The Pillars of Rome

by Jack Ludlow

  His luck ran out after about ten minutes. He saw one torch in front of him, only to find as he turned that another was casting a glow at an intersection to his rear. Ragas felt his heart contract as that glow turned to flame, and he saw behind him a scarred, grinning brawler carrying a spiked club. He was grinning because behind his quarry he could see quite plainly his leader, Gafon, sword in hand and so could Ragas when he turned to look. A boxer has fast reflexes; he has to, when in a bout only a split second separates him from delivering a blow or receiving one. Ragas did not hesitate; he ran at the thug holding the club, knowing that he stood a better chance against that than he did against the sharp blade and lethal point of a gladiator’s sword. The thug readied himself, club half-raised to smash in the approaching skull, as, behind him, Ragas could hear Gafon moving in to complete the kill.

  The way he launched himself, feet first at the ankles of the brawler, one foot striking home, threw the man off balance. The spiked club was already swinging, but the increased distance to a body now on the ground, added to his own loss of stability, took most of the strength out of the blow. It still broke an upraised left forearm, the crack of the bone going echoing off the alley walls. Ragas had spun upwards, fear making him unaware of the pain; he knew his left arm was useless, but that was not needed by a right-handed fighter. The bare-knuckled punch took the clubman right on the edge of his jawbone and the crack of that going was audible, accompanied as it was by a scream of pain that died in the brute’s throat as he was knocked unconscious. Ragas was out from under the collapsing body and running, cradling his broken arm, before the body hit the ground. He heard Gafon curse as he leapt over the inert gang member, as well as the ring of his sword blade as it connected with something solid. It was not any sense of direction that made Ragas turn left, just the need of self-preservation, but his hopes lifted as he saw the silver blue streak of the river ahead of him.

  The Tiber was not safety; it was fast flowing and treacherous, at its worst as it ran under the inner city bridges, doubly so to a man with only one good arm, but it was better than the certainty that lay behind him, a sword from which he could in no way protect himself. As he emerged on to the open wharf Ragas dug his feet into the wooden boards to add an extra ounce of purchase to his run. At the edge he threw himself with all the force he could muster, his dive taking him clear of the tied up boats. In the interval between leaving terra firma and the icy water closing over his head, Ragas heard Gafon yell in frustration.

  His putative assassin was only ten feet behind the splash, but for all that mattered it could have been ten leagues. Gafon could not swim, and even if he had been able to nothing would have got him into the Tiber at a point where it was narrow and deep. Instead he stopped, searching the silver sheen of moon-reflecting water to see if he could spot a floating head. One by one he was joined by the rest of his gang, who were sent downriver to look out for Ragas.

  ‘He’ll be dead for certain,’ Gafon said, when they re-gathered. ‘I’m sure I heard his arm go when it took that club. There’s no way that he could survive in that river with two good arms, let alone one.’

  In some ways Gafon was trying to reassure himself, yet as they made their way back to where the fallen clubman still lay, he reasoned that it made little difference. The odds of the slave surviving went from nil to near impossible, and if he did, would he want anyone to know; the only person interested was the one who had ordered him killed.

  ‘Look at him,’ Gafon said, as he stood over the crumpled heap of his gang member. ‘Supposed to be a street fighter and yet he gets knocked out by one blow.’

  The torchlight picked up the pale cream of the scroll that lay against the recumbent body. Gafon picked it up, handed his torch to another and opened it. He could not read it, but the words of Lucius Falerius filled his thoughts.

  ‘That scroll must disappear too.’

  ‘So it shall,’ Gafon reasoned, sensing that in his hand he held a guarantee of his own security. ‘Into my strongbox.’

  ‘Right, lads,’ he called. ‘Get back to your houses. I’ll go and tell our stuck up employer that his wishes have been carried out.’

