Medicus

by Ruth Downie

  He had promised himself he would walk away from trouble, but this was different. Hurrying through the shadowed streets he overtook another family and was surprised to hear, " 'Evening, Doctor! Are you going where we're going?"

  It was a moment before he recognized the barber, who seemed to be out for a stroll with his family.

  "There's a fire," explained Ruso, wondering how they could have failed to notice.

  "Looks good, don't it?" observed the barber. He fell in step with Ruso. "I wouldn't bother meself, but we'll never hear the last of it if we don't take the ma-in-law."

  Ruso winced. For all they knew, people could be injured or dead.

  Clearly the barber had been right to assess his mother-in-law as a mad old bitch. "We'd better hurry," he said.

  "Oh, it'll go on for a bit yet," observed the barber. "Mind your step!"

  He pushed Ruso to one side just in time to stop him from stepping in a pile of animal droppings. "Once that lot get going with the dancing and the stories you can be up till daylight." The man lifted his left hand to reveal the dark shape of a tankard, "Still, there's usually a good drop of beer to be had."

  Ruso's legs carried on in the same direction while his head rearranged his assessment of where he was going. His suspicions were confirmed when the barber said, "One thing you can say for the locals, they know how to do a good bonfire."

  Ruso said, "What are they celebrating?"

  "The new year."

  "But it's only the end of October!"

  "Ah, to you and me and the rest of the empire, Doc, but the wife's family's new year is tomorrow. And tonight for one night only—this is according to the old bag, mind—the doors are open between the living and the dead."

  "I see," said Ruso. They were closer to the fire now. He could hear faint strains of chanting and the wail of pipes, hopefully from the living. He wondered whether, miles away across the damp green hills of Britannia, Tilla was singing one of her interminable ancestor songs beside a bonfire of her own.

  The crowd had gathered on a patch of empty land between the last houses and the cemetery. The size of the crowd surprised him, but the Twentieth had been here for many years now and he supposed most of their women would be local. People had gathered well back from the leaping flames of a colossal bonfire. Those closest to him were silhouettes and around the fire he could make out the pale shapes of faces. The flames lit up the movements of the musicians, who were standing on some sort of platform.

  Around him, knots of people were wandering across the grass to where a couple of lamplit carts were serving food and'—judging by the numbers of men and women clutching cups—beer. He glanced back at the entrance to the lot and saw, as he had expected, a glint of moonlight on polished armor. The legionaries standing guard on each side of the gate would be the visible ones. He supposed others would be stationed farther back, discreetly positioned so as not to provoke trouble but ready to rush forward and quell it if it seemed to be starting without them. The chances of any trouble here, though, were minimal. Most of these people would have connections with the army. This, he thought, surveying the crowds, was just the sort of event Rome would approve. Happy natives enjoying a night out under the watchful eye of their benevolent imperial guardians. He wondered what the imperial guardians would do if the old woman was right, and the dead decided to walk back through the open door and join in.

  The thought reminded him of something. He felt for his purse and fingered the coin inside. Then he strode across to join the line at the drinks stall.

  Ruso disliked talking to people about death. They usually asked questions he didn't know the answers to. Wherever possible, he left that sort of thing to the priests. The priests didn't know the answers either, but they thought they did, which usually seemed to please grieving relatives. When there was no priest available, he would pull out some sort of platitude about the deceased having gone to a better place and being out of pain now. But had they? Were they? How could anyone know?

  He had seen many people die, and he could still make no sense of it.

  One moment the body was a person with a will and a future and a sense of humor and a liking for honeyed dates or goat cheese or other men's wives. Then—and the change could take a second, or hours, or days, but the end was always the same—the body was just a mass of flesh which had to be disposed of before it stank. And whatever anyone said about ghosts or open doors or crucified Judean carpenters, nobody had ever come back, so how could anyone say with any confidence that there was a better place—or any place at all?

