The Ides of April (31 page)

Mine had slithered into order almost of their own accord, and the results were disturbing for me. I no longer believed that the aedile had killed the maid – or any of the other people who died on the Aventine in mysterious circumstances. He was the wrong type.

That meant my friend Andronicus was stirring up trouble when he swore it was otherwise. I wondered if I really should meet the aedile to assess him first-hand, but Andronicus had also tried to implicate the runner Tiberius, and I was equally convinced that was wrong, so why bother? People like me were best advised to avoid all magistrates. It was definitely a bad idea to roll up to one who was in the throes of the main festival in his period of office and accuse him of committing a series of unspeakable murders. Everything I did know about Manlius Faustus said he would grow very hot under the tunic at that. Especially if he hadn’t done it.

If he was innocent, I would be stuck for the rest of my career, working in a city where officials knew of my outrageous claim. Not sensible. I even had relatives who would annoyingly point out that the aedile had a right in law to compensation for me blackening his reputation. Some of the blighters were so keen to make names for themselves that in a promising cause célèbre, they might even rush to prosecute me on Manlius Faustus’ behalf . . .

I had committed myself to plenty of stupid actions, though never before because somebody else incited me. I liked to make my errors for myself.

There was no reason to think anyone from the Faustus/Tullius household had been directly involved with the murders at all and, frankly, I was beginning to be annoyed with the archivist for suggesting it. Andronicus clearly felt resentment against the people he lived with, but it was irrelevant to my investigation and he should have kept it to himself.

I had met people like that before, people who thought my work was one big game. To them, trying to send me down the wrong track was a challenge, often a joke. Their theories were like ill-formed, pointless, wild ideas cooked up in a bar, which is indeed where they often floated to the surface. I ignored them – at least when I was sensible.

I recognised, too late, that I been lured into trusting Andronicus’ judgement because of how I felt about him. I was furious with myself. I had behaved like a daft girl.

It was not that I blamed him for my wasted trip. Somebody did need to ask Venusia if she saw anything. I was half looking forward to telling Tiberius at some point that despite his sneers at my competence I had gone to those lengths – a twenty-mile, two-day trip – supposing we ever liaised on the subject again, which seemed unlikely.

Perhaps we should meet. I had questions he might answer and an idea to test. As I say, I had done a lot of thinking.

As soon as we arrived in Fountain Court, Rodan rushed up to tell me Andronicus had been there. I would have liked space to recover. I wanted to readjust, given some of the doubts that had struck me. I had certainly not spent that journey musing on the airy spheres of astronomical philosophy.

‘That fellow of yours has been,’ grumbled Rodan, so churlishly I guessed they had had words about me being missing. I should have left a message. ‘He’s an irritating bastard.’

At that moment Andronicus himself turned up again. There I was, tired out, with a small collection of luggage at my feet, after Felix dumped us, with a fretful eleven-year-old, plus Ferret, plus Rodan staring curiously. Women have to handle such situations, postponing the demands of lovers. Andronicus could see my predicament, yet swarmed all over me. It struck me he was like a dog who could not bear to be left alone. He had the same kind of self-centred jealousy, and as it turned out, was equally prone to sulking, to spite me for going off secretly, without taking him on his lead.

‘I had to attend a family occasion, then I needed to interview that maid, Venusia – it all came up rather suddenly, but I’m here now, so I hope you can forgive me.’

‘It was her birthday,’ announced Postumus. I expect he thought the detail might be helpful.

‘And who is this?’ Andronicus asked, with a glint in his eye, and pointing. Thank the gods, Postumus was far too young to be mistaken for a rival.

‘My brother. He is not as evil as he looks, just never turn your back on him.’

Andronicus assessed my brother, who was a chunky child as a result of his single-minded manner of eating. He loved food as his substitute for loving anybody else. Over his solid body, Postumus wore a good quality tunic, which he had managed to keep fairly clean because he was the kind of odd child who enjoys being careful. The unnatural creature had also been subjected to a very neat haircut, specifically for my birthday. He looked arrogant and superior. The ferret must have summed him up for Andronicus: such a pet may be a normal accoutrement of a working country dunderhead, but in the city it defined my brother as a pampered rich boy.

