Читать «Scandal takes a Holiday (мдф-1)» онлайн - страница 4

You're not from hereabouts," Petronius probed. So where is home, Zeno?" Zeno had been trained to look dumb or daft. Far away?" This time the child let himself nod. Did you come on a ship?" Too specific. Zeno relapsed into vagueness. Petrp glanced at me over Zeno's head, then stopped asking. Questions would be better when we had seen whether the unresponsive mother had been battered by her husband or lover or whether [less likely] she had just faded away in her sleep from some natural illness. We passed the Theatre. Opposite that tight-arsed Augustan edifice were various old monuments and guild assembly rooms. Then came a podium holding a neat row of four little temples, all elderly in style, just before the approach road to the massive granary built by Claudius. We stayed on the Decumanus to the end of that block. Then the boy turned right, facing the river. He stopped in front of what had once been a fortified gatehouse, when Ostia was much smaller and much, much older. This would have been the boundary wall of the original settlement. It probably dated back to the supposed founding of the port by Ancus Martius, one of the traditional Kings of Rome. They built to last in those ancient times, using massive square blocks. The stolid gate, made redundant when the town expanded, had now been redeveloped into shops. Above them were a couple of rooms let to visiting foreigners. Petronius left Zeno with me; he made a brief enquiry at one of the shops, then went up alone by an outside stair. I sat on the kerb alongside the child, who meekly squatted by me.

Who told you to come to the vigiles for help, Zeno?" I asked nonchalantly, as we pulled in our feet in front of a heavy cart full of marble blocks.

Lygon told me, If anyone ever doesn't wake up, the vigiles will want to know." Lygon instantly became a key suspect. Is he one of the family?"

My uncle." The child looked embarrassed. There are uncles and uncles. Some uncles are no relation, as children understand.

Where is he at the moment?"

Gone away on business."

When do you think he will come back?" Zeno shrugged. No surprises there. Petronius stuck his head out of a window on the top storey.