Saturnalia mdf-18 Read online

  'They offered me a stage donkey,' saidJunia, unaware of the effect she caused in some of us. 'But I didn't think we had the room.'

  'Very wise!' intoned Pa seditiously.

  When Zoilus had finished his turn, I cornered him. 'That was a good haunting-though not as frightening as when you jumped me on the Via Appia!' I backed him up against Gaius and Junia's petite but decorative Greek urn display stand. Their four alabastra and their kylix (which had one broken handle, but Pa thought it was reproduction anyway) wobbled disconcertingly. 'Now before you get paid, you will answer me some questions.'

  'Marcus, mind my precious red figures!'

  'Just shut up, Junia. This is men's talk. Talk, being the big word, Zoilus.'

  'I am just a restless spirit-'

  'I know, I know; drifting about eternity like a dried leaf… Why did you call Zosime a bringer of death?-Don't go all vague on me. My sister's going to give you a big bowl of her deep-fried sesame balls as thanks for this evening, so there's no need to be ethereal. You'll need a strong stomach. Why did you say it, Zoilus?'

  'I don't know-ow-Owl' He might be a spirit but he knew when his privates were kneed. This was my first time putting the persuaders on a ghost. His ectoplasm had more substance than he pretended. After a couple of wine cups, I was not gentle; my sudden jerk produced a satisfactory shriek.

  'Stop messing about, or you'll really be dead and I won't bother to bury you.' I had no time for finesse. 'Look here-Members of my family, some of whom are young and sensitive, are gathering to see what's going on. I'll have to beat you up fast and very hard…' Zoilus understood. He had roamed among vagrants long enough to know about impatient men and the pain they could inflict.

  He caved in and answered me sensibly. He knew about the runaways who died in the night even though they were fit, or halfway fit. I asked if he had seen any being killed. He moaned a bit, which I took for an affirmative. I asked if the killer was a woman or a man; to my surprise, he said a man. It was one of the few statements I had ever heard him make with firmness.

  'Are you sure? So what had Zosime to do with it?'

  'Woo-oo…' This tremor was barely audible.

  'Oh stop it, Zoilus. Brace up, you ghoul! If I brought him in front of you, could you identify this man?'

  But Zoilus collapsed. Hiding his head in his spectral robe, he just writhed about and moaned more. Eventually I foolishly loosened my hold on him as Junia interrupted again, bringing a tray of dubious looking bites. Zoilus made a sudden run for it, through a set of double doors and away across the home-built sun terrace that was the pride and joy of Gaius Baebius. My hands were too greasy to stop him; my will was flagging too. As he fled, he snatched the purse with his agreed fee from Junia, but ignored her snacks. Maybe he could tell that my sister's famous over-salted, under-spiced deep-fried sesame balls were as hard as Pluto's heart in Hades.

  SATURNALIA, DAY SIX

  Eleven days before the Kalends of January (22 December)

  LXVIII

  The sixth day of Saturn alia often sees revellers reviving. Those who had been out of their heads for the past five days either die of drink and debauchery or learn to live with their condition. I felt I was enduring the worst aspects, with no chance to enjoy myself I missed the good events because of my work, and was sober for the grim ones.

  Junia's layered cheesecake was repeating on me acidically when I climbed out of bed. Helena rubbed my hunched shoulders and crooned sympathetically.

  'I'm depressed about that flautist.'

  'I know you are, love. Maybe today Mother will manage to get into the Vestals' House. She knows we are going to them tonight-' 'Are we?'

  'I'm sure I told you, Marcus.'

  'I'm sure you thought you did!'

  'Oh please be good about it. Mother is trying to create a normal festival for Claudia. She will do her best for you; she realises you're bound to ask has she talked to Ganna.'

  Being 'normal for Claudia' might be Julia Justa's aim, but her eccentric daughter threatened to jeopardise that: Helena had a bad conscience about leaving the priestess on her own for the past two evenings, so she proposed taking Veleda with us this time.

  'That's risking trouble! Ulterior motive?-You think ifClaudia hits her hard enough, Veleda will be done for and my problem will be over?'

  'Desperation! Somehow, Marcus, we have to resolve issues.'

