I had one more task before I left Antium. I went to the workshop which had once belonged to the famous cameo-cutter, Dioscurides. He was long gone but an atelier still existed, where high-class craftsmen made every kind of cameo, not just from gems and from coral brought up from the Bay of Neapolis, but wondrous pieces carved from two-tone layered glass. I bought a small vase for Helena, an exquisite design in white and dark blue which I could either save for her birthday in October or hand over now to win her round if she was still being distant with me.
Remembering that I owned an auction house, I even made enquiries about bulk purchase – - but the snooty salesmen sneered at that; they wanted only to deal direct with customers and take all the profits. Pa would have wangled some deal, I knew. I wasn't my father; I refused to become his ghost.
Exclusivity did help, however. When I asked about the jewel found at Anacrites' house, I was told they would have records of who made it, who bought it and when. I described it. They professed admiration for my eloquent detail. They sent me out for lunch. When I returned, a small piece of parchment was handed over, which they insisted 'was in confidence. The cameo had been made a long time ago for an emperor who died before it was finished; it had remained at the workshop, awaiting the right buyer, until very recently.
Sadly, the eventual purchaser was not Modestus or his wife Livia Primilla, but a man in Rome called Arrius Persicus, who must have oodles of bullion, from the price he paid. It was not written down, though proudly whispered to me. The gem left the workshop only a few weeks ago. That too ruled out Modestus and Primilla. It also left no obvious link to Anacrites. Unless Persicus had disappeared mysteriously in the past month, the agent's claim to Petro and me that the cameo was found 'in undergrowth on the marshes' became suspect.
It was possible Persicus had been done in on his way back to Rome with his expensive new bijou. Petronius would have to check if he had been reported missing.
'Is he a collector of precious objects, or do you know who he bought it for?'
'Confidential, Falco.'
'Girlfriend, you mean?'
'We rather thought so.'
'I'm sure you get a smell for it… Is he married?'
'Presumably. He bought a second piece that day – very much cheaper.'
How sad life could be.
I returned to Rome, passing straight through and making my way to the Janiculan. Communicating with my own sweet wife Helena Justina was now an urgent issue.
I dumped my luggage in the porch. Times had changed: I knew people would take it in for me. I could hear my little ones romping in the gardens, with Nux barking. Instinct drew me down a path away from them. I found Helena seated on a bench that had been set up close to where we held my father's funeral. A new memorial stood there, with an inscription to Pa and a sad last line naming our lost baby son. Also Marcus Didius Justinianus, beloved of his parents: may the earth lie lightly upon him. I had not been able to ask Helena anything about this; I had to arrange it myself. I had not even seen it since the mason set it up.
Helena's attitude suggested that she came here regularly. She was not weeping, though I thought I detected tears on her cheeks. If she was managing to mourn, that was an improvement on her previous tight, tense refusal to acknowledge what had happened.
After I met her gaze, I sat beside her in silence, then we looked at the memorial together. After a time, Helena of her own accord placed her hand on mine.
It was some weeks to Helena's birthday, but when we returned to the house I gave her the blue glass vase anyway. She was worth it. I told her that; she told me I was a hound, but she still loved me. 'I would have been just as pleased at your return without a gift.' A man in my line of work has to be cynical, but I believed her.
'Just so long as you don't see it as a bribe.' This would be our only mention of Petro and me keeping that man at our house.
'Even you can't afford the size of bribe you would have needed.' 'Oh I know. At least, unlike the wife of Arrius Persicus, you know I haven't bought a bigger present for some secret mistress.'
'No, darling. Spending even this much money must have been enough of a shock.'
'I'll get used to doing it. For you.'
'Well,' said Helena graciously. 'You had better go and tell Petronius Longus what you found out.'
'You're giving me a pass out of barracks! – Not tonight, though, honeycake. I'm staying in with you.'
'Don't overdo it, Falco – or I will think you have something to hide.' Helena Justina was almost her old self again.
I really felt too travel-weary to seek out Petro but sent a message to him with news of Volusius being a mathematician and Arrius Persicus buying the cameo. He would follow up these leads. I suggested we meet up for breakfast at Flora's next day. I burrowed back into domesticity -patted the children, tickled the dog, played mental tug of war with Albia about nothing much, bathed, dined, slept.
'Anyway,' Albia had demanded, 'what did you do with that scraggy bit of rope you took away from Nux? We spent hours searching for it while you were away.'
'I burned it. You don't need to know why – - nor does the dog.'
'That was a waste. She loved her tugging rope.'
Nux was a scamp but I liked to think even she had standards. She might not have loved the rope if she knew what it was. Besides, with Anacrites repeatedly dropping in on us like an annoying uncle, the dog's toy had to be sacrificed.
While I was in Antium, he had even come up to the villa, Helena said. She told him I had gone to Praeneste for a client. She claimed it was a very attractive 'widow for whom I carried out unspeakable personal services; Anacrites had commiserated with her in apparent shock and sorrow.
'He said, This is a new side to Falco. So I snapped, You are not a very good spy if you think that! Don't relax,' Helena warned me. 'The man is not stupid. He didn't believe a word of it. Marcus, he will be wondering where you really did go.'
Next morning Helena arranged to bring the family back to our house. I had the impression she had been pretty well ready to do it even if I had not arrived to fetch them. I left the villa earlier. Even up here, I checked carefully that I was not followed. The spy was a man. down now, though; perhaps he would stop haunting me.
Flora's Caupona was a decrepit drinks place in my family's part of the Aventine, run by my sister Junia. Luckily she had not yet arrived, since her mornings were occupied with the needs of her son, who was profoundly deaf. Junia had proved an inventive, devoted mother who spent hours coaxing him into basic communication. She had already had plenty of practice with her supremely dull husband, so perhaps her patience with little Marcus was not all that surprising.
In her absence the waiter Apollonius produced what the workers who formed the caupona's early passing trade had to endure as stamina food: stale bread and weak posca, the vinegary drink that is given to slaves and soldiers. Nobody who hoped for a sociable outdoor breakfast would ever come here. The tuck had one advantage, though; it was better, and safer, than what Flora's served for lunch.
Apollonius had once taught geometry at an infant school; he taught Maia and me. It would have been a neat coincidence if he had known the victim Volusius – - a coincidence to find only in a Greek adventure yarn. In real life it never happens. 'Can't say I've heard of him, Falco.'
While I waited for Petro to show, I wondered glumly if the stricken young teacher half dead of fright at Antium could also have left his job and become a wine waiter. If so, in this city with hundreds of thousands of street bars, we would never find him.
I could tell by the jaunty way Petro approached that he had made progress. During the night shift, he said, the new facts I brought from Antium turned into excellent leads.
We told Apollonius to go into the back room and stay there, reading a long scroll of Socrates.