Death at Pompeia

Twenty

It took a long time to get home, even so. We had to go the long way, on the military road — no carriage-driver would willingly take the older Celtic track, with its boggy hollows, corners and vertiginous descents — but the newer route was mostly quicker anyway, especially in the dusk. The road was busy, as it always was towards the end of day, with carts and wagons coming to make deliveries: no civilian horse-drawn transport was permitted on the streets, until the town gates were ready to be shut.

There were few things going in our direction, though, and we made good progress. There was no military traffic to force us off the road — we did not even catch up with the soldiers from the garrison. I wondered if they had gone another route but as Minimus pointed out: ‘They are trained to march twenty or thirty miles a day carrying full equipment, so a two-hour route-march is simple exercise to them. I wouldn’t be surprised if we met them coming back!’

Indeed, as we turned off the main road on to the gravelled spur that led to Marcus’s estate — and therefore to my roundhouse which was built on part of it — I thought I did hear the sound of approaching marching feet and the clanking of armour from somewhere up ahead. But there was no time to think of that. The sun was setting further in the west, and the shadows of the forest were distinctly lengthening. The chill wind of evening was rustling the leaves and the first owl was hooting as it searched for its prey. The driver slowed the horses to a walk. At any moment, I thought, he might refuse to take us any further in this light. That would be a serious predicament. It was dangerous to be walking on unfrequented roads, in the forest, unarmed and in the dark.

I rapped on the back of the planks behind his seat. He stopped and craned over to look in on me. ‘You wanted something, citizen?’

‘Not much further now. I’ll give you a brand to light yourself back home.’

He muttered something about not having realized how far it would be, and how he would not have taken the fare if he had known, but he did urge the horses slowly on again. After a few minutes, which seemed an age, I saw the roundhouse coming into sight and I signalled to the driver that it was time to stop. He drew up at the gate to the enclosure.

Minimus jumped down at once and helped me to the ground. As he was doing so his partner, Maximus, came running from the house.

‘Oh, master, you are home at last. The mistress was concerned. She was beginning to think of sending out a search party for you.’ He grinned at Minimus. ‘How was the wedding? Was it a good feast?’

‘I’ll tell you in a moment. First I have to pay.’

The driver named a sum that made me pale. But I would have to pay it, and persuade him to come back. My freedom depended on my being early into town and making some breakthrough with the problems that I faced.

The driver saw my frown. ‘A double journey, citizen, and a slow one in this light. I might have had a dozen customers by now.’

I turned to Minimus. ‘But didn’t you agree a price before we left?’

The slave boy shook his head, shamefacedly. ‘I’m sorry, master, Marcus never did.’ Of course, I had not thought. He was not accustomed to such bargaining.

I turned to the driver. ‘I will pay what you ask. But only on condition that you come back here in the morning as soon as it is light, and take me back into the town again.’

The driver looked mutinous. ‘Another double trip!’ Then he brightened. ‘I’ll take it in advance.’

I was prepared for that trick. ‘When you come tomorrow. I will pay you then — for both the journeys.’ That should ensure that he came back for me, I thought. ‘In the meantime, here is something on account. Maximus, go inside and find a sestertius for him. Minimus, you go and find a brand to light him home.’ The two boys ran to do this, and I turned back to him. ‘Tomorrow morning, as soon as it is light. I am going back to the garrison, so don’t be late.’

I left the two boys to pay him and fix the torch on to the metal hook which was provided for that purpose on the carriage frame. I went into the roundhouse to my wife.

She was sitting spinning by the central fire. She smiled as I came in. ‘Minimus says you’ve had a trying day.’

I was about to answer when she raised her hand. ‘Tell me later on. Junio is coming and you can tell us then. You are tired and hungry. Take your toga off and sit down on that stool, the boys will fetch some water and wash your face and hands. There is vegetable stew in that pot on the fire, and I have baked those oatcakes that you like so much.’

I sat down gratefully and did as she had said, willing to delay bad news as long as possible, while Minimus tended to my every need. How much longer would I have the luxury of slaves and home-cooked food like this?

I glanced at Minimus. He had been given a great bowl of stew as well. I was not hungry somehow, but he wolfed his down, and — seeing the disappointment of my wife — I forced myself to eat. It was fragrant and delicious and I did not speak a word until there was not a morsel remaining on the plate. Just as I was mopping up the very last of it, my adopted son Junio came into the house.

I told the story then, trying not to dwell too much upon the threat to me.

Junio and Gwellia listened carefully, and did not interrupt — except to ask for every detail I could recollect. I was grateful for their help. I had encouraged Junio to do this many times, and he had an aptitude. He often saw things I had not seen myself, and Gwellia had a gift for spotting discrepancies from a female point of view. This time however, they seemed mystified.

