Dark Omens

TWELVE

So, apparently he hadn’t heard at all. Perhaps the rumour-mongers were not interested in an incomer from Dorn. ‘An important Roman has gone missing in the snow,’ I told him.

He gulped. ‘Somebody of consequence, I suppose?’

‘Considerable consequence, in his own mind at least.’ I grinned. ‘I think you’ve heard of him. The man who wanted to offer the Janus sacrifice this year, and was so discomfited when you produced the ram. Perhaps it would have been luckier — for everyone — if he had contrived to make the offering.’

I half expected that my neighbour would have been amused, but he simply muttered, ‘Of course it would have been. As things were, it could hardly have been worse.’ He met my eyes briefly, then turned his glance away. ‘You say that he’s still missing? You mean, he’s not been found?’

I shook my head. ‘It seems he set out in the snow, some little time ago, and no one’s seen him since. There are people searching for him even as we speak. And that’s where you come in. Is it possible you have a mule — one which could carry a second person, perhaps, if he was small and didn’t weigh too much?’ I realized that Cantalarius was looking more and more appalled, so I added hastily, ‘I don’t mean all the way to town, of course, only a mile or two in an emergency? I’m sorry to ask that, but I promised that I would.’ By this time he was looking so dismayed that I heartily wished that I’d ignored my wife’s request and hadn’t promised her to ask anything of the sort.

My neighbour didn’t answer: he simply stared at me, as though Jove had struck him with a thunderbolt — until his young wife, having completed her scramble down the hill, came hurrying across to join us in the court, snatching off her mourning veil to get a better view.

One look at his expression was enough to make her say, ‘What is it, husband? Not more trouble, by the gods? Tell me it isn’t a message from the temple?’ Her voice was shrill and anxious and she sounded close to angry tears. She must have been attractive at one time, I suppose, but her face was getting lined with too much care and hunger, and her eyes were wild and tear-filled as she looked at him. ‘I told you it would happen. I knew you shouldn’t have tried to offer that abomination to the gods!’ She glanced towards the altar plinth, now empty apart from the statue of the Lars.

Her husband simply shook his ugly head. ‘This is no messenger from the temple, wife. This is our neighbour, from the roundhouse down the track. He’s come here asking me about a mule.’ He turned to me and added doubtfully, ‘Though I am still not sure I understand exactly what he wants.’

I gave them what I hoped was an encouraging smile. ‘I know you keep a mule — or two of them in fact — and I know that money has been very short. I thought you might be grateful if I came to you. I am prepared to pay, of course, provided that we can agree a reasonable sum, and if I am successful in my enquiries, I’ll mention your cooperation to Marcus Septimus.’ I smiled at the woman. ‘That may do more to change your evil luck, even than offering the gods your ancient friend.’ I gestured to the plinth.

I rather expected to be rewarded with at least a smile. The promise of a personal commendation of that kind — especially when Marcus lived so close nearby — was usually more effective than a bribe, but to my surprise the woman gave an anguished cry and clutched her husband’s arm. ‘Didn’t I tell you, husband? Now look what you’ve done!’

Cantalarius ignored her and went on looking grim. ‘You spoke of enquiries, citizen? What enquiries are these?’

‘I thought I’d made it plain,’ I answered patiently. ‘In this cold weather it’s almost certain that the missing man is dead and since there are questions concerning his estate, my patron has asked me to investigate. I am sorry to disturb you at your funeral — and of your last remaining land slave too — but if I’m to join the search, I shall need an animal. Without one I can hardly walk the roads to Glevum in this chill, let alone go searching for a corpse.’

The woman was no longer listening. She was still tugging at her husband’s toga folds. ‘You shouldn’t have done it — this is all because of you.’

I looked at her in some perplexity, but Cantalarius seemed suddenly to have recalled himself.

‘You want the mule to join the search for him?’ He raised his brows at me, then disengaged his garment from the clutching hands. ‘Woman, you are overwrought,’ he said, with a firmness that I’d never heard in him before. ‘This is not what you suppose. Go away into the house and let me handle this.’ He spoke with such authority that, to my surprise, she let go meekly and did as she was told. Her husband watched her out of sight and then turned back to me.

‘You must forgive my Gitta,’ he said, in something like his normal tone of voice. ‘You can see she’s not herself. It has been a dreadful day …’ He motioned to the smoke which was still rising on the hill.

I nodded. ‘The death of that last land slave must have been a bitter blow,’ I said, then added in an attempt at sympathy, ‘But perhaps this morning’s sacrifice will serve to change your luck.’ I gestured to the altar. ‘You used your original ram, I suppose? And I see you offered a bird or two as well. Well, perhaps it’s done the trick. You must agree the auguries look good. After all, the blood is hardly dry and here I am offering to hire your mule from you.’

He looked at me intently. A cloud seemed to have lifted from his brow. ‘You think that little sacrifice alone might pacify the gods? Even without the involvement of a priest?’

I was about to offer more assurances but suddenly I realized what he’d said. ‘Without the priest?’ I echoed. ‘You mean that after all he would not agree to come?’

Cantalarius turned away and kicked a pebble with his toe. When he spoke his voice was curiously calm. ‘Oh, he agreed to come all right — I even went out with my mule to meet him on the way — but he did not arrive at the appointed place. I thought at first that he’d simply changed his mind, though I’d paid him everything we had.’

‘Including that ancestral god of yours?’ I said.

