A Coin for the Ferryman

Chapter Thirteen

Lucius stared after the slave’s retreating back. There was a moment’s silence.

‘You went out to the lane, then?’ I ventured finally, wondering what errand would take him from the house, especially while Marcus and Julia were in town.

When Lucius answered it was with disdain. ‘Of course. I believe I mentioned that there was a messenger?’

My turn to stare at him. A messenger? Why should that take Lucius to the gate? No citizen of his rank would go out to the road to receive an errand boy. More likely the messenger would be required to come in and wait for him — sometimes for a considerable time. However, I could hardly challenge Marcus’s cousin outright.

‘A messenger from your aunt Honoria, I think? And you received him, since your cousin was not here?’ I prompted shamelessly.

Lucius gave a thin smile. ‘Indeed. In this very atrium, in fact. But in view of the seriousness of the news from Rome, naturally I did not encourage him to linger here. I saw that he was given food and drink — he had ridden from Londinium without a stop, except to change his horses at the military inns — and sent him on to Glevum, to try to catch up with Marcus at the garrison if he could. Of course, the messenger doesn’t know the roads, so I escorted him to the gatehouse and personally asked Aulus to point out the shortest route.’

Without even giving the poor lad a chance to rest, I thought, after his long and dusty journey on the roads. However, it was logical enough. The rider would have a travel warrant to speed his way as regards the horses and assistance at the inns, but he would not know the short cut through the lane that passed my house, which — for a single rider — would cut off several miles.

‘And Aulus was at his station then?’ I asked. It was a meaningless enquiry, in the circumstances — obviously he must have been, or Lucius could not have asked him anything — and Lucius treated it with the raised eyebrow it deserved. I hastened to add a more judicious thought. ‘He did not seem peculiar in any way at all? Not ill, or anything?’

Lucius stiffened. ‘What do you mean by that?’ His voice was sharp. Still contemptuous of my idiotic questions, it appeared.

‘I thought — since he went missing shortly afterwards — there might have been some sign of the reason. Did he seem to be his normal self to you?’

Lucius gave me his thin smile. ‘His normal self? I’m not sure what his normal self might be. After all, I hardly knew the man.’

‘Shrewd and grasping and malodorous, and willing to sell information at a price,’ I said. Lucius looked properly scandalised at this — it is not polite to criticise the servants of one’s host. I hastened to explain. ‘You must have realised that the fellow was a spy? Marcus has relied on him for years.’

‘I heard rumours yesterday of something of the kind. Not that I would have used him in such a way, of course.’ He had turned that disapproving fish-gill pink again.

I laughed. ‘Don’t worry, citizen. It would not have been surprising if you had. Most of us have slipped Aulus a little something now and then. Though, naturally, your rank and purse would get more out of him than I am able to. He has been the ears and eyes of Marcus for so long, he is accustomed to being paid more handsomely than I can generally afford.’

Lucius seemed genuinely interested in this. He lost that stuffed and starchy look. ‘You used him, then, yourself‘?’ He glanced at Minimus, and then went on as if the slave boy was not possessed of ears and eyes. ‘Aulus did not strike me as having the qualities of mind to. .’ he paused, ‘to pass on intelligence with much intelligence.’ The pale eyes glinted at this attempt at wit.

‘All the same,’ I said, ‘he is reliable. He does not see the point of everything you ask, but what he does tell you is generally accurate enough. For instance, I wanted to know what vehicles were passing in the lane the other day — the day I think the murder of our corpse took place. He gave me a sort of list. I’m not convinced that it was quite complete — if I’d had money in my purse, I might have learned some more — but I’m certain that what he told me is nothing but the truth.’

‘I see.’ The thin lips smiled. ‘Perhaps I should have questioned Aulus when I had the chance. Or we should have questioned him together, you and I.’

Another jest? He was talking to me as though I were his equal, all at once. I knew I should be flattered by the compliment, but something was niggling in the corner of my brain — a vague feeling that something important had been said, some significant detail which had passed me by. I racked my brains but for the moment I could not work out what it was. Meanwhile Lucius was still smiling in that impassive way of his, waiting for me to answer his remark.

Well, two could play the game of flattery. ‘I’m sure your rank and status would ensure success,’ I said. I didn’t have to add ‘your bribe’ — that was implicit, as we were both aware. ‘Perhaps we could both talk to him when he turns up again.’

‘Willingly. Supposing that he does.’ Lucius arched his eyebrows. ‘Marcus was telling us, just the other day, about the trouble you are having with those rebels in the west, and how it’s feared they might now have a hideout in these woods.’

