Shit.
Under the laurels, Drusilla, her blue-eyed, cross-eyed, dark Egyptian cat, began to lick a languid paw in preparation for the evening hunt of moths and mice and crunchy creepy-crawlies.
'I presume you've checked that Flavia isn't staying with friends?' Claudia asked. The Games of Apollo kicked off in two days when there would be eight days of races and feasting and plays. Could this be some teenage prank related to the festivities?
The girl has no friends,' Julia retorted, and Claudia could well believe it. A sulkier, more self-centred little madam was impossible to find. 'She simply went out last night and never returned.'
Something slithered around in Claudia's stomach. 'What time did you notice she hadn't come home?' she asked, instinctively knowing the answer. The poor little cow hadn't been missed until that note arrived!
'I've been busy,' Julia snapped. 'To make ends meet, we've had to sell some of our slaves, which loads extra work on me — and besides, the girl's old enough to come and go as she pleases.'
'In other words,' Claudia drained the goblet in one swallow, 'you can't actually pinpoint when she was snatched.'
'Now that's where you're wrong.' A smug expression settled on Julia's features. 'I've narrowed it down to last night, because the only things missing from her bedroom are the clothes and jewels she went out in.'
'Which were…?' No wonder Gaius had had little truck with his doltish sister. She was as slow as he'd been sharp, as dull as he'd been shrewd, self-centred as he'd been focussed. In fact, Claudia did not recall Julia ever once tipping back her head and roaring with laughter, as her brother had used to do.
'She was wearing her best rose-red tunic shot with gold. A ring set with jade, another with agates, two matching silver armbands, her favourite faience pendant, gold ear studs and,' Julia finished on a note of triumph, 'the emerald pin I'd given her for Saturnalia.'
Good grief. The surprise is not that Flavia was kidnapped, more that she wasn't robbed! 'Is it usual for Flavia to leave the house dressed like a dog's dinner?' For a girl with no friends and with the Games not kicking off for two days, surely Julia thought it odd, as Claudia certainly did, that Flavia had gone out in her finery?
'Oh, didn't she tell you?' Julia's smile was pure reptile. 'That's why she's been all Apollo-this, Apollo-that, of late. You must have noticed her preoccupation?'
'Teenage girls fall in love with gods and heroes all the time,' Claudia said. One minute it's dolls and skipping ropes and dressing up. Next, it's spots, cosmetics and infatuation with either ruff-tuff, he-men types such as Hercules, whose bulging pecs and oozing masculinity sends them swooning in their pillows, or else they fall for the dreamy poet-cum-musician types. 'Long-haired Apollo with his lyre and romantic verses is always a hot favourite,' she pointed out. And — like every teenage crush — gloriously out of reach!
'That's as maybe,' Julia said, 'but it's been driving me demented. Her bedroom walls are covered with ghastly yellow sun discs, which she's painted herself, hundreds of the blessed things, and all because she's been invited to take the lead role in Friday's production of The Serving Women. That's when-'
'Yes, yes, I know what it is.' Everyone in Rome knows, you stupid cow! Claudia got up and began to pace the office. How many generations had turned to dust since that fateful day when Rome had been besieged by an enemy who took to demanding high-born female hostages? Quite for what purpose Claudia shuddered to imagine, but out of hardship, heroism is born. A humble serving wench gathered together a group of equally spirited young women who, disguised in their noble counterparts' finery, employed strength, cunning and resilience to turn the tables on their assailants and save the day. In return, Rome honoured their courage every year by re-enacting the drama.
'Exactly what connection does this have with Flavia's abduction?'
'No need to get prickly.' Julia bridled. 'I just wanted you to be aware that the Prefect organising the show felt our little Flavia was perfect for the lead. Not everyone gets selected, it's a tremendous honour for us-' Claudia's sizzle of a glare cut her short. 'Anyway,' Julia finished stiffly, 'the point is, she didn't return from rehearsals.'
Out in the garden, the trunk of the sour apple tree glowed like a dying ember in the last vestiges of twilight. In the distance, a trumpet blasted, a signal to heave open the great city gates. Would that a second blast could spirit away this carping hag!
'What about the authorities?' Claudia asked, returning to her desk. 'Has Marcellus notified any of the officials?'
There's a clue here, she thought. Something Julia had said… something which didn't add up.
'Are you mad?' Julia squeaked. 'You've seen what it says in the letter, they'll kill her!'
Claudia moistened a fingertip and ran it lightly over her eyebrow. 'I doubt whether anyone who spells authority with an "O" is in an intellectual position to find out,' she said dryly. 'I advise you to seek official help.'
'I will not,' Julia snarled, 'compromise this girl's life for a measly sesterces or two.'
Claudia heard her chair scrape across the mosaic floor. Then again, it could have been the grinding of her teeth. 'This is not a question of compromising Flavia's life,' she hissed back, 'it's a matter of basic common sense.'
The kidnappers might settle for a single payment. Then again, they might not. Greed is an unpredictable commodity. Moreover, they might return the girl alive, but in all probability they would not. No witnesses. No loose ends. Without doubt, this was a job for the professionals.
'So what are you saying?' Julia tried to shrug free the clammy tunic which was sticking to her back. 'I'm to return to Marcellus and inform him you won't help?'
Well done, Julia, you're catching on at last!
A mental picture formed in Claudia's mind. Her brother-inlaw's lizard smile. Complexion like an unripe mulberry. How often over the past ten months had he 'just happened' to be passing, or (surprise, surprise) found himself seated beside her in the theatre? Of course, if she could just see her way clear to advancing a couple of hundred to tide him over until the next contract. Handing Marcellus money was akin to tipping water over sand, you never saw a drop of it again.
Claudia poured herself another glass of wine and drummed her fingers lightly on the table.
Except that was only half the story. Dammit, every time they met, his palm would contrive to alight on some curvaceous part of her anatomy and despite swatting him off like a gadfly, that sticky imprint seemed to linger for hours! Marcellus, you lecherous warthog, you can bloody whistle for your money and, Croesus, it would need a sturdier abacus than the one on her desk to reckon up the number of times Julia had cut her in the Forum or slandered her reputation!
And Flavia was turning into a right little chip off the sour old block.
Little? Claudia picked up a quill and ran the feather lightly down her cheek. Ho, ho, did I say, little? In the five years since Claudia had married into this family of misfits, Flavia had evolved from an awkward, lumpy, difficult child into an awkward, lumpy, difficult teenager. The only girl with less sex appeal than a plucked goose! Numerous attempts to get her married off had fallen flat, thanks to Flavia's outrageous sullenness, until it had almost reached the stage where they'd run out of decent families to approach. What prospects then? Unless the silly cow came to her senses, and quickly dammit, she'd be stuck for life with some dim-witted dolt of a husband — or worse, with an ageing roue who'd view her as nothing more than his personal prostitute to use how and when he wanted! Young women, as Claudia knew to her cost, were not in a position where they could pick and choose.