Venus in copper

I entered the Twelfth district. Home smells assaulted my nose. A wolf whistle, without violence, followed me in the darkness as I took the lane.

Fountain Court.

Of all the groaning tenements in all the sordid city alleyways, the most degrading must be Fountain Court…

Outside the barber's, Rodan and Asiacus lifted their gladiatorial frames from a bench where they were chatting; then they sank down again. They could find another day to batter me. At the laundry I heard convivial strains from where Lenia must be entertaining her sordid betrothed. Rome was full of women planning how to fleece their men; grinning, I wondered if she had managed to persuade him yet to name a day.

A door opened. Outlined against the light behind I glimpsed a disorderly lump, topped by a few scrags of hair; Smaractus!

I was all paid up until November; no point stopping to insult him. It would keep. I could exercise my rhetoric some other day. Pretending not to notice him, I tightened my cloak and pulled down my hat so I could pass by like some sinister wraith, enveloped in black. He knew it was me; but he stepped back.

I steeled my legs, then warmed by nostalgia for familiar aggravation, I broached the first of those depressing six flights of stairs.

Chapter LXVIII

The place was a dump.

An amphora, nobbled from the Senator's mansion, stood leaning against what passed for a table. The bung was out. So this was what went on here when I was off elsewhere, struggling with a case… Two pastry doves, oozing with raisin juice, were standing in an old chipped dish, beak to beak like battered lovebirds. One still managed to look sleek enough, but the other had a tired droop to his tail-like me.

The glamorous piece who pretended to take in messages was sitting on the balcony with a beaker of wine, reading one of my private waxed tablets. Probably the one I would have ordered her not to read. The poetry.

She had left a spare cup on the table in case anyone happened along who liked decent wine. I poured myself a drink. Then I leaned against the folding door and rapped with my signet ring. She appeared to take no notice, but her eyelashes ruffled slightly so I reckoned that my manly presence had registered.

'Falco live here?'

'When he feels like it.'

'I've got a message.'

'Better give it to me.'

'You're beautiful.'

Her eyes lifted. 'Hello, Marcus.'

I gave her my masterful grin. 'Hello, fruit! It's all over. Gone as far as I could.'

'Will you convict her?'

'No.'

Helena laid aside my poetry. Alongside her on the bench was a small pyramid of published works. She was wearing one of my more disreputable tunics and her feet were pushed into a pair of crumpled old slippers, also mine. I said, 'Trust me to pick a girl who pinches my clothes and raids my library!'

'These came from Uncle Publius-' She gestured to the scrolls. I knew the Senator had a brother who died earlier that year, lost at sea (made a bad mistake in politics). 'His house had jumble going back to the province where he served as a young man-'

'You read all those this evening?' I asked, afraid it would be an expensive business keeping this quick reader stoked.

'Just skipping.'

'Skipped anything good?'

'I've been reading about King Juba. He married Cleopatra Silene, the daughter of Mark Antony. He seems quite an interesting person-for a king. One of those eccentric private scholars who write detailed notes on curious subjects-a treatise on Spurge, for example.'

'Good old Juba!'

'Are you familiar with Spurge?'

'Naturally.' I sounded as if I were thinking What in Hades is Spurge? I grinned. 'Spurge is that green plant, all the same sickly colour: spear-shaped leaves and bitty flowers-'

Helena Justina brought her two strong eyebrows together, then went quiet in a way that meant How does this idiot know about Spurge! I heard a warm gurgle: the laugh, full of delight, which she reserved for teasing me. 'Oh you're a market gardener's grandson!'

'And full of surprises!' I said defensively.

'You're clever,' Helena replied, giving me a soft look.

'I like to show an interest. I can read. I read everything I can lay my hands on. If you leave those scrolls around the house, I'll be an expert on King Juba by the end of the week.' I was feeling sore; due to failing in the case maybe. 'I'm not an Aventine lout. Wherever I go I notice things. I pay attention to the Forum news. When people talk I listen properly-' Helena's patient silence stopped my bitter, boisterous flow. 'I know, for instance, that you, my darling, have something particular to say to me about Spurge.'

She smiled. I loved Helena's smile. 'It can be used in medicine. King Juba named one kind Euphorbia, after his physician. Euphorbus employed it as a purgative. Mind you,' declared my darling caustically, 'I wouldn't allow Euphorbus to spoon a dollop into me!'

'Why not?'

'The dose has to be exactly right. Spurge has another use.'

'Tell me,' I murmured, leaning forwards expectantly at the glint in her bonny eyes.

'In King Juba's province archers use it to paint on arrowheads. Spurge is also highly poisonous.'

'Poisoned arrows usually work by causing rapid paralysis… so where,' I asked, to give her the pleasure of telling me even though I already knew, 'is this province your uncle once served in, which had the famous and scholarly king?'

'Mauretania,' said Helena.

I closed my eyes.

Helena stood up and wrapped her arms round me. She spoke in the quiet, reasoned way she used when we were unravelling a case. 'Of course, this proves nothing. A jurist might deny it was even evidence. But if a prosecution lawyer read out an excerpt from King Juba's treatise, then you told the court about the scroll you saw in Severina's house, then-if the barrister was persuasive and you managed to look more sensible than usual-this is the kind of colourful detail which might condemn.'

I opened my eyes. 'The plants have a milky sap; I remember from weeding. Probably tastes bitter. She may have mixed the juice with honey so Novus would lap it up greedily…'

Helena found a way to hold me even closer; I coloured but met her, as they say, halfway. 'Have you worked out how she applied it?' she asked.

'We both knew that some time ago-' Helena nodded. 'She spread the poison on that silver dish, the one used at the dinner party for the cakes. Then she fixed it with her egg-white glaze, so none of the poison touched the cakes. Minnius sent seven; so when Severina failed to attend the dinner, if everybody was polite-as I was told they were -one last cake must have stayed on the dish. All through the business conference Hortensius Novus must have had his eye on it. When the party broke up and he disappeared, he had dashed back into the dining room. He gobbled up the remaining pastry. Then-'

I stopped.

'Then,' Helena completed for me, 'Hortensius Novus licked the plate!'

Would it convict? Only circumstantially. But all evidence is circumstantial in some way. A defence lawyer would be keen to point that out.

Was there any point going on? The gold-digger had made her fortune. She might reform now; she might be reformed by Lusius. I had a personal reason for denouncing Severina, but an even stronger motive for attacking my ex-landlord Novus. If Severina had not murdered Novus for me, I would be a murderer tonight myself.

'Marcus, you're exhausted. I wish I had never told you. You did enough; now let go!'

'No client,' I said. 'No reason to do anything… No justice!' I exclaimed.

Justice was for people who could afford it. I was a poor man, with myself and a decent woman to support, on an income that would hardly stretch to let me breathe, let alone save.