'Hurry!' He grabbed my hand and pulled me after him. He was surprisingly strong for one who looked so delicate. I tried to keep up, but he was faster, and ended up dragging me through the foyer and the atrium, across the central garden, under the portico and down a long hallway. Outside a doorway hung with a heavy curtain a group of slaves were gathered, murmuring among themselves. They parted for Trygonion, who pulled me past the curtain into the room beyond.
Outside was bright sunshine, but inside the room it might have been midnight. The windows, like the door, were covered with heavy curtains. The only illumination came from a few lamps, which burned very low.
As my eyes adjusted to the darkness, I saw Clodia reclining on a sleeping couch with ornately carved ivory legs and plush pillows. She was covered with a woolen blanket. Her face and hands looked pale and waxen in the dim light. 'Trygonion?' she whispered.
'Mistress!' he cried, addressing her as if he were her slave. He ran to her side and took her hand. 'I came back as quickly as I could.'
'Is Gordianus with you?'
'Yes. Save your breath, please.'
'Why? Do you think I have so little left?' She laughed weakly. The gallus contorted his face. 'Trygonion thinks I'm going to die,' she said, turning her glittering eyes to me.
'What happened, Clodia?'
'I think it must have been something I ate.' She made an arch expression, then winced.
'Have you summoned a physician?'
'My brother owns a very skilled healer who happens to know a great deal about poisons. Publius has reason to be concerned about poi-son, as you can imagine. The physician came while Trygonion was gone. He's outside the door now, I imagine; I couldn't stand having him in the room with me.'
'What did he say?' asked Trygonion frantically.
'He said, 'I think it must have been something you ate.' ' She smiled wanly. 'He wanted to know how much of the powder I swallowed, and when. Early this morning, I told him, but I felt no ill effects until almost midday. He says I'm very lucky to have eaten so little of it. As it is — '
'What powder?' I said. 'Didn't Trygonion explain?'
'No time. We ran all the way,' the gallus said.
'The powder that I came across in the kitchen,' she said. 'Imagine that! How many mornings have I ventured into the kitchen before my breakfast is ready? Never. But today, for some reason, I was awake early, and hungry, and when I called for Chrysis she didn't come, so I went to the kitchen myself. You should have seen how Chrysis jumped when I stepped into the room. She stood by a little table, and on the table was a bowl of honeyed millet. 'Is that for me?' I said. Chrysis said nothing. I walked to the bowl and saw the little box beside it, and the crumbly yellow powder inside the box. 'Some sort of spice?' I said. I suspected nothing, you see.'
'A crumbly yellow powder?'
'Yes, not like any spice I know of. I touched my finger to my tongue, dabbed it in the powder and touched my tongue again. I did it without thinking. The powder didn't taste at all bad, really, only a bit earthy. Then I saw the look on Chrysis's face. All at once I knew.'
I heard a strange whimpering behind me. I turned my head. The whimpering seemed to come from the opposite corner of the room, from near the floor. I thought it might be a dog. Then my eyes caught a slight movement, higher up. I peered into the deep-shadowed gloom, confused, then suddenly perceived the shape of a body suspended upside down from the roof. It was a nude woman hanging from a rope tied around her ankles, twisting very slightly. She whimpered again.
'Silence!' shouted Clodia. She sat upright, then fell back against her pillows. Trygonion fretted over her until she slapped his fawning hands away. 'I sent for Trygonion at once. He came running from the House of the Galli. He was the one who thought of sending for Publius's physician. I waited and waited for the man to come; it turned out he was down at the herb market and no one knew where he had gone. At first I wasn't worried. I felt fine. Then at midday the discomfort began, and the physician still hadn't arrived. I took to my bed, and Trygonion kept fretting over me until I thought to send him for you, Gordianus.'
'Why me?'
'You must know more than most men about poisons. I thought you might be able to tell me something about the yellow powder. Fetch it, Trygonion.'
He tore himself from her side and went to a little table crowded with tiny boxes and bottles. A burnished mirror was hung on the wall above the table, reflecting the somber light of the lamps and affording a startling glimpse of Chrysis hanging from the ceiling across the room. Trygonion returned with a little pyxis. I stepped to the nearest lamp and studied the contents.
'Is it too dark to see?' said Clodia. 'I can't have the lamps any brighter. The light hurts my eyes.'
'I can see well enough. I may be wrong, but I suspect this is a substance called gorgon's hair. It comes from the root of a plant that grows wild on the shores of Mauretania. It used to be quite rare in Rome, but one sees it more and more nowadays. It's very potent, acts fairly quickly, and has almost no flavor, so that it can be mixed with almost any kind of food.'
Clodia closed her eyes and nodded. 'You see, Trygonion, I told you that Gordianus would know. The physician said the same thing.'
'Did he explain the effects?'
'He hardly needed to. I've discovered them for myself.' 'Dizziness, nausea, a sensation of coldness, a painful sensitivity to light?'
She nodded, keeping her eyes shut. 'How much did you swallow?'
'Only that single small taste. Once I saw the look on Chrysis's face I knew what I'd done.'
Again, I heard the whimpering from the corner of the room. 'Silence!' cried Clodia.
'If you swallowed no more than that-' 'Then I'll survive, yes? That's what the physician said.' It would be a stupid physician who told a powerful, dangerous woman that she was going to die, if there was even the slightest possibility that she might survive. The powerful do not appreciate being given bad news, especially if it turns out to be false. Better for the physician to assure his master's sister that she would live; if she didn't, she would be in no position to vent her disappointment on him. But the physician was probably right. I knew something of gorgon's hair and its effects, and such a small dose seemed unlikely to kill her.
'If the physician said you'll be better, then I'm sure-' 'Don't you have your own opinion?' Her voice was sharp. 'You recognized the poison. You must know how it works.'
'I know many poisons by sight, but it's others who use them, not
me.'
'Of course you're not going to die!' Trygonion insisted. Clodia allowed him to fuss with her blanket and caress her hands.
'I thought you'd forestalled the poison plot against you,' I said. 'So did I. But that farce at the Senian baths must have been only a diversion staged by Caelius. He wanted me to think I had got the better of him, when all the time his viper was already at my breast. The slave I trusted more than any other!'
Over in the corner, Chrysis whimpered and twisted in space. My eyes had grown used to the darkness and I was able to see her more clearly. Her smooth, naked flesh was scored with mottled stripes.
'The little spy weeps because I had her beaten,' said Clodia in a low voice.
'Her punishment has only begun.' 'She confessed to you?'
'Not yet. But Caelius must have spies in my house, just as I have spies in his. Who better than Chrysis? And I caught her in the act of poisoning my food! If I hadn't happened to step into the kitchen at that moment-'
'Why do you think this poison came from Caelius?' Clodia gave me such a withering look that I sucked in my breath. Had Catullus ever known that look? Then she shuddered and winced and shut her eyes. 'Who else?' she demanded in a weak voice. 'We know he already had the poison. What I didn't know was the slave he would use to get the stuff into my house. Chrysis, not Barnabas!'
'You think this is the same poison that he tested on his own slave?' 'Of course.' 'It's not.'
She bit her lips and shifted beneath the blanket. 'What do you mean?'
'The poison Caelius administered to his slave acted very quickly. You told me so yourself, and I assume that your spies gave you an accurate report. The slave died in agony, you said, while Caelius watched. 'It took only moments,' you said. This can't be the same poison. The Mauretanians say that gorgon's hair is like 'a coiled snake
