The Accusers Page 14

  'You are not hopeful.'

  'True.'

  'Does it matter who bought it, Falco?'

  'Very much. If we are to get Birdy off, it's no use just crying that he's a good boy and he never harmed his papa. We have to show who really did it. And this is urgent.'

  Honorius was gripped by what I was saying. 'But who are we to accuse, Falco?'

  'I suggest the mother.'

  'Not Carina?'

  'No. I was just trying to scare her. Calpurnia Cara did originally hatch the hemlock plan, if Birdy told us right. So Calpurnia is my chief suspect - with the possible connivance of Paccius.'

  'Paccius!' Honorius looked scared. 'Paccius conspired to kill his client? You live in a harsh world, Falco.'

  'Welcome to it,' I said gently.

  Then, since I was getting desperate myself, I stood up and let him tag along as I searched for the household facilities.

  Instead of the normal plank over a pit in an earth-floored cupboard, Carina and Laco had a well-tiled room with a stone throne; it stood over a pit, but the pit was very clean and there was a huge mound of fresh sponges beside the white marble washing bowl. I pointed this out to Honorius. 'This is why I don't suspect Carina. I don't mean because her house is unusually hygienic. I mean, the woman is damn rich.'

  'She doesn't need her father's money?'

  'No. Supposing there is any left...' Which I was starting to doubt.

  When we returned, Negrinus and Carina looked subdued, but prepared to talk. I told Honorius to take Birdy off somewhere, while I flame-grilled Carina. It was the first time we had had access to her; I intended to be thorough.

  'Please don't worry.' In fact she seemed unconcerned. She gazed at me with that direct, thoughtful stare. She was sitting upright, hands lying still in her lap. A maid was there to chaperon, but the elderly woman sat at a distance with her eyes cast down. 'Rubiria Carina, I am sorry we have to do this. I just want to talk to you about your family. Let's start with your childhood, if you don't mind. Were you a happy household?'

  'Yes.' If she stayed so monosyllabic, this would be useless. Her husband was off out socialising somewhere; I hoped to finish before he came back to interfere.

  'I imagine your mother was a little strict. What was your father like at home?'

  Carina now decided to go along with it. 'He was a good father. We all liked him.'

  'You and your sister were both married young. Were you both happy with your choices?'

  'Yes.' Back to the stone wall. The chaperon was ignoring our discussion; I wondered if she was deaf.

  'And your brother? I haven't talked to him much about this strange situation where he became the second husband of his best friend's wife.'

  'It happens,' said Carina bluntly.

  'I know.' I waited quietly.

  'Licinius Lutea and my brother were educated together and they served in the same province for their army duty. They had been close friends all their lives. Lutea married first. They had a son. Later, he suffered financial difficulties and Saffia Donata's father insisted on a divorce.'

  I raised my eyebrows. 'Hard! That's a rather old-fashioned idea, isn't it? Nowadays we tend to believe the parents should not break up happy couples.'

  'I only know,' Carina said slowly, 'that Saffia did not argue with her father.'

  'Any husband can go through a bad patch... I met Donatus. A frantic old buffer. He worries that his girls' dowries will be frittered away while in other hands.'

  Carina made no comment on my hint about the old buffer's claim for negligent estate management against her own father. 'I think my brother felt sorry for his friend,' she said. 'Lutea was afraid he would lose touch with his son, who was then just a baby. My brother agreed to marry Saffia himself- he needed a wife, he was rather a shy person, and he knew Saffia. It would mean Lutea could still see little Lucius often and eventually Lucius could go and live with his father without too much disruption.'

  'So Lutea would once have been a frequent visitor to your brother's home. I gather he and your brother are less close now? And Lutea still seems to be on rather close terms with Saffia?'

  Carina knew what I meant. 'So he does,' she spoke drily. But she said no more.

  I looked her in the eye. She was a married woman, the mother of three children. She must know the world. 'Do you think Lutea and Saffia have been playing around during your brother's marriage?'

  She coloured and looked at her lap. 'I have no reason to suspect it.' She had every reason, I thought.

  'Did your brother worry about them?'

  'My brother is good-natured and easygoing.' If it were true that he had been cuckolded, I wondered who had fathered Saffia's as yet unborn child. Then I even wondered who had really fathered the first child in this second marriage, the two-year-old daughter.

  'Some would say your brother is too easily pushed about.'

  'Some would say that,' Carina agreed quietly.

  'Saffia told me you were a nice woman,' I remarked. 'Would you say anything similar about her?'

  'I have nothing to say about Saffia Donata,' said her ex-sister-inlaw. It did not surprise me. Carina was nice. Nice - or else hiding something.

