Free Time to Depart by Lindsey Davis

screwed out on merit and in the face of Establishment prejudice. Now he held the final post available. The Establishment was still prejudiced against him, but he need not care.
    He wore the purple; it was his entitlement. With it he had neither wreath nor jewels. For him the best adornment of rank was acute native intelligence. That was aimed at us. An uncomfortable experience.
    'Falco! What are you doing here, and who's your big bodyguard?'
    I walked forwards. 'I act as his guardian actually, sir.' Petronius, annoyed at my joke, followed me; I shoved him to the front. 'This is my friend Lucius Petronius Longus, whom you want to see: the enquiry captain of the Aventine sector in the Fourth Cohort of the vigiles. He's one of the best - but he's also the happy fellow who shut the Emporium today.'
    Vespasian Augustus stared at Petronius. Petronius looked self-conscious, then thought better of it and stared boldly at the floor. It was marble; a tasteful acreage in black and white. The tesselations had been laid by a sharp tiler.
    'That took nerve!' commented the Emperor. Petronius looked up again, and grinned slightly. He would be all right. I folded my arms and beamed at him like a proud trainer showing off his best gladiator.
    'I apologise for any inconvenience, sir.' Petronius always sounded good. He had a mellow voice and a calm delivery. He gave a trustworthy impression. That explained his success with civic selection boards, and with women.
    'Apologies may not be enough,' replied Vespasian. Unlike selection boards and women, he could spot a rogue. 'How do you know Falco?'
    'Colleagues from the Second Augusta, sir.' Our legion was one Vespasian himself had once led. Both Petro and I allowed ourselves a certain cockiness.
    'Really.' The Second had disgraced itself since Vespasian's day. Regretfully, we all let the subject drop. 'You two work in different areas now.'
    'We both strive for law and order, sir.' A bit too pious, I thought. Petro could get away with it perhaps, since Vespasian had not known him long. 'Which is what I was doing today after the robbery at the Emporium.' Petronius Iiked to gallop straight to the point. The concept of first being weighed up through friendly chatter was so alien to his blunt nature that he was rushing the interview.
    'You wanted to assess the damage before people trampled everywhere.' Vespasian could assimilate information swiftly; he rapped out the explanation as if it were obvious. I saw Petro flush slightly. He now realised he had plunged in too fast. Given our relative positions in this conversation, forcing the pace was rude. Being rude to an Emperor was the first step to having a lion sniff your bum. 'Why', asked the Emperor coolly, 'could you not have made the merchants responsible for alerting you to their losses in due course? It is in their own interests to provide the information. They will want you to retrieve the stolen goods. So why cause a riot?'
    Petronius looked alarmed. He had done things his own way. It was a way that would work, so he had not bothered with alternatives. Alternatives tend to be messy. Just thinking about them wastes time.
    'Closing the market sounds crude,' he admitted. 'I was thinking ahead, sir. It was clear we were dealing with a highly organised gang. They had already made fools of everyone involved with security at the Emporium.' He paused. Vespasian quietly indicated that he could go on. Petro got into his stride: 'My immediate reaction was that the raid was so well done they wouldn't stop there. We'll see them again - either at the Emporium, or elsewhere. At this moment they have the advantage on me. I need all the facts - and I need them rapidly. Today I had to discover everything I could about the methods used - how they had identified the goods in advance, for instance. This was no ordinary robbery. The haul was exceptional, and I prophesy big trouble in Rome.'
    Without actually answering the original question, Petronius Longus had managed