A Coin for the Ferryman

Chapter Fourteen

I was still expecting the farmer to exhibit some concern, or at least to ask some pretty pointed questions of his own — after all I had told him bluntly that I feared his eldest daughter might have come to harm — but he did nothing of the kind. Instead, he pursed his lips and scowled as though I had insulted him.

‘I blame her mother for all that,’ he burst out angrily. ‘Showed her the way her grandfather mixed lime to bleach his hair, like all the other elders of the tribe.’ He ran a proud hand down each end of his magnificent moustache, which had itself been lightly bleached. ‘You do hear of women who have limed hair these days — no respect for masculine tradition and the way things should be done. Of course, she wanted to try it for herself. Someone had told her that blonde girls are prettier and how they sometimes shave their heads and sell their hair for wigs, and after that there was no stopping her. As if she could ever be a beauty! Girl looked like a pig.’ He spat again, this time into the fire.

‘So she did bleach her hair?’ I said, returning to the point.

‘Bleached it! She nearly turned it green, and damaged it so much that half of it broke off the first time she put a bone comb into it. Her mother had a struggle to plait it afterwards — but the stupid girl was thrilled to bits with the effect. Just before her husband-to-be was going to visit, too! I was tempted to hack it all off with the shears and leave her like a sheep, but her mother persuaded me against that in the end. Said Morella would look even worse if she was bald — said it didn’t look too bad when it was braided up, and perhaps the colour would grow out again in time!’ He aimed another gob into the centre of the fire. ‘I should have given both of them a thrashing there and then. I’m too soft with my womenfolk, that’s the truth of it.’

I had to look away as he said this, and I caught Minimus’s eye — he was standing at my elbow all this time. His expression was carefully impassive, as Junio’s would not have been, and he did not return my glance, but I was convinced that he had understood our Celtic speech — with that red hair he was probably Silerian by birth. I was about to ask him to repeat what he had told me about the tunic and the boots when the farmer abruptly got to his feet.

‘About the clothes — I’ll have her mother in and you can talk to her yourself. She’ll know what the girl was wearing — I couldn’t tell you that. I never take an interest in such female details.’ He strode over to the doorway and clapped his hands three times. ‘Wife! I want you! Come to us at once.’

The wife in question must have been waiting close outside, because almost at once she came hurrying in. She was a little wizened woman, with an anxious stoop and a lined and worried weather-beaten face. She could never have been pretty — her nose was far too long — and age had not been very kind to her. Her neck was scrawny and wrinkled and her hair was thin and grey, though she still wore it in a long, brave braid; and her hands — though strong and brown — had ugly livid spots. I noticed that she had expensive sandals and toe-rings on her feet and, remembering the boots that my slave boy had described, I wondered if I’d come here on a fool’s errand after all. If the wife wore proper shoes, I told myself, wasn’t it likely that her daughter did so too?

But then my mosaic-maker’s eye fell on the pattern of the homespun plaid robe she wore, and I knew at once that it was one I’d seen before. Most Celtic families weave a special pattern of their own, and this was identical to the one the corpse had worn. That dress had belonged to a member of this tribe — if not the woman’s daughter, then another relative — and since that person, almost certainly, was dead, I felt a sudden surge of sympathy. But I could not spare her the grief that was in store. I looked at her sadly.

She was smiling a little nervously, showing a row of broken teeth. ‘You called me, husband? I was waiting for your summons. I am sorry that I took so long to answer it.’ Her voice was soft and squeaky, with an apologetic tone, although it seemed to me that she had come the moment she was called. ‘You want me to bring refreshments for your guest?’ she added, gesturing to me, since obviously the slave boys didn’t count. ‘Your’ guest, not ‘our’, I noticed. Clearly, in this household, the farmer’s word was law. Another thing he’d borrowed from the Roman way of life — in many Celtic households the woman has a say, and often is as educated as the menfolk are. ‘A drop of fresh milk and an oatcake, perhaps?’

It sounded quite delicious but the farmer shook his head. ‘No need for that. The citizen will not be staying long. He has a question for you, then he’ll be on his way. Tell him what he wants to know, and get back to your work.’

She turned towards me, her grey eyes wary. ‘Well, citizen, what is it that you want to know? Something about bees or dyeing wool, perhaps? I am not well informed on many things.’

‘Something about your eldest daughter,’ I said quietly.

I saw the flame of hope spring up in her. ‘You have some news of her? Oh, thank all the gods. I thought that I should never hear of her again.’

‘Be silent, woman,’ her husband said, much as he would have quieted the dog. ‘Listen to what the citizen has to say.’

