“But she has been known to run off. The nurse neglects her duties?” I suggested.

The Pomonalis sighed. “She flirts with the workmen whenever she can.”

“Right. I don’t want to be indelicate, but do you think it goes beyond flirting?” I did wonder if Gaia had seen something that shocked her.

Ariminius scoffed quietly. “You have seen the nurse! But the men don’t mind laughing with her-any excuse to stop their work.”

“And then Gaia slips away?”

“She means no harm,” Laelia cooed, like a doting aunt. “She just plays by herself.”

“A huge imagination, I gather?” The woman nodded. I asked quietly, “And is that why she came to tell me someone wanted her dead?”

Both bristled. Both ignored the question fixedly.

“I think she really had been threatened,” I said.

Still no answer.

I looked pointedly from one to another, as if deciding whether the death threats came from either of them. Then I let it drop. “There are various possibilities,” I told them coldly. “Prime options are thatbeing unhappy for reasons that nobody wants to admit-Gaia ran away either to seek out her father or your aunt Terentia. My view is, you should inform both of them, so they can look out for her.”

“Your view is noted,” said Ariminius. “I shall discuss with the Flamen whether to tell Scaurus.”

“Terentia Paulla already knows the child is lost?”

“She does,” replied Ariminius-not revealing that the ex-Vestal had been staying here until only that morning. I in turn did not reveal that I was aware she had been a visitor.

“Other possibilities are that the child may be here, hiding or trapped; a full systematic search is my next move. The third option is that she has been abducted, possibly for financial gain.”

“We are not a wealthy family,” Laelia said, raising her eyebrows.

“That’s a comparative term, of course. Where you see only mortgages, a starving robber might nonetheless hope to extract a fortune. Is money a problem?” I saw Ariminius shake his head, as much at his wife as at me. Although I had first thought him ineffectual, he now seemed to have a grasp of reality the others here lacked. Laelia just shrugged vaguely. I said to him, “Well, please inform me immediately if anything like a ransom note arrives.”

“Oh yes.” Ransomers would probably address the ex-Flamen, but Ariminius was playing the man of decision again. At any rate, if he saw a large spider who could only run slowly he would perhaps think about ways he could step on it.

“The worst possibility, if indeed she has been abducted, is that she is brothel fodder by now.” I was being blunt deliberately. Shock tactics were the only weapon I had left. “A potential Vestal Virgin would be seen as rich pickings.”

“Dear gods, Falco!”

“I don’t mean to frighten anyone. But you have to know. That is one reason why the Emperor decided to take Gaia’s loss so seriously. That is why I am here. That is why you have to be frank. The child is six. Wherever she is, she must be terrified by now. And I have to get to her fast. I need to know about any unusual occurrences-anyone seen hanging around-any aspect of her inclusion in the lottery that could affect her. She wanted to be a Vestal, but it was not universally popular, I understand?” I had borne around on the old tack again: their family feuds.

“Oh, that was just Aunt Terentia!” Laelia assured me. Nervousness got the better of her, and she giggled uncharacteristically. “She was wicked about it-actually, she said enough women in this family had had their bedroom lives ruined.”

I managed not to look startled. “She did not enjoy the celibate life herself, then?”

Laelia now regretted having spoken. “Oh no, she was devoted to her calling.”

“She was a chaste Virgin-and afterwards she married. The sequence is not unknown. So, tell me about ‘Uncle Tiberius.’ Am I right that his boudoir life was, let’s say, uninhibited?”

A glance was exchanged by the husband and wife. Ariminius had moved his foot against Laelia’s; coincidence, perhaps. If it was a warning, it was not much of a kick.

“The man is dead,” he reminded me rather pompously.

“So all he deserves now are eulogies? Luckily we are past the funeral, so you can drop the sickening pretense that he was a worthy descendant of right-thinking republican heroes, and had unimpeachable moral standards.” I looked at Laelia. “I gather he thought he should share his manly favors widely. Did he ever make advances to you?”

I was prepared for her to hide behind her husband, but she answered straight: “No. Though I must say, I did not care for him.” It was very direct-too much so, perhaps, as though she had rehearsed it.

“You knew what he was like?”

This time her gaze did waver. Perhaps the man had groped her, yet she had never told her husband. I wished I could have talked to her without the Pomonalis present.

“You knew he had made himself unpleasant to Caecilia Paeta?” I insisted.

“Yes, I knew that,” Laelia answered in a low voice.

“It was you she confided in?”

“Yes.” I wondered briefly: If Caecilia had attracted the lecher but Laelia did not, was Laelia jealous?

“Did she tell you of her fears that he might one day go for Gaia?”

“Yes!” These affirmatives were snapping out now.

“Did anybody tell Laelius Numentinus?”

“Oh no.”

“You already had enough troubles in this family?” I asked dryly.

“How right you are!” returned Laelia, rather defiantly. That did not mean she would expound on what those troubles were. Ariminius, I noticed, looked distinctly uncomfortable.

“Did Terentia Paulla know what the man she had married turned out to be like?”

Laelia now sought support from her husband. He was the one taking decisions on what confidences to reveal-or what lies to tell. He said, “Terentia Paulla knew what she was doing when she married.”

I gazed at him. “How did she know?”

“Uncle Tiberius was a very old friend of the family.”

I paused. That, colleagues, is always an intriguing situation. Old friends of families are rarely what everyone pretends. They may well be like this one: dirty swine who can never keep their pricks under their tunics, men who bully the women into tolerating their abuse because quite simply no one ever complained before and it seems too late to say anything after so many years.

“So why, if his predilections were obvious, did an extremely holy woman who had just spent three decades living modestly ever want to marry him?”

“Only she can answer that!” cried Laelia harshly.

“Well, if I have no luck finding Gaia, I may have to talk to your aunt.” I noticed that caused a shock of panic, at least in Laelia. She hid it well.

Despite her disguised alarm, for once it was the wife and not her husband who came out with the official tale: “Aunt Terentia prefers to see nobody at present. She is in mourning for her husband-and not in the best of health.” Mourning for her husband-or mourning her own stupidity in marrying a philanderer? Poor health-or just poor judgment?

“I shall try to spare her then. I met your brother,” I told Laelia. “Do you get on with Scaurus?”

“Yes, we’re very close.” I let that go too. I would not fancy having my sisters asked the same question.

“I believe you have seen him recently?”

“Not for anything special,” gasped Laelia, looking nervous at the question. Her shiftiness seemed to have something to do with her husband, as if he might not know.

“Wasn’t there a family conference?”

“Minor legal issues,” Ariminius put in. Still watching Laelia, who was now feigning wide-eyed innocence, I remembered that Meldina, the girl at the farm, had mentioned that Scaurus had been to Rome recently “to see his sister.” Once again, I yearned to interrogate Laelia without her husband. They seemed welded together, unfortunately.

“Issues arising from the death of Terentia’s husband?”