See Delphi And Die (10 page)

'When Caesia died,' I butted in, sounding snappish, 'this Phineus fled straight back to Rome. It's suspicious to me! Any sign of similar in the Valeria case?'

'No, no. Phineus is all right,' Aquillius reassured me. 'Really knows his stuff. Understands this country better than anyone. If I was booking a culture tour, Falco, I'd travel with Seven Sights. Phineus gives people the best time.'

'So what if I want to interview this man?'

'Oh he'll be back.'

When I asked Aquillius if I could see his interview tablets from the Olympia investigation, he had to confess he had not taken any notes.

'Go and get your head down, Falco. Let me know if there is anything that we can do. Enjoy your stay. And don't forget - the governor's office only wants to help!'

XXI

To work. After waking late and settling in next day, Helena and I took ourselves for a mid-morning brunch at the Helios, the rooming house where the Seven Sights group were penned up. Glaucus had gone to find himself a gymnasium. Our youngsters were out seeing the town. We knew that meant looking for the temple with the official prostitutes, but we were confident they would just stand around and stare. Helena had said if they got into any sort of trouble in the administrative capital of a province where I was working, we would abandon them.

'She's joking!' Gaius protested.

'Dear nephew, do not be too sure. If you commit a crime here, you take your chance with local justice.'

Gaius had no idea that one of his uncles had been eaten by an arena lion when he offended local sensibilities whilst accompanying me on a mission overseas. (To be truthful, we did not entirely abandon Famia. We cremated the few pieces of him that survived the gnawing, and took the ashes back to Rome.)

The Helios had a porch with a colourful terracotta architrave, but that was its only gesture to graciousness. We could see that the rooms were tiny and dark; the corridors managed to smell damp, even on a baking hot day. We wondered what favour Aquillius Macer had owed the proprietor, to make him place the suspects here. This time, he really was keeping down the demand on his contingency fund. They were crowded in a sour billet.

Still, there was a small courtyard, shaded by pergolas from which dangled still-unripe bunches of grapes. Beneath, stood a selection of wobbly tables and benches. Helena and I ensconced ourselves side by side against a wall, so we could both survey the area. Food was available; they sent out to a nearby fish restaurant.

While we waited, Helena drew up a list of reasons why people went on leisure tours. 'Escape; culture - art and architecture; other kinds of education - curiosity about the world beyond Rome...'

'Sex.' I was thinking of my conversation with Aquillius yesterday.

'Religion!' she countered, unaware that that fitted my category. Helena, who had sharp sensitivities, then quizzed me with those great brown eyes. I told her what the quaestor had said about the Aphrodite of Cnidus. She giggled. As always, this reduced me to helplessness. 'Showing off!' Helena added, for some reason.

'Sport.'

'Collecting things.'

'Adventure.'

'Writing a book.'

'Oh lady, now you are being silly!'

Helena chuckled again, then steadied and advised that when I interviewed the group members, I should find out which of them were writing travel diaries.

I concentrated on trying to wedge bits of broken pot under a leg of our table to stabilise it.

The trapped travellers came to lunch early. We were barely into our stale rolls and pan-fried octopus when in strolled a man with a short body on extremely long legs; he was thin and balding and everything about him said he was a self-opinionated fool. Helena had unrolled our letter from Aulus on the table; assessing the man, she placed the clean, pointed end of her spoon against the name of Tiberius Sertorius Niger, the father of the family in the family of four. Sure enough, his wife joined him: a pale woman reading Herodotus (she read bits aloud, mainly to herself; no one else took any notice. Helena, who had whizzed through the histories on our way out from Italy, recognised the passage). Soon after, their two children came, gobbled a few mouthfuls, spilt a jug of water, then kept wandering off from the table and looking for mischief. The boy was about fourteen, the girl slightly younger. They were sullen and bored.

Next came a middle-aged woman, solo, rather stout, with wispy hair, struggling to manage her over-large lop-sided garments. She nodded to the mother, who must have previously discouraged the widow (as we had guessed this was) from sitting among the Sertorius family. Instead, Helvia plonked herself down at the table next to ours. Helena might have made conversation, but we needed to remain detached observers for a little longer; she became absorbed in the letter from Aulus, while I just scowled anti-socially. Although Aulus had called Helvia 'fairly stupid', she must have deduced that I was a dangerous dog who might froth at the mouth if spoken to. She avoided looking at us.

Suddenly she began a prolonged consultation of the chalked slate which served as a menu board (deciphered, the spidery Greek letters simply said there was octopus in sauce, or octopus without). Helvia's fixed preoccupation was a cover, so she could avoid a shabby, slouching man, wearing a large conical hat, who wandered in and looked around for someone to disturb: this had to be Volcasius.

Helena dug me in the ribs; I countered with a lecherous squeeze, to make it look as if we were lovers on a private tryst. No use.

