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Chapters (65)
  1. COVER
  2. NEMESIS
  3. ROME AND LATIUM: SUMMER, AD 77
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Petronius groaned. ‘I’d love to. I haven’t got the manpower, Falco. If Anacrites keeps them close to him at home or in his office, those are no-go areas. I can’t send troops into the Palace and I am not getting a formal reprimand for watching that swine’s private house—especially not on a case I was told to drop,’ Petro concluded reasonably.

‘Last night, he suggested they were his bodyguards.’

‘Then the whole idea is definitely off.’

‘You didn’t tell me it was on.’

‘I’m thinking about it.’

In the end, Petro taxing his brain proved unnecessary. One of my nephews turned up at the station house, bringing a message. Katutis had written it out. His writing was so neat, I always had difficulty deciphering the letters.

‘What exactly is the point of your secretary, Falco?’

‘Oh he goes his own way. That keeps him happy.’

Petro got his clerk to decipher. Albia had spotted one of the hangdog Melitans. Anacrites was watching my house again.

‘The bastard! He’s made this too easy for us—’

Petronius grabbed my arm. ‘Now hang on, Marcus; we need to plan this properly—’

I nodded. Next minute he and I were scuffling in a doorway, laughing like ten-year-olds, as we each tried to be first through as we dashed out to run down the Aventine by the nearest steps to the Embankment. We knew that in taking on the Melitan we would be taking on Anacrites. Nothing of what happened next had been adequately considered. But with hindsight, it is fair to say Petronius and I would still have done it.

40

We separated and approached from two directions.

It was still light. The day’s heat had diminished slightly, but blue sky still soared over the marbled bank, the Tiber, and the low hills opposite. The frenetic hum of city life had lost a little of its persistence as businesses slowed down and individuals thought about going to the baths. Those bath houses that had already opened would have just allowed admittance to their outer porticoes. Stokers were busy raising a smoke, ready for the formal entry to the changing rooms when the bell rang. There was plenty of banging and shouting, which carried further across the water as the last boat relays brought goods up to the Emporium from Ostia, making the weary stevedores curse as they longed to down tools and bunk off to wine shops.