'Do you think it was Priscillus? Did he attack you because you had some evidence?'
'Priscillus would probably have killed Novus if he could get away with it. I am not sure yet. My money is on Pollia and Atilia at the moment-' She looked satisfied with that alternative, as any woman would.
I was starting to worry why Helena had been gone so long; I missed her if she left the house. I suggested Severina could stay and meet her. 'No; I was on my way to the baths-' So much for making a special journey to see me She persuaded the parrot to hop on to the post at the end of my bed. 'Now: you are going to the cook's funeral; I still don't really know why-' She paused, as if she did not entirely trust me. I scowled, which may not have given the reassurance she required. 'Will you come and see me afterwards?' 'If madam requires.'
Before she left she told me to take care of myself (though I thought we had established someone else was doing that), then at the last moment she leaned over and kissed my cheek.
I swear she expected me to grapple her onto the bed Some people show no respect for an invalid.
'Alone at last!' I sighed at the parrot.
'More front than the beach at Baiae!' the parrot returned colloquially.
I started my poem.
Afterwards I did some thinking.
Anyone else who had been battered to cow-heel glue by Appius Priscillus might decide that alone convicted him of any unsolved deaths that month. I was not so sure. The sequence of events seemed illogical. Hortensius Novus had invited Priscillus to dinner, promising a pact; there was no way Priscillus could have known until the night was over that Novus would reject a merger after all. When things were looking hopeful, why come armed to murder him? The over-ostentatious cake rang with the women's resonance. Obvious and vulgar. Too obvious, it seemed to me-but crimes are often committed with ludicrously poor judgement. Criminals are supposed to be cunning and clever. Sometimes fools get away with a crackpot scheme because no one can believe they would have behaved so stupidly. Not me though. After five years as an informer, I was prepared to believe anything. I had been thoughtful too long. 'So tell me who did it? Chloe screamed. I threw my boot at her, just as Helena came in. She rushed out again, giggling helplessly. 'How was your father?' I shouted after her. 'He wants to talk to you.' 'I thought he might!'
She poked her head back round the door curtain and gave me a smile which ought to have warned me there was worse to come. 'Actually, my mother does as well...'
Helena Justina reckoned Falco's Satire I.I ('Let me tell you, Lucius, a hundred reasons why I hate this parrot...') was the best work I had ever done. Just my luck.
Chapter LIV
I make it a rule never to go to the funerals of people I have killed myself. But it seemed fair to make an exception for someone I had killed by accident.
Helena was still sleeping on the reading couch in the other room, on the poor excuse that she would not disturb my convalescing frame. Something would have to be done about that. I was already enjoying myself, planning schemes for changing things.
I got up quietly on my own. The day before I had dressed and mooched about the house to test my strength, but there was a subtle difference now I knew I was going outside. For the first time since I was hurt I made my own morning drink; watered the sleepy parrot; and looked about like a proprietor again (noticed that the crack in the wall seemed to be growing steadily). I took a beaker in to Helena. Hiding her anxiety, she pretended to be half asleep though an inch of warm cheek emerged from the coverlet to be kissed goodbye.
'Take care ...'
'And you.'
On legs which felt like cotton floss I walked downstairs, then I noticed a carrier staring at my bruises so I walked all the way back to find a hat. In case Helena had heard me and was frightened, I popped in to reassure her it was me.
She had gone.
Puzzled, I turned back into the corridor. The apartment was silent; even the parrot had hunched up and gone back to sleep.
I pushed aside the curtain to my bedroom. Her beaker of hot honey now stood among my own pillowside litter of pens, coins and combs; Helena was in my bed. As soon as I left she must have scampered out and curled up here, where I had been.
Her brown eyes stared at me like some defiant dog, left alone, which had jumped up on its master's couch the moment he left the house.
She did not move. I waved the hat in explanation, hesitated, then crossed the room to kiss her goodbye again. I found the same cheek-then as I moved away she followed; her arms came round my neck, and our lips met. My stomach tensed. Then a brief moment of questioning dissolved into certainty: this was the old, sure welcome only Helena could give-the girl I so badly wanted, saying that she wanted me ...
I made myself stop. 'Work!' I groaned. No one would hold up the cook's funeral if I stayed to play.
Helena smiled, still hanging round my neck as I feebly tried to free myself while my hands began to travel over and round her more deliberately. Those eyes of hers were so full of love and promise I was ready to forget everything. 'Work, Marcus ...' she echoed. I kissed her again.
'I think it's time,' I murmured, against Helena's mouth, 'I started coming home for lunch like a good Roman householder...'
Helena kissed me.
'Stay there!' I said. 'Don't stir-stay there and wait for me!'
Chapter LV
This time as I reached ground level some contractor's men were unloading their tools from a hand-drawn cart. A helpful sign. If the landlord was bringing in the finishing trades at last, maybe we should soon have new tenants too. Make the place less like living in a mausoleum. And some time -though probably not today! - I might persuade those fellows to stuff some hair and plaster in our crack.
I felt good. Even though I was going to someone else's funeral, my life was cheering up.
It was the Kalends of September. In Rome, still hot well into the evening, though in the northern parts of the Empire - Britain, for instance, where I had served in the army and later met Helena-there would be a damp chill now in the mornings and the long winter dark would already be making its approach felt on the late afternoons. Even here, time had taken a new turn round the spindle. I felt like a stranger. I had that uneasy mood which besets the emerging invalid, as if the city had lived through centuries in the few days I was confined to my sickroom.
I had come out too soon. The air felt troublesome on my fragile skin. The bustle disconcerted me. Noise and colour shouted alarm signals to my brain. But the first real shock of my working day was that when my hired donkey blundered up the slope of the Pincian, the stall where Minnius used to sell his cakes had gone.
There was nothing left. The stall, the awning, the delectable produce had all vanished. Even the oven had been dismantled. Someone had completely levelled the cake-man's pitch.
Within the extensive Hortensius grounds, smoke from a portable altar led me to the scene of the funeral. Members of the household were still winding out in convoy from the mansion; I stood back while they assembled in a space among the pine trees. Viridovix would be in famous company. Pincian Hill boasts the Emperor Nero's surprisingly tasteful monument.
There were no shocks at the funeral. Revelations at the bierside are a cheap device employed by epic poets. I was a satirist now, so I knew better than to expect surprises; we satirists are realists.
In my Greek brimmed hat, and the black cloak I wear on these occasions, I tiptoed discreetly among the mourners. I may not have passed entirely unnoticed, since the normal rule at funerals is that half the people present spend most of their time peering about for family celebrities; the keen-eyed, looking for long-lost half-brothers to complain about, would have worked out that I was an unknown quantity who might be good for a few hours of speculative gossip later on.