In at the Death (Marcus Corvinus Book 11)

by David Wishart

  He gave me a sharp look. ‘What?’

  ‘Papinius’s ex-girlfriend seemed to think Albucilla had seduced him. That likely, do you suppose? She go for youngsters as a rule?’

  ‘It’s been known. Not that the lady’s unduly particular where the age of her menfriends is concerned. Eclectic’s the word I’d use.’ He beamed. ‘That’s Greek, Corvinus, as I hope you noticed. As was charismatic.’

  ‘Yeah, it did register.’

  ‘I’m teaching myself Greek in my free time.’

  ‘Oh, whoopee.’ Definitely a new model Crispus. The old type wouldn’t’ve recognised the aorist of pherein if it’d jumped up and bitten him. ‘You know whether there might’ve been any other reason for Albucilla to have taken Papatius on? Besides the sexual?’

  ‘No.’

  ‘And you don’t know either why he killed himself?’ I wasn’t going to suggest murder to Crispus. No way. The bugger would’ve used the information somehow, and I didn’t want the trail muddied at this stage.

  ‘I told you. Soranus was soaking him. That’s reason enough for me.’

  Yeah, well, he’d done his best and I couldn’t complain. I stood up. ‘Okay,’ I said. ‘Thanks, Crispus, I owe you one. I’ll see you around.’

  I was just leaving, my hand on the door-knob, when he said: ‘Corvinus?’

  ‘Yeah?’ I turned.

  ‘Wait a minute. A freebie. No skin off my nose, but you might be interested.’

  ‘What in?’

  ‘You called the kid Papinius Allenius’s son.’

  ‘So?’

  ‘Rumour is he wasn’t. Old rumour, nineteen years old. His natural father was Domitius Ahenobarbus.’

  I stared at him.

  Shit!

  21

  ‘It explains a lot of things, lady,’ I said when I’d finished telling Perilla about the subsequent gossip with Crispus. ‘Why the divorce. Why Allenius never took any interest in him. Why the consular’s so bitter against his ex-wife. Allenius and Ahenobarbus were of an age, they were colleagues. Only thing was, Ahenobarbus was related to the imperial family. There wasn’t much a career politician like Allenius could do about it.’

  ‘You think he knew?’ Perilla said. We were in the garden, me with a half-jug of Setinian, Perilla with a chilled fruit juice. No Placida: the lady had relented and let Alexis take her out rabbit-chasing. ‘The boy, I mean.’

  ‘Sure he did. Cluvia told me: he was proud of his family, his father especially. I thought that was odd at the time; the Papinii are no great shakes, and although Allenius had made consul he was no ball of fire personally. Besides, he and young Sextus had hardly ever spoken. Change Ahenobarbus for Allenius and the Domitii for the Papinii and you’ve got a pretty good pedigree. In social terms anyway, because the gods know who’d want that bastard Ahenobarbus for a father.’

  ‘But why didn’t Ahenobarbus acknowledge him?’

  ‘Gods, Perilla! For any number of reasons. One, whatever his own private life was like, Tiberius was a moralist in public. How do you think he’d’ve reacted if it came out that one of the imperial family had got a colleague’s wife pregnant? Two, the pressure would’ve been on - if Allenius had blown the whistle and subsequently divorced Rupilia, which he would’ve done - for Ahenobarbus to marry her, and Ahenobarbus had much bigger fish to fry than a hick provincial from Leontini. She’d been an amusement, nothing more, and young Sextus had been an accident. Three, on Allenius’s side - Rupilia’s, too - where was the benefit? Rupilia would be disgraced, Allenius laughed at, and with Ahenobarbus as an enemy his career would be down the tubes before it’d even started. As it was, if he kept schtum, at least officially, he was owed.’ Doxa; it all came down to doxa.

  ‘But he still divorced Rupilia.’

  ‘Sure he did. As soon as he could, right after the birth. I never said he didn’t have a concern for his honour, and raising another man’s child by his wife while having to pretend it was his own just wouldn’t sit with a guy like that. Only thing was, he didn’t give out the reason.’

  ‘Hmm.’ Perilla was twisting her lock of hair. ‘So what has this to do with the murder?’

  ‘Fuck knows.’

  ‘Marcus!’

  ‘Yeah, well. Maybe nothing. Probably nothing. Still, it opens up another angle. And I’ll have to have a word with Ahenobarbus.’

