'I didn't think Flora existed.'
'Flora exists.' Petronius stood up. He was leaving the Valerian.
'How,' I demanded emphatically, 'did this Flora acquire the knife if Pa had it?'
'Don't worry about it,' said Petro. 'I'm the investigating officer, and I know all about the knife.'
'I have a right to know how it got there.'
'Not if I'm happy.'
'Blow you, Petro! I was damned nearly sent to trial because of that implement.'
'Tough,' he said.
Petronius Longus could be an absolute bastard when he chose. Official posts go to people's heads. I told him what I thought of him, but he simply ignored my rage.
'I must go, Falco. I'll have to advise the owner that the waiter's dead and the caupona's empty. That crowd outside is looking for an excuse to break in and smash up the furniture while they help themselves to free wine.'
'We'll stay there,' Helena volunteered quietly. 'Marcus will keep the thieves and looters out until a watchman can be sent.'
Petro glanced at me for confirmation. 'I'll do it,' I said. 'I owe Epimandos something.'
Petronius shrugged and smiled. I did not know the reason, and I was so annoyed with him I did not care.
LXI
I told Helena to go home; rebelliously she came with me.
'I don't need supervision.'
'I disagree!' she snapped.
The waiter's body still lay where we had left it in the main part of the building so we hovered about in the back. Helena marched into the little cubicle Epimandos had slept in, and sat on his bed. I stood in the doorway. I could see she was furious.
'Why do you hate your father so much, Falco?'
'What's all this about?'
'You can't hide from me. I do know!' she rampaged. 'I understand you, Marcus. I can see what perverted suspicions you were harbouring about who had used your mother's knife!'
'Petronius was right. Forget the knife.'
'Yes, he's right-but it took a long argument to convince you. You and your stubborn prejudices-you're hopeless! I really did think that after Capua and your meetings with Geminus in Rome these past few weeks, you and he had at last reached an accommodation. I wanted to believe you two were friends again,' she wailed.
'Some things don't change.'
'Well you don't, obviously!' I had not seen Helena so angry for a long time. 'Marcus, your father loves you!'
'Settle down. He doesn't want me, or any of the rest of us. Festus was his boy, but that was different. Festus could win anybody over.'
'You are so wrong,' Helena disagreed miserably. 'You just won't see the truth, Marcus. Marriages do fail.' She knew that; she had been married. 'If things had been different between your parents, your father would have had just as strong a grip on you and all the others as your mother has today. He stands back-but that doesn't mean he wants to. He still worries and watches over what you all do-'
'Believe that if it pleases you. But don't ask me to alter. I learned to live without him when I had to-and that suits me now.'
'Oh you're so stubborn! Marcus, this could have been your chance to put things right between you, maybe your only chance:' Helena rounded on me pleadingly: 'Listen, do you know why he gave me that bronze table as a gift?'
'Because he likes your spirit and you're a pretty girl.'
'Oh Marcus! Don't always be so sour! He took me to see it. He said, 'Look at this. I had my eye on it for Marcus, but he'll never accept it from me'.'
I still saw no reason to change my own attitude because these two had palled up. 'Helena, if you have come to an arrangement, that's charming and I'm delighted you get on so well-but it's between you and him.' I did not even object to Helena and Pa manipulating me, if that thrilled them. 'I don't want to hear any more.'
I left her sitting on the waiter's bed, below the amulet Festus had once given Epimandos. It had not done the waiter much good.
I stalked away. The main bar, with its sad contents, still repelled me, so I lit another lamp and stomped upstairs.
I looked in the two small rooms that lay above the kitchen area. They were furnished for thin dwarves with no luggage who might be prepared to spend their free time at Flora's sitting on rickety beds staring at spiders' webs.
Gruesome fascination drew me to the other room again.
It had been scrubbed and rearranged. The walls had been washed over with a dark red paint, the only colour that would hide what had been underneath. The bed was now below the window, instead of by the door. It had a different blanket. The stool where the soldier's wine tray had been placed by Epimandos on that fatal night had been changed for a pine box. As a gesture to decor, a large Greek pot with a lively octopus design now stood on a mat on the box.
The pot used to be in the bar downstairs. I remembered it there; it was a fine item. I had always thought that. However, when I went to have a closer look, I noticed that the far-side rim was badly chipped. The pot would not repay mending. All the owner could do with the thing was shove it somewhere and admire the octopus.
I was thinking like Pa. I always would.
I lay on the bed gloomily.
Helena could no longer bear to be at odds with me, so she came upstairs too. Now it was her turn to stand in the doorway. I held out my hand to her.
'Friends?'
'If you like.' She stayed by the door. Friends we might be, but she still despised my attitude. However, I was not intending to change it; not even for her.
She looked around, realising this was where the soldier died. I watched her quietly. Women are not supposed to think, but mine could and did, and I liked to watch the process. Helena's strong face changed imperceptibly as she considered everything here, trying to imagine the last minutes of the soldier's life, trying to comprehend the waiter's demented attack. This was no place for her. I would have to take her downstairs again, but too soon a move would offend her.
I was watching Helena, judging my moment, so the puzzled thought caught me unawares: 'There's something wrong about this room.' I stared about me, wondering what had worried me. 'The size is odd.'
I did not need Apollonius to draw me a geometric sketch. As soon as I thought about it, I realised the floor plan here upstairs was much smaller than the ground-floor area. I swung myself upright and went out on to the landing to check. The other two guest rooms, which were so tiny they hardly counted, occupied the space above the kitchen and the waiter's cubicle. The staircase used up a few more feet. But this eight-foot-square room where Censorinus had died was only about half the size of the caupona's main room downstairs.
Behind me Helena had entered the soldier's room. 'There's only one window here.' She was acutely observant. As soon as I went back to her I understood what she meant. When Petronius and I stood in the street throwing pebbles up, there had been two square openings above our heads. Only one lit this room. 'There must be another bedroom up here, Marcus-but there's no door into it.'
'It's been blocked up,' I decided. Then a possible reason struck me. 'Dear gods, Helena, there may be something hidden up here-another body, for instance!'
