'No. All I want is honest company and conversation with a friend!' I breathed in heavily, then expelled the air hard to clear my lungs. When I looked up, she had dropped her wool altogether and was watching me nervously. 'I just left the Hortensius place. Before that, Priscillus.'

'What happened?' By now she was p.r.i.c.kling with delight at facing a grand occasion. She knew I had come to finish things. Excitement was her medium; I would have to trip her over unexpectedly, or I would never succeed.

'Bad acting and lies mostly! Anyway, I've wrapped it all up for you... afraid the women filled me up with wine; I'm not myself--' I forced a grin, then flung up my hands. 'I feel soiled, Zotica! I resent being toyed with. I particularly resent the none-to-subtle implication that I am just another attractive artwork any freedwoman with more cash than discrimination can buy!' I had set off rambling pleasantly. 'I like to be a genuine find. The years have given me one or two knocks that will never be hammered out again, but my personality has been burnished into a choice investment for a connoisseur ...'

'What's the matter, Falco?' Severina giggled.

'Nothing. Actually, I think it's all right. I think that without a shred of proper evidence I put the frighteners on all of them!'

'Tell me then!'

I ticked them off on my fingers. 'Crepito and Felix know Priscillus would happily have poisoned them -- so the dangerous idea of a joint partnership is scuppered. Now Novus is gone, their grip on the Hortensius empire has slipped a bit--especially since I've said that they are liable to a senatorial enquiry. They should be hastily cleaning up their business habits and devoting their lives to public works ... Priscillus believes the other two are turning him in to the law. He's rushed off on a long sea cruise. That should be good news for his tenants. With any luck, he'll drown before he dares return to Rome.'

'How did you achieve all this?'

'It was nothing! Persuasiveness and charm. Meanwhile Pollia and Atilia are terrified that if they put a foot wrong I'll send them to the arena for their attempts to poison Novus. In return for my silence they are taking up n.o.ble deeds--in their own lavish style of course. I persuaded them to apply their energy to an establishment for orphaned girls. You're an orphan, aren't you; I could get you a place if you want--'

'How much liquor have they given you?'

'Not enough; it was a highly acceptable vintage!'

Severina laughed at me. I beamed at her. Suddenly she realised the merriment was a ploy and I was sober after all.

'My house fell down today,' I said. I let the smile go out of my eyes. 'But of course, you know all about that.'

Chapter LXV.

I watched Severina's uncertainty gnawing.

'How ironic it would be, Zotica, if I brought you to court not for any of your husbands--or even for killing Novus -but charged with murdering the people who died today! An old lady I only heard banging on walls, and a family I had never even realised were living there.'

We both sat motionless.

'Why don't you ask?' I sneered.

She forced out the words: 'Is your friend all right?'

'What is it to you?' The danger of her situation had long informed those still blue eyes, but whatever she thought lay too deep to penetrate. 'You knew her didn't you?' I asked. There was enough steel in my voice for her to think Helena might be dead. 'She used the same baths as you.'

'I thought you sent her--'

'Yes, I realise that. You were wrong. It was her own idea. She must have wanted to know what I was dealing with. She never told me, or I would have forbidden it -- tried to, anyway. Helena's resistance to domineering was one of the things I first fell for.'

'What happened to her?' Severina managed to ask.

'The apartment collapsed. Everyone who was inside was killed.' I paused. 'Oh there's no need to sit there wondering whether you should confess, Zotica! I know who to blame. Cossus told me. You knew. You gave the order, in effect. Then the nearest you came to warning me was a pathetic attempt to lure me here today--never mind anyone else who might be there!'

There was a change in Severina's face, but so imperceptible I could not define it. Not that I wanted to. Even if she felt regret I was hardened against her.

'I hold out no hopes of indicting you. I've lost my witness; Cossus is dead. He let himself be recognised, and the locals dealt with him. In any case, the Hortensii were the landlords. Their agent should never have taken instructions from you. Why did you do it? To dispose of me, because I became a threat to you? What made you change your mind? A hope of using me after all?'

She spoke at last. 'You should be grateful I tried to keep you away!'