  The shock of the freezing water, coming straight off the snow covered mountains of the Apennines, sent a jolt through Ragas’s body, yet it was not just the cold he feared but the speed of a watercourse in spate. Tumbling downriver in the teeming cataract, he fought to get his head sufficiently above water to keep air in his lungs, difficult with one arm useless, while with his good arm he sought to stay away from the riverbank. In that Ragas succeeded, but he had forgotten about the Tiber bridges and it was those that did for him. With arches constraining the waters, the speed of the flow increased and he was sent tumbling into a raging torrent that spun him head over heels so that he no longer knew which was up or down.

  Still under water, his body going rigid with the cold, Ragas knew he was going to drown, for with only one arm he had not the means to save himself. His mind turned first to the gods he had worshipped all his life to plead for intercession, aware that they never had in all the years he had made obeisance to them and that they were not going to now. But then as his lungs filled with water he saw the image of that child in the basket as he had handed it to Lucius, the infant that ensured his bloodline was safe. So perhaps his gods had not deserted him after all. He could have, many times, died in battle, but they had kept him alive till he had fulfilled that one function. So, if the earth had no further use of him, he could depart it in peace.

  The corpse that washed up downriver was beyond recognition, naked, battered as it was by rocks and scarred by sand so that it looked as if it had been flayed; there was no way to tell who the man was or from what part of society he had come. Bodies washed downriver towards the port of Ostia were nothing new; they could be paupers dead of starvation, victims of robbery and murder, slaves killed by their masters, even men in despair who took their own life.

  Those who found it were decent folk, farmers and fisher folk, and pious enough to appease Mania, Goddess of the Dead, so they had the good grace to set up a pyre and give the body some sort of burial, watching as the soul of this unknown casualty was taken up to the heavens in the smoke of his burning corpse.

  Gafon returned alone as promised to the Falerii household, to tell Lucius that his orders had been fulfilled, glad that the man who had employed him seemed satisfied enough to gift him another purse of gold for his efforts. But he was not allowed to depart without what the senator called advice, but which he knew to be a threat.

  ‘Be careful how you pay off those to whom you owe money, Gafon. Sudden evidence of wealth, or even claims of unexpected good fortune, makes men wonder, and that causes them to gossip.’

  ‘I shall take care, Lucius Falerius, and if I can ever be again of service…’

  ‘I cannot see that we shall ever need to meet again.’

  Gafon felt the scroll inside his tunic, pressed against his belly. They would meet again, all right, when things died down. Lucius Falerius would pay handsomely for that, just to ensure that no one connected the disappearance of his warrior body slave with the murders he and his band had just committed. He exited to streets that were now full of wild people and flaming torches, as those who had supported the plebeian tribune, and saw in him hope for the future, reacted noisily to the news of his death.

  CHAPTER SIX

  He should not have been there, wherever there happened to be, and as Clodius forced his eyes open, he tried at the same time to focus so that he could locate himself. Normally he woke in the shack, warm when the wind was not too fierce, with the familiar smell of the sod-brick walls, his pig snuffling, chickens clacking and the odour of peat smouldering on the fire. Now he was cold and what little sun penetrated the canopy of trees above his head hurt his eyes. He turned on his side, but the tangled tree roots looked so menacing close up that he threw himself onto his back, stifling a groan as the stabbing pain filled his entire skull. Slowly it subsided to a dull ache, alo
ng with the first flicker of memory: an all-night drinking session with his friends. It had not started that way, just a quick snort to be friendly, but one cup of the rough red wine, unwatered, had followed another, until the prospect of Fulmina’s anger at his prolonged absence faded. By the time they had started on the grain spirits that was distant indeed, and it continued to recede with each cup, till any concern about what his wife would say finally evaporated completely.

  Now such thoughts came back with a vengeance! He lay, eyes still tightly shut, going over in his throbbing head the words he knew would greet him; he had heard them from Fulmina often enough before. Clodius opened his eyes a fraction and struggled slowly to his feet, knowing her wrath would just have to be faced, and the sooner the better. His mouth was as dry as a bone, with his tongue like a piece of leather in the middle and his nose had that painful sensation at the top that feels like the start of a cold. He must have been snoring fit to wake the dead. Gently he rocked back and forth, aware that he was still suffering from the effects of drink, putting his hand out to steady himself against the nearest tree.