  ‘Why should you do that?’

  ‘Lady, he was the kid’s real father. He knew, young Papinius knew. The chances are Papinius got his job with the fire commission directly through Ahenobarbus, not via Allenius. That means Ahenobarbus had a personal, vested interest in him. And I’ll bet you a jar of Caecuban to a pickled anchovy that the solution to all this has something to do with the kid’s job. Good enough?’

  ‘Not really.’

  ‘Stick, then.’ I leaned over and kissed her. ‘Also, apropos of nothing whatsoever, I’ve got a link between Albucilla and Acutia.’

  ‘Between Albucilla and who?’

  I did a double-take. Oh, yeah: the day I’d talked to Albucilla at the Apollo Library had ended with me being mugged, and subsequent events had pushed that little interview into the background. Perilla didn’t know about her, because I’d never mentioned the lady. ‘You remember Acutia in Antioch?’ I said. ‘Publius Vitellius’s wife?’

  ‘Oh, that Acutia! Yes, of course I remember her; mousy little thing. And I did know she was in Rome, it’s only that our paths don’t cross nowadays.’

  ‘That so, now? Anyway, I bumped into her at the Apollo Library. She and Albucilla seem to be good mates.’

  ‘Really? So?’

  ‘You don’t think that’s strange?’

  ‘No, Marcus, of course not. Why should I? And what has Acutia to do with Sextus Papinius in any case?’

  I ignored the last bit; yeah, I was wondering about that myself. ‘Or that both of them should just happen to have had connections with Aelius Sejanus?’

  ‘Marcus –’

  ‘Albucilla’s husband was one of his pals before he betrayed him, and according to Crispus Albucilla was his mistress. And that bastard Vitellius - well, you know all about him.’

  Perilla sighed. ‘Marcus, dear, I’m sorry, but so what? Half of Rome had connections with Sejanus, one way or the other. And if he was a...common interest between the two women then it’s perfectly natural that they should be friends. However, Sejanus is dead, and if not exactly forgotten then the next thing to it. Support for him - if that’s what you’re accusing the two of them of, and the gods know in what sense - is no longer an issue. Besides, why on earth should it be relevant? From what I remember of Acutia and know of Lucia Albucilla they may not be particularly similar in character, but that’s no bar to friendship. They obviously share literary tastes, for a start.’

  ‘Yeah. Yeah, I realise all that.’ I took a morose swig of the Setinian. Perilla might be right, sure, but I’d seen what I’d seen: those ladies had had something cooking together besides a common interest in lyric poetry, I’d bet my sandals on that. And although the Sejanus link was probably completely incidental I still couldn’t get it out of my head. ‘Still –’

  ‘What did Crispus have to say about Carsidius?’

  ‘Hmm? The bastard’s pure as the driven snow. Any more perfect and they’d deify him.’

  ‘That doesn’t sound very promising.’

  ‘Too right it isn’t.’ I took another pull at my wine-cup. ‘One thing, though. You can forget the bribery aspect. When I suggested it Crispus laughed in my face, and Crispus can scent a crook like a dog scents vomit.’

  ‘Marcus, please –’

  ‘So Carsidius lied. Why did he lie? Someone put him up to it, but who?’

  ‘Balbus, perhaps.’

  ‘Or Ahenobarbus. He’s part of the equation now, remember, and he’s Balbus’s - and Papinius’s - ultimate boss. It all comes down to the fire commission. There’s a cover-up involved there, and it’s a top-level one; for Balbus and Carsidius to be involved at the least it has to
be.’ I poured myself more wine from the jug. ‘Jupiter and all the ever-loving gods!’

  ‘Don’t get annoyed, dear.’

  ‘I’m not annoyed, I’m frustrated. There’s something we’re missing, something big. Until we know that nothing makes sense.’

  ‘All right. Say there is a connection with the commission. What could it be?’

  ‘Peculation on a major scale. Creaming the top off the Treasury allocation. That much is obvious.’

  ‘How would it work?’