'While you eliminated Helena?' She was sharp; she realised I would not have been able to discuss it at all if that were true. 'Helena was out of the building, or you'd be dead. You had a reason for what you did today. Don't pretend you wanted me. Even if you did, do you really believe I would have turned to you--or any woman--if I lost her in that way? But your motive was much more complicated. I knew you were jealous -- yet you were jealous of us both. You hated the thought of other people possessing what you had lost...' I leaned forwards so I came closer, down to her level as she crouched on her stool. 'Tell me about Gaius Cerinthus, Zotica.'

It was the first time I was ever certain I surprised her. Even now she refused to give anything away: 'You obviously know!'

'I know you and he both came from the Moscus household. I know Cerinthus killed Grittius Fronto. I could prove it; there was a witness. But the Fates decided for me that Cerinthus would not come to trial. I know Cerinthus was then crushed by a falling wall. I know Hortensius Novus owned the wall.'

She closed her eyes, a bare acknowledgement.

I could guess the rest: 'Cerinthus was a slave with you. What happened--you grew fond of him? After you were married to Severus Moscus, or before?'

'Afterwards,' she said calmly.

'Once Moscus died, you were a free woman with a handy legacy. You and Cerinthus could have been married and led pleasant lives. Why so much greed? Was ama.s.sing a huge dowry his idea or yours?'

'Both.'

'Very businesslike! How long were you intending to carry on?'

'Not after Fronto.'

'So first there was Moscus--was it Cerinthus who chose his master's seat in the hot amphitheatre?'

'Cerinthus bought the ticket; you cannot blame him for the sun!'

'I can blame him for not keeping old man Moscus out of it! Then the apothecary, Eprius; you managed that yourself somehow. And finally the wild-beast man. Two mistakes there--Fronto never told you he had a nephew who was expecting to inherit, and he also battered you. Cerinthus must have been able to cope with you going to bed with other men, but he took against brutality. His solution was as vicious as he could make it. But Cerinthus soon walked under some typically unstable Novus masonry. You ended up with a sticky reputation, a dead lover, money you had probably lost the taste for--and nothing to occupy you but revenge.'

Her skin had a yellowy papyrus look, yet her spirit was unchanged. 'You can say what you like, Falco.'

'And you won't budge? I'm not so sure. You must have worked your way close to Novus with real pa.s.sion in your heart, but the night I told you he was dead it shook you, Zotica. Don't pretend otherwise! I think you realised the truth: hate was an empty motive. Novus was dead, but so was your lover. Cerinthus would never know you had avenged him. This time there was no one to share your triumph. This time you were alone. What, as you said to me, was the purpose of it all? Killing Novus was nothing like the joy of planning a future with someone you loved, was it, Zotica?' Severina was shaking her head, refusing to accept my arguments. 'I know, Zotica! I know just how you felt when you lost him, and I know how you still feel now. Once you have shared yourself like that, the other person becomes part of you for ever.' This time she let out a small exclamation of protest. It was too late; forcing her to admit the kind of emotion I felt for Helena only sickened me. 'What I cannot understand is how a person who had experienced real loss herself could deliberately inflict the same on anybody else!

At least, dear G.o.ds, when Cerinthus died you did not have to stand in the street and watch the falling wall!' There was a tremor in her face; I no longer wanted to see it. 'I know you killed Novus.'

'You don't know how.'

'I have some pointers.'

'Not enough, Falco.'

'I know you nudged Priscillus into thinking of poison, and probably the Hortensius women too--'

'They never needed pushing!'

'I know you prevented the women's feeble effort, and would probably have stopped Priscillus, but you had left the house before the meal. Nerve failed, did it--without Cerinthus to support you? But why set the others up as suspects, then keep them all out of it? Why risk destroying your alibis by hiring me? Oh you do love flirting with danger, but you did chance it, Zotica. I'm not completely useless; I've cleared them, even if I can't convict you. And why not let them take things to their conclusion, and carry out the deed for you?' She said nothing. I realised the answer; it lay in her obsessiveness. 'You hated Novus so deeply, you had to finish him yourself.'

'No proof, Falco!'

