Last Rites (Marcus Corvinus Book 6) Page 8

  ‘The Wart, as executor, turns several shades of grey and says there must be some mistake: his mother meant five hundred, not five hundred thousand. The emperor’s the emperor, so Galba has to grit his teeth and nod. In the end it doesn’t matter because the Wart never pays him a plugged copper.’ Crispus grinned. ‘Oh, Galba doesn’t like Tiberius. He doesn’t like him at all.’

  ‘So how come the guy made consul? Surely the Wart has to approve the appointments?’

  ‘I told you, him and the prince are like this.’ Crispus held up two interlocking fingers. ‘And we’re not just talking Damon and Pytheas here, either.’ Shit; classical allusions now. Crispus certainly had come on. ‘What Gaius wants these days he gets, and if he doesn’t get it he takes. And if he doesn’t take it himself his pal Macro takes it for him. All the Wart’s interested in is screwing fancy boys alfresco on that island of his. Not that I blame him, because this time next year he’ll be dead anyway and Gaius’ll be our new emperor.’

  Well, I knew the truth or lack of it in the first little nugget of scandal, and the Wart had four years yet before he was due to pop his clogs. But I wasn’t going to let Crispus in on the secret. Oh, no. Still, that bit about the fluteplayers had been interesting. It could be coincidence, sure, and there wasn’t an ounce of reason to link Galba with Cornelia’s death, but taken along with the fact that she’d died in his house it was certainly something to think about. And I didn’t like Galba’s smell; I didn’t like it at all.

  I stood up. ‘Thanks, pal. You’ve been very helpful. I owe you one.’

  Crispus grunted. ‘Just stay out of my life. That’s all I ask.’

  I left. On the steps of the building I saw Sextius Nomentanus coming up, but I pretended I hadn’t seen him. He wouldn’t’ve known about Torquata having to repeat the rite, sure, but I wasn’t taking any chances: bad news travels fast.

  The Temple of Juno Moneta, where the Mint is, was only a comparative step or two away. At least today I was saving on shoe leather: Murena could just as easily have been attached to the grain supply offices in Ostia, which would’ve been a real bugger. If finding the guy was easy, though, getting to talk to him was going to prove a bummer because I couldn’t just walk up and say, ‘Hey, my name’s Valerius Corvinus, I understand you’re screwing the senior consul’s wife and I was wondering if you played the flute.’ I needed an in, and an in I hadn’t got. I was still desperately trying to think of one when I reached the temple steps.

  Which was when I saw Gaius Secundus limping towards me. Secundus and I had practically grown up together, and until our paths had split in our late teens he’d been my best friend. Then as one of the Wart’s son Drusus’s aides in Pannonia he’d taken a bad tumble from his horse and wrecked his right leg and with it a blossoming military career. Not that it had soured him. Nothing could sour Secundus; he was too nice a guy.

  I waved. ‘Hey, Gaius!’

  He looked up, did a double-take, beamed and came over. We shook hands and grinned at each other. He’d aged, of course, since I’d last seen him a few months after the accident, but then that happens to us all, and he was still the good-looking bastard who’d had half the unattached females in Rome twittering round him.

  ‘So, Marcus,’ he said. ‘You’re back.’

  ‘Yeah.’

  ‘Permanently?’

  ‘I think so. For the foreseeable future, anyway.’

  ‘How’s Perilla?’

  ‘She’s well.’ Then, before he could ask: ‘We’ve an adopted daughter. She’s living up in the Alban hills with Perilla’s Aunt Marcia. You?’

  ‘Married too, now.’ His grin widened. ‘Very much so. You remember Furia Gemella?’

  ‘Oh, yeah.’ I did: the little stunner with the soup, the earrings and the matrimonial gleam in her eye. So she’d got him in the end. ‘She any relation to the current deputy chief priest?’

  ‘The daughter of a cousin.’ Well, us old families did tend to marry into each other, and relationships were so involved sometimes it’d need an Alexander to cut through the tangle. Marrying Perilla had made me unusual. Not that I was complaining. ‘We’ve three kids. All boys.’

  ‘Congratulations.’ Hell; Murena could wait. ‘You have time to split a jug of wine?’

  He shook his head. ‘Can’t, unfortunately. Not now, anyway. I’m working.’

  ‘As what?’

  ‘A city judge, believe it or not. Only I drew one of the short straws for the Mint.’

