Never had Claudia found stumping steps more reassuring, and she had to physically refrain from grabbing those red, chapped hands and showering them with kisses. This time, Echo eschewed vocal communication in favour of a jerk of the head and set a cracking pace up the atrium. The peristyle at the end offered shelter from the drizzle, although precious little comfort in the summer. No busts, no statues, no fountains, no shrines, just the one marble seat covered with birdlime. Even the garden was depressing, devoid of any plant that could not be classified as functional. At the far end of the peristyle, the doorkeeper stopped short, flung wide a cypress door and all but pushed Claudia inside.
From the cold detachment of its spartan surroundings, the contrast here was dramatic. A log fire crackled majestically, filling the room with a haze of applewood smoke, and had the bear still been inside its skin on the hearth, no doubt this was the place it would have chosen to lie. The walls were painted a rich dark red, like old mellow wine, embellished with gold and with green, and from a lampstand dangled four bronze lights illuminating a vast assemblage of busts and curios. So busy was Claudia, digesting this warm, inviting treasure trove, that she failed to realize she had company.
‘I trust my collection amuses you.’
She spun round. He was standing in the corner, in the shadow, perched against a chest. She would not show what he’d intended her to. ‘Are you Kaeso, or simply another lackey?’
It was hard to tell, him being shaded, but she thought she caught a change of expression, which might have been amusement. Or then again, might not.
‘I’m whoever you want me to be.’ Was that a yes or a no?
‘Then you’re not the man I’m after,’ she said. ‘The man I seek is quick and decisive, and I’ve been waiting half an hour-’
‘I am Kaeso.’ He shifted his weight, that was all. ‘And I very much regret the delay. You see, this is just a room I rent, Tucca had to fetch me.’
Tucca, not Echo. And this was not Narcissus, fallen in love with himself, there was not a mirror in the room. The voice remained in shadows.
‘She might have explained.’ Let him make small talk. Sooner or later he’d have to come out.
A flash of teeth showed in the corner. ‘There is a slight problem with that,’ replied Kaeso. ‘Someone cut out her tongue. She’s a mute.’
Claudia wanted to whistle, to say, ‘No shit,’ but held back.
‘She lives here alone,’ he was saying. ‘Tends the whole house herself, apart from the groceries, and her daughter does that.’
‘I’m surprised any man bedded her once, never mind enough times to give her a child.’
Claudia hadn’t realized she’d spoken aloud until she heard Kaeso chuckle. ‘Oh, Tucca was married. In fact it was her husband who cut out her tongue.’
Bastard. ‘Where is he now?’ Despite herself, she was curious.
‘Officially? Lost in a shipwreck. In practice? Planted in the lawn, between the bay tree and the yew. You passed him.’
Claudia tipped her head on one side. ‘Are you a keen fan of Assyrian horror stories, by any chance?’ she asked.
‘No. Is it relevant?’
‘How about Tucca?’ she persisted. ‘I suppose it’s too much to hope she comes from a long line of desert nomads?’
This time his laughter was rich and unrestrained. ‘You don’t run with the pack, do you?’
Prising himself off his perch, Kaeso stepped forward and Claudia was glad she had steeled her senses earlier. Imagining some terrible deformity which had made him wary, she was unprepared for raw perfection.
‘No, sir, I do not.’
Claudia watched him cross the room to stoke the fire. As to his age, she put him at thirty, but admitted she might be out five years either way. Not exceptionally tall, he was strong, she could see rounded biceps strain the sleeves of his tunic, saw powerful calves below the muscular knees of the athlete. On a man who trains hard in the gymnasium, it was unusual to see collar-length hair. In the darkened recess, it looked dark and yet now, under the light, it seemed almost fair. Tawny.
‘Please. Take a seat.’ He poured white wine into pale-green slender glasses, but instead of taking the second chair, sat on the bearskin rug at Claudia’s feet, staring into the crackling flames. His profile was pointed, rugged even, with a jaw that was sharp rather than square. His musky scent mingled with the applewood burning in the hearth, and now his hair seemed golden. Sleek.
Oh, yes. The war machine was sleek.
As the logs glowed red, Claudia waited.
‘Claudia Seferius,’ he said lazily, his grey eyes watching soot motes dance up the chimney.
She felt a jolt down the length of her spine. She had not given Tucca her name.
Kaeso rose to his feet and began to pace the room. ‘Let me think. Your husband died last September, no, I’m wrong…last August. He bequeathed the entire estate to his young widow and nothing whatsoever to his family.’ He turned his sharp, lean face towards her. ‘Contrary to expectations, though, the widow did not liquidate the assets, she tried to make a go of it.’
Claudia stared into her glass and hoped her cheeks were not as red as she feared. The reflection in the glass showed no break in the fluidity of his tread.
‘But there are problems for a woman going solo in commerce. The men, they are against her. They will not accept her in the Wine Merchants Guild, and thus they hope to ruin her.’
Now when Claudia’s face burned, it was from fury. Bastards! Once close friends of Gaius, the minute he died they were like vultures, circling his business and hoping to pick it clean without cost to either coin or conscience.
‘They won’t,’ was all she replied. She would beat these sons of bitches, so help her, yes she would. She would bring them crawling on their knees. ‘But that’s not why I’m here.’
The powerhouse faltered in his pacing. ‘Is it not?’ He padded back and coiled himself in the empty chair. ‘Then what does bring you to Kaeso?’
‘I heard you are very good at finding people.’
He bridged his fingers and considered her. ‘Not always do they wish to be found,’ he replied.
‘But you find them, nonetheless,’ she countered, and he smiled.
‘Are you hungry?’ he asked, drawing a tray of steaming chestnuts from the fire.
Watching as he squatted on the bearskin, one knee raised, prising open shells, Claudia saw now the reason for the apparent change in hair colour. It was not one shade, but a blend of several making up the whole. As one of the nuts proved stubborn, he dropped it, sucking at the finger it had scorched, and the long mane bounced. Yes, mane. In fact, now she came to think of it, there was much of the animal in Kaeso. The pointed features, the strong grey eyes, the trained physique, the lope. For a moment, she could not place the animal. Then suddenly it came. The wolf. The ultimate tracking beast.
When he’d finished digging out the chestnuts, he passed half across, dribbling them slowly into Claudia’s cupped palms. Between them, logs crackled and spat and glowed orange, and the apple-scented smoke spiralled upwards, blue and hazy. Finally, Kaeso sat back in his chair, put his feet on the table and said, ‘Who is it you want found and why?’
Claudia nibbled the succulent nuts. ‘Why is not your concern.’
‘I beg to differ. Have another glass of wine.’
She studied the collection of artworks. Busts, ivories, a faience vase showing leaping billygoats, a marble cat with jewelled eyes which must be at least five centuries old.
‘I want you to locate a man who calls himself Magic,’ she said. ‘He signs his letters with the seal of the cobra.’ Kaeso unfurled himself from the chair and threw a log on to a fire which did not need additional fuel. ‘Is that all you have to go on?’
He meant, is that all you intend to give me.