Wolf Whistle

She felt a jolt down the length of her spine. She had not given Tucca her name.

Kaeso rose to his feet and began to pace the room. ‘Let me think. Your husband died last September, no, I’m wrong…last August. He bequeathed the entire estate to his young widow and nothing whatsoever to his family.’ He turned his sharp, lean face towards her. ‘Contrary to expectations, though, the widow did not liquidate the assets, she tried to make a go of it.’

Claudia stared into her glass and hoped her cheeks were not as red as she feared. The reflection in the glass showed no break in the fluidity of his tread.

‘But there are problems for a woman going solo in commerce. The men, they are against her. They will not accept her in the Wine Merchants Guild, and thus they hope to ruin her.’

Now when Claudia’s face burned, it was from fury. Bastards! Once close friends of Gaius, the minute he died they were like vultures, circling his business and hoping to pick it clean without cost to either coin or conscience.

‘They won’t,’ was all she replied. She would beat these sons of bitches, so help her, yes she would. She would bring them crawling on their knees. ‘But that’s not why I’m here.’

The powerhouse faltered in his pacing. ‘Is it not?’ He padded back and coiled himself in the empty chair. ‘Then what does bring you to Kaeso?’

‘I heard you are very good at finding people.’

He bridged his fingers and considered her. ‘Not always do they wish to be found,’ he replied.

‘But you find them, nonetheless,’ she countered, and he smiled.

‘Are you hungry?’ he asked, drawing a tray of steaming chestnuts from the fire.

Watching as he squatted on the bearskin, one knee raised, prising open shells, Claudia saw now the reason for the apparent change in hair colour. It was not one shade, but a blend of several making up the whole. As one of the nuts proved stubborn, he dropped it, sucking at the finger it had scorched, and the long mane bounced. Yes, mane. In fact, now she came to think of it, there was much of the animal in Kaeso. The pointed features, the strong grey eyes, the trained physique, the lope. For a moment, she could not place the animal. Then suddenly it came. The wolf. The ultimate tracking beast.

When he’d finished digging out the chestnuts, he passed half across, dribbling them slowly into Claudia’s cupped palms. Between them, logs crackled and spat and glowed orange, and the apple-scented smoke spiralled upwards, blue and hazy. Finally, Kaeso sat back in his chair, put his feet on the table and said, ‘Who is it you want found and why?’

Claudia nibbled the succulent nuts. ‘Why is not your concern.’

‘I beg to differ. Have another glass of wine.’

She studied the collection of artworks. Busts, ivories, a faience vase showing leaping billygoats, a marble cat with jewelled eyes which must be at least five centuries old.

‘I want you to locate a man who calls himself Magic,’ she said. ‘He signs his letters with the seal of the cobra.’ Kaeso unfurled himself from the chair and threw a log on to a fire which did not need additional fuel. ‘Is that all you have to go on?’

He meant, is that all you intend to give me.

‘Those are the only tangible facts I have,’ she replied slowly. ‘But if, during the course of your enquiries, you come across a woman who has mislaid a small son answering to Jovi-’

‘And what,’ interrupted Kaeso, ‘shall I tell this Magic when I find him?’

‘Tell him?’ Claudia set down her glass and leaned forward. ‘My dear Kaeso, I think you are under something of a misapprehension. I don’t want you to tell this Magic anything.’ She shot him a dazzling smile. ‘I want you to kill him.’

XI

Marcus Cornelius Orbilio emerged from the tavern, gingerly rubbing his belly and deliberating which direction to take next. Should he turn right and head for the Field of Mars, because if there was loose talk to be overheard, it was there at the baths and along the porticoes, amongst the running, wrestling and fencing? Or ought he to cut up to the Palatine, give his report to his boss and catch an update on policy and matters of state? He sighed. It was all very well, wanting to clap the Market Day Murderer in irons, but when the security of the Empire was at stake, a man had to be clear about his priorities. Nevertheless, there was a Scythian tattooist on the Vicus Tuscus, was there not, who might shed light on blue dragons…?

Having made his decision and with his thoughts firmly centred on a wild adventuress who made his heart turn somersaults, Orbilio went out of Silversmith’s Rise. Say what you like about the weather, it never affected life in the Forum. From the winter winds which blew straight off the marshes to sticky summers riddled with insects, the hucksters continued to go with the flow. On the wet, slippery steps of Concord’s temple, cloth merchants spread gaily coloured bales to tempt the ladies, while over by the basilica, fortune-tellers promised riches and happiness for the price of a meal, and four men carried a strong box to a depository.