“You mean,” I said, “that he was like a tribal warrior chieftain but a cultured, sophisticated one?”
She smiled lazily. “Yes, that’s it. Women like that, you know: a rough man, dripping masculinity, who’s had his roughest edges polished smooth. It made him very popular among the ladies here.”
Oho, I thought. Here’s a new factor. “You mean other men besides Diocles may have had a reason to kill him?”
She erupted in tinkling laughter. “A jealous husband? Here? Not likely! As long as the wife was discreet, the husband would just try to parlay the affair into a business advantage. This isn’t Rome, Praetor.”
“As I am being reminded constantly. Did your husband or Diocles have business dealings with Gaeto? Not implying any impropriety on your part, of course.”
“Only on the most mundane level, I think. Gaeto dealt in high-quality slaves, so he would want to present them to best advantage. That would mean perfumes and scented oils, especially for the house servants and entertainers. And he was princely in gift giving, especially with his African and Asian contacts. I believe he regularly ordered assortments of the costliest scents for that purpose.”
“Do you know of anyone besides Gaeto who might have been involved with Gorgo?”
She pursed her mouth and arched her eyebrows. “As far as I know, she was as blameless as her eulogy would have it.”
“Is anyone ever that blameless?” I asked.
“Never. But she lived a rather secluded life out there in the temple. We never mixed much with them except at municipal banquets and that sort of event. They’re local aristocracy, or fancy themselves so, too well-bred for the likes of us.” She laughed again. “If that’s how aristocrats live, you can have it!”
“I couldn’t agree more, though I’m something of an aristocrat myself. In Rome we like to affect a taste for the simple, rural life. In truth, we’d all love to live like Lucullus, if only we could afford it.”
“You’re not doing too badly,” she said. “Old Hortalus’s villa is said to be the finest in Italy.”
“Alas, it’s just a loan. Before long, I’ll have to go down to Bruttium and you know how miserable that’s going to be. It’s like Rome two hundred years ago and I’ll be surrounded by Bruttians.”
“It is a backward place,” she agreed. “Actually, you should be grateful these murders have occurred. It gives you an excuse to prolong your stay.” She looked up under her thick eyelashes and smiled slyly.
“By Jupiter, you’re right. I suppose that makes me a suspect.”
“I think I would commit murder to stay in Baiae and out of Bruttium!” she said, bursting into laughter again. She had been into the wine before she joined our table.
“I still wonder, though,” I went on, “why the men deferred to him so. Only a small minority would have found in him the same attractions the women did.”
“More than you would think,” she said. “But you are right. The fact is, many of Baiae’s noblest had business dealings with Gaeto. Very deep, important business dealings. Some of our most impeccably respectable citizens are involved in extremely dirty dealings.”
“What sort of dealings?” I asked.
She leaned forward on her elbows in a parody of intimacy. “It’s all about using money to get more money, Senator. That’s what business is. You Roman aristocrats like to pretend that the only respectable sources of wealth are land and plunder in war. The businessmen here prefer the luxury trades. But you and they know the truth: The greatest source of wealth is human flesh. And the only true power is absolute dominion over human flesh.” The worldly cynicism in her eyes was an unsettling thing to behold.
“Go on,” I said, through with clever banter.
“Do you know why everyone despises the slaver? Because he reminds us that we are all slavers. Where would our empire be without slaves?”
“We wouldn’t have an empire,” I answered. “We wouldn’t have a civilization.”
“Exactly. They grow our food, and then they cook it and serve it to us and clean up afterward. They build our houses and tend our baths. They provide us with fornication and when we tire of them, we can sell them off. They race chariots for our amusement and die in our arenas for the same purpose. They teach our children and tend us in our illnesses.”
“It’s hard to imagine a decent life without them,” I agreed.
She sat back with a depraved smile. “We consume them, Praetor, just as surely as if we were cannibals eating their flesh. We dangle before them the prospect of freedom to keep them pacified and ensure more willing service, but the whip and the cross are always there just in case kind treatment and prospective freedom aren’t enough.”