  ‘How should I know? It wouldn’t be easy, that’s for sure. The Wart set the commission up himself, and the Wart’s no fool. Four men at the top - four - , all on a level, all imperials by marriage. Domitius Ahenobarbus, sure, he’s as crooked and ruthless and self-serving as they come, but he’s got colleagues that’ll be watching him like hawks. Watching each other, too, because they’re no saints either, and you can bet that each of them would just love to see one of the others step out of line so they could yank the rug from under. Come down a step and it’s the same: checks and double-checks all the way down the line, the Wart’s seen to that. And to round things off, we’ve got to believe that someone like Lucius bloody Carsidius, who never bent a rule in his life, will tie himself in knots and lie like hell to cover for whoever is milking the scheme and is a murderer into the bargain. Fuck!’ I banged the table and the wine-jug jumped. ‘The whole thing’s impossible!’

  ‘Marcus, dear, don’t lose your temper.’

  ‘Yeah, well. It is.’

  ‘So assume that it isn’t. How would Papinius fit in?’

  I took a deep breath. The lady was right: losing my temper didn’t help. We had to look at this thing dispassionately. ‘Not as a major player,’ I said. ‘Maybe he saw something he shouldn’t’ve seen, heard something, read something...Perilla, this is sheer fantasising!’

  ‘He was Ahenobarbus’s son. You know that now. If you think Ahenobarbus is the most likely villain - and I’d agree - then that fact might be relevant to his involvement. At least it puts it within the bounds of possibility.’

  ‘Sweet immortal gods, lady! He was a nineteen-year-old kid on the bottom rung of the ladder! What chance would he have to be privy to any sort of secret?’

  ‘I don’t know. Of course I don’t. But he was murdered, after all, and his death disguised as suicide. Surely that counts for something?’

  That stopped me. Yeah, right; that was the absolute bottom line, and there was no escaping it. Someone had decided that the kid was too dangerous to live, and had enough clout to cover his tracks by putting pressure on some of Rome’s top men. We weren’t playing games here.

  I would definitely have to talk to Domitius Ahenobarbus.

  At the end of the garden, the side gate opened: Alexis back with Placida. She looked up and saw me...

  OW-OOO! OW-OOO-OOO-OOO!

  Oh, hell.

  Now I knew what a Gallic boar felt like when it saw a hundred and twenty pounds of boarhound racing towards it. I just had time to get up and put both my hands out before she hit.

  ‘You have to forgive her really,’ Perilla said as I picked myself out of the flower bed and fended the brute off. ‘With all her faults she is very affectionate. And she’s definitely beginning to take to you.’

  ‘Yeah. Yeah, right.’

  Problem was, she still smelled of fish

  22

  Arranging an interview with Domitius Ahenobarbus was easier said than done.

  You don’t just drop in uninvited on someone who’s nephew to the Wart and the husband of Augustus’s granddaughter, and who knows exactly where that puts him on the social ladder. I’d never met the guy personally, which suited me just fine because in addition to being a four-star imperial he was a five-star bastard: short-tempered as a rhino with a migraine, arrogant as hell and with a streak of malicious cruelty a yard wide. The story went, he’d once driven over a kid on Appian Road just for the fun of hearing him scream. He’d’ve had the mother, too - so he told his pals later over dinner - but she moved at the last minute and he had to choose between them.

  Not a nice man, Domitius Ahenobarbus.

  So I did things properly. I had Bathyllus put on his best tunic and hernia support and sent the little bald-head over to the Palatine with strict instructions to impress. I’d wondered what to use as an excuse for the meeting and decided in the end not to bother: if the bastard was as aware of who I was and what I wanted to talk about as I thought he’d be then I’d be wasting my time wrapping things up in fancy language. Besides, whether he was a four-star imperial or not, in terms of family history the Valerii Messallae were as good as the Domitii Ahenobarbi any day of the month, so bugger him sideways and twice on the kalends.

  All of which was why, next day, I found myself outside the main gate of the emperor’s palace. The Wart hadn’t lived there for years, mind, let alone stuck his boil-encrusted face inside the city’s sacred boundary-line, but Ahenobarbus and young Agrippina - there were no kids, yet - had taken over one of the wings and were doing a pretty good job of acting as stand-ins. Rumour was, the two were well-matched. By all accounts Germanicus’s daughter was as cold and calculating as her mother, with all the qualities of a first-class bitch in the making.

  ‘Marcus Valerius Messalla Corvinus to see Gnaeus Domitius Ahenobarbus,’ I said to the door-slave.

  The guy looked at me like I’d turned up selling brooms. ‘Do you have an appointment, sir?’

  ‘Of course I’ve got a fucking -’ I caught myself. Steady, Corvinus! Gravitas, gravitas! ‘Ah...yeah. Yes, of course I have.’