'No proof,' I agreed gently. No point pretending otherwise. 'Not yet. But evidence is bound to exist, and I'll find it. You condemned yourself by what you tried to do to Helena today. She's safe--but I'll never forgive you. I can be just as patient as you were with Novus, and equally devious. You may never rest now, Zotica. One false move, and I'll be on to you--'

She stood up. She was fighting back. 'Helena will never stay with you, Falco! She was brought up in too much comfort and she knows she can do better. Besides, she's too intelligent!'

I gazed up at her benignly. 'Oh she'll stay.'

'Stick with your own kind, Falco.'

'I'm doing that!' I swung myself upright. 'I'm leaving now.'

'I'll thank you and pay you then.'

'I want neither from you.'

Severina laughed ruefully. 'You're a fool then! If you want to live with a senator's daughter, you need money even more than Cerinthus and I did.'

Her jibe failed to rouse me. 'I need money all right. I need four hundred thousand sesterces; let's be precise.'

'To qualify as a middle ranker? You'll never manage it!'

'I will. And I'll keep my integrity.'

My ludicrous social position seemed to fire her with a desperate hope of suborning me after all. 'You should stay with me, Falco. You and I could do good work in this city. We think alike; we both have ambitions; we never give up. You and I could make a useful partnership in any area we chose--'

'We have nothing in common; I told you before.'

She gave me her hand, with a strange, grave formality. I knew I must have nearly broken her. I knew I never would achieve it now.

I pressed my thumb against the copper ring, her love token from Cerinthus. 'So all this was a clever vengeance campaign, eh? All for Venus? All for love?'

Sudden laughter lit her face. 'You never stop trying, do you?'

'No.'

'Or failing, Falco!'

It was her familiar vindictive farewell.

As I left the house, someone else was just arriving. A figure as smart as a bookmaker's uncle: bright tunic, bronzed skin, buffed boots, plenty of hair tonic--but not all sw.a.n.k. He was as sharp as pepper. Although it was a long time since I had seen him, I recognised him immediately: 'Lusius!' It was the Esquiline Praetor's clerk.

Chapter LXVI.

As soon as I realised who it was, my heart b.u.mped: I guessed that there had been a new development.

We danced round one another on the doorstep. 'I'm just leaving,' I smiled.

'Corvinus heard there was another case to answer--' We carried on dodging, and squinting like rivals. 'How have you got on?' Lusius asked.

'She's clear again. I did manage to work out who arranged to do in the animal importer--but the perpetrator's dead. He was her lover, but without him there's not enough to take her to court alone. I made her admit she had a partner until recently, but that's all.'

'No other evidence?' asked Lusius.

'Zilch.' I gained the impression he was holding something back. I gripped his elbow and drew him into the pool of light from a bronze lantern which hung on Severina's porch. He made no resistance. 'What's the idea, Lusius? You look pretty pleased with yourself!'

The clerk grinned. 'This is mine, Falco!'

I raised both hands, backing off. 'If you found something ... It's a bargain, Lusius.'

He told me in a quiet voice, 'I've got her on the apothecary.'

I had thought we had both run the apothecary angle into the ground. 'How? Will that doctor who examined him make a report at last?'

'No. But did he tell you that he never attended Eprius normally?'

I nodded. 'Apparently he was called in after the choking because he lived across the street.'

'And probably because Severina knew he was a fool... What I've found out,' Lusius continued, 'is that Eprius did have a physician of his own.'

'For the famous cough that killed him?'

'Eprius never had a cough.'

'I gather you spoke to his regular quack?'

'I did. And I discovered that for years his own doctor had been treating him for piles. The medicine man reckoned Eprius was very vain--and so embarra.s.sed about his problem that Severina may not have known.'

'Does this have a bearing on our enquiry?'

'Ah well!' Lusius was really enjoying himself. 'I showed the normal doctor the remnants of the cough lozenge that allegedly choked Eprius--though I didn't tell him what it was supposed to be. It was rather mutilated, and partly dissolved, but he was fairly sure the thing was his own handiwork.'

'Then what?'

'When I did tell him which end of his patient the lozenge had been recovered from, he was extremely surprised!' I was beginning to guess. 'That's right,' said Lusius cheerfully. 'She must have known Eprius possessed a little box of magic gumdrops -- but he lied to her about their purpose. The "cough lozenge" which Severina says choked him was actually one of his suppositories for piles!'