White murder marcus corv.., p.23
White Murder (Marcus Corvinus Book 7), page 23
Like I was doing now. I kept thinking of Cascellius’s pal, the one from Gabii who’d been found kicked to death in an alley...
The long silent trip to the Pincian wasn’t pleasant.
We got there eventually. The litter guys set us down, Laughing George opened the curtains, climbed out and waited for me to disembark. The house was even more impressive from close up: a marble-porticoed monstrosity with a flight of steps that would’ve put the Temple of Jupiter Capitolinus to shame. Not that I was much interested in architecture at that precise moment.
‘Go ahead,’ Laughing George growled. ‘We’re right behind you.’
A comforting thought. I went up the steps trying to fight back the cold feeling in my gut, with the gorilla-wrestlers at my heels. The door slave gave us a look as blind as Homer’s and opened up.
The hall inside could’ve come straight from one of the Wart’s Capri villas, only it was bigger and probably cost more.
‘Straight through and up the stairs. The boss is in his study.’ Still Laughing George. The other guy hadn’t spoken. Maybe he couldn’t.
‘Is that so? All this and culture too. What’s he doing, pal, writing an ode?’
‘Don’t be smart, Corvinus. Just walk.’
I walked. At the top of the stairs was a panelled door between a pair of matching bronzes that would’ve had my stepfather Priscus drooling.
‘Stop there.’ Laughing George pushed past me, knocked and waited.
‘Come in.’
LG opened the door and moved aside.
22.
I went in. The study was fitted out in keeping with the rest of the place: way over the top. Maybe comparing it with the Pollio library is an exaggeration, but there were still a hell of a lot of book-rolls in the cubbies round the walls. Perilla would’ve loved it.
Not that the guy on the couch looked much like a reader. I couldn’t imagine him chucking his kids under the chin, either, or shooting the breeze with his wife over the pork rissoles of an evening. I couldn’t imagine him doing anything, except maybe lying in the shallows of some river with his nostrils above the surface pretending to be a log and waiting for some poor bastard to use him as a bridge.
‘Sit down,’ Eutacticus said.
Laughing George and his mate took me by the elbows and plonked me down on the other couch. Then they stepped back to just within grabbing distance.
‘Marcus Valerius Messalla Corvinus.’ That came out slow and consideringly, like he was chewing it.
‘Yeah,’ I said. ‘That’s me. All four of me.’
I could feel Laughing George shifting slightly in his number twelve sandals, but the guy’s expression didn’t change. ‘Don’t make jokes, Corvinus, please,’ he said. ‘I won’t tell you again.’
I swallowed. ‘Right. Right.’
‘I’m told you were asking about me recently. And that you’re making enquiries into the death of a charioteer.’
‘Right.’ Jupiter! Maybe I’d died and been reborn as a parrot.
‘I don’t like enquiries.’
I was going to say, tough! but I changed my mind. This bastard wasn’t a bastard who enjoyed backchat. I didn’t say anything.
‘On the other hand, in this instance my conscience is clear.’ He showed his teeth in a quick grin. I thought of logs. ‘And what is more important in respect of your continued good health I didn’t personally approve of Pegasus’s death myself.’
‘Uh...is that so?’
‘Indeed. We had quite a good relationship while that gentleman drove for the Greens. You’re probably aware of that fact already. Our association might have been in abeyance temporarily, but it still existed. Very much so. I looked forward to its resumption when he had settled in with his new faction, and I don’t take kindly to losing an asset. Not kindly at all.’ He was staring at me with a look that would’ve done credit to a jaundiced wolverine. ‘Whoever killed Pegasus did me no favours. I just wanted to make sure you understood that, in case the results of your...investigation led you to think otherwise.’
‘So you don’t know who did it?’ I said. Well, it was worth asking, and at least my neck seemed safe. That was a relief, anyway.
‘No. Not at the moment.’ Without taking his eyes off me he reached his little finger to his mouth and carefully picked between two teeth with the nail. ‘But I’m making enquiries of my own, and when I do that person is going to be very sorry. Very sorry indeed.’ He inspected the nail and wiped it on his mantle. ‘No one kills in the racing business without my knowledge and approval, not for any reason. Certainly no one kills against my interests. If the murderer is lucky you’ll find him first.’
