Medicus mi-1

by Ruth Downie

  Tilla had steadied the bowl on her lap by trapping it between her knees and the tabletop. In front of her on the scrubbed wooden surface was a heap of untouched bean pods: by her feet a bucket of hollow green halves. Ruso, feeling his tunic beginning to stick to him in the heat, watched unnoticed as she reached for a fresh pod. She pinched one end until it burst open, then widened the gap with her thumb, and finally twisted her wrist so the pod was upside down before maneuvering the thumb back down the inside of the pod to send the beans bouncing into the bowl. A couple shot over the rim. Tilla dropped the empty pod into the bucket and picked up another.

  Ruso retrieved a bean that had rolled toward his feet. So, this was what a servant with one hand could do. He hoped the cook was not in a hurry for the vegetables. He stepped forward and dropped the escaped bean into the bowl. Tilla looked up at him in surprise just as the back door opened, sending in a gust of welcome cool air, and with it Merula's voice. "Doctor! Just the man we need!"

  "Give me something, Doctor."

  The hand that grabbed at Ruso's was cold.

  Ruso, who had never expected to see its owner again, disentangled himself from the feeble grasp. The two men stood eyeing each other in the middle of Merula's back yard. The sweaty strands of hair that were usually combed flat across Claudius Innocens's head were dangling around his nose. His skin had a greenish tinge, which Ruso found both professionally interesting and, on a personal level, deeply satisfying. The silence was interrupted by Innocens's need to bend over the bucket again.

  Ruso commended Merula for keeping the patient away from anyone else. It could be contagious.

  Merula turned. "Phryne!"

  A blond girl who was barely more than a child appeared from the open doorway of an outhouse and sidled into the yard. A nervous smile flitted across her face. One hand instinctively rose to cover crooked teeth.

  "Get a bed made up in there."

  "Yes, Mistress."

  "Well, what are you waiting for?"

  "Please, Mistress, I don't know where-"

  "Then ask someone!"

  The girl fled.

  Merula turned back to the merchant. "I hope she isn't going to be another disappointment, Innocens."

  "She's just a little nervous, madam," he assured her. "She'll settle down-ah!" He bent over, clutching at his stomach.

  Merula asked Ruso what he thought the problem was, adding, "He hasn't eaten here," before he could speculate.

  Ruso scratched his ear. "It's hard to say," he said. "It could be anything, really." He turned to the patient, who was now slumped against the wall. "It might just pass by itself. You really want me to prescribe you something?"

  "Anything, Doctor, sir. I'm in your hands." Innocens's head drooped, swayed toward Merula, and lifted again. "Excellent doctor. Business acquaintance of mine."

  "He sold me a half-dead slave," explained Ruso.

  Innocens made an attempt to plaster the strands of hair back in place.

  "And you got a bargain, sir. She's turned into a fine-looking girl."

  "No thanks to you." Ruso had a sudden thought. "Innocens, do you come to Deva regularly?"

  "I pass through, sir. From time to time."

  "Were you here in late spring?"

  "Ah-possibly, sir. Possibly."

  Ruso wished he had bothered to find out the specific date of the fire. "How long had you been here before you sold me that slave?"

  "Oh, dear…" The strands of hair fell down again and dangled while their owner struggled to form an answer. Finally he said, "About two or three days, I suppose, sir. I really don't feel very-"

  "Did you ever know a girl called Saufeia?"

  Merula turned to stare at Ruso.

  "Me, sir? Saufeia? I don't think so, sir. But these girls' names change like the wind, sir. If you're after something special I could-"

  What Claudius Innocens could do was never made clear: He was too busy lunging for the bucket.

  Ruso had to hurry back to his hastily cleaned but still smelly lodgings to fetch one of the ingredients for Innocens's medicine. By the time the ailing man had swallowed it, a bowl of pale damp beans was resting on the table where Tilla had sat. Ruso knocked on her door without success and then, hearing her weeping, hurried downstairs to see if there was a spare key. That was when he learned that Tilla was no longer occupying the shabby little upstairs room. Merula had moved her in to sleep with the other girls.

