The Mammoth Book of Locked-Room Mysteries and Impossible Crimes

by Mike Ashley

  A gentle tap on the door cut through her reverie. “Claudia?”

  Many a fair-skinned man will suffer for a day outdoors in the sun, but the hunt had had the opposite effect on Claudia’s host. It had deepened his tan, lightened his hair, and set off the white of his linen tunic to Greek god perfection.

  “Are we too raucous for you, darling?” Aegean blue eyes ranged over the arch of her breasts, her exquisite jewels, the rich tangle of curls piled high on her head. “Is that why you haven’t joined us?”

  “Are you sure you want me?” she countered, as the door closed softly behind him. “I am, after all, the only female guest and . . . well, boys will be boys and all that.”

  “Janus, how could I not want you?” His eyes were smoky, his voice a rasp. “Claudia—” He opened his clenched fist to reveal a shining sapphire ring. “It’s a betrothal ring.”

  Oh, Max. How predictable you men are!

  “Oh, Max, this is so unexpected!”

  For a minute he said nothing, and she watched the rise and fall of his magnificent chest. Then, as he was about to speak, the moment was broken when, emitting a cry not unlike a strangled cat, one of the peacocks on the lawn shook its tailfeathers then spread them in a brilliant display of iridescence to a pair of peahens who continued to strut with total indifference.

  “Isn’t it risky, allowing such precious birds to roam free?” Claudia asked, as he advanced towards her, his soft leather sandals making no sound on the dolphin mosaic. He smelled faintly – very faintly – of almonds. “Suppose your wild beasts fancied a nibble? They’d surely be the easiest of targets.”

  “In my business,” Max whispered, his hand slipping round the curve of her waist, “a man can leave nothing to chance.”

  For a beat of six, Claudia watched as the drab peahens flapped in to the branch of a walnut tree, to settle down for the night. Then she gently removed his hand. The peacock’s fantail fell limp.

  “Over that hill –” Max swept the rejected arm towards a spot far on the horizon as though that had been its original intention “- runs a high perimeter fence with some pretty ferocious spikes on the top.” He laughed. It was a melodious, gentle, masculine laugh, pitched seductively low. “The only threat to these beautiful birds is my cook. He claims their roasted flesh is delicious!”

  And when searching blue eyes bored deep into her own, Claudia saw a man who was very much pleased with himself. Not smug, not self-satisfied. Just quietly confident, like a man who’s achieved something special. Any other time and she’d have put that down to his counting all those lovely gold pieces that he’d fleeced off the men who were so noisily swilling his wine – had it not been for that little matter of the sapphire ring.

  “That perimeter fence,” he continued, “was erected not only to keep my hunting beasts in, but also to keep other animals out. Since I breed my own stock,” he whispered, and she felt his breath on her cheek, “I can’t risk weakening the strain by letting them loose with the native population. My bears, for instance, are particularly belligerent, and it’s touches like these that give my hunts their – shall we say, competitive edge.”

  Claudia knew what he meant. Only last year, the scion of one of Rome’s leading tribunes had died of wounds received whilst tangling with one of Max’s famous wild wolves – an incident which, far from deterring others, had in fact doubled the hunter’s trade. The greater the danger, apparently, the more men wanted a slice – especially rich men, who had never seen action in war. It was a pretty bizarre consequence for two decades of peace, but man’s compulsion to dance with Death had made Max wealthy in the extreme. Who was Claudia Seferius to decry a system that worked?

  “Somehow we seem to have drifted away,” he said quietly, “from the subject of this little trinket . . .”

  The drifting was not accidental. “Max, this isn’t the time.” Claudia kept her gaze on the horizon. “With the banquet in full swing, you should be there for your guests.”

  He lifted the back of her hand to his lips and kissed it lightly. “Beauty. Intelligence. And impeccable manners, as well. Darling, you and I will forge a brilliant alliance.”

  Claudia said nothing, and it was only when she was alone once more in her bedroom that she realized that, somewhere along the line, Max had pressed the betrothal ring into the palm of her hand. She slipped it on to her finger and watched the light reflect off its facets.

