"A Body In The Bath House" - читать интересную книгу автора (Davis Lindsey)

VII

"A ulus," I instructed, addressing Aelianus by his personal name in in attempt to make him feel inferior. Pointless. If one thing had qualified that blighter for the Senate, it was his inborn sense of divinity. "Your job is to root out background on our suspects. We have a couple of leads: Pa gave me an address for the yard out of which they are supposed to operate, also a name for the winery where they were regulars. That's where he used to meet up to commission them for work" work being a euphemism with these fellows. Then here's a possible home address for Cotta. It's an apartment by a food shop called the Aquarius at the side of Livia's Portico."

"Where's that?" asked Aulus.

"On the Clivus Suburanus."

A silence.

That runs into town from the Esquiline Gate," I said calmly. Senators' sons were bound to be ignorant. This pair would have to start drawing themselves street maps. "If the apartment location is right, someone there should be able to send you on to Gloccus."

"So if I find them '

"Not likely. Unless they are very stupid' which was a possibility' they will have fled as soon as their man died. That's whether they topped him personally, or merely had the killer on their payroll."

"What would they be afraid of if they are innocent?" Innocent, that was a sweet word. Was our thickset, sullen Aulus a closet romantic?

"They would fear being tortured by the vi giles I corrected him. "The dead man had been deliberately hidden under their floor so they are at least accessories."

"Oh."

"Just pump their associates for clues about where they have run off to and physical descriptions would help."

Aelianus looked less than impressed with his task. Tough.

Both brothers were beginning to feel that working with me was not' glamorous. For starters, we were gathered at my new house on the

ri riverbank eating a very rapid breakfast. A bread roll and a beaker of warm water each came as a shock. They had expected tour-hour dalliances in wine shops

"What can I do?" nagged Justinus plaintively.

"Plenty. Solve the identity of the corpse. Go to the contractors' yard with your brother. Hang about after he leaves and talk to the other workmen." I knew Aelianus would be rude to the men; then Justinus would be more friendly. "Make them list whoever was on site during Pa's bath house job. Again, obtain descriptions. If they cooperate-'

"Which you don't expect?"

"Oh I expect the goddess Iris to glide down in a rainbow and tell us everything! Seriously, find out who is missing. If you get a clue, visit wherever the missing man lived and take things on from there."

"If nobody tells us who he was," Justinus said, frowning, 'how can we proceed, Falco?"

"Well, you're big boys," I said unhelpfully.

"Oh go on!" scoffed Aelianus. "Don't throw us in and leave us to sink."

"All right. Try this: Gloccus and Cotta were the main contractors. But half the fancy fittings were supplied, and sometimes fixed, by other firms. See the marble-bowl supplier, the mosaicist, the plumber who laid the water-pipes. They don't want to be blamed. So they may be less inclined to conceal the truth. Ask Helena which importer sold her that monster splash basin in the tepidarium. Ask my father's slaves for names of men who tramped mud through the kitchen fetching water for their mortar mix."

"Were workmen allowed in the main house?"

"No."

"That wouldn't have stopped them?"

"Right. If you want a really irritating experience, try talking to Pa himself."

Then what?"

"Just do the jobs I have suggested. Then we'll reconvene and pool ideas."

They looked sulky. I kept them back a moment. "Get this straight. No one forced you to come in with me. No anxious parent begged me to find you a position. I could use someone street-smart instead of you two amateurs. Never forget, I have a queue of my own relatives who need the work." The Camillus brothers were naive; they had no idea how much my relations despised me and my work- nor how

crudely I loathed the feckless Didii. "You both wanted this. I'm allowing it as an idealist. When you bunk otl back to the high lite, I'll just know that two pampered patricians have acquired practical knowledge through me."

"Oh noble Roman!"Justinus said, smiling, though he had lost his rebellious attitude.

I ignored it. "Campaign orders: you accept that I am in charge. Then we work as a team. There is to be no showing off on solo escapades. We meet up every morning here, and each man turns in full details of what he has found out so far. We discuss the next course of action together- and in the case of disagreement, my plan takes precedence."

"And what," demanded Aelianus caustically, 'are you intending to do on this case, Falco?"

I assured him I would be hard at work. True. My new house had a wonderful roof terrace, where I could waste hours playing. When I grew tired of planning herb troughs and realigning rose trellises, then the kind of dalliance in a wine shop that I had denied to the boys would suit me fine. If they guessed, neither knew me well enough to complain.

Taking both into the business brought me the benefit of their competitiveness. Each was determined to better his brother. Come to that, both would have been happy to put me in the wrong.

