The Ides of April fam-1 Page 7

  If I had come later, I would have had a session with Serena, the best physical manipulator on the Aventine, but she tended to work in the evening when the baths were officially open. Combing my hair dry in a patch of sunshine served to calm me almost as much as a massage. The long slow strokes always reminded me of those first months after I was brought to Rome. I very quickly got to know all of my new female relatives; they were numerous, and I learned to dread the heavy-handed ones. Every time any of them visited our house, I would be passed across to be worked on. Most women in Rome own a nit-comb and are adept at using it.

  I have dark hair which, unfortunately, gives no clue to my original nationality. I will always remember the first time Helena washed it for me: her firm but kindly touch as she made me endure the warm water on my tender scalp, while I whimpered and wriggled, then the wonderful clean scent of rosemary as she rinsed and untangled everything. She could have had a slave look after me, but she had chosen to foster me, so she herself carried out all the unpleasant tasks of cleaning me up and taming my wild habits. I wanted so desperately to be mothered, at first I could hardly bear to trust her in case our new relationship abruptly ended. It took me years to realise that motherhood did not come to her naturally; she saw it as a duty and would much rather have been reading, or spending time with her husband.

  She loved us now. No, that sounds wrong; she had always given us love, willingly and amply, but she enjoyed us more, now we were older and she could talk to us as equals.

  She had hated it when I left home to make my own life as an informer, seeing my exit as her own failure. But she too was a dogged, independent spirit; I had learned that from her. Undoubtedly, she was proud of me now. I often went home and consulted her about my work.

  Thinking about her, I decided to have lunch with Mother today.

  The girls were out, visiting friends, and our brother was having lessons, so I stayed for hours, talking and not talking, just spending time together. Just when I was thinking I should leave, the girls reappeared, full of excitement; then Father came home from the auction house, so we all adjourned to the roof terrace for the ceremony of hearing about his day. Many bowls of olives later, I declined the offer of dinner, and made my way back up the Hill to Fountain Court.

  I was in a good mood. Most of the day had gone by, but who cared? That is the bonus of being freelance. You can make your own hours-always an excuse for working no hours at all.

  My mood improved even more when Rodan emerged to tell me that Metellus Nepos had called while I was away, and had left something for me. He had brought my payment for the work I did for Salvidia, plus extra for when he hired me himself. He had even presented me with a sample of his cheese too. Such a civilised man. Immediately my benign feelings towards him reasserted themselves.

  It was too late to apply myself to work, and since I didn't know how long Nepos would remain in Rome now the funeral was over, I decided to trip around to Lesser Laurel Street, tell him his offerings had been safely received and say thank you.

  That was when I found him in a terrible tizzy. He was about to visit the house of a neighbour who had died, just after she attended his stepmother's funeral. Celendina was her name. I had not known that previously, but I gathered she was the old woman I had talked to at the necropolis. That alone gave me a reason to accompany Nepos and pay my own respects-even though he and I both knew I was going along out of professional curiosity. Celendina had been perfectly well yesterday, a self-sufficient body who had stood at the side of the pyre without complaint until she had to leave. I could still see her in my mind's eye, as she toddled off home at a good pace. Although she was elderly, Nepos and I were both amazed to learn she had died barely hours afterwards.

  Nepos was very upset. I could not blame him. There seemed a striking similarity to what happened with his stepmother. Neither of us thought it was a coincidence.

  Celendina had lived just around the corner. As I walked there with Metellus Nepos, I tried calming him, to little avail.

  Some well-disposed neighbour had supplied a couple of small cypress trees to stand either side of the doorway. People who lived locally were keeping a sharp eye out for visitors, as they do when something odd has happened and they don't want to miss what follows. We soon had several helpful persons presenting us with information.

