The Iron Hand of Mars Read Online Free Page B

for a normal girl? The kind who rushes home to mother whenever you upset her, but then slinks back the next week with a new necklace you’ll have to pay for?”
    â€œBecause only a girl who likes pointless dramatic gestures would fall for me.”
    He let out an impatient growl. “Are you looking for her?”
    â€œHow can I? She could be anywhere from Lusitania to the Nabataean desert. Leave off, Petro; I’ve had enough stupidity!”
    â€œWell, women never travel far alone…” Petronius himself had always favoured simple, timid fluff-balls—or at least women who convinced him that was what they were.
    â€œWomen are not supposed to travel. That simple rule won’t deter Helena!”
    â€œWhy did she flit?”
    â€œI can’t answer that.”
    â€œOh I see: Titus !” The Praetorian Guard must have been spotted by one of his troopers when they were squatting outside my house. “That’s you finished, Falco, anyway!”
    I told him I was tired of other people’s optimism, then I slouched off by myself.
    *   *   *
    The next time a summons came from the Palace, ostensibly from Vespasian, I knew it must really be Titus who was plotting to remove me from the scene. I suppressed my annoyance, and made a vow to extract the largest fee I could.
    For my interview with the purple I made a sartorial effort, as Helena would have wanted me to. I wore a toga. I had a haircut. I kept my lips pressed close together to hide my republican snarl. That was the most any palace could ever hope for from me.
    Vespasian and his elder son were governing the Empire in effectual partnership. I asked for the old man, but the receiving official had gum in his ears. Even with a written invitation from his father, apparently it was Titus on that night’s duty roster to handle pleas, pardons, and wine-bar rejects like myself.
    â€œWrong throne room!” I apologised, when the limp flunkey passed me in to him. “Sir, I gather the good of the Empire will be best served by despatching me elsewhere! Rumour says your noble father has a horrible proposition I’m just dying to hear.”
    Titus recognised my jibe at his personal motives. On hearing the news I might be leaving, he gave a short laugh, which I did not join. He signalled a slave, presumably to lead me to the Emperor, but then held us back. “I’ve been trying to get wind of a certain female client of yours,” he admitted—too offhandedly.
    â€œSo she gave us both the slip! What did she tell you?” He made no answer; at least Helena favoured me with angry messages. Feeling braver, I risked sneering. “She’s travelling. Fraternal visit, apparently. She received a letter from the noble Aelianus recently, in high dudgeon over some imagined slight.” I saw no need to confuse Titus by saying it was over me.
    Titus frowned warily. “Surely if her brother was annoyed, avoiding him would be more logical?”
    â€œHelena Justina’s reaction would be to rush straight there.” Titus was still looking quizzical. I believe he had had a sister himself, an impeccable girl who had married a cousin and then died young in childbirth, as Roman women from good families are supposed to do. “Helena likes to face up to things, sir.”
    â€œDoes she!” he commented, perhaps with irony. Then he asked more thoughtfully, “Camillus Aelianus is in Baetican Spain? But surely he’s too young for a quaestorship?” Would-be senators normally serve as provincial finance officials just before their formal election to the Curia at twenty-five. Helena’s brother had two or three years to go before that.
    â€œAelianus is the son his family all think a lot of.” If Titus wanted Helena, he would need to bone up on her relatives. I described the situation for him with a familiar ease: “The Senator persuaded a friend in Corduba to find the boy a