Bodies Politic

by David Wishart

  Gallius’s note arrived the next day to say he’d booked me for an appointment with Flaccus for the late morning of the day after. Great; so things were moving. I reckoned the next step was up to the other side in any case, whoever the other side were, and the best I could do was keep rattling the bars and hope something would jump. Going and talking to Flaccus, whether he was a villain or not, was pretty effective bar-rattling in anyone’s book: it’d show that I knew he was involved somewhere along the line, and that might just prompt a little panicky reaction that would open up an avenue or two. Those I definitely needed.

  Like I said, I’d checked out the exact location of the Palace on my walkabout. It was on the Lochias peninsula to the east of the two harbours, the focus of a huge complex of public and private-official buildings and gardens that the Ptolemies’d spent over two and a half centuries putting together and that sprawled beyond the peninsula itself part-way along the coast either side. Whether it was the normal arrangement or not - possibly not, because somewhere in this gobsmacking marble rabbit-warren would be where Herod Agrippa was staying while he was in Alex, and given recent events Flaccus would want to be careful over his health - the place was heaving with legionary guards; there weren’t exactly formal military checkpoints, but the lads in the iron lobster suits were obviously keeping a close eye on incoming traffic. I got precise directions from one of them and found my way to the governor’s suite of offices.

  The entrance lobby was what a top-notch Janiculan villa’s would like to be when it died and went to heaven: the width and length of a small basilica, floored in different-coloured marble, with original bronzes that would’ve had Perilla squeaking with delight and, forty feet up, a coffered ceiling in cedar-wood with gold filigree and inlaid paintings of gods, nymphs and assorted members of the old royal family looking smugly down at the plebs beneath. Yeah, well; I’m no culture buff, as you know, but the thought that I was standing on the same spot where, perhaps, Cleopatra had greeted Antony gave me goosebumps.

  There was a secretary’s desk at the centre. I went over, my sandals clicking on the marble and sending the echoes round the panelled and picture-hung walls.

  ‘Yes, sir.’ The secretary was waiting for me.

  ‘Marcus Valerius Corvinus,’ I said. ‘I’ve an appointment with the governor.’

  He checked a list. ‘Yes, of course.’ There were two or three slaves hanging about in identical red tunics. The secretary beckoned one over. ‘Take Valerius Corvinus upstairs. To the governor’s office.’

  ‘Follow me, sir,’ the slave said.

  There was a broad staircase behind the secretary’s desk, flanked by a couple of equestrian statues in white marble that wouldn’t’ve been too big for a major square in Rome. The staircase was built to match. We went up.

  In the palace as it was originally, we would’ve been in the private apartments. Or at least a tiny bit of them. The staircase gave out onto an octagonal hall built on the same scale, with doors leading off, more bronzes and paintings, and two or three couches against the walls: sitting couches, not reclining ones. Sitting on one of them was Marcus Gallius.

  ‘Hey, Corvinus.’ He stood up. ‘The governor asked me to come as well, to fill in any details. You mind?’

  ‘Not at all. Good to see you again.’ We shook.

  ‘I’ll just tell the governor you’re here, sir,’ the slave said. ‘Then if you’d like to wait until he’s ready for you.’

  ‘Sure. No problem.’ I sat down on one of the couches, and Gallius did the same, while he knocked on one of the doors and disappeared inside.

  ‘So, how are you feeling after your adventure?’ Gallius said.

  ‘Oh, I’m fine. No ill effects.’

  ‘That’s great.’Just then one of the other doors opened and a man came out. He was Greek, plump and balding, in his fifties, with the pouchy look of a worried hamster. He nodded to us as he passed, then did a small double-take when his eyes met mine. He looked away at once and speeded up, pattering off down the staircase. ‘It can’t be -’

  ‘Hang on, pal. Sorry.’ I was frowning. If it hadn’t been for that double-take I wouldn’t’ve given the guy a second thought. Now I did, and he’d looked vaguely familiar. ‘You happen to know who -?’

  The governor’s door opened and the slave came back out. ‘If you’d like to come through, gentlemen.’

  Well, the hamster could wait. We went in.

