Finished Business (9 page)

Now, I have to be very careful about the next bit. There was shock, yes, that was to be expected. But I had the distinct feeling that there was something else, a stillness and a sharpening of interest, like the atmosphere in the room had changed somehow. Trouble was I couldn’t tell where it originated; it could’ve been with any one of them, or with all four. All I knew was that it was there.

‘You’re joking,’ Longinus said.

‘No, there’s no mistake. The evidence is quite clear. He was killed deliberately.’

‘Have you any idea who did it?’

‘Who the actual killer was, yes. One of the garden slaves saw a freedman coming from the direction of the tower at about the right time, and acting suspiciously. A middle-aged guy with a scar or a birthmark on his left cheek.’ I shrugged. ‘That’s more or less all I know at present. Who organized the murder and why, well, your guess is as good as mine.’

‘Sweet holy Jupiter!’ Longinus was staring at me. ‘So how can I help you? I haven’t seen Lucius since I left for Asia almost a year ago. And not for a good two months before then, either.’

This was the tricky bit. ‘Uh … it’s rather personal, sir. I think perhaps we’d better talk in private.’ I turned to the others. ‘No offence, gentlemen.’

‘Nonsense, Corvinus. I’m sure you can’t ask me any questions that I’d be embarrassed to answer. And Graecinus here was a very close friend of Lucius’s as well.’ Yeah; now he happened to mention it, I remembered that Leonidas, the estate manager, had given a Julius Graecinus as one of Surdinus’s bosom philosopher mates. ‘You carry on, my dear fellow; ask away. Anything I can tell you I will, and gladly.’

Well, he’d had his chance. Even so, I wasn’t looking forward to this. ‘I understand you’d been friendly with the family for a long time, sir.’

‘That’s right. I told you, for thirty years and more. Lucius and I were quaestors together, cut our political teeth on the same teething ring, you might say. We’ve kept up the friendship ever since.’

‘I, ah, don’t mean just with Naevius Surdinus. I mean with the family as a whole.’ Jupiter! ‘Specifically with Surdinus’s wife, Cornelia Sullana.’

That got me a straight look. ‘Corvinus, just exactly what are you saying?’ Longinus snapped.

I was beginning to sweat. Easy this wasn’t, and I could see now how the guy had got to the top of the senatorial appointments tree. Cassius Longinus, for all his good-old-boy manner – or maybe because of it – was no pussycat. I’d imagine he and his great grandfather would’ve had a lot more in common than just their names.

‘I was told that, uh, the two of you had an affair,’ I said. ‘Some twenty-five years back. Maybe a bit more.’

He was goggling at me. I didn’t dare even look at the other three.

Then he laughed.

‘Who the hell told you that?’ he said.

‘Actually, it was the lady herself. Cornelia Sullana. It isn’t true?’

‘Have you
met
the woman, Corvinus? She has a face like a hatchet and a voice like a bloody saw! Of course it isn’t bloody true!’

‘But …’

‘Look, get this through your head once and for all, here and now. I can’t stand bloody Cornelia Sullana. Never could. Pompous, overbred, whining. I’d no more take her into my bed than I would my farm bailiff’s prize sow. The gods know why Lucius married her in the first place. Oh, she’d name and money, yes; in that sense she was a good catch, but he never liked her. And I was quite definitely his friend, not hers.’

‘Then why should she claim you had an affair when you didn’t?’

‘I haven’t the faintest idea. You’d best ask her.’ He got up. ‘And now if that’s all you came for, my dear fellow, we’ll call the visit at an end, shall we? Nice of you to come. You can find your own way out, can’t you?’

Gods!

I
t was still a long way from dinner when I got back to the Caelian, and Perilla was working in her study. Or, at least, she had a book-roll open and was taking notes.

‘Oh, hello, Marcus,’ she said absently. ‘Just a moment. I want to get this down first.’ I waited while she scribbled a line or two on the note tablet beside her then laid the stylus aside. ‘There we are.’

‘What’s the book?’ I said. Not that I was really interested, but it’s always politic for a man to show an interest in his wife’s little hobbies. Besides, we were on her territory here. Unfortunately. Being in Perilla’s study always makes me nervous. Oh, sure, studies should have a book-cubby or two included, no argument, that’s what they’re for – at least for appearances’ sake. But not a good dozen of the buggers stacked full of books whose titles make your eyes water. Particularly when they’re there for more than decoration.

‘Aristarchus of Samothrace’s recension of the “Iliad”. Julia Procula lent it to me.’

‘Is that so, now?’ I paused. ‘Uh … what the hell’s a recension?’