I broke the news to her as gently as I could. We had found a plaid garment in suspicious circumstances, I explained, and we feared that it might once have been Morella’s — though I didn’t say anything about the money in the hem. Then I outlined the description which the dancing woman gave. ‘So, knowing that your daughter had run away, and gone to join an entertainment group,’ I finished, ‘I wanted to check if this dress could possibly be hers. It sounds as if it might. I understand from your husband that she’d lime-bleached her hair in a way that made her stand out from the general crowd.’

The woman shot an anxious look towards her man. ‘Morella didn’t mean any disrespect by that,’ she said. ‘She’s a bit slow of understanding, that’s the only thing. She thought that it looked pretty when she saw my father’s hair, and when I showed her how he did it, she tried it for herself.’ She ignored the furious scowl that her words produced and seemed to stand a little taller as she added, ‘My father is an elder of the tribe, you see, and he still keeps up the ancient warrior traditions in that way. Spikes his hair and wears a long moustache — and insists that members of his family do the same.’ The faintest ghost of a tired smile flitted on her lips. ‘Even sons-in-law,’ she added.

Suddenly I understood why the farmer, who clearly favoured Roman ways, stuck to the old traditions in his style of dress. ‘Yours is an ancient family?’ I hazarded.

She nodded, and was about to speak again when her husband interrupted with a sneer. ‘Ancient and feeble-minded, half of them, and all as proud as gods, though they don’t have much land or money since the occupation. Still, folks still look up to them. Why do you think I married her? It sure as Pluto wasn’t for her wealth and you can see it wasn’t for her looks.’

So I was right about the nature of this uneasy partnership — it was a marriage between a common man with money and a woman of good rank. He brought his wealth and she brought her tribal lineage. Perhaps it was her bloodline that still protected her — though she was cowed, she showed no signs of actual violence and I had no doubt that he was capable of it. Probably she still had powerful relatives.

At this moment she was looking at the floor, two red spots of humiliation on her withered cheeks. Poor woman! And I was the bearer of such unhappy news! I felt so sorry for her, I could hardly frame the words.

‘And Morella was wearing a dress like yours the day that she disappeared from home?’ I said, as gently as I could. ‘I think I recognise the pattern of the plaid — though it is different from the one your husband wears.’

She raised her eyes to look full into mine, and I could see the anxiety in them. ‘I weave the pattern that my mother used,’ she said, ‘though sometimes I use his family’s colour patterns too. But certainly Morella had a dress like this. I did not weave the cloth for it; my mother originally made it for herself, just a little while before she died. She passed it on to Morella one Beltane feast, when she was too ill to leave her bed any more, and Morella had finished her quick-growing phase. Morella was so pleased with it she rarely took it off, though recently it had been getting tight on her. I know she would have been wearing it on the day she left, although I didn’t see her go.’

‘And on her feet?’ I asked, although I was certain of the answer by this time. ‘Would she have sandals?’

She shook her head. ‘A pair of home-made boots.’ She glanced towards her husband, as if half afraid of how he would respond to what she said. ‘I don’t know why my husband didn’t tell you all this himself. She only had a single pair of boots, and only the one dress that fitted her these days. Her father thought. .’

He interrupted her again. ‘I am not made of money, woman, to have your looms kept busy with needless articles, when woven cloth commands a good price in the marketplace in town. Of course she would have had a proper dowry when she wed: two robes if she’d wanted them, from bought material, pink or blue or any hue she chose, with cobbler’s sandals and toe-rings and gold balls for her hair. Everything a modern bride could ask for, as well as her own cooking pots and pans. I’d put aside the cash to pay for it. But until that happened, what would have been the point? Her dress still fitted, and there was some wear in it yet, while the younger children are growing up like trees. There’s always one of them needs new clothes every year, even if the rest have hand-me-downs.’ He glared at her triumphantly. ‘And you see that I was right! What would she have done with them if I had given her new things? Run off with them, that’s what, and we would have spent all that money in vain.’

The woman looked beseechingly at me. ‘So it is certain that she’s gone for good? I wasn’t sure. .’ She glanced towards her husband, and then added timidly, ‘She’s quite a simple sort of girl, you see, and I thought she might get tired of it and come back home again.’

‘Caper here tells me that you got a message after she had gone. To say that she’d gone away to join the dancing girls?’

‘Dancing girls?’ The voice was full of hope. The woman was pressing her thin hands together so hard that the knuckles had turned white. ‘I knew she dreamed of being one of them, but I never supposed she had the slightest chance.’

