He ignored the baby when anyone was looking, but Maia had caught him dandling his grandson secretly. He called himself tough, but was an utter softie.
Petronius assumed Petronilla had got herself pregnant purely to annoy him. My wise aunt Maia thought it was an unfortunate accident and was glad Petronilla had had enough sense not to tie herself to whatever male disaster had landed her in trouble. She loved her father and had always been his darling. He was hideously traditional, yet when a crunch came, Lucius Petronius did not let her down.
It went for me, too, I knew that. Had I truly been in difficulty with the aedile, Lucius Petronius would have scooped me out of it. He had played the fool tonight, but only because nothing else was needed.
With Petronilla he refused to stop railing. In the end, Maia biffed his ear and sent him onto their sun terrace. Various children cleared dishes, which left her free to tackle me about Faustus.
I said nothing. What was there to say?
‘Petronius says your fellow “seems all right”.’
Juno and Minerva! I fought back with tactless enquiries about the menopause, until my ear was biffed too. ‘Ow! Girls’ talk. You know you love it.’
‘Don’t push me, Albia.’
We settled down and discussed the auction. I brought her up to date on today’s adventures.
Maia was round (too round, these days) and attractive, her hair still dark − aided by her daughter Cloelia, who was a hairdresser, and a good one, though even Cloelia had failed to tame Maia’s curls. She coped well with being a step-grandmother but her youthful spirit remained. Maia had always been seen as headstrong. She had ideas. She spoke her mind. I didn’t quibble with that − except when she spoke of my chances with Manlius Faustus, a man she had never met and couldn’t judge, even if I wanted to have a chance with him, which, according to what I consistently told the family, I did not.
‘Ideal,’ commented Maia. ‘No risk of Falco having to kill some twerp who can’t keep his tozzle under his tunic.’
‘He’s pious.’
‘He’s unique, then!’
‘Do you want me to tell you about the new strongbox incident or not?’
‘I think I get it. This is a magic container. Every time the lid comes up, a bloated corpse pops out. Does my brother know? He’ll shoot into this conundrum like a belaying pin up a sailor’s arse.’
I had no idea where Maia had learned her nautical naughtiness. It was me who had been married to an ex-marine; her first husband was a horse vet. ‘I am handling it. Don’t say a word to Falco – or Helena.’
‘You’re right, she’s as bad. What’s your plan?’
I spelled out options. From choice, I wanted thoughts from Faustus, but I let my aunt be my sounding board. The first line of enquiry had to be: discover what had upset Callistus Primus so badly. I had suspicions.
‘You think it’s his father? The first body?’ My aunt tossed that in without being asked.
‘Oh, thank you, Maia! I do love solving a problem, then having my grand theories pre-empted.’
She smirked. Always the clever one in the family – and she knew it. ‘Obvious. We took the auction instructions from the father, but since then only the sons have been involved. Primus and Secundus were insistent I send any money straight to them when I cashed up. If their father is dead, I suppose they can’t touch anything else. They have no free cash – they admitted to me they had used up everything from under the mattress, getting their cousin elected.’
‘Which he won’t be. He lost the Emperor’s favour, and now he’s been seriously hurt. He could die.’
‘So no bribes or fines will be coming in from that lucrative magistracy!’ Maia had a cynical view of administration. ‘I assume your lad is doing nicely out of his, by the way. All right: Manlius Faustus is too perfect to exploit the chance. I’m going off him rapidly … So why would Primus start blarting over an empty strongbox, unless he thinks it’s linked to some terrible tragedy?’
‘Bad memories? He might just have been remembering property they lost ten years ago to Mount Vesuvius,’ I conjectured even-handedly.
‘Rubbish! It must have deeper meaning.’ Maia was always brisk.
‘They could have lost family in the eruption, as we did.’
‘Why sell the strongbox at all?’ she demanded. ‘If it has sentimental connections that still make him cry?’
‘Maybe Secundus and Firmus put it in the sale without telling Primus.’
Maia refused to accept it. ‘He came down to watch the bids first time, didn’t he? With the others? Was he easy when Niger secured it?’
‘He looked calm enough that day,’ I confirmed, remembering how the two brothers and Firmus had stood and watched the strongbox being sold. ‘So what about Niger? Have you come across him before?’
‘Oh, yes. He acted as a negotiator for several people. Some folk don’t like to come to auctions in person, perhaps out of shyness or fear that they’ll get carried away and bid too much. Or simply the day and time are inconvenient for them.’
‘Ever had anyone else go back on what their agent did?’
‘No. Sometimes one receives an earful if he fails to buy a wanted piece, or pays too much. That’s just the rough and tumble of patron and agent,’ Maia told me. She added, ‘And I’ve never seen anyone buy back their own goods before.’
I thought about it. ‘If Primus really believes now that his father was the first dead man, I reckon at the original sale he wanted to see if anyone took an unhealthy interest, meaning they could be involved in his father’s death. He wanted things to look normal, yet didn’t want the strongbox to go to someone else.’
Maia followed my thinking. ‘So back at the start he wanted the strongbox sold, for the money. He still thought that, once you told him someone had been dumped in it dead. But after he decided the corpse could be his own father’s, he viewed the box in a horrible new light. No one else should treat his father’s last resting place impiously. He tried to retrieve it discreetly, using Niger.’
I nodded. ‘And then I know they all had a row. Secundus and Firmus didn’t want to keep the chest because either they don’t think the father was ever in it at all or they don’t feel the empty container matters. From what they shouted at each other today, Secundus and Firmus cannot bear to believe the first dead man was Callistus Valens. They see Primus as wrongly fixated, while he blames them for wilful blindness to the truth.’
‘Can’t they just find out by looking at the dead man?’
‘Tried it.’ I told Maia what Fundanus had said about Niger going to view the corpse. ‘Niger claimed he didn’t recognise the man. So he’s then gone back to the Caelian and told the three junior Callisti that it is not Senior.’
Maia frowned. ‘So why is Primus so sure it was Valens? Why would Niger say no to that?’
‘I don’t know. It could be a genuine mistake. Niger had only recently started working for them. He may not have known the father well enough to recognise him. The body was in a repulsive state, Maia.’
‘These three men,’ mused my aunt, ‘have some reason to fear the old one must be dead.’
‘They all seem to care about him. What did you think?’
‘Nice man,’ said Maia, immediately. ‘Something of a rarity!’
‘So they are genuinely upset if something has happened to him … Niger’s wife says he had been sent to the country on an errand earlier. In the week before the auction, the father had stopped sending messages, so let’s say Niger was hired to investigate. He learned nothing. When I turn up to say a corpse has been found, Primus starts brooding. He tells Niger to get back the chest. Niger is also sent to check out the body – Primus knew its location from me. Niger pronounces that it is not Valens, which Secundus and Firmus accept, perhaps too readily. Primus doesn’t believe it. He and the other two quarrel; they are all badly overwrought.’
‘Why didn’t Primus go and have a look himself?’ asked Maia.