marcus – obviously the spokesman of the duo – pushed in front of me. ‘You’ – he levelled a finger at Fundanius – ‘are going to be one sorry cheating bastard before much longer. The mistress told me to promise you that; she’ll see to it personally. And you’ – the finger shifted to Doccius – ‘I’ve already told you; you’re a dead man walking. Buy yourself an urn.’

Doccius was looking queasy again, but Fundanius hadn’t moved.

‘How fascinating,’ he said equably. ‘But Publius Doccius works for me now, and I look after my own. Do be sure to give my regards to Mamilia, won’t you? I think you know your way out.’ He nodded to me. ‘Corvinus.’

I nodded back, and we left.

‘We’re stymied,’ I said to Perilla when we’d settled down later that afternoon on the terrace with a pre-dinner drink. ‘The bastards just sat there and laughed in our faces.’

‘It can’t be as bad as all that, dear,’ Perilla said. ‘There must be something you can do.’

‘Like what, for example?’ I took a morose swallow of wine. ‘They know I know the whole story, no argument, but they also know there isn’t a blind thing I can do about it. Not without some solid proof; Fundanius pointed that out, and he was right.’

‘But you have it, surely. As far as the scam aspect of things goes, at least. Your crane operator, what was his name, Siddius, confirmed that the accident on the quayside happened, and that the amphoras he dropped were filled with water. That’s confirmation in itself.’

I sighed. ‘Perilla, I haven’t a hope in hell of getting a signed statement from the guy, which is what it’d need. How long do you think he’d survive if he crossed Publius Doccius, never mind Fundanius? He’d be signing his own death warrant, and he’d know it. Plus the fact that, a), it’d be his word against everyone else’s, and b), as far as the port authorities are concerned there was no accident to begin with because he didn’t fucking report one at the time.’

‘Gently, Marcus.’

I took another swig of wine. Not that it did any good, mind.

‘Well, he didn’t,’ I said. ‘And the reason he didn’t was, he was paid to keep his mouth shut. You think he’d change his story now, in public, anyway? Why should he? What’s in it for him, barring a slit throat down an alley?’

‘You’re certain that Fundanius was in on the fraud?’

‘Absolutely; one hundred per cent. He knew about Siddius, for a start, and he couldn’t’ve done that if he wasn’t involved up to his eyeballs.’

‘What makes you so sure?’

‘Because when he mentioned the crane operator he used the word drunken. Which I hadn’t done. Oh, sure, clumsy, incompetent, cack-handed, any appropriate term you like given the circumstances; but the only way he could know Siddius had a drink problem is if Doccius had told him. QED.’

‘That isn’t much to build a case on.’

‘It’s good enough for me, lady. But with the only other witness being oh-so-conveniently dead unless by some miracle I can twist Nigrinus’s arm when he shows up and get a confession out of him we are well and truly screwed.’ I refilled my wine-cup. ‘The only consolation is that if I’m any judge of character Mamilia won’t let them get away with it. That is one very ruthless lady. Me, I wouldn’t be in Publius Doccius’s sandals for his weight in gold pieces, whether he has Fundanius’s protection or not.’

‘You can’t prove a connection between Fundanius – or Doccius, at least – and Gaius Tullius? That’s the other angle, surely.’

‘Uh-uh. For the same reason: no hard facts. Oh, they knew the name when I brought it up, sure, I’d bet a year’s income on that, because it came as a nasty facer; in fact, I thought at that point I had them. But then when I mentioned the partnership arrangement with Nigrinus, they-’

I stopped.

Oh, shit! Oh, holy gods!

‘Marcus?’ Perilla was frowning. ‘What is it?’

‘That was when the bastards relaxed,’ I said slowly. ‘Both of them at once, right then and there. Grinning their heads off. They’d been on the back foot up until then, but when I brought in Nigrinus you could almost hear the sigh of relief.’

‘But that doesn’t make any sense! Nigrinus had to be involved for the fraud to work. Didn’t he?’

‘Sure he did. No argument.’ I was thinking hard. There was something there; there had to be. When I’d mentioned Gaius Tullius completely out of the blue, it’d been a shock, because up to then he hadn’t figured; everything I’d said, all the questions I’d asked and the accusations I’d made, had had to do with the scam itself or – previously – with the death of Correllius. Now for the first time with the mention of Tullius Fundanius and his new pal had lost control of the plot, and they were running blind. Only then they realized that I wasn’t as smart or as clued-up as they thought I was. Feared. Whatever. Because I’d made a crucial mistake.

‘Marcus …’

I waved her to silence. So what was it? I replayed the conversation in my head.

I’d said that when Doccius ran across Gaius Tullius he hadn’t been working for Correllius; that he’d been in partnership with Fundanius and the Porpoise ’s captain Nigrinus …

Only I hadn’t said captain, had I? I’d said owner.

‘Nigrinus didn’t own the Porpoise ,’ I said.

Perilla was still frowning. ‘But that’s silly, dear! Of course he did!’

I shook my head. ‘Uh-uh. Oh, we assumed he did, sure, because he was the ship’s captain, after all, and that’s the way these things usually work. But that’s all it was: an assumption.’ I was trying to remember my original conversation with the clerk in the harbour master’s office, and with the quay-master Arrius. As far as I could recall, neither had said that Titus Nigrinus actually owned the Porpoise ; like I said, that’d only been an assumption on my part, and it had gone uncorrected. ‘Nigrinus was only the hired help, not the third partner per se. No wonder the bastards were laughing up their sleeves. I’d got my facts wrong, and they knew it.’

Perilla was staring at me. ‘Can you check?’ she said.