He nodded. ‘Including that, although he jeered at it. But evidently even that was not enough.’

I stared at the altar. ‘But what about the sacrifice?’ I murmured stupidly. ‘It’s obviously been made.’

‘I was so desperate and furious that I made the offerings myself — though my wife insists that I should not have done it on my own. She is convinced that I have only made things worse.’ He made a wry face. ‘She is beside herself with worry, as you may observe. So when young Sordinus came hurrying to the pyre — ’ he gestured to the hill, where fitful smoke still curled into the air — ‘and made signs to us that there was someone here …’

‘Your wife thought I’d brought a message from the temple?’ I supplied.

He nodded. ‘Sordinus cannot talk, of course, so he could not explain. Perhaps Gitta was expecting an apology — or at the least for the goods to be returned …’

‘Or even that the priest had come at last,’ I finished. ‘But by that time, of course, it would have been too late. You had already made the sacrifice. And your poor land slave was already dead.’ I gestured to the pyre.

‘Gitta is inclined to blame me for that too,’ he muttered bitterly. ‘Thinks it is a judgement from the gods.’

‘Because you were making the sacrifice yourself? But surely you’ve performed such rituals before?’

‘Many times, citizen. And at this very altar. As paterfamilias I’ve made a lot of offerings at the household shrine. But I’d moved the statue, and what’s more I’d vowed upon that altar that there would be a priest today — promised the gods a proper sacrifice this time, and once again I failed. So the death of the land slave was the final straw. It happened just as I was lifting the sacrificial knife. That’s what upset my wife. She is sure that I have angered the ancestral deities and increased the curse instead of lifting it.’

I nodded. Suddenly her agitation did not seem so strange. ‘But you went ahead and finished the acts of sacrifice?’

He shrugged. ‘I had to do something, citizen. I couldn’t interrupt the rituals again, or Gitta would have left me there and then. I’m not sure that she won’t do so, even now. It’s all the fault of that confounded sacerdos. If he hadn’t ruined my attempt at sacrifice in town, all this would never have occurred.’ He spoke with such feeling that I was surprised.

‘You are not convinced that you have raised the curse yourself?’ I said. ‘Of course, he promised he would come and I can see that you are angry, but consider this — if he had turned up and made a mess of it again, wouldn’t that have been still more unfortunate?’

He looked thoughtfully at me. ‘You are right, of course. And I confess that I was furious with his failure to appear. Though now that I realize it was not his fault at all …’

I interrupted him, surprised. ‘Why not, if he had agreed a fee? You had a legal contract, didn’t you?’

It was his turn to look astonished. ‘Did you not just tell me he was missing in the snow, and although they’d searched for him it was feared that he was dead?’ He saw me staring in surprise, and added mournfully, ‘The man who was to make the Janus sacrifice, you said.’

And then — at last — I understood his shock. ‘You thought I meant the priest! What did you suppose? That your curse had struck again and all this had happened on his way to you?’ I shook my head. ‘Well, don’t worry. This is not about the priest. I was talking about the man who wanted to provide the ram. Genialis, the would-be councillor.’ Cantalarius still looked puzzled so I added helpfully, ‘The man that I was making that hurried pavement for.’

An expression of bemusement crossed my neighbour’s face. ‘So the priest …?’

I put my arm around his crooked back. ‘I’m very much afraid that he has simply let you down.’ I realized he was shaking with relief, and I said, to comfort him, ‘I’ll mention that to Marcus when I see him, too — if you had a spoken contract, you have a case in law. It’s not much consolation, I’m aware — especially where a member of the priesthood is concerned. He’ll only claim you simply made a donation to the shrine, but all the same, the intervention of our most senior magistrate might persuade him to attempt some compromise. And in the meantime, I’d still like to hire your mule.’ I tried a sympathetic smile. ‘Perhaps the fifth part of an aureus will help persuade your wife that the sacrifice you offered was not a bad thing after all?’

He managed to summon a rueful smile at this and summoned Gitta from inside the house. She still seemed ready to hector and complain, but once her husband had explained affairs to her, she brightened up remarkably, and when she heard about my offer for the mule, she was positively anxious for him to seal the contract, there and then.

‘It is surer profit than attempting to sell leeks and cabbages,’ she said, suddenly business-like and adopting a judicious air. ‘Let him hire both of them, husband, if he likes, and look for this unlucky councillor.’

I was about to protest — I didn’t want to do anything of the sort — but Cantalarius was already waving this aside.

‘I shall require one animal to go to town myself — with the money that Libertus has agreed to pay, we shall have enough to buy some more feed for the stock. With luck we may keep the rest of them alive until the weather breaks.’

I beamed at her. ‘You see? That sacrifice your husband made has obviously worked — the gods are seeing fit to change your luck at last.’

She seemed about to speak but he prevented her, raising a hand and looking indulgently at her. ‘Perhaps the citizen is right. Things are looking hopeful, for a change. Nonetheless, wife, one of us should go back and attend the funeral pyre — otherwise we shall offend the netherworld again. We are already in danger of not showing the dead enough respect. You go back and take over the lament. Sordinus cannot do it, and it must be done. I will take the citizen to select his mule then I’ll come to you and conclude the rituals.’

Gitta nodded. ‘Perhaps I was wrong about that offering after all,’ she said.

Then she turned and went hurrying off, while her husband led me and Minimus back to where the mules were kept.