A Whispering of Spies

THREE

It was raining heavily as I wove my way back down the crowded stairs and hurried back towards my workshop in the swampy northern suburb just outside the walls. But I could not dismiss that meeting with the steward from my mind. The more I thought about it, the more I started wondering if those two younger slaves, Brianus and Pronta, actually knew about the fatal robbery from their master’s cart. As soon as they appeared Calvinus had seemed oddly anxious to get rid of me and he’d scrupulously avoided any mention of the theft while they were in the room.

I shook the water from my eyes. No doubt I was making mysteries where there were none. Wasn’t it only natural that he’d wanted me to leave, given the topic of our conversation a moment earlier? Openly discussing his master’s private life — and with a stranger, too — was not acceptable behaviour for a slave of any kind, especially a senior steward in a trusted role. No doubt he was afraid that I’d say something indiscreet in front of the young slaves. One did not have to wonder how Voluus would react if, by any chance, he came to learn of our exchange.

Would the others have betrayed him to their master, then, if I had given them the opportunity? It was more than possible: Calvinus ran that household on fear, not loyalty. Clearly he was convinced that they were spying all the time: he’d taken good care to move out of their potential earshot while we talked. Well, I thought, he need have no fear of me. The last thing that I wanted was for Voluus to learn that I’d been impertinently asking questions of his senior slave: the lictor was powerful enough to make life difficult, even for a citizen tradesman like myself. As to what he’d do to a member of his staff. .!

No wonder that Calvinus had taken fright and hustled me away. It was simply unfortunate that it had happened when it did — just when he’d seemed about to tell me something more about where Voluus got his wealth! As it was I had very little to report to Marcus on the subject when I saw him later on.

However, there was no help for it and it was too late now. Besides, there was a mosaic waiting to be finished in my shop. Marcus might think that my customers would wait, but I knew otherwise. The present commission was for a wealthy councillor, who would certainly expect his pavement to be laid on time, or I’d find myself subject to a heavy financial penalty. The man was famous for imposing them, if any contract was not scrupulously met. I pulled my hood more firmly round my ears and turned my attention to struggling on against the rain.

It required attention, too, since I had passed the northern gate and was into the sprawling suburb where I plied my trade. The roadways were not paved Roman ones like those within the town: here they were rutted, and treacherous with mud. Even when keeping to the pavements at the side I was forced to pick my way with care. If I slipped and broke a leg I could be there for hours — I was almost the only person on the streets.

Businesses were open — you could smell the tannery and there was cheerful sawing and hammering from the carpenter’s — but there were virtually no pedestrians about. Even the keepers of the little shops, who generally looked out across their open counters to the street, had retreated to the gloomy rooms within and had either half-closed the shutters to keep out the rain, or had moved their goods indoors entirely, so only the hanging signs gave any clue as to what might be on sale. There were, in any case, no customers today. Only a straggling donkey-cart squelched by, with its drenched driver huddled down behind the reins, and a solitary vendor with a tray of sorry pies, sheltered in a doorway against the driving rain.

I would be glad to be inside myself, beside a warming fire — and was cheered to realize that it would not be long: I was almost at my destination now. I could already see the stockpiles of ready-sorted stone glistening wetly just outside my door. I clutched my cloak around my soaking knees and began to hurry the final block or two, just as my son Junio came darting out of doors, holding a leather apron like a hood above his head. He didn’t look in my direction, simply bent down by each heap and hastily collected several colours in a bag. No doubt he needed extra pieces to complete the little pavement that we were working on.

He raised his head and saw me, waved and scuttled back inside. I was about to hasten after him when a soft tug on my clothing made me whirl around. With the insistent patter of the rain and the squelching of my feet, I had not heard anyone approach, but I found a small, drenched, hooded figure standing at my heels.

‘Citizen pavement-maker,’ this apparition said, its voice so tentative that it was almost whispering. When I didn’t answer, it added nervously, ‘You are a citizen, I think? That is what they told me in the m-m-market-place. I would not wish to show you disrespect.’ The speaker pushed the cape back from his face and I recognized the skinny boy from Voluus’s apartment.

‘Brianus?’ I said doubtfully. I hadn’t noticed the stammer earlier.

‘You r-recall my name?’ The thin cheeks flushed with pleasure.

I nodded. ‘But of course. I saw you only half an hour ago.’ I frowned. ‘What brings you over here? Did Calvinus send you?’