‘Oh, Marcus! A critical revision. Sort of … well, a bit like cleaning the accumulated grime off a painting and restoring it to its original appearance. Removing all the interpretations and amendments made by later scholars operating on premises based on what was, to them, contemporary usage and getting back to what the author really
meant
. Aristarchus works on the principle that you can only understand what an ancient writer is saying by interpreting the words or sentiments by comparison with other, similar passages in the author’s own works, and not by anachronistic reference to present import. Or, of course, with passages in the works of his contemporaries, should these exist. Fascinating!’

‘Ah … yeah. Yeah.’ Jupiter alive! Well, I had asked.

‘For instance, did you realize that for Homer the word
phobos
didn’t mean “fear” but “rout”, as in rout in battle? And the verb
phobeisthai
meant to flee, to be routed?’

‘Uh, actually, no. No, strange as it may seem, that one must’ve slipped past me, lady.’

She grinned, put the note tablet inside the roll to mark her place, laid the book on the table beside her, and sat back. ‘Very well, dear. So, how did your day go? I’m all ears.’

I sat down on the other couch, cradling the cup of wine Bathyllus had given me when I’d got back. ‘We were right about Tarquitia and Hellenus,’ I said. ‘They cooked up the scam between them. Or at least Hellenus set things up originally and Tarquitia took it from there.’ I told her about the visit to the Old Villa.

‘But that’s terrible!’ she said. ‘They ought to be stopped! Isn’t there anything you can do?’

‘Uh-uh. They haven’t broken any laws, they were careful about that. As far as the original property sales were concerned, everything was done in due legal form, with Surdinus’s consent all the way down the line. The same goes for Tarquitia’s resale of the Old Villa to Surdinus Junior; she was the legal owner, and so long as he was willing to pay the asking price, she could charge what she liked. The will’s legal, too, so Hellenus gets his third of the estate and because she’s already fulfilled the marriage clause, she has the fifty thousand clear to do as she likes with.’

‘At least she’s giving that to Otillius. I feel very sorry for him, Marcus.’

‘Don’t be.’ I took a swallow of the wine. ‘The guy’s had a lucky escape, and if he is genuinely in love with her, he’ll get over it. Fifty thousand sesterces is one hell of an incentive.’

‘You think she and Hellenus will marry? Really?’

‘Yeah. I think they probably will. Oh, sure, they’re crooked as they come, both of them, but they go together like fish sauce on beans. And for all they’ve got a cold streak a mile wide, I think they’re honest by their lights. At least, they’d claim to be. In theory, Tarquitia could walk away from the guy with the whole boiling, but I don’t think she will, because she knew exactly what she wanted and she’s already got it.’ I shrugged. ‘Anyway, they’re out of it. For the foreseeable future, at least.’

‘So what about Cassius Longinus? Did you manage to see him?’

‘Yeah.’ I frowned. ‘That was strange, if you like.’

‘How so?’

‘He claimed the affair with Sullana never happened at all.’

‘Interesting. You believe him?’

‘Perilla, I don’t know. On the one hand, the lady said it did. Unprompted. Why should she invent a thing like that?’

‘Where her husband’s concerned, the answer’s obvious. Like she told you, she’d been trying to get him to divorce her for years, and he wouldn’t agree. Confessing to an affair with one of his closest friends might well do the trick, as indeed it did.’

‘Surely he’d’ve checked with the man first? Confronted him in his turn?’

‘Marcus, how could he? Longinus was in Asia at the time, and as far as anyone knew, he might be kept in office for years. Governors frequently are, and they’re forbidden to leave their provinces without formal permission from the emperor. Besides, if Surdinus’s wife confessed to him, out of the blue and unprompted, that she’d committed adultery at some time in the past, why should he disbelieve her? Particularly when their marriage had never been a happy one. Personally, if it was an invention, I think it was an extremely clever one; Sullana picked on someone who was not only a prime possibility in circumstantial terms but whom she knew wasn’t in a position to give her the lie. You’d never have known Longinus’s side of things if he hadn’t been unexpectedly recalled to Rome. And as for repeating to you the lie she told her husband, if Sullana wasn’t aware of the current situation – and there’s no reason why she should be, since his return is so recent – then the same argument applies. She could be perfectly truthful and at the same time perfectly safe from being found out.’

‘She’d’ve been found out eventually, when Longinus’s term expired and he came back to Rome, lady. By Surdinus, I mean, if he’d still been alive and believed his friend over her.’

‘Of course she would. But that wouldn’t matter, because she’d already have her divorce. My guess is that then she’d simply have told Surdinus the truth, that the whole thing was a fabrication. I mean, what could he do about it? And naturally Longinus himself would be completely off the hook.’