‘Or her.’
He made a wheezing noise. It could’ve been a laugh but I wouldn’t’ve taken any bets. ‘Or her, as you say. I don’t make distinctions. In either case they’re dead meat.’ My stomach went cold, not so much at the words as at the way he said them. ‘So you’d better move quickly. However, as far as your...enquiries...into the late Pegasus’s sideline activities in the racing sphere are concerned, I expect those to end as of now. They’re none of your business. You understand me.’ It wasn’t a question, and he didn’t wait for an answer. He looked past me at Laughing George. ‘I’m finished. Take him out and –’ He paused fractionally. The lips twisted in a smile. ‘Let him go.’
Bastard!
‘Yes, boss.’ A hand big as a ham lifted me to my feet.
‘Oh, and Corvinus?’
My mouth was dry as old leather. ‘Yeah?’
‘My thanks for putting me on to the fact that Pegasus wasn’t killed for his purse. I owe you one.’ The thin lips twisted again. ‘A small one, so don’t start getting big ideas. You can consider that letting you leave here with your ribs intact constitutes part of the repayment.’ He turned away. ‘Goodbye. Have a pleasant walk to the Caelian.’
The sun was almost beneath the horizon of Mars Field as Laughing George closed the gate behind me and I set off back down Pincian Road. My stomach still felt like someone had tied a knot in it. Well, that had been a nasty little experience and a half, and I reckoned I was lucky to get out the other end with all my bits still attached, especially after Eutacticus’s penultimate parting shot, because I wouldn’t bet more than evens that his crack about the ribs had been a joke. Humour clearly wasn’t that bastard’s bag. Or not the brand of humour that I appreciated, anyway.
Glad to be outside and undamaged as I was I didn’t much relish the thought of any more walking. Today had been a long, long day and I was whacked, even without the last interview, if that’s what you’d call it, too whacked even for a wineshop. Not that I had to walk, of course; now the restriction on wheels within the city boundaries had been lifted until dawn I could take a carriage from the rank at the Saepta. Besides, I needed space to think.
I took the first one in the line, gave the guy directions and settled back against the cushions. Look on the bright side, Corvinus. At least I’d talked to Eutacticus. Or been talked at, rather. And I’d learned two things. The first was a simple confirmation, if I’d needed one, that Sopilys hadn’t been spinning me a line and Pegasus had actually been up to no good with the Greens; the second, far more important, was proof that he’d had plans to do the same with the Whites. That little nugget of information was interesting, and I thought about it and the implications for quite some time.
Then there was the question of Felicula. We weren’t finished with that lady yet, no way, not by a long chalk. The most likely person to know whether she’d been married before Turranius, of course, had been Simo the building site manager, but the idea hadn’t occurred to me until I’d left the yard and I didn’t think the guy would prove too helpful a second time round, even if I did trek all the way back down to Pottery Mountain. Maybe Cascellius could help, although I doubted it: Cascellius’s knowledge of Felicula wouldn’t go back that far, and if even Pudens didn’t know – which I’d bet he didn’t, and couldn’t’ve done for the scam to work – then I was stuck that side as well. There was always the public records office, sure – that would have the documentation of an earlier marriage, if it existed, on file – but I didn’t even consider taking that route. For a start, I didn’t have any idea of date or name of husband, and for another thing I didn’t know whether either he or the lady had been a Roman citizen at the time. If not, then I could whistle for a record; if so, I’d still be twiddling my thumbs waiting for the clerk to find the document at next year’s Winter Festival. Assuming, like I say, it existed in the first place. I sighed. Maybe the best plan would be to cut the knot, confront Felicula herself and see where it got me.
It was fully dark when we pulled up outside my front door. I paid off the carriage and was reaching for the doorknob just as Bathyllus opened up with the tray in his hand. Janus in spangly tights, how that little bugger does it is a complete mystery. Ours, however, not to reason why, just be grateful. I sank the first cup of life-giving fluid in one and held out for a refill.
‘Sorry I’m late, Bathyllus,’ I said. ‘Problems you do not want to know about.’
