`Anything published? I was told you are 'respected' in your field.' `People have been kind.' The modesty was as false as a whore's golden heart.
`What are you working on at the moment for Chrysippus?' I pressed him.
`A review of fiduciary transactions since the Augustan period.' It sounded dry. That was being generous.
`Surely that has a limited appeal to a normal readership?'
`It is a small field,' Avienus boasted proudly.
`Thus allowing you to be its pre-eminent historian?' He glowed.
`Whether or not the general reader gives a quadrans about your
subject?'
`I like to think my researches have relevance.' Nothing would put him off. I stopped wasting effort on insults.
`Was Chrysippus paying you?'
`On delivery.'
`When will that be?'
`When I finish.'
I had detected tetchiness. `Was late delivery why he called you in yesterday?' A
`We did discuss programming, yes.'
`A friendly chat?'
`Businesslike.' He was not stupid.
`Reach a decision?'
`A new date.' It sounded good.
`One you were happy with? Or one that suited him?'
`Oh, he makes all the running!'
`Well, he did,' I reminded the grumbling historian quietly. `Until somebody battered him senseless and glued him to the tesserae of his elegant mosaic with lashings of spilt cedar oil.'
Avienus had had an unmoved expression until then; it barely changed. `I am held up by one of my blocks,' he said, ignoring the salacious detail and returning doggedly to the point. Was that his style? The public would spurn it. Anyway, I had no truck with `blocks'. A professional author should always be able to unearth material, then develop it usefully.
`Did you attack Chrysippus?' I sprang on him.
`No, I did not.'
`Did you have any reason to kill him?' This time he merely shook his head. `Would any of his other authors have had such a reason?'
`Not that I could say, Falco.' Ambiguous. Are historians linguistically meticulous? Did Avienus mean he knew no reason – or he knew a reason but would not reveal it? I decided against pursuing this; he was too aware of the questioning process. Nothing would come from badgering.
`Did you see any of your colleagues while you were here?'
`No.'
I consulted my list. `Turius, Pacuvius, Constrictus and Urbanus all visited, I have been told. Do you know them all?' He inclined his head. `You meet them at literary functions, I presume?' Another twist of the head. He seemed too bored now, or too offended by the simplicity of the questions, to bring himself to reply aloud.
`Right. So you were first here and Chrysippus was definitely alive when you left?'
`Yes.'
I paused for a moment, as if considering, then said, `That's it then.'
`And you will be in contact if you need anything else.' That was my line.
Apart from alienating the officer investigating him for murder, he had just lost a potential buyer. I liked history – but I would never now allow myself to read his work.
XXII
I HUNG AROUND quite some time longer. I was expecting five men most of whom had apparently decided to ignore me. Since a no-show would imply guilt, this was intriguing. But I bet that when I did confront the others, they would try the old `never got your message' trick. Maybe a heavy-handed visit from the vigiles was needed to change their minds.
Turius turned up just as I had decided to go home for lunch. He must be the infuriating one of the set.
He looked mid-twenties. An untrustworthy `respectable' visage, with a nasty little buttoned mouth. His dress code was the opposite of the Avienus black. His tunic was vermilion, and his shoes were punched and laced. Even his skin had a bright, slightly hennaed colouring. His hair, under a shimmering oil slick, was extremely dark. The ghastly tunic was bloused over his belt in a way I loathed. While nothing about Avienus had made me consider geography, I decided at once that Turius had provincial origins. Writers tend to home in on Rome from Spain, Gaul, and other parts of Italy. I could not be bothered to ask where he came from, but found him too loud, too cocky, and probably effeminate. Hard to be sure, as I had no personal reason to enquire.
`I was starting to think nobody wanted to talk to me. Avienus is the only other person who has bothered to respond.' `So he said.'
`You two been conspiring?' I took out the notepad, keeping my gaze fixed on him while I set it in front of me and produced a stylus. I smiled, but with unfriendly eyes.
`I happened to meet him-' He was flustered. Perhaps he had never been interrogated before. Or perhaps it meant something. `Where was that?'
`Just the popina at the end of the street. What's wrong with that?' `I didn't query it.' But I was querying whether the writers had met to make sure their stories matched. -`A man can buy himself a snack.
Well,' I said, looking as if I disapproved, `there are new laws against hot food stalls, but I suppose a cold bite taken at midday cannot do much harm.' Helena or Petronius would have doubled up laughing at my sanctimonious attitude. `So! You are Turius.' Said with the right tone of distasteful surprise, that always suggests you know something.
As I hoped, he looked torn between a desire to be famous and terror that I possessed secrets. That he featured in secrets, I felt sure. Instinct only – but I trusted mine.
`Do you have a praenomen?' I was scribbling at my notes as if creating a prosecution brief for the magistrate.
`Tiberius.'
`Tiberius Turius!' That sounded good and ridiculous. `I'm Falco.' Obviously tougher.
Before I could ask, `What's your line, Turius?' he told me anyway. `I am devising rules for the ideal society.' Yes, Avienus had informed him what my questions would be. I raised my eyebrows without comment. He grew faintly embarrassed. `Plato's Republic for modem times.'
`Plato,' I remarked. `He excluded women, am I right?' Turius was trying to decide whether I approved of this fine patriarchal stance. If he could have seen the women in my life dealing with me, he would not have puzzled over the issue for long.
`There was more to it than that,' he answered cautiously.
`I bet!' Just when he thought he could engage in a critical discussion, I swept Plato aside brutishly. `So what does your treatise have to say? Finished it yet?'
'Er – most of it is sketched out.'
`Lot of writing-up to do?'
`I have not been too well -'
`Bad back? Migraine? Face ache? Piles?' I rapped out unsympathetically. I stopped just before saying, `Terminal desire to bore people silly?'
`I suffer from attacks -'
`Don't tell me. I feel queasy hearing about other people's ailments.' I assessed how robust he looked, then made a swift stroke with the stylus. `How did Chrysippus feel about your poor health, Turius?'
