The Ides of June

by Rosemary Rowe

  Fortunately, the womenfolk did not appear to be especially concerned. They would not know about the warrant, I realized suddenly, only the letter of authority which he had given me and which I was carrying underneath my robes. I still had that, of course, but it was merely a general letter under seal. It would not have the force of a legal contract if it came to court – especially if the owner of the seal was dead.

  But I was not about to tell the women of my fears. For the moment they had sufficient woes to bear. But I was shaken to my sandal-straps. My mind was in a whirl. The letter-writer had clearly found a way to strike – Marcus’s precautions had not been good enough and his courage in remaining at his post had been a tragic, terrible mistake. Or was this perhaps the handiwork of the new Emperor – a decree of indictment that had been issued recently, and acted on now that the legion was no longer in the town – exactly the thing that Marcus had originally feared? Either way, I thought, it hardly mattered now. The outcome was the same.

  My patron – whom I’d loved, in spite of all his faults – was dead, and that increased the present danger for us all. My heart was cold with grief, but there was no time for tears. I was charged with keeping his little family safe. It was the last thing I could do for him.

  ‘I know of a safe place to stop, I think,’ I said aloud, thanking the gods for prompting me to pay for an unwanted plate of stew, and leading the skinny servant to try and help me in return. No one would think to find us in a humble trapper’s house, especially one that wasn’t even on the major road. If somebody did trace us to the inn we used last night, they would ask the landlord where we planned to stop – not the serving boy. And he would not volunteer it, for fear of being whipped – though I did not believe that he’d betray us anyway.

  There was no thought of stopping, after that, and with one accord we huddled down against the wind and rain, wrapped our damp cloaks around us and ploughed on doggedly.

  We found the roundhouse just as dusk began to fall. It stood in an enclosure not unlike my own, except for the skins of animals nailed up on huts to dry – clearly the place that we were looking for. It was as small and humble as the boy had said, but I have rarely been so pleased to see a building in my life. A thin plume of wood-smoke was rising from the central chimney-hole, and through the open doorway came the faint glow of a fire.

  Even Marcellinus brightened. ‘Are we stopping here?’

  He looked so woebegone I melted instantly, forgiving him the tantrums of the afternoon. Poor little fellow, he did not know what tragedies had struck.

  ‘I hope so!’ I told him, cheerfully. ‘It will be warm and dry at least. Wait here while I go and ask them if they have room for us.’ The ox had already shambled to a stop, and I got down stiffly and walked over to the gate.

  A figure detached itself from the shadows of a hut. ‘Who there?’ The Latin was atrocious, but the meaning was quite clear. ‘What your business here?’ The speaker came towards me, brandishing a wicked-looking skinning-knife, and in the fading light I got a better view. This must be Caeder’s father, Esadur.

  He was a tall, spare fellow, every inch a Celt, from the long moustaches to the traditional plaid trouser-leggings and the matching cloak. His face was gaunt with hunger but under the huge eyebrows his eyes were very bright. They glittered with suspicion and – I guessed – with fear.

  ‘Have I the honour of addressing Esadur?’ I asked, politely, in my native tongue.

  The dark frown deepened, but the knife-hand dropped. ‘How do you know my name?’

  I pressed my advantage. ‘You have a son called Caeder, I believe?’

  ‘I used to have one, traveller, but he’s no longer here. Why do you seek him? Is he in some trouble?’

  ‘I could wish him happier,’ I answered, with some truth. ‘But I saw him just this morning and he is fit and well – owned by the landlord of the tavern where we stayed overnight. He sends his greetings and commended me to you. He suggested you might provide us food and shelter for tonight – we have small children with us, and would pay you well, of course.’

  He looked at me a moment, then past me at the cart, where Kennis was sitting with the baby in her arms attempting – ineffectually – to rock it back to sleep. The trapper seemed to make his mind up, suddenly. He stuffed the knife into a holder at his belt and gave a piercing whistle through his teeth. A mangy dog came racing from the house with a small thin harassed woman hurrying after it, holding a lighted taper in her hand.

  She paused at the doorway when she caught sight of me. ‘What is it, Esa?’