Yeah; fair enough. Even so …

‘Even so,’ I said, ‘the guy couldn’t wait to get rid of me. That’s after welcoming me with open arms.’

‘Are you surprised, dear? You’d just accused him in front of friends of seducing the wife of a friend and colleague, not to mention siring her first child. Don’t you think, whether the accusation was well-founded or not, he might be just a little peeved?’

‘Hang on, lady! I hadn’t actually got round to Surdinus Junior. He never let me get that far.’

‘Nonetheless.’

‘In any case, that wasn’t the
really
interesting part of the interview.’ I told her about the change of atmosphere when I’d said I was looking into Surdinus’s murder. ‘That was weird. There’s something going on there, I’d bet my back teeth.’

‘Who were the men? Do you remember?’

‘They were all broad-stripers. Pretty much Longinus’s age and class.’ I thought for a moment. ‘A couple of Gauls … uh, Julius Graecinus and Valerius Asiaticus. The third was a guy called Anicius Cerialis. Graecinus is a philosopher pal of Surdinus’s, that I know, although whether it’s relevant I can’t say. The other two I’ve never heard of. Any bells?’

‘I know Graecinus, at least. More than just his name, I mean: he’s a philosopher, yes, Stoic, you won’t be surprised to learn, and a good friend of Marcus Vinicius’s.’ Yeah, right: I knew Vinicius, or at least I’d met him. One of the lady’s more high-powered literary acquaintances, and despite the fact that he was the husband of the emperor’s sister Livilla, he was pretty human on the whole. ‘We’ve talked at one or two of Vinicius’s get-togethers. Charming man, very intelligent.’

‘Solid?’

‘If you’re implying, could he possibly be the kind of man who would arrange for a block of masonry to be dropped on a friend’s head, Marcus, then he certainly is no such thing. That sort of person, I mean. Absolutely not.’

I grinned. ‘OK. What about the others?’

‘I can’t help you there at all, dear; I’ve never heard of either of them. I know Longinus himself, of course – or at least I did, very slightly, before he went to Asia, again on the literary side of things, although his prime interest is jurisprudence. He’s a recognized expert, with several technical books to his credit. Rather an old-fashioned man, with old-fashioned values.’ She smiled. ‘That isn’t a criticism, by the way, far from it; he’s a practising Stoic, in the best sense of the word. Our republican ancestors would have loved him, and for the right reasons, which makes a change.’

‘So you don’t think he would’ve dropped a hunk of stone on a friend’s head either.’

‘No. Definitely not. Nor, for that matter, carried on a clandestine affair with his wife, even when invited to do so by the lady in question. I told you as much when you originally suggested it. The idea’s completely ridiculous.’

Bugger. Well, the lady had been wrong before in her assessment of character. Not all that often, mind. We’d just have to see. And there were still the other two to check up on, Asiaticus and Cerialis. I reckoned another visit to Secundus was in order.

There was a respectful knock at the door. Only one person knocks like that.

‘Yeah, Bathyllus,’ I said. ‘Come in, we’re decent.’

He did.

‘I’m sorry to disturb you, sir. Madam,’ he said. ‘But a message has just arrived. From Naevius Surdinus.’

‘Uh … that’d be Surdinus Junior, would it?’ I said. Given Naevia Postuma’s wacky spiritual interests, it was just as well to check these things.

Bathyllus gave me his best fish-eyed stare; humour is something that the little guy does not believe in. ‘Yes, sir,’ he said. ‘Of course. Naturally. He was wondering if you could drop by tomorrow. Whenever is convenient, but the morning would be best. He has something important to tell you.’

Hey! Maybe things were moving after all. One of his bought help might even have identified our mystery freedman. Although if that was the case then it cast serious doubts on Junior being responsible for the murder himself. Still, we’d cross that bridge when we came to it.

‘He supply any more details?’ I said.

‘No, sir. That was the message in its entirety.’ The barest of sniffs: the implication being, of course, that had there been any Bathyllus would bloody well have told me them up front. Yeah, well, fair enough. ‘And Meton says that since you’re back earlier than usual he is prepared as a great personal favour to bring dinner forwards. Should you prefer it.’

‘Good idea, pal. Tell him yes, that’d be great.’ Early though it was, I’d covered a fair stretch of Rome that day on foot with nothing since breakfast but a sesame-seed roll, and I was starving. ‘OK with you, lady?’

‘Certainly.’

‘In about an hour, then, sir.’ He went out.

So I’d have to take another long hike up to the Vatican. I was getting my fair share of exercise on this case, and no mistake. Still, I wasn’t grousing.

This looked promising.