Domina (Paul Doherty Historical Mysteries) Read Online Free PDF Page A

off his horse in the courtyard. Agrippina herself helped him into the baths, shouting at the servants to bring food and wine which she insisted they taste first. Creperius, soaking in soapy water up to his neck, sat and gaspingly sipped at the wine.
    ‘I thought you were dead!’ Agrippina protested.
    She sat by the edge of the bath, feet in the dirty water, glaring down at this most faithful of agents.
    ‘Where’s Sicculus?’
    Creperius opened his eyes. He was a horse-faced man with scrawny, red hair; submerged in the water, he looked even more like the nag he rode with his long, wrinkled face creased into a smile. He sipped again at the wine.
    ‘Sicculus is dead!’ Creperius stared round the room, peering through the billowing smoke.
    ‘There’s only myself and Agrippina present,’ I reassured him. ‘Whilst the door is locked and bolted from the inside.’
    ‘I had at least a dozen spies in my son’s household!’ Agrippina exclaimed.
    ‘Well, we’re all gone now,’ Creperius replied without opening his eyes. ‘Do you remember Roscius the actor? He won’t be treading the boards anymore; his bowels became ulcerated and corrupted his whole flesh, turning it to worms. He hired slaves to bathe him but all his clothing, hand basins, baths and food were infected with the flux of decay.’ Creperius splashed the water. ‘Roscius spent most of the day in a bath, but it was no use: the vermin continued to spill out of every orifice in his body.’
    ‘Poison?’ Agrippina asked.
    ‘Of course!’ Creperius laughed. ‘Probably administered by one of Poppea’s servants. Naturally, I became very careful about what I ate and drank.’
    ‘And Sicculus?’ I asked, recalling the small Sicilian with his mop of black hair and laughing face.
    ‘I searched Rome for him,’ Creperius retorted, ‘but there was no sight of him. Rumour says Nero’s agents caught him, cut off his eyelids and locked him in a chest bristling with spikes. The only reason I know that much is because a joke is circulating that Sicculus’s death was due more to insomnia than pain. After that, I decided to leave Rome. I have been hiding out for at least a week. When I thought the time was ripe, I used what silver I had, bought that horse and fled.’
    ‘So, it’s happening,’ Agrippina whispered.
    ‘Oh, yes it’s all happening. Publicly, Nero calls you “the best of Mothers”. Secretly he’s plotting furiously. You haven’t got a friend left in Rome: anyone you favour has either been bought or killed. If you returned to the city, you’d never leave it alive.’
    ‘And who is the moving spirit behind this?’ Agrippina asked. ‘It can’t be my son? Somebody has seized his heart and caught his ear.’
    Creperius opened his eyes and smiled lazily. ‘Domina, I think you mean a different part of Nero’s anatomy. Poppea is now queen of the day as well as queen of the night. She is Augusta in everything but name.’
    ‘And my son?’ Agrippina was eager to change the topic of conversation.
    ‘He loses himself in the usual revels. Disguised as a slave, he puts himself at the head of a band of roisterers, and they roam the streets after nightfall.’
    ‘Tigellinus!’ Agrippina exclaimed.
    ‘Tigellinus is one of them. He’s Master of the Revels. They waylay passersby, rob and strip them and then hurl them into sewers. They haunt shops, inns, taverns, houses of ill-repute. No woman is safe. Do you remember Senator Julius Montanus?’ Creperius wiped the water from his face. ‘One night Nero, in disguise, attacked his wife. Montanus defended her and gave your son a good whipping. The Emperor just ran away. Montanus later realised who he had attacked and went to the palace to apologise. The silly idiot should have kept his mouth shut. All your son said was: “You struck Nero and still dare to live?” Montanus recognised the threat and committed suicide. Your son now wanders Rome with a troop of gladiators to defend him.’
    ‘Why?’