Gladiator
Page 3
Linus’s mother had heard them talking. She glanced over. ‘We should buy some cloth to make the new slave some suitable clothes.’
Cy looked in alarm at the short tunic that the boy beside him was wearing. ‘I am not wearing a skirt,’ he said.
Linus’s mother frowned. ‘A slave does not dictate what he will or will not wear.’
‘He should not,’ Linus agreed with his mother. ‘But Father said he was mine. And I say that he should be allowed to wear the clothes of his own country.’ He looked at Cy’s sweatshirt and trousers. ‘Strange as they may be.’
‘Very well,’ said his mother. ‘We will take this piece of purple cloth. I do not have time to argue with my daughter. I leave tonight to join my husband in Rome, and must ensure that she has adequate clothes before I go.’
Behind the older woman’s back Cy saw the shopkeeper Darius and Linus’s sister Rhea Silvia exchange glances.
Then the scene in front of his eyes shuddered and settled.
‘What was that?’ asked Cy.
‘It is August,’ said Rhea Silvia’s mother. ‘The earth always trembles in the hot summer months.’
Cy screwed up his eyes. The figures in front of him were again moving in a strange slipping movement.
‘Let us go.’
It was his mother’s voice that he heard now.
‘Stop dreaming, Cy.’
Cy blinked his eyes wide open. His mum was waving her hands in front of his face. She bent to take a closer look at him. ‘You’ve gone very pale, you look as though you need some fresh air. Come on. I’m giving up on this shopping trip. I’ll drop you at the library on the way home.’
CHAPTER V
‘ALL THE BOOKS on volcanoes are out,’ said the librarian, ‘and the Internet terminals are booked up for the rest of the day.’
‘No way!’ said Cy. ‘I need information and our computer at home is being repaired.’
‘The best I can do is book you an Internet session for tomorrow.’ She flicked open the computer appointment book. ‘It is Cyrus Peters, isn’t it?’ She smiled as Cy nodded. ‘I thought I recognized your face, Cy. I’ll put you down for Internet access tomorrow afternoon,’ she went on. ‘Try not to forget, because after tomorrow we’ll be closed for the bank holiday weekend, and it might be the last chance you get to finish your homework before school begins.’ She gave Cy a slip of paper which showed the appointment time for his Internet booking.
Cy held the piece of paper and thought about where he could put it so that he would not forget about his appointment tomorrow. The trouble was, he forgot lots of things. Most times he didn’t even know he’d forgotten them. And often it was really important things, like one night when his mum phoned and asked him to let his dad know that she was waiting to be picked up from working late at her school. Cy had hung up the phone in the hall and walked towards the kitchen with the message clear in his head. Yet the moment he walked through the kitchen door it had gone. Just like that. He was halfway through helping his dad cook dinner when his mum phoned again twenty minutes later and neither she nor dad was best pleased. His dad because he’d had to cook most of the dinner, and his mum because she had been hanging around in the rain. The thing that no-one seemed to understand, not even Cy, was that he didn’t even remember things after being reminded about them. He could only take his mum’s word for it that she had asked him to ask Dad to come and collect her. Cy could remember speaking to her on the telephone but not exactly what she had said.
Similar things happened to Cy all the time so he knew that it was he who was at fault. At school, or with his friends, or at home, his brain frequently jumped out of gear and sometimes even juddered to a complete halt. Then everybody became exasperated with him. Though actually, thought Cy, it wasn’t quite true to say that absolutely everybody lost their patience. His grampa and his teacher, Mrs Chalmers, were more understanding. Mrs Chalmers always said that she was sure that Cy was gifted in other ways. And Cy’s grampa always said that the best thing to do in life was to get on with what you had, and think up ways of dealing with what you hadn’t.
Cy’s grampa had been in the War. He’d served with Field Marshal Montgomery in the Western Desert and anytime Monty had come past Grampa’s tent for a bit of a chat on how the war was going, Grampa had been able to advise him about planning ahead, as he told Cy: ‘Forward thinking, that’s what I said to Monty. Forward thinking helps overcome the odds.’ Grampa called it his ‘Strategy to Survive’. And he had devised a strategy for Cy to remember things. Cy felt in the pocket of his jeans for the big brass curtain ring Grampa had given him. Using the curtain ring was Grampa’s idea so that Cy would know there was something he had to remember. Cy wrapped the piece of paper with his appointment time around the curtain ring. He was sure that he wouldn’t forget to look at it tonight and tomorrow. Well . . . he was almost sure.
