I turned my head. She turned hers. I was two digits away from kissing her. She knew it, and made no attempt to move away. If I did, I knew what would happen: I would start to feel responsible.
Leaning on the couch behind me, I hoisted myself to my feet.
Severina scrambled upright too, holding out her hand for me to steady her. The wine, and the sudden motion, made us both sway. For a moment we lurched together, still clutching hands.
Had it been Helena, I would have found my arms were round her. Severina was smaller; I would have to stoop. She was not the birdlike bony type who gave me goose-pimples; under her loose shift I could see inviting flesh on her. Her skin always looked clean and smooth; it was poignantly perfumed with some familiar oil. In the lamplight, and so close to me, the wintery grey of her eyes was suddenly a deeper, more interesting, blue. We both knew what I was thinking. I was relaxed, and susceptible. I was missing my lady; I too needed company.
She made no attempt to stand on tiptoe; she wanted the decision-and the blame-to be all mine.
Too tired out and tipsy to think fast, I searched for a way to escape with some tact. 'Bad idea, Zotica!'
'Not tempted?'
'Too far gone,' I pretended gallantly. At that moment I felt so overcome with weariness I could easily have agreed to any procedure which allowed me to lie down. 'Another time,' I promised.
'I doubt it!' she answered-pretty vindictively.
I managed to stagger home.
I had not been back to my Piscina Publica apartment since Anacrites arrested me. I would have been relieved to find a message from Helena Justina: some signal that she missed me, some reward for my own good faith. There was nothing.
Still, I could hardly blame a senator's daughter if she was too proud to make overtures. And, having said I would wait to hear from her, there was no way on earth that I was going to approach her first.. .
I went to bed, cursing women.
Severina didn't want me; she wanted me to want her; not the same thing.
Nor, I thought angrily (for the drink was now making me belligerent), was there any way that a pair of cool blue eyes would make me forget the girl who really made me furious; the girl I wanted to think about; the girl whose brown eyes once said so frankly that she wanted me. ..
Frustrated beyond endurance, I crashed my clenched fist as hard as I could against the bedroom wall. Somewhere close by, within the building fabric, a shower of falling material rattled disturbingly as if I had shifted a joist. The debris trickled for a long time.
In the darkness I moved my hand over the wall surface. Unable to find any damage to the plasterwork, I lay rigid with guilt and foreboding, listening for noises.
Pretty soon I forgot to listen and fell asleep.
Chapter XXXVIII
I woke earlier than I might have done, due to my dreams. Dreams which disturbed me so badly I won't bother you by revealing what they were.
To avoid further nightmares I sat up and dressed-a drawn-out procedure, given that it only consisted of pulling on a clean tunic over the crumpled one I had slept in, then finding my favourite boots where Ma had hidden them. During this struggle, I could hear some sort of racket going on. The old woman upstairs was bawling away at some poor soul as if he had thieved her only daughter's virginity.
'You can only regret it!' a man's voice raged. Pleased that for once I was an innocent party in her delusions, I stuck my head out just as Cossus the letting agent tumbled downstairs past my door. He looked flustered.
'Trouble?' I asked.
'She's a mad old bag-' he mumbled, glancing back over one shoulder as if he feared the woman would call down a witch's curse on him. 'Some people never know what's good for them -'
He seemed disinclined to dispel my curiosity so I contented myself with chivvying, 'What's happening about that water-carrier you promised me?'
'Give us a chance ...'
This time I let him depart without a tip.
I left home without any breakfast. Nursing a sore head, I set off to see the women on the Pincian. It took me some time to get there. My feet had apparently taken a vow against walking anywhere today. I fooled them by hiring a mule.
Novus was being honoured in a brave style on his departure across the Styx. Throughout the house there was a dark smell of embalming oils and incense. Instead of a few indicative cyprus boughs, each doorway was guarded by a pair of whole trees. They must have uprooted a small forest. Trust this lot to create a spectacle even out of a funeral.
The slaves were in strict black. The cloth looked brand-new. The freedwomen must have had sempstresses working all night.
When I managed to get in to see them (for they were putting on a show of being too overwrought for visitors), Pollia and Atilia were veiled in elaborate swathes of exquisite white: the upper-class colour for mourning wear (more flattering).
I muttered condolences then squared up to the situation: 'You may ask me how I dare to show my face ...'
Sabina Pollia cackled briefly. Grief can affect some people with irritability. As usual her face was beautifully presented, yet today it was apparent that her voice was ten years older than the face.
I braced myself. 'Look; I did my best-which is all I ever promised you.' Hortensia Atilia's huge dark eyes, which looked more frightened than sorrowful, fastened on me anxiously. Sabina Pollia glared. 'You were right about Severina-though her timing seems inexplicable ... There was no way to prevent what happened. But she won't escape justice this time -'
'How can you be so confident?' Pollia asked me cuttingly.
'Experience.'
'You were confident before!'
'No; I was cautious before. Now I'm angry -'
'The matter has been reported to the Praetor,' Pollia broke in.
'Yes; I suggested that myself-' I already guessed what was coming.
'Then I suggest we leave the Praetor to deal with it!'
After the whiplash of scorn from Pollia subsided, I started again cautiously: 'You commissioned me because I worked for the Palace, which happens to be where I was detained last evening-'
'Our husbands have instructed us to discontinue your services.' This was Atilia, who had always appeared the more timid of the pair. Neither of these women would care a bent hairpin for what their husbands said; Felix and Crepito were mere ciphers. But one excuse was as another when clients were set on dismissing me.
'Of course,' I said, 'you must respect your husband's wishes!'
'You failed, Falco!' Pollia insisted.
'Apparently!'
Even with a raging hangover I knew how to be professional. They were both tense, expecting an angry outburst; I could relieve my feelings later so I disappointed them. 'Ladies, I never stick around if I have lost my clients' confidence.'
I saluted them politely (since I wanted them to pay me), Then I left.
The end of the case. Ah well; if I failed to recruit any other business I could always go back to working for the Palace.
Signed off.
Signed off again! It was always happening to me. Somehow the only clients who ever commissioned me were vacillating types. Hardly had I drummed up interest in their tawdry lives, than they changed their fretful little minds about needing me.
I could have solved this one. I would have enjoyed doing so. Never mind; for a few weeks' surveillance I could now charge the two women extortionate expenses, then nip off out of it before the messy part. It was the best way to do business, for a philosophical man. Let the local law and order people give themselves headaches puzzling how Severina managed it this time. Let the Pincian magistrate try to bring her to court where the Praetor Corvinus on the Esquiline had failed. I was laughing. I could send a bill for my expenses, spend some time at the baths, enjoy myself, then read about official bungling in the Daily Gazette...