"Not any longer! You with the Praetorians?" she spat at me.
I played down my astonishment. "Life's too short!" I waited after that. It was the only thing to do, since I had no idea what I was waiting for. She seemed to consider whether I could be trusted, then after a moment, out it spilled.
"They came here afterwards. They didn't care about him, they only wanted information."
Tell them anything?"
"What do you think! He was good to me when he had any money... I went to the Temple; I buried him myself. Falco, he may have been found in the river, but I know he didn't drown. They told me at the Temple he must have tipped in when he was drunk. But when he was drunk that was probably quite often, but I had more tact than to ask "he used to lie down in the cart and let the horse walk him home."
"Anyone find the cart?"
"Left in the Cattle Market Forum, minus the horse." "Hmm. What did the Guards want, princess?" "He had found something valuable. He wouldn't tell me what, but it frightened him. He handed it in at the nearest lockup instead of selling it himself. The Guards knew he found it. They didn't know what he had done with it." So it was not the Guards who snatched young Sosia. Unlikely anyway; she would not have escaped so easily she might never have escaped at all.
"I'll have to speak to them. Any chance of a name?" Astia knew very little. Their captain, she told me, was called Julius Frontinus. As a member of an elite regiment, he undoubtedly possessed the full three names of a substantial man, but two were enough for me to pin him down. For the first time in my life I volunteered to face an interview with the Emperor's Praetorian Guards.
XV
The Praetorian Camp was on the far side of the city. I walked slowly. I was expecting when I got there to be crushed like an eggshell beneath a Guard's heavy boot...
I recognized Frontinus at once. He wore an enamelled breastplate and a great silver buckle on his belt, but he had once learned his alphabet sharing a stool under the primary school awning at the corner of our street, side by side with a curly haired rogue called Didius Festus. To Julius Frontinus, therefore, I was a national hero's baby brother and since he could no longer take Festus to a tavern and get him joyously drunk because Festus was dead in the desert in Judaea he took me.
It was a discreet, well-run winery, way out in the northeast corner of Rome, near the Viminal Gate, full of soldiers from the city regiments and very businesslike. There was no food. There were no women. There was every kind of liquor, warm and cold, spiced or straight, charged well over the odds, though I was not allowed to pay. On my own I would never have got a foot indoors. With Frontinus, no one gave me a second glance.
We sat among a group of tall, well-padded men who openly overheard but never spoke. Frontinus must have known them; they seemed to know whatever he was going to say. Getting him to say it took a while. When a man like that invites you out drinking it is understood that prior to business there must be ceremonial. Ours, in honour of me and as a pleasure for him, was to discuss heroes and their heroism until we were both maudlin drunk.
After we talked about Festus and before I passed out, I managed to ask some questions. Before Frontinus sent me home in a builder's waggon with a load of ridging tiles, he managed to answer them.
"Whyever did he do it?" Frontinus was still musing. "First up the town wall at Bethel, so first dead. Nothing to do for the rest of eternity but let his gravestone whiten in the desert sun. Lunatic!"
"Wanted to cash his deposit with the burial club. Couldn't bear losing all those stoppages from his pay. So, patriotic brother, Hail and Farewell!"
It was two years since Festus died, towards the end of Vespasian's Galilean campaign, though so much had happened in the city since then that it seemed much longer. Yet I could not believe he had gone. In some ways I never will. I am still waiting
I played down my astonishment. "Life's too short!" I waited after that. It was the only thing to do, since I had no idea what I was waiting for. She seemed to consider whether I could be trusted, then after a moment, out it spilled.
"They came here afterwards. They didn't care about him, they only wanted information."
Tell them anything?"
"What do you think! He was good to me when he had any money... I went to the Temple; I buried him myself. Falco, he may have been found in the river, but I know he didn't drown. They told me at the Temple he must have tipped in when he was drunk. But when he was drunk that was probably quite often, but I had more tact than to ask "he used to lie down in the cart and let the horse walk him home."
"Anyone find the cart?"
"Left in the Cattle Market Forum, minus the horse." "Hmm. What did the Guards want, princess?" "He had found something valuable. He wouldn't tell me what, but it frightened him. He handed it in at the nearest lockup instead of selling it himself. The Guards knew he found it. They didn't know what he had done with it." So it was not the Guards who snatched young Sosia. Unlikely anyway; she would not have escaped so easily she might never have escaped at all.
"I'll have to speak to them. Any chance of a name?" Astia knew very little. Their captain, she told me, was called Julius Frontinus. As a member of an elite regiment, he undoubtedly possessed the full three names of a substantial man, but two were enough for me to pin him down. For the first time in my life I volunteered to face an interview with the Emperor's Praetorian Guards.
XV
The Praetorian Camp was on the far side of the city. I walked slowly. I was expecting when I got there to be crushed like an eggshell beneath a Guard's heavy boot...
I recognized Frontinus at once. He wore an enamelled breastplate and a great silver buckle on his belt, but he had once learned his alphabet sharing a stool under the primary school awning at the corner of our street, side by side with a curly haired rogue called Didius Festus. To Julius Frontinus, therefore, I was a national hero's baby brother and since he could no longer take Festus to a tavern and get him joyously drunk because Festus was dead in the desert in Judaea he took me.
It was a discreet, well-run winery, way out in the northeast corner of Rome, near the Viminal Gate, full of soldiers from the city regiments and very businesslike. There was no food. There were no women. There was every kind of liquor, warm and cold, spiced or straight, charged well over the odds, though I was not allowed to pay. On my own I would never have got a foot indoors. With Frontinus, no one gave me a second glance.
We sat among a group of tall, well-padded men who openly overheard but never spoke. Frontinus must have known them; they seemed to know whatever he was going to say. Getting him to say it took a while. When a man like that invites you out drinking it is understood that prior to business there must be ceremonial. Ours, in honour of me and as a pleasure for him, was to discuss heroes and their heroism until we were both maudlin drunk.
After we talked about Festus and before I passed out, I managed to ask some questions. Before Frontinus sent me home in a builder's waggon with a load of ridging tiles, he managed to answer them.
"Whyever did he do it?" Frontinus was still musing. "First up the town wall at Bethel, so first dead. Nothing to do for the rest of eternity but let his gravestone whiten in the desert sun. Lunatic!"
"Wanted to cash his deposit with the burial club. Couldn't bear losing all those stoppages from his pay. So, patriotic brother, Hail and Farewell!"
It was two years since Festus died, towards the end of Vespasian's Galilean campaign, though so much had happened in the city since then that it seemed much longer. Yet I could not believe he had gone. In some ways I never will. I am still waiting
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