  "That isn't what we agreed."

  "I'll give you a discount," conceded Merula, placing a jug of wine and four cups onto a tray. "We needed the room." She glanced around the bar area and shouted, "Daphne? Table four!"

  "Whoever's in there now doesn't sound very happy."

  Merula handed the tray across the bar to Daphne, who had changed from her kitchen clothes and had tied a green ribbon in her hair. "I don't buy girls to make them happy," said Merula. "I buy them to work. Yours is in with the others. Through the kitchen and turn left."

  On a lone chair festooned with discarded clothes sat Chloe, now huddled in a brown blanket, her feet soaking in a bowl of water. Tilla, who had been lying on one of the lower bunks, swung her legs off the bed and stood up. Chloe stayed where she was.

  Ruso had never considered where bar staff might live when they were off duty, but if he had, he would have expected something better than this. The room was dingy and cramped. What little floor was visible between the three sets of bunk beds was presumably mud beneath the covering of dried bracken. The walls had once been cream but were badly stained with soot. Limp feminine laundry had been draped over a length of twine tied between the bunks. The girls had made attempts to brighten things up: Two cheerful red bows adorned the latches of the shutters and a familiar-looking cup filled with yellow flowers sat on the one shelf. Around the flowers lay a scattering that reminded him of Claudia: combs, mirrors, hairpins, jars of makeup.

  He had the feeling of being too big for the room; as if any misjudged movement would knock over something precious and break it.

  The girls, as was proper, were waiting for him to speak first. Trying not to think about Chloe's tongue exploring his ear, he cleared his throat and said, "Good evening."

  Tilla bowed her head and murmured with a pleasing-and surprising-display of respect, "My Lord."

  Chloe reached for a towel. She looked tired. The black around her eyes was smudged. It was hard to imagine her as the seductress he had seen writhing in the bar.

  Ruso coughed again. "I hear there was a funeral today."

  Chloe lifted one foot out of the water. "Some of us are starting to wonder who's next."

  "I am sorry for the loss of your colleague."

  "That's more than the management were. And I wouldn't call it much of a funeral. If it hadn't been for Decimus I bet they'd have dumped her in a ditch."

  Not sure how to reply, Ruso turned to his slave. "Show me where you are sleeping now."

  Tilla indicated a rolled-up mattress stashed between two bunks. As Ruso checked to make sure it was the clean one, she said, "A new girl is here."

  "Asellina's been replaced," put in Chloe. "They were starting to run out of staff."

  "The new girl is locked in the room," Tilla continued.

  It was not an unreasonable precaution. "You should stay away from her for a day or two," suggested Ruso. "If she came here with Innocens she may have the same illness."

  "I hope he is very ill and then he dies," said Tilla.

  Ruso, who could not agree with this sentiment aloud even though he might share it, instructed her to sit down. He knelt awkwardly in front of her to check the alignment of the splints. Chloe did not offer him the chair.

  As he felt along the length of the lower splint, he said, "I gather Innocens did not eat here?"

  "If that's what Merula said," put in Chloe before Tilla could answer, "then he didn't."

  Ruso glanced at her. "I'm not trying to accuse anyone. Nothing you say will leave this room, but it will help me do my job."

&
nbsp; He saw the two girls look at each other. Chloe shrugged, tossed the towel aside, and reached for her sandals.

  "He takes from the kitchen," explained Tilla. "When the mistress is not there."

  "What did he take?"

  "Wine, apple pie, and Mariamne," said Chloe.

  "Mariamne?"

  "He might have made her feel sick," continued Chloe, winding the thongs of a sandal up her calf, "but not the other way around. There's nothing wrong with the wine, and other people have had the apple pie."