He nodded. He was a pathetic little figure — even younger than I’d thought — and his legs beneath the cape were thinner than a stork’s. Hardly more than ten or twelve years old, I guessed. He looked up at me speechlessly, from somewhere in the region of my chest.

Naturally the steward must have sent him, I thought; otherwise the boy would not have dared to leave the house. ‘How did he discover where to look for me?’

The boy looked terrified, but he managed to reply. ‘He told me to ask around in the m-m-market-place and find out where you l-l-lived.’

‘But you managed to hurry fast enough to catch me on the way?’

Another nod. ‘I have a m-m-message for you.’ Rain was streaming down his face unchecked and his fairish hair was plastered to his head.

‘Come into my workshop and give it to me there,’ I suggested, with a smile. ‘Perhaps we could let you dry off by the fire.’

‘Oh, I c-c-couldn’t do that, citizen. That would take too long. Calvinus will. .’ He stopped in confusion, and trailed off helplessly.

‘Flog you?’ I finished.

He didn’t answer but I saw that I was right.

‘Very well then, give me the message if you must,’ I said. ‘But be very quick. I’m getting soaked out here.’

‘It’s quite a short m-m-message and I have learned it off by heart.’ He took a deep breath and went on — quite loudly and in a peculiarly artificial tone, as though he were a herald at the basilica: ‘“J-j-just after you left, we had a messenger to s-s-say that master reached B-B-Britannia a day or two ago, together with his wife and slaves and the r-r-remainder of his goods. He has found a ship’s c-c-captain who will bring them round by sea, and they should be here in less than half a m-m-moon. He himself has taken horse, and sends word that he’s already on his w-w-way.”’ He raised his streaming face to me again and added in a more normal tone of voice, ‘That was the m-m-message. And I’m to add that, “the m-m-master doesn’t know what happened yet, and this m-m-makes things urgent.” Calvinus says that you will understand.’

I nodded. It was becoming obvious that my surmise was right and Calvinus had not told the other slaves about the theft. ‘I understand,’ I said. In the circumstances, I rather wished that I did not. What did the steward expect that I could do?

‘Is there a reply, ci-ci-citizen?’ It was not a stammer, I realized suddenly. The boy was shivering.

I looked down at him and felt a wave of sympathy. The lad was undernourished and soaked through to the skin and too afraid of punishment to come and dry himself — as any other slave would certainly have done — at once. I made a quick decision. ‘Indeed there is an answer, but I will have to write it down. Come to my workshop and I will see to it.’

If he saw through my little ruse he gave no sign of it. He bowed. ‘In that c-c-case, citizen, you had b-b-better lead the way.’ I had forgotten that he did not really know where we were going. I hurried the few remaining paces to where the workshop was. The street door was half-open, and I motioned him inside, but Brianus was too timid to precede a citizen so in the end I led the way myself — through the front area where the counter was, round the partition wall, and so into the inner room beyond. A fug of smoky warmth enveloped us.

I looked gratefully around the room. A cheerful fire was burning in the chimney-place and gangly Minimus — the second of my little red-haired slaves — was warming something in a small pan over it, while Junio was busy with a pattern on the floor. It was a pleasant scene of humble industry and there was a welcome smell of oatcakes, pies and newly spiced hot mead.

Minimus saw me first. ‘Master!’ he cried, scrambling to his feet. ‘Come in and dry yourself.’ He hurried over to take my cloak from me. ‘We saw you coming. What kept you so long outside in the rain?’

I indicated Brianus, who was hanging back against the wall. ‘This slave has been sent after me from Voluus’s residence with an urgent message,’ I replied. ‘He’s awaiting my reply. In the meantime, take his cloak. He’s dripping on the floor.’ I winked at Junio, who had sat back on his heels and was watching this exchange with amusement on his face.

He saw the wink, nodded, and went back to his work — saying over his shoulder, ‘See to it, Minimus. Hang it on that nail there on the chimney-piece. We don’t want water falling on the tiles.’

Brianus looked doubtful but he slipped his garment off and allowed Minimus to hang it, with mine, above the fire, where it began to give off wisps of steam and odours of wet wool.

My own slave turned to me. ‘Master, won’t you take refreshment first? I am just preparing some of your favourite drink. The young master sent me out especially to get the mead. And we’ve left you a portion of hot pie and some of the oatcakes that the mistress made for us. You must be hungry — you have not eaten anything for hours. Or were you given something at the lictor’s residence?’ He looked enquiringly at Brianus.