  'Let's talk about your mother now. As I said before, don't be alarmed. I want to establish some background. Were your parents only ever married to each other?' A nod of the head. 'That's a rare and beautiful situation nowadays! So you children had a happy upbringing and theirs was a comfortable marriage?'

  'Yes.'

  'They produced three children as the law encourages -' I noticed a flicker of some emotion. Carina stilled it quickly. 'You were all born fairly close together, weren't you? Do I deduce that after your mother had her three babies, deliberate measures may have been taken -'

  Abortion is illegal; contraception discouraged. Carina bristled. 'I could not possibly say anything about that, Falco!'

  'I apologise. Excuse me, but your father died in "his" bedroom, I understand. Did your mother have her own room?'

  'Yes,' Carina agreed, rather stiffly.

  'Plenty of people do,' I assured her. 'But my wife and I find the marital bed a more companionable arrangement, I must say.' She made no comment, and I could not bring myself to ask what arrangements she and Laco preferred. 'You have a different outlook from your parents. Your mother insisted Saffia had her daughter put to a wet-nurse, I'm told. Did you farm out your own children?'

  'No.' Again I saw a fleeting expression I could not place. Perhaps Carina, on the surface so composed, was uneasy about admitting she had spurned Calpurnia's strict childcare advice.

  'Dare I ask, is your independent outlook why you have a reputation for being somewhat estranged from your family?'

  'I am on perfectly good terms with my family,' Carina declared.

  'Oh?' I toughened up. 'I heard that there had been trouble, that your husband had to put his foot down over interference - that you yourself refused to attend your father's farewell meal, and that you made an outburst at his funeral accusing your relations of killing him.'

  Panic struck her. 'I don't want to talk to you any more!'

  'Well are my facts right?'

  'Yes. But you don't understand -'

  'Tell me then.'

  'There is nothing to say.'

  'When your father had announced he would commit suicide, why didn't you want to see him?' She was silent. 'Do you regret that now?'

  A tear did start lurking. 'It was not like that, Falco. I never refused to attend that lunch; I was not invited. I knew nothing of the discussions. Juliana had told me Papa had decided against suicide - and I even thought my brother was away.'

  'So you were estranged?'

  'No, they all thought it was easier...' She was trying to rationalise. She wanted to excuse them for leaving her out.

  'So does this explain your accusations at the funeral? You felt you had been fed the wrong story -'

  'I was upset. I made a mistake.'

  'Not entirely - if it turns out that
somebody did kill your father.'

  'Nobody in my family.'

  'You changed your mind about that?'

  'I had a long talk with my brother. He explained -' She paused. 'Things I had not known before.'

  'Your brother told you his story and you accepted that your father's death came from outside the family? So who did it?' 'I can't say. You must deal with it.'

  'You are not helping.'

  'This is a nightmare.' Rubiria Carina looked at me straight. She spoke like a woman who was being quite honest. Women who are lying always know just how to do that. 'Falco, I wish it would all go away. I want us to know serenity again. I want to hear no more of it.'

  'But your brother is accused of parricide,' I reminded her. She was clearly under enormous strain and I feared she would break down.

  'That is so hard,' Carina murmured bitterly. 'After all that we have suffered. After all he has to live with. It is so unfair on him.'

  Her feelings were deep and explained why she had now given refuge to Negrinus at her home. Yet somehow this was not what I had expected her to say. She meant something else; I was missing it, I sensed it.

  I asked Carina about her father's will. When she fell back on pretending she was only a woman and unfamiliar with family finances, I dropped the conversation, collected Honorius, and went home.

  Honorius had learned little new from Birdy. Still, I expected that.

  The young lawyer was not entirely useless. 'I asked who holds the copy of the will. This may, or may not, surprise you, Falco. It is with Paccius Africanus.'

  I was surprised - but I was not going to show Honorius that.

  'Don't tell me -' Informers of the Paccius and Silius type are infamous for chasing legacies. 'Paccius has had himself made the main heir!'

  Unbelievably, it was true.

  XXII

  BIRDY'S APPOINTMENT of Honorius to work with Falco and Associates caused a storm among the associates. We made a silent, angry party when we attended the praetor's office for the pre-trial arraignment.

  The situation looked black for our client. Paccius and Silius had formally joined as co-accusers. There was little to choose between the evidence each informer produced against Negrinus - as Honorius had said, there was virtually no evidence. The praetor awarded Paccius the privilege of first speaking. Paccius won this right to lead the case only because he had reached the praetor first with his original deposition.