  Hot damn, this was working out well.

  III

  “To Claudia!”

  “Hurrah for the lady!”

  “A toast to Claudia Seferius!”

  One cheer after another ran round the banqueting hall, drowning the flutes in the background. All this, she thought, because I was the one who put Max on to Soni at the slave auction – what would they have been like, had she suggested he purchase a whole string! Goblets chinked, roasts were carved, and plates of salmon and oysters and hazel hens were passed round as slaves continuously topped up the wine. Except. Claudia coaxed a scallop out of its shell. Except Max had only bought the one slave, and what a magnificent specimen he was, this Soni from Gaul.

  As a Greek balladeer recounted Jason’s triumphant lifting of the Golden Fleece, Claudia leaned against the arm of her couch and thought back to her first meeting with Max. Was it really only three weeks ago? So much had changed in that short space of time. She popped the scallop into her mouth and reflected that, without that chance meeting at the slave auction, she would not be here tonight as . . . well, as “guest of honour”, shall we say, of the man on whom Rome’s wealthiest citizens descended with greater regularity than a double dose of prunes, and where small fortunes changed hands for the gamble of turning wives into widows . . .

  “See this?” A portly marble merchant on the couch opposite lifted the hem of his tunic to show his fellow diners a livid red scar. “The puncture wound was so bloody deep, I’m left with a permanent limp, but he was a plucky bugger, I tell you. Game to the end.”

  “Call that a scar?” The magistrate beside him yanked at his neckline to expose a long and jagged line, barely healed. “Compared to mine, yours is a scratch.”

  Much to the balladeer’s confusion, all eight then began dismantling expensive clothing in a bid to compare injuries, each insisting theirs was the worst while swearing at the same time that their quarry was the bravest, the toughest, possessing by far the most guile – ever. The singer’s words became drowned in the melee and Max shot a slow, but happy wink at Claudia. He had noticed, then, the ring which she wore on her finger . . .

  Perhaps not as rich as Midas, hunts which were famed the length and breadth of Italy had enabled Max to not only purchase this fabulous villa stuffed with antiques and fine art, but lands that stretched to every horizon. No, sir. Claudia impaled a prawn on her knife. Without that chance meeting in Rome, Claudia Seferius would not be sitting here tonight with the man around whom Great Plans revolved . . .

  Sometimes, she reflected, the gods on Olympus do smile down on mortals. Her mind drifted back. She’d been crossing the Forum from the east and another man had been crossing the Forum from the west. Marcus Cornelius Orbilio, to be precise, but— But dammit the man’s name was not important! What mattered was that the sweetest of all goddesses, Fortune (may her name live for ever), Fortune arranged for the slave auction to be held smack in the middle of their crossing paths. And Marcus Cornelius, god bless him, knew Max . . .

  Marcus.

  Marcus Cornelius.

  Marcus Cornelius Orbilio.

  Something skittered inside her when she pictured his face and she gulped at her wine to settle the jitters. Pfft! So what if he was tall and dark and – all right – not exactly bad looking? Who cared that his hair was wavy, except where it sometimes fell over his forehead, and that he wore the long tunic of a patrician? Marcus Whatsisname Thingy meant nothing to her. Nothing whatsoever. Less than zilch. In fact, the only reason her pulse raced now was owing to the lack of legality of certain scrapes she’d been in, seei
ng as how Supersnoop was attached to the Security Police.

  In fact, that’s what she’d been doing in the Forum, returning from some rather dodgy dealings, but hell, what other option is there, when merchants conspire to freeze a young widow out of the wine trade that she’d been thrust into after inheriting her late husband’s business? Goddammit she’d married the old goat for his money, the least others could do is allow her to spend it. But no. Supersnoop’s always there, sticking his investigative snout in her business, hoping to catch her red-handed. One day he’d cotton on that she was too damned smart for him, but in the meantime Marcus God-but-I’m-handsome Orbilio had, for once in his miserable life, come up trumps.

