Not over the killing, mind. The broad-striper code may be elastic, but it only stretches certain ways: in some directions it’s rigid and unbreakable. Like taking unforced oaths. Carsidius hadn’t had to do that business with the altar, especially there in the study with his ancestors looking on. No, I was with Caepio there: whoever had had the kid murdered, it wasn’t our poker-backed senator pal. Or at least — thinking of the actual wording of the oath I stopped and rephrased that — at the time when the murder was being planned and committed Carsidius hadn’t known about it. That would’ve been a typical bit of senatorial wriggling…
So why had he compromised his reputation by lying about the bribes? Lied he definitely had, the business with the altar — again — proved that beyond a doubt. But if he was lying, then -
I slowed. Okay, Corvinus. Think it through, boy.
Reputation. Doxa. Carsidius had admitted bribery to me, sure, but that was in a one-to-one situation, with no witnesses. His reputation — as far as the rest of the world was concerned — was safe. Oh, yeah, he claimed he’d also told Balbus, but then Balbus was in the same boat. When we’d met I’d been the one to suggest that Papinius had been taking bribes. All Balbus had done was confirmed it; but — and this was the point — he’d made it clear that apart from talking to the boy himself he hadn’t taken the matter any further. So again we had the one-to-one, no witnesses scenario, because Papinius was long past confirming or denying anything. Okay. So what we had here was a closed circle. I start the bribery rumour myself, Balbus picks it up like the gift it is and passes it to Carsidius, who feeds it back to me, while telling me he’s already made his own confession to the aedile, who’s had the business shelved. Result — or this is the plan, anyway — dumb-head Corvinus goes off whistling into the sunset believing that Papinius was on the make, his boss had caught him at it and as a consequence the kid had committed suicide. End of case, end of investigation, pull down the blinds and go home…
It worked. Sure it did. The big question was why? Why should two prestigious, well-respected senators get together to produce a cover-up for a murder?
It didn’t make sense; none of it. Nor did the business with the keys. That had been another lie on Carsidius’s part, and not a very good one, either. Sure, he might well have had a bailiff called Faustus, but trying to shift the blame onto him and then telling me in the next breath that the guy had just been coincidentally sacked and had left Rome for parts unknown was in the tap-dancing oyster bracket. Keys were important, I knew it in my water. Carsidius knew it too, which was why the bastard had practically fallen over himself to fob me off. The question — again — was why?
It was starting to rain: big drops from a blackening sky. I covered my head with my cloak and picked up speed.
One last, last thing. That ‘something else’ besides anger in Carsidius’s look, when I’d asked him about the key.
It had been fear.
19
Well, that’d been short and sweet. I got home in plenty of time for a leisurely bath, a second-of-the-day shave and a less-than-hurried change into a decent lounging-tunic. Lippillus wouldn’t’ve minded if I’d got in on two wheels as usual, and neither would Marcina, who was a very nice lady indeed, but Perilla would’ve had my guts for sandal-straps. They arrived just short of sunset: bang on time, in other words, but then Lippillus knew and loved our Meton. Fifteen pre-dinner-drink minutes before zero hour was allowed; give it twenty and you were pushing things. Once, we’d had a couple of Perilla’s poetry-klatch cronies over for a meal and they were an hour late. We were having soles, and soles were what we got. In a way. How the surly bugger managed it I’ve no idea, but you could’ve walked on them to Puteoli.
‘Hey, pal!’ I said as the door-slave brought them through the peristyle into the garden; luckily, the rain had passed off and we had a fine evening. ‘Bathyllus, a drink for the Watch commander.’ I’d got in a jar of Signinan, speciaclass="underline" Signinan’s mostly medicinal, but the top vintage — and this one was top, ten years old if it was a day — was something else, dry as a bone and when it was chilled sheer perfection. Lippillus was no wine expert, but he knew good stuff when he tasted it, and on a Watch commander’s pay that didn’t happen all that often. ‘Marcina. You want wine or are you having one of Perilla’s fruit juices?’
‘Wine, please, Marcus.’
No ordinary Roman matron, Marcina Paullina. She’s North African, a good foot taller than Lippillus, and a total stunner.
‘Do it, little guy,’ I said. Bathyllus soft-shoed off.
‘How’s the dog?’ Lippillus said.
‘Oh, Placida’s settling in very well.’ Perilla smiled. ‘Isn’t she, Marcus?’
‘Uh…yeah. Yeah, she is. In a manner of speaking.’
Lippillus was grinning. ‘You’re lucky, then,’ he said. ‘I was talking to Quintus Pilius earlier. He’s Watch commander for the Fifth and Sixth, says there’s this thing up on the Viminal belonging to a woman called Sestia Calvina, and you would not believe — ’ He stopped. ‘Have I said something wrong?’
I was grinning too. Perilla had coloured up to her earlobes. ‘No, pal, not at all,’ I said. ‘We’re fascinated. Carry on.’
‘Ah…there’s not much to tell, really.’ Lippillus shot Perilla a nervous sideways glance. You could’ve used the set of her lips to draw lines. ‘Pilius was probably exaggerating.’
‘That so, now?’
‘I mean, nothing could possibly — ’
‘Wine, sir.’ Bathyllus had come up with the tray. Saved by the butler. Never mind, I’d get the whole story later.
Lippillus took a cup, and while Perilla’s and Marcina’s attention was on their own drinks he turned away and said quietly: ‘You got a moment, Marcus? In private, before we start?’
Uh-oh. He might be wearing his best party mantle, but currently the guy had his Watch commander’s face on. Also, I hadn’t missed the fact that Marcina had taken Perilla’s arm and was leading her out of earshot like she and Lippillus had arranged things in advance. Which, I would bet, they had.
So. Business.
‘Yeah,’ I said. ‘Yeah, of course I have.’
‘Lucceius Caepio hanged himself last night.’
Oh, shit. ‘He did what?’
‘Titus Mescinius sent to tell me just before we left. He thought you might be interested.’
I glanced over at Perilla. Her head was turned in our direction, but Marcina was keeping her busy. So; arrangement was right, and very sensible: to Perilla, a dinner party was a dinner party, and if she caught us talking murder there’d be hell to pay later. ‘You have any details, pal?’
‘Not many. His wife found him when she came home this morning. You know she was in Capua, visiting her sister?’
‘Yeah. Yeah, Caepio told me.’ My brain had gone numb. Bugger, what a mess! ‘Was the suicide genuine?’
Lippillus gave me a sharp look. ‘As far as I know. Or at least, as far as Mescinius does. There any reason why it shouldn’t be?’
I was thinking back to how the guy had looked and acted the day before. It was possible, sure. Caepio had been desperate enough, and frightened enough — the gods knew why, or what of — to have taken his own life, but another suicide was too coincidental for comfort. ‘No,’ I said slowly. ‘Or at least nothing definite. Even so — ’
‘There were no suspicious circumstances. At least that’s what Mescinius says.’ Hah! ‘Suicide note, the lot.’
‘Did Caepio’s wife identify the handwriting?’