  They asked for a three-week delay for investigations. For our purposes, this was too short. Honorius asked to extend the period, but was overruled. No reason was given. He was overruled either because the praetor thought he was too junior to count, or because the praetor just hated his face. Yes, Birdy had stuck us with a liability.

  Worse followed. When we requested trial in the murders court, surprisingly at first the praetor seemed to like the idea. I reckoned he was worried that a case which had already been trawled through once in the Senate might start to look like a legal mess if all the same evidence were regurgitated with a second defendant. As the arbiter of what came to trial, it might make him look indecisive. He would be even more anxious if my associates came to him in the next few weeks with yet another new accused! So far, nobody knew that part of the plan.

  Caught by surprise, Paccius and Silius made no immediate objection to our request. However, they did not need to. The praetor disapproved of anything the upstart Honorius wanted. 'Metellus Negrinus is a senator, an ex-quaestor and ex-aedile. We cannot subject him to trial on a level with tavern knifings, like killers who are little better than slaves. Request refused!'

  Paccius and Silius smiled at us pityingly.

  I myself made a further application on Negrinus' behalf 'Sir, the accusers' case is based on their proposition that our client was jealous and angry because he was cut out of his father's will. We appeal to have Paccius Africanus produce to us a copy of the will.'

  'Paccius has it?' The praetor sat up sharply on his curule stool. Those X-shaped folding seats have no back support. A firm posture is required in the honourable magistrate who uses his symbol of authority. You see magistrates lying on massage slabs at the baths, groaning about their lumbar pain. It's a hazard of the job. In court, they tend to slump in boring moments, then jerk into a more rigid position if they are caught out by something said.

  This one hated legacy-chasing. 'Paccius Africanus, can you explain this?'

  Paccius rose to his feet smoothly. I gave him credit for a calm reaction. 'Sir, for legal reasons only, the deceased Rubirius Metellus assigned me his heir. I gain very little. I have to reassign everything to others. The estate is mainly governed by a fideicommissum.'

  'Held in trust?' snapped the praetor. He said trust as if he was referring to some repulsive bodily function. 'Held in trust for who?' Long words did not trouble him, but we could tell he was startled; his grammar had slipped. When Rome's chief magistrate forgets how to operate the dative case - especially when the illustrious one is using the interrogative in its accusatory mood with a full blast of unpleasant emphasis - then it's time for the clerks from the Daily Gazette to take notes for the scandal page.

  'Various friends and family.' Paccius eluded the question as if the outrage it suggested had never occurred to him. 'I shall send a copy immediately to Falco's home address.'

  I thought the praetor shot me a look as if he longed to be asked to lunch so he could see the sensational note tablet. In view of his brusque treatment of Honorius earlier, I refused to do him favours. We then all consulted our notes, as if we were now checking for any other trivial points we could throw in to distract ourselves from serious issues. Issues like justice for the innocent.

  Neither side found any, so we all went home.

  To my surprise the copy arrived within a couple of hours. The will was on the inner sides of two waxed boards. That's normal. It was so short only one board was written on. Metellus senior had named Paccius Africanus his heir, thus leaving him all his debts and responsibilities, plus the religious safe keeping of the family's ancestral masks and household gods. Metellus had bequeathed small sums to each of his two daughters, after allowing for the amounts in their dowries. Both his son and his wife were specifically ruled out of inheritance, though each was given a very small lifetime maintenance allowance. I mean very, very small. I could have lived on it, but I had once been nearly starved and accustomed to cockroaches as fellow lodgers. Anyone who grew up in senatorial luxury would find the allowance tight.

  Everything else went to Paccius, who was to pass on the money intact to Saffia Donata.

  'This is odd.' Honorius took it upon himself to comment first. 'We need to show this to a wills expert. Silius uses one -'

  'Old Fungibles is supposed to be the best,' Justinus disagreed coldly. 'We should avoid anyone who works with the opposition, Falco.'

  'Old Fungibles?' I croaked.

  Aelianus jumped in smartly: 'Interchangeable items; often consumables... A nickname, presumably.'

  'Where did this mobile comestible come from?' I asked, still unconvinced.

  'Ursulina Prisca,' Justinus grinned.

  'Oho! Give me his details then,' I instructed, also grinning. We did not explain to Honorius the in-joke about our client, the litigious widow. 'I'll take along the will for advice; Aelianus can come too.' Honorius looked put out; that was tough. He was our law man, but I needed to re-establish good relationships with my own team. The Camilli cheered up, seeing Honorius snubbed. Justinus offered to hunt down more herbalists, still chasing the purchaser of the Metellus hemlock.