“It’s the price of losing wars and choosing the wrong parents,” I said. “Been that way since Deucalion’s Flood. What is your point?”
“That we all know it’s true and it shames us. So we’ve singled out the slaver, the man who buys and sells the flesh, to bear the brunt of social disdain while we all merrily profit from his business. If it came out that some of our most revered public figures were silent partners with our richest but most despised resident, certain reputations would be sullied forever.”
This tickled my memory, suggested some question that had eluded me or that I had failed to ask. But she went relentlessly on and the moment passed.
“There are worse things than being a slave, Praetor, and I’ve been some of them. Luckily, it was only temporary and now I’m a great lady again. Some things can be covered over and forgotten. Others can’t. Bear that in mind while you look into these killings.”
“I shall do so,” I assured her.
Abruptly she dropped the serious discussion and resumed the gossipy banter more suitable to the situation. A few minutes later her litter arrived and she made her good-byes.
“Well,” I said to Hermes as we resumed our lunch, “what do you make of that?”
“Another woman muddying the waters. Probably trying to throw you off her husband’s scent and onto someone else.”
“What she said about slaves—what do you think?”
He shrugged. “She didn’t say much I can argue with. But it’s the way of the world, isn’t it? Short of the gods coming down from Olympus and taking a hand in things, how are you going to change anything?”
“How, indeed?”
9
“Why can’t things ever be simple?” I lamented.
“Because people are involved,” Julia informed me. “I think natural phenomena are relatively simple and predictable. When people with their passions and hatreds and ambitions are involved, things get complicated.”
We were sitting in one of the lovely outer gardens of the villa. The bees buzzed pleasantly among the blossoms, the fish splashed vigorously in the ponds, the birds sang prettily in the trees, the mountain smoked ominously in the distance.
“I wish that was predictable,” I said, pointing a finger toward Vesuvius.
“As far as I know, volcanoes are as unpredictable as the whims of the gods,” Julia said.
“Do you think all the most prominent people here were in league with the late Gaeto? Have they all been making illicit profits from the slave trade?”
“The day I believe a word one of those women says, you have my permission to bury me alive like a promiscuous Vestal.”
“I thought so. At least we know now that Gaeto gave her the necklace.”
“We know that Gaeto bought the necklace from the jeweler,” she corrected me. “It might have been through other hands in the interim.”
“Your logic, as always, is better than mine,” I admitted.
“What are we going to do about Gelon?” she asked.
“I have to allow him to see to his father’s funeral,” I told her. “It would be inhumane to do otherwise.”
“I agree, but he will have to be kept under close watch.”
“Hermes and Marcus and some of the others can ride escort. I doubt the boy will try to escape. Where c
an a Numidian hide in Italy? And he couldn’t get to a ship in time to elude me.”
“I hope that is true. It would be a great embarrassment if he were to get away.” She added, “And you are going to have to set a trial date soon. It won’t look good if you stall much longer and duty calls you elsewhere.”
“Bruttium,” I muttered.
Reluctantly, I rose and went to the wing where we were keeping Gelon. He had borne the news of his father’s death stoically. Of course, I had no idea what their relationship might have been, except that Gaeto had been generous with his son in terms of money. Not every son is saddened by the passing of a father. He had turned pale when I described the circumstances of his father’s murder, but that was to be expected. To be murdered in your own bedroom by someone you trust is always an unsettling prospect.
When I arrived at his quarters, I found Antonia already there. Wanting to console the boy in his grief, no doubt. From the look of things, she was succeeding.
“Gelon,” I said, pretending not to notice his guilty expression, “today you may ride to your father’s house to see to his obsequies.”
“That is very good of you, Praetor,” he said.
“Before leaving, you will be required to swear oaths before the gods and witnesses that you will not try to flee custody.”