Postumus gazed back. Many people found his stare disconcerting. Even in my weary state, I found amusement in watching how Andronicus would react. Both were used to taking a specific position, observing everybody else disdainfully.

‘She has to take me home now.’ Postumus claimed me casually, but effectively.

‘Must you?’ Andronicus was pleading in his most winning way. My heart fluttered. He knew how to make his attentions fervent. He knew, too, how to seduce and disorientate a woman who thought she had decided she wanted to be left alone. ‘Since when have you been a pedagogue, dragging little pupils through the streets?’

‘Afraid I must.’

‘But what about me?’

‘Andronicus, he is eleven. It’s getting dark; he cannot be out on his own on the Aventine. He would frighten the muggers. Either he stays the night with me here—’ I could see that would not fit whatever plans my friend had ‘—or I have to take him.’

There was no reason why Andronicus should not have walked down the hill with us, then come back with me. Nobody suggested that.

Instead he demanded abruptly, ‘What was so urgent, to send you chasing after Venusia?’

Oh Juno. Not here, not now. ‘I had to ask if she saw something.’

‘Any luck?’ challenged Andronicus. I was conscious of Postumus assessing my friend like a scientific experiment put in front of him by his tutor (a cheap academic, but sincere and whom, you guessed, Postumus derided).

‘No, none.’

‘So where is she?’

‘Some place in the country. Do you need to know?’

‘Of course not,’ Andronicus replied, so immediately and so reasonably I felt chastened. ‘We seem to be having an argument, Albia.’

Though he spoke lightly, and wore his open-eyed innocent expression, Andronicus was tense. The people I knew called this kind of talk a discussion. Arguments were when you threw dinner bowls, first making sure they were full. Mostly we had those with bad-tempered toddlers. There had been many with Postumus.

‘So your trip was pointless?’ Andronicus asked, when I failed to respond to the argument comment. I wasn’t ready for discord tonight.

‘No, but it made me sure I need to see Faustus.’

‘I told you not to.’ While I was taking that in, Andronicus insisted, ‘You should do what I say!’

He
should have known better. Anyone could see I was tired and tetchy, but in any case that was a bad move. ‘Because you are the man?’

‘I am not your head of household,’ he conceded, as if making a belated attempt to cool the tension. I let the moment pass. Or so it seemed. When men start handing out orders to me, I can be a good actress.

Postumus slipped one hand into mine. That was unusual. I saw what he was up to. He loved a stand-off. He loved to stir one. My brother spoke up with his eerie self-assurance: ‘Flavia Albia’s head of household is our father, Marcus Didius Falco.’

With what seemed a single breath, Andronicus became all silkiness again. ‘Of course he is, little man, and we must certainly get you home to him! You go, Albia.’

‘If our father dies,’ Postumus announced, as if he had been working this out, ‘Albia’s head of household will be me!’

That was too much. With a wince at me, Andronicus went off, swinging down the alley, after saying significantly, ‘Well, I may come along again later!’

I made no comment.

‘You ought to stay with us tonight,’ my potential head of household instructed me. As a go-between in a love affair, Postumus made an efficient hatchet-man.

I left the luggage with Rodan and set off with the boy. I started at a fast march, but slowed down. We had to watch our step. In our absence, the Cerialia ceremonies must have continued on a daily basis; wherever a procession had snaked around the Aventine, remains of the nuts thrown at bystanders – Ceres’ bounty – still lurked on the sidewalks, ready to make the unwary twist an ankle. I was wearing the wrong shoes. Even my brother was so tired, his feet were all over the place and I had to steady him when he stumbled. The last thing I wanted was for him to drop the ferret, and for us to have to persuade the slinky beggar to come out of a drain.

When we arrived home, my brother broke away from me, and scampered ahead into the house shouting cheerily, ‘Guess what! Ferret killed Diddle and he’s eaten her!’ He knew my sisters would start wailing.

He was eleven. Just a child. He seemed wise beyond his years, yet sometimes we overestimated him. Half the time
he did not understand the significance of things he said and did. Never try to reason with a boy; it’s pointless. We, who knew and tried to love him, accepted his eccentricities and even his rudeness. But other people could take him badly amiss.

