We were on foot. In light leather party shoes with sloppy straps and flimsy soles, every uneven pavement tortured our feet. Still, we had no need to mill about making decisions. Our only problem was pushing through the crowds. First the banqueters, who were merrier than they should have been, given how hard it was to find any of the free wine. Then the unfed onlookers, who saw no reason to let people who had an invitation dodge their duties. '10 Saturnalia!' And 10 to you, you gawking menace… We were elbowed and shoved – all in a cheerful spirit, of course – and only escaped after we were bruised and swearing.
I reckoned Anacrites would be heading up the Clivus Capitolinus, so we ducked the other way. I took us through the Arch of Tiberius and the Arch of Janus to the back of the temple, then turned along the dark rear portico of the Basilica. On the Palatine side it was deserted, apart from a few ever-hopeful women of easy virtue, but none tried to approach us. At the far end we took a straight run to the right up the Vicus Tuscus, a swerve as we headed for the Circus Maximus, a rush across the Street of the Twelve Gates. To climb the Aventine, I picked the first steep lane. Temple of Flora, then Temple of the Moon. A veer to the left, a shuffle to the right, and we came out by the Temple of Minerva where I had told Clemens to establish his watch-point. Flanked by enormous double porticoes, the Temple of Diana sprawled at an angle, right next door, just beyond our arrival point.
Everywhere should have been silent and in darkness, but the piazza in front of the temples was ablaze with lamps, music and excited voices. We had picked a bad night. The neighbourhood was choked with a crowd of manumitted slaves, who claimed the goddess Diana as a patron. Their main celebration is supposed to be the slaves' holiday on the Ides of August, the day when the temple was inaugurated centuries before; at Saturnalia, freedmen pull their cap of liberty back on if they are tired of being sober citizens and want another chance to indulge in riotous behaviour. The singing, dancing crowd was intermingled with others whose shyness suggested they were fugitives. If these furtive souls had been hiding up at the temple, they had now ventured outside to party in the streets, thinking the festival gave them security. But I thought I recognised some from my dark adventure on the Appian Way. I certainly knew their alarming habits. A flock of them were swooping around like uninvited guests, obviously trying to unnerve other people.
'Hello, pretty boy!' Clemens greeted me, with a teasing glance at my blue tunic and soft shoes. Dropping the joke, the acting centurion helped a sword belt over my head. Concealing it beneath my cloak, I nestled the familiar weight of the weapon under my right arm. The others were carrying too. It was illegal – but the laws for private citizens in Rome had not been composed to cover occasions when you might have to search the oldest temple recorded by the pontiff, looking for an enemy of the state. 'This is a bit busy, Falco!' 'The night is going to be fun. I warn you, we'll be vying with the Praetorian Guards.' 'Marcus knows how to organise a good night out,' Helena told Clemens, perhaps with pride in me. 'I-o!'
We had a hard time squeezing through the crazy revellers. By the time we reached the altar court below the steep steps to the Temple of Diana, nothing was going as planned. Coming towards us from the gentle dogleg of the Clivus Publicius I now saw Anacrites' litter, presumably with him lolling inside, massaging his twisted ankle. A small armed escort marched behind. The few Guards who had peeled off from imperial duties at the Temple of Saturn would have been a manageable group for us. But I saw with despondence that a much larger force had already formed up here in the compressed outdoor altar space, waiting to rendezvous with the Spy. Pressing forward, Clemens had seen neither the new arrivals nor their waiting phalanx of colleagues. I nudged him hard. 'Hold off! 'Shit on a stick!' he muttered, behind his hand. He hissed an order and the lads pulled up. We edged back, hoping to hide in the crowd.
No luck. Anacrites had seen us. He had his litter carried right alongside. His sleek head appeared through the curtains. 'Falco! You were perfectly right and I should have listened. Your prescience is wonderful.' Sickened by his fake adulation, I stared around for its cause. The Spy pointed happily. Two figures approached at a fast trot from the direction of Fountain Court: Lentullus, with his ears looking big on a shaven head, loping breathlessly after my taller, faster brother-in-law. ' You warned me I did the wrong thing keeping him in custody. I should have let him go myselЈ If the priestess will not come to him,' Anacrites gloated, 'you knew that Camillus Justinus would come straight to her!'
XLI
The Temple of Diana Aventinensis had been built to dominate the major peak of the Hill. After centuries of isolation, it had succumbed to the crush when the Aventine became a popular living space, and it had lost its drama. The view from afar was lost. The altar court was nothing like the grand meat-slaughtering area at Ephesus, where the warm cuts from daily sacrifice feed the entire city. On the Aventine, noisy, narrow streets abutted the two long portico wings, and the front steps came down into an equally squashed thoroughfare where the altar lurked amidst normal toings and froings. It was no place to hold a riot.
The situation deteriorated rapidly. Trust a mob to sense a carnivaclass="underline" the frolicking freedmen immediately saw that they were unwanted obstructions to an official operation. They whooped and set out to disrupt it. Waving their caps of liberty, they began taunting the Guards, oblivious to danger.
Among them, ran a man I had seen on the Via Appia, the one who tootled a one-note pipe until your teeth gritted. I wanted to ask him if he knew anything about the boy flautist from the Quadrumatus house, but I was not free to deal with that.
The Praetorians were not only armed, but every one was an ex-centurion. Many had made it to the top: first-spear, chief centurion in a legion, hard-bitten as they come. All of them were just what you would expect from soldiers who had served out their time yet could not bear to leave the service. These types always begged to be allowed an extra stint in the legions. Then, instead of becoming veterans with provincial farms, the gnarled obsessives signed up for yet another posting, on imperial protection duty. Many had never even been to Rome before. With their special camp on the city outskirts that acted like an enormous officers' club, their fabulous figured breastplates and their immense scarlet helmet crests – not to mention their privileged position so close to the Emperor – they then thought they had been posted to be gods on Mount Olympus.
They rarely had a chance to do more than ceremonial duties. Their mood was edgy. Most of these bullies would at some period have served a tour in Germany; inevitably, some must have been there in the Year of the Four Emperors, during the bloody rebellion Veleda caused. The barbarian element in their duties tonight must be unsettling them. Grim-faced, scarred, and solid as slaughtered beef carcasses, they were keyed up to whip out their swords and fight someone. It could be anyone who offended them. These bastards had a low threshold for annoyance and once they were riled, they were not fussy whom they took it out on.
'Hold off!' I ordered my little gang. 'We can't engage with Praetorians.' The lads looked disappointed. I was not sure I could control them. Clemens, inexperienced as an acting centurion, looked as if where they led he would follow.
I had other problems. Anacrites jumped from his conveyance. Before I could intervene, Helena Justina stormed up to him. Delight at being in ascendance had healed his ankle magically, but Helena looked ready to kick his legs from under him. She had not yet spotted her brother; she was concentrating on the Chief Spy. Ever since Anacrites and I once worked together on the Census, she treated him like my junior clerk.