Wolf Whistle

‘If you must know, it’s the aunts,’ she explained, when they had settled at the table and given their orders. ‘The old crabs plan to disinherit me.’

‘Your husband’s will was perfectly legal.’ Orbilio knew, because he’d once had to try and disprove it. ‘What’s the problem?’

Claudia pulled a face. ‘They believe they can prove me unfit, as a woman, to manage the inheritance. They want me to marry Porsenna.’

Orbilio buried a laugh in his handkerchief. They had more chance of building a snowman in summertime. ‘Who,’ he asked, keeping his kerchief close to hand, ‘is Porsenna?’ Outside, two small boys chased a piglet up the street.

‘Their puppet,’ she explained, sinking her teeth into a piping hot scallop dripping with garlic. ‘The mouse man.’

A squid ring fell off Orbilio’s knife. ‘The what?’

‘Porsenna breeds dormice for the banquets of the rich and famous.’ Young, dull, pliable-what more could Larentia ask? Rumour had it, he spent most of his waking hours writing recipes for cooking his precious fattened profitmakers. ‘So what I don’t need,’ she said, crunching on a stick of celery, ‘is a soldier clumping about in armour to draw attention to myself.’

Orbilio laid down his chicken bone. ‘Come on. Even your mother-in-law couldn’t blame you for wanting protection against a madman.’

Claudia sipped at her wine. It was good. Better than Seferius wine, in fact. ‘The problem with Magic is that somewhere along the line, he’s started to believe it’s reciprocal.’ She speared a mushroom and waved it at Marcus. ‘That’s right. This creep actually thinks we’re in a two-way relationship.’

‘Larentia wouldn’t believe that.’

Claudia leaned over and broke off a chunk of hot, steaming chestnut bread. ‘Of course she wouldn’t. But will that stop her convincing a judge I encouraged him?’ The slightest excuse, no matter how tenuous. Think of the money at stake. ‘So we’re agreed, then. No legionaries?’

He tilted his chair back against the wall and folded his hands behind his head. ‘No legionaries,’ he agreed. ‘Until after the old trouts have left.’

Claudia waited.

‘But until then,’ he continued eventually, ‘I shall have to take other precautions to safeguard your life.’

Claudia set her drawstring bag upon the table and patted it. ‘Such as?’

He even made out he was considering other options. ‘You leave me no choice,’ he said gravely. ‘I shall have to protect you myself.’

Now why is it I had a feeling you’d say that? ‘And just how do you plan to do that?’

‘By moving in, you can pass me off as a relative, a servant, even your agent. We’ll think of something.’

We certainly will. ‘Oops.’

Bending down to retrieve Claudia’s bracelet which had fallen on to the tiles. Orbilio thought he detected a flash of movement from the corner of his eye, but when he straightened up, she was helping them both to a rich gamey stew of venison and hare.

‘I have a plan,’ she said. There was no sign of the little blue bag on the table. ‘It’s one I’ve used before and I call it my Runaway Success.’

‘Foolproof?’ He was so suspicious, he almost checked under his plate.

‘Foolproof.’ But it takes half an hour. ‘I’ll explain, but in the meantime, tell me this. Do you think Jovi is in any danger?’

‘Because he saw the “sleeping” lady, and possibly the killer, who thinks he might identify him?’ Orbilio mopped his stew with his bread. ‘No,’ he said decisively. ‘My guess is that yes, Jovi saw the victim in the alley. It was dark, he was lost and frightened and alone, and he wanted help, but that’s when the killer got lucky. I think the victim had already been knocked out-the other two had bruises on their skulls, that’s how he ties them up and strips them without a struggle. So when Jovi came bumbling along, the killer simply melted into the shadows until the boy gave up.’

Around the tavern, smells of meat juices dripping from the spit mingled with guffaws of raucous male laughter from the corner. Logs from the fire crackled as the flames licked round their splintered edges.

‘Then that’s one cold-blooded bastard you are looking for.’

‘Isn’t he, now.’ Marcus combed his hair with his hands. The torn flesh on his knuckles was healing over, she noticed. ‘We know the girl was unharmed at that stage, and Jovi would certainly have said if she’d been naked, so having secured himself both victim and secluded killing ground, our man simply toughed it out.’

Roaring fire or not, it seemed cold all of a sudden. ‘He? You think the killer’s a man?’

‘Do women do things like that to each other?’ Claudia shivered. ‘Was he…slicing her up while Jovi and I were there?’

Orbilio pushed back his plate in distaste. ‘That girl died in the early hours of the morning,’ he said in reply, ‘and she took one hell of a long time to do it. But to answer the question you are too damned proud to ask, no, Mistress Seferius, you could not have saved her life.’ His face had gone white and his lips were pursed to nothingness. ‘Instead, I’d have had three bodies lying in the mortuary, instead of one.’