  The room was all of a piece with the rest of the place so far, in scale and everything else: big enough almost for a formal reception hall and kitted out with furniture and artwork that would’ve put any urban villa’s in Rome to shame. Flaccus was sitting behind a big scrollworked desk at the end, his back to a set of windows that looked out towards the harbour and Pharos Island beyond. He stood up: a big man in his late fifties, florid faced, dressed in a formal narrow-striper mantle; yeah, being the Egyptian governor he would be an equestrian rather than a senatorial.

  ‘Valerius Corvinus. Delighted to meet you. Please sit down. Gallius?’ The tribune had stopped at the door and was standing at attention. ‘You too, my boy. This is quite informal. Pull up another chair.’

  I went over, shook, and sat down. The chair had a back to it, and it was made of inlaid cedar.

  ‘Well,’ Flaccus said when we were all settled. ‘Gallius here tells me you’ve been in the wars.’

  ‘Yeah. It was only thanks to him and his lads that I came out the other end of them.’

  ‘I’d like to apologise first.’ Flaccus frowned. ‘We have our share of knifemen and street-thieves, yes, of course we do, every city does. But for a Roman citizen to be attacked on the Way in broad daylight...well, if it hadn’t happened I would’ve said it was impossible. Have you any explanation yourself? Besides the fact that they were drunk.’

  ‘They weren’t drunk.’ Gallius made a movement, and I glanced at him. ‘Sorry, pal, that part wasn’t true. They acted it, sure, at first, but they were as sober as I was.’

  ‘Then -’ The governor’s frown deepened. ‘You said they didn’t demand your purse? That they simply tried to kill you?’

  ‘Yeah. That’s right.’

  ‘And you hadn’t provoked them in any way?’

  ‘Uh-uh. Quite the reverse. I was heading across the street to avoid them at the time.’

  ‘But that’s incredible. You have no explanation for their behaviour? None at all?’

  ‘Not that I’d care to offer.’ I paused. ‘You have one yourself, maybe?’

  ‘No, Corvinus. Absolutely none. It makes no sense whatsoever.’ Well, his puzzlement seemed genuine enough, but then he’d had plenty of time to prepare. ‘Still, all’s well that ends well, I suppose. I hope it won’t spoil your stay in Alexandria. You’re here for long?’

  ‘We haven’t got any fixed plans. Just as long as it takes.’

  ‘As long as what takes?’

  ‘My adopted daughter’s getting married. My wife wanted to find material for the bridesmaids’ dresses.’

  He laughed. ‘You’ve come all the way for that?’

  ‘Plus the holiday. And a bit of personal business.’

  ‘Oh, yes? And what would that be?’ There was a knock on the door, and it opened. ‘Excuse me. Yes, Sextus, what is it?’

  I turned round as the guy came over. He was Roman, wearing a formal striped mantle of his own.

  ‘I’m sorry, sir, but if I could have your signature on this, please? If you remember, you wanted it sent as soon as possible, and the courier’s ready to leave.’

  ‘Let me see.’ Flaccus took the sheet he was holding out and read it. ‘Oh, yes. Quite right, Sextus. Thank you.’ He reached for the pen on his desk and dipped it in the ink-pot. ‘Valerius Corvinus, this is my aide, Acilius Glabrio.’ He signed the sheet at the bottom, sanded it and gave it back.

  ‘Thank you, sir.’ The guy took the letter. ‘I’m sorry to have interrupted. Pleased to meet you, Valerius Corvinus. Tribune.’ He nodded to Gallius and left.

&nbs
p; ‘Now.’ Flaccus looked back to me. ‘You were saying. Some personal business.’

  ‘Yeah. A favour to a freedman. Not one of mine, one of Naevius Sertorius Macro’s.’ I was watching his face closely. He managed pretty well, but he couldn’t stop the giveaway blink and the slight freezing of his expression. Got you, you bastard! ‘Did you know him at all?’

  ‘Macro? Of course. As an acquaintance rather than a friend, but certainly I knew him. I was sorry to hear of his death. He was a very...able man.’ Interesting choice of adjective. ‘Which freedman, as a matter of interest?’

  ‘His name was Dion. He used to be Macro’s secretary.’

  ‘Did he? Then I never met him. But then Macro was only an acquaintance of mine, not a friend.’ Odd; that was the second time he’d said it: deliberately? And if so, was it just the usual career man’s knee-jerk reaction of distancing himself from someone who’d been chopped? But then, what about that I was sorry to hear of his death? ‘And the business itself? If you don’t mind telling me.’