  I said I wanted to resolve what I would have for breakfast first. It ended up being honey on a brown roll, but I ate it on the hoof Petronius Longus sent me a message to come to the doctor Mastarna's house. It wasn't to help Petro face up to a medical consultation: Scaeva's physician had killed himself

  I walked to the place by the Library of Pollio, musing on how many times I had been called out at first light by the vigiles. Suspicious deaths often occurred at night. Either that, or nosy neighbours informed at the patrol house last thing, so they could go to bed with a clear conscience. Sometimes the watch simply found the corpses while they did their rounds.

  When I reached the house, processing was virtually complete. 'Your name came up,' Petro informed me dourly. Whenever he found me involved in a case, he disapproved.

  What had happened looked obvious. Mastarna had been found by his housekeeper, the lop-sided midget I had seen before busying herself around his smart apartment. She was now pretty shocked. Sometimes if she had backache Mastarna would give her a 'tonic' so she slept well and the pain eased. She must have known that he had a habit of dosing himself with mandrake too, but she had not expected the jug of poison.

  We know he did himself in,' Petronius confirmed. 'It's classic. He left a note.'

  'Don't say that's where my name cropped up?'

  'Bright boy. "There is no wayout. Falco knows everything. I apologise."

  So what's that about?'

  I sat down to think. His despair could be because I had announced yesterday that I was on the verge of identifying Scaeva's killer. Petro and I gazed at the Etruscan lying on his reading couch. The toga he had worn so fastidiously when Helena and I visited now lay in a crumpled heap on the floor, one of the signs that he had roamed about the room in anguish before he stretched out on his couch, with a jug of dark liquid. There was a clean cup on the tray, untouched. He had swigged straight from the jug. Then he tossed the valuable article across the room. Drips followed its progress. One of the vigiles rubbed at a spot on the floorboards; Petro kicked him just in time as he went to lick his finger and taste the stuff.

  Petronius knew more than he had at first revealed, even to me. Mastarna had died yesterday evening. Before that, he had been visited by a colleague who had greatly upset him. The housekeeper was bad with names but she said the fellow-doctor was a Greek.

  'Must be Cleander. He has a spiteful attitude. And he gave the impression he knew something- must have concerned Mastarna.'

  There had been a short argument, then Cleander left. Mastarna went out a couple of times, seeming agitated and saying he wanted to seek advice from friends, but he returned forlorn because they were out. He asked for writing materials and sent the housekeeper to her own house; she lodged elsewhere. She said he was a very private man; Petro and I exchanged glances. Uneasy, the loyal biddy had got up very early and came to check on him. When she could get no answer, she panicked. Thinking the worst, she sent for the vigiles.

  'One of his friends turned up to see what Mastarna wanted yesterday-apparently he went around banging on doors like mad. The fellow is co-operating.' Petro had closeted the witness in another room, to which he now took me.

  I was surprised to see Pylaemenes. The dream therapist said that he had not known Mastarna well. He had been surprised that the man had been trying to see him so urgently last night. 'Bit of a shock Aedemon says Mastarna was after him too.'

  'You both know something that explains Mastarna's suicide?'

  'Everybody knows,' Pylaemenes exclaimed. 'Mter we saw you yesterday, that bastard Cleander must have come here, crowing that the game was up-th
ey were always on bad terms. Mastarna tried turning to Aedemon and me but then he despaired… Somebody is going to tell you now, so it may as well be me. This is what I know, Falco. I had a slight involvement because there had been a family argument. Quadrumatus needed me to interpret a dream and tell him whether he was right to take a stand.'

  'Quadrumatus Labeo,' I told Petro, 'is a man of enormous wealth and power, apparently incisive-yet he can't jump unless this star-spangled Chaldean tells him what to do.'

  'What was the problem?' Petro asked Pylaemenes.

  'Scaeva. Scaeva was always sickly. He wanted to be well for Saturnalia, when they had a big programme of events planned. He and his sister-'

  'Drusilla Gratiana. Wife to Quadrumatus,' I spelled out to Petro.

