"He paid you to say that? You"re protecting him?"
"Why should I? I was born here; I thought I was one of the family. My mistake! I was sold overnight. Then they bought me back, but only for the horses. A double shock, and not a word said to me about it either time. Oh, I always got on all right with him," Bryon declared. "But things will never be the same again. So believe me, he"ll turn up."
"You mean because he needs the old man?
Bryon smiled grimly. "No. Because of how badly the old man needs him!"
He would not explain.
He did come back. And I found him. But a lot happened...
Helena Justina took the air that morning, accompanying the lad who renewed the wreath of flowers on the berm at the estate boundary. I had escorted them. Then two donkeys hove into view bearing Petronius Longus, Arria Silvia, and a basket which I could see was stuffed with picnic things: a prearranged rendezvous.
Petronius had been longing to take me drinking ever since we arrived. This was his opportunity. He must have imagined a holiday carnival would in some way help me.
I was annoyed. "Don"t be ridiculous! I"m tracking down a murderer; he could turn up any time. How can I go gadding up the mountain-"
"Don"t be so stuffy!" Helena chaffed. "I"m going, so you have to." Before I could argue further she had sent the boy home, cajoled me onto a donkey, and hopped up behind me. She held onto my belt. I held onto my temper, just.
It was a still, hazy day with that vapoury, innocuous look which on the Campania coast means intense heat later. Petronius picked our route. My donkey was the awkward one, which increased the mood.
We rode up past the rich black ploughland on the lower slopes, then through the thriving vineyards which in those days covered the mountain almost to its summit, making Bacchus its natural patron G.o.d. Wild broom was still flowering as our way snaked higher and higher into the rarified air. Vesuvius then was much more majestic than now. It was twice the size, for one thing - a quiet, luxurious, richly farmed mountain, though there were ancient secret places on the peak where only hunters went.
Petronius Longus stopped for a tasting at a wayside wineseller"s. I did not feel like drinking. I said I had always wanted to go up to see the gorges at the top of the mountain where Spartacus the rebel slave had held out against a consular army and nearly brought down the state; I too was in a fair old mood for bringing down the state.
Helena came with me.
We rode as far as the donkey could easily travel, way up among the tangled brushwood which I knew was frequented by wild boar. We both dismounted, tethered Ned, then set off to cover the final stint to the top. It was rough going; Helena stopped.
"Too strenuous for you?"
"I"m struggling - You go on; I"ll wait with the donkey." She went back. I went on. I thought I wanted to be by myself; but I felt lonely as soon as she left.
I reached the summit quickly, had a look round, decided the historical research had not been worth the effort, and scrambled back down to Helena.
She had spread out a cloak and was sitting there with her sandals unstrapped, lost in thought. When she glanced round I deliberately let her see me making an inventory. She was wearing a pale-green gown which showed off the fact she was well worth showing off. Her hair was parted and twisted the way I had once liked it, above simple gold ear-rings. If she coloured her face it was subtle enough not to show. A pity I could not convince myself she had planned this neat effect for me.
"Did you reach the top? What was it like?"
"Oh, a cone-shaped peak with a huge rocky depression, and great fissures full of wild vines. That must have been how the rebel army made their escape when Cra.s.sus evicted them-"
"Is Spartacus a hero of yours?"
"Anyone who fights the Establishment is a hero of mine." None of this was the point at issue so I sounded terse. "Well, what is this merry jaunt about?"
"A chance to speak to you privately-"
"Barnabas?"
"Yes and no. I met him yesterday," Helena confessed, her restraint admonishing my harshness. "It was perfectly civilized; we sat in the garden, and I had honey cakes. He wanted to see me. He has no money, for one thing-"
That angered me. "You were divorced from his patron. He has no right to sponge off you!"
"No," she said, after an odd pause.
"You never gave him cash? I accused.
"No." I waited. "The situation is complicated," she told me, still in that washed-out voice; I continued to stare her out. "But I may be short of funds myself-"
I could not envisage Helena in financial straits. She had inherited land from a female relation, then after her divorce her father had given her part of the dowry her ex-husband had returned. Pertinax himself had bequeathed her a small fortune in precious spice. So she was richer than most women, and Helena Justina was not the type to squander it on tiaras or to give away thousands to some seedy religious sect.