  Ruso pondered the possibilities as he checked the limited movement of the bandaged hand. He was paying no attention to Chloe groveling for something under one of the bunks, which was why when he turned to find her hidden behind a golden cavalry mask and brandishing a sword, it was a shock.

  Chloe raised the mask. "It's blunt," she assured him, lifting the sword toward the fading light from the window before sliding it back into its scabbard. "You wouldn't believe what rubbish you have to put on here just so the customers can look at you taking it off again. Want to come and see the show?"

  "I'm sure it'll be very, uh…" Ruso paused, looking for a word. "Artistic."

  " 'Course it will," said Chloe. "That's why they come to watch."

  When she had gone he turned to his patient. "Tilla, tell me what you know about Claudius Innocens."

  "He is a patch of slime."

  "Yes, but do you know what he was doing in Deva before I met him?"

  Tilla shrugged. "He stays at an inn. He leaves me locked up there when he goes to do business. He tells me he will fetch a healer but I never see one."

  "And some of his business was here with Merula?"

  "I do not know, my Lord. If you ask him, he will lie to you."

  "Did he ever mention any other girls?"

  "He says I am the most ungrateful girl he has ever met."

  "Hm. So he doesn't lie all the time, then. Tell me one more thing. Do you know why he is ill?"

  The eyes that reminded him of the sea were wide with innocence. "Perhaps he is cursed, my Lord."

  "What would make you think that?"

  "Perhaps your medicine will make him better."

  "Perhaps."

  There was a pause, then she said, "What medicine do you give?"

  Ruso looked at the door to the kitchen, which was closed. He looked at Tilla, and at the complex bandaging that covered the very best work he had been able to do, but which even now would probably not return her the full use of her arm. He said, "I gave him medicines that are recommended by several authorities."

  She raised her eyebrows, waiting.

  He took a deep breath and said, "Some of my colleagues recommend chewing several cloves of raw garlic." Although not necessarily to cure vomiting. "And then to sweeten the breath, the patient should take honey containing ashes of burned mouse droppings."

  Her eyes widened. "And this is what you give for sickness of the stomach?"

  "There are men who recommend these things," he responded, wondering what had possessed him to administer this ludicrous and disgusting treatment in which he had no faith at all, and scarcely able to believe that he had just admitted this weak-but oh, so enjoyable! — moment to a slave.

  From somewhere in the yard outside the window came the sound of retching. Tilla said, "I think it did not work."

  "No," agreed Ruso solemnly. "Perhaps he is cursed."

  40

  Ruso's thoughts as he lined up with the First Century on the damp parade ground were a mixture of apprehension and annoyance. The apprehension was such as any man who has not recently undertaken serious physical training might feel at the prospect of a ten-mile run. The annoyance was partly with Valens, who could surely have found a more sensible way to impress the second spear. It was also with himself for rising to the challenge of Valens's "I would have signed you up too, but after a summer off I don't suppose you'd be up to it."

  Pride had prevented him from asking exactly what he would be signed up for. Valens was obviously out to create an impression of being Enthusiastic and Committed, and it would not do to be seen as less enthusiastic or less committed than his rival in the race for promotion. So when Valens had asked him which of them should go first while the other remained on duty, he had volunteered. Now, standing on the parade ground surrounded by the fittest, fastest, fiercest, and best-trained unit in the legion, he knew he should have listened to his common sense rather than his vanity

  A centurion was bawling orders. The second spear was nowhere to be seen. It occurred to Ruso that a more suspicious mind might have described his friend and colleague as a devious bastard. It also occurred to him that there had been no need for him to do this run, but now he was here he had to finish it or risk public humiliation and serious damage to his hopes of promotion.

  When the men first set off the shock to his system was as bad as he had feared, but once he had forced his thoughts away from the prospect of the next ten miles, his body settled back surprisingly quickly into the familiar anonymity of the training run. He was no longer an individual. He was part of a many-legged creature moving forward over the relentless crunch of boots on gravel. His lungs shared the heavy breathing of men keeping step. His own sweat mingled with the smell of others wafting through the afternoon drizzle as they passed the competing stinks of laundry and tannery. As they followed the East road out between the green fields that were the territory of the Cornovii, his mind was free to wander.