  Until then, Claudia was stuck with relying on moneylenders, con-tricks and bluff to keep the creditors at bay, but Fortune was favouring more than the brave that day. She was favouring Claudia Seferius. It was obvious, from their frosty introductions, that the two men weren’t exactly bosom buddies and chances are the meeting would have come to nothing – had Max not then excused himself, saying he needed to purchase a slave from the block.

  “Just the one?” Claudia had asked. Normally people picked up quite a number. “One is hardly worth coming to Rome for.”

  Suddenly the opening was there for the blond hunter to score points over his aristocratic rival. “My lovely Claudia,” Max had rasped, his eyes stroking her curves. “For me, one person is always enough.” Arched eyebrows indicated the auction block. “Which of those slaves would you recommend?”

  “It depends on what qualities you’re looking for,” she’d purred back, with barely a glance in Marcus’ direction.

  “In men,” Max replied huskily, “it has got to be staying power. Don’t you agree?”

  “I wouldn’t settle for anything less.” From the corner of her eye, she saw the flush rise on Marcus’ face and, noticing Junius jabbering away in his native tongue to a fellow Gaul beside the auction block, she found it delectably easy to add, “Personally, I’ve always found Gauls to have extremely strong backs . . .”

  Marcus by that time was glaring daggers and Max, capitalizing on this sexual undercurrent, instantly bid for the Gaul, whose name, it transpired, was Soni. The same Soni who had done the hunt so proud today.

  All in all, Claudia thought, things were going exceedingly well . . .

  Especially that exquisite moment when, swallowing his pride, Orbilio enquired whether he might attend Max’s forthcoming hunt. Knowing these were extravaganzas to die for, Claudia watched his face turn to thunder when Max oh-so-politely informed him that, alas, he only ever took ten men on a hunt and, he was so very sorry, but the next was fully booked . . .

  As it happened, Claudia had been in the courtyard this morning when the hunt had set off. And there were eight men present, not ten. Dear me, she really must remember to mention that numbers thing to Marcus next time she saw him—

  If she saw him again. The chances were, now he knew she was ensconced here with Max, he’d stop pestering her and stick his nose into someone else’s illegal wranglings.

  “ . . . I parried to the left, made a feint, dodged back to the right, but he was too smart for me . . .”

  “. . . I was impaled once, right here.” More linen was bunched up to expose violated flesh. “Tossed me right on to my shoulder, he did . . .”

  He! A wave of disgust washed over Claudia. They talk about boars, bears and wolves as though they were the hunter’s equals, yet how often do you see stags armed with a slingshot, or running with their own pack of dogs? She looked round the banqueting hall, at watery red eyes, fists thumping on tables, where words were already slurring, and wondered how these cloistered, overweight city-types would fare in one-to-one combat. With no bearers carrying their spears or their arrows. With no dogs at their side to hound wild creatures into panic. Just them out there, with only their wits to keep them alive . . .

  “Having fun, darling?”

  “Absolutely.”

  And what would it be like, living with a constant succession of drunken braggarts, day in and day out? Max coped admirably, but then the post-hunt entertainment – this orgy of showing off afterwards – was part and parcel of the package he sold. He was, she decided, a magician. An illusionist. A man who – abracadabra! – turns fat slobs into young bucks, and should they look in the mirror back in Rome and see who they really are, then hey presto! All they need do is hand over more coins and suddenly they’re heroes again. The “war” wounds were not only worth the pain and aggravation. They were fundamental to the whole process.

  She recalled their return this afternoon, whooping and hollering in the courtyard amid carcasses of slaughtered beasts and a welter of blood-caked spears, concerned only with the glory of their own achievements and not a single thought for the wounded. Or a lowly slave, who hadn’t come home . . .

  “Is our hero not invited to join the celebrations?”

  For perhaps a count of ten you could have heard the proverbial pin drop following Claudia’s question, then everyone clamoured at once, most of them bursting into raucous, drunken, astonished laughter.

  “You mean Soni?”

  “Not in here, love!”

  “Soni? Join us? Now that’s rich!”

  Claudia felt a tug on her elbow as Max gently steered her away from the couch. “That,” he said, speaking through his forced smile, “was extremely embarrassing, darling. My guests comprise merchants, politicians – the cream of Roman society.” He paused. “They do not take their dinners with slaves.”

