by Ruth Downie
‘A meeting?’
Ruso hoped the feeling of light-headedness was the result of rushing to intercept Lollia after hasty bathing on a very empty stomach, and not something to do with the contents of the water bottle. He said, ‘Apparently they came across some chap there, and he’s enticed them away with him.’
‘Are you quite sure? We haven’t got anybody missing.’
‘We’ve lost two,’ said Ruso. ‘Four now, because Lucius has taken our stable lad and gone to look for them.’
‘I’ll have a word with the staff,’ she promised. ‘I’ve never heard of Christians stealing people before. Aren’t they supposed to look after one another and feed the poor?’
‘I don’t mind them feeding the poor,’ said Ruso, annoyed that she was failing to see the point. ‘Even if it does encourage scrounging. And I don’t mind what rubbish they believe. I can even put up with them being a secret society and thinking their god is better than everybody else’s. But they can’t go running off with other people’s …’ He paused. ‘With other people’s people.’
‘No, that’s quite unacceptable,’ agreed Lollia.
‘They’ve been hiding things in the house here as well. You might want to have a look around your own place in case there’s another crack-down.’
‘I will.’ Lollia paused to inspect the olives forming amongst the slender leaves. ‘I’ve never understood why people make a fuss about the Christians,’ she said. ‘Surely nobody really believes they burned down Rome?’
Ruso shrugged. ‘Who knows? If they steal people’s … people, who knows what they’ll do next?’
Chapter 58
Brother Solemnis’ mules clopped over the long wooden bridge into Arelate as if they had not noticed that it was only held up by a row of boats moored to two posts. His passengers were wide-eyed: Cass staring at the gleaming expanse of river flowing beneath them, and Tilla wondering what would happen if the mooring-ropes broke.
‘Everything’s bigger than I thought,’ whispered Cass. ‘We should never have come.’
Tilla, who was feeling the same way, was not going to admit it. ‘If we had never come,’ she said, ‘we would not know about the beautiful wide river and the strange bridge that will still live in our minds when we are old and grey and our teeth fall out.’
As she spoke the cart lurched over a bump, and she grabbed at the side to steady herself.
Relieved to be safely across, she shook the dust of the journey off her borrowed straw hat, scowled at the sight of yet another amphitheatre rising above the red roofs of the town and observed, ‘My friend and I need beds for the night.’
She saw a blush spread up the back of Brother Solemnis’ neck. He only just halted the mules in time to avoid ploughing into four slaves carrying a litter out of a side street. She tried again. ‘Brother, we need beds.’
Brother Solemnis seemed to be having trouble speaking. Finally he blurted, ‘But what will Mother say?’
Cass leaned forward and explained gently, ‘My friend is hoping you can recommend an inn where we will be safe.’
The blush grew deeper. Finally the lad managed to stammer out a name. ‘Run by a woman,’ he added, as if this might make it safe for them, although not for a defenceless young man. As if to make sure he was rid of them, he said, ‘I’ll take you.’
The woman at the Silver Star Inn seemed delighted to welcome them. She was probably bored with only a sleeping cat and cobwebs for company.
Tilla had long since discovered that the price and quality varied in a place like this, but the basic offering did not. During the journey through Gaul, she had once sighed over yet another insipid cup of watered wine and asked whether there wasn’t something else. The owner, who seemed pleased to be asked, took so long to list the wonders of all the other wines on offer that she wished she had kept quiet. Even the water had to be praised. It was from his own spring, fit for the gods themselves, with the very taste of ambrosia. Realizing he had not understood the question, she had asked if there might be beer, or mead? How about sweetened milk?
The bartender had looked at her as if she had just insulted his children, and said, ‘This is Gallia Narbonensis, madam. We are not in the north now.’
This rejection of beer seemed a peculiar form of obstinacy, especially now that Tilla had found out how wine was produced. But even Cass, to whom she had confided her quiet longing for a long draught of barley beer, had reacted as though her boredom with the subtle and complicated tastes of Gaul were something about which she would do well to keep quiet. So when the usual watery offering turned up in cups that were none too clean, Tilla accepted it with a smile. Then she admired the cat, kicked Cass to stop her staring apprehensively at the cobwebs and began to ask questions.