  It wandered back to the cheering sight of the signaler waving at him from the departing wagon to Londinium that morning. Tonight, if his legs were still capable of holding him up, Ruso would stand before the healing God and offer up a prayer for courage for the signaler, steady hands for the surgeon, and the large measure of luck that was needed for successful cataract surgery. And a prayer that for all their sakes, the girlfriend would not deliver while they were on the road.

  The thought of the woman led his mind down darker paths: back to the moment when he had realized that Claudius Innocens was supplying slaves to Merula's and might have been around when both of the dead girls disappeared. The thought that his own Tilla had narrowly escaped being offloaded to the highest-bidding bar owner had filled him with fury. That fury had led him over a boundary he had never imagined he would cross. Until yesterday, he had honestly been able to claim that, no matter how unlovely or annoying they were, he had always done his best to help his patients. Now he felt-not shame exactly, but a sense of being stained by the dirt of others.

  He had not harmed Innocens. To his relief and Tilla's probable disappointment, the man had recovered overnight and had sent a message of thanks to the hospital this morning. Perhaps the purveyors of mouse droppings had a point after all.

  Mouse droppings? There was another boundary he had never imagined he would cross. Not to mention his newfound doubts about ghosts and his sudden rush of faith in Trajan. Ruso wiped a drip of drizzle off the end of his nose. Perhaps the damp climate was making him soft in the head.

  He must concentrate on what was important. His duty to his family was no less just because they were far away, but with all the distractions here-slave girls, house fires, arguments with Priscus-he had given them scant thought recently. He must organize himself. He must adopt a logical approach. Observation, diagnosis, treatment.

  Observations

  No cash Short-term extra costs of long-term investment (Tilla) Large debts in Gaul Small debts in Brittania

  Grim (and dangerous?) living quarters No housekeeper

  Increasingly distracted, impulsive, and unprofessional behavior. He was constantly finding his mind wandering away from whatever he was supposed to be doing. As if Tilla were not enough of a diversion, this morning he had found himself wondering if the two girls' deaths were not connected at all, and whether Decimus had lied to him. He only had the man's word for it that there had been no contact from Asellina. What if the porter really had received a message that his girlfriend had run away to join him? Would it have been w
elcome? His dreams of a future with her would not have included harboring and supporting her as a fugitive slave or having to desert from the legion to flee prosecution from her owners. What if he hadn't been prepared to take the risk? What if he had been afraid of being punished for encouraging her? What if…

  Gods above, he was doing it again!

  Diagnosis

  A man burdened with too many responsibilities

  Treatment

  Long term, concentrate on getting the family out of debt In the meantime, stay calm

  Hold out for eleven days until payday

  Use Hadrian's bonus to clear all of the loan from the Aesculapian fund and most of the one from HQ

  Find — private patients ways to campaign for promotion somewhere cheap and civilized to live. (The CMO's quarters will do nicely.)

  Avoid — hospital administrators rogue slave traders destitute or deceased females, and any temptation to find out what happened to them civilian liaison officers any more bright ideas from Valens

  Eventually, he would be able to realize his investment in Tilla. He would do it without the help of Bassus, whose bar-trade contacts would probably all be as seedy as Claudius Innocens. He had noticed an advertisement for a traveling slave trader chalked up on a couple of walls on the way out of town, but he did not want to take that route either. Bassus's claim that the local dealers would rob him blind was not the only reason for his reluctance. Having kept her alive, he felt some responsibility toward the girl. He wanted to have some control over where she ended up. If there really were a shortage of good staff in Britannia then some respectable household would have a suitable vacancy. By the time the arm was healing-say, in six to eight weeks-that officer would have turned up.