ODE TO A BANKER

Apollonius brought our food then, so Junia broke off to mention little errors he had made in seasoning the salad, and to suggest clever ways he could serve it more elegantly next time. He thanked her gravely. I caught his eye, then had to shove spring onions into my mouth quickly to cover up my grin.

`Jupiter, sister – this is a one-snatch food-bar, not a palace dining room.'

`Try not to talk with your mouth so full, Marcus. And don't tell me how to do my job.' After two weeks, she was the expert. Helena kicked me, as a signal not to upset myself arguing. Junia reassumed her regal position, leaning on the inside counter. She could not resist a final dig. `You want to have a sharp word with Mother – about that man Anacrites.'

This time I crammed a large piece of sorrel into my mouth to annoy her deliberately, before answering: `Ma knows what I think.'

Junia tossed her head angrily. `She cannot know what other people are saying.'

`I don't know myself. What are you talking about?' `Oh, don't play the innocent.'

I had a bad feeling. I tried not replying.

`Well, for one thing,' Junia enjoyed telling me, `he has persuaded Mother to give him all her savings to invest.'

`Shush! Don't discuss our family affairs so publicly.' For once, I was happy our children were making such a racket.

This was a shock. I had been unaware Ma had any savings with which she wanted to speculate. At my side, Helena moved slightly, almost as if she had expected something else to be said. Whatever she thought, she was noticeably keeping quiet. Now she reached over me to where Apollonius had set down the breadbasket and took a roll. Then she involved herself in breaking it into very neat pieces, which she slowly ate. Flora's Caupona had always specialised in very doughy rolls. What looked like seeds on the top, usually turned out to be grit.

After chewing and swallowing my sorrel leaf to give myself reaction time, I pointed out to Junia that if Ma had been pinching back a few coppers every week from her housekeeping, it could hardly amount to much. She had brought up seven children unaided, then even after we left home she let herself be drawn into helping out the most feckless and hopeless of her offspring. Our elder brother Festus set the standard for sponging before he was killed in the East. I looked after his daughter financially, but various grandchildren were being shod, fed, and in some cases pushed through basic schooling by their devoted grandmother. She had two brothers (three if you counted the one who had sensibly run away); from them she cadged country vegetables, but otherwise our family offered few possibilities to recoup her generosity. Pa gave her a small annuity. I had always paid her rent.

Junia came outside again and whispered a huge figure that she thought our mother's nest egg might amount to. I whistled. `How did she collect that together?'

Still, Ma always was tenacious. She bailed me out of prison once; I knew she could call on spare cash somewhere. I imagined she hid it in her mattress the way old women are supposed to do to help burglars find it easily.

`What has Anacrites done with this money, Junia?' Helena asked, looking concerned.

'He put it in some bank he uses.'

`What – the Golden Horse? The Aurelius Chrysippus outfit?' I was now horrified. I did not care where Anacrites shoved his cash, but enough questions hung over the Golden Horse to make anybody else now shun the place. `Has Anacrites told Ma that the proprietor, was recently found dead in suspicious circumstances – and that there is a suggestion of devious practice?'

`Oh Juno!' drawled my sister loudly. `Well, that's Mother in trouble! I must tell her at once – she'll be devastated!'

`Just advise her quietly,' I warned. `The bank is perfectly solvent as far as I know. Anacrites was talking to me about removing his own cash in view of these problems – but that's privileged information. I presume if he withdraws his own funds, he will do the same for Ma.'

It rankled that my mother had turned to Anacrites for investment advice. It rankled even more that he had known her financial position when I, her only son, did not.

Junia had sat down and was now posing, chin on one hand, looking thoughtful. `Of course, maybe it would be better not to say anything to Mother after all.'

`Why ever not?' Helena's voice was sharp. She hated people acting irresponsibly. `Somebody ought to warn Junilla Tacita. She can make up her own mind what she does about the situation – or better still, she can ask Marcus for advice.'

`No, I don't think so,' Junia decided.

`Don't be coy, Junia,' I said lazily. I hardly paid her any attention; I was intending to warn Ma about the bank myself. `What's on your mind then?'

Being Junia, she could not bear to keep a nasty premise to herself `If Ma was to lose money because of Anacrites, it might put a stop to something worse.'

`Worse than Ma losing her savings?' I was coughing over a radish – not only because it was hot.