HELENA TOOK THE baby from me demurely while the two heavies sat up and jeered. “Io, Falco! Watch out; Smaractus is looking for you.”
They had immediately become perky now that I had appeared to put myself in line for thumping.
“Forget it,” I said, giving Helena a glare to keep her in some sort of order. “Smaractus has stopped harassing me He promised me a year's free rent when I saved his life in the wedding fire.”
“Get up to date,” chortled Rodan. “The wedding was over a year ago. Smaractus has just realized you owe him for the past two months!”
I sighed.
Helena sent me a look that said she would talk to me at home about which part of our tight budget the money would come from. Since the rent in question was owed for my old apartment, currently occupied by my disreputable friend Petronius, she would reckon he should contribute. His life was such a mess at present, I preferred not to bother him. I winked at Helena, which nowhere near fooled her, then I encouraged her to go ahead and start putting pans on our cooking bench.
“Don't fry the fish; I'll do that,” I ordered, asserting my rights as the cook.
“Don't stay too long gossiping then; I'm hungry,” she retaliated, as if the delay in dinner was all my fault. I watched her cross the road, a figure that made the two gladiators salivate, and walking with more confidence than she ought to show. Then I saw the scampering shape of Nux our dog shoot out from the shadows at the foot of the stairs and accompany her safely home.
I had no intention of pressing Rodan and Asiacus for more information, but I had promised to tackle Smaractus about Lenia's divorce. He was on his way down. That became obvious, as the shrieks of abuse from his tenants grew louder. His bodyguards Hill their wineskin to stop him pinching it, and shambled to their feet.
I yelled up to Smaractus. As I expected, the pleasure of telling me my period of free rent had ended brought him rushing down the staircase. A lolloping figure with a belted-in winegut, he stumbled badly as he reached ground level.
“You want to watch that,” I advised in a nasty tone. “Those treads are crumbling badly. The landlord's heading for a huge compensation claim when someone breaks their neck.”
“I hope it's you, Falco. I'll pay the claim; it would be worth it.”
“Glad to see relations between us are as amicable as ever-by the way, I'm surprised you haven't been asking for rent again; it's very good of you to extend my free-gift period-”
Smaractus went a horrid shade of purple, outraged by my cheek. He clutched at a heavy gold torque he had taken to wearing; he had always been prone to insulting his tenants by flashing large chunks of ugly jewellery. It seemed to act as a talisman and he hit back straightaway: “That big bastard from the vigiles who you've planted in my apartment on the sixth, Falco-I want him out. I never allow sub-letting.”
“No; you prefer that when folk go on holiday you can stick in filthy subtenants of your own and charge twice Petro's all right. He's part of the family. He's just staying with me for a short term while he sorts out some personal business. And speaking of women, I want to talk to you about Lenia.”
“You keep out of that.”
“Now settle down. You can't go on like this. You both need your freedom; the mess you've put yourselves in needs to be untangled, and the only way is to face the situation.”
“I've spelt out my terms.”
“Your terms stink. Lenia's told you what she wants. I dare say she's been rather over-demanding too. I'm offering to arbitrate. Let's try and arrange a sensible compromise.”
“Stuff you, Falco.”
“You're so refined! Smaractus, this is the kind of stubbornness that dragged out the Trojan War to a decade of misery. Think about what I've said.”
“No, I'll just think about the day I can lose you off my tenants' list.”
I beamed at him. “Well, we're at one there!”
Rodan and Asiacus were growing bored, so they made their usual offer to Smaractus of rolling me out like a pastry and making a human fruit tart. Before he decided which of his pet bullies was to hold me down and which to jump on me, I put myself in the street with room to sprint for home, then asked him casually, “Is Calliopus, the lanista, a colleague of yours?”
“Never heard of him,” growled Smaractus. As an informant he measured up to his filthy qualities as a landlord: he was as welcome as root rot.
“Rodan and Asiacus have been telling me about the ructions in your business. I gather the big new amphitheatre heralds an unparalleled era of happiness among the high-living venatio boys. Calliopus is one of them; I'm surprised a man of the world like you doesn't know him. What about Saturninus then?”
“Don't know him, and wouldn't tell you if I did.”
“Generous as ever.” At least that made him look worried that his truculence had in some subtle way shed light for me. “So you didn't know the arena suppliers are all hoping to make their fortunes when the new place officially opens?”
Smaractus merely looked furtive, so I grinned and waved goodbye. I arrived home just in time to wrench the fish skillet from Helena before she let the whitebait stick.
She was waiting for me to rebuke her for chatting to dangerous characters. I deplore arguments, unless there is a good chance of me winning. So we avoided that. We ate the fish, none of which were much bigger than my eyebrow though they were all equipped with spiky skeletons; there was also a small white cabbage and a few bread rolls
“As soon as I start getting paid for the Census job we're going to indulge in some fat tunny steaks.”
“The cabbage is nice, Marcus.”