‘Let’s go back to basics,’ Junio said. ‘Who would stand to profit by Honorius’s death? Pompeia does, I suppose. Not Helena Domna, she has lost her home, and will only have her own allowance to live on from now on.’

‘And not Livia either,’ Gwellia put in. ‘She’s worse off than before. If she wanted to be rid of him, she only needed to sue for a divorce. They are not so difficult to come by nowadays — any good lawyer could have got her one. She has been dutiful and Honorius is cruel — he has shown that by executing his own daughter in that way. She would have got her dowry back intact, and the freedom to do anything she liked. As it is, she gets a guardian and shares the estate with Pompeia and the child. She’ll need the guardian’s permission to do anything at all.’

‘So it rather depends on who the guardian is,’ I said. ‘If it is Gracchus, he might have a motive, I suppose. And the doorman, too. He was hoping for his freedom, and Honorius might have been standing in his way. But how could they have murdered anyone? Or Miles, the son-in-law whose wife Honorius killed? He had a grievance, but he wasn’t there.’

‘Redux?’ Gwellia put in. ‘He had a private grudge concerning Zythos, it appears. But how could he have brought poison to the house? Which brings us back to Antoninus, possibly. Suppose that Livia is right — there really was poison in that garum and Honorius somehow tasted it today. Somebody realized that and killed the murderer. They might even have filled the amphora up again. That makes a kind of sense. It could even have been Livia herself — she seemed anxious that no one else should taste it afterwards.’

I made a doubtful face. ‘But why should Honorius begin that garum today? It was a small amphora and they had many guests.’

‘Well, he was tasting all the wedding wine,’ she said, obviously unwilling to let the theory go.

‘Of course he was,’ I murmured, and then stopped with a frown. ‘But, come to think of it, why was he doing that? It isn’t usual for hosts to test the wine when it has come directly from the vintners only hours before. Did something happen to make him question it?’

‘And why did he taste the wine himself, in any case?’ Junio was sounding interested and excited now. ‘Most people would have someone do it for them, wouldn’t they?’

‘As Helena Domna did, in fact!’ I said triumphantly. ‘Junio, you’re right. Did he ask the servants to taste the wine at all? Do you know, Minimus?’

There was no answer. The slave boy was sitting on the upturned pail which served him as a stool, and his empty bowl was still balanced on his lap, but he had slumped forward, his ginger head leaning upon his arms.

For an awful moment I felt my blood run cold. ‘Minimus!’

But my voice had roused him, and he slowly stirred. He opened one eye drowsily, then pulled himself upright, obviously horrified to realize where he was. ‘I’m sorry master — I was fast asleep. There has been so much to see and do today. It won’t occur again. What can I do to make amends to you?’

He clearly feared a beating, but Gwellia caught my glance. ‘You can rinse these dirty bowls for me, then smooth the straw and spread the blanket out to make your master’s bed. Then, I suggest that you should go next door into the servants’ sleeping room and go to bed yourself. You’ll be wanted first thing in the morning, so I understand. Your master has enough concerns without your carelessness.’

Junio smiled. ‘And I must go back to Cilla. She’ll be waiting up for me. She would have come to see you, father, but she’s not been well. I’ve been away from her all day — working on that pavement you started yesterday. I haven’t even had the time to go into Glevum and open up the shop.’

‘Poor Cilla! What’s the matter?’ I was all concern. Junio’s young wife had been a slave of ours, and had always been the picture of robust good health.

Gwellia nudged me sharply. ‘Nothing serious. But he should get back to her. Maximus, you can take a brand and escort him up the path.’ Junio’s roundhouse enclosure was very close to ours.

My son turned at the doorway. ‘Shall I come with you tomorrow, father, when you go into town? It seems to me that you could do with my support?’

‘If you would like to and if Cilla’s well enough,’ I said. It was as close to begging as dignity allowed. ‘There are several things that you could do for me.’

And he was gone, with Maximus holding a torch to light his way. Minimus murmured a blessing and withdrew, leaving my gentle wife and I alone. The evening rituals of the household seemed precious suddenly.

I helped her with the fire, raked the ashes over the clay pot in one half of it, so that the bread would cook in the embers overnight, and banked the other half with slower-burning logs, not only to warm the roundhouse, but to ensure that we still had a means of cooking when the morning came. Then I lay down on the bed that Minimus had prepared and Gwellia drew the covers over me, settled down beside me and blew the tapers out. A moment later her soft breathing told me she was fast asleep.