  It was a night and a day since the old woman had been found dead. Her body was no longer at the house but had been taken away by the undertaker-an officially supplied one. Somehow the vigiles had become involved at the scene. From what we heard, I realised their removing the body was for a corpse-inspection, in a case of presumed foul play. But this sounded different to what occurred before with Salvidia, at least in the neighbours' version-a sorry tale that only emerged slowly as people started to feel uncomfortable about it.

  It was her son Celendina had lived with and vigiles' suspicions centred on him. As I had deduced, he had been not right from birth; we were told that only people who knew him very well could communicate with him. He was never able to go out, and had grown into a strange, heavy lump who became upset if he was alone for too long, so that was why his mother left the funeral early. Sometimes in the past a neighbour had minded him for Celendina, but I could tell they had never liked doing it. No one wanted to take over full-time care of him now. Motherless, his future was uncertain.

  The son, Kylo, was no longer at the house. The neighbours said people had been drawn there last night by him screaming and shouting. They broke in and found him with his mother's lifeless body, violently shaking her. Everyone at once assumed something had gone wrong between them and he must have killed her. In such circumstances, people easily turn against a man with mental difficulties. Uproar ensued. The vigiles arrived. Now Kylo was in custody, accused of his mother's murder.

  One peculiarity of the events was that, although no one could make sense of most things Kylo said, when they found him he distinctly said several times: "Flavia Albia." My name.

  XII

  I made sure I got to the vigiles before they came looking for me.

  Our local cohort was the Fourth. Their headquarters was in the Twelfth District, over in the Piscina Publica, by the Aqua Marcia. They had sub-barracks too, one of which covered the Thirteenth, here on the Aventine. I knew it well. I had been coming here as long as I had lived in Rome, so it held no terrors for me.

  You could tell you were approaching the barracks by the number of gloomy drinking bars. The complex had a pair of huge gates, which led into a courtyard stacked with equipment for firefighting, which was the vigiles' primary purpose. Their other interest, in crime, had developed when the patrols who went out sniffing for smoke at night kept running into muggers and burglars as those evil-doers carried out their own nightly patrols. The vigiles started to arrest them. So law and order became an additional function. It would be nice to think that made Rome a safer place, but only halfwits would believe it.

  The force was composed of ex-slaves, volunteers who each served six hard years then gained the privilege of citizenship-if they survived. They were led by ex-soldiers, one of whom in the Fourth had been an uncle of mine. He was now officially retired, though whenever he managed to give my aunt the slip, he still hung around the station house like a disapproving ghost, on the excuse of unfinished business; there was a particular gangster he had failed to catch. It continued to obsess him.

  Like many community organisations, there was never enough money allowed for the vigiles' upkeep, while they also had no prestige and so no incentive to excel. This gave the men a hangdog, shabby air; they could often be seen lolling against a siphon engine in some quiet alley, pretending to wait for a call-out, but eating snacks and chatting up loose women. They had a humourless tribune, who roosted in the main building in the Twelfth, while Titus Morellus was now in charge of investigations in our local depot. He was typical- overweight, shaved head, lazy attitude. He was not quite as sweaty as some of the others, though they all smelled.

  "Flavia A
lbia! Don't you come here begging for favours."

  He knew who I was. That is to say, in vigiles' terms, he knew who my father and uncle were (best pals, who had cooperated on many a case in their day-a day that was past now, though not according to them). I would hardly have counted here, but for a lucky breakthrough on an old inquiry: my own reputation rested on that time I exposed a doctor who drugged his women patients and then interfered with them. A couple of them had got together afterwards and asked me for help. Unfortunately, that was ten years ago and we were running cut of men who remembered it. The vigiles have short memories. Although in theory they build up local expertise and a detailed record of previous cases, in fact their interest only extends to this week's tasks. Half the time they are not even interested in those.

  I told Morellus why I had come. He spat. The vigiles were all crude.

  "Yes, we've got the lad here. I call him a lad; he must be over thirty but he's like a big baby. And big he is; his poor old mother must have struggled to deal with him."

