He confirmed Diomedes’ story. These two were old cronies who often got at amphorae while they were standing unattended outside dining rooms; this pair had even been known to raid the stores, if they thought they could get away with it. On the night in question, in the free and easy atmosphere that followed the wedding, these unreformed wine-stealers had cheerfully managed to make themselves paralytic. Amethystus heard nothing. His only memory was of waking woozily to find everyone else running around in panic, with the master dead. Had they been sober, according to him, he and Diomedes would have given the intruders a good thumping.

I would have to ask my uncles about this: what penalty pinching fine wines carried for these slaves – and would their blind intoxication exonerate the drunks from their obligation to protect their master’s life?

Next I sent for Daphnus, to see whether as server at the feast he knew about amphorae being raided. Unsurprisingly, he did. I wondered if he had a tipple himself.

This tall young man was snappy and smart, the only one who had somehow obtained an ornament (a cheap amulet, hung on a thong) and better shoes than the general issue (probably his master’s cast-offs; they looked too big for him). He had oiled hair and he oozed ambition.

He was the first to check my role. ‘Are you the one who is going to get us off?’

‘That depends on your story, Daphnus, and whether I believe it. Even if I do, I shall need to pin the deaths of your master and mistress on somebody else before you can be reprieved.’

He looked crestfallen.

His work consisted of delivering refreshments to the family and visitors, and serving formally at table; when the chef was absent (the chef was among the staff sent to Campania), Daphnus even carved the meats, a task in which he considered himself an expert. He must have been indoors doing that when the two others siphoned off half an amphora, he maintained.

‘Would you have reported them, if you saw them do it?’

‘Oh yes,’ he assured me, unconvincingly.

He told me he wanted to make something of himself, gain his freedom, start a small business. If Polycarpus could manage that, Daphnus reckoned anybody could.

‘What do you think of Polycarpus?’

‘Complete crook. He came from nowhere, has no aptitude or skills. It’s all a big bluff. He gets other people to run around and do the business, then takes all the credit.’

‘Isn’t that what his job requires?’

‘Fair enough.’ Daphnus shrugged, as if there was no real animosity between him and the steward, only envy.

‘But he got on well with your master.’

I thought I detected a slight delay, before Daphnus agreed Polycarpus was held in good regard by Aviola.