They played at being diligent. I amused myself wondering what the hair-plastered labourers made of them. Eventually we summed up progress: "Quintus, shoot the first spear."

Justinus had learned in the legions how to give intelligence reports to brusque commanding officers. He was relaxed. Looking deceptively casual, he surprised me with some useful gen: "Gloccus and Cotta have been partners for a couple of decades. Everyone speaks of them as famously unreliable- yet they are somehow accepted and still given work."

"Custom of the trade," I said gloomily. "A standard building contract contains a clause that says it shall be the contractor's responsibility to destroy the Premises, abandon the agreed Drawings and delay the Works until at least three Festivals of Compitalia have passed."

He grinned. "They do cheap house extensions, incompetent remodelling, occasional contract work for professional landlords. Presumably the landlords' fees are larger, so the incentive to turn up on site is greater."

"And landlords employ project managers who flay slackers," Aelianus suggested. I said nothing.

"Halt their clients are in dispute with them for years afterwards," Justinus continued. "They seem to live with it. When it looks like becoming a court case, Gloccus and Cotta cave in; they will sometimes bodge repairs, or a favourite trick is to hand over a free statue plinth as supposed compensation."

"Offering a half-price rude statue that the client doesn't want?"

"And thus squeezing even more cash from him! How did you know, Falco?"

"Instinct, my dear Quintus. Aulus -contribute?"

Aelianus squared up slightly. He was slapdash by nature, but a generous superior would say he might repay the effort of training him. I was not sure I called him a worthwhile investment. "Gloccus lives by the Portico of Livia with a skinny drab who yelled at me. Her hysteria seemed genuine- she hasn't seen him for some weeks."

"He left without warning and without paying the rent?"

"Astute, Falco!" Could I bear this patronising swine? "She described him rather colour fully as a fat, half-bald slob spawned by a rat on a stormy night. Other people agreed he's paunchy and untidy, but he has a secret charm that no one could quite identify. They "can't see how he gets away with it", seems the consensus."

"Cotta?"

"Cotta lives- or lived alone in a third-floor set of rooms over a street-market. He's not there now. No one locally ever saw much of him, and no one knows where he's gone."

"What's he like?"

"Skinny and secretive. Regarded as a bit of an odd case. Never really wanted to be a builder who can blame him? and rarely seemed happy with his lot. A woman who sold him cheese sometimes on his way home in the evening, said his older brother is something in the medical line- an apothecary perhaps? Cotta grew up in his shadow and always envied him."

"Ah, a thwarted-ambition story!" That sort of tale always makes me sarcastic. "Doesn't your heart bleed? "My brother saves lives, so I'll smash in people's heads to show I'm a big rissole too…" How do their workmen view these princes?"

"The labourers were surprisingly slow to insult them," marvelled Justinus. Perhaps it was his first experience of the mindless loyalty of men in trade men who know they may have to work with the same bastards again.

"Subcontractors and suppliers?"

"Buttoned up." They, too, stick with their own.

"Nobody would even tell us who's missing," Aelianus said, scowling.

"Hmm." I gave them a mysterious half smile. "Try this: The dead man is a tile-grouter called Stephanus." Aelianus started to glance at Justinus, then remembered they were on bad terms. I paused, to show I had noticed the reaction. "He was thirty-four, bearded, no distinguishing features; had a two-year-old son by a waitress; was known for his hot temper. He thought Gloccus was a turd who had diddled his previous week's wages. On the day he disappeared, Stephanus had gone to work wearing a worn, but still respectable, pair of site boots which had black thongs, one with a newly stitched repair."

They were silent for only a moment. Justinus got there first. "The waitress found out that you were working on the murder, and came to ask about the missing father of her son?"

"Smart boy. To celebrate, it's your turn to buy the drinks."

"Forget it!"Justinus exclaimed with a laugh. "I've a bride who thinks it's time we stopped living with my parents- and I've no savings."

The senator's house at the Capena Gate was a spacious spread but having many rooms to flounce off to only created more opportunities for quarrels. I knew Aelianus thought it was time that his brother and Claudia moved out. Well, he would. "We are not going to earn much on this, are we, Falco?" He wanted Justinus to suffer.

"No."

"I see it as an orientation exercise," Aelianus philosophised.

"Aulus," snarled his brother, 'you are so pompous, you really should be in the Senate."

I stepped in fast. "Informing is about days of nuisance work, while you long for a big enquiry. Don't despair," I chaffed them cheerily. "I had one once."

I gave them a few ideas for following up, though they were losing heart. So was I. The best ploy would be to drop this, but to store our notes handily under the bed. One day Gloccus and Cotta would return to Rome. Those types always do.