I was grateful for the comfort of her sleeping form, but I could not rest. My mind was too full of the worries of the day and fears about the morrow. It was not just the murders — though, Jove knew, they were sufficient problems in themselves — but there were little questions which niggled at my brain. That writing tablet for example, and the way that Livia and Redux had both been shocked by it. Livia’s astonishment was explicable enough, but could I really believe that Redux had merely been anxious for his friend? Antoninus had clearly possessed that writing block — he’d used the thing to send a note to me. Had Zythos bribed him with it, in exchange for silence over some misdeed? Was it about that statue, that it worried Redux so? I was sure the information was in that writing block, but for the life of me I could not work out what it was. And my future might depend on it.

In the end I got up quietly, so as not to wake my wife, and groped my way to where Maximus had folded up my clothes. I fumbled in the pouch and found the writing block. The ivory of the cover glimmered at me in the dark, and when I opened it I could just make out the paler colour of the wax. Of course, the new wax which had replaced the thin and damaged piece! Why had I not thought of that before?

I hurried over to the glow that was the hearth, and lit a taper from the burning wood, shielding it by placing it inside a wooden bowl, so that its light did not disturb the house. Then I placed the trivet on the hottest section of the fire, and carefully balanced the open writing tablet on the rim of it.

I was so excited by my new idea that I was not alert, until a voice behind me made me whirl around. ‘Master!’ Minimus was standing in the entrance, watching me. ‘What are you doing?’ He padded towards me, rubbing bleary eyes and I saw that he was tousle-headed and barefoot, with only his thin under-tunic on. ‘Are you trying to destroy that lovely thing?’

I shook my head, and placed a finger on my lips. ‘The cover is ivory, it will take no harm. And if I am careful, I will not scorch the wood. But see, the wax is already softening and I will be able to lift it from the frame.’ I took it carefully from the trivet as I spoke, burning my fingers a little with the heat. My method had been more effective than I hoped, and the wax was dripping of its own accord. I took up a knife and helped it on its way, then lifted the taper to look closely at the wooden backing frame. ‘Just as I thought. There are scratches visible. But in this light, it is impossible to see.’

Minimus grinned impishly at me. He kept his voice low, just as I had done. ‘If you rubbed it with black dust from the fire, it would get into the grooves and show the marks up more.’

He suited the action to the word and I saw that he was right. There were a lot of scratches, and at first it seemed a maze — fragments of numbers and disconnected words, each new message obscuring the one underneath. But when I risked a second taper and rubbed in more black dust, it was possible to convince myself that I could make out words.

‘“A S tomorrow”,’ I read aloud, ‘then something undecipherable, then the words “usual ajar”.’

Was that what it said? I stared at it. It made no kind of sense. It sounded like an invitation to a robbery. The statue possibly? That sounded plausible. And could the AS stand for Antoninus, in that case? Antoninus Seulonius — wasn’t that what Marcus had called him long ago?

‘Well done, Minimus,’ I murmured, and he preened.

He whispered back, ‘It’s something we used to do — Maximus and I — when we were small and wanted to pass messages between ourselves without the chief slave finding out. Just a piece of wood and a nail to scratch it with. Silly really, but we were not allowed to talk and we had to spend hours waiting to be called.’ He looked anxiously at me. ‘Have I atoned for dropping off to sleep?’

‘I suppose so,’ I said with a laugh. ‘But now go back to bed or you’ll be doing it again.’ I reached out and rubbed his tousled hair. ‘And I’ve enough troubles without that, Jove knows. You gave me quite a shock.’

He nodded ruefully and padded off. But it was true, I thought, as I blew the candles out and went back to lie down on my own bed again. For a dreadful moment, while he was slumped like that, I had seriously feared that he was dead. Perhaps it was because my mind was full of poisoning. Or he had reminded me of Antoninus at his desk. There had been something very similar. Almost as if he were. .

‘I wonder!’ I murmured to myself, recalling something that Redux had remarked. Well, that would have to wait until tomorrow too. And feeling that at least I had a path to follow now, I closed my eyes at last.

I woke to find Gwellia shaking me and thrusting a glass of water into my hand.

‘Wake up, husband. The carriage is here. Junio is waiting and it’s time to go. I’ll cut a piece of bread and cheese for you, and you can eat it on the way. Minimus will help you to put your toga on. I’ve given him the money for the carriage fare, but if you want any extra you’ll have to get it from the shop, because until I sell some eggs and cloth, that’s all the cash we have.’ Her voice trembled — just a little. ‘Send the boy home to let me know what happens, husband. And good luck!’

She kissed me as the boy deftly wrapped my toga round my form. Five minutes later, we were on our way.