  'They were keen that Mastarna should carryout an operation on Scaeva's throat. Mastarna claimed he could remove Scaeva's inflamed tonsils and cure him. But Quadrumatus has his own doctor Aedemon-who strongly warned against it. Aedemon wanted to purge the patient of the impurities that he said would be causing the infections. As you know Fako, Cleander attends on Drusilla; he also is a huge opponent of surgery-that's his beef against Mastarna. But Drusilla was dead set on her brother trying anything.'

  'So young Scaeva is in misery, the doctors are all squabbling and the relatives are slogging it out at top volume; you get called in to tweak a dream or two as the beleaguered master's last resort?' Petronius looked askance. 'And you helped him decide what he thought, did you?'

  'Quadrumatus forbade the surgery,' agreed Pylaemenes coolly.

  I saw it all now. 'The others ignored him? Mastarna egged on Scaeva; Scaeva and his sister secretly arranged to have it done. So what happened? Was the operation on the same day Scaeva was found dead?'

  Pylaemenes nodded. 'He bled to death during the surgery. Mastarna admitted afterwards that it was a known risk.'

  It took me a moment to grasp the nuances. 'It was a throat operation! Unless Mastarna was the most brutal surgeon in history, or so drugged up he was floating on the ceiling, however could he slip with the knife so badly that he lopped offScaeva's entire head?'

  This time Pylaemenes just shrugged. 'Unbelievable. That's doctors for you.'

  It explained why no weapon had ever been found. After the debacle, Mastarna would have taken it away in his medical bag. Even if we now found a surgical implement drenched with blood, that would prove nothing. We could not say it came from Scaeva. Mastarna probably cleaned up the knife afterwards in any case. Most surgeons are that hygienic. Well, their patients hope they are.

  'So who removed the head?' mused Petronius. 'And why, then, did they put the head in the atrium pool?'

  'As a cover-up,' I said carefully. 'Drusilla still didn't want her husband to know that his orders had been countermanded. They organised a vindictive little enhancement, to disguise the bungled surgery and place blame on an innocent party.' Petro knew who I meant, of course.

  'There was panic,' said the Chaldean. 'Drusilla was distraught at the death of her brother-blamed herself Still blames herself, in fact, and frankly she's going to pieces over it. Her staff were running around in circles, wondering what to do. They all knew this was more than Quadrumatus would take. Drusilla herself found the head before they could warn her.'

  'Does Quadrumatus know the truth now?'

  'He suspects. His nightmares have been indicative.'

  'You could interpret them,' Petronius suggested. 'Might be for the best. Man deserves to know.'

  'The mind is a sensitive organ,' murmured Pylaemenes. 'He needs to work it out himself So much more healthy!' The bastard thought that whoever told Quadrumatus the truth of this tawdry episode might end up being dismissed.

  Petronius looked at me. His vigiles training had come to the fore. He was working out how to avoid documentation. 'There has been no crime, Falco. What they did with the head was an act of desecration-but that's for Quadrumatus to take up with his wife. Woman sounds troubled enough already. Her brother's death was stupid and avoidable, but that's her punishment. I'll put that death down as an accident. Mastarna's a suicide. Must have hated the thought of losing his reputation.'

  'And his business,' I said. 'Who would ever hire him after hearing he lost Scaeva that way? Besides, there might have been a whopping compensation claim. If Quadrumatus employs as many lawyers as doctors, one of them was bound to spot the potential to screw Mastarna for professional negligence.'

  Petronius whistled, thinking of the possible sums involved.

  For him, it was neat. I still had one preoccupation. 'Pylaemenes, what was the involvement of Scaeva's boy flautist?' Petro looked at me quickly. Unsure whether he knew yet that I had asked Marcus Rubella to authorise further investigation by the cohort, I told him, 'The flautist must have known something. I think he's been killed to stop him speaking out. I want Scythax to look at him.'

  'The flautist was supposed to be there,' interrupted Pylaemenes. 'He knew all about the operation. Scaeva used him for music therapy. So he was meant to be in the room all the time, playing soothing tunes to help relax people. Unfortunately he's a dozy soul- well, maybe he was scared of watching the surgery. I heard that he turned up too late. Mastarna had completed the operation-as far as it went, before the patient haemorrhaged everywhere. Drusilla and her maids were screaming. Scaeva was dead-that must have been obvious-and the child witnessed his master in pools of blood, in the very act of having his head cut off…'

  Petronius cursed, brutally. 'Killing the boy was pointless. Accidents happen. If there was no crime, there was no need to silence the little beggar.'

