'Thanks.' Helena was watching, so I tried to sound dour. Helena was on the verge of giggling. 'I get the picture.' A better perspective than I needed. 'Are you all upset by Scaeva's death?' They certainly were, though that seemed to be because he used to reward them decently for their services. Many a young aristocrat would not have bothered, so this showed him in a good light, and the girl rather sweetly shed a tear in his memory.

Scaeva could have dallied with Veleda because she posed a challenge, but he was far from desperate for sexual favours. Unless Veleda's golden looks had drawn him into danger, his tastes were basic. The first-choice slave girl was pretty, but inane and as common as dog dirt. She showed far too much cleavage, she had a big backside to go with it, and her conversation was tortuous. I won't say I never played around with girls like that, but I was grown up now. I became very grown up when Helena Justina was on observation. One thing I had learned about aristocratic girls: they were risquй – so risquй it was shocking – but only in private company. I saw it as an honour to be included, frankly.

Risking another torrent of piffle, I asked the girl if she knew anything about the afternoon when Scaeva died. 'No.' Too quick. She knew something, but had been warned to keep quiet.

Whatever she knew, the steward knew as well, but he too was lying. They both valiantly maintained that nothing odd had happened until the corpse was discovered. I then asked for another interview with the young flautist; I thought Helena, who always won the hearts of adolescent boys, might worm something out of him. Again, we were disappointed. The steward told us the flautist had upped and run off. 'Was that unexpected? He had always been well treated here?' 'Of course. This is a wonderful home. We never have people running away. Our master, a most affectionate owner, is horrified; he has had a big search organised, for the boy's own sake. He has devoted a great deal of personal time to it. The poor lad had remained in shock, terribly distressed. Quadrumatus and all the household are deeply concerned for his welfare.' I saw Helena narrowing her eyes as if she thought the degree of concern might be significant. 'No luck with the search?' I knew the answer. 'None, Falco.' We did not meet Quadrumatus Labeo or Drusilla Gratiana. Both were in town that afternoon. But Helena, who put duty above any risk of unpleasantness, faced up to meeting the old black-clad maid, Phryne. I let her go alone. When Helena came back, she murmured, 'Phryne was perfectly pleasant with me, Marcus. You must have lost the knack.' 'You mean she's a mean-spirited old bitch.' Helena smiled. 'Failed to fall for your charm? All right, she is rather vinegary… I am sure she knows a lot more than she's told us-' '- But she'll never reveal it on principle.' Last time I came here, they had managed to give the impression all was openness. That story had been compacted like a mud brick. They all told the same tale. Today the careful edifice was crumbling away. Almost everyone we spoke to was patently unreliable. Perhaps the difference was that today nobody had been expecting me. No one was braced. They had lost their polish. The steward allowed us to inspect all the relevant scenes again, so I could show Helena. He shed us, as if he was relieved to get away. A teenaged girl was deputed to escort us to the salon where the death occurred and then on to Veleda's quarters, passing the atrium as we walked to and fro. We might have picked the escort's brains – but she was apparently a new acquisition to this wonderful home, straight off the boat from Scythia and spoke no Latin.

As we took a look around the grounds outside, we commented coolly on whether it was likely such a household would buy slaves who could not communicate. Midges around the stately ornamental canals were bothering Helena, so we walked back through the topiary, towards the carriage I had hired. A man was standing beside it hopefully. 'Any chance of a lift back to Rome?' Before I could tell him to get lost, he introduced himself as Aedemon, the doctor who attended Quadrumatus Labeo. I winked at Helena, but she was already assuring him demurely that we had plenty of room for a little one to squeeze in.

Was she joking! Aedemon weighed about three hundred and sixty Roman pounds. Like many overweight men, he gave no sign of recognising that he was enormous. He hopped aboard, squeezing his bell-bottomed body through the flimsy door with a couple of sideways twists. We had to let him take one seat of the carriage, which dropped unevenly under him; we two squashed together opposite, bouncing about. But I never objected to nestling dose to Helena and this was a wonderful unsought chance to interview the man.

XXXI

Aedemon was an Egyptian; he had left Alexandria twenty years before to bring his skills to bear on the putrefaction that, according to him, ran in Roman veins. I tried to look grateful as, almost uninvited, he described his history and methods. He was an empiricist; he believed all disease started in the bowels. Putrefying food created gases which invaded and poisoned the rest of the body. The only cure was purging and fasting. If purging and fasting was supposed to be the answer, it had not done much for him. He must have his tunics specially woven on a wide loom, or with several lengths joined across the body.

As this great lump made the carriage sag on its axle until the coachwork scraped the road surface, he cheerily proclaimed the Egyptian notion of bodily vessels being blocked by corrupting substances, while I tried not to imagine what would happen if his personal blockages were suddenly flushed out. Apparently you needed to use the right amulets and chants as well as medicine – so I gave fervent thanks to Mercury, god of travel, that these amenities were not in our coach.

Aedemon looked neither Eastern nor African. He had a square, dark-skinned face with lightly crinkled hair, but almost European features. His attitude had its own exotic cast. He seemed honest, and perhaps he was, yet he gave the impression he was alien and devious.

'So what brought you to the house when your patient was out?' Helena hiccuped as the carriage bounced. She was being thrown all over the place. I managed to park an arm across her and grasped the window-frame, wedging her in position. 'I had to deliver a new tincture of hellebore.' 'Quadrumatus Labeo is unhealthy?' 'He's merely rich, Helena,' I interrupted. Aedemon seemed sufficiently worldly to permit my cynical joke. 'He needs his system and his coffers flushed out on a regular basis.. Rich men can't open their bowels themselves, love. They need help.'

Aedemon did give me a sophisticated smile. 'Where you would use a plate of boiled green leaves for loosening purposes, randomly selected, I give him a measured dose of an aperient, yes.' 'More scientific?' asked Helena. 'More precise.' 'More expensive,' I muttered. 'But Quadrumatus is a fit man. He has a doctor merely because he can afford one?' Helena ventured; Aedemon accepted it from her, and nodded.

Since he seemed amenable, I asked, 'Did you ever have anything to do with Scaeva?' To Aedemon's knowing lift of an eyebrow, I grinned and said frankly, 'Yes, I'm hoping that he was not strictly your patient, so you will not be bound by the Hippocratic Oath!' 'I never attended him formally, Falco. But I was once asked to examine him when Mastarna could not be contacted.' 'What did you think?' 'He had inflamed Eustachian tubes and chronic sinus blockage, which in my opinion called for detailed analysis. In my work, I search for causes.' 'Whereas Mastarna prescribes…?' 'Aminean wine.' Aedemon paused, as if he was about to amplify the statement, but did not add to it. 'You disapproved?' asked Helena. 'Not at all. There is nothing wrong with Aminean wine – in moderate doses. It can cause diarrhoea, in my opinion, though its reputation is for curing that.' 'And it has no effect!' Helena scoffed. 'Our elder daughter has sore throats all the time,' she explained. 'We have tried everything.' 'Try a catmint cordial. My wife used it on all of ours. No harmful effects and a great comforter.'