The innkeeper was very sorry to hear of the loss of the lady’s brother.
‘We are looking for anyone else whose man died on the Pride of the South, so my friend can grieve with them. She is thinking of raising a monument to him by the river.’
Cass’s face betrayed surprise. Tilla, who had only just invented the monument, was rather proud of it.
‘My brother was an honourable steward of a wealthy man,’ explained Cass.
‘His master wants to help pay for the monument,’ said Tilla, voicing the lie that Cass had only implied. ‘But we want an inscription. A very long one, in big gold letters. We want to find out the date of his death, and where his body might lie.’
The woman shook her head. ‘I wish you luck,’ she said, ‘but there is a great deal of sea beyond the end of the river, and one ship is very small.’
Later, when Cass had slipped out to use the latrine and probably inspect the kitchen for cleanliness, the woman leaned closer to Tilla and whispered, ‘Is she gone?’
Suddenly realizing why the woman was oblivious to the state of her surroundings, Tilla said, ‘Do you want to tell us something else?’
‘It is none of my business.’
‘I will not be angry,’ promised Tilla
‘The brother’s master,’ whispered the woman. ‘Do not commit yourself to paying a lot for that monument on his behalf.’
Tilla frowned. ‘You know him?’
‘I know his type,’ insisted the woman. ‘If he sent that poor man to sea in an old bucket like the Pride, then he did not care much about him. And if he has money, he is not prepared to spend it.’
Tilla put a hand on the woman’s arm. ‘What else do you know about this ship?’
‘It is a very unlucky ship.’
‘We know this.’
‘They say the dealer who bought it sailed on it and drowned with all the crew.’
Tilla fingered the chipped edge of her cup and wondered if this was going to be a wasted trip. ‘Perhaps there is nobody left to tell us anything.’
‘There is someone who might know,’ continued the woman, ‘if you aren’t too fussy. Go to Phoebe’s bar in the Street of the Ropemakers.’
Tilla repeated the name. ‘Who shall we say sent us?’
The woman sniffed. ‘If you say it was me, she will tell you nothing. Nobody speaks to Phoebe since she cannot keep her hands off other people’s husbands.’
Chapter 59
Surveying the lamplit debris of the dinner party, Ruso could not remember when he had endured a longer evening. Or a more embarrassing one.
Had he not seen it, he would never have believed that the Arria of the pinned curls and the tastefully displayed cleavage could have been created from the woman who had clung helplessly to him out on the porch not two hours before. Even her voice had changed. The tremor of anxiety had been pushed aside by a new confidence. This was Arria’s dinner party, the dancing cupids were on display, and she was not going to let a little thing like a poisoning ruin it.
Even the cook had somehow managed to recover from the invasion of the investigators, and the food was not noticeably worse than usual.
Those, together with Lollia’s company, had been the best aspects of the evening. As for
the worst – there were plenty to choose from.
There had been Arria’s cry of ‘How lovely of you to come! Gaius, you remember Diphilus, our nice builder? Diphilus, Gaius says we can’t have the outdoor dining room!’
There had been Arria’s vaunted pride in his achievements over in Britannia, and the apprehension of Lollia’s ‘Are you going to tell us all about them?’
There had been the awful sense of doom as Marcia offered ‘We can tell you something much more interesting!’ followed by a glare from Arria and an unabashed ‘A man’s been poisoned right here in our house!’ and then Flora’s ‘But it’s all right, it wasn’t us.’
There was Arria’s simpering smile when Diphilus said, ‘It must have been a shock for all of you young ladies,’ and Marcia replied, ‘Not as much of a shock as having strange men investigating our underwear this afternoon.’
Diphilus had downed his wine in one gulp and held up his glass for the laundrymaid (promoted to wine steward for the evening) to refill it.
Arria asked Lollia Saturnina to tell them all about amphora production. Lollia had just said that she was afraid everyone would find it very boring when Flora
finished draining the sauce from the lettuce leaf into her mouth and said, ‘Everything’s gone downhill since Gaius came home.’