"Unless you want to flirt with a very demanding ballet dancer, I can"t see you strapped for cash!"
"Ah well...." She ducked the issue stubbornly. "Now you tell me something. What happened at the Villa Poppaea that upset you so bitterly?"
"Nothing that matters."
"Something about me?" she persisted.
I could never resist Helena"s earnestness; I let out abruptly, "Do you sleep with Aemilius Rufus?"
"No," she said.
She could have answered, "Of course not; don"t be stupid." It would have sounded much stronger, though I would have believed her less.
I did believe her. "Forget I asked. Look, next time you take honey cakes with Barnabas, I"ll be behind the pergola." Her silence jarred me "Lady, he"s a fugitive-"
"Not now. Let me deal with him. Somebody has to bring him back to the real world-"
I was overwhelmed with fondness for her dogged way of doing things. "Helena Justina, you cannot take every problem in the Empire onto yourself!"
"I feel responsible..." Her face remained strangely remote as she argued with me. "Don"t you hara.s.s me, on top of all my other troubles-"
"What troubles?"
"Nothing. Do your work for the Emperor, then we can attend to Barnabas."
"My work can wait; I"m looking after you-"
"I can do that myself?" she suddenly exploded, astonishing me. "Always. I shall have to - as I fully realize!"
I felt my jaw harden. "You"re talking nonsense."
"No, I"m speaking the truth! You know nothing about me; you never wanted to. Lead your own life how you choose - but how could you say what you did about Rufus? How could you think that?"
I had never seen Helena so hurt. I was so used to insulting her, I had failed to notice that for once her tolerance had snapped.
"Look, it was none of my business-"
"Nothing about me is any of your business! Go away, Falco!"
"Well that sounds like the sort of instruction I can understand!" I felt so helpless I lost my temper too. I thundered blackly, "You hired me because I was good - too good to waste my time on a client who will never confide in me." Helena made no answer. I walked over to the donkey. "I"m going back. I"m taking the donkey. Are you coming with me sensibly, or staying on this mountain by yourself? More silence.
I unhitched the animal and climbed aboard.
"Don"t worry," I said unpleasantly. "If a wild boar steps out of the undergrowth, just roar at him the way you roar at me."
Helena Justina neither moved nor answered me, so I started down the mountain without looking back.
LIX.
I rode downhill for three minutes at a steady pace. As soon as the track widened, I reined in the donkey and drove him back again.
Helena Justina was exactly where I left her, with her face out of sight. Nothing had attacked her: only me.
When my heart steadied I walked over, then reached down and rubbed the top of her head gently with my thumb.
"I thought you had left me," she said in a m.u.f.fled voice.
"Is that likely?"
"How should I know?"
"I thought I had left you," I admitted. "I"m the sort of fool who would think that. If you just stay in the same place so I can find you, I shall always come back." She choked on a sob.
I dropped on my haunches and wrapped both arms round her. I held her tight but after a few hot tears had trickled away under the neck of my tunic she grew quieter. We sat there, perfectly still, while I sent my strength flowing into her, and the strain I had been feeling for so long it had come to seem natural went running away too.
Eventually Helena mastered her misery and looked up. I hooked two fingers into her neekchain and pulled out my old silver ring. She coloured faintly. "I used to wear it..." She tailed off in embarra.s.sment.
With both hands I snapped the cham apart; Helena gasped and caught the little circle of silver as it fell into her lap. I glimpsed the inscription: anima mea, "my soul". I grasped her left hand and replaced the ring myself. "Wear it! I gave it to you to wear!"
Helena seemed to hesitate. "Marcus, when you gave me your ring to wear - were you in love with me?"
That was when I realized how serious things were.
"I made myself a rule once," I said.
"Never fall in love with a client -" She rounded on me in distress, then saw my face. "Sweetheart, I"ve made a lot of rules, and broken most of them! Don"t you know me? I am frightened you will despise me, and terrified other people will see you doing it - but I"m lost without you. How can I prove it? Fight a lion? Pay my debts? Swim the h.e.l.lespont like some lunatic?"
