Oracle of the Dead(38)

“And you suspect the Oracle staff was behind the disappearance of your master?”

“Sir, he was set up! They as much as told him to take along plenty of extra cash this trip. And I never heard of an oracle saying anything outright like that. Worst thing is, I helped them do it.” Apparently she had been fond of her master. We always want to believe that our slaves love us, but this is seldom the case.

“You are blameless. How could you suspect that an idle conversation would lead to your master being waylaid by robbers? You divulged no secrets. No court would hold you accountable.”

“I still feel terrible about it.”

“You needn’t. Now, Floria, you must tell me something else.”

“I’ve already told you what I know.”

“For that I am quite grateful. You have been a great help to my investigation. But when you called me in here, you were very apprehensive. Frightened, in fact. Why?”

She was quiet for a moment, her arms crossed before her as if she were cold on this warm afternoon. “Word has been going around, Praetor. Nothing open, but when I go to the market or down to the corner fountain for water and some gossip, I keep hearing the same thing: It’s going to be bad for anyone who helps this Roman praetor in the matter of the temples and the killings. It’s something everybody just seems to know: This is a local matter, no need to get Rome involved. Keep quiet if you know anything, or it’ll be the worse for you.”

“I wish you would let me place you under my protection.”

“In a few days, this matter will be over one way or another and you’ll be gone, Praetor. But I’ll have to live here the rest of my life. I don’t know any other place and I don’t want to start over somewhere like Rome.”

“Very well, but if you feel in any way threatened, come to me instantly.”

“I will, Praetor, and now I think you should go.” She went to the door and opened it just enough to stick her head out. She scanned the alley both ways, then motioned for me to go. I stepped outside, hand on dagger again, but the alley was deserted.

As I made my interrupted way toward the city gate and my waiting horse, I thought about what I had just heard. Of course, my first thoughts were of how I might have been tricked and gulled. Was she a plant? It was known that I would be in Stabiae that day, but nobody could have known that I would on a whim choose to wander about the city alone. I had chosen that particular alley because I did not know the town and it seemed as good a way as any to find the forum and thence the gate. Try as I might, I couldn’t see how she could have been planted in my path.

As for the rest, it sounded plausible enough. It hardly seemed shocking that a foreign cult was acting as a cover for a robbery ring, though ten years at the minimum seemed a long time for it to stay under wraps. Of course, the late Lucius Terentius had been neatly disposed of in a manner that would not have cast suspicion on the Oracle. People are lost at sea every year, hundreds of them even in a year of good sailing weather. Also, they need not fleece all of their customers, just the ones who present a prospect of high profit and safe disposal somewhere far away.

Still, this said nothing about the murder of the priests of Apollo. I could not tie them to a ten-year-old murder, and the circumstances of their deaths had no apparent connection with the fraud, larceny, and murder perpetrated by the Oracle below them. There was always the possibility that the woman had some other motive entirely. Perhaps she had some personal grudge against the cult of Hecate and merely wished to blacken them in my eyes, not that I required much in that direction.

At the public stable by the gate, I retrieved my horse and mounted. The guard at the gate gave me directions to the villa where Sabinilla lived. The ride was pleasant and nothing occurred to disturb my fruitless cogitations. A fine, paved road turned off the main road, leading to the villa. It was situated on a cliff-lined spit of land jutting into the sea, with breathtaking views in all directions. I could hardly have imagined a more dramatic setting. The main house occupied the very tip of the spit, so that a suicidally inclined occupant could simply dive off a back terrace to end all his problems. There were times when that extreme act seemed attractive to me. As I had feared, Julia was waiting for me at the top of the steps leading to the house.

Of course she didn’t shout. She was too proper a patrician wife for that.

“Decius!” she hissed. “Have you lost your mind?” Her hiss could probably be heard in Rome. Maybe in Gaul. “What are you doing wandering off alone?”

“I’m grown, my dear. I don’t require a pedagogues.”