Before I could buff aside the man who had stopped me, something made me think again. The loon looked familiar.
His companion seemed to know me too, for it butted me in the kidneys as familiarly as a nephew. It was a brown-and-white-patched billy goat, about waist high, with a sad expression. Both its ears had nervous tics. Its neck had a queer kink.
I knew about this goat. The owner made some hopeless claim that it had been born with its head facing backwards.
'Sorry – ' I tried to make off.
'We met at Gerasa! I've been trying to find you!' the owner piped.
'Look, friend; I have to go – '
He looked downcast. They made a gloomy pair. 'I thought you were interested,' protested the man. The goat had the sense to know I just wanted to escape.
'Sorry?'
'In buying the goat!' Dear gods.
'What made you think that?'
'Gerasa!' he repeated doggedly. A dim memory of viewing his beast for a copper or two in a mad moment came floating back. A more terrible memory – of foolishly discussing the beast with its owner – followed rapidly. 'I still want to sell him. I thought we had a bargain: I came looking for you that night, in fact.'
It was time to be blunt. 'You've got the wrong idea, friend. I just asked you about him because he reminded me of a goat I once owned myself.'
He didn't believe me. It sounded weak only because it was the truth. Once, for very complex reasons, I had rescued a runaway nanny from a temple on a seashore. My excuse is, I was living rough (I was doing a job for Vespasian, always prone to leave me short of tavern fees) and any companion had seemed better than none at the time.
I had always been a sentimental type. Now sometimes I let myself indulge in conversations with owners of peculiar goats just to show off my former expertise. So, I had talked to this man in Gerasa. I remembered he had told me he wanted to sell up and plant beans. We had discussed what price he wanted for his quaintly angled exhibit, but I had never had any intention of rejoining the goat owners' guild.
'Look, I'm sorry, but I like a pet who looks you in the eye.'
'Depends where you stand,' the menace persisted logically. He tried to edge me into position behind his billy's left shoulder. 'See?'
'I've got a girlfriend now; she takes all my energy – '
'He draws the crowds!'
'I bet he does.' Lies. As a sideshow the goat was completely useless. He was also nibbling my tunic hem, despite his disability. In fact, the crooked neck seemed to place him more readily in line with people's clothes. The last thing I needed was a series of domestic writs for damaged skirts and togas.
'What was yours called?' demanded the owner. He was definitely mad.
'What? Oh my goat. She didn't have a name. Growing too familiar only leads to heartache on both sides.'
'That's right:' The goat owner could tell I understood his problems. 'This is Alexander, because he's great.' Wrong. He was just terrible.
'Don't sell him!' I urged, suddenly unable to bear the thought of them parting. It seemed to me mis couple of deadbeats depended on each other more than either realised. 'You need to know he has a good home. If you're going to retire from the road, take him with you.'
'He'll eat the beans.' True. He would eat everything. Goats actually tear up plants and shrubs by the roots. Nothing they come near to ever sprouts again. 'You seemed like a good sort, Falco-'
'Don't bet on it.'
'He has his funny ways, but he repays affection: Still, maybe you're right. He belongs with me.' I had been reprieved. 'I'm glad I've seen you again; it's cleared my mind.' I pulled Alexander by the ears, almost regretfully. Obviously a connoisseur of quality, he tried to eat my belt.
I was leaving them when the long-faced goat owner suddenly asked, 'That night in Gerasa, did your friend ever find his way to the pools?'
Chapter LXX
'What friend?' if we were talking about Gerasa, I didn't need to ask what pools.
I was trying to keep things light, whilst all the time my sense of oppression grew. I hate murder. I hate murderers. I hate running up against the need to name one of them. Very soon now it was going to be unavoidable.
'He was in your company. When I came to offer you the goat, I asked him where you were. He said you'd gone into town, and in return for that he asked me directions to the pools of the Maiuma.'
'What did he look like?'
'Blow me if I know. He had no time to stop; he was dashing off on a camel.'
'Young? Old? Tall? Short? Can you see him here now?'
The man looked panicky. Unused to describing people, he was fumbling for anything to say. It was no use pressing him. Not even with one possible murderer – Tranio – standing ten feet from us waiting to go on-stage. The witness was unreliable. Too much time had passed. Now if I offered suggestions he would agree with them instantly to escape his quandary. This loon held the answer to everything, but I would have to let him go.
I said nothing. Patience was my only hope. Alexander was slyly consuming the sleeve of my tunic; seeing it, his owner biffed him between the ears. Striking the goat's head reminded him of something: 'He wore a hat!' I had heard that before.
While I was catching my breath, the goat's owner voluntarily described the Gerasa specimen. 'It was one of them knitted things, with a flopped-over top.'
That was nothing like the wide-brimmed, round-crowned Greek hat that Musa had been sent from Petra by Shullay. But I knew where I had seen this. 'A Phrygian cap? Like the sun-god Mithras wears?'
'That's right. One of them long floppy ones.'
Grumio's collection cap.
So Ione's killer was Grumio. I had given him an alibi myself, based on the bad premise that I had seen him several times in the same place. I never dreamt that in between he might have galloped off somewhere else.
Looking back, my confidence had been ridiculous. Of course he had taken a break from his act. He could never have sustained that sparkling performance all night. If he had stood on that barrel for the whole evening, by the time Musa and I returned from the Temple of Dionysus he would have been hoarse and completely exhausted. That had not been his condition when he dragged me up for abuse and the near-fatal 'accident' using my own knife. He had been alert, in control, exhilarated, dangerous. And I had missed the obvious.
Grumio had done two turns on the barrel. In between, he had ridden to the pools and killed the girl.
Had he acted alone? And had he killed Heliodorus too? It was hard to work out. My mind was a mess. Sometimes it is better to have twenty suspects than a mere two. I wanted to consult Helena. Unluckily I had trapped her in the commander's private box.
I walked to the arena entrance. Grumio was no longer there. He and Chremes had slipped into the arena ready to make their entrances from one side. They were hiding in one of the niches. Davos was concealed on- stage, ready to pop out as the ghost. The rest of the cast had been waiting for me.
Ribes was still enjoying himself with the lyre. Luckily Syrians liked minstrels. Ribes fancied himself rotten, and since no one had signalled him to end the overture, he was working it up in frenzied improvisation.
Tranio was by the gate. I walked up to him casually. 'You'll be glad to know I found Grumio's ring.'
'His ring?'
'Blue stone. Could be lapis; might just be sodalite:' He had absolutely no idea what I was talking about.
'As I thought – he even lied about that!' I grabbed Tranio by the elbow and yanked him closer.
'What's the game, Falco?'