The librarian gave Cy a searching glance. ‘As this is the umpteenth enquiry on volcanoes that I’ve had today I’m guessing there’s a school project due to be handed in quite soon. Would I be correct?’
‘Tuesday,’ said Cy, ‘when school goes back after the break. We have to hand in a fully documented project on volcanoes.’
‘Well, you had better get started then.’ The librarian raised her head and looked across the library. ‘There’s a boy and a girl working with some reference books at the table by the window. They’ll probably let you share.’
Cy looked over to where the librarian was pointing. He sucked in his breath. Eddie and Chloe! The Mean Machines! They were the two nastiest people in the whole school, and they always seemed to pick on him especially. They were the last people he wanted to see.
‘I’ll leave it until later—’ Cy began.
‘Later will be too late,’ said the librarian. ‘Remember, the library will be closed for the long weekend. You can’t put it off any longer, Cy.’ She had come round to Cy’s side of the counter and was now steering him towards the table in the corner.
‘Let Cy share these books with you,’ she said to Eddie and Chloe. ‘He is researching the same subject.’ She smiled at all three of them. ‘If you are doing the same project then you probably know each other anyway.’
Eddie nudged Chloe. ‘It’s Cy,’ he said in a treacly sweet voice.
Chloe gave the librarian one of her special friendly smiles that she reserved for adults in authority. ‘Of course we can share. That’s no problem.’ She moved swiftly to the next chair, making a space between her and Eddie.
‘Look,’ said Eddie. ‘Here’s a space right here for Cy.’
The librarian pulled the chair out, and before he could help himself Cy stumbled forwards and sat down, trapped between his tormentors.
‘Good to see you, Cy,’ said Chloe in a sing-song voice. ‘Come and join us, Cy.’ She waited until the librarian had returned to the counter. ‘Sewer-Cy,’ she said.
Eddie leaned closer so that he was crushing Cy’s arm and elbow. ‘Why do you bother doing projects?’ he sneered. ‘Your writing is so awful that nobody will be able to read it.’
‘That’s right,’ Chloe chimed in. ‘If we’re preparing things for display in class Mrs Chalmers always gives you drawing to do ’cos your writing is so scrawly.’
Cy felt one of his panic attacks beginning. He desperately began one of Grampa’s stress-suppressers: counting to ten very slowly and thinking of the shapes of the numbers while doing it. But it was no use. He couldn’t get beyond number 3. The shape would not form in his head. It was ridiculous! He was much too old for this to be happening to him. For goodness’ sake! He must be able to count to 3! Cy began again: 1 was a wizard wand; 2, an elegant swan serene on a flat lake; 3 . . . where was 3? He knew that he always thought of it as a crabby-looking little number, unfinished and gaping with an open mouth that seemed to be saying rude things . . . a bit like Chloe . . .
‘Look.’ Chloe shoved her finger right into Cy’s face. ‘Look, Eddie, Cy’s gone into one of his daydreams.’
Eddie looped his foot under Cy’s chair leg and dragged it forwards. Cy fell back down again.
‘Don’t be silly,’ said Cy. ‘Let me go or I’ll call the librarian over.’
‘Tell-tale,’ said Eddie.
‘Clype,’ said Chloe.
‘No,’ said Cy. He quoted from the ‘IS’ and ‘IS NOT’ anti-bullying posters that their headteacher had put up in the corridors and cloakrooms in school. ‘“Reporting bullying IS NOT telling tales. Reporting bullying is responsible citizenship.” So –’ he looked from Chloe to Eddie – ‘let me go or I’ll yell.’
Eddie moved his face so close that his breath was hot against Cy’s face. ‘You won’t yell and you won’t tell, because that only makes it worse, doesn’t it?’ He kicked Cy’s chair. ‘Doesn’t it?’
