‘Very much so,’ said Hermes again. I would have left it — had he not added, ‘ — by most people.’
I pricked up my ears. ‘Who disliked her?’ Apparently Hermes failed to hear the question.
Pretending to change the subject I asked what might seem an innocuous question: ‘This probably has no bearing, but if their plans had worked out better, the two victims would never have been at the apartment when the thieves broke in … Do you happen to know why they could not leave for Campania straight after their wedding?’ The freedman leaned back on his stool and said nothing. His silence screamed at me to persist. ‘Hermes, they wanted to go the day before. What stopped them?’
‘Who, you mean,’ Hermes said. He pursed his lips, then gave up the answer. ‘Valerius Aviola had been letting someone use his villa. The guest failed to vacate the house when requested — that was why he sent so many slaves on ahead. I believe they had orders to assist with the guest’s packing − by force if necessary. Mucia Lucilia was not prepared to share the accommodation.’
‘Ah!’ So Mucia was firmly putting her foot down — only one day into her marriage. ‘Who was this unwanted guest? And why were they being difficult?’
‘On why, I cannot comment,’ returned the freedman primly, indicating the reason was not favourable to the sticking limpet. ‘I can certainly tell you who she is.’
She? The discovery that Mucia Lucilia refused to share the villa with another woman was intriguing. Had Valerius Aviola kept some long-term mistress secreted away in the country? … I guessed Hermes was about to reveal his wild theory, the one Sextus Simplicius had not wished me to hear, in case I believed it. Normally I have no time for other people’s crazy thoughts. I like to invent any mad theories for myself — and then discount them.
Hermes flushed red with real anger: ‘She was digging her heels in, refusing to go. She was malicious, it was unacceptable, my mistress was adamant and nobody blames her. Flavia Albia, the household slaves had nothing to do with what happened. I can tell you exactly who wanted Aviola and my dear young mistress dead. They thwarted her and she wouldn’t take it. She wanted Aviola’s villa and to get it, she arranged to have them murdered.’
This must be an amazing villa. ‘But, Hermes, who is she?’
‘The most jealous, manipulative, evil, scheming woman you will ever meet — his wife!’
14
Diana Aventina!
That blew everything apart. All previous theories had to be reassessed.
Disappointingly, it turned out that Aviola had not been a bigamist. He had been previously married but divorced.
Hermes erupted into an outburst where he claimed the ex-wife was a schemer who had sworn Aviola would not get away with his remarriage. From the moment it was announced, she tried to poison him against his new bride. She was famously vindictive and would stop at nothing, even murder.
I downplayed all this. Alleged evil scheming needed to be thought about later, in private. Damaging someone’s reputation unfairly carries a high premium in Rome, even if you are right to defame them. The worse a person is, the more likely they are to demand compensation and the higher their claim. I knew my legal uncles would advise restraint.
Cautiously, I prised out the facts. Galla Simplicia had married Valerius Aviola in their youth, a marriage that lasted long enough to produce three children. They divorced way back, yet remained in contact because of those children. Young at the time of the split, they were brought up by their mother; she received money for their maintenance and had grown rather too used to this income. She had property of her own but particularly liked Aviola’s handsome and comfortable Campanian villa, where until now she had been allowed to visit, using the excuse that she was taking the children to their family’s holiday home.
‘How old are they now?’
‘All in their twenties.’
‘So maintenance payments to their mother ought to have stopped anyway!’ I bet the new wife had pointed that out to Aviola.
Hermes said there had never been any question that, as Galla Simplicia now claimed, Aviola had gifted the villa to her. It was well known in their circle that it was his own favourite house. He went down there every summer, and it was natural he would want to take a new wife soon after their wedding. Hermes told me (as Sextus Simplicius had not) that this villa specifically formed part of the bequest from Aviola to Mucia Lucilia in his new will. If he died, he intended that the second wife should have it.
I wondered what his previous will had said. Clearly Galla Simplicia would have angled for it. But possibly the villa had been assigned to the children — and probably they would acquire it now.
I could see exactly why Mucia Lucilia had refused to share the place with Galla Simplicia. I would have done the same. Mucia needed to take charge.
I guessed how sourly Mucia must have viewed the heavily entrenched ex-wife, together with Aviola’s now grown-up children. Anyone could guess how much those children must be under their mother’s influence.
But there was a reverse slant. Aviola’s new marriage, after so many years of easy coexistence, would have destabilised the ex-wife’s position. Since they divorced so long before, this change may have surprised her, caught her out. An extreme reaction might have occurred, just as Hermes claimed — yet was it likely?
‘She and Aviola had a screaming row. She tried to bully him, using her children.’ Hermes flushed scarlet with indignation again, even to his outstanding ears.
‘What are the children like?’ Spoiled brats, or I was losing my touch.
‘Ghastly,’ he snapped back. As I thought. ‘Expecting to sponge off their father for life.’
‘Boys? Girls?’
‘Useless boy, two insipid girls. Galla was terrified their father would lose interest, especially if Mucia Lucilia were to bear children who might supplant hers.’
A reasonable fear. Many an older father prefers the fresh little infants of his still-warm second marriage to the ruder, more demanding children of a troubled first union. Galla’s three were old enough to have gone through their charmless adolescence, which can leave permanent bad feeling; in any case, Aviola may never have known his children well. Babies lie in their cradles blowing bubbles like helpless darlings who won’t cost any money, or cause family quarrels, or ever stop loving their besotted papa … Meanwhile the determined second wives are right on the scene, constantly reinforcing the new brood’s claims.
‘Galla Simplicia is a shrewd woman?’
‘Brutally,’ snarled Hermes.
‘Even so, to want two people dead seems extraordinary, let alone make it happen in such a terrible way. Are you certain Galla would do that?’
‘Absolutely!’ he assured me.
Without enthusiasm, I mused aloud that I would now have to trek to Campania, in order to interview this woman. Hermes barked with harsh laughter. According to him, Galla Simplicia would have heard that Aviola was dead, and was bound to be hot-footing it to Rome to make a claim on the estate.
‘Sit tight and you will soon meet her, whirling in to cause trouble!’
I could hardly wait.
15
I returned to Sextus Simplicius’ house, with angry words in mind, but he was ‘not at home’. I bet he had gone out on purpose, in case I came racing back to roar at him for withholding information. Alternatively, he was in, but not to me — hiding behind a door until I went away. I hoped he got cramp.
It was the steward who spoke to me. It would be wrong for me to inform him he might be displaced by Polycarpus, but he seemed shrewd. I suspected he knew his job was threatened. I felt sorry for him, and I wondered if an unhappy man might open up.
I sighed, genuinely weary. ‘Oh dear. I am running around in circles over this Aviola business. I just learned about his ex-wife, Galla Simplicia, and I desperately need to ask your master for more details. There is a rumour she is troublesome, and on her way to Rome.’ The steward, Gratus, smiled slightly. ‘I need some background, Gratus, before I have to run up against her … Still, I won’t ask you questions that you shouldn’t answer.’ Of course I planned to do just that.