  ‘Never again,’ he croaked, rubbing his throat, this a vow he often made in the morning when his head hurt, one he struggled to keep when the sun went down. He looked around at the unfamiliar surroundings and his voice croaked again as he berated himself. ‘You’ve done it again, Clodius Terentius.’

  Most people, when they got drunk could at least find their way home, even crawling. Not Clodius: drink made him seek the open air where he could look at the stars and sing melodies to the gods in the heavens. Sweet songs to him, but Fulmina was fond of telling him otherwise; that if he had heard himself singing in his cups, then he would know why the gods never granted him any of his requests. Rubbing his fingers into his temples provided some temporary relief from the ache in his head, but it did nothing for his mouth, or his throat. He tried to swallow to alleviate his suffering, but no fluid came, so he pushed himself off from his supporting tree, letting his weight carry him down the hill to where he was sure he would find water.

  ‘Fulmina.’

  His voice felt as though it was full of sand as he croaked his wife’s name. Why was it everybody saw her as a good and kind person? He stumbled through the trees, fending himself off as he lost his balance, cursing her and all her friends as he did so, people who were always telling him how lucky he was to have such a wife. Even his men friends did so, forever remarking that she had kept her figure, but they did not have to live with her, and perhaps if she had not been so kind and generous and had avoided feeding anyone who cared to call at their door, they would not have reached the stage, quite so quickly, where everything, including the small farm they had once owned, had had to be sold.

  The stream was gurgling, the trees forming a dark canopy over the clear brook. Clodius walked straight in up to his knees, gasping at the freezing temperature as the water of a melted glacier filled his sandals. He bent down to drink, telling himself that, knowing this river, he would be home before the sand had time to run through the glass. Clodius had forgotten that he had been drinking Dabo’s rough spirit the previous night, the stuff his old army chum distilled from grain, a brew much more potent than wine. Worse still, a copious drink in the morning tended to leave you just as drunk as you were the night before. His cupped hands moved rapidly as he gulped down quantities of icy water, throwing yet more over his head. The dryness in his throat eased immediately, but as he stood up, he swayed alarmingly and a warm glow filled his body as the pain in his head evaporated. Suddenly he threw back his head and laughed out loud, his long straggly hair still wet, dripping water down the back of his grubby tunic.

  ‘What an old woman I am!’ he shouted, waving his arm as though addressing an audience. ‘To be afraid of a slip of a thing like Fulmina.’ His round, purple face took on a deep and threatening frown, as he loudly addressed his imaginary audience, Nemestrinus‚ the God of the Woods and the nymphs that inhabited these forest glades. ‘Am I not her husband? Is she not bound to obey me?’

  Clodius was shaking his fist at the imagined face of his spouse, but it stopped abruptly as the child’s cries rent the air. He staggered slightly, losing his balance as he sought the source, so that the freezing water, coming up to his chest as he fell to his knees, made him wince. Struggling to his feet again, Clodius splashed through the stream towards the sound, till he saw the small white bundle in the tiny patch of sunlight. He also saw the little pink face, screwed up in displeasure, and the wide-open mouth. Bending for a closer look, his bulk cut out the sunlight from the child’s tightly closed eyes, which added to its distress. Clodius noticed the disturbed state of the ground around the tiny glade, evidence that it had been visited by men on horseback and as he turned he saw, through the tops of the trees, the distant mountain, an extinct volcano, with a hollowed out top shaped like a votive cup.

  Clodius was not much of a father, never had been, yet he had picked up his own sprogs often enough, drunk and sober, to lift this mite. The piercing blue eyes were open, fixed on him in an unblinking stare. He chucked the bawling infant under the chin, and put his hand inside the swaddling clothes, running it up the baby’s legs, to feel the small scrotum and penis.

  ‘Well, little fellow,’ he said, his voice now clear and soft. ‘How did you come to be in a spot like this?’

