'I know.' Understanding about my brother, there were tears in her eyes. I made to stroke her soft hair; my arm seemed impossibly heavy and nearly caught her a clout on the side of the brow. Seeing it coming, Helena held my wrist. Once I stopped flailing she laid my arm back tidily alongside me. 'Go to sleep.' She was right; that was safest. Sensing my silent appeal, she came back at the last minute, then kissed me again, briskly on the head. 'I love you too.' Thanks, sweetheart.

What a mess. Why does solitary, deeply significant thought lead so inevitably to an amphora?

I lay still, while the darkened tent zoomed to and fro around me and my ears sang. Now that I had collapsed, the sleep I had been heavily craving refused to come. So I lay in my woozy cocoon of misery, listening to the events at my own fireside that I could not join.

Chapter XXXV

'Marcus Didius has things on his mind.'

It was the briefest excuse, as Helena sank back in her place gracefully. Neither Musa nor the bill-poster answered; they knew when to keep their heads down.

From my position the three figures looked dark against the flames. Musa was leaning forwards, rebuilding the fire. As sparks suddenly crackled up, I caught a glimpse of his young, earnest face and the scent of smoke, slightly resinous. I wondered how many nights my brother Festus had spent like this, watching the same brushwood smoke lose itself in the darkness of the desert sky.

I had things on my mind all right. Death, mostly. It was making me intolerant.

Loss of life has incalculable repercussions. Politicians and generals, like murderers, must ignore that. To lose one soldier in battle – or to drown an unlovable playwright and strangle an unwanted witness – inevitably affects others. Heliodorus and Ione both had homes somewhere. Slowly the messages would be winding back, taking their domestic devastation: the endless search for a rational explanation; the permanent damage to unknown numbers of other lives.

At the same time as I was pledging a violent vow to right these wrongs, Helena Justina said lightly to Congrio, 'If you give me the message from Chremes to Falco, I will pass it on tomorrow.'

'Will he be able to do the work?' Congrio must be the kind of messenger who liked returning to source with a pessimistic announcement of it can't be done'. He would have made a good cartwheel-mender in a backstreet lock-up workshop.

'The work will be completed,' replied Helena, a firm girl, Optimistic too. I would probably not be able to see a scroll tomorrow, let alone write on it.

'Well, it's to be The Birds,' said Congrio. I heard this impassively, unable to remember if it was a play, whether I had ever read it, and what I thought if I had done so.

'Aristophanes?'

'If you say so. I just write up the playbills. I like the ones with short names; takes less chalk. If that's the scribe's name who wrote it, I'll leave him off.'

'This is a Greek play.'

'That's right. Full of birds. Chremes says it will cheer everyone up. They all get a chance to dress in feathers, then hop about squawking.'

'Will anyone notice the difference from normal?' Helena quipped. I found this incredibly funny. I heard Musa chuckle, though sensibly he was keeping out of the rest of it.

Congrio accepted her wit as a straight comment. 'Doubt it. Could I draw birds on the posters? Vultures, that's what I'd like to have a go at.'

Avoiding comment, Helena asked, 'What does Chremes want from us? Not a full translation into Latin, I hope?'

'Got you worried!' Congrio chortled, though in fact Helena was perfectly calm (apart from a slight quiver as she heard his plans for artwork). 'Chremes says we'll do it in Greek. You've got a set of scrolls in the box, he says. He wants it gone through and brought up to date if the jokes are too Athenian.'

'Yes, I've seen the play in the box. That will be all right.'

'So you reckon your man in there is up to it?'

'My man in there is up to anything.' Like most girls with a strongly ethical upbringing, Helena lied well. Her loyalty was impressive too, though perhaps rather dry in tone. 'What will happen about these elaborate beak-and-feather costumes, Congrio?'

'Same as usual. People have to hire them off Chremes.'

'Does he already possess a set of bird costumes?'

'Oh yes. We did this one a few years ago. People who can sew,' he menaced cheerfully, 'had better get used to the idea of stitching feathers on!'

'Thanks for warning me! Unfortunately, I've just developed a terrible whitlow on my needle finger,' said Helena, making up the excuse smoothly. 'I shall have to back out.'

'You're a character!'

'Thanks again.'

I could tell from her voice Helena had now decided that she had sufficient details of my writing commission. The signs were slight, but I knew the way she bent to toss a piece of kindling on the fire, then sat back tidying her hair under one of its combs. For her, the actions marked a pause. She was probably unaware of it.

Musa understood the change of atmosphere. I noticed him silently shrink deeper into his headcloth, leaving Helena to interrogate the suspect.

'How long have you been with Chremes and the company, Congrio?'

'I dunno: a few seasons. Since they were in Italy.'

'Have you always done the same job?'

Congrio, who could sometimes appear taciturn, now seemed blissfully keen to talk: 'I always do the posters.'

'That requires some skill?'

'Right! It's important too. If I don't do it, nobody comes to see the stuff, and none of us earns. The whole lot depends on me.'

'That's wonderful! What do you have to do?'

'Fool the opposition. I know how to get through the streets without anybody spotting me. You have to get around and write the notices real quick – before the locals see you and start complaining about you ruining their white walls. All they want is space to advertise their pet gladiators and draw rude signs for brothels. You have to dodge in secretly. I know the methods.' He knew how to boast like an expert too. Carried away by Helena's interest, he then confided, 'I have done acting once. I was in this play The Birds, as it happens.'

'That's how you remember it?'

'I'll say! That was an experience. I was an owl.'

'Goodness! What did that entail?'

'In this play, The Birds,' Congrio expounded gravely, 'there are some scenes – probably the most important ones – where all the birds from the heavens come on the stage. So I was the owl.' In case Helena had missed the full picture, he added, 'I hooted.'

I buried my face in my pillow. Helena managed to stifle the laughter that must be threatening to bubble up. 'The bird of wisdom! That was quite a part!'

'I was going to be one of the other birds, but Chremes took me off it because of the whistling.'

'Why was that?'

'Can't do it. Never could. Wrong teeth or something.'

He could have been lying, to give himself an alibi, but we had told nobody Musa had heard the playwright's killer whistling near the High Place at Petra.

'How did you get on with hooting?' Helena asked politely.

'I could hoot really well. It sounds like nothing difficult, but you have to have timing, and put feeling into it.' Congrio sounded full of himself. This had to be the truth. He had ruled himself right out of killing Heliodorus.

'Did you enjoy your part?'

'I'll say!'

In that short speech Congrio had revealed his heart. 'Would you like to become one of the actors, some day?' Helena asked him with gentle sympathy.

He was bursting to tell her: 'I could do it!'

'I'm sure you could.' Helena declared. 'When people really want something, they can usually manage it.'

Congrio sat up straighter, hopefully. It was the kind of remark that seemed to be addressed to all of us.