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Nonetheless, I am sure her great-uncle is heartbroken.
    'Your son less so?' I queried coolly.
    'No!' Tullia Longina exclaimed. 'Even the magistrate could see in the end that he is innocent. The whole party were exonerated and allowed to go on their way.'
    'What happened to Valeria's corpse?' I asked.
    'A funeral was held at Olympia.'
    'Cremation.'
    'Of course,' said Tullia, looking surprised. Thank the gods. That saved me sniffing at another set of bones.
    Helena moved slightly, to break the tension. 'What was your reaction when Caesius Secundus came and told you something similar had happened to his daughter?'
    'Oh the circumstances are quite different.' On the limited information we had, I could not see that. Caesius had no idea how his daughter died. Either the Tullia knew more than they were saying about Valeria, or they were determined to say she had suffered an 'accident' even though Aulus had written that in Olympia there was no dispute that she was murdered. The Tullia were definitely brushing Valeria's death aside - just as Caesius thought everyone had done to his own daughter. Still, their son had survived, his two brothers were flourishing; the Tullia wanted to get on with their lives.
    'Is there any chance that we could see the letter Statianus wrote?' Helena then requested.
    'Oh no. No, no. I no longer even have it.'
    'Not a family for keepsakes?' Helena barely hid her sarcasm.
    'Well, I have mementoes of all my sons when they were little - their first tiny sandals, baby cups they drank their broth from - but no. We do not keep letters about tragedies.' Tullia's face clouded. 'They are gone,' she said, almost pleading with us. 'I understand the other father's grief. We are all very sorry, both for him and for ourselves; of course we are. Valeria was a lovely girl.' Did she really think that, or was she merely being courteous? 'But now she is gone and we all need to settle down again.'
    Perhaps she was right. After this interview, Helena and I decided there was no point pursuing the Tullia. I thought we had probably heard the husband's views in his wife's last statement. 'She is gone, and we all need to settle down again.' Two months after a death, this was not particularly callous, not from parents-in-law who appeared to have barely known the girl.
    'Did anybody know Valeria?' Helena wondered to me. 'Know her properly?'
    I thought Statianus was an enigma too. However bland the excuses, I still thought it incredible that he should lose his recent bride, yet continue his travels among a bunch of strangers as if nothing had happened.
    'The trip to Greece was to celebrate the marriage,' Helena agreed. 'So if the marriage had ended, what was the point in continuing?'
    'It was paid for?'
    'My parents would demand their money back.' She grimaced, then added brutally, 'Or Papa would quickly fix up a new match, then rerun the tour with wife number two.'
    I joined in the satire. 'Right from Rome, or from the spot where the first bride perished?'
    'Oh from Olympia. No need to make the bridegroom relive sights he had already enjoyed!'
    I grinned. 'People think me crude!'
    'Realistic,' Helena countered. 'This trip must have cost the Tullia a very great deal, Marcus.'
    I nodded. She was right. Tomorrow I would seek out and interview the agents who had fixed up the expensive package.

IV

    I wore the toga I had inherited from my brother. I wanted to look prosperous, yet overheated and stressed. I piled on some flashy jewellery that I keep for when I act as a crass new man. A torque-shaped armband and big ring with a red stone carved with a man in a Greek helmet. Both came from a stall in the Saepta Julia that specialised in kitting out idiots. Polished up, the gold almost looked real - though not as real as my own straight gold band that told the world I really was a new entrant to the middle class. Vespasian had conned me into taking equestrian rank - so I was really gullible.
    Beside the ancient Forum of the Romans lies the