  Clodius bent down and wet his finger, pushing it into the child’s mouth. The infant, suddenly silent, suckled greedily, his gums taking a strong hold on the knuckle. When he pulled his hand away the crying started at once. The child’s other hand had taken a grip on Clodius’s index finger, pulling hard to indicate the need for food.

  ‘Tough little mite, ain’t we.’ He pulled at his index finger but his charge would not let go. ‘And a strong ‘un too.’

  He ignored the yells of the child as he spoke soothingly, throwing a quick glance at the sun, which, in its limited winter strength, had probably saved the baby’s life, and which also told him which direction to go. ‘Who’d want to leave a fine little lad like you out here to die, eh? I think I’d better take you home to my Fulmina so she can have a look at you.’

  Fulmina would be mad at him for getting drunk and being out all night but he knew her well and had seen, often enough, the way she looked at new-born infants to suspect that this little fellow, with the red-gold hair and the strong grip, would deflect any abuse his wife might throw his way. She would start yelling as soon as she saw him, but once Fulmina had this bundle in her arms and gazed into those bright blue eyes, he would be forgotten.

  It was not all plain sailing. She shouted at him all right, first because of his absence, that followed by an instruction to fetch the girl, Prana, from across the field at the back of their hut. She had had a baby the week before, so within seconds of her arrival the child was silent, hungrily feeding from Prana’s breast. Clodius felt very weary; the consuming tiredness of man suffering from the effects of drink and he started to ease himself onto a stool.

  ‘Don’t sit down!’ Fulmina snapped. ‘Get some water on the fire.’

  ‘It’s nearly out,’ Clodius replied, leaning over it and giving it a prod with the broken sword he had brought back from war service.

  ‘Then bank it up. This poor mite needs to be bathed.’

  ‘Take him down to the river.’

  Fulmina’s face took on the expression she reserved for addressing idiots, one Clodius saw all too frequently. ‘Oh yes. You find a child that has been out in the cold all night…’

  Clodius replied before he realised that to do so was a grave mistake. ‘Didn’t do me any harm.’

  His wife positively spat at him. ‘More’s the pity. You could freeze to death anytime and not be missed. Besides, he still has blood on him. Poor thing wasn’t even washed after the delivery.’

  ‘Why wash something you don’t want to keep?’

  The look in Fulmina’s eye told him that she would never want to wash him. Not for the first time Clodius wondered what had happened to
that sweet slip of a girl with whom he had set up home all those years ago. By the time he had banked up the fire around the blacked clay pot, now full of water, the child was fed and Prana had gone back to her own brood. Fulmina held him over her shoulder, singing softly and patting him on the back while Clodius sat by the fire, occasionally dipping his finger into the pot; if the water got too hot, the terracotta would crack.

  The infant gave a loud burp, which brought a big smile to Fulmina’s face and she sat down on the other side of the peat fire cradling him in her lap. ‘Where did you find him?’

  ‘Upstream, near the edge of the Barbinus ranch.’

  That made Fulmina glower, for they had been forced to sell their farm to the wealthy Cassius Barbinus and any use of the name always upset her. ‘I won’t ask what you were doing up there yourself,’ she hissed angrily. ‘I dare say you were singing to the gods again, you drunken oaf.’

  Clodius wanted to explain that it had been an accident, with one harmless drink leading to another. He had the Feast of Lupercalia as an excuse, but experience told him to remain silent on that score. ‘It’s a good two leagues away from any road. He wasn’t meant to be found.’

  ‘What makes you think the people that abandoned him came from the road?’

  ‘Hoof prints. Two horses, at least, I’d say. He must be a sturdy fellow, though he’s well wrapped up. If they’d bothered to undo those swaddling clothes, he wouldn’t have survived through the night.’

  ‘Poor little mite,’ said Fulmina, beginning to unwrap him so he could be washed. ‘Is that water warmed through yet?’

  Clodius poked his finger into the top of the pot. ‘Nearly. It wasn’t just the cloth though. There’s shade all along that riverbank. They put him in one of the few spots that gets any sun once it has topped the mountains. I think that’s really what kept him going till I turned up. The question is, what are we going to do with him?’