"You can"t swim."
"Learning is the hard part of the test"
"I"ll teach you," muttered Helena. "If you fall into any deep water, I want you to float!"
The water was pretty deep here. I stared at her. She stared at the ground. Then she confessed, "That day you left for Croton, I was missing you so badly I went to your apartment to look for you; we must have pa.s.sed one another in the street .
Overcome, she ducked her head onto her knees again. I cackled with laughter, bitterly. "You should have told me."
"You wanted to leave me."
"No," I said. My right hand was cradling the back of her head, exploring a hollow which seemed purposely made to fit the ball of my thumb. "No, my darling. I never wanted that."
"You said you did."
"I"m an informer. All talk. Mostly inaccurate."
"Yes," she agreed thoughtfully, raising her head again. "Didius Falco, you do say stupid things!"
I grinned, then I told her some more.
Above the Bay, the sun broke free of that vaporous cloud cover, and a band of light ran swift as silk across the coastal plain and up the mountain where we were. Warmth flooded over us. The elegant ellipse of the coastline brightened; at its open end the Island of Capreae emerged as a dark smudge complementing the folds of the Lactarii range. Below us the small, white, red-roofed buildings of Herculaneum, Oplontis and Pompeii crouched along the sh.o.r.e, while on the linenfold slopes of the distant hills villages and farms tantalized the eyesight among the natural rocks...
"Hmm! Just the sort of spectacular vista where you bring a beautiful woman, and never once look at the view..."
As the sunlight hit us, I levelled Helena on her back and stretched myself alongside, beaming down at her. She started stroking my ear as if it was something wonderful. My ear could take more of that; I realigned my head so it was more readily available while I basked in her scrutiny. "What are you looking at?"
"Oh, a thatch of black curls which never look combed -" I happened to know Helena liked my curls. "One of those long, straight, superior noses off an Etruscan tomb painting. Eyes that keep moving, in a face which never reveals what they have seen. Dimples!" she scoffed (driving her little finger into one of them).
I jerked my head; trapping the finger in my teeth, then pretended to eat it.
"Excellent teeth!" she added crossly, as an afterthought.
"What a wonderful day!" I had always liked warm weather. I had always liked Helena too. It was hard to remember there had ever seemed much point pretending otherwise. "My best friend"s happy getting drunk with his wife, so I can forget him. I"m lying in the sunshine up here, with you all to myself, and in a moment I shall be kissing you..." She smiled up at me. A shiver ran all down my neck. Alone with me now, she seemed completely at peace. I too had relaxed to the point where I was ceasing to relax... Helena began to reach for me, just as I gathered her closer and kissed her at last.
Many seconds later I looked up gravely at the sky. "Thank you, Jove!"
Helena laughed.
The green dress she was wearing was light enough to show that she was wearing nothing else. It was fastened along each elbow-length sleeve with five or six mosaic gla.s.s b.u.t.tons twisted through embroidered loops. I undid one to see what would happen; Helena combed my curls with her fingers, smiling. "Shall I help?"
I shook my head. The b.u.t.tons were stiff, but stubbornness and other factors had taken hold by then so I winkled off three, working upwards; then I explored her arm, and since she seemed to like it I carried on unb.u.t.toning to the top of the sleeve.
My hand slid from her wrist to her shoulder then down again, no longer on her arm. Her cool soft skin which never saw the sun shrank, then rose to my touch at her intake of breath; I had to fight to stop my fingers quivering.
"Is this leading somewhere, Marcus?"
"I hope so! Don"t imagine I could get you on your own at the top of a mountain and not make the most of the chance."
"Oh I never thought that!" Helena a.s.sured me quietly. "Why do you think I wanted you to come?
Then, being a practical woman, she undid all the b.u.t.tons on the other sleeve herself.
A long time afterwards, when I was utterly defenceless, a wild boar strolled out of the undergrowth.
"Grrr!" said the Senator"s daughter amiably, over my naked shoulder.