Nemesis

I bought a bread roll to start the conversation; it never works. As soon as I said what I wanted, Vexus turned unhelpful. He had not overflowed with customer care to start with. I introduced myself and I might have been trying to sell him a silver-boxed ten-scroll set of Greek encyclopaedias. Used ones.

'Get lost.'

'I want to help your daughter.'

'Leave my daughter alone. She's not here and she's had enough trouble.'

'Can I see her?'

'No.'

'I don't blame you – - but my enquiry won't harm her. Maybe I can get the Claudii off her back.'

'I'd like to see that!' Vexus implied I wasn't up to it.

'Will you at least tell me about Nobilis?'

'Mind your own business.'

'I'd like to – but those wastrels on the marsh have become the Emperor's business. I'm stuck with investigating. So let me guess: your girl married Nobilis when she was too young to know what she was doing – against your advice, no doubt? It went sour. He beat her.' I wondered if the father was violent too. He looked strong, but controlled. Still, men from boot-menders up to the consulship have been known to conceal their domestic brutality. 'Did they have any children?'

'No, thank Jove!'

'So Demetria decided to leave, but Nobilis would not let her go. She came home; he hated it. She found someone else, and he put a stop to that… Right?'

'Nothing to say.'

'Is she still with her new man?'

'No.'

'Nobilis put the scares on?'

'Half killed him.'

'In front of her?'

'That was the point, Falco!'

'So the new man caved in?'

'He got rid of her,' agreed her father bitterly.

A ghastly thought struck me. 'Don't say she went back to Nobilis?'

Vexus pressed his lips together in a thin line. 'Thankfully, I put a stop to that.'

'But she was so frightened, doing what Nobilis said became a possibility?'

'No,' said the baker, with heavy emphasis. 'She was so frightened it was never a possibility.'

That was all he would tell me. I left details for Demetria to contact me, if she would. No chance. I heard the tablet with my name on it thump into a trash bucket before I got back outside to the street.

I asked about Demetria around the neighbourhood. I met nothing but hostility. The atmosphere felt dangerous. I left before a riot could start.

XXVII

I had another lead to follow: Petronius and I had been told by the waitress at Satricum that Claudius Nobilis worked for a corn dealer called Thamyris. He lived outside town. I took Nux and Helena and drove out to his place, a scattered set of barns and workshops off the coast road that went south.

Thamyris was a wide, squat, shabby typical countryman, in his sixties, wearing the usual rough tunic and a battered hat which he kept on even though when we arrived it was the lunch break. He and his men were gathered on benches, a peaceful group. They had mastered the art of making their working day revolve around the time they took off. Some were eating, some whittling. There was easy-going chat. Nux jumped from our cart and went to sit with them. She guessed correctly they would pet her and feed her titbits.

Nobody showed any curiosity about us. If we had wanted to buy grain we would have had to wait. The men stayed where they were and carried on enjoying their break; Thamyris stayed put and talked to us. Helena was allowed to sit on one of the benches, which a lad willingly swept of straw first, using the back of a fairly clean hand.

I explained what I wanted. Thamyris replied slowly and thoughtfully, as if he had answered these questions before. I asked him; he said he was always being consulted these days about Claudius Nobilis. For years the man had worked in this labour gang unremarked, but now the local authorities had a definite eye on him. It might have been awkward, had he not already taken himself off somewhere.

'Do you know where he's gone?'

'He said something about the family. Knowing what they are like, I kept my nose out of that.'

'So who else has been asking about him?'

'Men from Antium. A man from Rome.'

'I'm supposed to be the man from Rome – - who was the other bastard?'

'Someone like you!' The grain dealer enjoyed the joke. I pressed him for details and came to the conclusion he had been visited by one of Anacrites' runners.

While I brooded on that, Helena changed the subject pleasantly: 'What was your impression of Nobilis when he worked for you?'

Thamyris summed up like an employer who noticed things: 'He did the work, though he didn't push himself.'

'Did he fit in? Was he one of the lads?' I asked.

'Yes and no. He never said much. If we were all sitting around like this, he would be with us. If we went out for a drink together in the evening, he would tag along. But he always tended to move off a little distance from the group.'

'Did he strike you as at all odd?' Helena then wondered.

'He had his obsessions. He liked talking about weapons. He collected spears and knives – nasty big ones. He seemed a bit too interested, if you understand me.'

I nodded. 'Trouble?'

'He never gave me any.'

'But he came with a reputation?'

'That I don't deny. People said he had been accused of thieving as a child, and I did hear that years ago a woman said he had raped her.' Thamyris seemed unconcerned. On the scale of country crime, rape tended to rank with shouting boo at chickens.

'So why do you think he left?' asked Helena. 'We heard he was "going to see his grandmother", whatever that means. What's the mystery?'

'A classic excuse.' Thamyris gave a laugh. It was the irritating kind that suggests someone knows a lot more than you do and intends to take a very long while revealing it. 'When people want time off.'

Helena asked, 'So what was up with him? Was he upset? Did he have a quarrel?'

'Better ask Costus.' Hearing his name, a corn cockle on another bench looked over. 'Nobilis!' called his boss in explanation.

'Oh him!' The younger man exclaimed dismissively; then he just went back to whittling.

I raised my eyebrows. Thamyris dropped his voice. 'Had a fling.' I showed that I still didn't get it. 'Costus.' The voice lowered even further. 'With Demetria!'

I left Helena to draw out anything else she could from the dealer, and strolled across to Costus. He was a handsome chunk, who looked none too bright – - in fact, if he had moved in on the wife of the violent Nobilis, he couldn't be. 'You're brave!'

'Stupid,' he conceded.

'I'm looking for your war wounds.' I could see no recent bruises, though his nose and one ear had a squashed look. Without a word, he pulled up the lower edge of his tunic to reveal a ferocious, fairly new knife scar running from below his hip to his belly-button. It was healed, but he must have been laid up and in some danger for a long time. I whistled through my teeth. 'Very brave – - and no wonder you seem subdued.' The Claudius women had told me it was three years since Demetria had left Nobilis. She must have already known Costus, through his working with her husband; were they lovers before, or was it only after she left that this young man had provided a consoling shoulder? 'Did Nobilis stop working here because his wife left him for you?'

Costus shook his head. 'She just left him. Then he went to pieces. He couldn't accept it.'

'You took her over afterwards?' A couple of his workmates were now watching us quietly. 'Do you know where she is now?'

'Nope.'

I bet he did.