Part 14 (1/2)

XXV.

Sm.u.f.fLING NOISES announced trouble. I deduced that Nux was now lying outside in the corridor, full length, with her paws against the door and her nose pressed to the gap at the bottom. I could also detect that little Julia must be p.r.o.ne alongside, bottom up, mimicking Nux. They could not get in. However, more competent noises told me that someone else, someone adept at domestic burglary, was working on the latch with a piece of wire expertly poked through the side crack in the door. We were about to be invaded. I had seen enough children rescued from cupboards to know who was coming to get me.

Helena was sitting in her chair, fully clad and innocent, when the door opened. Nux shot in and hurled herself on to the bed. Julia was being gripped under a firm arm.

'h.e.l.lo, Ma.'

'This door sticks!' exclaimed my mother, as if she a.s.sumed I had not noticed the problem. 'What can you expect - in this house?' Her disapproving sniff referred to my father, who had owned the house previously. Then she looked me over. 'What happened to you, then?'

'I'm fine.'

'I asked what happened. Still, I see you survived.' Helena had quietly relinquished her chair, taking Julia. Julia tried the screaming-at-father trick, though in the presence of her awesome grandma she moderated the noise. My curly-haired daughter had a fine sense of who would tolerate nonsense. Ma perched in the wicker chair with a scowl like a particularly anti-social G.o.ddess of retribution.

'How are you, dear mother? How is Aristagoras?'

'Who?' asked Ma, as she always did when anyone enquired after her eighty-year-old boyfriend. I backed off. I never had the nerve to ascertain exactly what was going on. My father had asked me to find out - which was another reason not to. 'I heard there was trouble,' Ma sniffed. 'I see that's right.'

'Misunderstanding with some men who don't like my current workload... Who told you?' I a.s.sumed it was Petronius, then I remembered that Maia and Petro were not speaking to Ma. Whereas a sane mother might be expected to feel glad that her troubled daughter had now found stability with a good-looking, salaried officer who adored her, mine kept pa.s.sing remarks about Petro's estranged wife not deserving to lose him...

'Anacrites never forgets his poor old landlady.'

'Bull's b.o.l.l.o.c.ks!'

'I don't know who taught you to be so crude.' Ma sniffed, implying it was Pa.

Anacrites was the Chief Spy - a one-time follower of my sister Maia, who had turned violent when she dumped him. Even before that he was my long-term enemy - but he had been Ma's lodger and she thought him little lower than a Sun G.o.d in a twinkly diadem. I had other views about where his rays shone.

I ignored the low hint that Anacrites, who was not even family, paid more attention to my mother than I did. 'I did not want that b.a.s.t.a.r.d to know I was back in Rome.'

'Don't get your name everywhere in the Forum then. He says you are a byword for stupidity, because of this law work.'

'He thinks that only because I'm bringing justice to the innocent - a concept far too n.o.ble for Anacrites.'

Faced with a son who had n.o.ble motives, Ma lost interest. She lowered her voice. 'He knows Maia is back too.' She was worried, seeking rea.s.surance. I sighed. I had none to give. If the Spy still harboured resentment, Maia was in for trouble.

Helena asked, 'Does Anacrites know about Maia and Petronius?'

'He asked me,' said Ma.

'And you told him!' I scoffed.

'He knew anyway.'

Another problem.

Helena pa.s.sed Julia back to my mother. 'Junilla Tacita, if you could stay for a while and keep an eye on my brood, I should be very glad. My brother's wife is having her baby and I would appreciate a chance to go over there.'

Thrilled to be asked, Ma let a put-upon look pa.s.s over her features for a suitable moment as she pinned down Julia's plump thras.h.i.+ng legs. 'If they need a nurse, you have the right candidate sitting right downstairs. I was talking to her earlier - well, someone had to show some civility; poor dear, she's quite abandoned, all by herself in the hall -'

'Who, Ma?'

'Ursulina Prisca. She seems a very nice woman,' Ma told me pointedly.

'Quintus is looking after her woes.' Helena was searching for her ear-rings. My mother's keen black eyes had spotted the search and noted that the jewellery had ended up on the table. She sensed something private, though in the more interesting quest to set us straight about Ursulina, it pa.s.sed without comment.

'Well, your Quintus needs to sort out that pig-farm business before the cousin ruins everything. Tell him the a.s.sessment of the walnut crop sounds very low to me.' Ma and Ursulina Prisca must have found each other kindred spirits. 'The valuer is a liability, and if you want my advice -'Which we didn't. 'Which of course will not be welcome as I'm just an old lady who brought up seven children single-handed, and I'm supposed to have no knowledge of the world -'

'What advice, Ma?'

'Do not trust the freedman with the limp!'

Helena told Mother gently that she would pa.s.s all that on to Quintus, who was very good at caring for widows.

'I wish I had someone to look after me!' snapped Ma. 'If they need a good midwife -'

'I'm sure Mother has found them one,' Helena muttered. Upon mention of Julia Justa, Ma shut her mouth like a tightly pleated furnis.h.i.+ng feature on a smooth bolster. She had a wonderful complexion, which belied her age. It was a tribute to home-macerated face cream, brewed to a secret recipe which Ma pa.s.sed off as mainly rose petals (this may have been true, but on principle my mother managed to make it sound like a bluff}.

When Helena escaped to see about Claudia Rufina's progress, I claimed I was feeling poorly and needed to be left alone to sleep. After another hour of rollicking comment, my mother did leave me, removing my daughter and dog too. Exhausted, I fell into a deep slumber.

Honorius was the first of the forage party to report in.

'Negrinus refuses flatly to contest the will. No reason. I thought his sister, Carina, might argue - but she backed him up. Her husband, Laco, appeared for once - though he would not interfere.'

'So Negrinus is throwing it all away.'

Honorius sat on my bed with his arms folded. 'Negrinus is an odd body, Falco. One minute he shows all the anger you'd expect from a man in his situation. Then he suddenly implodes and seems to accept being shoved down a s.h.i.+t-hole by his closest relatives.'

'He is keeping something from us,' I said. 'He'll fight for himself when he's about to be charged with parricide - an offence that will get him sewn in a sack and thrown into the sea if he's found guilty. But when the penalty is less drastic, he reins back. He must have a reason to lie low.'

'So it's find the reason, then?'

'Oh yes - but you tell me where to start!'

We were both at a loss.

'I tried to see Saffia,' Honorius then told me. I refrained from throwing my water jug at his stupid head. Tantrums don't suit mature men. Anyway it was a decent jug. 'No luck. Incommunicado. Household in uproar. Males barred on the threshold. She has gone into labour, I was informed., 'They must be putting birth-inducement powders in the aqueducts,' I growled. 'We have to see her. She seems to have gripped old Metellus by the privates - with the rest of the family all standing back helplessly to watch.'

'Well yes, but it won't look too good, Falco, if we hara.s.s Saffia for answers while she's in full birth pang!'

'You're a softie. It's just the moment.'

'That's one of your jokes,' Honorius replied stiffly.

'You're scared you'll end up snipping an umbilical cord or gathering up the afterbirth.'