Whilst my runners pursued our uninspiring leads, I devoted myself to family issues. One joyless task was on behalf of my sister Maia; I ended her tenancy on the house Anacrites had trashed. After I gave the keys back to the landlord, I still used to walk that way, keeping watch. If I had caught Anacrites lurking in the area, I would have spitted him, roasted him, then thrown him to the homeless dogs.

In fact something worse happened. One evening I spotted a woman I recognised, talking to one of Maia's neighbours. I had told a few trusted people that my sister had moved away to a place of safety; I never mentioned where. Friends understood the situation. Nothing would be said to a casual enquirer. Her neighbour was now shaking her head unhelpfully.

But I knew the infiltrator. She had dangerous skills. Her paid task was finding people who were attempting to stay hidden. If she found them- that is, when she found them- they always regretted it.

This woman was called Perella. Her arrival confirmed my worst fears: Anacrites was having the place observed. He had sent one of his best operatives too. Perella might look like a comfortable, harmless bundle who was only after female gossip. She was past her prime; nothing would change that. But under the dark frumpy gown she had the body of a professional dancer, athletic and tough as tarred twine. Her intelligence would shame most men; her persistence and courage frightened even me.

She worked for the Chief Spy. She was damned good and she enjoyed that fact. She usually worked alone. Scruples did not trouble her. She would tackle everything; she was utterly professional. If she had been given the ultimate order, I knew that she would kill.

My solution was easy. Sometimes the Fates must have a drop too much to drink; while they lie down groaning with a headache, they forget to screw you.

A let-out arrived the same evening, when I reached home. The lads and I had arranged to hold a final consultation about the missing builders. Aelianus and Justinus had discovered something that day which made them think we should call off our search.

"Gloccus and Cotta are way out of reach." Aelianus used a nasty smirk sometimes.

I was too upset by Perella; I just rambled, with half my mind on it: "So where are they? A yurt in darkest Scythia? While some tradesmen dream of retiring to a tasteless southern villa, with a pergola that a Babylonian king would envy, do bath house contractors opt for being smoked to oblivion with filthy drugs in exotic eastern tents?"

"Worse, Falco." Suddenly I knew what was coming. Still too full of himself, Aelianus continued, "There is some large project overseas- building specialists are being sent from Rome. It is regarded as a hard posting, but we were told it is surprisingly popular."

"High rates of pay,"Justinus inserted dryly.

They were trying to be mysterious, but I already knew of a project that would fit.

"Do you want to guess, Falco?"

"No."

I leaned back, cradling my head. I sucked my teeth. This was normal man-management: I looked supercilious while they looked shifty. "Right. We'll go there."

"You don't know where it is," complained Aelianus, always the first to jump in blindly when he ought to suspect a catch.

"Don't I? They are builders, aren't they?" I knew where all the contractors were rushing off to currently. "Now. I owe this to your parents: one of you has to stay in Rome and mind the office. Agree between you who wins the chance to travel. I don't care how. Draw counters from an urn. Throw dice. Ask a dirty astrologer."

They were reacting too slowly. Justinus got there first: "Falco knows!"

"They've gone to a project known as the Great King's House. Am I right?"

"How do you know, Falco?"

"We are looking for two builders. I make sure I know what's being talked about in the building world." It was a coincidence but I could live with assistants who thought I had magical powers. "This is an enormous, glamorous palace being built for an old supporter of Vespasian's. The Emperor takes a personal interest. Unluckily for us, the great one who has an unpronounceable name which we must learn to say is king of a tribe called the Atrebates. They live on the south coast. That's the south coast on the wrong side of the Gallic Strait. It's an evil stretch of water, and it separates us from a ghastly province."

I stood up, "I repeat: one of you can pack a bag. Bring warm clothes, a very sharp sword, plus all your courage and initiative. You have three days to kiss the girls goodbye, while I finalise our commission."

"Falco! What commission?"

"One Vespasian has particularly begged me to accept. Our commission from Sextus Julius Frontinus, provincial governor of Britain, to investigate the Great King's House."

It was horrible but neat.

I would go; I would have to take Helena; that would mean we took the children. I had sworn never to go back, but oaths are cheap. Gloccus and Cotta were not the only lure. I would drag along Maia, removing her from Rome and from Anacrites' grasp.

I set it all up very quietly. I had to arrange things at the Palace so discreetly that Anacrites would not find out. Only then did I warn Maia.

Being one of my sisters immune to good sense, careless of her own safety, and thoroughly bloody-minded Maia refused to go.