I let Petronius answer. ‘We shall do all we can. You understand that we already suspect what happened. Whether any trace of her remains is a question I can’t answer yet. I’m sorry.’

Silanus accepted it. But he had one more worry. We had told him how Modestus died. ‘Will she have suffered . . . the same kind of injuries?’

Petronius Longus grasped his shoulders. ‘Don’t think about it. She won’t be suffering now. My advice is, try to live as normally as possible until we report back. Whatever happened to Livia Primilla is long over.’

He would not give fake reassurance, nor could he offer comfort.

We had brought what remained of the late Julius Modestus with us from Rome. In such circumstances, the vigiles used a tame undertaker to cremate the body before it was returned to the family. All Silanus received was a plain urn with the ashes.

Petronius implied the cremation had been carried out when they thought the dead man might never be identified. But I saw the nephew’s face. He recognised concern for him: preventing any chance that he or his children might see the decayed, beaten, mutilated and tortured corpse.

17

The butcher in Lanuvium was typical. He was built like an unhealthy boxer, with a cleaver through his belt. A row of meat joints hung along the front of his shop, just where his horrible nitty head would bang into them all day. He had blood on his tunic. It looked and smelt as if it was weeks old so if you ate his meat you would keel over. But if we all avoided the produce of off-putting butchers, we would be stuck with a diet of lettuce leaves and the Empire would be overrun by beefy barbarians.

He no longer possessed the slave Syrus. We groaned, thinking this was the start of an interminable chain of petty debt pay-offs. In Rome it would have been. The butcher would have sweetened a brothel-keeper who then passed on the goods to buy a sack of hay . . .

Sophisticated barter had yet to arrive in Lanuvium. They were simply careless. ‘Syrus? I only had him two days. He ran away.’

‘Not much of a debt cancellation!’ Petronius grinned. ‘If I were you, I’d take the old “sleep-with-my-sister” settlement next time.’ City wit really goes down well in country districts. The butcher gave him a glare that made me squeamish. Still lost in his joke, Petro appeared to ignore the frosty looks but went on in formal vigiles mode: ‘Have you reported your slave as a fugitive, sir?’ The ‘sir’ was satirical, if you knew Petro.

‘What’s the point?’

‘He may turn up.’

‘That good-for-nothing is long gone.’