‘Gods, lady, I don’t know! If they weren’t in Carsidius’s pay then how did they get their hands on a key in the first place? Whose pay were they in, if anyone’s? And why target a respectable senator and his factor? Besides, there was no guarantee lamebrain Mescinius would even find it, quite the reverse. The second scenario’s just too fucking complicated.’
‘Marcus — ’
‘Yeah. Yeah, I know. But I just feel where this case is concerned that I’m bashing my head against a brick wall.’ I put an arm round her. ‘Whichever way you turn it, it doesn’t make any sense. One thing, though. Caepio had beans to spill, and so does his boss. Carsidius may be no killer, or not of Papinius anyway, but he’s in something, somewhere, up to his neck, and he’s covering like crazy.’
She snuggled against me. ‘Don’t worry. It’ll work out eventually.’
Yeah. Right. When pigs sprouted wings and looped the loop above Capitol Hill.
20
I woke up the next morning no further forward. Okay; so what now?
I’d tried things head-on and got nowhere; it’d been like looking at one of these Parthian rugs proper-side-up, at the pattern the weaver wants you to see. Fine. So let’s do it another way: turn the rug over on its front and look at the underside. Lucius Carsidius might be squeaky-clean and one of the doyens of the senate, but like I’d said to Perilla the guy was covering something; that I’d bet my back teeth on. I hadn’t forgotten Mucius Soranus and his good friend — however much she denied it — Lucia Albucilla, either. Plus various odds and sundries that I’d think up as matters progressed.
All of which meant I needed to talk to one guy: Caelius Crispus.
We went back a long way, Crispus and me; certainly further than he’d like to recall sober. Not that it made for a good relationship, because the bugger would cheerfully have eaten my liver raw. So. Not exactly a friend. Nonetheless, if the three-faced, immoral, slimy, blackmailing bastard did happen to be run down by a cart as he was crossing the road or — more likely — was pulled out of the Tiber wearing concrete boots something precious would go out of the world. The air would smell cleaner, mind, but in his own sweet way Crispus was unique, a professional dirt-digger to his carefully-manicured fingernails who took an honest pride in his work and a craftsman’s delight in thoroughness and attention to detail. As a result, what he didn’t know about the top five hundred’s dirty linen just wasn’t worth the effort.
Well, the good thing about last night was that Placida was firmly grounded. After Lippillus and Marcina had gone, I’d sent in the heavy squad, they’d dragged her out from the bush she was lying under in a sturgeon-induced stupor, and we’d shackled her in ignominy to one of the peristyle pillars. Not even Perilla objected. And if Sestia Calvina had turned up unexpectedly the lady would probably have punched her lights out.Perilla can get very serious about some things, like sturgeon cooked in saffron wine must, for example. And she has a vicious left hook.
So no walkies today. I ate a quick breakfast and set out for Market Square. If he hadn’t been poisoned, knifed, strangled or more legitimately disposed of by one of his erstwhile victims, Crispus would be over at the praetors’ offices on the Capitol where he was one of the foreign judges’ reps. With any luck I could catch him and make his day while the bastard was still fresh enough to enjoy it.
Market Square, as it usually is that time of the morning, was already heaving. There must’ve been another senate session pending, because the area between the senate-house and the Julian Hall was packed with broad-stripers in groups of two or three, engaged in the quaint time-honoured Roman custom of pre-session wheeling and dealing, backbiting and general character assassination. I noticed, over by the senate-house door, Lucius Carsidius in deep conversation with a couple of other senior broad-stripers, one of whom was my old pal Lucius Arruntius. Carsidius glanced up as I passed, then turned his back when I gave him a cheery wave. Arruntius ignored me, too. Yeah, well; it’s nice to be popular.
I checked with the guy at the desk that Crispus was still infesting the building, found his office, knocked on the door — he’d moved up another notch, seemingly, to walnut panelling and ivory scratch-boards above the brass handle — and went in.
‘Hey, Crispus,’ I said. ‘How’s the lad?’
He’d been eyes-down at his desk taking notes onto a wax tablet from a paper roll. His head came up looking like Pompey’s when the Egyptian vizier pulled it from the pickle jar.
‘Oh, shit,’ he said.
I walked across the polished wood floor, pulled up a chair and sat down. ‘So how are they treating you these days?’ I said. ‘Not overworked? Bright-eyed, bushy-tailed and getting your regular eight hours?’
‘What is it this time, Corvinus? As if I didn’t know.’
‘Perilla sends her regards.’
‘Stuff Perilla. Look, I’m busy.’ He held up the wax tablet. ‘The senior praetor wants this digest for the Nucerian committee meeting this afternoon and he isn’t a patient man. Plus I’ve got a dozen reports to read.’
I grinned. ‘You turned respectable, pal? Conscientious, even? Well, now, there’s a thing!’
‘Fuck off. Please.’
‘Come on, Crispus! I need your expertise, and it won’t take long. Just a bit of information, okay?’
He sighed and put the tablet down. ‘Maybe. Depending what it is. Fifteen minutes, no more. And that’s only because calling the slaves and having you thrown out on your ear would be more trouble than it’s worth.’
‘There’s my boy!’ Jupiter, this was Crispus? Respectable was right. Still, the bugger was getting older, like the rest of us. Maturing, like a cheese. He was even sporting a natty middle-management bald patch that he’d carefully combed the hair over. With his background he’d never make praetor, sure — the good old Roman political network had some standards — but he wasn’t doing too badly on the sidelines. Maybe he’d just finally decided to cash in his winnings and quit while he was ahead of the game. Pity, really; I’d quite enjoyed my occasional bouts of Crispus-baiting, and the guy had had a horrible fascination about him.
‘So,’ he said. ‘Get it over with. What do you want to know?’
‘Lucius Carsidius. He as squeaky-clean as he’s made out to be?’
His eyes widened. ‘Carsidius the senator?’
‘Is there another one?’
‘What’s your interest in him?’
‘That’s my business, pal. He above board, or what?’
‘Of course he is. He’s one of the straightest men in Rome.’
Bugger. One thing about Crispus — and I couldn’t see it having changed, even in his new-model, born-again conscientious civil servant persona — was that he genuinely loved gossip for its own sake. Oh, sure, he could be duplicitous as hell when he liked, he could lie through his teeth when it suited him, but when he said a guy was straight in that disappointed tone there wasn’t any room for manoeuvre and you might as well put the shutters up and go home. Still, I owed it my best shot. ‘Crispus,’ I said. ‘No one is absolutely straight, especially if he’s a sodding senator. So give.’
He spread his hands. ‘You want the worst? Okay. Fourteen years back, the time of the Numidian war, he was on the North African staff. He was prosecuted before the senate for selling corn to the enemy. The case collapsed for want of evidence and he was acquitted nem con. That do you?’
I sat back. ‘That’s it? That’s the worst?’
‘You asked for it, you’ve got it. Nothing else, public or private. To my certain knowledge.’ He sniggered; a flash of the old Crispus. ‘And believe me, Corvinus, I would know.’
‘Jupiter, pal, that’s impossible! There must be something!’
‘You want a potted biography? Because that’s all I can give you. His father served with Germanicus on the Rhine, and Carsidius grew up hero-worshipping him. When Germanicus died he kept up with the family, Agrippina and young Nero especially. Eight years back, when Nero was exiled, he was one of the few senators who spoke up for him against the emperor, which didn’t do him much good politically but earned him a lot of brownie points with the more responsible broad-striper elements who he is now very much in with. He’s not ambitious — never made consul, stuck at praetor — but word is he did any job he had well and came out the other end smelling of roses. End of lecture.’