  ‘Nothing important. Just finding out something he was anxious to know.’

  ‘Really? In Alexandria?’ Another blink, and the face too controlled. I didn’t answer. ‘Well, I won’t press you further. It’s none of my concern, but I wish you luck.’ He got to his feet. The interview, obviously, was over. ‘Thank you for coming, and my apologies again for your unfortunate introduction to the city. Gallius, thank you for coming too.’

  ‘Sir.’ Gallius stood up and saluted.

  We let ourselves out.

  ‘I might as well’ve saved myself the bother.’ Gallius grinned as we headed for the stairs. ‘I’m busy enough today already.’

  ‘Sorry, pal. And for throwing you a wobbler over that drunk business.’

  He stopped. ‘Yeah. Why did you do that, by the way?’

  ‘I’ll explain another time. It’s complicated.’ Then I remembered the worried hamster. ‘Incidentally. That guy who passed us before we went in. You know him?’

  ‘Cineas? Sure.’ He carried on down the stairs.

  ‘He work here?’

  ‘No, he’s one of the big local merchants.’ He stopped again. ‘Now there’s a point. He deals mainly in textiles. Wholesale, import and export. If your wife hasn’t found the material she’s after yet then maybe I should’ve introduced you. I might’ve got a commission out of it.’

  Hey! ‘You have an address for him?’

  ‘Sure. His place is easy to find. One of the big warehouses just off Market Square, between it and the Eunostos Harbour.’

  Bugger; centre of town. The chances were that Perilla had been there already. But there again, if he was a wholesaler perhaps not; it was worth a try, anyway. ‘So what was he doing in the Palace?’

  ‘He’s in and out. He’s one of the main government suppliers.’

  ‘And the room he came out of?’

  ‘Oh, that was Glabrio’s office. The guy you met. The governor’s aide. Now I’m sorry, Corvinus, but I’ve got to rush. Pick you up again?’

  ‘Sure.’ My brain was buzzing. ‘Oh. The dinner. I checked with Stratocles; any evening’s fine, you choose. Just give us a day’s warning and turn up an hour before sunset with your party slippers.’

  ‘Will do. See you.’ He rushed off, and I followed him down more slowly.

  Well, I’d certainly rattled a few bars, and the result had been interesting. Plus there had been the unexpected bonus of seeing hamster-face. I remembered him now, sure I did.

  He’d been one of our fellow passengers on board the Erytheis.

  CHAPTER TWENTY-ONE

  Next morning after breakfast I bundled the whole family into Stratocles’s coach and we headed for Soma Street and - ultimately - Cineas’s warehouse.

  ‘But I still don’t understand why you want to come, dear,’ Perilla said. ‘I mean, the suggestion may’ve come from your wineshop friend, but Marilla, Clarus and I are perfectly capable of looking at material by ourselves.’ She sniffed. ‘You certainly haven’t shown any interest so far.’

  Bugger; this is what you get for trying to hide things from your wife. I couldn’t give her my real reason for tagging along because that’d mean telling her about the knife attack: if the finger pointed at anyone for blowing the whistle on me in Alex with Flaccus or whoever so quickly then it was our fellow traveller in ladies’ dresses. And I wanted to face him myself with a reasonable excuse to back me and see whether he jumped. As cover, Perilla’s bridesmaids quest was perfect, because it was genuine. If the guy was straight - and I’d bet a jar of Mareotis to one of pickles that he wasn’t - he wouldn’t turn a hair.

  ‘Yeah, well,’ I said. ‘Maybe I’m just feeling a little guilty about that.’

  She sniffed again. ‘The guilty part I can believe. You’re certainly guilty about something, dear. But I don’t think it’s a failure to look at dress material.’

  Shit. ‘Look, lady -’

  ‘This Cineas is connected with the case, isn’t he?’ Marilla said.

  ‘Obviously.’ That was Clarus.

  Bugger, this was a conspiracy! The three of them were ganging up on me and they were too bloody smart by half! ‘Uh...maybe. Could be. It’s a possibility.’

  Clarus grinned.