  He knelt, stretched out his hands, and let the cold dry earth run through his fingers. Plants had begun to grow on the grave. He assumed they were weeds, although in the moonlight it was impossible to tell. It had been difficult enough to make out the name burned along the wooden post that was hammered into the top of the grave as a marker, but finally he had picked out all the letters: SAUFEIA. Spelled correctly. One "f."

  He had never met this young woman in life. He had only seen the battered and decaying husk of a body from which the soul was long gone. He owed her no duty beyond that of a doctor to a patient. He had more than fulfilled that duty. Yet still he felt guilty.

  The people who buried Saufeia's ashes had not left a spout to connect the dead to the living, so he lifted the cup of wine he had bought from the stall—how Roman these people had become!—and held it at arm's length above the grave. He listened for a moment to the sounds of celebration drifting over from the bonfire. Then he began to tilt the cup until a thin stream of wine ran from it to soak into the soft earth. As it trickled into the ground he said quietly, "May you rest in peace, sister. May you enjoy a better life in the next world than you suffered in this one. May you forgive us all for not avenging you sooner, and . . ." He paused to clear his throat, "and may the dead be kind enough to forgive me for not telling the whole truth, because I have a duty to the living."

  "Sometimes," murmured a girl's voice, "is good not to tell too much truth."

  Ruso felt his whole body begin to shake. The night when the doors are open between the living and the dead . . . And yet it was the wrong voice. He knew that voice. He knew it very well indeed. Slowly, he lowered the cup onto the grave and was relieved to press his hands onto the solid earth. He told himself he was not losing his mind. He was simply confusing his memories: an understandable mistake brought on by the strange surroundings of the moonlit cemetery and too much free wine at the bar.

  "Hail and farewell, Saufeia," he whispered, then scrambled hastily to his feet.

  "Are you finish?" The words were spoken by a woman in native dress with a shawl pulled over her head.

  He stared at her, squinting in the moonlight. "You aren't really here," he informed her. "I've had too much to drink. I am going to walk to the real world now, past next year and back into this one, and then I am going to bed, and when I wake up tomorrow morning you won't be there."

  The girl eyed him solemnly and then said, "My Lord is afraid he is losing his mind."

  "I'm not losing my mind," he insisted, "I'm drunk."

  "My Lord is drunk," she agreed, "but I am here. She pushed back the shawl and held out one bare arm. "See?"

  He rubbed his eyes and looked at the pale arm. Then he took it and turned it over, marveling at its straightness.

  "I have seen you go to the bar," explained Tilla. "I wait outside for a very long time while you drink, and I follow you."

  He had thought many times about what he would say to Tilla if he ever saw her again. He could not remember what he had decided. Instead, he found himself slipping back into the role of doctor. "The muscles in the arm will be weak," he heard himself telling her. "You must do exercises every day to build them up again. Clench your fist for me. Good. Do you have full movement in the hand?"

  She gave a deep, throaty chuckle. "Now will you will ask me if my bowels are open today?"

  He let go of the arm. "No. I'm sorry, Tilla, I—" He glanced around them at the deserted cem
etery. "I can't believe you're here. I thought you were never coming back."

  "The first time I meet you," she said, "I am thinking I wish to die. I want to go to the next world. You, with your bandages and your exercises and eat your dinner and have you use the pot yet, you keep me here."

  Ruso scratched his ear. "I'm not sure about the next world," he said.

  "That's why I prefer to keep people in this one, just in case."

  "Then I find out that you want to sell me."

  "That was a mistake," said Ruso. "I wasn't thinking straight."

  "A mistake, yes."

  "Did you bring the message about Phryne?"

  "I send a boy to the gate. I have to find out what has happened to that Priscus man. To know if it is safe to come."

  "I thought you would stay at home with your people."

  She paused. "I think about you and the other good-looking doctor," she said. "In that terrible house."

  "Valens is trying to engage a better one," said Ruso.