  'But since they did kill the flautist,' I barked back at him, 'there is a crime-and we are damn well going to solve it!'

  Petronius patted my shoulder. He knew about my deadline.

  'You've got your own worries. Leave this to us, Fako.'

  LIX

  I took Petronius Longus at his word.

  While I was out and about, I went to see Julia Justa. At the senator's house the door porter consented to say that my mother-inlaw had gone that morning to the Vestals' House, though she had not returned. Typical: Mastarna killed Scaeva and presumably he then decapitated the dead patient. I no longer needed an explanation, but I was obligated to JuliaJusta anyway… I would not have made her beg favours from her Vestal friend unless it was unavoidable; next time we needed the Vestal it was bound to be more difficult, and who knows what emergencies lay in the future?

  The senator was out. Gone to the gym. Perhaps to escape the stress at home. He and I were both members of Cassius' gymnasium by the Temple of Castor, so I thought I might drop in and find him there. Unfortunately, someone had reported my presence in the house to Claudia Rufina. She came flying downstairs, green stoles fluttering like yacht pennants, and accosted me. She was a good mother, and her arrival was punctuated by alternate wafts of a very expensive perfume and baby milk. One of her pendant pearl ear-rings was sitting askew; Claudia had a devoted Baetican maid and plenty of polished silver hand mirrors, so it had probably been playfully yanked by ninemonth-old Gaius Camillus Rufius Constantinus.

  She grabbed at my sleeve. 'Marcus, don't go!' 'Ah Claudia-don't hit me!'

  She lowered her voice swiftly to a quieter register. 'Don't ever joke about that, Falco.' Teasing was what this higWy anxious young woman needed, in my opinion. She needed to hand it out too. If she had let Justinus think she didn't give a damn, he would have come skipping home weeks ago. Still, not all women were like Helena

  Justina; that was why Helena had been inescapably my choice. I was still being surprised by her. Whereas this one had had her fiery moments and was generally viewed as temperamental, to me she would always be straightforward and predictable. I knew what she thought of my talents, for instance: 'You are never going to sort it out, are you?'

  'Claudia, don't be so pessimistic. Events are moving fast. Have you seen Quintus?'

  'I don't care if! never see him again.'

  'You do care-and, Claudia, you have t
o contact him. You and he must talk.'

  Claudia fiddled with the bangles on her wrist. 'Well he knows where to find us. He could come home. He could visit the baby, at least. '

  'Claudia, he really can't come at the moment. He is generously caring for a young soldier who is terribly wounded. Quintus and I are both fond of Lentullus, and he is perilously close to death. He saved your husband's life getting his wounds. Besides, I ordered Quintus to stay put. I had to. I'm trying to keep him out of Anacrites' clutches.'

  Claudia stared at the floor. 'That man came to see me.'

  He was back from Nemi then. 'I hope you didn't tell him anything. '

  Claudia's face clouded. She had talked. Rats. At least she was now feeling guilty about it. That meant she was vulnerable to pressure.

  'He's a bastard. Poor you. Was it awful?'

  'Oh Marcus, I told him Quintus was hiding with the vigiles. Was that very wrong of me?' Just very, very stupid.

  I sucked my teeth. 'Well, whatever comes of it, I'm sure Quintus will forgive you.' I let it sound doubtful. 'Given how much he loves you, Claudia…'

  Claudia Rufina burst into tears. Oh, excellent. Or as Helena scoffed later when I told her about it, 'You swine, Falco!'

  LX

  I was still trying to escape from Claudia when Julia Justa was brought home. The bearers carried the dilapidated Camillus chair into the hall, and she descended stiffly, looking weary, just as I was saying, 'Some men find it hard to show their true feelings, Claudia.'

  Shedding her cloak, Julia Justa gave me a narrow look. She was as shrewd as Helena and would have spotted at once just how I was working on Claudia's feelings. My deviousness would not surprise her. The noble Julia had always seen me as unreliable.