Man Eater

It made sense. At a certain age, every man needs to anchor his career and Orbilio could picture Barea studying the racehorses, then offering his services to a leading stud farm.

‘Will you keep in touch with Tulola?’ he asked.

‘If I can’t afford tarts, who knows? But I wouldn’t mind a crack at the other one.’

‘Euphemia?’

‘Claudia. Very tasty. Got your leg over yet?’

‘It’s getting late, I think I’ll-’

‘What! Smart, intelligent aristo like you and she gave you the elbow?’

‘Time’s pressing, I need to spruce myself up for dinner-’

Barea’s laughter drowned the chatter from the monkey house. ‘Don’t take it personal, my old son, she probably prefers a bit of rough, them types do, know what I mean?’ He tapped the side of his nose knowingly.

Orbilio feigned a sudden interest in ostriches as they passed the compound.

‘In fact,’ the horse-breaker ran his bony fingers over his blue-black, slicked-back hair, ‘I wouldn’t be surprised if she’s dancing the four-legged limbo with me before long.’ With a confident wink, he turned on his heel and marched off.

Orbilio’s mouth twisted into a grin. You can try, Barea, you can try.

He began to laugh aloud. I just pray Claudia doesn’t hurt you too badly in the process.

*

While Barea slipped round the door of Tulola’s heavily scented bedroom and Orbilio slipped beneath the steaming waters of the hot-room bath, Claudia Seferius, subject of their recent conversation, cradled a jug of mulled wine and the knowledge that, by rights, she ought at this moment to be rubbing shoulders with merchants and porters, astrologers and ferrymen in the bustling town of Narni. She should not, as she was now, be sitting alone in Sergius Pictor’s courtyard. She should be surrounded by hordes of late-night carousers gathered together on the banks of the Nera where in daylight the barges sail past, with their high sterns and curved bows, laden with everything from marble to saltfish to slaves.

But no.

Fancypants has to stick his nose where it doesn’t belong. Never mind that it was tantamount to throwing her to the wolves, duty is duty, isn’t it, Marcus? What does it matter if innocent people suffer, so long as Truth is the victor?

Irritably she got up and flounced round the topiaries. Dammit, he gets under my skin almost as badly as the dust from the journey and heaven knows, that was awful enough. Yesterday’s rain and today’s sunshine meant the gunge kicked up from those mules stuck like porridge, clogging her pores and making her queasy by the time they got back to the Vale of Adonis. It had to be that? What other explanation could there be?

Not Agrippa. His death was shocking and, yes, desperately disturbing. He was such a fit man, a genuine hero of the people-heavens above, we rely on men like him.

Who suggested the nausea was connected with Loverboy? No, no, no. With the inevitable unrest in Rome, his boss would recall him immediately, because when the Empire moved, it did so with astonishing pace, and Orbilio was an ambitious sod. He’d be off to Gaul, probably before the month was out, and that’s what she wanted, wasn’t it? Him out of her hair once and for all? Well, of course it was, what a damned silly question.

It’s that baby goat I ate at lunchtime. More milk than blood in its body, no wonder I felt queer.

Claudia inhaled the steaming vapours from her goblet-honey, saffron, cinnamon and, oh, was that a hint of pepper in there? Before she could identify the other ingredients, Pallas burst out of the south wing in a stream of light.

‘There you are, there you are!’

Good old Pallas, nearly wetting himself to tell her that when a certain fire broke out this morning, Macer’s finger of suspicion pointed directly her way-only someone, Pallas added gleefully, his brows lifting just as high as they could go, had given her an alibi.

‘Who?’ He spread his hands apologetically. ‘Darling girl, how should I know that, I’m simply repeating what I heard.’

Reading the message emblazoned in his eyebrows, Claudia pressed further. ‘But you could, no doubt, hazard a small guess?’

‘We-ell,’ he began, then, as he glanced over her shoulder, his tone changed abruptly. ‘Of course, it was difficult to keep track of anyone today.’

Claudia spun round. Perhaps it was merely a trick of the light that suggested a door to the north wing had swung shut?

‘Because of Macer,’ Pallas qualified.