The waggons had carried us out of the Forum, across the Via Aurelia and further south. We dashed round the Circus Maximus at the starting gate end and scuttled east until we were level with the central Obelisk. When we approached the Twelfth Sector I drew to a halt, bolting into the shelter of an alley, as we both struggled for breath. I backed her ladyship against a windowless wall, flung one arm across in front of her, and stared about, frantically listening. After a time I let my arm drop and lowered my bag of gold silently to the ground. There was nothing but the low throb of general noise beyond the buildings round about. Where we were seemed suddenly peaceful. We stood in a discrete pool of quietness: me, the senator's daughter, the silhouette of an owl on a roof-tree, and the smell of old bean skins from a nearby rubbish dump. It might have seemed quite romantic to anyone with a passion for broad beans.
"Lost them!" I whispered. "Enjoying your trip out?"
She laughed, almost soundlessly in the back of her throat. "Beats sitting by a fountain watching slave girls sewing fringes onto frocks!"
I was about to do something well say something, anyway,
– when into the space where my words would have gone, some other villain spoke.
"Now there's a fine Etruscan necklace, lady! Dangerous running about the streets like that. Better hand your glitter over to me!"
XLVI
Helena Justina rarely wore much jewellery, but all her best pieces were on her tonight. I sensed her anguish even in the dark.
Without moving, she asked me in a low voice, "What shall I do?"
"Whatever he says, I think. He's not very big but he's armed."
I had found a blacker shadow, two yards away on my right. Instinct told me about the blade. I scooped the lass across me to my left. The voice laughed scornfully: Treeing his sword arm if he had a sword! Lady, let's have your loot!"
With a wrench of annoyance, Helena detached her scintillating earrings, a panther-headed bangle from each arm and the tiara from her hair. Holding all these, her fingers fumbled at her necklace catch.
"Let me."
"Lot of practice?" scoffed the thief.
He was right; I had undone necklaces before. I could manage this. There were two loops of wire which I pushed together, then twisted apart; while it was on, the weight of the necklace held them in place. Her neck was soft, and warm from running. I know that because only a fool undoes a lady's necklace without tickling the lady's neck.
"Hercules knot!" I answered suavely, then let the light skein of gold shiver into her hand.
A scrawny paw reached out to take possession, then he snarled at me. "Your ring too!"
I sighed. It was the only legacy other than debt that I had ever received. I tossed him my Great Uncle's signet ring.
"Thanks, Falco!"
"He knows you!" Helena sounded annoyed.
The villain was obviously some Aventine scavenger, but a stranger to me. I chipped back sharply, "Lots of people know me, but not many of them would pinch my Uncle Scare's signet ring!"
Helena tensed as if she hoped I would pull out some hidden weapon, then jump. Vespasian had stopped the Praetorians searching his visitors as a signal of quiet times, but I was not such a maniac as to visit the Palace with a knife up my sleeve; I had nothing to jump with.
Our thief suddenly lost interest. Listening too, I heard why. I caught a whistle I recognized; the scavenger slipped down the entry and vanished with his swag.
A man with a flare tumbled into the alley.
"Who's there?"
"Me Falco!" Someone else joined him hotfoot. Tetro, that you?"
"Falco? We've just flushed out that runt Melitus he get anything off you?"
"Jewellery. Lucky you turned up; I had a sack of gold, too!"
"I'll follow it up. You had a what?"
"Sack of gold."
All the time we were speaking, Petronius Longus had been walking down towards me. Now, in the light of the patrolman's flare, he finally glimpsed a vision of my naiad.
"Falco! Now that's downright perjury1." he exploded. He gripped his trooper's arm, then brought up the brand like a beacon. From then on, his eyes were ignoring me. In the torchlight Helena Justina shimmered, iridescent as an opal; excited eyes, that challenging expression, and the best set of shoulders in the Capena Gate She was the same height as me, so my big, slow friend gave us both four inches. He was dressed entirely in brown, with a wooden baton of office twisted through his belt. He wore leather wrist guards greaves strapped to the knee, and a knotted headband round his all but shaven head. I knew he played with children's kittens when he was at home, but he looked grim. Helena edged closer to me; I took the opportunity to slip my arm around her. He shook his head, still rapt in disbelief. Then, all dimpling innocence, the dimwit had to ask, "I suppose you'll try to tell me, this is your vinegar pot?"
What a vindictive bastard!
Before I could wriggle out of it, Helena broke free of my arm and rapped back in a thin voice: "Oh that's me! He usually says I make Medusa's snakes look like a pot of fishing worms."
I bellowed, Tetronius Longus, for a quiet man you make a lot of unnecessary noise!"
There was nothing I could say to her, so I grumbled at him.
"She's a senator's daughter"
"Where would you get one of those?"
"Won her at dice."
Thundering Jove! Where's the game?" he demanded, lifting her hand in his.
"Oh put her down! Titus and Domitian Caesar have both made their poisoned marks on the poor wench tonight " Bright-eyed with the discovery of a friend in a predicament, Petro smirked defiantly, then kissed my senator's daughter's hand with the exaggerated respect he normally keeps for handing Vestal Virgins along the Ostian Way. I was struggling to stop him: "Mars Ultor, Petro! This is the Camillus girl"
"Oh, I realized that! If it were one of your Libyan dancing girls you'd have her in some boudoir on her back!" He believed that I had deliberately lied to him about her; he was furious.
"Oh I'll grant you the boudoir," I slammed at him through bared teeth though not necessarily on her back!"
Petronius grew flustered. I knew that he would; for him lewd talk was private, between men. He released Helena abruptly so she lifted her chin. She was white as smoked linen. My heart sank.
"Watch captain, advise me please. I want to reach my father's house, can anything be done?"
I'll take her," I interrupted, warning him not to interfere.
At that, quite unexpectedly, Helena flung at me: "No thank you! I've heard your opinion; now I'll tell you mine!" She had lowered her voice but Petro and I both winced. "You went to Hades and back in Britain; you saved my life; you are the only person in Rome who keeps a lamp lit for my cousin. You do all that, yet you remain foul-mouthed, prejudiced, and full of casual derision as lacking in good manners as you are in good nature or good will. Most of the things you blame me for are really not my fault"
"I don't blame you for anything"
"You blame me for everything1." She was wonderful. I could not believe I had ever thought otherwise. (Any man can make a bit of a mistake.) "If there's one thing, Didius Falco, I shall regret to the end of my days it's not letting you fall in the River Rhodanus while I had the chance!"
She had a way with pleasantries that flayed a man's skin.
She was so angry I became helpless, I leaned against the wall behind us, and laughed until I was weak.
Petronius Longus continued to stare in embarrassment over our heads at the wall, but he said drily, "Regret it even more, lady; even in the army Falco never learned to swim!"