`Only Lollius himself.' Maia had a dry way of insulting her sisters' husbands. Her only blind spot was her own, and that was understandable. Once she let herself notice Famia's deficiencies the rest of us would be in for a lengthy diatribe. `How's Petronius?' she asked. `Is he going, with you?'
`He's been laid up by the criminal world's society for the preservation of marriages, a smart group of lads with strict moral consciences who see themselves as the thunderbolt of Jupiter. They knocked him about so badly I'm hoping that when his black eyes clear up again; he'll march straight back to Arria Silvia.'
`Don't bet on it,' scoffed Maia. `He may bang on the door but will she open up? Last I heard, Silvia was making the best of her loss.'
`What does that mean, sis?'
'Oh, Marcus! It means her husband did the dirty, so she dumped him, and now she's been seen going around with a new escort.'
`Silvia?'
Maia gave me a hug… For some reason she always regarded me as a winsome innocent. `Why not? When I saw her, she looked as if she was having the most fun for years.'
My heart sank.
`How's your poetry?' If, Maia was trying to cheer me up with this bright enquiry after my hobby (which I knew she ridiculed) the ploy failed.
`I'm thinking of holding a public recitation sometime soon.'
`Juno and Minerva! The sooner you leave for the country the better, dear brother!'
`Thanks for the support, Maia.'
`I'm always ready to save you from yourself.'
I had one minor task to complete. I could not face an hour of twittering from Milvia, so I refused to visit her house. I wrote a terse report, to which Helena attached a bill for my services, payable on receipt. I assured the girl I had seen her mother, and spoken to her personally. I said Flaccida was well and had enrolled herself for a series of speculative lectures on the natural sciences, from which she did not wish to be disturbed.
That done, my next call was to Petronius at his aunt's house, a trip I was required' to make in company with our earnest supervisor, the ex-Consul. His idea of man management was to check up personally on staff who might be malingering.' Once again I had suggested Frontinus come in plain clothes, lest he cause Petro's wheezing Aunt Sedina to expire with excitement at the idea of having such an eminent' man sitting on the edge of a bed in her house and examining her errant nephew. Instead, Sedina greeted me warmly, then treated my companion as if she assumed he was my shoe-changing slave. I was honoured with the visitor's bowl of almonds to munch, but I let the Consul have one or two.
When we first walked in I saw that my old friend looked even worse now the bruises and swellings had reached the glorious stage.' He was covered in so many rainbows that he could have played Iris on stage. He was also conscious, and sufficiently himself to greet me with a barrage of obscenities. I let him get it out of his system, then stepped aside so he could see Frontinus lurking behind me, bearing a flagon of medicinal cordial. As consuls go, he was well brought up. I had taken grapes. That gave something for Petro to chew on as he fell gloomily silent in the presence of the, great.
Small talk is difficult with an invalid who has only himself to blame. We were hardly going to humour him by discussing his symptoms. Wondering how he could ever have caught his disease was out too. Stupidity is an ailment nobody talks about openly.
Frontinus and I made the mistake of confessing we had come to, say farewell before a junket to Tibur. This immediately gave Petro the idea that he would hire a litter and come along with us. He could still hardly move; he would be useless. Still, it might be good to remove him from any danger of renewed attacks from Florius and I was quite pleased to put him out of Milvia's reach too. His aunt soon stopped being put out in case her own hospitality wasn't good enough, and came round to thinking that fresh country air was just what her big daft treasure needed. So we were stuck with him.
`All very, well, but it won't help Lucius Petronius get back together with his wife,' said Helena, when I told her afterwards.
I said nothing. I had been to the Campagna with that rascal before. Grape gathering with Petronius on various relatives farms had, taught me exactly how he intended to convalesce: Petro's idea of a nice country holiday was lying in the shade of a fig tree with a rough stone jar of Latium wine, and getting his arms around a buxom country girl.
Our final venture was to walk over to the Capena Gate to see Helena's family. Her father was out, taking his elder son on a vote-catching visit to some other senators. Her mother seized our baby with a rather public display of affection, implying that she was displeased with other members of her tribe. Claudia Rufina seemed very quiet. And Justinus only made a brief appearance looking serious, then slid off somewhere by himself. Julia Justa told Helena he was trying to reject the idea of entering the Senate, even though his papa had mortgaged himself deeply to make election funds available; the son had now been sentenced to take an improving trip abroad.,
`Where to, Mama?
`Anywhere,' commented the noble Julia, rather forcefully. We had a distinct feeling we were only being favoured with half the story, but everyone was being held on a tight rein so there was no chance of a private chat.
`Well, he won't be going before Aulus and Claudia's wedding presumably,' Helena consoled herself. Justinus was her favourite, and she would miss him if he were exiled from Rome.
`Claudia's grandparents are due here in a couple of weeks,' her mother replied. `One does one's best' Julia Justa sounded more depressed and hard-done-by than usual. I had always thought her a shrewd woman. She was that rarity among patricians, a good wife and mother. She and I had had our differences, but only because; she lived by high moral standards. If she was in difficulty with one of her sons, I sympathised. She would not want me to offer help.
Hoping to discover what was up, I tried to run the senator to earth at Glaucus' gym, which we both patronised, but Camillus Verus was not there.
A day later we were, all settled at Tibur. Frontinus was staying; with patrician friends in a lavishly equipped villa which had stunning views. Helena and I had rented a little farm down on the plain, just a couple' of outbuildings attached to a rustic dwelling. We installed Petro in bachelor lodgings above the shack where the winepress would operate if there was one, while his aunt shared a corridor with us. Sedina had insisted on coming along to continue nursing her darling. Petronius was livid, but there was nothing he could do. So much for his romantic aspirations. He was to be pampered, fussed over – and supervised.
`This is a dump, Falco.'
`You chose to come. Still, I agree. We could probably buy this place for not much more than we're paying in rent.'
Disastrous words.
`That's a good idea,' said Helena, coming upon us unexpectedly. `We can start your portfolio of Italian land, ready for when you decide to qualify for a higher rank. Then we can show, off talking about `bur summer residence at Tibur''.
I was alarmed. `Is that what you want?'
'Oh, I want what you want, Marcus Didius.' Helena smiled wickedly. She hadn't answered the question, as she well knew.
She looked more at ease and less weary already than she had been in Rome, so I spoke less grumpily than I intended. `Even to annoy my sister Junia with her fancy aspirations, I won't invest good money in anywhere as pitiful as this.'-
`It's good land, my lad,' reported Petro's waddling aunt, coming in with a bundle of limp greenery in her shawl. `There are wonderful nettles all over the back; I'm just going to conjure up a nice pan of soup for us all.' Like all townswomen, Auntie Sedina loved to come to the Campagna so she could demonstrate her domestic skills by producing dubious dishes from ghastly ingredients that would be shunned with shrieks of terror by the countryborn.
Buying a patch of six-foot-high wild nettles in the faint hope of becoming an equestrian sounded about my
