The afternoon was a waste of time, and my visit to the midwife had failed to reassure me. Feeling more tense than ever, I rode back to the estate. Evening was falling on the distant Mariana mountains, and I wanted to be with my girl.

THIRTY-TWO

The next day turned out to be slightly more productive, though I began it gloomily.

Tormented by my thoughts about Helena and the baby, I tried clearing my mind by helping Marius Optatus on the estate. He was spreading manure that morning, which I found appropriate. I reckon he could see the mood I had worked myself into, but in his usual way he said nothing, just handed me a rake and let me work up a sweat among his slaves.

I could not ask his advice. In the first place he was a bachelor. Besides, if any of his slaves overheard us they were bound to join in the conversation with colorful country lore. The last thing an expectant Roman father needs is a bunch of rural types cackling at his anxieties and telling him to sacrifice expensive animals to invisible woodland deities at some Celtic shrine in a grove guarded by a stone lion.

I would have paid for a kid and for a priest of the Imperial Cult to deal with it too, if I had thought it would do Helena any good. But the only gods I ever had faith in are the faceless kind who come in dark hoods with sinister downturned torches, looking for new clients to introduce to the Underworld.

I was close to madness. I admit it. Anyone in my position who had paid attention to the high rate of mother and infant mortality would be just as bad.

About the time the slaves were starting to hint that Optatus should signal a break for a cup of posca and an apple—in fact while they were making loud jokes about what a dour-faced overseer he was—the boy from the house came out to inform him visitors had called. Optatus merely nodded to show he had received the information. I leaned on my rake and questioned the lamp-boy, who said we had been favored by Claudia Rufina and her friend Aelia Annaea.

Optatus still doggedly carried on working as long as he could. His attitude intrigued me. He would not stop work for women— even if Helena was right and he hankered after one of them. He was the first man I had ever met who appeared to have perfectly normal inclinations yet who would rather spread manure.

Eventually, when the slaves' mutters of rebellion did force a halt, he and I handed over to a foreman and walked back to the house. We then had to wash rather thoroughly, but the young women seemed determined to wait until we both appeared; they were still talking to Helena in the garden when we finally emerged.

As Optatus and I walked outside to the sun-drenched garden we heard giggling: the result of allowing three women to gossip together for an hour with a jug of what passed for herbal tea. All three would have described themselves as quiet creatures with serious outlooks. Optatus may have believed it. I knew better.

Claudia Rufina, the girl I hadn't seen before, must have been older than her brother. She looked just over twenty—easily marriageable, especially since she had a huge dowry and was part-

heiress to a man of some age. The girl should have been snapped up by now. Her head lifted, and she stared at me with solemn gray eyes over the big nose Helena had previously described. She was a sturdy young lady with a worried expression. Perhaps it was caused by constantly seeing the world at an angle.

Her friend had mastered the feminine trick of appearing serene. I recognized Aelia Annaea from seeing her at her father's house, though today she was not quite so plastered in gems. At close quarters she was a little older than I had first thought, and several years older than Claudia; she looked much more of a challenge too. She had a fine-featured, very delicate face with clear skin and hazel eyes which missed absolutely nothing that went on.

This trio looked like an exposition of the architectural orders. If Helena was Ionian with her smooth wings of hair pinned aloft with sidecombs, then Aelia Annaea inclined to the Doric severity of a neat pediment of brown hair fixed dead square upon her small head; young Claudia, in Corduban modernist fashion, had allowed a maid to inflict on her a Corinthian flourish of ringlets. Our two visitors were the kind of close friends who went out together in same-color dresses—blue, today; Claudia in light-hearted aquamarine and Aelia more subdued in a deep squid-ink shade. Helena wore white. All three women were enjoying themselves making constant small gestures: adjusting their stoles, preening their hair, and rattling their bracelets (of which there were enough to stock a market stall).

I sat down with Marius Optatus. Though we had washed, we retained a close memory of the smell of manure so we tried to keep still and limit how much we exuded. I picked up the jug, and found it empty. I was not surprised. I had already noticed a plate which must once have been piled high with sesame cakes; it too had been thoroughly cleaned up, except for a few seeds. When the talk is of fashion tips, the munching gets serious.

Optatus greeted everyone with a silent nod. Helena introduced me.

"Have you come to Baetica on business, Marcus Didius?" inquired Aelia Annaea disingenuously. I reckoned she had overheard enough from her grumbling relatives at home to know just what my position was. This was a young lady who picked up all the news.

"It's no secret," I answered. "I'm the hated agent who has been sent from Rome to poke his nose into the olive oil business."

"Oh what's the reason for this?" she responded lightly.

I just smiled, trying to look like a dumb cluck who would be satisfied with any tale her untrustworthy papa wished to hand me.

"We had heard there was somebody coming from Rome." Claudia was the serious one, utterly straightforward: the type who had never realized that when a delicate question had been posed it was perfectly permissible to keep quiet. Especially if your grandpapa might have something to hide. "My grandfather thought it was somebody else."

"Someone else in particular?" I asked, smiling again.

"Oh a strange old woman who had approached him asking questions when he was out in the fields one day. He actually wrote to your father about it, Aelia!"

"Did he?" Aelia Annaea was too clever to tell Claudia to shut up; it would only draw attention to her tactlessness.

"Well that was a surprise!" Catching my curious expression Claudia explained, "Everyone was amazed to find them corresponding. Grandpapa and Annaeus Maximus usually avoid each other if they can."

"An old feud?"

"Just professional rivalry."

"That's sad!" I grinned. "I was hoping for a hot tale of seething envy and passion. Was there no stolen land? No favorite slavegirls raped on riverbanks? No runaway young wives?"

"You read the wrong poetry," said Helena.

"No, love; I read the law reports!"

Marius Optatus said nothing, but chuckled to himself. He was not much help with repartee. I was perfectly prepared to handle three women at once, but an occasional respite would have been useful; in fact, this situation called for my rascally friend Petronius.

"What happened to the old biddy?" I inquired of Claudia. "She was shooed away."

Aelia Annaea had been watching me. She was thinking herself a match for any undercover agent—especially one investigating openly. I winked at her. She was no match for that.

Apropros of nothing Helena asked, "So were you both acquainted with my brother?"

Oh of course, squeaked both wenches, in enthusiastic tones. Past acquaintance with Aelianus would be their public reason for making much of Helena, a new face (with a Roman hairstyle, and perhaps bringing a scroll of Roman recipes). Apparently Aelianus had been a jewel of Corduban society (these were very polite young women). At least, he had been a close friend of Claudia's brother, Rufius Constans, and of Aelia's three brothers, who must all have owned impressive formal names in the Roman style, but whom she called Spunky, Dotty and Ferret.