  "So what's the verdict?" I asked, attempting a show of respect for his opinion.

  "He can pee in a pot. We don't have to change his loincloth."

  "Don't be a pain, Morellus. What's the verdict about his mama?"

  "The obvious one. He killed her."

  "True?"

  "No, convenient," Morellus admitted. "You know us, we're very public-spirited. We just want a good clear-up rate." If he had been more sophisticated, this would pass for a joke. In him, it was a curious mix of mild shame at their failings and real couldn't-care-less.

  I told him I had heard a rumour that there were many mysterious deaths happening. He shrugged. "Nobody has told us. But nobody ever tells us anything."

  I thought, there could be a good reason for that. . "There is an aedile involved now."

  "There would be!" He spoke with contempt.

  I grinned to show I shared it. "Can I see this Kylo?"

  "In the cells. One of my boys is looking after him, one who has a child of his own that was born simple. You know. Big head and squinty eyes. According to her father, his little girl needs help, but has a wonderful personality. She's vulnerable, but completely loving."

  "What do you think?"

  "I think he's right," Morellus replied immediately, giving me back a level stare. "She does."

  "Have a wonderful personality?"

  "That's what I said."

  "But is Kylo different? Do you believe he is capable of violence?"

  "He is odd." Morellus mimicked Celendina's son, holding one arm across his chest, with the hand dropped, and hitching up one hip. "Someone like that might be feared locally, especially as he is so big and powerful. Say a group of neighbours responded to a commotion, found her dead with her son shouting wildly and holding her corpse-what happens? It would be instinct for them all to assume he had shaken the old woman to death."

  "So?"

  Morellus might be fat and lazy, but he had a brain when he bothered to use it. "Could be something different. What if in fact Kylo had panicked? He found her dead, became upset, then just shook her as hard as he could in a hopeless attempt to wake her up again?"

  I said that was remarkably fair-minded, to which Morellus- blushing-replied that I was not to quote him.

  The prisoner was sitting on the ground in the second courtyard. The vigilis who was on guard had him feeding crumbs to pigeons. Physically, he looked no more dumb than any barrow boy or household messenger, though the brain damage was obvious in his vacant eyes and the way he held himself. Morellus had done a good mime.

  Kylo was tall, powerfully built and deeply uncommunicative. He had loose curls like a little boy but was indeed over thirty; despite that, you could see at a glance that he could not take care of himself. His mother must have managed everything: food, dress, hygiene, keeping him occupied, keeping his sexuality in check. She would have had a lifetime of defending him from other people's ignorance, and of pleading with people to accept him.

  I explained who I was. Although it seemed rude to talk about Kylo in his presence, he was taking absolutely no notice of us. The vigilis agreed that without his mother, Kylo was lost. "And he knows it."

  Even though Kylo appeared not to be listening in, he glanced up when we mentioned his mother. I saw the fear and sadness in his eyes. Yes, he knew. The only person who had ever cared for and looked after him was gone. He was alone; nobody wanted him; he was finished.

  I managed to get his attention for a moment and said clearly, "I am Albia." It seemed to mean nothing to him. I said it again. "My name is Flavia Albia. Somebody said you wanted me."

  There was no response. I explained to the vigilis how Kylo was supposed to have spoken my name to the neighbours. If so, he had already forgotten why. Maybe his mother had come home and told him about Salvidia's funeral, mentioning that she had met me. In his first moments of terror after Celendina died, he might have clung on to her last words. Now, there was no way we would get him to explain. He had completely forgotten all about it.

  Since the vigilis had a daughter with disabilities, even if hers were different from Kylo's, I thought his advice was worth having. "He doesn't look like a murderer. He's just a great lopsided lump who seems happy enough feeding pigeons. Do you think he killed his mother?"

  With regret in his voice, the man answered, "I think we have to proceed as if he may have done."

  "Would it have been accidentally?"

  "I can imagine that."