  Yeah; that made sense. The two chief Mint officers were praetors. So the gods did reward those who led a blameless, upright life after all. I sent up a small prayer of thanks to Mercury, guardian god of snoops; the duplicitous old reprobate was obviously on my side, and he was working his winged sandals off. ‘Really?’ I said.

  ‘Really. If you’ve business, though, we could meet up later. Name the place and I’ll be there when the office closes.’

  ‘You’ve got a deal. Ah…’ I hesitated. ‘You happen to know a guy called Murena, by the way? Gaius Licinius Murena?’

  ‘Sure. He’s one of my finance officers.’

  Better and better! Oh, thank you, Mercury! ‘Could you describe him? Physically, I mean?’

  Secundus frowned. Intellectually gifted he wasn’t, but he was no fool either. ‘What’s this about?’

  ‘Maybe nothing. But I have to know what he looks like.’

  ‘Young. Twenty-something. Good-looking, eye for the girls.’

  Yes! ‘He, uh, play the flute at all?’

  The frown deepened. ‘Not that I know of, but I’d be surprised if he did. Marcus, you involved in something?’

  ‘Yeah. Only it’s complicated.’

  Secundus’s face cleared and he laughed. ‘Meaning you don’t want to tell me, right?’

  ‘Right.’ I grinned back. ‘Not at the moment, anyway. Look, pal, I need a favour. A big favour.’

  ‘You only have to ask. You know that.’

  ‘Could you bring us together? I don’t want an introduction, in fact I’d rather not have one, but it’d help if I saw the guy myself. Is that possible?’

  ‘Sure. Nothing easier.’ He shrugged. ‘If he’s around he should be in the clerks’ room. I’ll take you there now.

  ‘That’d be great.’

  We went into the Mint building. One thing about tagging along with the boss, you aren’t asked any questions and you don’t have to answer any. Secundus led me along a maze of corridors and opened the door of a long room stacked with shelves and smelling of ink and parchment. The dozen or so scribes sitting at desks took one look and began to be very busy indeed. One of them, an old guy with buck teeth and ink-stained fingers, came over.

  ‘Morning, Sestus,’ Secundus said. ‘Is Gaius Licinius here?’

  ‘Yes, sir.’ The slave’s eyes went to me briefly and slid off incurious. ‘In his office.’

  ‘Fine.’ He turned to me. ‘Excuse me, Marcus, this won’t take a minute. Do you want to wait or will you come as well?’

  ‘Oh, I’ll come,’ I said.

  Murena was at his desk. As we came in he looked up and set the tablet he’d been reading aside. Yeah, he fitted. He fitted very well.

  ‘Ah, Gaius,’ Secundus said. ‘I wanted to have a brief word with you about the die stamp for the new issue.’ He glanced over his shoulder at me. ‘I’m sorry, Marcus. A little business, I’m afraid. You’re sure you don’t mind waiting?’

  It was beautifully done. I hadn’t known Secundus had any acting talents, but he could’ve given old Roscius lessons. ‘No, I’m fine,’ I said. I leaned against the doorpost and did my best to look bored while Secundus talked technicalities.

  The guy was perfect: twenty-four, twenty-five max, slim and muscular as a Games net-and-trident man and with a face like a Greek Apollo. Good voice, too: ‘husky’, like Aegle had said. I could just imagine women curling up when he whispered sweet nothings in their ears. No wonder Aemilia had lost her heart and her pants. The fluteplaying side of things was a problem, s
ure, but that was something I could check up on along with the guy’s movements on the evening in question.

  Secundus gave it a good ten minutes then got us out. He didn’t relax the pose until we were back outside the building itself.

  ‘Well?’ he said. ‘You get what you wanted?’

  ‘Yeah. Thanks, pal.’ I grinned. ‘In spades. I owe you one.’

  He grinned back. ‘You owe me one jug of the best Caecuban in Gorgio’s cellar. Or half a jug, anyway, this time of day. I’m not greedy and Gemella doesn’t like me going home pissed and reeking of strong drink.’

  ‘You too?’ I laughed. ‘Okay, you’ve got it. So when are you free?’

  We arranged a time and I left him to do whatever praetors in charge of Rome’s mobile wealth do between sunrise and noon. Probably rest their feet on top of a desk and let the minions do the work. Then I went back down the hill towards Market Square and Tuscan Street to put myself a cup or two ahead while I waited. I reckoned I deserved the break. It’d been a busy and largely successful morning, and there ain’t no better way to unwind than in a good wineshop with a saucer of cheese and olives and a decent belt of Caecuban.