  He checked a wax tablet and made a tick with his stylus. ‘Ah. There you are. Very well, that seems to be in order. If you’ll come this way.’

  I followed him, hitching up my formal mantle. Gods, I hate these things! Yeah, sure, they’re impressive, especially out in provinces where most of the locals make do with a loincloth or animal skins turned inside-out, depending on climate, but they impress because they’re totally impractical. Anyone who’s had to move any distance wound up in twelve feet of carefully-choreographed woollen blanket, and who isn’t a complete mental cheesecake, will agree with me. Still, you had to make sacrifices.

  We went through what seemed miles of rooms and out into a central garden loud with peacocks and the sound of water from the ornamental fountain. Ahenobarbus was sitting under a trellised vine dictating to a secretary. No mantle for that guy: he was wearing a simple lounging-tunic. He looked up and frowned. He was big, red-haired - the family hadn’t got the surname Bronzebeard for nothing - and built like a bull.

  Red-haired. I remembered the miniature that Rupilia had shown me. Yeah; that’s where the kid had got it from. Not from his mother at all, or not completely. And the shape of the face made sense too.

  ‘That’s all right, Callistus, you can go,’ Ahenobarbus said. The secretary closed the roll, tucked his pen and ink-bottle into a pouch at his belt, bowed and left. ‘Have a seat, Corvinus. Ruber, a chair.’

  There was a wicker chair at the end of the loggia. The door-slave pulled it up, saw me settled and then moved off.

  ‘Now.’ Ahenobarbus was still frowning. ‘What can I do for you? According to your major-domo you wanted to talk about young Sextus Papinius.’

  ‘Yeah. That’s right.’

  ‘Then I’m afraid you’ve had a wasted journey. I knew the boy by sight, but –’

  ‘He was your son.’

  Silence; long silence. The frown deepened to a scowl. ‘You know, I find that rather insulting,’ he said carefully. ‘Sextus Papinius’s father was Papinius Allenius, the ex-consul. If you’ve been listening to any other rumours then I strongly recommend in your own interests that you discount them for what they are. Complete and utter nonsense.’

  ‘That so, now?’ I said. ‘Me...well, I didn’t know the kid when he was alive, but I’ve seen his portrait. He had red hair and a full jaw. Sound familiar?’

  ‘His mother has red hair.’

  ‘Sure.
But not the jaw. Nor does Allenius. You’ve got both.’

  He stared at me like I’d crawled out from under a stone: evidently, the guy wasn’t used to being contradicted. Tough. I stared back; like I say, a Valerius Messalla’s got his own pride, and I wasn’t here for fun.

  ‘What do you want, exactly?’ he said. ‘Just out of interest, you understand.’

  ‘To know why the kid was murdered.’

  His eyes flickered. ‘Papinius committed suicide.’

  ‘No he didn’t. Someone decoyed him to the top floor of the tenement, probably slugged him from behind and then pitched him through the window. You know anything about that?’

  He stood up quickly. ‘Now you really are being insulting. I’ll ask you to leave, please.’

  ‘Not yet. Not until I’m done. Two questions. First: if the kid wasn’t your son then why did you have Allenius put him forward as a junior officer on the fire compensation commission?’

  For a moment I didn’t think he’d answer. Then he said, through tight lips: ‘I didn’t. The suggestion - the request - was Allenius’s, I only approved the appointment. We’re old colleagues and I was happy to help his son begin his political career.’

  ‘Come on, pal! Allenius hadn’t had anything to do with the boy since he was born and wanted nothing to do with him then. So why should he bother calling in a valuable favour?’

  ‘Are you accusing me of lying? Because if so –’

  ‘Okay,’ I said. ‘Second question, two parts. Young Papinius was being blackmailed by a guy called Mucius Soranus to the tune of fifty thousand sesterces. He borrowed the cash from a money-lender by the name of Vestorius. Just before he died he repaid the loan in full, plus the interest, sixty thousand in all. He had to get them from somewhere. My guess is that they came from you. Right or wrong, and if right then why should you pay? And what the hell did Soranus have on him to merit that much bread?’

  ‘Sextus Papinius’ - Ahenobarbus’s face had gone as red as his beard, and I could see his fists flexing and unflexing - ‘was taking bribes. According to Laelius Balbus –’