‘You think he might have been abducted or attacked?’ This was a possibility which had not occurred to me — though perhaps it should have done. What else would have persuaded him to leave his post like that? He would hardly have done so willingly, and risked a flogging for his pains. I thought a moment and then shook my head. ‘Aulus is not the kind of man that brigands set upon — not unless there was a well-armed band of them, at least, and even then he would have laid about him with his club, and bloodied one or two of them for their pains. And the way he roars, it couldn’t go unnoticed in the house. Besides, there’s no sign of a struggle — I can vouch for that.’

‘You don’t suppose that he simply took the chance to run away? He was always complaining about something, when I spoke to him.’

I had to smile at this. ‘And make himself a fugitive, with a price upon his head? Not Aulus. He must have earned his freedom price half a dozen times in bribes, but he’s never shown the slightest inclination to buy his freedom and depart. I think he quite enjoys his position as a spy.’

Lucius seemed unwilling to abandon his idea. ‘In normal times, perhaps. But no doubt, like the rest of us, he was alarmed by knowing that we had an unburied body in the house, just when the Festival of the Dead is coming up. Perhaps he feared the spirits and made a bolt for it?’

I could not see Aulus as a superstitious man — one whiff of his onions would frighten off any ghost! I shook my head again. ‘More likely there was some crisis in the lane and — not finding another servant when he called for one, since there were none about — he left his post to deal with it himself.’

‘Unless you are right and he was suddenly unwell.’ Minimus had been standing by and listening to all this. ‘I remember that did happen to him once before — we found him in the forest, being very sick. He’d gnawed some sort of flower bulbs instead of onions.’

‘Your attendant interrupts us, citizen!’ Lucius was outraged by this affront to his dignity. ‘If he were my servant I should have him flogged.’ Shutters had come down across his face, like a shop-front at the market closing up, and his previous thawing manner had frozen hard again.

‘Nevertheless, we must investigate all possibilities,’ I urged.

But he was not to be wooed into friendliness again. ‘Then you can leave me to arrange a search for the missing gatekeeper. You, I believe, have other things to do. I think there is someone awaiting you outside?’

It was a dismissal, and a timely one, in fact. So much had happened that I had almost forgotten Stygius and his land slave. ‘Of course,’ I murmured. ‘I must go at once. But. .’

Lucius gave me that tight smile again and raised a warning hand. ‘That is your priority, citizen, I fear. Your patron requested you to solve this crime, and it is important that you make a start if you are to put that corpse to rest before the Lemuria begins.’ He swallowed self-importantly, so that the cartilage in his throat bobbed up and down. ‘I only hope that the disappearance of this Aulus fellow is not another manifestation of a curse upon this household. But, as I say, you can leave that in my hands. I will go and talk to the chief steward now, and arrange a search party.’ And without another word he turned away, and strode from the atrium.

‘I’m sorry, master.’ Minimus was beside me in a trice. ‘I did not mean to interrupt you and provoke the citizen.’

I grinned at him in mock severity. ‘Then ensure you mind your manners another time,’ I said. ‘Now, take me to the stable block at once. I’ll see Stygius and this land slave, if they’re still here.’

They were. Stygius was doggedly standing vigil beside the shrouded corpse — from which, as Lucius had said, a distinctive odour was now beginning to emerge — while his companion loitered uncomfortably nearby. The older man came across to greet me as soon as I appeared.

‘Ah, Citizen Libertus, there you are. This here is Caper — the slave I told you of. The one who interviewed the father of that girl. You’ll have to speak slowly. He’s fairly new to us.’

I nodded at Caper. The word means ‘he-goat’ and presumably some recent slavemaster had given him the name. I could see why. He was a tall, rangy-looking youth with curly, thick black hair, which sprouted not only from his long and bony head, but from his sinewy hands, legs and forearms too. A straggling beard and whiskers formed a sort of frame around his face so that he did look like a kind of half-tamed animal — a mountain goat perhaps — standing on its hind legs for a trick. He was dressed in a grimy tunic, with a leather apron and rough rags tied about his feet for boots. He raised a pair of wary eyes to me as I approached, and Stygius prodded him forward with one brawny arm.

‘Now then.’ Stygius poked the unfortunate Caper fiercely in the ribs. ‘This citizen is your master’s special protégé, so you make sure you answer when you’re spoken to.’

It didn’t altogether look as if the goat could manage that. He was gazing at my toga with a doubtful air, as if it overawed him.

‘You spoke to the family of this girl?’ I said.

He nodded, but said nothing. Before Stygius could offer a rebuke, I spoke again. ‘You could take me to the place?’

Another nod. ‘Nicely place,’ he said at last. His voice was what I had expected, gruff and low, with the strong accent of the local tribe. Brought up in some poor family, I would judge, and sold to slavery to help the funds when he was old enough. As Stygius said, his Latin was not good, though obviously he could understand my words. I wondered how he had coped with asking questions in some of the Roman households round about.

‘Nice place?’ I said, in Celtic, and earned a wondering smile. My dialect was not the same as his, but it was close enough to give him confidence.