‘Yes, sir.’ He closed the door then held the cup long enough for me to get rid of my travel-stained cloak. ‘Ah...you have eaten, have you?’
Uh-oh. This sounded bad. Miss a meal in the Corvinus household without giving three days’ prior warning in writing and you have a major diplomatic incident on your hands. ‘Meton’s annoyed, right?’ I said.
‘When I last went down to the kitchen he was cleaning the skillets, sir.’
Gods. Bad news; bad news. Skillet-cleaning is a job for the skivvy, and Meton was strictly the culinary demiurge type. Our touchy-as-hell chef was into seriously-put-upon mode, and my chances of getting so much as an omelette out of him were about as good as a snowball’s rolling through Hades. ‘Dinner was...ah...something particularly good, then?’
‘Sea urchins in rosemary-flavoured wine and poached tunnyfish steaks with a sweet cumin sauce, sir. He went to the fishmarket at dawn specially.’
Oh, bugger; worse and worse. That wasn’t the sort of stuff that took readily to a reheat, and the guy even objected to warming up leftover bean stew for lunch. Also, knowing Meton, he’d’ve put in more time choosing the shellfish and tunny than the Wart spent on the Armenian problem. ‘Never mind,’ I said. ‘I wasn’t hungry anyway.’ A lie, but hassles after the day I’d had I just didn’t need. ‘How’s Project Tyndaris going’
The little baldhead coloured. ‘Extremely well, sir. I called round just after lunch time and invited her here tomorrow for the tile-polishing demonstration. She was delighted. Most gratifying.’
‘Fine. Fine.’ I relieved him of the wine jug and carried it through to the living-room.
‘Marcus, where on earth have you been?’ Perilla was lying on her couch with a writing tablet and stylus. ‘Meton’s livid.’
I kissed her. ‘Yeah. I’ve heard.’
‘We waited as long as we could before starting dinner but we had to give you up. You look absolutely exhausted. What happened?’
‘Long story.’ I stretched out on the couch. Jupiter, that was good! ‘I talked to Laomedon. Serapia’s probably in the clear, but we’ve got another two or three new front runners.’ I told her what the Reds’ driver had told me about Pegasus’s designs on the faction. ‘That opens up a whole fresh angle. One gets you ten that the bastard was working on Felicula to get his foot in the door with her husband. Blackmail.’
‘Pegasus had some sort of hold on the woman?’
‘Yeah.’ I filled my cup. ‘At least, I think so. I don’t know for sure, let alone what it was, but it seems likely. And I’d bet good money that their affair didn’t end when she said it did.’
‘Hmm.’ Perilla put the writing tablet aside and laid her chin on her hand.
‘I thought maybe it might have something to do with her ex Turranius, but I checked and that’s all above board. Turns out he was rich as Croesus and Felicula got the lot, but he died in an accident.’
‘A genuine accident?’
‘Absolutely. The guy fell from a set of scaffolding in front of half a dozen witnesses.’ I sipped my wine. ‘He was on his own at the time, so there was no funny business. Problem is, I can’t see what else Pegasus could’ve had. Unless there was a prior marriage we don’t know about that ended the same way.’
Perilla was frowning and twisting her hair. ‘I don’t suppose you could be approaching things from the wrong direction?’ she said.
‘How do you mean?’
‘I’m not altogether sure myself. But from what you told me Felicula does seem genuinely fond of her husband and it is reciprocal. If Pegasus had become a party to some secret in her former life then it would have to be something major before it would threaten a split in the relationship. And if she is financially independent then that factor wouldn’t come into things.’
I shifted on my couch. ‘I’d call murder pretty major, myself.’
‘Marcus, you’re overpostulating here. For that theory to work, you need both an earlier husband and a convenient death. There’s no evidence at present for the existence of either, and until there is perhaps it might be better to think in other terms.’
‘Like what?’
‘We know quite a lot about Felicula. She used to be a dancer, she was previously married to a builder who left her a very wealthy widow. She loves her husband and has a good relationship with him. Correct?’
‘Yes.’
‘Now what do we know about Pudens? Apart from the fact that he’s Master of the Reds and Felicula’s husband?’