'Is anybody sitting here?'

'We are waiting for friends!' Helena put him off coldly. Volcasius stared at her as if he needed an interpreter, but as he hovered on the brink of joining us anyway, my sweetheart waved him away like a bothersome wasp. No one meeting Helena for the first time was ready for her blistering glare. Volcasius wandered off, and was soon shifting from empty table to empty table. The waiter must have experienced his unsettled behaviour before and ignored him.

Two men came in together. Helena decided they were Indus and Marinus, who as single men of mature years had paired up. They were oddly assorted, one short and one long, both in their fifties, both cheery and sociable. We could not work out which was the widower and which the man Aulus had defined for some reason as 'disgraced'. They glanced around for the least awful spot to sit, though without making it obvious; then they politely shared with Helvia. Volcasius looked as if he were thinking about squashing in with them too, but the taller of the men had adroitly moved the spare seat sideways, then stretched out his leg on it as if he had a painful knee. After perusing the menu board, he joked, 'Same as yesterday! Bootstraps with gravy, or bootstraps plain...'

At this point two couples arrived together, making lots of noise, all with very white garments and heavy jewellery. The foursome may not have been drinking yet, but with lunch on hand they were cheerfully expecting it. We guessed that the loudest pair must be Cleonyma and Cleonymus; he had a pristine short haircut, hers was piled high in elaborate turrets and swayed as she tottered about on problematic wooden heels. The 'fun folk' as Aulus had called them, Minucia and Amaranthus, were bitterly complaining. He had run out of money and been flagrantly cheated by a currency-changing Egyptian at the local port of Kenchreai (this seemed to have been several days ago, but still rankled. She had just been through a revolting experience in the public lavatory the group had to use (as they moaned loudly, the Helios let them sleep but not shit; the sit-down had flooded all over her cerise suede sandals (not for the first time, apparently, though nowhere near as badly as a legendary facility at Paphos... Despite their fury, Minucia and Amaranthus were bearing up with engaging good nature, assisted by the willingness of Cleonyma and Cleonymus to ply them with red wine.

Copious jugs had appeared as soon as Cleonymus arrived. This must be a daily ritual; it looked as if he acted as a regular paymaster for the whole group. I saw Sertorius' wife shake her head rapidly in annoyance. She refused the waiter's proffered tray, then muttered darkly to her husband. Sertorius, though, looked as if he thought, why refuse a free drink? Plenty of scope for family tension there.

'Oh it's all experience, isn't it?' shrieked Minucia to Helena, as she lurched against our table. 'No point coming away unless you see the funny side of life!'

Helena smiled, but tried to remain unobtrusive. Unfortunately, I noticed the Sertorius parents with their heads close again, having another angry discussion. I hoped it was still about the big-hearted, wealthy Cleonymus always supplying wine. Not so. Sertorius Niger pushed back his seat noisily. He stood up, strode across the courtyard and came directly to our table.

'You!' he cried, in a voice that made everyone else look up. 'You are spying on our group, confess it!'

'That's right.' I put down my spoon calmly. 'My name is Didius Falco and I represent the Emperor. I am here to interview you all - so why don't you sit down right now? You can be first.'

XXII

Sertorius had sat down before he realised I had given him orders. He coloured in indignation. His wife scuttled up, protectively; she must expend a lot of effort in saving him from the effects of his rudeness. Then their children came over, looking inquisitive. The girl placed herself behind her mother, hanging over her with her thin arms around the woman's neck in a display of unnecessary affection; she had knocked her mother's beaded ear-rings awry. The boy swaggered up and helped himself to our remaining food. We had finished eating, so we ignored it until he began flicking a strip of octopus at the sauce in the serving dish to make it splash all over the place (yes, we had chosen the version with sauce, hoping for our favourite at home, pepper and fennel in red wine; we never learn).

Helena closed her hand around his wrist. 'You know, Tiberius Sertorius, son of Tiberius,' she informed him, with blistering sweetness, 'I would not allow bad behaviour like that from Julia, my three-year-old! Please, either listen quietly, or if you cannot stop fidgeting, go and wait for your parents in your room.' She released him, and let his shock register.

Helena had observed that the two teenagers tyrannised even their own family, mainly because no one ever pulled them up. Her public rebuke startled all of them. The parents were nonplussed and had the grace to look embarrassed. The boy subsided grumpily. Behind the father's back, I could see Indus and Marinus silently applauding. They were the group's subversives. I had hopes of juicy gossip from that pair, later.

'You have worked out all our names!' Sertorius senior accused us, still annoyed about spying.

'Nothing sinister.' My reply was mild. 'It is my job to be well briefed. May we talk about Valeria and Statianus? When did you first encounter them?'

'We all met up for the first time when we took ship at Ostia,' the wife began.

'Let me deal with this, dear!'