“Certainly.”
“You will also be escorted by my men. This is more for your protection than from any concern I might have that you will try to escape. There is probably a good deal of hostility toward you among the local populace, especially the Greeks.”
“I have no objection,” he said.
“May I come along?” Antonia asked.
“You may not,” I said.
Thus it was that, a little past noon, we rode from the villa down the Baiae road. As we passed the temple I saw the last smoke rising from the embers of the morning sacrifice. This caused me to wonder how Diocles was coping with his personnel shortage. As we went on to the main road I chanced to look back and I saw the old man standing before the altar, looking at us. The distance was too great to read his expression.
By the time we approached Gaeto’s residence and slave compound, the bright day had turned gloomy, with lowering clouds promising rain. It seemed fitting. Not because of the solemn occasion but because the days had been all too bright and pure since my arrival. When things go too well for too long, the gods have something nasty in store for you, and weather is no exception. A break in the fine weather might be a good thing.
We arrived at Gaeto’s compound to find preparations well advanced. Jocasta and the steward had arranged what I was informed was a traditional Numidian chieftain’s funeral, with certain Greek and Roman embellishments.
On the beach had been erected an imposing funeral pyre, made of seasoned wood with abundant frankincense stuffed into every available cranny. Gaeto lay atop it on splendid cushions, clothed in equally magnificent raiment. He looked startlingly lifelike, almost as if he would rise from the bier and join the obsequies. This was the advantage of having your own Egyptian undertakers.
The musicians from the compound played harps and sistra, and black Nubians using sticks or their palms beat a hypnotic rhythm on drums made of hollowed logs with skins stretched over the open ends. The drum is an instrument favored by no civilized people, but it creates a stirring rhythm when played by skilled Africans and certain Asians.
The rest of the slaves sent up histrionic lamentations, the Greeks among them being especially skillful in this. Ritual mourning is an ancient tradition, and they wailed lustily, though they could hardly have been deeply moved by Gaeto’s death.
Some of the slave women, possibly concubines, stripped naked, smeared themselves with ashes, and flogged one another bloody with bundles of thin rods. Jocasta, who was Greek, took a more decorous course, merely unbinding her hair and letting it fall loose on her shoulders, ripping her gown down the middle and, now bare from the hips upward, drawing a single, symbolic stripe of ash across her brow.
Gelon recited a prayer or eulogy in his native tongue, an eerie, high-pitched chant full of gutturals and vocal clicks, with each sentence or verse seeming to end on a rising inflection. At the end of it he took a torch and set fire to the pyre, and as the flames rose the tribal bodyguard rode around it in an endless circle, whooping and pounding their hide shields with their spears.
All in all, it was a fine send-off. The only thing missing was a delegation of mourners and attendees from the town and surrounding countryside. But there was not a single representative of the local population. Whatever deference Gaeto had received in life, he got none at all in death. Something seemed obscurely wrong about this, but I couldn’t put my finger on it.
When the fire had burned to embers, the undertakers went in with rakes and took out the blackened bones and wrapped them in many yards of white linen. This bundle they carefully placed in an elaborate urn and over the bundle poured an aromatic mixture of myrrh and perfume. Then they placed the cover on the urn and sealed it with pitch. This urn, I was informed, would travel by ship to Numidia and be placed in the family tomb.
When all was accomplished, a funeral banquet was held in the courtyard of the villa. It was served in Numidian fashion, with all the feasters seated in a circle on the ground, upon cushions. The centerpiece was the urn containing Gaeto’s remains—an interesting variation on the Roman practice of having a skeleton or skull among the decorations of the dining room, to remind diners of the transitory nature of life; that the tomb is never far away; and that food, wine, and good company should be enjoyed while we have the chance.
“What will you do now, Gelon?” I asked.
“You mean, assuming that I’m not found guilty and executed?”