Gods! Well, sometimes you have to humour them. ‘One, he’s pretty well-heeled; he must be, to run the Reds. Two, he’s Sicilian, or at least he moved from there. Panormus, specifically. And three, he made his money in the corn business.’
‘One, you’ve just told me that Felicula is rich in her own right and is also fully in favour of her husband’s involvement with the faction. Why should he be the one who pays the bills? Two, the only evidence you have for Pudens being Sicilian, or a former resident of Sicily, comes from Felicula. She in turn probably derived it from Pudens himself, since they only met after he had moved to Rome. And three...well, the same argument applies. You have no objective evidence for his past life whatsoever, except what he told his future wife.’ She paused, then said quietly: ‘In fact, when you get right down to it we don’t really know anything about Pudens’s antecedents at all.’
I sat very still. Shit, the lady was right. Even Cascellius hadn’t been able to give me any concrete information about him. And blackmail was all about antecedents...
‘You think we should take a closer look at Pudens?’ I said.
‘That would certainly be an obvious course of action, if only for purposes of elimination.’
‘Okay. But how?’
‘Wasn’t Quintus Lollianus in Sicily at one time? You could begin by checking with him.’
Yeah; now that was a distinct possibility. Lollianus was an old pre-Perilla mate of mine and we’d had him and his wife round for dinner once or twice since we’d moved back from Athens. He was big in Aqueducts and Sewers these days but he’d done his two-year junior finance officer’s stint as an aide to the Sicilian governor. And since as far as the Roman administration’s concerned Sicily is first, middle and last all about corn, any major Sicilian corn dealer would inevitably come to the finance officer’s notice. Lollianus might well know Pudens. Or not, as the case might be, which would be interesting in itself. Score one for the grapevine. ‘Good idea, lady,’ I said. ‘I’ll see him tomorrow.’
‘You mentioned two or three new possibilities. Felicula was one. Who were the others?’
‘Hmm?’ I was still thinking about Pudens. ‘Oh, the other two go together. Cammius and Cario.’
‘Marcus, we’ve been through both of these already!’
‘Uh-uh. Like I said: together, not separate. And there’s new evidence.’
‘Where from?’
This was the bit I’d been dreading. ‘A guy called Eutacticus. That was why I was late home. He’s...ah...a cartel boss. Lives up on the Pincian.’
‘Oh, Corvinus!’ Perilla was looking at me like I’d said I’d been selling my body to sailors under the arches of the Sublician. Which didn’t surprise me: everybody in Rome knows about the cartel bosses. They just don’t talk about them.
‘No problem. We had a very pleasant chat. He confirmed that Pegasus had been throwing races when he drove for the Greens and that he had plans along the same lines with the Whites.’
‘He told you that?’
‘It was no skin off his nose. The guy’s dead and the scam’s buried with him.’
‘I’m sorry, dear, but I don’t believe you. Not about Pegasus cheating on his faction. About the pleasant chat. You’re hiding something.’
Oh, hell. ‘Jupiter, Perilla, just drop the psychic stuff, okay? I’m fine. No bones broken.’
She sat up. ‘No what?’
‘Will you just listen?’
‘Don’t you ever get involved with people like that again! Marcus, they are dangerous!’
She was telling me something I didn’t know? ‘Okay, okay,’ I said. ‘Just leave it, fine?’
Silence. Long silence. ‘Very well,’ she said at last. ‘What about Cammius and Cario?’
Gods! That had been a nasty one. I took a restorative swig of Setinian. ‘We know now that Pegasus was definitely planning to throw a wobbler with the Whites. Definitely being the operative word; we’ve moved beyond theory here. Cammius must’ve had his suspicions about why a top driver should’ve left the Greens. He would’ve had to be blind or a fool if he didn’t, and Cammius isn’t either. Agreed?’
‘Agreed. But –’
‘Wait a minute, lady. I’ve got the ball. Let’s say Cammius found out somehow that Pegasus meant to play the same game with him and decided to cut his losses. He gets his son Cario to decoy the guy onto neutral ground – remember, we only have Cario’s word for it that Pegasus is blackmailing him – and one or the other of them kills him.’