  ‘Someone Caeder sent. A Celtic family by the look of it. Offering money if we’ll feed and shelter them.’

  ‘How many of them are there?’ At the promise of silver there was such relief, that I knew that we would find safety here – for overnight at least.

  ‘Two women, two small children and myself,’ I said. ‘Together with a mule, and ox, and a pair of little slaves. I’ll pay you what I would have paid an inn. Would that suffice?’ I named a sum – twice what I’d given the landlord earlier.

  It was more than handsome and she seized on it at once. ‘Well, they’ll have to take us as we are – there’s nothing been prepared. But I think there’s enough grain porridge in the pot – I’ll throw some extra herbs and oats and eek it out a bit. It will be warm and filling, if it’s nothing else, and we’ll find a bed for all of you somehow, if it’s only on that pile of reeds I cut to weave a mat. We can turn the ox and mule out on the grass around the back. Will that be adequate?’

  ‘More than acceptable,’ I said with gratitude.

  ‘Then, Esa, you had better show them in.’

  Esa grunted. He untied the gate and gestured me inside, while he went off to help the family from the cart.

  I followed the woman into the house. It was made of daub and wattle, like my own, but much more crowded and less luxurious. It was warm and smoky and extremely dim, with only the fire and two small tapers giving light – a question of economy I guessed, because the woman quickly lit another candle at the hearth. By its extra glow I gradually perceived – from what seemed to be a pile of straw beside the wall – a dozen sleepy eyes regarding me. A row of children of assorted ages lay huddled underneath a blanket made of rough-sewn skins.

  ‘You go to sleep,’ their mother said – as though that were possible, with a crowd of strangers in the room. ‘This man and his family have come to stay the night.’ She turned to me. ‘I only hope that there’ll be room for you in here. I’ll move the loom away.’ She moved towards the stones that held the weft in place.

  ‘And spoil the cloth that you were weaving? You’ll lose the tension if you move the weights,’ I said, preventing her. ‘Caeder suggested we might use the storage hut. I’m sure we’d manage there.’ It was not a pleasant prospect but at least it would be dry and we could rest, I thought.

  She seized on the suggestion instantly. ‘The hut – that is a good idea. But not for guests! I’ll put my boys out there, this once, and you can have the fire. And children, don’t complain! This is man is going to pay – tomorrow there’ll be vegetable stew and eggs for all of us. Now take this taper and go out to the hut – you’ll find those reeds out there to make a bed. Lasticus, you’re in charge. Make sure they settle down. Your father and I will come and join you later on. And take your cover with you – it will be cold out there. The guests can use our blanket – we’ll wrap up in cloaks.’ She was already setting the stew-pot back onto the fire and throwing more grain and herb leaves into it.

  The children went out, grumbling. I thought of protesting about disturbing them, but I restrained myself. I was so weary that I could have lain down on the earth floor where I stood, and slept so that only a thunderbolt from Jove could have awakened me, but there were others in the party and I must think of them. Besides, a handsome tip would be more welcome here than simply another night beside the fire.

  No sooner had they gone than my own women and children from the cart arrived. Ju
lia looked rather dubious at first, and stood uncertainly beside the door, but then the smell of porridge began to fill the air and she consented to come in. The baby, however, began to wail again.

  ‘We’re all of us tired and hungry,’ I murmured to our hostess, as we took our wet cloaks off and hung them up to dry on nails around the wall. ‘The infant specially. In fact we’re rather hoping that you could help us there, as well. Caeder says you have a baby at the breast? But perhaps he’s weaned by now?’ I remembered the small toddler I’d seen trailing to the hut.

  ‘My latest child was too feeble to survive,’ Caeder’s mother said, as though this misfortune were a matter of mere fact. ‘But I still have milk, if that is what’s required. Doesn’t the mother have enough for it?’ She enquiringly turned to Julia, who looked blankly back.

  ‘Kennis speaks no Celtic,’ I hastily explained. ‘My wife and I were sold to slavery and did not bring her up. She was raised in Roman households all her life.’ There was not a word of this that was not strictly true, though it gave a different picture from the reality.

  However, it earned me a sympathetic nod, as I had hoped. The woman understood – if anybody did – that parents sometimes have to sell their children to be slaves. ‘And the baby’s father?’