  Also to think. How the hell did I go about finding out more about Gaius Licinius Murena?

  10.

  It was late afternoon before I got back home, slightly the worse for wear: we’d had a lot to catch up on, and the one jug had turned into two after all. Perilla was upstairs in her study working on a poem, but she came back down to the atrium in any case. That suited me: being in Perilla’s study with all these books and not a wine cup in sight makes me nervous as hell. Some people’s ideas about what constitutes necessary furnishings are weird.

  I slipped off my sandals, we settled on to the couches and Bathyllus wheeled in the Setinian.

  ‘So, lady, how was your day?’ I asked.

  ‘All right. That is, if you except the arrival of a note from your mother asking us round for a meal over the Winter Festival.’

  I groaned. Jupiter! ‘Can we get out of it?’

  ‘Marcus, dear, I am no more keen to be poisoned by suspect cooking than you are, nor do I relish the prospect of your stepfather covering one of my best mantles with sauce as he usually does; but no, we cannot get out of it. This is our first year back, and naturally Vipsania expects us. We’ll just have to grit our teeth.’

  ‘I’m more worried about what we’ll be gritting our teeth on, lady.’ I scowled into my wine. This was going to be a bad one, I could tell that now: Phormio, Mother’s hyperinventive chef, went into overdrive on big occasions like the Winter Festival, and he didn’t take prisoners. ‘You think she and Priscus would consider coming to us instead?’

  ‘I asked. Vipsania said Meton was fine in his way but his menus were pedestrian.’

  Ouch. I winced. If Meton ever got to hear that little squib he’d blow every gasket in his tiny food-fixated brain and go looking for Phormio with a cleaver. Well, there was nothing we could do; we were committed. Maybe if we were very lucky there’d be a plague or a major fire between now and the Festival that’d give us the chance to cancel. Failing that the only defence was to eat before we left.

  The clock went ting! That’d be the tenth hour. Strange, I hadn’t noticed the drips. Maybe I was getting used to them after all.

  ‘How’s the clepsydra behaving?’ I said.

  ‘Perfectly. It’s an absolutely marvellous machine, and so useful I don’t know what we did without it. I can’t understand Bathyllus’s attitude. He doesn’t like it at all.’

  Surprise, surprise. ‘Yeah, well, he’s a traditionalist, our Bathyllus. And I don’t think the pissing cherubs went down a bomb with him either.’

  Perilla settled back on her couch. ‘So,’ she said. ‘How is the case going?’

  I told her about the various visits. ‘That guy Murena is a perfect fit, physically, anyway. It looks like the Aemilia theory is working out. All I’ve got to do now is check on whether he plays the flute and what he was doing two nights ago. That’s going to be difficult but not impossible, thanks to having Gaius Secundus on the strength.’ I took a swallow of Setinian. ‘We’ll have to have Gaius and his wife round, by the way. They’re practically neighbours.’

  ‘Perhaps we should ask your friend Caelius Crispus as well,’ Perilla said demurely. ‘Since he’s been so helpful.’

  I laughed. ‘Jupiter, lady, the guy’d have apoplexy! But you’re right, he’s been a great help. That angle on Sulpicius Galba was interesting, too.’

  ‘You think that’s a possibility, Marcus? That the senior consul was involved?’

  ‘No. Not really. He’d have no motive, for a start. But he’s the only person we’ve come across so far with fluteplayer connections, and since it’s his place the mechanics of the thing wouldn’t be a problem. If we could find a reason why he’d introduce one of his fancy boys into the house on the night of the ceremony, then –’

  I stopped. The clock had gone ting!

  Perilla’s brow wrinkled. ‘But it can’t be nearly that time already!’ she said.

  I got up and went over to check. The Victory’s pointer was on the eleven. ‘Wrong, lady. At least, your bronze pal in the tutu says it is.’

  ‘But that’s absolute nonsense!’

  ‘Come over and see for yourself.’

  She did. We stared at it together.

  ‘The drips are too fast,’ Perilla said finally. ‘The valve needs adjusting.’

  ‘Where to? This is December. One more notch and we’re at the end of the scale.’

  ‘Do it anyway.’

  I turned the duck so its beak pointed to the last notch. The drips speeded up.

  Perilla said, ‘Hmm.’