  "Really? Some little thing upset him and he suddenly lashed out? Then Celendina was not strong enough, or not quick enough, to get out of the way safely?"

  "Could be."

  "I met the mother at a funeral. I suppose she may have been tired after that, and let her attention wander … Or perhaps Kylo was piqued by her leaving him alone. But he seems docile now."

  "We'll have him here a few more days before we charge him. I am supposed to watch and assess him."

  I was unhappy about it. "There is no witness to what he is supposed to have done, no proper evidence. You call this justice?"

  "No," said the man quietly. "The neighbours were throwing rocks at the house. They were all set to tear him apart. We call it protective custody."

  As I left, Morellus emerged from an interview room and called out to me. "His Eminence wants a word with you. I have orders to take you over to the Twelfth."

  He meant Cassius Scaurus, the tribune, the humourless one. Scaurus ran his cohort the same way as his predecessors did; the method was to put up his feet in the main station house over in the Piscina Publica while he thought up ways to cream off the budget for his personal use. He ruled this outstation by the fine tradition of leaving it to look after itself.

  I knew a truly serious interview would entail me being tied to a bench or chair and subjected to endless shouted questions in a very violent atmosphere. It was unlikely they would use their heated metal implements to inflict unbearable pain, though it could not be ruled out. The aim was to force a confession. Any confession. It did not have to be true. Why niggle about details?

  "What does he want?"

  "The proverbial few questions."

  "Help with your enquiries? Is he authorising the full torture package?"

  "He has to get a chit from the Prefect for that," Morellus admitted, as if he thought I might find this comforting. "I had the impression your interview will be limited to basics-horrible threats and mental cruelty."

  "Delightful! So when are you coming to collect me?" I asked thoughtfully.

  "When I get around to it," Morellus told me. His tone was heavy with the suggestion that it would never happen. I hoped he did not expect a reward for "forgetting" to do it-especially sexual favours. Perhaps he took a lenient attitude out of respect for my father and uncle. That may have figured partly, but the real reason was that he loathed the tribune.

  "Right. Don't expect me to come quietly."

  "No, I'll arrive mob-handed."

  "I don't suppose the
re is any point in me asking what I am supposed to have done, Morellus?"

  He laughed.

  Hunching my shoulders, I threw my stole round them angrily. "And you still expect me to believe you when you say that there is no funny business going on?"

  Morellus paused. The flabby, lackadaisical brute really did hate that tribune to a horrid degree. "I suppose, Flavia Albia, if I wanted to upset the old man by taking the initiative, I could start asking around about mysterious deaths."

  I was satisfied. I despised him, but the dregs of being a good officer had somehow survived in him. He could do a decent job when he chose. He would also be deeply annoyed if he discovered that his superior had been keeping him in the dark. If Morellus did uncover any funny business happening on the Aventine, which the tribune had failed to mention to him, then because of his deep-seated loathing of Cassius Scaurus, there was a good chance Morellus would pass on the details to me.

  XIII

  "Well, Flavia Albia-you're hiding quite a history!"

  There was only one way to offset my depression: lunch. I had come to the Stargazer, the neighbourhood snack-bar my relatives had owned for years, where the aediles' archivist now discovered me. Rodan probably told Andronicus where I would be and, as I greeted my new friend with a lightly pattering heart, for once I blessed the porter.

  Andronicus flopped on a bench opposite. Junillus, the young waiter, came to see what he wanted. Being Junillus, he just stood silently, with a waxed tablet poised for writing orders. He had an apron. He had cocked his head. It was obvious why he was there.

  When Andronicus said nothing, Junillus walked off, presumably thinking the customer needed more time. I noticed the archivist moved the purse on his belt to a more central position, instead of on his hip. That conveniently told Trinius the pickpocket where to find it, once Trinius had finished glugging his mulsum and wanted to lift the price of tomorrow's drink before he left. "The waiter seems a bit off…"