Bodies Politic

by David Wishart

  The starters came: raw vegetables, quails’ eggs with a fish-pickle dip and an endive salad with a honey and wine-vinegar dressing.

  ‘Did you find your bridesmaids’ material, Lady Perilla?’ Gallius said.

  ‘Oh, yes. Actually, yes we did, at that merchant’s warehouse you recommended. Absolutely marvellous. Thank you.’

  ‘Cineas has some good stuff.’ Gallius shelled an egg and dipped it in the pickle. ‘We were lucky to spot him at the governor’s. And if Corvinus here hadn’t got himself involved in that fracas originally he’d never have -’ He stopped and coloured. ‘Uh, I mean -’

  I was laughing. ‘It’s okay, pal. She knows. She had the whole thing out of me in practically five minutes flat.’

  ‘Don’t exaggerate, dear.’ Perilla sniffed.

  ‘Well, more or less.’

  ‘I still don’t understand it.’ Gallius redipped the poised egg. ‘For a Roman citizen to be attacked in the open street doesn’t make any sense. It just can’t happen.’ I looked a warning at Clarus, but he didn’t need it. He helped himself to endive salad and said nothing. ‘Mind you, the city’s in a strange mood these days, not itself. There’ve been a few muggings in broad daylight. People being beaten up for no reason at all.’

  ‘Yeah?’ I said, reaching for a stick of celery. ‘People like who?’

  ‘Jews, mostly. The occasional Greek, but mostly Jews.’ He hesitated. ‘One or two suspicious fires, too. Jewish property again, not in the Delta district where most of them live, up by the harbour.’

  I set the celery down. ‘You think there’s going to be trouble?’ I said quietly. ‘Real trouble?’

  He glanced at Perilla. ‘Well...nothing major yet, but it isn’t looking good. Hasn’t done since that King Cabbage business. It’d help if the governor -’ He stopped and looked uncomfortable.

  ‘If Flaccus’d clamp down on it,’ I said.

  ‘Yeah. More or less.’ A shrug. ‘That’s not just my opinion, far from it, and I’m not criticising. But we’ve been told to soft-pedal, ignore things. Agrippa still being here isn’t helping matters, either.’

  ‘He’s shown no signs of leaving?’

  ‘No. Not yet, nor of pulling his horns in supporting the Jews. And the Greeks don’t like it. Particularly with Isidorus whipping them up.’ He gave me a direct look. ‘Corvinus, if I were you I’d leave yourself. As soon as you can. Maybe I shouldn’t say that because the official line is that everything’s under control and it’ll all blow over, but there you are.’

  I sat back. Shit. If Gallius felt strongly enough about it to give me the warning in front of Perilla and the kids then the situation was serious right enough. And I’d got my own inside information to confirm it. ‘We talking riots here?’ I said.

  ‘We could be. Potentially.’ It came out unwillingly, sure, but it came out all the same.

  ‘Oh, Marcus!’ Perilla set down her spoon.

  ‘What do you reckon the time scale is?’

  ‘A month. Maybe less, if things go on the way they are at present. We’re getting more incidents every day, and the circumstances’re worse every time. No actual deaths yet, but that’s more by good luck than design.’

  Gods! Maybe we’d better make enquiries about ships asap after all. Not that I’d be sorry to go, as far as the case was concerned: I suspected I’d got about as much out of Alexandria as I was going to, and the Roman end was showing signs of developing nicely again. Perilla’d be happy enough too, because she’d got her material and if things were going to spill over into outright violence she wouldn’t want the kids anywhere near it, obvious Roman citizens or not. We’d have to have a serious talk later.

  ‘So it seems you can forget the Rhine transfer,’ I said. ‘It looks as if you’ll have your excitement after all.’

  ‘I told you, Corvinus. I don’t want excitement at that price. And action in Germany would be cleaner.’

  ‘You’re being transferred to a Rhine legion?’ Clarus said.

  ‘Uh-uh. Just a private joke. I wish it wasn’t, mind.’

  ‘Seemingly there’s a big campaign coming up.’ We’d just about finished the starters, and I signalled the slaves to clear away and serve the main course. ‘Germany and beyond, over into Britain. The Rhine legions’re providing the beef.’

