Helena soothed the children. Helena made Silvia comfortable with blankets and cushions in Petro's room. Helena saw to the doctor, shooed off the sightseers, and reassured Ollia and Larius. I even saw her with Ollia, feeding the children's kittens. Then she sent a message to the villa that she was staying here.

I went round the inn, as Petronius used to every night.

I stood on the road outside, listening to the darkness, hating whoever had done this, plotting revenge. I knew who it must have been: Atius Pertinax.

I looked in on the stables and fed Nero hay by hand. Indoors again in the room where Petro had been taken, Silvia rocked gently, nursing Tadia in her arms. I smiled, but we did not speak because the children were asleep. I knew Silvia blamed me. For once we had nothing to quarrel about: I blamed myself.

I snuffed all the tapers except one, then sat with him. Tonight his features contained strange hollows. Under the bruises from his headlong fall his face seemed so lacking in colour and emotion it was like another man's. I had known him for ten years; we had shared a barracks at the back of the world in Britain and a tent on forced marches during the Iceni troubles. Back in Rome afterwards, Petronius and I had split more wine jars than I cared to remember, scoffed at each other's women, laughed at each other's habits, exchanged favours and jokes, rarely squabbled except when his work clashed with mine. He was a brother to me, where my own had been almost too colourful to tolerate.

He never knew I was there. Eventually I left him, with his two elder daughters curled asleep against his side.

•

I walked upstairs, watchful and conserving my resources. I turned up the mattress on his bed and found, where I knew it would be, Petro's sword. I stood it beside my own bed.

In our other room, Helena was talking to Ollia and Larius; I looked in to say goodnight, needing to count heads. I managed to croak at Helena pompously. 'This is very inadequate, but thank you for staying. It would be chaos without you. I don't mean to burden you with our troubles…'

'Your troubles are my troubles,' Helena replied steadily.

I smiled, unable to cope with it, then jerked my head at Larius. 'Time for bed.'

But Helena was persuading Ollia to confide in her and Larius seemed part of the seminar, so after I had left them the murmur of their voices continued for some time.

It was the third hour of darkness. I was lying on my back, with folded arms, studying the top of a window recess on the opposite wall as I waited for the day and my chance to extract my revenge. A board creaked; I expected Larius but it was Helena.

We knew each other so well we never spoke. I held out my hand to her, and made space on the awful bed. She blew out her lamp and I damped it to stop the wick smelling, then I thumbed mine too.

Now I was lying on my back with my arms folded, but this time they were folded tight round Helena. Her cold feet found a place to warm themselves under one of mine. I have a clear recollection of how we both sighed at that moment, though I cannot say which of us fell asleep first.

Nothing happened. There is more than one reason for sharing a bed. Helena wanted to be with me. And I needed her there.

LXIX

For the next three days I scoured the Bay in a hired vessel from Pompeii, a slow ship with a dull captain who could not, or would not, grasp my urgency. Once again I was searching for the Isis Africana and once again it seemed a waste of time. Every night I went back to the inn, exhausted and morose. Petronius started to regain consciousness late the first day, deeply quiet and puzzled at his own condition, yet essentially himself. Not even his gradual recovery comforted my bitter mood. As I expected, he could remember nothing about the attack.

On the third day I wrote to Rufus, offering to join forces. I told him what had happened, and named the new charge against Pertinax: attempted murder of a Roman watch captain, Lucius Petronius Longus. The boy who took my message returned, asking me to visit the Aemilius house. Larius drove me in Nero's cart.

Rufus was out. It was his sister who wanted to see me.

I met Aemilia Fausta in a cold room where the heavy shadow of a walnut tree outside fell across the open shutter. She looked smaller and thinner than ever. Her pallor was increased by the unflattering tones of an insipid aquamarine gown.

I was annoyed. 'I expected your brother. Did he get my letter?' Anticipating my reaction, she nodded guiltily. 'I see! But he'll manage the hunt without me?'

'My brother says informers have no part in civic life-'

'Your brother says too much!' I let her see I was angry; I had wasted a journey, and lost a day of my search.

'I am sorry,' Aemilia Fausta interrupted carefully, 'about your friend. Was he badly hurt, Falco?'

'Whoever hit him wanted to crack someone's skull apart.'

'His?'

'Mine.'

'Will he recover?'

'We hope so. I can't say more.'

She was sitting bolt upright in a wicker chair, a long fringed scarf twisted across her lap. She had a numb expression and her voice sounded colourless.

'Falco, is it certain the attacker was Pertinax Marcellus?'

'No one else has a motive. Plenty of people dislike me; but not enough to want me dead!'

'My brother,' she went on, 'believes it is an advantage that Crispus and Pertinax are together now-'

'Your brother's wrong. Pertinax has lost all sense of morality; these wild attacks-and there have been others-show the full extent of his breakdown. Crispus just needs his big ideas trimmed.'

'Yes, Falco,' Fausta agreed quietly.

Giving her a thoughtful scrutiny I said, 'Vespasian disagrees with his politics, and you don't like his private life-but that does not affect his potential for public service.'

'No,' she acknowledged, with a sad smile.

My scalp tingled expectantly. 'Are you offering me some information, lady?'

'Perhaps. My brother has arranged to meet Crispus with a view to arresting Pertinax. I am frightened what may happen. Sextus can be impetuous-'

'Sextus? Oh, your brother! I gather Pertinax is unaware they have arranged this friendly rendezvous?' I wondered if Aufidius Crispus had now made his choice: to secure Vespasian's favour by handing over the fugitive. (Or whether he was simply shedding himself of an embarrassment before he made his own bid for the throne.) Meanwhile, in some way he would probably bungle, Aemilius Rufus was attempting to snatch Pertinax so he could roll into Rome covered with glory… In this high-flown project I noticed nobody was planning any active role for me. 'Aemilia Fausta, where is the meeting?'

'At sea. My brother left before lunch for Misenum.'

I frowned. 'He would be wise not to trust the fleet. Crispus has close associates among the trierarchs-'

'So,' confided Aemilia Fausta, more drily, 'has my brother!'

'Ah!' I said.

Darting off at a tangent, the lady abruptly enquired, 'Is there anything I can send to help your friend and his family?'

'Nothing special. Thanks for the thought…'

As in most things, Fausta seemed to expect rebuff. 'You think it's none of my business.'

'Correct,' I said. A thought crossed my mind which I dismissed as disloyal to Petronius.

I could see that Aemilia Fausta would be just the type to jump straight from her passionate infatuation with Crispus to a single-minded crush on anyone so foolish as to listen to her troubles. This scenario was no new one. Being a big, tolerant type (who loved something dainty to cuddle on his knee), my tentmate Petronius had left in his wake many fervent little ladies who regarded him as their saviour for reasons I was too embarrassed to enquire about. He usually stayed friends with them. So he would not want me to quarrel with Fausta on his behalf.