Ruso was wondering how much wine she had consumed when Marcia stepped in with ‘It’s not Gaius’ fault, it’s that Tilla he brought with him. She’s turned us all into barbarians. Now she’s stolen Cass.’
‘And our other brother has gone mad and run off after them,’ put in Flora.
Arria told them it was not nice to talk about family business at dinner, and Lollia attempted to come to the rescue with ‘I’d like to have met this Tilla. Is she someone you know from Britannia, Ruso?’
He said, ‘Yes.’
‘But now she’s gone,’ said Arria, as if that were the last word to be said on the subject.
For a moment nothing could be heard but the scrape of spoons on bowls. The cupids cavorted silently across the walls while Ruso thought wistfully of Tilla’s attempts at cookery in the little room with the flowers on the windowsill.
Moments later he became aware of a strange feeling in his stomach: perhaps caused by the contents of Severus’ water bottle, or perhaps by the appearance of a bowl of reheated goats’ testicles on the table in front of him. It occurred to him that there was a certain irony about being accidentally poisoned by one’s own ex-wife. When he returned his attention to the conversation, Lollia was saying, ‘Just fifteen.’
Marcia’s triumphant ‘See?’ was wasted on Ruso since he had no idea what they were discussing.
‘Lollia was married at fifteen!’ Marcia was determined not to let the point go. ‘Lollia, tell Gaius he must sort out a dowry before I die of old age and shame.’
Lollia smiled and reached for an oyster, Arria told Marcia not to harass the guests, and Ruso said, ‘Did I tell you I went to the gladiator barracks today?’
There was a tinkle of metal on mosaic. Marcia reached down to retrieve her spoon. When her face reappeared, it was flushed.
‘I’ve got a job there,’ he explained.
Marcia’s hazel eyes were locked on to his own, searching his face for some clue to what he had found out.
‘I met some interesting people,’ he continued. ‘I’m not sure I can do much to help them, though.’
‘Of course you can, dear, you’re very good at that sort of thing.’ Arria turned to Lollia. ‘It’s all those years in the Army, you see. Gaius knows everything there is to know about chopping off and stitching up. Will you be going to the games?’
Ruso missed the effect of this on Marcia because he was distracted by a small arm appearing from beneath his couch. It was followed by a dark head, then the naked owner of both crawled forward and tried to pull himself up by grabbing the three-legged dining table on which sat the bowl of testicles. The table was a delicate creation in polished walnut, not intended for use as a ladder. Before Ruso could grab it, table and toddler had crashed on to the mosaic in a howling tangle of limbs and spilled food.
Cries from the surrounding diners were undercut by a screech of ‘Galla!’ from Arria.
Ruso lifted off the table. To judge from the noise Little Gaius was making, he was not seriously injured. He swept the child up under one arm, ignoring the wails and waving arms at one end and the small fat legs kicking the air at the other. ‘Galla!’ he shouted, swerving round the end of a couch and lurching towards the door just as Galla appeared. She reached for the child. ‘I’m sorry, sir. He ran away again.’
‘Girls!’ ordered Arria, seizing her chance. ‘Go and help Galla put the children to bed.’
The demands of ‘What?’ were almost in unison.
‘Your mother asked you to put the children to bed,’ put in Diphilus, with more gallantry than sense.
Marcia said, ‘We don’t have to do what you say.’
Hearing echoes of his childhood, Ruso looked into the hazel eyes and said, ‘You have to do what I say. Apologize to your mother, and to Diphilus.’
Marcia opened her mouth to answer, then closed it as understanding dawned. Her brother and official guardian had been to the gladiator barracks. What followed was not gracious, but it was an apology.
After the girls had gone Ruso had piled the splintered remains of the table in a corner beneath a cheerful cupid who was driving a chariot pulled by two goats. Returning to the couch, he took refuge in his wine while the staff scoured the floor for potsherds and testicles and while Diphilus explained in detail to the three remaining diners why fixing the drains would involve digging up most of the garden. Arria was so intrigued that she did not notice the glass in her hand gradually tilting and tipping its contents across the floor.
