The Accusers

`Would she?'

`Probably not.'

We sat in silence.

It was Petronius who told me that when the courts reopened, Silius Italicus was to charge the apothecary with murdering Metellus. Petro had heard it from the Second Cohort. They were agog because not only was Rhoemetalces to be offered to the praetor as having a case to answer, but Silius was putting up Rubiria Juliana as his co-accused. Well, that mischief will have brought festival joy to yet another Roman family.

Io Saturnalia!

XI

‘SILIUS is doing this because he wants a Senate hearing,' Petro said.

He was a good Roman. Legal gossip excited him. `He's out to make his name. Parricide is a bloody good way to ensure it; the public will be avid for details. This Juliana woman is patrician, so it will go before the Curia. If the family have imperial influence it could be even better than that. To spare her the ordeal, Vespasian may himself take her case at the Palace -'

`He won't,' I disagreed. `The old man will distance himself from this family. Ordinarily, he might have rescued them from the ordeal of a public trial, but the corruption conviction will put them on their own.

`You mean he is an Emperor who won't fiddle things for the elite?'

`I mean, Petro, he won't want it to look that way.'

`Does he fiddle?' Petronius was certain that I had inside knowledge.

`Presumably. Don't they all? What's the point of ruling the world if you never fix things?'

`I thought Vespasian didn't give a toss about the upper class.'

`Maybe not. But he wants them in his debt.'

`You are a cynic,' observed Petronius.

`You get that way.'

`It's very hard for Juliana,' Helena reckoned when I went home and told her. `To be accused of killing her papa, when she bought the pills only because he sent her.'

'Silius will argue that Juliana is lying. Why send her? Why not send out his wife or a house slave?'

`She was his daughter,' Helena said. `She knew the apothecary. Metellus trusted her to make sure they were pills that would be quick and clean and painless.'

`Would you do it for Decimus?'

Helena looked shocked. She loved her father. `No! But then,' she reasoned, Juliana tried -'Helena learned fast; she quickly swung along with my caution. `Or she says she tried – to thwart her father's suicide.'

`I am sure the defence will parade that claim on her behalf.'

`I'm sure the defence will bungle it!' Helena was even more cynical than me. I was not sure whether this had always been so, or whether living with me had hardened her. `She's a woman. With scandal in the air, she will stand no chance. The prosecution will allude to the previous corruption trial whenever possible, implying by association that Juliana is corrupt too. Like father, like daughter. In fact yes, she did buy the pills – but her father had declared to all the family that he intended to commit suicide. That is a recognised device at his rank, sanctioned down the centuries. Juliana was simply his instrument.'

I sniffed. `He changed his mind.'

`So he was a vacillating coward! But Juliana had tried to save him, so that's a double tragedy for her. And to be then accused of murdering him is vile.'

We were sitting in my office at home, me on a couch with the family dog shoving at me to make more room available, and Helena sitting on a table swinging her legs. The scrolls she had moved to clear a space for herself were squashed against a wall cupboard. From time to time she fiddled with my inkwell, while I watched, waiting for it to go over. It had a non-spill device, supposedly, which I was curious to test. `You met the apothecary, Marcus. What did you think of him?'

I repeated what I told Silius: Rhoemetalces was a successful professional who seemed to know what he was doing. Even accused of murder, I thought he would hold up well in court. As well as he could, that is. He had sold the pills which killed a man, he could not alter that. Everything hung on the court's interpretation of Metellus senior's intentions. Suicide is not illegal, far from it. So could the apothecary be held liable for a man who changed his mind? I thought it would be unfair – but fairness and justice are two different bines on the hop.

`You met Juliana,' I reminded Helena. `What was your opinion?'

Helena acknowledged that she had not viewed Juliana as a prospective killer. `I wanted family background. I did not scrutinise her as a possible suspect.'

`Still, what about her behaviour struck you?'

Helena pulled back the scene from her memory. `I saw her only briefly. She had a family resemblance to her mother Calpurnia, but younger of course, and softer. Sad and strained, but it looked well etched, so either those were always her natural features or all this business has worn her out.'

`Happy marriage?' I asked.

`Nothing to say yes or no,' Helena shrugged. 'Juliana thought I had come to express condolences. I felt she liked that. She seemed more genuine in her feelings than her mother had been – much less conscious of how everything would look.'

`Someone had told her not to answer questions.'

`Oh yes. She was quick to bridle and she jumped up to call for more attendants, once she realised what I had really come for.'

`Was she frightened?' I wondered.

`A little. Whether scared of me and what I might ask her, or afraid of whoever had told her to be very careful, I can't say.'

`The husband?'

`Most likely. What did you think of him, Marcus?'

Rufus? Unhelpful bastard. Not just to us – to his wife too.'

We talked about the second time Juliana was questioned, after she became a suspect, when Justinus and I had interviewed her formally, with her husband grimly sitting by. We had seen Paccius Africanus lurking at their house, so he was clearly still advising the family, including Juliana. So at what stage had it struck him that her involvement with the pill purchase might cause her problems? Presumably now he would be the defence in the new court case.

`Will you attend the trial, Marcus?'

`Love to, but it will be an impossible squeeze. If the case is heard in the Curia, only senators will be admitted inside the chamber. You know what it's like. The open doorways will be packed with nosy sightseers, most of whom won't hear a word. I can't face that.'

`You produced the initial evidence from which Silius must be working. Would he not take you, in the prosecution party?'

`He might if I had kept in with him. He has not been friendly since your brothers grabbed our fee.'

Helena looked serious. `And how, exactly, did they achieve it?' I looked vague. She tapped a fingernail on the inkwell. `Which of your dubious methods, Falco?'

`Oh… they visited the informer's underling, that useless Honorius, in his office.'

`And?’

'And persuaded him to produce a banker's order.'

`Persuaded?' asked Helena, with a glint. `They beat Honorius up?'

`Nothing so subtle. They locked themselves in with him and stayed there until he gave in. As I heard it, Aelianus took along some reading matter and sat casually immersed in scrolls. The lads peed out of the window, but Honorius was too shy, so he was suffering. After a few hours Honorius also became very hungry; Justinus fetched out a very large lunch basket – which they proceeded to devour with relish and did not share with the scribe.'

`I suppose Honorius caved in by the time they reached the forcedmeat balls?' Helena chortled.

`I think it was the giant shrimp tails that did the trick. Quintus sucks them out of their shells so very suggestively. But you get the idea.'

Helena Justina, the light of my life, gave me a look that said she was never quite sure whether to believe my rampant stories – but she rather suspected the worst of them were true. This look contained enough underlying humour to show she did not entirely disapprove. I like to think she was proud of me. After all, she was nicely brought up and would not have wished her husband to collect his debts using sordid brutality.