I shook my head. I only wished that I had more hopeful news for her. ‘If she is the person that we heard about, she didn’t join the troupe, in fact.’

A little sigh of what might have been relief. ‘Then she did go with the animals, as the message said!’

‘That was the message?’ I was honestly surprised. ‘I’d heard that you were told she’d gone away with a troupe of travelling entertainers, and I assumed she meant the dancing girls. We know she tried to join them, but they turned her down. Then my servant thinks he saw her at the villa gates, a day or two ago, judging by the description of her hair. She’d got herself a tunic — to look more like a dancer, I supposed — and she seemed to be asking for directions to the town.’

I glanced at Minimus for confirmation, and he nodded eagerly.

The woman could not disguise the disappointment that she obviously felt. ‘Then it can’t have been Morella. She knew the way to Glevum — she’s walked to the market there with me a hundred times to sell our cloth. Besides, didn’t you say this happened a day or two ago? It’s more than that since Morella went away and we’d had the message from her by that time, hadn’t we?’ She turned to her husband.

He spat into the fire. ‘How am I supposed to know exactly when it came? I was out working all hours in the fields — not like that carter who brought the news to me, who has the time to drive his goods to Glevum every day. Mind you, he’s got sons to help him, not like some I know, whose wives are only good for bearing girls.’

She ignored this outburst and shook her head at me. ‘I’m sure my husband had had the message before then. Anyway, where would Morella get a tunic from? She didn’t have the money to buy one for herself. It must have been someone like her that your servant saw.’

I frowned. This was getting more perplexing all the time. It was true that the girl that Minimus had seen was not wearing the robe of telltale plaid. Was it possible that this was simply a strange coincidence? If Morella was so simple-minded she might have sold the dress — perhaps without knowing that the coins were there — before she went away to join the animals. Or perhaps she had swapped her garments for a tunic in the town, and come back to the villa afterwards? Certainly the rest of the description seemed to match. In that case, did some other person put the money in the hem? And, if so, who and when and why? And what was Morella doing at the gate?

I shook my head. None of this seemed to be making any sense at all. I wished it had occurred to me to bring the dress with me, and to have asked the woman with the dancing girls last night exactly when her unlikely candidate had come to talk to her. Looking back she had not been specific on the point. ‘The other day’ was all that she had said. Was it feasible that Morella had gone to Glevum, made her approach, been turned away and somehow turned up at the villa later on? And if so, what was Aulus telling her in that confidential way?

I turned back to her mother. ‘What exactly did the message from her say? Do you still have the note?’

‘Note, citizen? How would we read a note? And how would my daughter send one? She cannot read or write.’ She shook her head. ‘It was just a verbal message. It was my husband who heard it, anyway, not me.’

He spat into the fire and growled reluctantly. ‘Morella had found some travelling entertainment act with animals, and the man had asked her to go away with them — I imagine to clean out the cages or something of that kind.’

‘Would she do that? Work behind the scenes? When she really wanted to be a dancing girl?’ Cleaning smelly cages did not seem a very appealing lifestyle to me. There would be little pay, if any, and the girl would be hardly better than a slave.

Her mother smiled wryly. ‘I believe she would. Of course the dancing had been a dream with her, ever since she met a dancing girl in town, but she was always good with animals, and she would have been content, if the people who kept them were fairly kind to her. Anything to avoid marrying the man her father chose!’

‘Be silent, woman!’ the farmer shouted, leaping to his feet. If we had not been there to witness it, I believe he would have knocked her to the ground. ‘You have answered the questions. Get back to your work.’

All her animation drained from her instantly. ‘Yes, husband,’ she said meekly, and slunk away again. I heard her moving in the dye-house opposite the door. I wondered how many of the children she had in there with her, trembling in case their father summoned them.

One thing I had learned this morning, anyway. I understood why poor Morella might have run away. Her father held her in less affection than the dog, her mother clearly could not protect her, and she was to be forced into a marriage that she did not want. Even cleaning cages might seem a preferable life, if the animals were affectionate at all. I was beginning to feel real sympathy for the girl.

However, it was clear her father did not share that view. ‘So, citizen, I think we’ve told you everything.’ He stood up as if to indicate that I should take my leave. ‘You tell your patron that I did my best for you. And if you do find Morella, don’t you dare to bring her back. I’ll sell her into slavery, if she ever comes. She made her choices — she can stick with them. After I’d arranged a husband for her, too. And now of course he won’t have any of my other daughters in her place. Refuses even to come and talk to me.’

