WHO?
After finding some first-aid for Gavius – a jug of very fine wine to calm my nerves – we were hurried through the bordello hallways past several empty rooms furnished with all manner of beds and torture racks. I had a sense these Etrurians sure knew how to party.
Then we were out the back door to remove suspicion from the premises in question – even though any magistrate brave enough to enter this precinct would have Claudius' closed just by the air of malcontent it exuded.
Not wishing to appear as a likely pair who had soiled their underwear, we ambled away from Lower Town at a brisk sprint. We found Merdius nosing about in a pile of rubbish, his saddle and fittings helpfully missing.
Gavius was gabbling something hysterical about rabies and “my fault”, so I comforted him by saying he was showing all the classic symptoms. Well, I had to say something, and I had enough on my mind already.
For starters, I had to find Porcia. If Claudius woke up – or the real Phantom arrived today, I was going to need protection. Secondly, I had to find a way back into Claudius' – you try giving up on a flounder full of bankable bonds. There had to be a way. Of course escaping Arretium with my classic Latin looks intact was also important – but the cash? I am one part Macedonian after all.
By the Fates and Fortuna, our Second Lady was still at Martha's – on her third pot of cumin, leek and stray animal. She was blissfully unconcerned by our plight. Even though Gavius was clearly pale from shock, blood loss and spastic bowel, our little Porcia continued to spoon the broth only into her mouth. I knew I was going to have to split the takings.
“Come on – just a taste,” I said hoping to warm her up.
“No sod off – the gods know what I'll catch if you lick my spoon.”
“You can have some of this?” I offered the jar I was carefully nursing.
“Its only a jug – can you spare it?”
“It's only a stew pot, can you spare it,” I goaded her, which turned out to be a bad idea.
She had hands the speed of lightning and I had detached ear lobes for the taking.
“What is it then?” she stared into my black eyes.
My only delight was knowing she couldn't make them any blacker. Somehow I knew this was going to cost me again.
For the second time in an hour she had me on the back-foot, so I curled my lip as if it were nothing and shrugged, “Arretium's finest Chianti.”
To my complete distress of not understanding just what I held, she glanced only at Claudius' blue “C” on the jar and spat, “Not the wine – what trouble have you got yourselves into?”
“No trouble – nothing at all,” I stammered, with an attempted shake of the head.
“So why does Gavius look like he's been worked over by a Gladiator with the penchant for nostril lifting?” Porcia threw her red hair in his deflated and collapsed direction.
“It was a dog,” I answered – remembering how my old Ma's wooden spoon had demonstrated why I should always tell the truth.
“Bollocks.”
Even being straight wasn't working.
I began to consider if I could do without hearing in one ear.
“Alright…Alright.”
I winced at the extra twist.
“We met someone new,” I gave way, but she kept on twisted my ear until I couldn't hear my girlie-screams any more, “He runs a brothel in Lower Town…He offered me three hundred thousand to stitch up some toff up on the Acropolis.”
“Really?” she eyed me suspiciously.
“Really…For the love of the gods, ease off woman…Haven't you heard of Paterfamilias?”
That was my trump card – never underestimate that most powerful law of man's right over woman, and the possibility that come one day some man would be brave enough to enact it.
“You're not my husband,” she growled in such a manner that I should be very glad if I never was.
“For a share of three hundred thousand, we could always pretend,” I suggested, knowing how difficult it was for any woman to pass up my dry pasty skin, only a faint mono-brow – not two mating caterpillars as my Pa once called them – and general youthful inexperience in the bedroom, or any where else for that matter.
“Why? You already sleep by yourself and whatever you pinch I'm going to get anyway.”
She had a point there. Once again Porcia had walked me into a corner. But I wouldn't be made to beg.
“Please Porcia. Please, I beg of you – please, please, it's a King's ransom and then some.”
Clearly moved she eased her grip on a numb lobe and asked, “What's in it for me aside from fifty percent?”
Obviously still-bleeding Gavius was cut out – or did she really think I was going to split my share with him? So I had to add some other sweetener it seemed. Nothing sprung to mind, so – as I tried not stare at her rather shapely and clearly offered cleavage – my fall-back option had to make do.
“My undying love?”
“I'd want seventy-five percent for that,” she sneered in such a way a lessor man might very well have thought it meant to hurt.
By the gods this woman could bargain, one day she would be Rome's top Actor's Agent or lead a legion against the city – the affect would be much the same. I had to think of something fast. Something that had honour, dignity and perhaps Merdius learning to gallop.