  ‘Yeah.’ Gallius sipped his wine. ‘Gaetulicus and Apronius have four each already, of course, but they’re recruiting another two from scratch, plus the auxiliary support. It’ll be the biggest Rhine force since Augustus’s day, and if the emperor’s thinking of taking three Eagles with him to Britain, minimum, they’ll need every one of the rest to watch his back.’

  Things went very quiet. ‘Gaius is leading the expedition himself?’ I said. ‘In person?’

  ‘Sure, Corvinus. I told you that.’

  ‘No, you didn’t, pal.’ Shit! ‘You only told me about the push. You never said the emperor was taking personal command.’ I glanced at Perilla. The lady’s eyes were wide: she’d got it, too.

  ‘Yeah, well, he is.’

  ‘When would all this be happening?’

  ‘Next year, from what my Uncle Gaius said. Probably late summer early autumn, if preparations go according to plan.’ Gallius was frowning: he’d noticed the change in atmosphere. ‘Corvinus, what is this?’

  ‘Nothing. Just interested.’ I toyed with my spoon. ‘So, ah, Gaius - the emperor, I mean - would be heading north to join the Rhine legions some time in the summer of next year, right? That’s common knowledge?’

  The frown disappeared and he grinned. ‘I don’t know about common knowledge. You obviously didn’t know, for a start. Still, it’s no secret in army circles. My uncle’s known about it for months, and so have I.’

  Bloody hell! ‘And Gaetulicus’ll be in overall command, yes?’

  ‘Until the emperor arrives, and unless he appoints someone else. But he’s been governor of Upper Germany for the past eight years, and his brother was before him for years before that, so yes, naturally. And Apronius in the lower province isn’t likely to contest the point. He’s getting on a bit, Gaetulicus is his son-in-law, and they’ve been mates together since Gaetulicus took over.’

  Oh, fuck! It felt like a trail of ants with frozen feet were marching up my spine. I didn’t dare look at Perilla.

  ‘That’s...fascinating, pal,’ I said. ‘How’s the wine, by the way?’

  ‘Excellent.’ He drained his cup and I motioned to the wine-slave to refill it. Mine, too: after that little revelation I needed the full jug.

  Then the skivvies brought in the main course, and we talked about something else.

  ***

  ‘Okay, lady,’ I said, when the dinner was successfully over and we were alone and getting ready for bed. ‘We’ve got a terminus ad quem. And a modus operandi. And the criminis delictores. The plan is to stiff Gaius next summer when he leaves Rome and joins the Rhine legions, right?’

  ‘Marcus, he’ll have the Praetorian Guard with him,’ She wriggled out of her tunic. ‘Or at least a fair slice of them.’

  ‘I never said it would be easy.’ I stripped my own tunic off. ‘Still, Lepidus and Agrippina wouldn’t have a better chance. And assuming they haven’t already squared the Praetorian commander and his men and have to use force they’ve still got ten full legions on their team. That’s a hell of a lot of muscle. You said yourself, the problem with killing an emperor was manoeuvring him into a position where he was vulnerable enough for you to do it and survive afterwards. I’d say this situation fitted the bill pretty well, wouldn’t you?’

  ‘Yes,’ Perilla said softly. ‘Yes, I’m afraid it would. The profiting-from-the-deed criterion is satisfied too, because even if the senate weren’t happy with the situation Lepidus, as we said, would be far and away the likeliest choice for successor. In fact, the only choice that was practical. Especially with ten legions behind him.’

  ‘Yeah.’ I threw the tunic down onto a clothes chest. ‘Of course, we’re assuming that Gaetulicus has a r
eason to play ball. If so, it’s one we still have to find. I didn’t want to press Gallius on the subject, because he was suspicious enough already and I couldn’t go into the whys and wherefores, but he probably wouldn’t’ve known anyway and we have other ways of finding out.’

  ‘Such as?’ The lady reached for her sleeping gown.

  ‘Not here. Back in Rome.’

  She paused. ‘You think we should leave?’

  ‘Don’t you?’

  ‘Yes.’ She sighed. ‘Yes, I’m afraid so, Marcus. We haven’t been here any time at all, I know, but from what your tribune was saying the situation is going to get much worse, very quickly. It would be silly to stay and get caught up in things, so if you’re happy to go then I am too. Besides, with the winds against us it’ll take much longer, and we’re on a very tight schedule where the wedding is concerned.’

