Ovid

'I don't care. The fourth man can't've been the Wart. He was out of Rome at the time, on campaign in Illyricum.'

Silence.

'Are you sure?'

'Sure I'm sure.' I put my head in my hands. 'My father was the governor.'

'Ah.' Perilla was quiet for a long time. Then she said: 'In that case your comment was quite justified.'

I looked up at her. 'What comment was that?'

'Shit.'

A surprising lady, Perilla.

17

My father was waiting for me in the atrium when I came down the next morning. This was crazy. We hadn't spoken in months and now I couldn't get rid of the bastard. He was like one of these winter colds that you just can't shake. I thought about asking him whether while he'd been governor in Illyricum Tiberius had gone back to Rome at any time, but I decided against it. He'd've seen through the question straight away and refused to answer, or just lied. Besides, just the thought of having something that big on the Wart, with the Wart knowing about it, brought me out in a cold sweat.

'Hi, Dad,' I said. 'What brings you back this time? Your pile cream run out?'

I thought that might make him lose his temper but it didn't. He'd obviously decided to play it cool as far as I was concerned.

'I was talking to Cornelius Dolabella yesterday,' he said.

'Yeah?' I was instantly on my guard. Dolabella was a relative of Lentulus and Lentulus, if you remember, was the guy who'd told me about Julia. I wouldn't've thought the old devil would've blabbed but evidently he had; and to the most unlikely person I could imagine. Dolabella was one of my father's most bosom cronies. I'd met him once or twice socially, although once would've been more than enough. You've seen the pigeons at Castor's Temple strutting around pecking for crumbs and shitting on the Wart's nice new marble steps? Yeah. Add a mantle and a squint and that's the guy.

'He had some news that may interest you,' my father was saying. 'His brother Decimus needs a replacement finance officer for Cyprus.'

So Lentulus hadn't given me away after all. I breathed again. 'Oh, whoopee, Dad. And him not half way though the year yet. Lost the one he'd been given, did he? That was clumsy.'

My father didn't smile. Not that I'd expected him to.

'It wasn't Decimus's fault,' he said. 'Young Rufinus was drowned in a boating accident off Paphos.'

'Oh. Oh, shit. I'm sorry.' I'd known Rufinus quite well. He wasn't exactly a friend, but he'd had more going for him than some of the other characters who inhabited Dad's world. 'I really am.'

'So is Decimus.' I can never tell whether my father is being sarcastic, drily humorous or just plain cold-blooded. 'The point is that your name was mentioned as a replacement.'

I stared at him. 'You're not serious?'

He sat down and drew the folds of his mantle around him as if he was expecting a tame artist to wheel in a bust-sized block of marble on a trolley.

'Why not?' he said. 'It's about time you took an active interest in your future.'

Maybe it was telepathy. I wished I hadn't mentioned the subject when I was talking with Perilla. Now it looked as if every bastard in Rome was rooting for Corvinus to make good. The soooner we knocked this on the head the better.

'I haven't done my time with a legion yet.' Young men of good family usually spent a year in the army as junior staff-officers. So far I'd managed to avoid it. The thought of being cooped up somewhere out in the sticks for twelve months with a band of jolly mates whose idea of fun was a morning's pig-sticking didn't exactly thrill me to bits. A month or so of that and I'd probably get myself massacred by the locals just out of boredom.

'I daresay an exception could be made,' my father said. 'You could postpone your military service for a year. There've been plenty of precedents.'

This was serious. I sat down. 'You say my name was mentioned. Who by?'

His face took on a carefully bland expression. 'You know the system, Marcus. These decisions are taken by committees rather than by individuals.'

'Come off it!' Now the shock was over I was beginning to think of the implications, and they stank like a barrel of month-old oysters. 'Yeah, I know the system. Sure I do. You set this up, didn't you? You and your mate Dolabella.'

'Of course we didn't.'

The denial came out pat. Too pat.

'Okay. So tell me who did.'

My father's mouth shut like a trap. I didn't know which was worse: that he was lying or that he was telling the truth.

I got up and walked towards the garden colonnade. I was trying hard not to lose my temper. After all if my father had arranged the posting himself he'd done it out of what he'd see as kindness, and probably used up a valuable favour in the process. And if he hadn't there was just the chance he'd still let slip who had. And that was a name I wanted to know.

'A junior finance post in Cyprus would keep me safely out of circulation for the next couple of years, wouldn't it?' I said quietly.

'I don't know about safely, Marcus, but two years represents a normal tour of duty, yes.'

'And it couldn't come at a more convenient time, either.' My back was to him. 'After all, if someone is so bad-mannered as to go around asking awkward questions…'

'Oh, for heaven's sake!' The irritation in his voice sounded unmistakably genuine. 'That nonsense has nothing to do with anything. You're being offered the most splendid start to a political career any young man could ask for and all you can think of is-'

'That's right!' I turned round. 'All I can think of is that I'm being packed off somewhere I can't do any harm in the hopes that the "nonsense" as you call it will die a natural death. Or maybe even I will, like that poor bastard Rufinus.'

'Marcus, don't be melodramatic.'

But I wasn't going to be stopped as easily as that.

'Look, it won't work,' I said. 'Is that clear? No way! I'm staying in Rome and that's all there is to it.'

'Then you're a fool.' That came out flat as a slap. My father stood up and draped the folds of his senatorial mantle correctly over his left arm as if he was walking into court. I should've seen the speech coming. I'd had similar ones all my life. 'I won't ask you to decide straight away. That wouldn't be fair since I've sprung it on you so suddenly. But I want you to think this over very carefully. It has nothing to do with this other stupidity of yours — you know my views on that and I won't repeat them, but it is a stupidity, nothing more and nothing less. The fact is that you're being offered a post that any other young man of your age would give his eye teeth for. If you turn it down for no good reason then people won't forget. And when you do deign to take your responsibilities seriously you'll find they just aren't willing to trouble themselves over you.' He brushed a hair from the mantle's broad purple edging-stripe. 'I'll be seeing Dolabella later this morning and I'll tell him I haven't had a chance to speak to you yet. Tomorrow's the start of the Spring Festival, so everything will be closed down for several days. That should give even you time to give the offer more than a fleeting thought. Perhaps you'll have the courtesy to inform me of your final decision when the holidays are over.'

I knew from the tightness of the muscles around his mouth and the clipped way he delivered the final sentences that he was angry. Genuinely angry. My father was a politician's politician, and if there was one thing he could neither understand nor forgive it was for someone to refuse political advancement.

'Look, Dad,' I said as I followed him to the door, 'I'm sorry. I know you mean well. I know you've probably bust a gut trying to keep me in with the authorities.' This, I was sure, was true. He'd be concerned for the family name if nothing else. 'But I don't like being manipulated, and I don't like…'

He stopped and turned to face me. If he'd been angry before, now he was furious.