Caveat emptor

73

Medicine, like investigating, was an occupation fraught with failure. Still, back in Londinium, it was a relief to retreat into the relative simplicity of covering out-of-hours calls so that an unusually hesitant Valens could spend more time with his family. In quiet moments, Ruso carried on working his way through a stack of writing tablets, contacting everyone he could think of who might care to recommend him for a job.

There was no shortage of quiet moments. Tilla seemed to have very little to say to him or to anyone else. He had said he was sorry about the baby, but the only response was, “Yes.” He had asked what the Iceni man had said to her, but she refused to tell him. Since Serena had now reinstalled a full complement of servants, there was little for her to do. Instead she spent long hours sitting in the bedroom by herself. Asked what she was doing up there, she said, “Thinking.”

“About what?”

“Things.”

Not sure he was welcome upstairs, Ruso took to spending his evenings helping the apprentices practice their stitching on ox tongues and testing them on the medicinal properties of flavored wines. When the short one offered to take his teetering stack of letters, he realized with a jolt that he had no desire to send them. A new job would mean leaving Londinium. It would mean being on his own with Tilla. He was not sure either of them wanted that. “I’ll sort them all out when I’ve finished,” he told the apprentice, doggedly carrying on writing requests and leaving them to accumulate on the new table in Valens’s hall.

At night he lay awake regretting the demise of the cockerel. It would have been some sort of company as he waited for the trumpet from the fort to sound the change of watch and hoped for an emergency to give him something to do. In the mornings he slept late.

Tilla’s was not the only frustrating silence.

It was three days since he had delivered his report to the procurator’s office along with a claim for his expenses. Neither the procurator nor Firmus had been available to speak to him at the time, and there had been no message since. He had used the excuse of his expenses to visit the Residence, but again no one was around. The gap-toothed expenditure clerk told him his claim was being processed and that he would be contacted. The travel warrant clerk-last seen on horseback in the cemetery at Verulamium-had refused to discuss his emergency reinstatement into the cavalry. It was, apparently, “a military matter.”

Was his report so comprehensive that the procurator didn’t need to question him? Did nobody here care what went on up the road as long as the tax was paid? Maybe it had been a mistake to admit the truth about his coerced speech to the Council. Being honest about one’s failures was not a trait much prized among the powerful.

Ruso was even beginning to wish Metellus would get in touch. He had left a note in the Room Twenty-seven pigeonhole, but there had been no response. It had begun to dawn on him that he might never find out the end of the story. He was not important enough to be told. Nor, it seemed, was he competent enough to be given any more work as an investigator. For that, at least, he was grateful.

Thus it was with mixed feelings that he finally received a message ordering him to report to Firmus.

“Ruso!”

Was it his imagination or had the youth grown in the few days since they had last seen each other? His surroundings had certainly improved: no longer a dingy back room but a bright office with sun streaming through the window. Pyramus was perched on a stool just behind his master and a couple of scribes were hovering, waiting for instructions.

Verulamium, Firmus explained with obvious pride, had just delivered its tax along with a large consignment of forged coins for destruction.

Ruso offered congratulations and waited to find out why he was really here.

“And the procurator’s read your report and wants to see you. You weren’t entirely straight with us about Metellus, were you?”

“I’m sorry, sir,” said Ruso, wondering how much they knew.

“We’ve been in touch with the governor,” said Firmus. “My uncle will explain.”

On this ominous note Ruso was ushered out by one of the scribes and escorted to the procurator’s office.

The great man was sufficiently recovered to be seated at his desk in another crisp white linen tunic, but Ruso barely noticed him. What drew his attention was the very ordinary-looking man silhouetted in front of the window. It looked like… Surely it couldn’t be?

“Come in, Ruso,” said the procurator. “Metellus and I have some things to say to you.”