XX

As i i eft the site huts, my heel slipped in a barrow rut. I landed flat out. Wet mud attached itself down the full length of my tunic. I had badly jarred my spine. When I stood up again, cursing, pain shot all up my back and into my head, to score a direct hit on a grumbling tooth that I was trying to ignore. I would be walking stiffly for days.

I planted my feet apart, getting my breath back. This part of the palace grounds was in general use at present. The official hutments were fairly smart and arranged in a regular pattern. Scattered tents belonging to hangers-on and hobos had been pitched in an untidier camp. Smoke wreathed from untended cooking fires. The smell of dank leaves harboured duskier odours that I chose not to identify.

Pyramids of enormous sawn logs, mighty oak trunks from some nearby forest, had been piled at the track-side. In other rows, square stacks of bricks and roof-tiles waited, layered with protective straw. Somewhere not far off, I could smell caustic smoke, probably lime being burned off for mortar. Here, heavy delivery carts, many still with their contents, were parked in a rough line, their oxen and mules unhitched and hobbled. If there was supposed to be a watchman, he had gone off for a pee in the woods.

One of the carts belonged to Sextius. I limped over to it. I found Aelianus, looking heavily unshaven and distinctly grey. He was curled up awkwardly, in a cramped space in the back of the cart, fast asleep. The senator would approve of his son's endurance- though Julia Justa, who favoured her truculent middle child, would produce a more tart response.

Seeing a rough hide cover, I manhandled it free and gently laid it over him. I was careful. Aulus did not wake.

I leaned for a moment on the cart wheel, rubbing my sore back. Then I heard noises. Instinctively, I felt guilty lurking there alone. It made me cautious how I emerged into public view.

I must have crept like a mouse sneaking out from a skirting. A man who was atop a nearby wagon tailed to see me at first. A Hash of his extremely white tunic caught my eye. I had a good view of him. He was dragging up old sacks that covered the cart contents and peering underneath. He could have been the owner searching for something- or a thief. He looked furtive, not legitimate.

In fact I knew him. It was Magnus, the surveyor. I was so surprised to find him leaping about these transports on his own, I must have moved abruptly. He glimpsed me and tried to change position. Then he fell off.

Wincing myself, I hopped over there as fast as possible. He lay on the ground, but was making enough noise to prove that parts of him were undamaged. Obscenities came thick and vivid.

"Stuff you, Falco! What a start you gave me-' I helped drag him to his feet. He roared and shifted to and fro, pretending he had to re jig his limbs in their joint sockets. His fall must have been so unexpected he had stayed limp and that saved him. Basically, he was unhurt.

He had noticed my own filthy tunic, so I said, "Now there's two of us stiffening up like planks I took a tumble myself a minute ago. What were you up to, Magnus?"

"Checking a marble consignment," he breezed off-handedly. "And you?" Considering he had been behaving oddly, he was looking at me hard.

"I've been trying to squeeze more than two words at a time out of the mosaicist."

"Philocles? Oh, he's all gab!" Magnus laughed.

"Right. He didn't even tell me he was called Philocles. What about the other- his son, is it?"

"Philocles Junior."

"Surprise!" Why waste imagination thinking up a different name?

We had started to walk slowly towards the main site. Magnus had been battered by a far worse shock than me, but he was recovering. He must be in general good shape. Refusing to be put off, he insisted, "Going back to your office by the scenic route?"

I reflected wryly that he sounded like me, harassing some suspect.

There was no need to connect myself to Aelianus, so I told Magnus how the previous day I had met the man with moving statues to sell; I played up Great-Uncle Scare's interest in automata and just said I was curious. "The fellow isn't there. Must be making his pitch to Plancus and Strephon."

"Good luck to him." Magnus grinned. "Yes, I found his cart myself."

Now I did have to check. "And the snoring assistant?" I felt unease at someone else inspecting Aelianus without his knowledge. "Looks a rough character!"

"Oh I don't think so, Falco," replied Magnus demurely. "Rather odd, I thought did you not notice? He was wearing a very good quality tunic and has manicured hands."

"Oh dear!" I had been right to worry. I tried to pass it off. "One of the playthings they hawk about, is he? Maybe Sextius uses him to model moving parts."

Somehow I managed to manoeuvre the conversation onto delusional statuary. We ended up discussing Homer. That was another shock. According to Magnus there was a scene in the Iliad where the underworld god Hephaistos appeared, complete with a set of three legged bronze tables that moved around on wheels. "They follow him like dogs, dogs who will even turn round and go home by themselves at his command."

"Sounds like a good set of nesting-tables for drinks parties."

"When your guests have had enough, you can whistle and the tables remove themselves."

I liked Magnus. He had a sense of humour. But I was surprised to find that he read Homer, and I told him so.

"Surveyors take an interest in the world. Most of us are well read," he bragged. "Anyway, we spend time alone. Other people think we're tricky sods."

I made no comment. I had moved Magnus onto my list of men to watch. For one thing, checking important deliveries ought to be done by Cyprianus, the clerk of works. And I would expect marble to be kept not in some unsupervised encampment full of oddball hawkers and interlopers, but safe in the well-fenced site depot.

Covered with mud, I was hardly impressive. I went back to the old house and stripped off. Helena discovered me root ling through a chest of clothes. "Oh Marcus, what happened?"

"Fell down." I sounded like a sad little boy.

"Did somebody push you?" Helena was not being maternal; she worried about me getting into serious fights.

"What, some big rough bully? No, I fell down all on my own. I was dreaming and not looking where I put my feet. I'd been looking at work by some fresco artists; I must have been thinking about Larius."

Larius, my favourite young nephew, had bunked off to learn to be a painter in the Bay of Neapolis, where the rich had their fabulous villas and there was top-class work. It was three years since I had seen him. I tried luring him to Rome to help me decorate Pa's Aventine house, but my letter went unanswered. Larius had always been a businessman, too sensible to commit himself to unpaid favours. Besides, in Rome he had his appalling parents. Galla and her ghastly husband were enough to drive any son to a remote apprenticeship.

"Hmm… So that's where it is!" Helena brushed past me suddenly to seize on a dress of hers. It was a cream affair, with wide bands of blue on the hems. Although simple, it had cost a sackful; the material was a gorgeous weave shot through with silk. As she lifted it out with a seductive rustle and held it by the shoulders, she caught me looking sceptical. "Hyspale keeps trying on my clothes. There's no point. I am far too tall so they bunch on her." I said nothing. "Yes, she does it to annoy me."

Another problem with the damned nurse. I sighed. "You know-'

"I know!" I held my peace.

"When we get home," promised Helena. I'll tackle her in Rome. Mother will take her back."

"And she won't be surprised."

Helena looked at me. "Are you sniping at my mother?"

"No."

It was true. She might be my mother-in-law, but I had observed the Camillus family enough to know she had had a strong influence on Helena's development. I paid the proper respect to that. When a senator omits to divorce his wife after she has given him the correct number of children and he has used up the dowry, it generally means something too. I did not mess with Julia Justa.