  ‘Mmm. Okay, so I’ll take a walk to the harbour offices tomorrow, see what boats there are.’ I went over and kissed her. ‘You, ah, sure you want that sleeping gown on? Just yet, anyway. It’s a warm evening.’

  ‘Yes, it is, isn’t it?’ She kissed me back. ‘Perhaps I might leave it off for a while longer.’

  So she did.

  CHAPTER TWENTY-SEVEN

  It took us almost exactly a month to get back, but we were lucky both ends: the Latona, the first passenger-carrying cargo ship out, had had a sudden last-minute cancellation (actually the punter concerned had come off second best in a scrap with a crocodile he’d poked with a stick in an attempt to impress his lady-friend), and also she’d be going to Puteoli, not Brindisi. It meant only the one cabin, mind, and with four of us squeezed in we’d’ve had to sleep standing up, but Clarus and I left it to the girls and bunked down with most of the other passengers in the scuppers.

  Rome was still standing. After Alex it felt hot, cramped and crowded, and you noticed the smell, too. In Alexandria, in the summer especially, the prevailing wind from the sea keeps the air moving and fresh, and although it can get pretty niffy around the open canals the smell’s nothing to good old Tiber effluent, especially south of the Sublician where it’s had time to build up and where a lot of the big drains come out.

  Even so, it was great to be back. Travel’s all very well, but you wouldn’t want to make a habit of it.

  We spent the first couple of days recovering and getting into the swing of things again. We’d dropped Clarus and Marilla off at Castrimoenium on the way - I’d hired a travelling coach and driver in Puteoli - and Perilla had taken her precious material straight round to the dressmaker’s off Julian Square to be made up. I sent Lysias on the mare down to Ostia with Mika’s letter, plus various packages including a big one of stuffed dates for the kids and a promise to get over there as soon as I could and fill them in with the more general news in person.

  I’d had plenty of time on the boat to think up a plan of action. For the immediate future, anyway. There was no point in getting in touch with Gaius or Etruscus: the first because I’d no solid proof of a conspiracy involving Gaetulicus yet, the second because if I was right and our grey eminence X was one of his colleagues then showing up at Augustus House propria persona and asking for an interview would be just plain stupid. As, in retrospect, it had been last time, but there you go. Secrecy cuts both ways.

  So the first item on my agenda was another talk with Caelius Crispus. If anyone could point me at a candidate for X, barring Etruscus himself, then it was that muck-raking genius. Whether he’d be so amenable second time round was a moot question.

  No appointment here, of course. With Crispus, the element of surprise counted for everything, and if I’d warned him in advance I was coming he’d’ve gone to ground and not shoved his nose out from cover until spring. Accordingly, on the morning of our third day back I went over to the praetors’ offices on the Capitol, gave the clerk on the desk a cheery nod and made my way to the shifty little bugger’s room.

  He was lifting a wax tablet out of his in-tray. When he saw me he froze.

  ‘Oh, fuck,’ he said quietly. ‘Not again.’

  ‘Hi, Crispus.’ I shut the door behind me, walked over to his desk, pulled up a chair and sat down. ‘Long time no see.’

  ‘It’s only been a month, you bastard.’

  ‘Two months and four days. I counted.’ I gave him my best smile. ‘Doesn’t time fly?’

  ‘Too bloody fast, in your case. So what is it now, Corvinus? More about the imperials? Because if so I’ve already given you all you’re going to get, even with the emperor’s backing. And I’m still not certain that you’ve got that.’

  ‘I swore, didn’t I? I’ll do it again, if you like.’

  He waved an irritated hand. ‘No, no. Forget it. I trust you. In a manner of speaking.’ The piggy eyes narrowed. ‘You’re sunburned. You been away?’

  ‘Alexandria. We’ve just got back.’

  ‘A round trip in two months? Jupiter! You can’t’ve had much -’ He stopped. ‘It had something to do with the case you’re on, didn’t it?’

  ‘Yeah.’ I crossed my legs and leaned back. ‘To answer your question, though. About what I want. Jews.’

  ‘How do you mean, “Jews”?’

  ‘The name of a very senior civil servant, probably a Greek, who doesn’t like them. Has something against them. Whatever.’