‘The librarian will hear you,’ Cy said desperately.
Chloe looked quickly towards the library desk. The librarian was working at the computer terminal, but was still within sight and hearing. ‘All right,’ said Chloe, ‘you can share with us. But I’m using all of these books at the moment.’ She grabbed four of the reference books.
‘And I’m using these two,’ said Eddie, putting his hand on the rest.
‘Oh look,’ said Chloe in a sweet voice. ‘There’s this ickle little book here.’ She picked up a very old small booklet and slid it along the table to Cy. ‘That’s about your level anyway.’
Cy looked at the cover of the book. It showed a scene from ancient Roman times with a volcano erupting in the background. But it wasn’t the volcanic eruption that caught Cy’s attention. It was the details in the foreground that made him look closer. There was something vaguely familiar about the crowded market place. Shop fronts and stalls were piled high with goods of all kinds – fruit and wine in large jars, double-handled amphorae, fish on marble slabs, cooking pots and reddish-brown dishes of Samian ware from Gaul. In the foreground was a cloth merchant, with bolts of silk and leather skins, bales of cotton and embroidered cushions. And there was the cloth merchant himself. An older man, not clean-shaven as was the Roman custom, but with a small pointed beard.
Cy gasped and looked again.
It was the cloth merchant from his dream. The one who had been trying so hard to sell the length of cloth to Rhea Silvia!
CHAPTER VI
‘DARIUS!’ CRIED CY.
‘What?’ said Chloe and Eddie together.
‘The Roman merchant –’ Cy pointed excitedly at the front of the little booklet – ‘his name is Darius.’
‘How can you ever know that?’ demanded Eddie. ‘You’ve only just looked at the book. You can’t know the name of the person on the cover.’
‘But I do,’ Cy babbled on without thinking. ‘I met him – well, not met him exactly, but I heard him talking.’
‘Where?’ demanded Chloe. ‘Where would you possibly hear this, this . . .’ she flipped the book towards her, ‘. . . this . . . shopkeeper actually talking?’
‘It was when I was dreaming,’ said Cy. ‘I’d travelled to—’
‘Give us a break,’ said Eddie. ‘I do not want to hear about any of your idiotic dreams.’
‘But we should listen,’ said Chloe sarcastically. ‘This is Cy’s wonderful imagination that Mrs Chalmers always goes on about. Everyone says that Cy is so clever at making up stories.’ Chloe stuck her tongue out. ‘You are such a Super-Cy, aren’t you?’
Cy’s face went red.
‘No he’s not,’ said Eddie. ‘He must have seen this book earlier. I’ll bet it tells you all of that somewhere inside.’
‘Of course,’ said Chloe. She turned to Cy. ‘You came to the library earlier in the holidays and you’ve already done some work on the project, haven’t you?’
‘No,’ said Cy, ‘I haven’t. It’s just that sometimes when I dream I can choose . . .’ He hesitated and then stopped. He’d love to tell Eddie and Chloe all about how his dreams sometimes flipped over. And rather than being inside his head the way most people’s were, occasionally it went the other way and he was actually inside the dream. If only he could boast about meeting his Dream Master and knowing partly how to use the dreamcloak, which meant that occasionally he could dream up his own dreams the way he wanted them to be. (Except that it didn’t always work out as he planned.) Cy looked at Eddie and Chloe. They’d never believe him, and anyway he didn’t know if he wanted to share such a terrific secret with the Mean Machines. He hadn’t even told his friends Vicky, or Innis, or Basra.
Eddie leaned across the table and took the book from Chloe’s hands. ‘Let’s have a look inside. It probably gives you the shopkeeper’s name on the very first page.’
Chloe snatched at the book. ‘I had it first,’ she said.
‘Well, I’ve got it now,’ said Eddie, pulling it back.
There was a ripping sound as the book cover tore.
Eddie flung the book in front of Cy. ‘It was him,’ he said at once, ‘wasn’t it, Chloe?’
Cy felt himself grow hot and cold all at once. The librarian had appeared and was gazing severely at all three of them.
‘It is really fortunate for all of you that that booklet is locally produced and there is plenty of old stock available. But I am still not happy with your behaviour.’