  “They take their dinners with dogs.”

  “Cyclone and Thunderbolt are exceptions,” he said, and his blue eyes were steel. “The other dogs remain in the kennels, and never, ever do any of the bearers join in the banquet.”

  “No matter how competent?”

  “No matter how competent.” She felt his whole body unstiffen. “I admire your liberated ideas about slaves and equality,” Max said, winding one of her curls around his little finger. “But it’s my job to give these men what they want, and believe me, they don’t pay several thousand sesterces to dine with common slaves. Ah! The desserts.”

  Platters of melons and cherries, quinces in honey, almond cakes and dates stuffed with apple passed by in mouth-watering succession.

  “Come sit by me while we eat, it gives me an excuse to slip my arm round your lovely smooth shoulder.”

  “Shortly,” Claudia promised. “There’s something I must attend to first.”

  “Of course.” Max gently released the ringlet. “Hurry back, darling,” he whispered, rubbing the sapphire ring on her finger. “Your beauty is all that makes the evening tolerable. Oh, and Claudia—”

  “Yes?” She turned in the doorway.

  “Betrothal rings go on the left hand, my love.”

  IV

  The room in which Junius lay was lit only by a single lamp of cheap oil, whose stuttering flame cast staccato shadows against the far wall. No mosaics covered his floor, no painted scenes brought bare plaster to life. Even the welter of bandages which swaddled his head seemed uncared for.

  “You blockhead,” Claudia whispered, wiping a bead of sweat from his cheek. “What did you have to go and get yourself beaned for?”

  Dust motes danced in the wavering flame, and the scent of her spicy Judaean perfume blocked out the smell of caked blood. He was lucky, according to Max’s physician, that no bones were broken, he’d taken one helluva tumble, but watching the shallow breathing and the waxy texture of his skin, lucky was not the first word which came to Claudia’s mind. Her hands bunched into fists. Dammit, Max knew the terrain up on the ridge like the back of his hand, he should have warned Junius that shale was dangerous. The stretcher-bearers told her what happened – how he’d lost his footing under the weight of the weaponry he was carrying – but the fact that the accident happened at all was the problem. She should not have allowed Junius to go. Max knew he was inexperienced, dammit he should have insisted the boy stayed behind – but since he ha
dn’t, then he should bloody well have taken better care of his charge!

  She opened the shutter, allowing a small breeze to sport with the flame. From here, there was only a view of the cowshed, plus a hint of the moon through the oaks. Far away, a fox barked and she felt, rather than heard, the door open behind her.

  “How is he?”

  Claudia’s heart flipped a somersault. It can’t be. Sweet Janus, this isn’t possible – She waited until her pulse settled down. “Lazy as ever,” she said, not turning round. “But that’s servants for you these days. Not a thought for anyone but themselves.”

  The baritone chucked softly, and her heart began to spin like a top.

  “I’ve just come from the banqueting hall,” Marcus said. “And I think it’s a reasonable prediction to say there’ll be some jolly sore heads in the morning.”

  Claudia did not smile. “Orbilio, what the hell are you doing here?”

  “Oh.” He rubbed a hand over his chin. “Just passing.”

  “On your way where, exactly?”

  “Home.”

  She took in the long patrician tunic, the high patrician boots, the firm patrician jaw. And wondered why it was that little pulse always beat at the side of his neck when they were alone. “Isn’t this something of a detour for you? Say, of some one hundred miles?”

  His teeth showed white in the darkness and she could smell his sandalwood unguent, even through the pongs from the cowshed. Then the grin disengaged and his voice, when he spoke, was a rasp. “Claudia, you must leave, it’s dangerous here.”

  She closed the shutter, and the flame straightened up. “It’s the Emperor’s fault,” she told the comatose bodyguard. “He will keep subsidising theatrical productions, some of the drama’s bound to rub off. Or could it be, Junius, that this aristocrat’s simply jealous of Max?”

  “This has nothing to do with—Is that a betrothal ring on your finger?”

  “See what I mean?” she asked the welter of bloodstained bandages.