  Crispus laughed and relaxed. ‘Is that all? Easy, and no secret, either. Tiberius Claudius Helicon.’

  I sat forward again. Gods! ‘One name? Just the one? It’s that obvious?’

  ‘Sure it is. Plenty of Alexandrian Greeks in the civil service who don’t like the Jews, but you said “very senior”, and you don’t get much more senior than Helicon.’

  ‘He’s Alexandrian himself?’

  ‘Originally. He was one of the Wart’s slaves, like most of the top-brass secretariat’ - yeah; Etruscus must’ve been, too, from the shared part of their names - ‘but he was freed five or six years back. Now he’s one of Gaius’s closest cronies. They play ball together. Literally, work out in the gym every day with half a dozen other kindred spirits.’

  Shit. ‘What does he have against the Jews? Specifically, I mean?’

  Crispus shrugged. ‘Nothing particular I know of. But he’s an Alexandrian. If you’ve just been there you’ll know what that means.’

  Yeah, I did, and it was a fair point: being an Alexandrian Greek, he wouldn’t need a specific reason. ‘What’s he like? In himself, I mean?’

  ‘Clever bugger, too smart for his own good. Thinks a lot of himself and not very much of anyone else. A troublemaker for the fun of it. I’d sum him up’ - Crispus smiled - ‘as a malicious, objectionable shit.’

  Very concise and pungent, and it fitted. I reckoned I’d got my X. ‘Right. So how can I meet him? Unofficially and accidentally, of course.’

  The smile disappeared. ‘Come on, Corvinus! Information I don’t mind, but I don’t do introductions. Especially to bosom buddies of the emperor. Especially to one who’s not going to thank me in the end for getting involved, which reading between the lines and knowing you he fucking isn’t.’

  ‘Crispus!’ I spread my hands. ‘It’s no big deal. I’m not asking for a letter with your name on it here. Just point me in the right direction, no comeback, I swear. You can do it, I know you can.’

  He fizzed for a minute or so. Then he said: ‘You’re sure you have the emperor’s blessing?’

  ‘Carte blanche. I told you. And it’s important, maybe even vital. I’ll swear that too, if you like.’

  ‘Okay. It so happens he’s having a birthday bash in five days’ time. A big one, at his house on the Esquiline. You’d have to gatecrash, sure, but half of Rome’ll be there. That’s the best I can do; past that you’re on your own. Now clear out, I’m busy.’

  ‘I was going to ask you about Cornelius Lentulus Gaetulicus.’

  He purpled. ‘Out!’

  I grinned and stood up. Yeah, well, maybe I was pushing it. And I’d got a better source for info on Gaetulicus in any ca
se, at least where the military side of things was concerned, and that was the place to start. I could always come back if something suggested itself, and I needed to keep Crispus sweet. If that wasn’t an oxymoron.

  ‘Okay, pal,’ I said. ‘Another time, maybe.’

  ‘Not unless hell freezes first.’

  Well, he didn’t mean it. Not really. ‘Thanks, friend,’ I said, heading for the door. ‘I’ll see you around.’

  ‘Bugger off.’

  ***

  I wasn’t doing too badly here: only three days back in Rome and I’d cracked the Alexandrian side of the case. Potentially at least. How I was going to handle the Helicon aspect of things I didn’t know, but just having a name for X was a huge start, and it couldn’t hurt at least to see the guy personally close up. When I gatecrashed his birthday party - as I would - I’d take Perilla with me. That lady is a born gatecrasher.

  Fine. Now over to the Palatine, and Gaius Secundus.

  Secundus was one of my oldest friends, well pre-Perilla and almost back into childhood. He’d been all set for a professional military career until an accident right at the start of it had shattered his leg and made that impossible, so he’d taken the civilian political route instead, ending up five years before at city judge level. Even so, the Eagles were in his blood, and when that appointment had expired he’d moved over to the imperial side and bagged a high-powered desk job in military admin. Which was where he now was. We split a jug between us, now and then, when our paths crossed, and although he wasn’t the brightest button in the bag he was a very nice guy and about the best friend I had in Rome.

  Fortunately, the military offices weren’t in Augustus House, where I really didn’t want to go. I gave my name to one of the clerks and kicked my heels for two or three minutes; after which Secundus himself came down the stairs to meet me.