  ‘Head of the household that she lived in, a very wealthy man, and genuinely fond of her, I think. In fact, the little boy is his as well, but there was trouble in the house and it proved no longer possible for him to keep them there. Indeed we now have reason to think he since has died, but he’s provided for her very handsomely.’ I did not dare to look at Gwellia, who – as a native Celtic speaker – was listening to all this. It was the first indication that she’d had of my suspicions that Marcus might be dead. I heard the stifled gasp which showed she’d understood.

  ‘You think it was Marcus, who was discovered dead?’ she murmured, using Latin in an undertone.

  I gave a little nod. ‘It was the mention of the document which persuaded me. I’ll tell you later on. And why else would the curia want to talk to me?’

  There was a moment’s silence and I feared that she was going to weep. But I underestimated how resourceful my quick-witted wife could be. She turned to Caeder’s mother, as though nothing had occurred. ‘He even provided a wet-nurse until recently,’ she put in, joining the conversation in Celtic as before. ‘But now the woman has been sent elsewhere. And the child’s not thriving, sucking just from sops.’ Any quaver in her voice appeared to be concern about the infant’s health.

  Caeder’s mother clearly thought so. She made a clucking noise. ‘Poor little creature. No wonder that he cries. Bring him here to me and I’ll suckle him at once.’ She was already loosening her bodice as she spoke.

  Julia had not understood a word of our exchange, but the meaning of that gesture was unmistakeable. She brought the wailing infant, and handed her across. The woman cradled the baby in her shawl, gave the breast and as the child suckled greedily, she turned to Gwellia.

  ‘What’s the mother’s name? I heard you mention it.’

  ‘We call her Kennis,’ my wife replied, with more composure now. ‘And the baby is a girl.’

  ‘Then please tell Kennis to stir the porridge pot for me, and you can serve the food. You’ll have to use our bowls and spoons, I fear. You’ll find them in a stack beside the fire.’

  Gwellia was soon gathering them up, and showing Kennis how to stir the pot – not a task, I guessed, that she had ever done before. ‘Keep it from the sides and bottom so it doesn’t burn,’ my wife said, forcing a cheerful tone. (Latin gave her the freedom to explain the obvious.) ‘And as soon as it starts bubbling we can put it on the plates.’

  ‘And here are your slave-boys,’ a Celtic voice behind me said. ‘They will be wanting gruel as well.’

  I turned. Minimus and Tenuis were standing in the entrance way, looking so wet and woebegone that any heart would melt. Esadur, behind them, pushed them firmly in, closed the wooden door and used a hempen loop to fasten it. He gestured to the boys to hang their cloaks.

  ‘Don’t have a word of Celtic, either of them,’ he muttered to his wife, ‘but they are willing and – between us – we managed in the end.’

  ‘Arlina and the ox are safe and fed?’ I said, addressing Minimus. ‘I didn’t see a barn or stable anywhere.’

  ‘I don’t think there is one, master. But there’s a field of apple trees around the back,’ he answered, eagerly. ‘We put the animals in there – there’s grass and water and a gate so they’ll be safe enough, and there’s some natural shelter underneath the trees. The householder has pushed our cart in too, and put some leather hides across the roof – to help to keep the inside portion dry, I think. I tried to ask him, but he doesn’t understand a syllable.’

  I translated and expressed my satisfaction to our hosts, and we huddled round the fire, while Gwellia and Kennis served up the bowls of food. Grain gruel with herbs is not the tastiest of food, but it was hot and nourishing, and we ate it thankfully. Only Marcellinus baulked at such a meal – until I told him it was what brave soldiers ate, after which he downed his supper without more complaint. There was a home-brewed drink to follow, fermented apples mixed with meadowsweet. It was strong and – even for myself – had to be diluted with water from the ewer by the door. I am not generally very fond of apple-beer, and never serve it to my slaves and womenfolk, but now – when heated to sizzling with a hot brand from the fire – it seemed like nectar and everybody drank.