As the husband interrupted, Helena cut across him and spoke directly to the woman in a friendly voice. 'I am so sorry; your name is one we don't have specifically.'

'Sertoria Silene.' Her Greek second name, taken with the shared family name, explained some things. The rude bastard with the superior attitude had married his ex-slave. He never let her forget it. Now they had two children he could not control, while she was too diffident to try. The children had little respect for their mother, taking the lead from their father.

'Let your wife contribute,' I murmured to Sertorius, with mock-confidentiality. 'I find that women have the best memories.'

'Oh well, if you want trivia...' At his scathing sneer, I merely smiled, aiming to mend fences. Helena would give me all Hades for it afterwards, but my business was to humour these folk. 'As she says,' He referred to his wife without naming her; he must be ashamed of her origins. 'We met as a group on board ship; the Calliope - absolutely ghastly hulk. Bilges were so full of water, they could hardly steer the thing. Not what we were promised. That's going to be the first point in my letter of complaint. Before I get started on this place, of course. Putting us up here is an outrage. The manager is running a brothel on the side.

'Tell Aquillius. It's up to him how he houses you. Stick to facts, please. First sighting of the wedded ones?'

I knew my rebuke would rile Sertorius; he believed he was ultra-efficient. He squinted at me angrily, then said in a tight voice. 'The newly-weds were pretty well invisible at first. Later they peered out of their shells a bit.'

'They had only been together a week at most, when we started,' put in Sertoria Silene.

'Were they happy?' asked Helena.

'You mean, were they having a lot of bedtime fun?' broke in Sertorius coarsely, as if he were accusing Helena of prudery.

'Actually, I meant both.' She met his eyes directly, chin up and challenging.

'No doubt - both applied.' Sertorius answered as if he had not noticed Helena answering back, but his voice rasped - a sign of uncertainty.

'Did their relationship deteriorate?' Helena turned from the husband as if he did not exist, seeking details from Sertoria Silene.

'They did argue sometimes. But I thought if they stuck it out, they would settle down eventually. They were young. He had never had control of any money before, so he bungled it - and she was brighter than him.'

This was a sharp evaluation. I had underestimated Sertoria. While her fool of a mate seemed to dominate, I wondered if she had married him knowing she could run rings around him. It was citizenship at a price, but the price might have been worth it. She could read, poring over her Herodotus, clearly for her private pleasure; she would never have been a mere kitchen skivvy, but must have occupied a good household position. Helena told me later, she could imagine the woman as the educated secretary and companion of some previous, probably wealthy, wife. The wife died; Sertorius hated to live alone, so he picked up the nearest female who would accept him. That made sense. We did not envisage them having an illicit liaison while the first wife was still alive; mind you, anything is possible.

'And what do you know about the day Valeria died?'

'Oh nothing, really.' So Sertoria Silene had been told to prevaricate. I blamed the pompous husband for that.

I took up the questioning, addressing him. 'The men went to watch combat sports that day. Statianus came with you all?' He nodded. 'While the women took a tour of the Pelops relics?' Both looked surprised that I knew so much. People like this would never have met an informer before. 'Valeria too?' This time Sertoria nodded. Then she stared down at her lap. The daughter, still dangling around the mother's neck in a way that must have been painful, was suddenly still. I leaned back and stared at them, then asked softly, 'So what happened?'

'Nothing happened.'

Untrue, Sertoria.

I resumed my questions to Sertorius. 'And that night, you all ate together?'

'No. We men were dragged off to a so-called feast.' He sneered. 'It was supposed to simulate how winners in the Games celebrate at a banquet in the Prytaneion - if theirs is the awful standard that we had to endure, then I pity them. The women stayed at the tents, and all complained when we rolled home slightly merry!'

Helena pursed her lips in sympathy at Sertoria Silene, who rolled her eyes, to indicate how disgusting this had been.

'At what point that evening did Statianus and Valeria have their final quarrel? Was it when he reappeared drunk?' I wondered if it was Valeria's first experience of this. Given that she had been brought up only by a guardian and a remote grandfather in Sicily, the girl might never before have seen a close relative staggering and vomiting and behaving unreasonably. Maybe she was squeamish.

'Before we men went out.' Sertorius disappointed me.

'It was just a tiff,' his wife murmured, almost whispering the words.

I rounded on her. 'So you do know what it was about?'

She shook her head quickly. Helena shot me a warning not to harass Sertoria, then leaned forward to her. 'Please tell us. This is so important!'

But Sertoria Silene insisted, 'I don't know.'

Her husband then told us, just as decisively, that none of them knew anything of subsequent events. As a family, he said, they retired early to bed - because of the children, he charmingly explained. His wife had already told us he had been drunk, so no doubt there had been angry words, followed by tortured silences.

As if scared that somebody would say too much, they all stood up and retreated to their room, ending our interview.

Helena let them go with the mild comment that it would do the Sertorius children good to have an enforced afternoon nap.