Fanuilh by Daniel Hood (ebook reader with highlight function TXT) 📗

time to rest alone. It'd be improper for you to spend it in that empty house. You'll come to my sister's."

There was no room for objection, so Liam simply nodded his agreement

"Good, then," Coeccias said gruffly. "We'd best get to it, if we're to find this barmaid before I must prepare for the procession."

Gulping down the rest of his cider, Liam followed the Aedile out of the house.

There were seventeen inns, taverns and public houses in the Point, as well as a few private clubs and special establishments that Coeccias . thought worth checking.

Though the streets of this quarter were as narrow as those in the rest of the city, the area was much better laid out, with something approaching a plan. They were able, therefore, to follow an orderly route, covering. the relatively straight roads one by one. Further down in the city the roads twisted and angled in mazelike complexity, joined by uncountable alleys and hidden courts, all of which could harbor an eating house or wineshop, and Coeccias explained that his men had had to spend a great deal of time to cover a small area.

"I should have thought Tarquin unlikely to frequent the lower haunts, but it struck me not. Happily, there're not so many up here. We'll be through by an hour after noon, and if this Donoé exists, we'll search her out."

Polished ,paneling and expensive fittings, gilt and silver, foreign hangings and crystal goblets, intricately painted signboards—the inns and restaurants were expensively decorated, the rich accouterments proper for the neighborhood's merchant princes and giants of trade. Some even had their offerings painstakingly painted on large boards, for those customers who could read. The proprietors were quiet, polite men, singularly colorless, who could scarcely be bothered to remember the names of their wives, let alone their serving girls.

It was early in the day, and most of the places they stopped had not even opened yet, but Coeccias's title gained them entrance at every one. It was unfair, Liam knew, to compare these sophisticated restaurants and taverns with the Uncommon Player, but he could not help it. Two hours before noon, they could not be expected to have customers, but they still seemed unnaturally somber, depressing in the stilted formality of furnishings you were afraid to touch and proprietors who acted like courtiers in a tyrant's court. He silently praised the Player, and vowed to avoid the rich quarter if he wished to enjoy himself.

They were most of the way through Coeccias's mental list when they came to a stone building that fronted a stretch of street that was inordinately large for the quarter. It had a full portico with fluted columns a foot thick above which rested a triangular frieze, and broad steps made of carefully fitted blocks of white stone. There was no painted sign or nameplate to announce its purpose, and Liam laid a hand on the Aedile's arm as he started up the steps.

"What's this? It's someone's house."

"No house this," he muttered, and surprised Liam by flushing. "Come along."

Bas-relief panels adorned the double-leafed doors, but Liam did not have a chance to examine them, because the Aedile pulled one door open hastily and ushered him inside.

White and pink marble greeted them, totally at odds with the gray exterior, and Liam paused, unable to believe what he saw. A sweeping flight of marble stairs curved up and away from a huge foyer, lined with niches holding amorously entangled statues and potted plants. Banks of exotic flowers bloomed in vivid reds and oranges, filling the air with heady scents. Water danced and splashed in a. fountain at the center of the room, two stone lovers entwining in the pool. Two young women appeared far away at the top of the steps and then fled, giggling.

"Gods, Coeccias," Liam exclaimed, "it's a whorehouse!"

The Aedile silenced him with a staggering punch to the arm and a frantic "Hsst! Not so loud!"

"Why 'Hsst,' milord Aedile?" The speaker appeared smoothly from behind a heavy arras concealing a doorway. She was tall and bore herself proudly, with an elaborately curled headdress of gleaming black hair and an artfully painted face. "Though we glaze it over with 'house of pleasure' and 'night palace,' we are indeed a whorehouse: The man has the right of it."

She stepped in front of Liam and gazed with imperious amusement at him. "He needs must have seen one before to recognize it so quickly." She held out a ringed hand coolly, and Liam bent over it, suddenly embarrassed.

Her laughter was loud but not harsh. "Your pardon, sir, but men rarely say that here. In this house, it is more often a woman who gives that office." She turned to Coeccias, leaving Liam crushed and flustering in her wake. "Coeccias," she said warmly, giving him a lingeringly formal kiss on both cheeks. "What brings you to my house?"

"Business, Herione. A few questions for you, if you've the time."

"Ever business, Coeccias," she murmured, and slid her arm through his to draw him towards the arras. "Come along, servant," she called over her shoulder to Liam, who followed along hanging his head.

Behind the arras a corridor led towards the rear of the palatial whorehouse, and Herione went directly into the first room they came to. Walking side by side, arms linked, she and Coeccias seemed matched in size and height, appropriate to each other. Herione was broad, but not fat, statuesque, even in a girl's gown that had no hint of girlishness.

The room was her office, a fact attested by the ledgers in racks on the walls and the tidy columns of coins on a small writing table. A slate board bore a painted diagram of the house, with a woman's name and a blank line chalked into each room; Liam read th women's names and smiled; each was a princess or queen from history or legend. After the lavish entrance hall, the office seemed spartan. Herione gracefully motioned them to a pair of straight-backed cane chairs, and settled