He got me clean, and promised I would keep upright if I went steadily. Then I hired a chair myself, as far as the Capena Gate. I sat, dreaming of the new apartment I could now afford if any of the betting tokens were retrieved from Marcia…
Nothing is ever easy. As I paid off the bearers at the end of the Senator's street, I noticed a group loafing outside a cookshop: Anacrites' men. They had worked out that sooner or later I would try to see Helena. If I approached the house, my convalescence would be in a prison cell.
Luckily I was no slouch as a lover: I knew where to find the Senator's back gate.
When I crept in like a marble-thief, Camillus Verus himself was standing with his arms folded, staring at the carp in his gloomy pond.
I coughed. 'Nice evening!'
'Hello, Falco.'
I joined him making faces at the fish. 'I ought to warn you, sir, when I leave here I am liable to be arrested in the street.'
'Give the neighbours something to talk about.' The tunic Glaucus had lent me only had one sleeve; Camillus twitched an eyebrow at my bandaging.
'Pertinax is dead.'
'Tell me?'
'Some time. Before I can remember, I shall have to forget.'
He nodded. A carp shoved his snout up to the surface but we had nothing to give him so we just stared back guiltily.
'Helena has been asking for you,' her father said.