'What? Your dog-keepers? How lucky they were on hand to prevent trouble! What do these intruders say for themselves?'
'That's what we have come to ask you,' growled Cyprianus. 'Don't mess about, Falco. You were there; you were recognised.'
I reminded myself I was the Emperor's envoy and had every right to investigate anything I wanted. Guilt undermined me, nonetheless. I had been wrong-footed. Now I had a burned arm, canine teeth had ripped my tunic, I was hot and breathing hard. Worse, in my search I had found nothing. I hate wasted effort.
'I don't have to answer you tonight,' I said quietly. 'I have imperial authority to skulk- I could ask, what were you doing out there with a bunch of savage dogs?'
'Oh why are we arguing?' raged Magnus suddenly. 'We are all on the same side!'
'I hope that's true!' I scoffed. 'We can't have it out at this time of night. I suggest a site meeting with Pomponius tomorrow. Now it's late, I'm tired and before you go, there was somebody else on the prowl near the carts. What have you done with that young man who accompanies the statue-seller?'
'We never got him. What's he to you?' demanded Magnus.
I kept up the pretence that Aelianus was a stranger. 'He looks wrong. He hangs about. He seems to despise the artwork that Sextius is supposed to be selling- and if you must know, I don't like the colour of his eyes!' Neither Magnus nor Cyprianus looked fooled. 'I want him found, and I want to interrogate him.'
'We'll have a look for him,' Cyprianus offered fairly helpfully.
'Do that. But don't beat him up. I need him in a condition where he can still talk. And I want him first, Cyprianus: whatever his game is, he's mine!'
It did no good. I found out next day they had looked half the night for him. There was no trace of Aelianus anywhere.
I went out myself at first light, trawling all around the site. There was flattened undergrowth everywhere, but Aelianus had vanished. By then I had realised that even if Magnus and Cyprianus had found him, they would never have handed him over to me until they had knocked out of him anything he had to say. They would extract more than that too. They would want him to incriminate himself-whether he was guilty of anything or not.
At least if he was dead in a ditch, none of us had pinpointed the ditch. Only as the site came alive in the morning did I make myself reluctantly try the last place where he might be. Slowly, I dragged myself to the medical hut and asked Alexas if anyone had brought him a new corpse.
'No, Falco.'
'Relief! Thanks for that. But will you tell me if you get one?'
'Someone in particular?' the orderly asked narrowly.
There was no point pretending any longer. 'His name is Camillus. He's my brother-in-law.'
'Ah.' Alexas paused. I waited, with my heart sinking. 'Better look at what I have in the back room, Falco.' That sounded grim.
I whipped aside a curtain. My mouth was dry. Then I swore.
Aulus Camillus Aelianus, son of Camillus Verus, darling of his mother and dutifully loved by his elder sister, Aulus my sullen assistant was lying on a bunk. He had one leg heavily bandaged and a few extra cuts for emphasis. I could tell by his expression as his eyes met mine he was bored and in a bad mood.
XXXI
'Look who's here! What happened to you?'
'Bitten.'
'Badly?'
'To the bone, Falco. I am told it could go seriously septic.' Aelianus was dismal. Then have died from less, you know. Alexas patched me up. I have to keep off this leg for a while but I'll be kicking people with it soon!' I could tell who he wanted to kick.
'You're just angling to be sent home to your mother.'
'I am damn well not! I'm in enough pain.'
'Helena will come over and sort you out. She can bring you to the palace. Camilla Hyspale can nurse you.' Aelianus shuddered. 'No, all right. You are suffering enough. Helena will tenderly care for you. i
I'm so relieved to see you, I may even straighten your bed covers.'
I sat on his bunk. He shifted away petulantly. 'Leave me alone, Falco.'
'I have been searching everywhere for you,' I assured him. 'The thought that you had died on me was heart- rending, Aulus.'
'Shove off, Falco.'
'Everyone has been scouring the site. So how did you get here?'
I was the only entertainment available. Aelianus sighed and gave in, prepared to talk. 'You went off one way and I headed back up the track. The mosaicist ignored me when I banged on his shutter. I had legged it as far as the painters' hut when some of the dogs caught up. I just managed to scramble inside, but one got his damned teeth into my shin. I shook the fiend off somehow, and slammed the door closed. Then I sat with my back jammed against that door and my knees braced hard, I can tell you!'
'I'm sorry I couldn't come for you. I was rescuing Helena.'
'Well, I hoped you had her.' The way he said it meant, on the other hand stuff you, Falco! 'In the end the dogs were called off and taken away. I heard that mosaicist lambasting the men outside for the noise the dogs made. He was giving them a real earful- so nobody looked in the painters' hut, thankfully. I was not prepared to venture out again. I thought I wouldn't make it anywhere anyway. I must have drifted oft into oblivion then the painter lad came home.'
'Your brother's pal?'
'He was completely out of it.'
'Drunk?'
'Lathered.'
'So no use?'
'Oh I was just glad to have human company. I told him what had happened and he listened blearily. He passed out. I passed out. Eventually we both woke up. It was at that point we noticed how much I had bled.'
Aelianus told this tale with rakish fluency. He could be a prude over women, but I knew that as a young tribune in Baetica he was one of the crowd. Even in Rome, with his fond parents watching, he had been known to roll home at dawn uncertain of how he had spent the previous night.
'The painter brought you to be bandaged?'
'It was still very early; no one was about. So he hitched an arm around me and I hopped here. We told Alexas not to mention me to anyone.'
'The painter could have let me know.'
'He wanted to go back to sleep in his hut. He was not a well boy.'
'Alexas could have given him a draught.'
'Alexas said he wouldn't waste good medicine.'
'Does this fine toper know you are connected to your brother?'
'He knows that Quintus is my brother.'
'Then he knows everything by the sound of it.'
'He's all right,' said Aelianus, usually no fan of anyone. He must have felt really lonely in that hut last night until the painter joined him.
He closed his eyes. Shock had taken its toll. Dog bites hurt badly too. I patted his good leg. 'You've done enough. Have your sleep. I am truly sorry you were wounded to no purpose.'
Aelianus, who had propped himself up when I first entered, lay down again on his back. 'Shall I tell him?' he asked the low ceiling. Yes I will! He treats me like shit, he abandons me to die and he jibes at me. But I am a person of honour, with noble values.'
'You are warped.' In fact he sounded like his sister. It was the first time any likeness to Helena had revealed
