subtly improved in decor. There were Egyptian rugs beside the high bed, instead of mere Italian wool. Female garments lay folded in a chest, though nothing was in the cupboards. A comb, with a few long gray hairs caught in its teeth, lay on a shelf beside a green glass alabastron that contained a sweeter perfume than the crocus goo that still accompanied me if I waved my hand about.
I looked at the slave. She looked back at me. She pursed her lips. “We had people who used to stay here,” she announced, still meeting my eye rather pointedly.
“That sounds a bit peculiar,” I observed frankly. This one was a character. She nodded, admiring her own acting. “Somebody told you to say that.”
“They lived out of Rome,” she added, as if just remembering her rehearsal. “One of them died, and they do not come anymore.”
“These mysterious visitors’ names wouldn’t have been Terentia and Tiberius?” She gave me a slow nod. “And you are not supposed to talk about them to me?” Another nod. I looked around the room. “You know, I think somebody has been here very recently!” Somebody who left in a hurry, departing the house in a carrying-chair only as I arrived today, I reckoned. So why were the Laelii so concerned to distract me from knowing that Terentia Paulla was a recent guest?
Unfortunately, that was the end of the pantomime. I did hope the slave would privately expand on it, but when I asked, she shook her head. Still, I can be grateful for an anonymous tip (and believe me, clues were so skinnily arrayed here that I was more generous than usual when I dipped into my arm purse). But the trouble with oblique hints like that is you can never work out what they mean.
“Any ideas what happened to the little girl?” I asked conspiratorially.
“I’d tell you if I had, sir.”
“Anyone here she is particularly friendly with?”
“No. She never has friends, that I know of. Well,” said my new source, sneering, “not many would meet the right standards for the people here, would they?”
The male slave was returning, with a girl who must be Gaia’s nurse.
“I’m surprised they let you in!” scoffed the floor-mopper to me, as she toddled back to work.
XXXIV
GAIA’S NURSE was an eye-catcher: a short, sturdily built, swarthy, hairy slave from somewhere unsavory in the east. She probably worshipped gods with harsh, five-syllable names and cannibalistic habits. She looked as if she were descended from trousered archers who could ride horses bareback and shoot backwards sneakily. In fact, even if I were trying not to be unkind, facially she looked as if one of her own parents might have been a horse.
The looks belied her cowed nature. As a barbarian, she was a cipher. I did not need to witness her trying to supervise little Gaia to realize that any six-year-old with spirit could push this beauty about. Locking her in a pantry was too extreme; I bet Gaia Laelia could have ordered nursey to sit motionless on a thistle for six hours, and the girl would have been too terrified to disobey.
“I know nothing!” When she spoke, it was in an accent that the children in my family would have imitated happily for weeks, spluttering with hysterical laughter every time. Even lacking an audience, Gaia could probably imitate her cruelly. And reduce the nurse to sobs doing it.
She had been thrashed. They were new bruises. From the picturesque array, I guessed that after Gaia went missing yesterday, several people had tried to force this girl to answer questions, then when she produced no answers each had resorted to punishment. The nurse thought she had been brought here so that I could thrash her again.
“Sit down on that chest.”
It took her a long time to believe I meant it. This may have been the first time she had ever sat in the presence of the freeborn. I was under no illusions; she probably despised me for not knowing my place.
We were still in what had been described as the guestroom. I busied myself looking under the bed, even pulling it away from the wall and peering into the accumulated dust at the back of it.
“I am looking for Gaia. Something very bad may have happened to her, and she has to be found quickly. Do you understand?” I dropped my voice. “I shall not whip you if you answer my questions quickly and truthfully.”
The nurse glared at me with sullen eyes. Any trustworthiness in her nature had been beaten out of her long ago. She was spoiled as a witness-and spoiled as a child’s nurse too, in my opinion.
Still, what did I know? My baby had never had one. The way we were going, I would never experience the anxiety of choosing, instructing, and no doubt eventually dismissing somebody to help with Julia. Some ill-trained, immature, uninterested foreigner for whom our baby represented a spoiled, rude Roman brat with spoiled, rude Roman parents, all of whom Fortune had spared from slavery and suffering for no obvious reason-unlike the conjectural nurse who would think herself, but for Fortune, as good as us. As, but for Fortune, she might well have been.
“Right.” I sat on the edge of the bed and stared at this one. “ Your name?”
“Athene.”
I sighed slowly. Who does these things? It was hard to think of anything more inappropriate.
“You look after Gaia. Do you like doing that?” A grim look in response. “Does Gaia like you?”
“No.”
“Is the child allowed to beat you as the adults do?”
“No.” Well, that was something.
“But she locked you in a pantry the other day, I hear?” Silence. “ It sounds to me as though she is treated like a little queen here. I don’t suppose that makes her very well behaved?” No reply. “Right. Well, listen, Athene. You are in serious trouble. If Gaia Laelia has come to any harm, you-being her nurse-will be the first suspect. It is the law in Rome that if anyone freeborn dies in suspicious circumstances, the entire complement of slaves in the household is put to death. You need to convince me that you meant her no harm. You had better show you want this little girl rescued from whatever trouble she is in.”
“She’s not dead, is she?” Athene seemed genuinely horrified. “She’ s only run away again.”
“Again? Are you talking about the day you were locked up?” A nod this time. “Gaia was coming to see me that day, and I sent her home afterwards. Has she ever suggested to you that she wanted to run away permanently?”
“No.”
“Does she confide in you?”
“She’s a quiet one.” The Gaia I had met had spoken out confidently; somebody must have engaged her in conversation regularly.
I gazed at the girl, then sprang on her. “Do you think someone in the family wants to kill Gaia?”
Her jaw dropped. Not an attractive sight. It was a new idea to Athene.
They kept their secrets well here. It was no surprise. They dealt in ritual and mystery. In my view, religion had nothing to do with it. The fanciful rites of the ancient cults, where only the favored may communicate with the gods, are about power in the state. Easy to extend the same system to within the family. Every head of household is his own chief priest. Luckily we are not all expected to wear bonnets with olive prongs and earflaps. I’d sooner emigrate to a Cappadocian beanfield.
Athene really did not know Gaia had been afraid of being killed. The child had confided in me, a complete stranger, yet knew she must not risk telling her own nurse. Well, I could see a reason for that: the nurse answered to the family.
It’s a myth that the slaves always know all the dark secrets in a household. They know more than they are supposed to, yes-but never everything. A successful slave-owner will release confidences selectively: you have to give away the scandals that are merely embarrassing, like adultery and bankruptcy and the time your grandmother wet herself in the best dining room, but keep absolutely silent about the impending treason charge, your three bastards, and how much you are really worth.
“Right, Athene; tell me about yesterday.”
