Shadows in Bronze

'Barnabas believed his master had a golden destiny. So, for that matter, did Pertinax! His adoptive father filled him with a stupendous notion of his personal worth. In fact if Pertinax had remained alive, he would have been the dangerous one.'

'Ambition?' I scoffed quietly. Dead or not, anything about this Pertinax niggled me, because of his marriage to Helena. 'Did Pertinax covet power for himself?'

'Pertinax was an inadequate boor!' Gordianus grated with a sudden bellow of impatience. I agreed. 'Did you know him?' he asked in surprise.

'No need,' I answered glumly. 'I knew his wife.'

Having allocated Helena Justina's ex-husband a place on the chain of humanity that was less than a stag beetle in a cowpat, I could hardly believe the man had held Imperial ideas. But after Nero some odd candidates had emerged: Vespasian for one. If the freedman believed the death of Pertinax had robbed himself of the chance to be the Empire's Chief Minister, his vindictiveness became understandable.

Curtius Gordianus stood in silence, then he said, 'Take care, Falco. Atius Pertinax had a destructive personality. He may be dead, but I don't believe we have seen the end of the man's malign influence!'

‘What does that mean, sir?' If the Chief Priest wanted to be mysterious, I could not be bothered to take him seriously. Suddenly he smiled. It wrinkled his face unpleasantly, and his teeth were the type to keep for strictly private use – badly chipped and stained.

'Perhaps I chew bay leaves in the afternoon!' – Well, that explained the teeth.

I had to leave the subject there, because the searchers had returned – needless to say, without our man. But they had found one thing that might be useful. Kicked to the back of the sanctum in the Temple was a pocketbook that seemed more likely to belong to the assailant than the deputy priest: it contained a few notes which appeared to be sums checking tavern bills (hay: one sr; wise: ace aster; food: ace.).

That calculations seemed to belong to some careful type who was suspicious of innkeepers – well, that gave me a wide choice! What caught my eye in particular was a list on the front page which seemed to be dates (mainly in April, but a few in May), with names alongside them (Galatea, Lusitania, Yens of Paphos, Concordia…). Not horses, who would be all 'Fury' and 'Thunder'. Works of art, perhaps – a dealer's auction list? If those were statues or paintings which had all changed hands in the space of six weeks, it must have been a famous collection which had been broken up; Geminus would know.

Another alternative, and the one I eventually favoured, was that it sounded like a sailing list, and the stately symbolic names represented ships. – There was nothing else for me to do at Cape Colonna. I was anxious to leave. Before I left, Gordianus said sombrely, 'This freedman is too dangerous to tackle alone. Falco, you need help. As soon as Milo has installed me safely at Paestum, I shall send him to join forces with you-'

I thanked him politely, promising myself to avoid this stroke of fortune if I could.

When I arrived back in Croton I bumped into Laesus, though I had not expected to see him again and he looked pretty surprised at seeing me. But I discovered that while I had been paddling on the beach at Cape Colonna this excellent spark Laesus had sailed to Tarentum. My honest new friend told me he had made enquiries about Barnabas at the old Pertinax farm (now part of the Imperial estate).

'Who did you ask?'

'Who was bound to know? His mother, ghastly witch. Zeus, Falco!' Laesus complained. 'The wicked old baggage chased me out of her home with a pan of smoking fat!'

I tutted gently. 'Laesus, you have to charm them before they reach the hearth. Throw a purse in over the threshold but remember, your average granny can tell at twenty yards if a purse is only stuffed with mountain rocks!'

Laesus dashed on heedlessly: 'She didn't want money, only my blood. The revolting crone started life as a slave but she's free now and people look after her – I suppose Barnabas took care of it.'

'Her loving boy! What was she like?'

'She smelt frosty as a tiger's armpit and had no sense of time. But if the barmy old basket knows anything at all, you can hang onto the freedman's cash yourself. As far as I could gather, his mother thinks he's dead.'

I laughed.

'Laesus, I'll bet mine thinks the same; but it only means I haven't written home for a week!'

Events at Cape Colonna had shown Barnabas was very much alive.

I ought to have gone to see this angry old Calabrian bat myself, to sort out the real story. But life's too short; you can't do everything.

I showed Laesus the notebook we found in the Temple of Hera.

'Look at this list: Hones of April, Galatea and Venus of Paphos; four days before the Ides, Flora; two days before May, Lusitania, Concordia, Parthenope, and The Graces… Mean anything? I think these are ships. I think it's either a docking list, or, more likely at that time of year, a record'

Larius looked at me with those bright black robin's eyes of his. 'Nothing I recognize.'

'You said you used to sail to Alexandria yourself!'

'This doesn't mention Alexandria!' Laesus argued, with a pinched appearance at being caught out in his own professional sphere. 'It was a long time ago,' he admitted, understandably shamefaced.

I grinned at him remorselessly. 'A long time, and a lot of wine jugs if you ask me! Alexandria was a hunch.'

'Well, leave me the list and I'll ask around-'

I shook my head, tucking the notebook away in my tunic. 'Thanks; I'll keep it. It may be nothing important anyway.'

It says much for his lopsided charm that although I feel queasy just peering into rock-pools I almost agreed to travel in his ship with Laesus round to Rhegium. But you can die of being seasick; I preferred to stick on land.

I made Laesus a present of my goat. I guessed she might end up barbecued on the shore. I felt bad about it afterwards. But there are two things a private informer is better not lumbered with: women and pets.

I never mentioned she was sacred. Killing a sacred beast brings horrible misfortune but only, in my experience, if you know what you have done. When you don't know you don't worry, so you stand more chance.

The goat went with Laesus quietly: a fair-weather creature – like most of my friends. I told her if she had to be eaten by a sailor, I could not entrust her to a nicer man.

XXI

So; back to tell the Emperor how well I had done in Bruttium.

That week I spent in Rome was disastrous. My mother despised me for failing to fetch her liquorice. Lenia bullied me out of three weeks' rent. Helena Justina had left no messages. At the Camillus house I learned that she had left Rome to spend high summer in some country retreat; I was too proud to ask the door porter where. Her father, who was a pleasant man, must have heard I had come calling; he sent a house slave after me inviting me to dine, but I was too miserable to go.

Against this depressing background it was with some trepidation that I entered the Palace to report. Before I encountered Vespasian I tracked down Anacrites to compare notes.

I found him in a poky office, studying invoices. I managed to extract a confession that he failed in his mission to find Aufidius Crispus, the conspirator who had fled to Neapolis. It also emerged that he had done nothing about Barnabas either; even my news that the freedman had made another attack on a senator failed to rouse him. Anacrites was now auditing the contractors who had organized the Emperor's Judaean Triumph, so his mind was on tenders and daywork rates; be seemed to have lost all interest in plots.

Cursing him for a short-tempered, introverted scarab, I slouched off to see the Emperor, feeling very much alone.

After I finished my story Vespasian pondered for some time. 'Caesar, I hope I have not overstepped the mark?'