  "My arm is mended," she said. "I am still in this world, and I have to thank you. If you sell me, you can get a better house. Then I will find a way to the next world and you will have money."

  He stared at her. "You mean I sell you, I get lots of money, and if you don't like the new owner you kill yourself? What sort of an arrangement is that?"

  "Is honorable."

  "Is ridiculous. I told you, I don't believe in the next world. And I wouldn't dream of sending anyone to it so I can have a better house. That was never what I needed the money for." He hesitated. "If you really want to do something for me, come home."

  She looked him up and down. "You have not shave. There are dark rings under your eyes." She placed a finger close to the pin on his chest.

  "There is a hole in your cloak."

  "I've been doing a lot of night duty."

  The sound of cheering and laughter drifted over from the bonfire.

  She said, "Will your better house have mice?"

  He took a deep breath. "If you come back," he said, "you will not be sleeping with the mice. You will be sleeping with me."

  Another burst of distant laughter broke the silence. He was beginning to think he had made a serious mistake when she reached forward, took his hand, and turned to address the grave.

  "We must leave now, sister," she said. "We will pray for you. Watch over us in the new year from the next world."

  They were almost back at the fort gates when Tilla said, "I must tell you some truth, my Lord. You could not sell me anyway"

  "Why not?" said Ruso, happy to launch into an argument now that he was assured of her company. "I have the documents. You told me yourself that Innocens bought you in a legitimate sale."

  There was a slight pause before she replied, "I told you he pay money for me."

  "Exactly."

  "The woman he pay is not the one who—"

  "Stop!" ordered Ruso. "Whatever it is, I don't want to hear it. I'mtired of the truth. Just carry on the way you are, Tilla. That's an order."

  AUTHOR'S NOTE

  Ancient accounts of Roman Britain are tantalizingly patchy, and everything we have—even passages purporting to tell us what the Britons were thinking and saying—comes from the conqueror's pen. The earliest British stories were not recorded until an era as far removed from Hadrian as we are from Shakespeare. However, many of the gaps are still being filled by archaeology, and anyone in search of reliable information about our ancestors should most definitely look there rather than within the pages of an entertainment such as this.

  The layout and remains of Deva can be seen in the streets of modern day Chester, although the port silted up many years ago. The Twentieth Legion really did carry out major rebuilding there during Trajan's reign, but the schedule, the delays, and the bad behavior were imposed upon their innocent ghosts by me. I should also confess that while the administration portrayed here was inspired by the Roman army's meticulous record keeping, some of the arrangements might come as a surprise to scholars. They might be less surprising to anyone who has attempted to plait the fog of public finance for a living.

  The word medicus was used to describe men of various ranks, and the hierarchy Ruso is attempting to climb is pure conjecture. What is not in doubt is that the doctors of antiquity were remarkably skilled. Cataract surgery might have been terrifying, but it was possible. However, there were no modern antibiotics or anesthetics, and accurate knowledge sat alongside such beliefs as Pliny's suggestion that snakebites could be cured with human earwax. Small wonder, then, that the sick turned to Aesculapius, the god of healing, who may or may not have had a Thanksgiving fund, but who certainly deserved one.

  As for the rescue of Trajan, Cassius Dio records that he was saved from the Antioch earthquake by a mysterious stranger. Whether this stranger was Ruso or the god Jupiter, I leave to the reader to decide.

  The goings-on at Merula's bar were partly inspired by Pompeii, where the names of long-dead girls remain on the walls of their workplaces. Two thousand years later, of course, we have moved on. Slavery is illegal. Yet I fear that is scant comfort to any young woman a long way from home who is forced to provide "personal services" while the trafficker who holds her passport pockets her earnings. This appalling trade is going on right now, in our own cities, and it survives because it finds customers. I didn't need to make it up. Unfortunately.