‘Good pigs, they’ve got. And hens. And cabbages,’ he told me eagerly. ‘All sorts of things. It’s quite a little farm.’

‘How long will it take us to get there?’ I asked.

He looked at me, taking in the toga and the greying beard. ‘Took me half an hour,’ he said. ‘Take you a good bit longer, I expect.’

It took me twice that time, in fact. Several times Caper had to wait for me (though sometimes for Minimus as well, I was amused to note) and once again he lived up to his name. He led the way so quickly there was no time for speech. After a mile or two I was panting after him, far too breathless for conversation anyway.

Our destination lay in the opposite direction from my house, and we were soon in an area that I did not know at all. We hurried past the trappers’ hut and a scattered farm or two, but Caper did not pause. Away from the main lane he led us at a trot, till we were toiling up hilly forest tracks. We seemed to be leaving civilisation far behind when, stumbling along a little stony path, we suddenly came to a clearing in the woods. Caper stopped, and spread out one arm to indicate the crest of a small hill with a roundhouse enclosure on the top of it. ‘There it is,’ he said triumphantly.

It was a sizeable homestead, for a peasant farm, and I could see why Caper thought it a ‘nicely place’. I could make out four roundhouses at least, a large expanse of cultivated spelt, and half a dozen sheep and horses corralled into a field. But there was evidence of Roman ways as well. There were watch-geese roaming inside the inner yard; plump ducks and chickens pecked among long rows of cabbages, and we had already passed the portable woven fences which were moved around the woods to give swine new feeding grounds while keeping them enclosed. A stack of firewood was cut and standing at the gate, with a sprig of holly hanging over it for luck, and another pile of something (it looked like bundled leaves) was drying in a rick as winter fodder for the animals. Woodsmoke curled up from the roof-holes and from somewhere inside the enclosure a dog began to bark.

Clearly the place was mildly prosperous, but I was rather surprised to find that this was the household we’d been looking for. Stygius had told me yesterday that his land slaves were looking for news of a missing girl with soft, unblistered hands. The inhabitants of such a farm as this would work their land themselves — just as they would have built the roundhouses, dug the surrounding ditches and woven the triple fence. No troops of slaves to do the work for them — the women of the household would labour with the men. I said as much to Caper, when I found the breath to speak. ‘You were looking for a girl with tender hands,’ I said. ‘What made you come and ask your questions here?’

He looked at me, furrowing his eyebrows closer across his narrow eyes. ‘They told me at the big Roman house down there’ — he waved a vague hand in the direction we had come — ‘that there was someone missing from this farm. Apparently the father went down there a little while ago, saying that his eldest girl had run away, and asking if their land slaves had seen any sign of her. Of course they couldn’t help him, but they told me what he’d said. So up I came. I didn’t think there was much chance of its being any use, considering the hands and everything, but I thought I’d be in trouble if I didn’t try. I didn’t know then that the body was a man, or I might not have bothered coming here at all.’

‘You did the right thing, all the same,’ I said. ‘It turns out that we may be looking for a peasant girl.’

He grinned — a malicious little smile that showed his long and yellow teeth and reminded me more than ever what his nickname meant. ‘Course, that enquiry from her father was a little while ago, before her family got word that she was safe. She has joined a travelling entertainment troupe and sent a message home, saying she was well and happy and not to look for her. You knew that, didn’t you?’ He seemed to take a gleeful pleasure in the notion that my breathless exertions might have been in vain. ‘But there’s the father — you can ask him for yourself.’

I looked in the direction where he was gesturing. There was indeed a man — a burly man in Celtic trousers, tunic and plaid cloak. Borrowing from Roman ways clearly did not extend to personal appearance. His hair was pulled back into a long tail at his neck, which emphasised his jutting chin and long traditional moustache. He was leaning on the enclosure fence and staring hard at us. There was a none-too-friendly expression on his face, and I was alarmed to see a huge staff in his hand, while the dog — which was now squatting at his heels — bared his teeth in a ferocious snarl. Hardly the welcoming reception I had hoped.

I was contemplating whether I should go over and speak to him myself, or whether I should send either of the slaves, when the fellow solved the problem by shouting out to us.

‘You again, goat-face? What do you want this time? And who is your fancy toga-wearing friend?’ He was bellowing in Celtic, probably in the belief that I would not understand.

Caper looked uncomfortable. ‘This is the Citizen Libertus,’ he called back in the same tongue. ‘The favoured client of my master, Marcus Septimus — you know, the magistrate. Libertus is here on his particular account, to ask the same questions that I asked you yesterday and probably some others of his own as well.’ Then, seeing that the farmer was about to speak again, he added hastily, ‘He’s a Roman citizen, but he speaks Celtic too.’