  ‘Well, you haven’t been beaten up since we got here,’ Perilla said. ‘That’s the usual reason for you looking shifty and being reticent. I’d’ve noticed the cuts and bruises. The fresh ones, on top of those you got dodging that cart.’ Ouch. ‘And you haven’t come back from your walks with your clothes in a -’ She stopped. ‘That big rip in your tunic the other day. How did you get that? I meant to ask and I forgot.’

  ‘Ah...’

  ‘Marcus Valerius Corvinus!’

  Oh, fuck. She’d nailed me. Well, lying would just lead to more complications, and I doubted she’d believe anything I said now anyway. So I told her.

  ‘Someone tried to kill you? When we’d only just arrived?’ She was looking at me aghast. ‘How did they know?’

  Yeah, well; I suppose the fact that it’d been three days ago, I hadn’t been damaged, and I was still alive and breathing had sweated some of the drama out of it, but the lady had taken the news a lot more calmly than I’d expected. Not that I was ungrateful. Or maybe it was happening so often these days that she was getting blasé about it. ‘That’s the point,’ I said. ‘I bumped into this Cineas guy outside Flaccus’s office yesterday. He was with us on the ship and yet he went past me like greased lightning without letting on.’

  ‘Perhaps he didn’t recognise you.’

  ‘Sure he did. I said: when he saw me he slipped past like he’d been greased. And him being in the governor’s offices is too much of a coincidence to swallow.’

  ‘Hmm.’ She looked out of the window. We were almost up to Soma Street now: the main north/south drag, if you remember, that crosses the Canopic Way and takes you to the harbour. The Soma was the big tomb near the crossroads where Alexander and the Ptolemies were buried. Fortunately the lady had already ticked that particular box, so we wouldn’t be stopping.

  ‘You think the governor was behind the attack, Corvinus?’ Clarus said.

  Oh, bugger. I sighed. Well, sometimes you just had to go with the flow. ‘Yeah. I’d say that was pretty certain. He handled that part of the interview well, but he’d already had a full report and plenty of time to get his act together. But he wasn’t expecting me to bring up the Macro angle, and when I did it rocked him,. He’s got something cooking he doesn’t want found out, that’s a hundred per cent definite.’

  ‘But Marcus, that’s dreadful!’ Perilla said. ‘We’ve been through this before when you were talking about Isidorus. Flaccus is the governor. If he wants rid of you, even if he does it clandestinely, he has the authority to smother any investigation before it starts. I’m sorry, but again this is getting too dangerous. Give it up. We don’t need to go straight back to Rome, all it takes is for you to treat this like an ordinary holiday and he’ll leave you alone.’

&n
bsp; ‘Uh-uh.’ I shook my head. ‘Pride aside, I’m safe enough.’ Or at least I hoped so. ‘I’m a purple-striper after all. He’s got one senseless attack on official record already, and thanks to my tribune pal it didn’t come off. Two of them’d be too much of a coincidence to cover up, especially if the second were successful. And if I were found dead in an alley tomorrow, lady, what would you do?’

  ‘Go back to Rome and demand to see the emperor, of course. Tell him the whole thing. But Marcus -’

  ‘Right. Flaccus can’t risk that, not in his shoes. He’s in a shaky enough position in any case. And getting rid of you too would be just plain stupid.’

  ‘Then what can he do?’

  ‘Me, I’d keep my head down and just hope to hell the nosey purple-striper didn’t lift the lid off the pot. Which is what I mean to do.’ I glanced out of the window. We’d turned into Soma Street and were heading down the broad tree-lined avenue towards the market square. ‘Okay. So we play this straight, right? Forget the case. We’re ordinary customers, full stop. And if you do happen to get your material, lady, then it’s a bonus.’

  ‘Very well, Marcus. But I hope you know what you’re doing.’

  Yeah; so did I.

  ***

  Cineas’s warehouse was one of several in the back streets between the agora and the two main harbours: a big, solid building fronting on the street and covering almost half a block. We stopped the carriage by the front door and got out. There were some slaves outside loading bales of cloth onto a wagon. I went up to them.

  ‘The master around, pal?’ I said to the one in charge. ‘Cineas?’

  ‘Yes, sir. In the office on the left. You can’t miss it.’

  ‘Fine.’ I led the way.

  Wholesale was right: the place was full of bolts and bales, but not laid out like they would be in a shop so the customers could examine them. The office was built out from the main wall, and the door was open. I went in.