  There was no need of poppy juice tonight. The children’s eyes were drooping with fatigue and – after brief ablutions – we set them down to sleep where Caeder’s siblings had been lying earlier, with Julia beside them and the slave-boys at their feet. Esa brought some deerskins in to cover them. Gwellia and myself were given the bed-space of the owners of the house – with cleaner, warmer bedding than I’d had the night before. (A glance from me ensured there was no further talk of Marcus, while there were ears to hear.) We did no more than strip our outer clothes and footwear off, and – exhausted by the efforts, griefs and worries of the day – before our hosts had even raked the fire and tiptoed off, I was already in the arms of Morpheus.

  I dreamed of my patron, lying on a bier, and a great dark cloud that seemed to rise from him and roar towards me down an empty road, stretching its nebulous fingers out to seize me as it came.

  EIGHTEEN

  I awoke the next morning to the acrid smell of burning bread. I raised myself on one elbow and stared stupidly around. For a moment I could not work out where I was – except that the room was empty and clearly not my own. There was the sound of children’s laughter somewhere quite nearby. Too many children to be Junio’s! Then, with a sinking heart, I remembered yesterday.

  Of course, I was in Esa’s roundhouse! In daylight it looked a very different place. The stools and straw were missing, the hanging smoke had gone, the door was wide open, and the sun was streaming in – clearly, the summer downpour of the day before had passed. The room looked swept and ordered – almost bare, in fact – apart from the cloth-loom and a few tools hanging round the walls.

  But I had a faint impression of alarm – a memory of some stealthy movement very close to me. My purse? I felt beneath my pillow for it, but there was nothing there. Alarmed, I sat upright and looked around to find my clothes. I could not see them anywhere. There was no sign of Gwellia, either – or of anybody else. Meanwhile, a single flatbread loaf was scorching on the fire.

  I scrambled to my knees and pulled it from the iron tray. It burned my fingers, and I dropped it instantly, cursing myself for bothering with such a trivial thing. My instinctive cry of pain, however, had been heard and a moment later Gwellia came in.

  ‘Ah, you are awake then, finally?’ she said, as if there had never been the least cause for alarm. She put down a plaited basket as she spoke and pulled my missing clothing out of it. ‘Well, you are just in time. You can come and have some breakfast with the rest of us. I’ve aired your cloak and
tunic in the sun, as you can see. They were still a little damp from yesterday and you were so exhausted that we let you sleep.’

  I started to whisper the news about the purse.

  She waved my words aside. ‘Husband, I needed a few coins. I took it while you slept to give the woman the money that you’d promised her and she sent the elder children to a nearby farm to buy some food for us – and, naturally, for the family as well. They got back a little while ago, with homemade cheese and milk for everyone, but we’ve saved some for you, so when you are ready you can come and eat. Meanwhile, you’d better put this away again—’ from the basket she produced the purse – ‘and take more care of it another time. It may not be me who steals it.’ But she said it with a smile.

  I did not feel like smiling. The events of yesterday hung too heavily on me, but relief enabled me to give a sort of rueful grin. As I slung my money around my torso once again, and pulled my clothing over it, I gestured to the loaf. ‘I did not wholly save it, I’m afraid. But it won’t go far, in any case, between fifteen of us.’

  ‘That one was keeping warm for you,’ my wife explained. ‘All we others have taken ours outside. We’re eating in the orchard – though it’s a little damp – there wasn’t really room for everyone in here. Esa has taken stools out for the adult guests – including you, of course. So put on your cloak and come. You won’t believe what Marcellinus has been doing while you slept.’

  I wouldn’t have believed it, if I hadn’t witnessed it. He rushed towards me proudly as soon as I appeared. ‘I caught a caloman,’ he said, dangling a dead pigeon proudly by the legs and using the Celtic name for it. ‘Esa showed me how.’

  ‘The children have been with Esa, emptying the traps. Your little fellow went along, and did it very well.’ Caeder’s mother had not understood the words, but had deduced the sense. She had been suckling the baby again, and it was gurgling happily, but now she laid it down and did her bodice up, gesturing me towards the empty stool beside her. ‘I’ll teach him to pluck it, later, if you like. And my husband caught a hare. He’s skinning it this moment, and with the coins you gave us I can get leeks and turnips too, so there’ll be stew tonight. Are you going to stay another day with us?’