‘Oh, shit,’ I muttered. Obviously the brute had had the time of her life because she was looking as pleased as hell and the room was something out of the stage set for the sack of Corinth. ‘Come on, Placida. Home.’
I pushed through the massed minions, grabbed her by the collar and lugged her towards the exit. Half way there, she pulled away, bent her back, spread her rear paws, squatted and strained…
‘Placida!’
That was Perilla. Too late. Yeah, well, after all the excitement it was only natural, I supposed. Even so, it was the icing on the cake. As it were.
I looked at the goggling skivvies. ‘Uh…any of you lads have a shovel?’
We went back downstairs and grovelled. You don’t want to know the next part. You really don’t. Suffice it to say that the upshot was the financial equivalent of Cannae. When the bill hit my banker’s desk we’d be living on boiled beets for a month.
‘Just needs a little getting used to, eh?’ I said to Perilla as we walked back with Placida ambling good as gold between us; but the lady didn’t answer.
Fun, fun, fun.
6
I was up early the next morning, sneaking out of the bedroom just after first light; not that I needed to bother about waking Perilla, mind, because that lady could sleep through Etna erupting, and she isn’t one of nature’s early risers. I skipped the shave — I could always have a scrape at one of the booths around the edge of Market Square later if I had time — and went down to the dining room. No sign of Placida, but then after the previous afternoon’s escapade our friendly hellhound was in deep disgrace and relegated to a chained post in the garden. Not that I’d any sympathy, because if the day before had been anything to go by looking after the brute for two months would cost us an arm and a leg. Maybe we’d be glad of Natalis’s fifty thousand after all just to pay for the breakages.
I was really, really looking forward to going out dogless today.
Bathyllus was doing his pre-breakfast round of the bronzes with the special soft cloth he keeps for raising a shine on the various bums and bosoms. Sometimes I wonder about Bathyllus. All the same, if it keeps the little bald-head happy then who am I to complain?
‘Just get Meton to fix me an omelette in a roll this morning, sunshine,’ I said. ‘I’m off down to Public Pond, and I’ll eat it on the way.’
‘Yes, sir.’ Bathyllus sniffed: eating breakfast on the hoof in a public thoroughfare isn’t something the League of Major-domos approves of. ‘You’ll be back for dinner, of course. I understand Meton is serving fish.’
Oh, gods! I hate fish days. Not the menu, no — what our anarchic chef can do with a few slices of tunny, a bag of clams and a dash or two of fish sauce would have old Lucullus crying his eyes out — but turn up even five minutes late for the off and you find yourself living on boiled cabbage and meatballs for a month. Meton gets very serious about fish. ‘Yeah. Yeah, I’ll be there,’ I said. ‘Incidentally, you happen to know where Mucius Soranus lives?’
Bathyllus raised an eyebrow, which in Bathyllus-speak is strong stuff, certainly well beyond ordinary sniff-class: just because the guy’s a slave doesn’t mean he doesn’t keep up with the gossip, and where moral rectitude is concerned you could lay him flat and use him to draw lines. Even so, and on his uppers or not, Soranus was one of the Mucii who go back to the time when Scaevola played his trick with Porsenna and the brazier, and any prime-class major-domo worth his buffing rag would chew his own leg off before admitting that he didn’t know where one of the top five hundred hung out.
‘On the Cipian, sir. The big old three-storey property opposite the Porch of Livia.’
Hmm; not all that far away, then. If it didn’t risk breaching the three-line fish whip I might be able to take Soranus in last thing. Mind you, a talk with that bastard immediately before dinner could well put me off my feed. I’d have to see how things went. ‘Great. Thanks, pal. Now go and organise that roll, okay?’
Bathyllus soft-shoed out and I helped myself to an apple and a few grapes from the table. Early morning, preferably the crack of dawn but I was no masochist, was the best time to catch Decimus Lippillus because he’d be at the Watch-house reading through the reports his deputy on the night-shift had left on his desk. Then over to Julian Square to check up if the loan-shark Publius Vestorius was back from Ostia, a talk — if he was available — with Papinius’s boss Laelius Balbus, and finally round to Soranus’s, ditto. I reckoned that with all these bases successfully covered I’d’ve done my duty by Natalis, and barring any surprises — which I didn’t expect — we could call it a wrap…
‘I’ve brought the dog, sir.’
I turned. Bathyllus was standing in the doorway with my portable breakfast in one hand and the other holding Placida’s lead. The brute was grinning at me.
Oh, gods. This I did not deserve. ‘You have what, Bathyllus?’
‘For its walk. The mistress was most insistent. She told me last night not to let you leave without it.’
Jupiter sodding Best and Greatest! ‘Listen, little guy,’ I said, ‘I have about as much intention of spending a second day in that brute’s dubious company as I have of tap-dancing naked up the Sacred Way. When Perilla wakes up you can tell her — ’
‘Tell me what, dear?’
She appeared in the doorway behind Bathyllus and gave me a bright smile. I goggled. Shit, this was a conspiracy: nothing, but nothing gets that lady out of bed before the sun’s properly up.
‘Ah…’ I said.
‘I have explained already, Marcus. Very clearly. I promised Sestia Calvina that we’d look after Placida properly, which means regular walks. And since you’re walking anyway then you may as well take her along. I’m sure she’s marvellous company, really.’
‘Lady, that thing is fucking hell on legs! I’d as soon walk a wolverine!’
‘Don’t exaggerate.’
‘Perilla…’
‘Besides, after yesterday’s little episode with Alcestis we can’t risk leaving her in the garden, can we? She’d have to be chained, which wouldn’t be fair. And she is getting used to you.’
I opened my mouth, then closed it again: when Perilla’s in this mood there’s no point in arguing, and where logic’s concerned you can forget it. Bugger.
Now I knew how Orestes must’ve felt when he was stuck with the Furies.
I held out my hand for the lead.
Sure enough, Lippillus was standing at his desk, reading over a wax tablet and chewing on an omelette roll of his own. He looked up when I came in…
‘What the hell is that?’
I sighed. ‘Rare Parthian coarse-haired hornless antelope? No. Mutant Numidian hamster? I don’t think so. Hyperactive, totally uncivilised Gallic fucking boarhound? Why, I do believe it is.’ I pulled up a stool and sat while Placida squatted and lolled her tongue at him. Jupiter, I was knackered. Caelian to Public Pond in just shy of twenty minutes. Someone should explain to canines the meaning of the word ‘walk’ and how it differed from, say, ‘bolt’. ‘And don’t, don’t ask about the bag-lady, the cheese-seller, the woman with the poodle or the cat on the flagpole.’
Lippillus was grinning. ‘You’re tetchy this morning, Corvinus. She yours? You’ve never exactly struck me as the dog-owning type.’
I shuddered and made the sign against bad omens: with my current run of luck Sestia Calvina over in Veii would be trampled to death by a freak runaway elephant and we’d be stuck with the brute forever. Not that I’d’ve thought too badly of the elephant, mind. ‘No, we’re just looking after her. At least it seems I am. You know the way Perilla’s chain of logic works.’
‘She’s a beauty. Aren’t you, girl?’ He reached over and ruffled Placida’s ears, which put the two of them practically eyeball to eyeball. There isn’t much of Flavonius Lippillus in vertical terms, and his no-clout name doesn’t do him any favours either with the pukkah Establishment, but you don’t get to be Watch commander for one of the toughest districts in Rome without a pretty good reason, and for once the broad-stripers in the City Prefect’s office had got it right. What Lippillus didn’t know about Watch work you could drop down a hole and forget.