The slave knocked with his foot. Someone inside peered at us through a peephole, then the door swung open. As I stepped across the threshold, I hardened myself for the sight that awaited me.
Just beyond the foyer, the body of Numerius Pompeius lay upon a bier in the atrium, beneath the skylight. His feet pointed toward the door. The smell of the evergreen branches surrounding him mingled with the heady odor from a pan of incense set in a brazier nearby. The overcast morning light surrounded his white toga and waxen flesh with a pale ivory nimbus.
I forced myself to step closer and look at his face. Someone had done a good job of removing the horrible grimace. Embalmers sometimes break a jaw or stuff the cheeks to achieve the proper effect. Numerius seemed almost to be smiling, as if enjoying a pleasant dream. His toga had been arranged to hide the ugly marks around his throat. I saw him in memory nonetheless, and clenched my jaw.
"Is it so hard to look at him?"
I looked up to see a Roman matron dressed in black. Her hair was undressed and her face without makeup, but the ivory glow from the skylight was kind to her. I thought for a moment that she might be Numerius's sister, then looked again and decided she must be his mother.
"I think he looks rather peaceful," I said.
She nodded. "But the look on your face- I think you must have been remembering how he looked when you found him. I didn't see him until later, of course, and not… not until Pompey made sure he was presentable. That was kind of Pompey, to think of a mother's feelings, with so much else on his mind. Was Numerius so terrible to look at, when he found him?"
I tried to think of an answer. "Your son…" I shook my head. "The older I become, the more of death I see, yet the harder it is to look at."
She nodded. "And we shall be seeing so much more of it, in days to come. But you haven't answered me. I think you know what I'm asking. Did he look as if… as if he suffered a great deal? As if his final thoughts were of the horror of what was happening to him?"
The skin prickled across the back of my neck. How could I possibly answer such a question? To avoid her gaze I looked down at Numerius. Why could she not be content to remember him as he looked now, with his eyes closed and a serene expression on his face?
"I've seen the marks on his throat," she said quietly. "And his hands- they couldn't quite unclench them. I imagine him with that thing around his neck, reaching up to claw at it. I imagine what he must have felt… what thoughts went through his mind. I try not to think of those things, but I can't stop myself." She looked at me steadily. Her eyes were red from weeping, but there were no tears in them now. Her voice was calm. She stood erect, with her hands clasped before her.
"You needn't worry that I'll collapse to the floor sobbing," she said. "I don't believe in hair-tearing, especially in front of an outsider. I have no more tears. None I intend for a stranger to see, anyway." She smiled bitterly. "The men of this house have all run off, except for the slaves. They've left me to bury Numerius by myself."
"Your husband?"
"He died two years ago. The men of this house are Numerius's two younger brothers and his uncle Maecius; my brother moved in to head the household when I became a widow. Now they've all run off with Pompey, and left me to handle this. They know I can do it, you see. They saw how strong I was when my husband died, how strong I've been every day since then. I never flinch, never shirk. I'm famous for it. I'm the model of a Roman matron. So you see, when I ask you to tell me what it was like for my son at the end- and I ask you because it happened in your house, because you were there, and who else could tell me?- you mustn't avoid answering out of fear that you'll reduce me to tears and have a sobbing, hysterical woman on your hands. You must answer as if I were a man."
She had gradually moved closer to me, so that now she stood very near, her face turned up to mine. Her son's beauty came from her. Her undressed hair fell back from her face in dark, shining tresses. Her black gown emphasized the creamy flesh of her throat and the gentle flush of her cheeks. Her green eyes gazed up at me with disconcerting intensity. It was impossible to think of her as a man.
"Surely the Great One told you all you need to know. It would be his duty to you, as the boy's cousin and your kinsman-"
"Pompey told me what he thought I needed to know, that Numerius was… strangled. That he must have been taken by surprise from behind, off his guard, with no chance to respond. Pompey said that meant it must have been quick. Quick and… not so terribly painful."
Not necessarily, I thought. Did Maecia really want me to confirm her worst fears? To tell her that a man strangled by a garrote, with no chance to escape, might nonetheless struggle against the inevitable for quite some time- an eternity for him, no doubt- before succumbing? Did she truly wish to dwell on what Numerius might have thought and felt in those final panic-stricken moments of life?
"Pompey… told you the truth."
"But not the exact details," she said. "When I pressed him… you must know how he is. When the Great One has no more to say, no more will be said. But you were there. You found my son. You saw…"
"I saw a young man lying in my garden, before my statue of Minerva."
"And the instrument used to kill him…"
I shook my head. "Don't do this."
"Tell me, please."
I sighed. "A garrote. A simple device that serves no other purpose than to kill."
"Pompey says he left it with you, because you might need it for your inquiries. I can't even imagine what such a thing must look like."
"A piece of wood as long as my forearm, but not so thick, with a hole bored near each end; a slightly longer piece of stout rope, pulled through the holes and tied into knots."
"How does it work?"
"Please-"
"Tell me!"
"You slip the rope over a man's head, then twist the piece of wood."
"Pompey said it was still around his throat."
"There are ways to catch the rope over the wood so that it stays twisted tight and can't be removed by the victim."
She touched the creamy flesh of his throat. "I saw the marks. Now I understand." Her eyes glistened. "When you found him, with that thing still around his neck, what did his face look like?"
I lowered my eyes. "Just as he looks now."
"Yet you won't look at me as you say that. Can you look at him?"
I tried to turn my gaze to Numerius, but couldn't.
"He must have looked quite horrible, to have such an effect on a man of your experience."
"He was hard to look at, yes."
She shut her eyes. Tears glistened in her lashes. She blinked until they vanished. "Thank you. I had to know how he died. Now I can turn to asking why, and by whose hand. Pompey says you make your livelihood following such inquiries."
"I used to."
"Pompey says you'll help us now."
"He gave me no choice." Her eyebrows lifted. She had demanded unflinching answers, after all. "Did the Great One not explain that he coerced me into accepting this duty?"
"No. I never ask after his methods. But you will help?"
I thought of Davus and Diana, and Cicatrix in my home. "I'll do what I must to satisfy Pompey."
Maecia nodded. "There's something… something I couldn't tell Pompey."
"A secret? Anything you tell me may end up in the Great One's ear. I can't promise you otherwise."
She shrugged uncertainly. "If there's anything to be found out, Numerius has already suffered the consequences. I'm not even sure there's anything to it. A mother's suspicions…"