I could see that it was time for me to intervene. ‘Indeed I do. And I have a roundhouse, though not as grand as yours. Nor is my family quite as sizeable,’ I added, realising that there were several female heads watching us from the shelter of the roundhouse doors. The same heads heard me and instantly withdrew. ‘But it’s your eldest daughter that I want to talk about.’

The farmer threw me a furious glance. ‘And what is she to you? Come to tell me that she is found, have you, and want me to take her back? Well, I shall have to disappoint you, citizen. She ran away, and she can stay away, as far as I’m concerned. She has made a mockery of me and of my family’s good name!’

I took a pace towards him but was dissuaded by the dog, which snarled and barked and rushed fiercely at the fence. I stopped and shouted from the safety of the path. ‘A mockery?’ I echoed, trying to sound as sympathetic as I could.

He spat into the furze pile with ferocity. ‘How dare she run away when I have promised her, especially when I found her a decent widower like that. Cost me a pair of cows in dowry, and a lot of money too — and naturally he won’t agree to give them back.’ Another spit. ‘Course he was old and ugly, and inclined to smell of pigs, but a girl like that should be grateful to get any man at all. You tell her, citizen, if I lay hands on her, I’ll give her a leathering that she won’t forget.’

I was beginning to feel some sympathy for the young runaway. ‘You’d promised her in marriage?’ I took another step. The dog contented itself this time with an unpleasant growl.

The farmer hawked, and ran a hand and arm across his mouth. ‘Aren’t I just telling you I did?’ he said. He paused, then went on in an altered tone of voice. ‘But surely you must know that, if you’ve caught up with her. Morella is a bit simple, I grant you, but she wouldn’t tell a lie. Hasn’t got the wit to make things up at all. Too trusting, in a lot of ways, that’s been the trouble all her life.’ He cocked an eye at me. ‘I expect that’s what happened with this travelling act of hers. She found out what the fellow wanted, and didn’t care for it? Well, tell him I won’t take her — and that’s an end of that. I’m not obliged to, when she left here of her own accord. You tell her that as well.’

‘I can’t tell her anything,’ I said. ‘I don’t know where she is. I’ve come to ask you what she looked like, so I can search for her.’

‘Don’t bother. I don’t want her, and she sends word she’s happy where she is.’ Something seemed to strike him, and he glared at me. ‘Don’t tell me she’s already got herself in debt, and her creditors are searching for her? No doubt they’ll hold me liable, if they don’t find her soon, since she is my daughter, and a simple one at that. Oh, now it all makes sense! That’s why the magistrate has sent you, I suppose.’

I tried to deny it, but he paid no heed to me. He was still spitting at the ground and grumbling to himself. ‘Oh, dear gods of stone and tree, is there no end to this? I’ve done my best for her for years, and what’s the thanks I get? I’ve got other children to think about as well. Four more girls to make provision for. How am I to manage?’

I was still wondering what to say to that when he seized a piece of rope which was tied up to the fence, and used the looped end to secure the dog. ‘Well, I suppose in that case I’d better let you in.’ He came out to the gate and pushed it open, still grumbling. ‘What has she done this time? Taken things without permission from a shop?’

Caper was looking doubtful and so was Minimus, but I led the way into the enclosure and they had no option but to follow me — taking care to keep well out of range of the snarling canine which was straining at its leash. The farmer turned without another word and led the way into the largest building on the site — a communal roundhouse, complete with central fire, and tools and bedding ranged around the walls on the far side. The nearer section, however, was expensively furnished in the Roman style with a proper couch and tables, a handsome woven mat, and an ornate brass oil lamp burning on a stand. Morella’s father was clearly a successful man, as peasant farmers go.

He gestured to the couch, and I sat down on it while he took up a position on a wooden stool nearby. ‘Well?’ he demanded. ‘What is that she’s done?’

‘I am not sure that she’s done anything,’ I said. ‘And if Morella is the girl I am looking for, it seems unlikely that she was in debt. She had some money with her, quite a lot of it.’

He did not react to this with anger, as I’d expected he would do. He looked a little puzzled, if anything. ‘Well, I don’t know where it came from, then. I didn’t give it to her.’ He folded his arms aggressively across his chest. ‘So if isn’t money, what is it that you want?’

I glanced at Caper for support — after all he had interviewed the man before — but he evaded my eyes and stood staring at the floor. I took a deep breath. ‘We know of a peasant girl who may have come to harm. I hope it’s not Morella, but it is possible.’

I expected some response from him at this — even some expression of concern — but all that happened was a lengthy pause during which we could hear the dog still barking noisily outside.

Eventually I said, ‘I need to trace her movements for the last few days, to be completely sure. In order to do that there are obviously some questions I must ask.’

Another pause. The farmer still said nothing, so I pressed on anyway. ‘Did your Morella have long lime-bleached hair? And what was she wearing when she left the house?’