  ‘You got any other bright ideas, lady?’

  ‘Try it the other way.’

  I did as she’d told me. The drips speeded up some more. I turned the duck back, or tried to, and there was a dry metallic tunk! As it came free. The drips became a single trickle, then a rush, and the Victory lurched upwards on her pole like a dog after a rabbit.

  ‘Oh, shit,’ I murmured

  ‘Marcus!’

  ‘Yeah, well.’

  The little titan raised his hammer and brought it down with a sharp ting! The Victory kept on going.

  Perilla rounded on me. ‘Corvinus,’ she snapped, ‘if you’ve broken that clock…!’

  ‘I hardly touched the thing!’

  ‘Then what’s that duck doing in your hand?’

  Gods! Suddenly everything was my fault: typical bloody woman’s logic. ‘Look, Perilla,’ I said, ‘the bugger’s sentient, right? It’s got a mind of its own.’

  ‘Nonsense! Here, let me –’

  Ting!

  Gurglegurglegurgle.

  We both stared in horror as the pointer clanged against the top of its scale.

  Tinkletinkletinklepssss.

  Silence. Long silence.

  Perilla let her breath out. ‘There, now,’ she said brightly. ‘Crisis over. It’s reached the end of the cycle. All we have to do is leave it switched off until the engineer comes.’

  I looked at the titan. I swear the little bastard had a sneer on his face. ‘Listen, lady,’ I said. ‘Trust me. Forget the engineer, okay? The thing’s only biding its time until it gets the chance to really let rip. Send it back while you still can.’

  ‘Don’t be silly, Marcus. Honestly, sometimes I think you –’

  Knock knock knock.

  The front door. Oh, hell. That was all we needed: visitors, and the door-slave had gone walkabout. I yelled for Bathyllus, but he was obviously sulking or keeping a low profile or both: where domestic crises are concerned the little guy has a psychic streak that’s positively uncanny.

  Knock knock knock.

  ‘Are we expecting anyone?’ Perilla said.

  ‘Uh-uh. Unless it’s that flutegirl Thalia. I told the guy at the guildhouse to send her straight round if she showed up.’

  ‘Really?’ A sniff: the lady was clearly pe
eved. ‘Then perhaps you should let her in.’

  Barefoot, in only my tunic – I always get rid of my mantle, whenever I have to wear the thing, as soon as I get inside – I went through to the lobby and opened the door.

  It wasn’t Thalia. It was another Axeman, fist raised to knock again, glaring down at me in silent outrage like I hadn’t even bothered with the tunic. Standing on the pavement behind him, bristling, was a Vestal virgin.

  She was tall, thin and angular as a cloak-stand, yellow-faced and ugly as sin. I didn’t know if Vestals conformed to any dietary rules, but this one looked like she lived on dry bread and vinegar.

  ‘Marcus Valerius Corvinus?’ she snapped. ‘Marcus Valerius Messalla Corvinus?’

  ‘Uh, yeah.’ She’d said the extra handle to my name like she was making sure another MVC wasn’t pulling a fast one on her. ‘Yeah, that’s me.’

  ‘My name is Servilia.’ Her nose went up. ‘May I come in?’

  ‘Uh… yeah. Yeah, sure.’ I stepped aside quickly.

  She brushed past me like a homing wasp. ‘Quintus,’ she said to the Axeman, ‘stay here, please. I’ll call if I need you.’

  Still glaring at me, the guy lumbered inside and set his solid back against the wall. I swear the stonework creaked. I closed the door.

  Servilia looked me up and down. ‘The atrium is this way?’ she said.

  ‘Yeah.’ I was beginning to feel slightly steam-rollered here. ‘Just go straight through.’

  She cleared her throat. ‘Do you normally answer your own door, young man? Just out of interest?’

  ‘Uh, no.’ Jupiter on wheels! ‘I’m, uh, sorry about that. We’ve – ah – had a slight domestic crisis.’

  ‘Really.’ She made the word sound like she’d caught me in the middle of a full-blown orgy and the atrium was packed wall to wall with naked dancing girls. ‘Never mind. I am prepared to make allowances.’ Another freezing stare. ‘Some allowances.’

  ‘That’s great.’ I edged across the lobby. Servilia didn’t move, and the freezing stare dropped another couple of temperature points. ‘Uh… is there a problem?’

  ‘Naturally,’ she said, ‘you will want to make yourself respectable before we talk. You have my leave.’