‘It was a good match?’ I enquired, rising from my couch, but lingering nearby. I wanted to hear more about this intended groom — supposing that the farmer would tell me anything at all.

I need not have worried. He was only too anxious to rehearse his grievances. ‘A good deal better than the wretched girl deserved,’ he grumbled. He walked across the roundhouse to the other side and, from a shelf beside the wall, helped himself to a pottery goblet and a jug, both decorated with combed patterns in the Celtic style. He poured himself a measure of what might have been cold mead, and then — remembering himself — he waved the jug at me. ‘Made from my own honey. Want some, citizen?’

I was reluctant to offend him but I shook my head. ‘I would prefer water, if you have any. We have walked miles to get here, and it’s a long way back. Besides, you’ve given me a lot to think about. I need to clear my brain.’

It seemed that I had said the right thing, by accident. A surly smile spread slowly across his face, and after he had poured himself a portion from the jug he took another beaker — a Roman one this time — and plunged it into the pottery water-holder standing by the fire. He came across and handed it to me. I sat down again and sipped it cautiously: it was a little brackish, but it seemed clear enough.

He stood above me, swallowing his mead. ‘A wealthy widower, with land and cattle of his own. No other living heirs, so it would all have come to us — especially if he’d managed to get a child by her, though I don’t suppose there was much chance of that. The man is fifty if he is a day.’ (I bridled slightly, being more than that myself, but the farmer seemed oblivious of any possible offence.) He waved his beaker at me. ‘All right, she didn’t like him — I don’t care for him myself, but he only wanted someone to warm his bed and cook and clean for him. He wasn’t particular, he said — it’s cheaper than a slave. If she’d done as she was told she’d have inherited the lot. And he won’t survive much longer — he’s already getting frail. Stupid creature. All she had to do was wait. But would she? Not Morella. She hasn’t got the sense!’ He emptied his beaker, wiped his mouth and glared at me again.

He sounded more belligerent than ever now he’d drunk the mead, and I decided that it was time for us to go. I had learned all that I was likely to in any case, I thought. I finished the water — it wasn’t very nice — and put the cup down on the floor beside my feet.

‘Thank you for your help,’ I said politely as I rose. ‘It has given us something to go on, anyway. If we find your daughter, I will see that you’re informed.’

He made a noise that might have been a ‘Huh!’ but he led the way outside the house again and I followed him, accompanied by Caper and my slave. As we passed the dye-house I saw the woman there, with two young children tugging at her skirts. I gave them a little smile and she returned it timidly, but she saw her husband looking and she turned away again, frantically stirring something in a metal pot above the fire. I thought of my own dear Gwellia, and I could easily have wept.

The dog had stopped barking and was whining now, though it aimed a snapping yowl at me as I passed. The farmer let us through the gate, and without a word closed it after us and turned away again, striding towards the dye-house with a determined air.

We had not gone twenty steps, however, before we heard a cry. Not a child’s sob of protest, as I had vaguely feared, but a roaring bellow. ‘Citizen?’

I whirled round. The farmer was leaning on the gate. ‘I’ve been thinking about what you told us. I suppose the girl is dead?’ He was speaking Latin and I realised that he could have done so all along, though it was likely that his wife was not so fluent. From the way he glanced behind him, I guessed that she was not meant to understand this interchange.

I replied in the same language. ‘We don’t know for certain. We haven’t found the corpse.’ It wasn’t tactful, but it wasn’t meant to be. I hoped that I was right in my surmise about his wife, and that my bluntness would shock some reaction out of him.

It did. ‘You said that she had some money — quite a lot of it, in fact. In her clothing, was it? So you’ve found it, haven’t you? How else would you have known?’

So that was it. I nodded.

‘Well, if Morella’s dead, that money’s mine now, isn’t it? As the father of her family, it ought to come to me.’

Legally, I suppose that he was right, but I could not bring myself to say so. I looked him in the eye. ‘Someone else was wearing that dress when it was found. Someone who had been murdered and horribly butchered. So it may not have been Morella’s money at all. And if there is any doubt, it will be forfeit anyway — the state will claim it, if no owner can be proved.’

I am no expert in the law, but it sounded plausible and clearly the farmer was convinced. I saw the sullen look come down again. ‘You mind you bring it here if it was hers,’ he said. ‘Farathetos my name is. See you remember it. Or by the gods. .’ He said no more, but let the dog loose from its leash again. It was the other side of the enclosure but it barked and growled, and almost looked as if it was about to jump the fence.

‘Home!’ I said to Caper, and he led the way.