“Naturally. If acquitted, will you continue your father’s business?” I picked up a leg of roast pheasant. I had learned that the foods traditional for a Numidian chieftain’s funeral—whole roast camel, elephant’s feet, baked ostrich, and so forth—had not been available. I was quite satisfied with the fare they had been able to provide.
“I don’t think so. Trade has never been to my taste. If I am spared, I will sell out and return to Numidia.” Jocasta made a grimace of distaste. I wondered if she were part of his inheritance. Clearly, she had no liking for the idea of forsaking ultracivilized Baiae for barbarous Numidia.
“And what will you do there?”
“Resume the traditional family business,” he informed me.
“Which is?”
“Raiding.”
“Ah. A gentleman’s profession.” As indeed it was, among Numidians as among Homer’s Achaeans.
“And have you discovered my husband’s murderer?” Jocasta asked in an abrupt change of subject. She had changed into an untorn gown but had left her hair unbound and her forehead was still smeared with ash. Her eyes were red but dry, as if from the effects of sleeplessness rather than weeping.
“I expect to have the culprit in custody momentarily,” I assured her.
“We’ve been hearing that a lot from you lately,” she said, unmollified.
“Madame,” I said, “it is not my business to apprehend felons at all. That is the task of the municipal authorities. I take a hand only in the interests of justice, which I feel are not being served in this district.”
She bowed her head. “I stand chastened. My apologies, Praetor.”
It was raining the next morning when we mounted and made a bedraggled little procession as we rode up the bluff and onto the road that led toward Baiae. The stretch of road leading to Baiae was lined with fine tombs and shaded by large trees. The heavy mist that accompanied the drizzly rain lent the beautiful road a dreamlike aspect, but there was nothing dreamlike about the ambush.
They came from behind the tombs and trees: men on horseback, others on foot. They attacked with quiet ferocity, but the quiet didn’t last long. The Numidian guard raised a wild war cry and began to pelt the attackers with javelins while forming a barrier around Gelon.
Hermes already had his sword out, as did my other young men. All except Marcus had fought in Gaul or Macedonia or Syria. Being a serving magistrate I couldn’t go about wearing a sword, but I was no fool, either. My sword hung sheathed from the near-front horn of my saddle and I had it out just in time. My attacker took a swipe at my head, but I ducked low and extended my arm, thrusting beneath his jaw. He went off his horse backward with a spray of blood and a gargling cry. My horse collided with his, and its shod feet went out from under it, scrabbling on the wet pavement.
As it fell I managed to jump clear and keep hold of my sword, a circumstance of which I was absurdly proud. I looked around to see the battle well joined, the quarters so close that I could smell the stench of the attackers’ bodies and the garlic on their breath. I saw a Nubian go down with a spear through his chest, and then Hermes lopped the sword arm off a mounted man. The arm chanced to fall at my feet and I took the opportunity to appropriate its weapon—a good legionary gladius.
I was unarmored and had no shield, so I felt the need of a spare weapon. Besides, I wanted to try out some moves I’d seen that two-sword gladiator use in the Pompeii amphitheater. In Rome, I’d usually waded into street brawls with a caestus on one hand and a dagger in the other. In the legions, I’d fought with the customary sword and shield. I was intrigued by the possibilities of two swords, and I had my opportunity to try them out almost immediately.
A burly fellow wearing a rag of tunic and wool leggings charged me on foot, thrusting a sword at my chest. With my left-hand sword I banged it aside as I stepped in and slashed him across the belly with the other from left to right. He doubled over and I brought the left-hand blade down on the back of his neck, almost beheading him.
Two more closed in on me. The nearer held a club in both hands, presenting an interesting problem even if he’d been alone. As he raised the club for a blow, I sidestepped and brought my left-hand blade across in a backhand cut against his left wrist, severing it even as I brought the right-hand sword down on his skull, splitting it. The other man was on me even as the first fell, but Hermes rode up behind him and spitted him from back to front.
Under Vesuvius Page 13