I wished I did not at that moment remember the oyster-shucker, Lupus. It reminded me that what a boy says or does too casually to the wrong person may have terrible results.

I was grateful that my own little brother lived a sheltered life, kept in at home. He was never out on the streets where mysterious attackers prowled.

I
could have stayed the night with my folks, as Postumus had slyly suggested, but I was not in the mood for company – theirs or anyone else’s.

Andronicus did return to Fountain Court. It was almost as if he knew I preferred not to see him. I felt he was trying to impose his will, never a good trick for a man who wanted to impress me. I was in my apartment, the one on the second floor. I had not even undressed, but was lying on my bed as if I expected more to happen that night.

In Rome there would be other women lying in the centres of beds alone while men in separate rooms cursed them for it. One of the rites of the Cerialia required that as a gesture to chastity, women should preserve themselves from any male touch; to make sure, men had to sleep elsewhere. Of course this was a rite for the rich. The poor did not own enough beds.

I had heard that ladies who stayed celibate for Ceres drank a concoction of barley and pennyroyal to suppress their sexual appetite. Rumour had it, drugs were incorporated too, since grains and simple hedgerow herbs were not enough, supposedly, to overcome female lust. I needed neither herbs nor
drugs. Nothing beats seeing a man in a new light to kill your passion.

Did you know, even in low doses, the oil of pennyroyal is poisonous? People happily cook with it, or make infusions, yet midwives are said to use it to bring about abortions. And it can kill. Was the mystery killer using some similar, readily available household poison? Or was he in a position to access something more specialised?

So, true to his promise, Andronicus returned. I wasn’t surprised.

How many times do women lie awake, longing for a lover to appear, only to be disappointed? I had done it. This requires a degree of excitement about a relationship that I knew I had abruptly lost. Somewhere on the road out to Aricia, or returning home today, the Via Appia had claimed all my joy in the archivist. Tonight, I genuinely wanted to be chaste. It had nothing to do with religious observance, but reflected a cold drench of sense. I had lost the urge. Our rift was permanent. I would never again want Andronicus to touch me.

Did he know? Would he accept it? Was he a man who would let a disaffected lover go?

I heard him banging and shouting to be admitted, then Rodan growled in answer. I crept to the door, opening it quietly and not making my presence known. If the archivist gained entrance to the building, I was ready to press the door closed quickly and bolt it, then tremble on the inside, hiding from him.

It is odd how it happens: that subtle slither from being entirely wrapped up with a man, into not wanting him.

‘Orders is orders,’ Rodan was maintaining, like some officious clerk. That was a change, and utter hypocrisy. With him, orders were for forgetting or ignoring. ‘The owners of this building are very particular. Once I lock up the grille, I can’t let anybody in.’

‘What if I lived here?’

‘But you don’t, do you?’ Sometimes I forgot how Rodan had spent many years as a landlord’s enforcer. He knew how to remain unmoved, and indeed do it with a low-level threat of violence that would drain anyone’s courage.

‘I’m sick of this!’ Even Andronicus sounded ready for a fight. I was against that happening. Rodan might be a failed gladiator, but he was still big enough to inflict damage; in pain, the archivist would probably turn vicious. Being selfish, I did not want to have to find a new porter, if Andronicus managed to hurt Rodan. He was cheap, too stupid to rob us, and had been known to the family for many years; who likes change?

Andronicus was still ranting. ‘First the woman is continually missing, then she thinks she can run rings around me – I’d like to kill that pestilential brat she had with her.’

‘Better not try it.’ That must have been the tone Rodan once used for putting frighteners on slow-paying tenants. With the grille safely between them, he was happy to play tough. It was a slow, easy offer to hook someone’s organs out of them via an unusual orifice. Like an Egyptian embalmer – but with you still alive – at least you would be when Rodan started.

‘I am not being made a fool of – somebody will pay for the inconvenience!’

‘Send your bill!’ jeered Rodan.

‘You or her! It’s all the same to me who suffers.’ Andronicus’ Parthian shot was intended to chill. I could not help wondering if he guessed I might be listening.