I shook my head. I’d had nothing since I left the roundhouse at first light. ‘I would be glad to eat. But I’ll do that in a moment, when I have dealt with this. First, can you find a writing-tablet from the upper room?’ I indicated the steep ladder that led up to the attics in the roof.

Minimus looked startled. ‘But master,’ he began, ‘you already have one. It’s hanging at your belt. .’

‘That one belongs to Marcus, not to me,’ I told him firmly, removing it and putting it aside. ‘I cannot use my patron’s writing-block. But I’m sure there’s one upstairs that I once rescued from a midden-heap. I think the hinge is missing, but we can tie it shut. I’m sure you can find a stylus — or something that will do — and there’s a pot of wax somewhere that I can use to seal the ribbon with.’

Minimus was still havering at the ladder’s foot. I rarely sent him up into the upper room. The area had been damaged in a fire and, being draughty, leaky and unlit, was mostly used for storage nowadays, and then only of items which we rarely used. Before I married Gwellia those rooms had been my home but, unlike most of my tradesman neighbours hereabouts, I no longer lived above the shop — I had moved to my cosy roundhouse in the woods. It made for a walk of several hours a day, but I’d got used to that.

I turned to find Brianus goggling at me, clearly astonished that my slave would question my orders and not act at once. It made me speak a little sharply as I said to Minimus, ‘Now do as I request, and quickly, too!’

‘Can I take a candle?’ I realized that Minimus was genuinely alarmed. He did not like the ladder — not since I once found a dead body lying at its foot — and was not used to being sent upstairs where there were certainly spiders hiding in the gloom, and very likely rats.

‘Take one of those by all means,’ I said more cheerfully, indicating the bunch of tallow tapers that I kept hanging on the wall. ‘But you’ll hardly need a light. I’m almost sure the writing-tablet’s in the first box that you see, just beside the opening where the ladder comes. You could find it in the daylight that comes in from the roof.’

Minimus was still looking unconvinced but he took a taper and lit it at the fire, then — holding it above his head like someone entering a house of ghosts — began to climb the rungs. There was a moment’s thumping when he reached the top, and then he reappeared, brandishing the writing-block triumphantly. He blew out the candle, held it in his teeth, and came quickly backwards down the ladder, keeping his balance with his one free hand.

He handed me the writing-tablet and removed the home-made taper from his mouth with a grimace (it was made of goose tallow and no doubt tasted foul). ‘I hope this is what you wanted, master?’ he said. ‘It was the only one that I could see but the wax is so old and fragile that it might be hard to use. And I found a stylus with it, though that’s seen better days as well.’ He produced the metal scratch-pen from inside his tunic folds.

‘That will do very nicely,’ I told him, with a smile. ‘Though you are right about the wax. It has got damaged in the damp. We shall have to let it warm up for a minute by the fire. In the meantime, this young slave and I will do the same.’ Minimus was about to speak again but my look silenced him. ‘So I’ll have a little of that food and warm drink while I wait. And you can give a crust of oatcake and some watered mead to this young fellow here — I want him to run the whole way home to take my letter back, and he looks as if he needs a little sustenance.’

Brianus, who had almost stopped shivering by now and had been watching us wide-eyed, began to make a protest but I waved his words aside.

‘Brianus, I give the orders in this house, and I am instructing you to have a drink and half an oatcake. Is that understood? I don’t want you fainting with cold and hunger in the town when you are carrying my confidential correspondence through the streets — anyone might get their hands on it. Now do as you are told while I compose this note.’

It was the second time that I had spoken sharply and Minimus looked abashed. I do not often speak so brusquely to slaves, and he looked chagrined as he went about his tasks. I’ve never had a meal served to me with more promptitude and I was soon clutching a warm and welcome cup of mead. I took a sip of it. ‘The boy will be embarrassed to eat in here with me — which is no more than proper, since I’m the master here — so Minimus, you can show him into the outer room.’

Brianus stammered, blushing. ‘Citizen pavement-maker, you are very good. .’

I held a hand up to prevent him saying any more. ‘On second thoughts, Minimus, you’d better stay with him — make sure he doesn’t take fright and run away.’

Minimus looked astonished but he said nothing more. He did as he was told and hustled Brianus away, round the partition, with his humble snack.