“If you like cabbage.”
“I remember my grandmother's cook used to do it with a pinch of silphium.”
“Real silphium is a thing of the past. That was in the good old days when girls stayed virgins till they married, and we all believed the sun was a rather warm god's chariot.”
“Yes, everyone nowadays complains that the silphium you can buy is nothing like it used to be.” Helena Justina had an insatiable appetite for information, though she usually answered her own questions by raiding her father's library. I stared at her warily. She seemed to be playing innocent over something. “Is there a reason for this, Marcus?”
“I'm no expert. Silphium was always the prerogative of the rich.”
“It's some kind of herb, isn't it? Imported in ground up form,” Helena mused. “Is it not brought here from Africa?”
“Not any more.” I leant on my elbows and stared at her. “What's the wrinkle about silphium?” She seemed determined not to tell me, but I knew her well enough to reckon this was more than a general knowledge forum. I racked my brains to get it straight, then declared: “silphium, known to those who can't afford it as Stinking Goat's Breath-”
“You made that up!”
“As I recall, it does smell. Silphium used to come from Cyrenaica; the Cyrenians protected their monopoly jealously-”
“You can see it on coins from Cyrene when you get one palmed in your change at market?”
“Looks like a bunch of grotesque onions.”
“The Greeks always loved it?”
“Yes. We Romans for once allowed ourselves to copy them, since it involved our stomachs which always overrule our national pride. It was powerful stuff; but the ill-advised rural locals where it used to grow let their flocks overgraze the land until the precious crop disappeared. Presumably that causes much grief to their urban relations who used to run the silphium monopoly. Cyrene must be a dead town. The last known shoot was sent to Nero. You can guess what he did with it.”
Helena's eyes widened. “Do I dare?”
“He ate it. Why, lady; were you imagining some imperial obscenity with the highly prized herbage?”
“Certainly not-go on.”
“What's to add? New sprouts failed to appear. Cyrene declined. Roman cooks mourn. Now we import an inferior strain of silphium from the East, and gourmets at banquets moan about the lost Golden Age when stinking herbs really stank.”
Helena considered what I had just said, filtering out the exaggerations for herself “I suppose if anybody rediscovered the Cyrenian species, they could make their fortune?”
“The man who found it would be regarded as the saviour of civilization.”
“Really, Marcus?” Helena looked enthusiastic. My heart sank.
“Darling, you are not, I hope, suggesting that I should leap on a ship and sail to North Africa with a trowel and a trug? I really would much rather enjoy myself persecuting tax dodgers, even in partnership with Anacrites. Anyway, the Census is more of a certainty.”
“Sweetheart, you carry on squeezing defaulters.” Helena was decidedly preoccupied; she had allowed me to pick up the cabbage dish and drink the coriander sauce. “my parents have had a letter from young Quintus at last. And so have I.”
I replaced the dish on the table as unobtrusively as possible. Quintus Camillus Justinus was the younger of her brothers He was currently missing, along with a Baetican heiress who had been his elder brother's intended bride.
Justinus, who had once possessed the Emperor's personal interest and a promise of a spectacular public career, was now just any disgraced senatorial sprig with no money (the heiress had presumably been disinherited by her thwarted grandparents the moment they arrived in Rome for the wedding that was never to be).
It was still unclear whether Helena's favourite brother had run off with Claudia Rufina out of true love. If not, he was truly stuck. In retrospect-as soon as they vanished we had all realized she had adored him; unlike her stodgy betrothed Aelianus, Justinus was a handsome young dog with a wicked expression and winsome ways. What he felt for Claudia I was in two minds about. Still, even if he returned her devotion, he had eloped into disgrace. He had thrown away his hopes of entering the Senate, offending his parents and jumping into what was bound to be a lifelong feud with his brother, whose vindictive reaction nobody could blame. As for me, I had once been his keen supporter, but even my enthusiasm was tempered, and for the soundest of reasons: when Justinus bunked off with his brother's rich bride, everyone blamed me.
“So how is the errant Quintus?” I enquired of his sister. “Or should I say, where is he?”
Helena gazed at me peacefully. Justinus had always been dear to her. It seemed to me, the adventurous streak which had made her come to live with me also made her respond to her brother's shocking behaviour with less outrage than she ought to show. She was going to let him off. I bet he always knew she would.
“Quintus has apparently gone to Africa, my darling. Searching for the silphium is an idea he has had.”
If he did find it, he would make himself so much money he would certainly rehabilitate himself Indeed, he would become so rich he need not care what anyone in the Empire thought of him-including the Emperor. On the other hand, though he was a well-educated senator's son and supposedly intelligent, I had never seen any indication that Justinus knew the first thing about plants
“My brother has asked,” said Helena, gazing now at her foodbowl with a subdued expression that suggested to me she was on the verge of laughing, “whether you-with your market-gardening family background and your well-known horticultural expertise-could possibly send him a description of what he is looking for?”