To Ruso’s alarm, Lollia glanced across at him and winked.
Chapter 60
Arria brushed a stray olive aside and sank on to the couch while the cleaning girl and the laundrymaid lit more lamps and bustled around her with cloths and brooms. ‘We can’t go on like this, Gaius. Those wretched girls!’
‘Lollia said it was a very entertaining evening.’
‘I don’t want to talk about it. And that child! At this rate we shall have no furniture left.’
‘There’s too much of it anyway.’
Arria picked at a piece of fluff on the cushion. ‘I know you and your brother aren’t interested, but your father always wanted us to have a nice home.’
‘At the moment we’re lucky we’ve got a home at all.’
She looked up. ‘Well, I’m sorry to have to say it, dear, but whose fault is that?’
Ruso stared at her.
‘Your father was wonderful with money!’ she said. ‘And always so generous. I can’t understand how you two have grown up the complete opposite. He worked so hard to set up all those investments, and neither of you seems to have the faintest idea how to manage them.’
Ruso started to laugh. ‘Father didn’t have investments, Arria, he had loans! Loans to pay for all the things you insisted on buying. All the plans that got bigger and bigger –’
‘He agreed to the plans. I never bought anything without consulting him first.’
‘He never intended to build a temple that was going to cost a fortune to run for ever and ever. And he didn’t live long enough to agree to all these cupids.’
‘He would have liked them!’ cried Arria. ‘Do you want us to live in a mud hut like your barbarian?’
Ruso took a deep breath and reminded himself that he was no longer nine years old. He was a grown man and he was responsible for what was left of the family. ‘No,’ he said, wondering how many times Lucius had already tried to explain this to her, ‘I want us to live within our means. I know Father didn’t tell you all the details, because he didn’t tell us either, but a lot of the money was never really there. Now we have all this …’ He glanced around the dining room. ‘We have all these things, and we have to find a way to survive while
we pay for them.’
Arria’s hand crept to her mouth. ‘Are you saying your father lied to me?’
‘I’m saying,’ said Ruso, trying to remember what Cass had told him and wishing she were here to deal with this, ‘he was very fond of you and he wanted you to be happy. Now you won’t be ordering anything else, will you?’
Arria sniffed. The paint in the outer corner of one eye had smudged, giving her a black streak like an Egyptian. ‘It isn’t my fault, Gaius,’ she insisted. ‘Not all of it. Not the court case and everything. And all those children!’
‘We’ve all contributed,’ Ruso conceded. ‘But you have to listen, Arria. The only way out of this is to stop spending money.’
‘Not even a little outdoor dining room? It won’t cost much. Diphilus is such a nice man.’
‘No. We have to concentrate on keeping things going while Lucius and Cass are away, and we have to get these wretched investigators off our backs.’
Arria shook her head. A pin tumbled out of place and landed unnoticed on the couch. ‘There never was any money? Are you sure?’
‘Yes.’
‘No more lovely things?’
‘Just enjoy the lovely things you have.’
She was saying sadly, ‘Poor Diphilus will be so disappointed,’ when a voice from the doorway announced, ‘Never mind poor Diphilus. When are you going to make Gaius give me a dowry?’
Ruso growled, ‘Not tonight.’
‘Then what about Tertius?’
Ruso said, ‘Tertius made a choice,’ at the same time as Arria said, ‘Who is Tertius?’
‘I need money, Gaius.’
‘So do we all.’
‘Then Tertius is going to die!’ cried Marcia, bursting into tears. ‘And all you want to do’ (this was addressed to Ruso) ‘is to make money out of cutting him up! It’s all your fault, Gaius! I hate you!’
‘Then you shouldn’t have summoned me home,’ said Ruso.
Chapter 61
After a restless night throughout which one of them waited in dread for mice and the other for spiders, Tilla was relieved to open her eyes and find she could make out the hump that was Cass’s shoulder. Beyond it she could see the outline of the shutters. She closed her eyes again and slid her hands up over her ears in case the movement she was about to make should disturb anything with four paws and a tail and send it scuttling across her face. Then, with a move sudden enough to scare it away, she sat up.