‘We aren’t to blame,’ said Chloe. ‘Everything was fine until Cy arrived. It’s all his fault.’
‘I don’t think so, young lady,’ said the librarian. ‘I know Cy. He comes in quite often. Whereas you two have been sitting here most of the day not doing very much. I’d like the three of you to sit at separate tables. That way you might all get a bit more work done.’ She examined the book in her hand. ‘You’re lucky that this is not valuable and can be repaired. Please sort yourselves out by the time I return with it.’
Eddie and Chloe got up as the librarian took the booklet away to mend the page with some clear tape.
‘I’m going home now anyway,’ said Eddie. ‘You coming?’ he asked Chloe.
Chloe nodded and angrily began to pack up her things. She glared at Cy and hissed, ‘No-one gets me into trouble and gets away with it.’
‘Don’t you ever think that it is you who gets yourself into trouble?’ replied Cy bravely.
‘The next time we meet it won’t be me getting told off,’ said Chloe grimly as she and Eddie walked towards the exit.
At the library entrance Eddie paused and pulled at Chloe’s sleeve. ‘Look,’ he whispered. He pointed to the computer appointment book which was lying open on top of the librarian’s desk. ‘Cy’s got a booking for the Internet tomorrow.’
Chloe leaned over and studied the page. ‘What time is he coming to the library tomorrow?’ Her finger found the place on the page. ‘Right.’ Her eyes glittered and her face twisted in a sour smile. ‘I think we can arrange it that tomorrow Mr Cyrus Peters will get a very nasty surprise.’
Cy waited until the librarian brought back the mended booklet and then he studied the front cover as she tidied away the other books which Chloe and Eddie had been using. Cy could see more of the street scene than he had seen in his dream. In his dream he had been almost inside the shop, but this view was from the street itself and showed the stalls and shops in greater detail. Next to the cloth merchant’s was a cobbler’s stall where the cobbler sat on his stool working at his last. He was surrounded by foot templates, and pieces of leather cut to shape to cover soles and heels. Behind him were shelf alcoves where pairs of sandals and shoes were stored. Further along
was a perfume stall with pots of alabaster and marble filled with creams and oils. Rows of glass bottles and phials of many colours containing scented essences sparkled on wooden racks. A lady with elaborately coiled hair was sampling one of the perfumes. She held the lid in the shape of a peacock tail in one hand while she sniffed the contents of the bottle. Beside that was a fishmonger’s shop with the biggest variety of fish Cy had ever seen.
Cy traced the shapes and colours with his fingers. The text on the back cover told him that this had been an affluent town with goods coming from all over the Roman Empire and beyond. Silks and spices from China, perfume and ivory from India, grain from Egypt and fish brought in by the many boats that fished the sea close to the town. The stalls along the main shopping street, called in this book the Via dell’Abbondanza, were always busy. Had all this been going on outside the shop while he sat inside discussing mosaic-making with Linus?
‘What I don’t understand,’ Cy said, ‘is, if this is a book about volcanoes, why do we have a scene showing ancient Rome?’
‘It isn’t Rome,’ said the librarian. ‘It is Roman times, but this is not a scene from ancient Rome. It is the market place of a town quite close to Rome where there was a famous volcanic eruption. Almost without warning the nearby mountain, Vesuvius, threw out boiling ash and mud for days. The population was wiped out.’
‘When was this?’ Cy asked. ‘Where was the town?’
‘It happened in AD seventy-nine,’ said the librarian, ‘near Naples. The town was called Pompeii.’
‘Pompeii,’ repeated Cy.
‘Yes.’ The librarian looked at the book again. ‘We have more copies of this book, so I’ll let you borrow this one if you like.’
Cy opened the book carefully. There was another scene inside the front cover. It depicted the inside of one of the shops. The cloth merchant’s shop. Cy’s eyes began to blur as he gazed at the interior. There was a woman sitting on a long bench. Directly in front of her was a young girl who had draped a length of fabric about herself. The older woman’s head was to one side as she studied her daughter critically. A slave held a mirror so that the young girl could see herself. The material draped in long folds to the ground and was a beautiful reddish purple, a deep Tyrian-purple cloth.