  ACKNOWLEDGMENTS

  People whose names are not on the cover helped with this book, and I am indebted to the friends and family who offered encouragement in the face of my frequent assertions that it was going Very Badly.

  A few people deserve a special mention. Richard Lee and the Historical Novel Society helped to conjure the early chapters out of a very different story. Peta Nightingale and Araminta Whitley encouraged me to finish it—something I failed to do until the good folk at BBC Scotland threatened to come and inquire about its progress. Mari Evans at Michael Joseph and Gillian Blake at Bloomsbury USA provided much-needed guidance—and, thank goodness, a title.

  Bill Hancock supplied the quotation from Horace. Nina Palmer, Guy Russell, Kate Weaver, and Dr. Martin Weaver were all kind enough to read through the text, and saved me from much of my own ignorance.

  Three books provided particularly fascinating background: David J. P. Mason's Roman Chester: City of the Eagles, Ralph Jackson's Doctors and Diseases in the Roman Empire, and Alan K. Bowman's Life and Letters on the Roman Frontier.

  Needless to say, none of the above is responsible for any factual errors, misinterpretations, deliberate tweakings, or wild flights of fantasy that readers may encounter in the preceding pages.

  KEEP READING!

  More intrigue and bad luck lie ahead for Gaius Petreius Ruso.

  Turn the page for a sneak preview of the next installment in the Medicus series,

  TERRA INCOGNITA

  It is spring in the year 118, and Gaius Petreius Ruso has been stationed in the Roman-occupied province of Britannia for nearly a year. After his long and reluctant investigation of the murders of a handful of local prostitutes, Ruso needs to get away. With that in mind, he has volunteered for a posting with the army in Britannia's deepest recesses—a calmer place for a tired man.

  But the edge of the Roman Empire is a volatile place; the independent tribes of the north dwell near its borders. These hunterlands are the homoland of Ruso's slave. Tilla, who has scores of her own to settle there: Her tribespeople are fomenting a rebellion against Roman control, and her former lover is implicated in the grisly murder of a soldier. Ruso, filling in for the domented local doctor, is appalled to find that Tilla is still spending time with the prime suspect Worse, he is honor-bound to try to prove the man innocent—and the army wrong—by finding another culprit. Soon both Ruso's and Tilla's lives are in jeopardy, as is the future of their burgeoning romance.

  The new novel by Ruth Downie

  TERRA INCOGNITA

  Hardcover $23.95

  Bloomsbury USA

  Av
ailable wherever books are sold

  HE HAD NOT expected to be afraid. He had been fasting for three days, and still the gods had not answered. The certainty had not come. But he H had made a vow and he must keep it. Now, while he still had the strength.

  He glanced around the empty house. He was sorry about that barrel of beer only half drunk. About the stock of baskets that were several weeks' work, and that he might never now sell at market.

  He had nothing else to regret. Perhaps, if the gods were kind, he would be drinking that beer at breakfast tomorrow with his honor restored. Or perhaps he would have joined his friends in the next world.

  He would give the soldier a chance, of course. Make one final request for him to do as the law demanded. After that, both their fates would lie in the hands of the gods.

  He closed the door of his house and tied it shut, perhaps for the last time. He walked across and checked that the water trough was full. The pony would be all right for three, perhaps four days. Somebody would probably steal her before then anyway.

  He pulled the gate shut out of habit, although there was nothing to escape and little for any wandering animals to eat in there. Then he set off to walk to Coria,find that foreign bastard, and teach him the meaning of respect.

  1

  MANY MILES SOUTH of Coria, Ruso gathered both reins in his left hand, reached down into the saddlebag, and took out the pie he had saved from last night. The secret of happiness, he reflected as he munched on the pie, was to enjoy simple pleasures. A good meal. A warm, dry goatskin tent shared with men who neither snored, passed excessive amounts of wind, nor imagined that he might want to stay awake listening to jokes. Or symptoms. Last night he had slept the sleep of a happy man.