“How about never having to see me or Gavius again?”
“That was more what I was thinking,” she smiled.
At this point we should have started formulating an exciting infallible plot. The kind to deliver riches and cut out Gavius while still abusing his trust and skills. However, as is want to happen when things begin to swing my way, the Fates took a nap or Mercury and his useless slap-happy friends grabbed my destiny for a bit of fun.
I should have known the moment I felt a heavy hand on my shoulder. And it wasn't Porcia's. She instead eyed me from her stool with a wicked gleam, clearly seeing that like Gavius; I was about to be cut out of the deal – permanently. Claudius must have found me. Yet though my bladder eased its grip on my gravitas, my fingers never slipped on the precious wine jar.
“Where'd you flog that from,” came the familiar voice, spoken with all the class of a monkey learning German.
I was done for – it was Baebius – he'd steal his one hundred percent share if he caught on. Greek's, by the way, just can't speak rough Latin – rather, they tend to sound as though they're ordering something posh involving stuffed snails and garlic.
I slowly turned around, to bring the full splendour of our leading actor and manager into view. He was wearing a red tunic so fashionable the style hadn't caught on yet. His face glowed warmly – not even lunchtime and he was already half-snotted – while gleaming white teeth – showing a lot of gold wire holding them in place poked out of his smile like a buck-toothed donkey.
What half of Rome's women – the other half just hadn't met him yet – saw in this cove I just did not know. And now he had the gall to call this honest actor a thief.
“I was given it,” I grinned – suggesting the jar of wine was mine and he would have to prise it from my cold dead fingers.
“Claudius',” he nodded knowingly – with the manner of one realising they were about to prise a jar of wine from a wanted man's cold dead fingers.
It was Porcia who interrupted the silence as I tried to see if there was a place to flee.
“You know him?”
“Just met,” the cad answered as if he and the behemoth were on the best of terms, “Went there first – good local. Knows this town like he owned it. He organised a show for us.”
“Not another seedy brothel where the only applause we get is – show us your tits,” Porcia groaned, even though in all our shows those catcalls had been the pinnacle of our performance – and that Curtia frequently obliged the crowd even if they didn't ask.
“My dear lady, when I tell you that dirty hovels and backrooms are behind us, you'll thank me in any of many pleasant ways,” Baebius sighed with his best breathless asthmatic – like he had a chance with this girl.
“Really?” she purred as if he just might – by the gods she had never sounded so interested in me.
“Yes, my bonny lass, yes you will,” our lead answered as if he were already imagining how she would drape him in her buxom finery.
It was as if I didn't exist…and Gavius too.
Taking her small hand to stroke it he cooed, “Guess who has a summer house here?”
“Who?” Porcia replied leaning closer towards him.
For goodness sake, where was Curtia when I needed her.
He took a breath as if he was a steward announcing dinner and intoned a name I didn't expect, “Metrobius.”
Metrobius, super star of Roman stage, the finest female impersonator, comedian and arts connoisseur of our time – camp as a trireme load of Greek sailors a day from port too. Still that was part and part of our profession, an open mind or open purse were always handy. The main thing was him being filthy rich. Why, he could even make my flounder's contents look ordinary.
Somewhere around this moment, my addled mind wandered back to Claudius' and our conversation of the barkeep sending an acting troupe up to the villa of the poor git about to greet the afterlife. So that was that then. Old Metrobius had made one too many jokes about three inches and Etrurian men. Pity, I had always wanted to see one of his shows. Still better to run away than to be a suspect. It was said this old darling was very, very well connected.
“So when's the show for the old cove?” I asked, deciding to balance the arrival of the real phantom and my departure as best as possible.
Not taking his stare away from Porcia, Baebius smiled, “Tomorrow for lunch…And we had best be well rehearsed. No bunkum and balls this time.”
He looked up and considered Gavius sitting hunched over on the footpath, where once again he had just tried to throw up.
“I want the best Eunuch you've ever been, old son. If you need to be more in touch with your character I will oblige you.”
“My, my – why so touchy Baebius – I'm certain Metrobius will have seen worse than you…us,” our two-faced second lady offered.
“Well,” he began, as if weighed down by some great secret – as if he could keep one, “the truth is, Metrobius won't be alone.”
The Greek paused for dramatic effect.
“Lucius Cornelius Sulla is coming up from Rome tonight,” he laughed of the coup, “Our little troupe is to meet the approval, and just rewards, of the Dictator of our mighty Republic.”
It took me a good five minutes to realise I had dropped my jar of wine.
