Roman Games(32)

“His name was Hylas,” Lucius offered. “One of my father’s recent purchases. Kept him all for himself, too. Quite a tender morsel, I imagine.”

“But he wasn’t an atheist,” said Pliny. “He sacrificed yesterday, didn’t he?”

Lucius nodded.

“And he’s not a Jew either, sir,” Valens observed. The boy’s tunic was up around his waist, his tender nakedness exposed. It was also apparent that, while the other slaves were beaten and bloodied as well as strangled, Hylas had only been strangled. His throat was bruised but he was otherwise unmarked.

There were too many mysteries here, and Pliny was a man impatient of mysteries. Why hadn’t he questioned Pollux harder yesterday? Wills, contracts, account books were his meat, not this foul business. He squeezed the bridge of his nose between thumb and finger. He would insist that Aurelius Fulvus take him off the case.

“Centurion, question the slaves. I want to know who killed Pollux. Flog them, if you have to.” Was this him speaking, who had never ordered a slave flogged in his life?

Valens looked happy to obey. He saluted and turned away. Then turned back again. “Sir, there’s another thing, too.”

Whatever it was, Pliny didn’t want to hear it. But the centurion pressed on. “There’s another person in the house. A lady. She keeps to her room, we only came across her yesterday when some of the lads were, you know, exploring. Nobody had mentioned her to us.”

“What! Where?”



“At the end of the corridor there, near Verpa’s room.”



Pliny shot a questioning look at Lucius.



She was some house guest, the young man explained. He didn’t know anything about her really except that she seemed sickly. He’d hardly seen her since she arrived. Didn’t catch her name. What with everything else, he’d forgotten all about her.

Pliny sighed. He hadn’t learned much so far. He supposed it couldn’t hurt to have a word with this woman.

He tapped on the indicated door. Hearing a faint answer within, he opened it but hesitated on the threshold. She lay on a couch in the shuttered room, covered with a blanket although it was very hot. “Please come in, you aren’t disturbing me. I am Amatia,” she said in answer to his unspoken question. “And you are…?” The voice was low-pitched, warm, though with undertones of weariness in it. She threw off the cover and sat up as he entered. A short woman, pleasantly stout.

Pliny introduced himself and explained the reason for his presence in the house. When he mentioned Verpa her eyes seemed to widen momentarily. “I’m told you were here when the murder occurred. You didn’t perhaps hear anything that night, madam?”

She shook her head, no. Pliny came closer and searched her face. It was a serious, sensitive face. He guessed her age at forty-five or fifty, though she might have been younger. Clearly, illness had aged her: there were deep furrows of strain around the mouth. Her skin was translucent, without a touch of powder, and her graying hair was parted severely in the middle and pulled back from her forehead in a style that had gone out of fashion a generation ago. In face, she reminded Pliny of his mother, who had died when he was a boy. He began falteringly, “How long have you been in this house, madam?

“Six days.”



“And may I ask who you are?”



“I am Amatia, a widow from Lugdunum in Gaul.”



He waited, but no more was forthcoming. It seemed he would have to draw every answer out of her. “A long way away, Lugdunum. And may I ask what has brought you to Rome?”

“If you must know, I have traveled here to become an initiate of beloved Queen Isis and seek a cure for my hysteria. Doctors say that the womb is an animal with no fixed home. In my case it climbs up to my chest. The symptoms are unbearable. I can’t breathe or speak. I lose control of my limbs, I faint.”

“Dear me. Is there no cure?”

“My physician makes me inhale sulfur and other evil-smelling things to drive the womb down to its proper place, but the effect is only temporary. And so, at last, I have turned to religion. The goddess appeared to me in a dream, beautiful in her mantle of shifting colors, and exhaling breath like the spices of Arabia. She told me what I must do and promised to heal me. We must believe in our dreams, mustn’t we?”

“Oh, to be sure,” said Pliny, who didn’t.

“I came with my physician, Iatrides, half a dozen slaves, and a strongbox full of money for the initiation fee. When we disembarked at Ostia, the slaves robbed us of everything and ran off, leaving us alone and penniless.”

Pliny gave a sympathetic shake of his head. It was all too common a story.